Johnny, Nigel, your thoughts on this?

[The Johnny]

non-Hispanic whites, not non-white

Right.

[Nephew Twiddleton]

Stupid, off topic question...

What's the difference between a Latino/a, Hispanic white, and a Hispanic black? Is there a particular ethnic component at work, or is it more or less a cultural-linguistic distinction? What makes Hispanic white different from white and what makes Hispanic black different than black? Does the distinction go away after a generation or two of being in the United States? Like, say for example, my last name is Hernandez, but the last time I had an ancestor from South America was 80 years ago, what does that make me? Does it remain the same if my cultural background remains Latin American, or does it go away through Americanization? Just curious, because I'm not exactly clear on it. It's an odd and very specific distinction. Can thread split if appropriate, or pop it into the Hyphenated American thread.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Stupid, off topic question...

What's the difference between a Latino/a, Hispanic white, and a Hispanic black? Is there a particular ethnic component at work, or is it more or less a cultural-linguistic distinction? What makes Hispanic white different from white and what makes Hispanic black different than black? Does the distinction go away after a generation or two of being in the United States? Like, say for example, my last name is Hernandez, but the last time I had an ancestor from South America was 80 years ago, what does that make me? Does it remain the same if my cultural background remains Latin American, or does it go away through Americanization? Just curious, because I'm not exactly clear on it. It's an odd and very specific distinction. Can thread split if appropriate, or pop it into the Hyphenated American thread.

Hispanic is an ethnicity, and Hispanics are people of Latin cultural descent, and various races. Lots of Hispanic families have lived in the United States (or areas that are now the United States) for many generations. It has nothing to do with Americanization. Either you identify as Hispanic, or you don't.

[Nephew Twiddleton]

Stupid, off topic question...

What's the difference between a Latino/a, Hispanic white, and a Hispanic black? Is there a particular ethnic component at work, or is it more or less a cultural-linguistic distinction? What makes Hispanic white different from white and what makes Hispanic black different than black? Does the distinction go away after a generation or two of being in the United States? Like, say for example, my last name is Hernandez, but the last time I had an ancestor from South America was 80 years ago, what does that make me? Does it remain the same if my cultural background remains Latin American, or does it go away through Americanization? Just curious, because I'm not exactly clear on it. It's an odd and very specific distinction. Can thread split if appropriate, or pop it into the Hyphenated American thread.

Hispanic is an ethnicity, and Hispanics are people of Latin cultural descent, and various races. Lots of Hispanic families have lived in the United States (or areas that are now the United States) for many generations. It has nothing to do with Americanization. Either you identify as Hispanic, or you don't.

Cool, thanks, Nigel

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

It was a little oversimplified, but I think I covered the fundamentals. In a sense, it's what "Irish" and "Italian" and "German", among others, should be in America: distilled into a cultural derivative.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

I mean, in a lot of ways I think that Americans of Polish descent would be better served by being recognized as "Polandic" by ethnicity, regardless of other descent. Know what I mean? Or all the mixed-race Germans, who still identify as culturally/ethnically Germanic even though they are genetically quite diverse. Culture is not genetically dependent, thank goodness. Maybe at some point modern governments will figure out what ancient cultures understood intuitively.

[Junkenstein]

The CDC had already noted a worrying trend for suicides. "Suicide deaths have surpassed deaths from motor vehicle crashes in recent years in the United States. In 2010 there were 33,687 deaths from motor vehicle crashes and 38,364 suicides," the CDC's Nimesh Patel and Scott Kegler wrote in their report

Question - How is the death rate from Motor vehicles worked out? This seems incredibly low. Are they talking about deaths on impact/while still in the car? I'd guess that this number is actually much higher but the cause of death is recorded as something else (Blood loss/ cardiac/ shock etc) by virtue of being in the hospital.

Just seems like very strange numbers. I thought cars were still way ahead of most things in terms of how monkeys kill themselves and each other.

[Golden Applesauce]

My understanding is that deaths from X includes "X happened, went to the hospital, died of thing that was a direct result of X." Otherwise most gun deaths would be filed under organ failure / blood loss.

The really worrying thing about the death from cars statistic vs. suicide is... how may incidents of "lost control of the vehicle" are actually "pointed car at solid object and held down the gas"? Cars are the most dangerous implement most people handle on any given day. We think of car accidents as acts of God, because everyone is a better driver than average, right? Lethal care accidents happen to people all the time, so there wouldn't be much postmortem stigma.

Or maybe not, modern cars are pretty good at handling front-end collisions, probably better than most people realize (might be human interest bias, but in anecdotes when dude A crashes his car into car B, the people in car B suffer worse injuries than A.) If attempting suicide by car were really a trend, there'd be a spike in people stupidly hitting trees on roads not previously hazardous.

