Maybe, but then, everybody comes from SOMEWHERE and has SOME kind of ancestry, and I think as an American with German roots on one side of my family I still have some qualification to put myself in the place of someone with ethnicity. And, either way, I just find it hard to be proud of my ancestry. Not to say I'm ashamed, either. I don't think either feelings are really applicable to something that isn't a conscious choice. You can find appreciation or dislike for things in your heritage or ethnicity, but to be proud or ashamed as though its somehow a reflection on you or your own abilities doesn't seem right to me.
I mean, putting aside my German heritage on the one side of the family or left-handedness, as an American there are things in my country's past that I appreciate (such as relative religious freedom) and others that I absolutely despise (such as slavery), but ultimately I don't feel proud of the former just because some ancestor from one side of the family that I may or may not be related to had some part, and on the same note I don't feel personally ashamed for the latter - I have my own personal moral values that tell me that slavery is wrong and freedom of religion is right, and I don't need any ancestors to tell me that.
And I don't just mean race, either - in fact, that wasn't really even what was in my mind when I was typing my original post, although it still applies. What I had in mind was the sheer number of people I've talked to through the years that are proud because their dad was a police officer or a doctor and saved lives, even though it bears no reflection on that person himself and said person had NO say in whether his dad was a doctor or a rapist. And society really puts out an inconsistent message here, anyway - if your parents are doctors, we expect that you SHOULD somehow be proud of that, but if they were murderers, we say that you SHOULDN'T be personally ashamed or think that it reflects who you are.
Another example would be a girl that was on America's Got Talent last night - she was a contortionist who was clearly born with the ability to move her body in all sorts of different ways most people physically would be unable to - and, naturally, her parents and the judges say she should be proud of her abilities. So, by that logic, I should be ashamed that I don't have such abilities. I should hold my head low everyday of my life simply because my body limits my movements to certain directions. Again, this speaks to my opinion (which, as you stated, you're welcome to disagree with) that you really can't have pride without also having shame, and therefore it's better to have neither if it's something you have no control over.
But, that's as far as I'll go with this - it's making me seem racist or uncultured and I really don't think that I'm either - I just have a sense of apathy for something that society tells us most of the time to be exuberant over, and to most people that apathy appears racist or uncultured.
