- Tell me about beef stroganoff, is it good?
- I can't remember the last time I had it.
Someone remind me what's in that dish. (laughs)
- Oh, I'm gonna guess you're not white.
("In the Hall of the Mountain King" by Edvard Grieg)
- [Interviewer] Hi, what's your name and what do you do
for a living?
- I'm Colton.
I work in the restaurant industry.
- Mm-hm, yeah.
- Ah, no.
No, I've never been asked if I'm white.
- I mean, I have a few.
I guess I don't get out of my bubble that much.
- Okay.
("In the Hall of the Mountain King" by Edvard Grieg)
- What's up, everybody?
All right.
Off the bat, I'm going to say that you are white.
- Why do you think that?
- I think it's the eyebrows?
You've got (laughs) I don't know.
I kind of think--
- White people eyebrows?
(laughter)
- White.
- Just a vibe?
- Just, I just guessed off the bat.
Yeah, just the vibe.
There's nothing really about you that set you apart
from me.
You know, that's white.
- Yeah.
- How's it goin'? - What's up, man.
What do you use in your hair?
- That's, come on, that's like a dead giveaway.
- What!
No, how?
- I think it's Ms. Jennie's Multicultural Curls.
- Oh.
(everyone laughs)
Okay. (laughs)
I'm gonna guess you're not white.
- I'm gonna have to try that product, though.
- Really good for the curls.
- Can you sing for me?
- I can't.
- Simple Man by Lynyrd Skynyrd.
- I don't know. (giggles)
- Okay. (laughs)
He's not white.
Hey, can you show me your best dance move?
- Oh, God.
The classic sprinkler.
(laughter)
- Okay, cool.
Do you like Tom Hanks?
- I like him in Forrest Gump.
My favorite actor is Jim Carrey, though.
- You look white to me.
- All right.
- Hey. - Hey.
- How's it going?
- It's going well. - That's good.
- You have a very Norwegian, Scandinavian look about you.
- Yeah, I get that.
- So, she kind of just fits the description, in my opinion.
- Yeah, that's fair.
- You kind of just have the blonde hair,
blue eye look about you.
Also, the shape of your face is a little bit longer,
I feel?
That kind of is another giveaway.
The hair, as well.
- Hey, what's up. - Hey.
You have a pocket knife, leather shoes.
You're kind of graying up there.
White.
Hey. - Hey.
- What's goin' on. - What's up.
- Immediately, off the bat, your skin tone is darker
than mine.
I'm gonna say that you're not white.
Based on skin tone, really.
Boom.
There we go.
That's how you know.
What's up.
Can you show me your best dance move?
- You know, I'm kind of like a--
Like a little body roll?
- Right, right, right, you just got a little bit
of rhythm to it, a little bit of shoulder.
- Usually somebody's backing it up on me,
if that explains anything.
- Yes, I get that.
I'm gonna say you're not white.
- Hey. - Hi.
- What's up.
I know that this is a stereotype, I'm just gonna say it.
You do have kind of like a Jewish look about you.
- What does a Jewish person look like?
- Jews, I've seen Jewish people have the curly hair,
such as you do.
And straight on, from the nose.
- Mm-hm.
- Those are two indicators to me.
Not everybody has that.
- I think they do?
But, I mean, I'm not speaking for everybody.
(dramatic orchestra crash)
- Boom.
You two.
Okay, well, that is news to me.
- I got him wrong.
- So, how do you identify then?
- As half Japanese, half white.
What do people normally assume about you?
- I've gotten Mexican, Filipino, Native American,
and a lot of white.
People, I think I pass pretty well.
- [Colton] Yeah. I would guess so.
- So I would identify as biracial.
My dad's black and my mom's white.
- That really shocked me.
- Yeah (laughs).
I get that a lot.
- I'm sorry I got you wrong. - That's okay.
- Does that bother you?
- It's such an everyday thing.
That Jewish thing you said?