[Golden Applesauce]

Thoughts that aren't random worrying, but still not actually researched either:

The same economic pressures that push up suicides should also push down car deaths. Higher gas prices (they spiked around 200Xish? But still higher in 2010 than '99) means people cut down on driving & travel, high unemployment means fewer people are commuting to work. (Not sure what scarcity of work + foreclosure crisis does to average commute distances - that'd be something to look up.)

I remember when the SUV fad vs. gas consumption argument was at it's highest, people made arguments both ways about SUV safety. (Built like a tank! Rolls over! Built like a tank! Rolls over!) Did the jury eventually come in on that one way or another? Not sure how SUV ownership in 2010 compares to 1999, might not be that different.

Either way, advances in tech should make cars & roads safer every year; it's amazing how much science goes into making cars crumple so you don't, and getting smarter about how traffic works (the challenges in predicting traffic jams are mathematically very similar to the problems in predicting the weather, which we're worse at than anyone likes to admit at) means that every time they expand a road rearrange highway exits that stretch should be safer than before.

[Q. G. Pennyworth]

Thoughts that aren't random worrying, but still not actually researched either:

The same economic pressures that push up suicides should also push down car deaths. Higher gas prices (they spiked around 200Xish? But still higher in 2010 than '99) means people cut down on driving & travel, high unemployment means fewer people are commuting to work. (Not sure what scarcity of work + foreclosure crisis does to average commute distances - that'd be something to look up.)

I remember when the SUV fad vs. gas consumption argument was at it's highest, people made arguments both ways about SUV safety. (Built like a tank! Rolls over! Built like a tank! Rolls over!) Did the jury eventually come in on that one way or another? Not sure how SUV ownership in 2010 compares to 1999, might not be that different.

Either way, advances in tech should make cars & roads safer every year; it's amazing how much science goes into making cars crumple so you don't, and getting smarter about how traffic works (the challenges in predicting traffic jams are mathematically very similar to the problems in predicting the weather, which we're worse at than anyone likes to admit at) means that every time they expand a road rearrange highway exits that stretch should be safer than before.

The SUVs in 99 were highly prone to rolling and catching on fire. If I'm not mistaken, the modern designs are much better about both problems. The "built like a tank" was actually a separate problem, where accidents that would normally be nothing became serious for the other party, since the SUV bumpers don't line up with the bumpers of other cars. What should have been a fender-bender turns into serious damage for the smaller car.

[Anna Mae Bollocks]

Stupid, off topic question...

What's the difference between a Latino/a, Hispanic white, and a Hispanic black? Is there a particular ethnic component at work, or is it more or less a cultural-linguistic distinction? What makes Hispanic white different from white and what makes Hispanic black different than black? Does the distinction go away after a generation or two of being in the United States? Like, say for example, my last name is Hernandez, but the last time I had an ancestor from South America was 80 years ago, what does that make me? Does it remain the same if my cultural background remains Latin American, or does it go away through Americanization? Just curious, because I'm not exactly clear on it. It's an odd and very specific distinction. Can thread split if appropriate, or pop it into the Hyphenated American thread.

Hispanic is an ethnicity, and Hispanics are people of Latin cultural descent, and various races. Lots of Hispanic families have lived in the United States (or areas that are now the United States) for many generations. It has nothing to do with Americanization. Either you identify as Hispanic, or you don't.

I've heard people living in Canada refer to French people as Latins, what people mean by it seems to change from place to place according to who's around. And I think Nixon coined the term "Hispanic".

Once in awhile I see people wearing shirts with Aztec art and "I am not Hispanic, I am not Latino, etc...I am a Mexican".

[The Good Reverend Roger]

I've heard people living in Canada refer to French people as Latins, what people mean by it seems to change from place to place according to who's around. And I think Nixon coined the term "Hispanic".

Once in awhile I see people wearing shirts with Aztec art and "I am not Hispanic, I am not Latino, etc...I am a Mexican".

Which is sort of like saying, "I'm not <insert race>, I'm an American".  It's factually inaccurate, but rather an expression of where one's loyalties are.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

Also, from Wikipedia:

The term Hispanic is derived from Hispanicus (which derived from Hispania), Hispania may in turn derive from Latin Hispanicus, or from Greek Ισπανία Hispania and Ισπανός Hispanos, probably from Celtiberian[9] or from Basque Ezpanna.[10] In English the word is attested from the 16th century (and in late 19th century in American English).[11]

So, yes, Richard Nixon. 

[Anna Mae Bollocks]

Also, from Wikipedia:

The term Hispanic is derived from Hispanicus (which derived from Hispania), Hispania may in turn derive from Latin Hispanicus, or from Greek Ισπανία Hispania and Ισπανός Hispanos, probably from Celtiberian[9] or from Basque Ezpanna.[10] In English the word is attested from the 16th century (and in late 19th century in American English).[11]

So, yes, Richard Nixon.

He's forever, isn't he? "Nixon ye have with ye always". 

Should've double-checked. 

Didn't the government forms change under Nixon, though? They added "Hispanic", "White, not Hispanic", etc."?