Why Vivek Ramaswamy Is Wrong About Who Americans Are

In it he posits that there are two competing right wing visions of what American identity is, but before I get into that, why is this even a question? Well it is a question precisely because people like Vivek have propagated the lies of not just a propositional nation but a proposition ONLY nation. One in which ethnicity, race, blood, soil, or sacred geography play no role in what it is to be an American. They propose it is only vague set of civic virtues that bind and hold us together as a “nation.”

However, anyone with a sixth grade education should know that for any nation to be considered a nation, it must necessarily be linked to an ethnic group, else it be considered nothing more than a government. No one considered Carthage a nation. A nation is a group of people who are united by shared characteristics such as a common language, history, culture, and necessarily as a result a connection to a common ethnicity. Further, what an American is, has been well solidified since at least the 1800s if not 1791 when the first amendments to the constitution were ratified.

In the very first paragraph of the piece, Vivek attempts to frame his vision and the opposition position into a shadow box. Defining both as a right wing view but tying the opposition view to specific people like Nick Fuentes and Tucker Carlson. The fact is however, Nick Fuentes and Tucker Carlson have nothing to do with this point of view besides their apparent support of it, or in Tucker’s case non-support of it. The idea that being an American is not just some vague set of civic virtues but tied to who we are as a people is a view held by not only our founding fathers but Americans as a whole for over a century.

Vivek goes on to define what his vision of what “Americanness” is.

First let’s take apart the idea that being American isn’t scalar. That no one person can be more American than another. A truly egalitarian position don’t you think? Is George Washington more American than a fresh off the boat Venezuelan? Clearly so to everyone with common sense. Regardless, even Vivek has to define things in this small paragraph of what an American is. What happens if someone meets all of his criteria but one, are they less American? Is the person who exemplifies all of these characteristics more American? If not, then is the list itself not irrelevant?

For the sake of argument, let’s say Vivek would respond that it is indeed binary and that to be an American one must adhere to every single position listed here. Then following this logic anyone who doesn’t believe in the American Dream or has any prejudiced views, isn’t American? What if they only disagree with a varied interpretation of the right to “freedom of expression”?

Frankly, this is ridiculous and isn’t any better than just saying everyone is American if they want to be.

Moving on, since we need to define a word, lets exclude things that are mostly universal as they are largely irrelevant to defining what an American is if it can apply to literally every person on the planet. Let’s also dispense with legalisms as a piece of paper can say anything and can’t reasonably define what a people are.

So let’s break it down:

1. Rule of Law
   1. Every country in the world believes in the rule of law, even if ostensibly. It’s a vital component of every government that wishes to maintain basic order. Thus it is largely universal and unsuitable for definition.
2. Freedom of Conscience
   1. The right to hold your own beliefs is pretty universal today and only a handful of countries attempt to restrict it to any real affect and those are mostly third world countries. Thus it is largely universal and unsuitable for definition.
3. Freedom of Expression
   1. The same thing applies here as it does to “freedom of conscience” as freedom of expression is just the expression of the ideas one has a freedom to hold under freedom of conscience.
4. Colorblind Meritocracy
   1. This was never an American ideal until fairly recently in history. If we were to accept this then many of the founding fathers could not even be accepted as American under this definition. This was born of the civil rights era and thus unsuitable for definition.
5. The US Constitution
   1. This is ultimately a subset of of his “Rule of law” point but I won’t get too quibbley about how a legal document can define what it means to be a person so I’ll let him have this one as it is uniquely American though it could be expressed a lot more precisely.
6. American Dream
   1. This is pretty vague but let’s steel man this as best as possible and say that the American dream is the dream of a land in which life should be better, richer, and fuller for everyone with opportunity for each according to their ability. A dream of a social order where each person can attain to their fullest that of which they are innately capable. Is the American Dream not wanted by people who are not American? Isn’t that why they supposedly want to come here? Is the idea that you should be able to attain that of which you are capable not a fairly universal position today?
7. A Citizen Who Swears Allegiance
   1. Trying to define what an American is by saying those who already have citizenship are Americans is a non sequitur. We are trying to define what an American is without defaulting to legalisms and governmental definitions. This isn’t suitable for defining what an American is, even though it probably should be. The ideal is that citizenship align closely with what an American is. However, the entire reason we are having this discussion today is because it clearly does not align. Vivek himself, in other writings, has already conceded this.

