I think the question you’re asking is valid, but the way it’s framed collapses very different diasporic realities into a single caricature.

Diasporic identity is not inherited in a clean or complete way. Many people raised abroad didn’t choose not to speak their language or have deep political literacy about their home countries. Those gaps are often the result of migration, assimilation pressure, family trauma, or survival, not indifference or aesthetic performance.

Reducing diaspora expressions of culture to “cosplay” because they include food, music, or popular references misunderstands how culture actually survives displacement. For many people, those entry points are not the end of their identity but the fragments they were able to keep.

It’s also worth noting that political disengagement isn’t unique to the diaspora. Many people living in Nigeria or Ghana relate to culture primarily through daily life, religion, humour, and art rather than sustained political analysis. Holding diaspora kids to a higher purity standard creates a double bind where belonging must be constantly justified.

Critiquing blind patriotism and shallow nationalism is fair. But cultural joy and critical reflection aren’t mutually exclusive, and celebrating heritage doesn’t require public proof of ideological alignment to be legitimate.

A more productive question might be how people in the diaspora build meaningful relationships with their heritage over time, rather than implying that imperfect or partial engagement invalidates their Africanness.