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haha, shit. i lost it at the macbeth bit

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To be fair, how are you supposed to phrase this question?

I mean obviously you shouldn't assume that the person's racial background defines their culture, but how are you supposed to ask this in the PC way?

I would maybe wait until I knew the person a bit better, and perhaps bring up the subject by talking about my own ancestors.

@WaterDweller @RedSky

Why bother? Who cares?

@gorillaman

1. Morbid curiosity.

2. I think being able to distinguish ethnic backgrounds makes me a more complete individual.

Still thnk it sucks that asking a question like this has developed a racist stigma.

How about "What's your ethnic background?"

Few people have a problem with this discussion, but I'd still advise against opening with it.

How about...Before you ask a question with an obvious answer...

Place photographs of Japanese, Chinese, Korean, and Vietnamese side by side, male and female representatives of each, respectively. The differences are not that subtle.

Do the same with pics of Micronesian, Polynesian and Melanesian peoples, you'll get really good at it after a few hours of practice.

Here's a better opener, RedSky-

"My god, you're intoxicatingly beautiful...Where are you from?!"

If that causes the needle on your PC-Meter to fluctuate in the slightest, you may want to smash that meter against the inside of your skull until it no longer operates....

Personal Q&A-(inner dialogue)
Q: Why are the majority of white people so fucking irritating?
A: Because you are too close to so goddamn many developmentally-disabled Americans.

@xxovercastxx

Sounds okay. I don't like using ethnic as a word because it's associated with racists using it as a catch-all term for 'foreigner', like "oh, so he's ethnic?".

@chingalera

But the problem is that assumes that they must be from the originating region of their ethnicity!

I think I've gotten quite decent at picking people apart but still not perfect, might give that a shot.

I'm a whitey American who has been living in Thailand for 6 years, so I've been on the bizarro-world opposite side of this coin (sorta).

I get asked what country I come from all the time. Opening question, before name or anything else, in English or Thai, etc. That doesn't really bother me, but I know some other westerners who get tired of it.

The Thai word for any western non-Thai person is "farang", and a greater percentage of people take offense at being called "farang" all the time. Part of that is that "farang" is particularly linked to France/French nationality (France in Thai is "farang-set"), but now all westerners are lumped in with the same word. People from the UK, particularly England, tend to be a bit more annoyed at being associated with Frenchies. I don't really care -- it is simply their word to describe westerners, so why get riled up about it?

On the other hand, fortunately I don't usually have to deal with a constant bombardment of stereotypes associated with being a farang, and I can certainly see why various Asians living in the US could get annoyed with that.

IMO it's OK to ask a friend or acquaintance, but rude to ask a stranger. It's a personal question.

Comment hidden because you are ignoring dag.(show it anyway)

Really good. If I'm curious I might say "what's your heritage?" That's nice and positive.

I always say I'm from Earth, that way there's no awkwardness on my part.

*asia

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I'd be surprised if a white guy from San Francisco would get all hill-billy, ching-chongy like this. I mean, SF is 40% Asian. One would know better.

Was in a little cafe in Koyasan, Japan a few years back with the family. The waiter brought out a plate of fried potatoes saying it was 'service' (free) We tucked in, grateful for the extra snack, only to hear behind us, a couple of older locals saying, "Gee those foreigners love their fried potatoes". We chuckled to ourselves. We'd actually ordered the Japanese style dim sums.

Catch 22