"Authentic" food - explain it to me.

[gumpzilla]

I was paging through the recently bumped dim sum thread and saw various comments about white man's dim sum and whatnot. This reminded me of something I've sort of wondered about for a long time. It seems that at least a relatively large subset of the people who consider themselves seriously interested in food really prize "authenticity" in their food. I've never been able to tell if this is because it is supposed to actually taste better, if it is supposed to be some kind of a cultural statement, or if it is just food snob cachet. I'm guessing it's a healthy balance of the above.

So, all of you who consider the authenticity of your food to be highly important, please expound. Specific examples of authentic vs. non-authentic cuisine and why the former is superior would be much appreciated.