So what are we left with that isn’t a legalism or fairly universal? What can we use out Vivek’s construct to define an American? Well we have The U.S. Constitution and… well that’s it. So to be an American is believe in the U.S. Constitution? I think we can do a lot better to define what an American is.

So what IS an American?

It’s a great question. A question that was answered a long time ago but a question whose answer has erroneously sought reinvention by non Americans seeking to make their place in our country. A question that seemingly doesn’t have an answer now.

But I have one.

Let’s look back in history and see for instance how being an American was defined in the 19th century.

That seems pretty clear cut to me. The descendants of Europeans born in America. Why would the dictionary define it this way in 1828? Well because it’s just the plain fact of the matter. In 1828 America was 82% ethnically European. The remainder of which were slaves, a small minority of freed blacks, and trace amounts of other races which did not have the right to vote.

It wasn’t until the 15th amendment was passed after the civil war that blacks got the right to vote and actually became citizens. One could argue after all this time a minority of blacks are Americans but that’s a longer conversation and one I don’t necessarily agree with. Why would we need an amendment to allow blacks the right to vote, if they were Americans all along? This doesn’t make much sense to anyone with a cursory understanding of history.

It is very evident the founding fathers did not view non ethnic Europeans as Americans and that view seems to have persisted well into the 19th century. It was only after the civil war and subsequently the the 1965 immigration act and the Civil Rights Act that all of this became an attempt to re-write what it is to be an American.

Indeed, even later but before the 1965 immigration act America still retained its demographic representation at 82% of its population still being ethnically European.

So we have a nearly 200 year period (1776-1964) in which America was 80%+ ethnically European and then suddenly ethnic Europeans are now set to be a minority in the next 12 years. How can those people be American? It makes no sense to any rationally objective observer.

Being an American is more than a feeling, an appeal to legalistic interpretations, it is more than even just ethnicity but it is ethnicity as well. Being American isn’t binary.

• An American is an ethnic European
• An American is someone who speaks English
• An American is someone who has ties to our sacred geography, historical or otherwise
• An American is someone who has historical ties to America
• An American is someone who respects our founders and their intent
• An American is someone who embraces American culture
• An American is someone who respects the natural rights of men
• An American is someone recognizes that someone can be more American than another
• An American is someone who has no dual loyalty but also someone who recognizes our European heritage and brotherhood

If you replace American with Frenchman and a few other words here would that not also define who a Frenchman is? For this reason I think its a pretty good definition. Now, how many of these criteria does Vivek meet despite being a citizen? This is all to say someone being more American than the next person isn’t a means of Intra-ethnic rivalry but merely a non subjective lens through which we can ascertain the suitability of someone claiming to be American.

What Else Does Vivek Have to Say?

Let’s continue on now with the article to make sure we cover everything.

I see we have an appeal to Ronald Reagan, a man who granted mass amnesty to 3 million illegal immigrants who are, even by Vivek’s ridiculous definition, not American. I do respect Reagan for some of his positions and his intelligence but the man had some really bad flaws.

So now Vivek pivots, and says you’re every bit of an American as a mayflower descendant if you get your citizenship and “subscribe to the creed of the American founding” whatever that is and “the culture that was born of it.”

Culture wasn’t on Vivek’s original list, curious. American culture is distinctly European, it differs from other European nations but its culture is distinctly European because it was created by Europeans, for Europeans, and born of European ideas. This isn’t something that can be denied. No founding father thought to himself that one day several major American cities would be populated by non Europeans. I challenge anyone to show me the opposite.

