When telling someone you're American isn't enough.

Can someone explain to me what the ever-loving hell is going on here? So, if I told this person, "Oh hai, I'm American," that's not good enough? I'm sorry, on my maternal grandmother's side, my family has been here, in this same town/area of the state no less, since the mid-1700s. I think after nearly 300 years, I can stop calling myself German, don't you? That's even considering my maternal grandfather's mother was a German immigrant. That was only two generations ago, and yet, still kind of far-removed enough for me not to count as being German. As for my father's family, we simply don't know. The surname is Irish, and it's the going theory that they did come over from Ireland, but I know there's also English and French in there somewhere, and there's a small smattering of Native American too if my late grandfather was to be believed. One day I'll pay someone to really dig all this stuff up, but for right now all I have are theories on that side.

Really? I'm American and my family has been American for several generations. Unless I know the person, or I'm in the context of a geneological conversation, I see no need to go beyond the standard response because it is what I am. Maybe if my family had any cultural traditions linking us to our countries of origin, I'd feel differently, but all my culture is baseball, apple pie, and good ol' Southern BBQ (I prefer mustard base sauces for the record).

People are weird.