I usually get that a lot, actually.
People are like, Oh, I thought you were just
a white Jewish guy, or people will question whether or not
I'm actually biracial.
- It's like, no, man, you wanna see photos?
(laughs)
- I've definitely done that, yeah.
- Also biracial.
- I would not have guessed half black, half white.
I would have guessed, like half Mexican.
- I get that a lot.
Mexican, Jewish, and Middle Eastern.
- I think I got you right.
- Yeah, you got me right.
- And what do you identify as?
- I identify as North African.
- Wow.
- My parents are Moroccan.
I think what's weird for me, is that, for example in a lot
of forms and stuff, the US definition of white includes
people of European, Middle Eastern,
and North African descent?
I feel like I'm only white when convenient
on forms and stuff?
But like, in daily life, no one really.
I don't get any of the privileges of passing as white.
'Cause obviously I don't.
- Right.
Well, and as a white person,
I've never had to think about that.
- Yeah. - You know?
Like, after you saying that, that's not right.
- Yeah. - Sucks.
I got you wrong.
- Yes, you did.
- I identify as multicultural, but mainly as Native American
and Mexican.
- Native American and Mexican.
= And I am also part white.
- White people ever ask you what you are?
- I get Asian, Middle Eastern a lot.
- Do you normally pass as white?
- Yes, all the time.
- I got you right.
- You did, I do identify as a white person.
My mom is Native American.
- Really? - Yeah.
- 'Cause you don't really show any--
- Not at all, no.
- You didn't get any of those genes.
- Yeah, my dad's Sicilian.
- Why do you identify as a white person?
- 100% because of the way I look.
I've never felt comfortable identifying as a Native American
person, just because I don't look like one.
- Is that hard to deal with?
- Yeah, I'm not sure.
It's weird for me, because I feel really disconnected
from my ancestor's history.
Yeah, I don't know.
- Okay.
- This is kind of like the first time I've ever thought
about this.
Yeah, so I feel like I'm probably gonna learn a lot
about identity today.
- Give you some more to think about.
- Yeah, definitely.
- Okay, cool.
- Yes.
- So I identify as Latino, so I'm half Mexican,
half Nicaraguan.
I've gotten Italian, I've gotten Jewish, I've gotten Greek.
Mostly a lot of people of color also assume that I'm white.
It isn't until I speak Spanish that people are normally
blown away.
- Uh-huh, interesting, cool, cool.
I got you right.
- Yeah, you did.
Well, I do identify as white, with other races.
So I'm also Asian, Pacific Islander, native Hawaiian.
So, yeah, most of the time I'm just like,
some unspecified other.
Been surfing in Hawaii, and like, out in the line up,
people are like, oh yeah.
Like, get outta here, you're white, you're haole.
- Whoa, really? - Yeah.
- Haole.
- White person.
- It doesn't hurt you, it doesn't--
- Not really, no. (laughs)
- I am Puerto Rican and Trinidadian.
In the south I was identified as mixed a lot.
Like, people just thought I was black and white.
Or Mexican.
- Is it easy for them to just assume that?
- Yeah, 'cause we're all Mexican if we're Latino,
or whatever, so we're all the same is a lot of the
mentality of the south.
- So you identify as white.
- Mm-hm.
- But was I wrong in saying that you were Jewish?
- So I am Jewish but to have people try to tell me that
I'm not white, or as white because I'm Sicilian
because there's intermixing with North Africa--
- Like North Africa, yeah.
- Tunisia.
And it's in the Mediterranean, everything's all mixed
up there anyways.
But I've always felt like I've had white privilege
in America and so I kind of like call myself white.
It wasn't really 'til I moved from New Mexico to the
northwest that anyone thought I was--
You know, in New Mexico it's predominantly Hispanic, Latino,
and white.
So, I just was white.
- Okay.
(dramatic music)
(claps)
- Me?
(laughs)
Oh, sorry.
- [Interviewer] Good job, guys.