Vivek now appeals to racism and antisemitism. Isn’t this guy supposedly on the right? This reads like something your average leftist would write. This is the civil rights era egalitarian republicanism which the right has been attempting to discard for the past 10 years. This adoption of the leftist viewpoints has been deconstructed elsewhere by myself and others ad-nauseum so I won’t bore you with repeating it. Once again, he attempts to link this view of what it is to be an American to Mr. Fuentes. This is obviously an attempt to poison the well of the discussion and dismiss the arguments out of hand for simply being associated with a specific person. Again, Fuentes is not the standard bearer of this position, this position is a right wing position and not the domain of a single person. Even if it was, it is the correct position. Vivek likes to paint himself as politically savvy and I can only view this as an attempt to sway not you, me or any other person on the right but instead appeal to donors and establishment lever pullers that can gain him an ounce of power and influence as a gate keeper.

To address this: “I was born and raised in Cincinnati”

Vivek’s parents were born in India. His father refuses to get citizenship. His mother was very likely here on a J1 or H1B visa and got pregnant with him either in India before arriving to the US or immediately after arriving. He is by definition an anchor baby that got citizenship through the, hotly debated, birthright citizenship and earned his wealth shilling DEI and pump and dump scams.

Except Vivek isn’t dominating the polls, in fact Vivek is losing in the latest poll from Emerson to a very unpopular democrat in Ohio.

Vivek can be an extremely deceptive author. Take a look at when he says he opposes “left wing identity politics.” Doing everything possible to say the left is in fact a proponent of identity when in reality they are advocates of the egalitarian doctrine which has morphed, as it always does, into in inverted hierarchy in which white people are seen as the lesser. This isn’t the prescription of ideology but the consequences of a malformed worldview. In fact, Vivek embraces the politics of egalitarianism and in this way he is definitionally a leftist.

This also confirms to me this article isn’t written for you and me but his “colleagues” who are hesitant to act against their constituencies for Vivek’s view of an egalitarian America. He continues on to further attack Americans and attempts to equate politicians with our parents who should “reign us in.”

For reference sake, I am older than Vivek as are many on our side of the online right. We are not children to be guided, we are constituents and Americans who you may be bound by oath to listen to and represent, unfortunately.

I won’t bombard you with the rest of the article but Vivek lays his plan for essentially countering racism on the right. Calling on republican politicians to starkly ‘call to heel’ their constituencies racism and antisemitism, reduce the cost of living, a $10,000 check for every American at birth, and a grand national project like a moon base.

Is this guy serious?

I know this rings hollow to me and many others and frankly verges on straight insult. We don’t need grand national projects and lots of handouts to feel American. Cheaper eggs won’t make me feel better about Minneapolis becoming little Somalia. We need our country back, we need the opportunities and cultural upbringing afforded for our forebearers. I want my wife to be able to walk outside at night and not feel scared that I’m not within 10 feet of her. I need to see that we care about our people and that we can show the world who we are again. Not to boast, but as an example. To be a bit cliche, to be that shining city on the hill again. We can’t get that handing out free passes for citizenship like its discount day at Disneyland. There is no “thing” or policy I would take in place of a majority European America.

Vivek’s unearned arrogance rubs many of us the wrong way but it is a substantive and repeated pattern amongst Indians who have taken a seated position in republican politics thanks to Ramaswamy and others in the current administration. I am surely not the only one to notice this but it seems regularly like I am the only one bothering to point it out. It is not an isolated problem to Vivek himself but to everyone like him.

It is an unfortunate reality we are dealing with a specific threat from Indian “Americans” and Indians abroad today. So much so, they have taken an official role in the RNC, a Hindu prayer was read at the Republican National Convention, more Indians than ever currently serve in high ranking positions of power, and we are currently heading toward an overt pro-Indian geostrategic position billed as a hedge against China. That’s not to even mention the vast network of Indian accounts recently exposed on twitter and their, now apparent, attempt to shape American public discourse. It’s high time we look upon the “Indian Menace” as an existential threat to America and Americans.

Ultimately however, this really isn’t just a problem with Indians its a problem with our immigration system and the incentives it breeds for others to disenfranchise real Americans.

Deport them all.