Why are Independent Baptist Fundamentalists labelled Protestants? Something that always bothers me which I witness to Catholics: the well-meaning ones tell me I am a Protestant and say that "we protested the Catholic Church". This isn't true, the Baptist Church was never a part of the "Protestant Reformation" movement, and we don't actively engage in protesting the Catholic Church because we have no roots in it.

Although our theology might sometimes be labelled as "reformed" we call ourselves "fundamentalists" and not "reformers" because unlike Luther there was nothing for us to "reform". Our teaching does not come from any tradition and we teach solely what comes from the Bible. We take the Bible literally and base our theology off of that and not any tradition. For example, we don't have the Nicene creed  a tradition which Lutherans have which can be traced back to Roman Catholicism.

If you disagree please cite an accurate historical reference that says the Independent Baptist Fundamentalists were an active part of the "Protestant Reformation" and can thus be labelled Protestants or Protestant Reformers.
My first answer wasn't very good; I want to take a different angle. I hope this approach helps make this issue more clear.

TL;DR

You don't have to stage a protest to be Protestant. It's a matter of heritage.

Of fallacies and analogies...

Your question commits some basic fallacies that can easily be addressed.


  cite an accurate historical reference that says the Independent Baptist Fundamentalists were an active part of the "Protestant Reformation"


This step is quite unnecessary. Let's look a few analogous examples to understand why:


You didn't fight in the Revolutionary war, but you are an American citizen right? Even if you don't hold the same views as these who picked up muskets to fight for the colonies independence, your very existence has it's roots in that conflict.
By a similar token, I was born in America to third generation American parents. But my last name is Maclennan. Somewhere way back when, I had an ancestor named Lennan and -- whatever my opinion of Scotland may be -- I bear his name and and have my roots in that country.


Speaking of ancestry, let's think about your bloodlines for a minute. I'm a white boy. Nobody looking at me would take me for an Asian or an African. My blood comes from the Anglo-Saxon world. Never mind the fact that I now live in the Middle East, I have roots in a specific world and culture. I may not identify with its values, eat its food or speak its language1 but there is still a sense in which it is valid to identify me as a Westerner.

Now for Theology...

Much like a genealogy, the history of Christian religion may be drawn as a tree. We can start with the NT church2. I think its safe to say we both consider that a true church. For at least some very initial stages, there was not anything quite like what we know of as denominations3. As time went on, deviant theologies cropped up, were countered, and some people stuck with orthodox belief and others wandered. Some of these might be considered fundamentals of faith (such as the Gnostics) others might be considered less fundamental (eventual division between the major traditions we have today).

I covered a lot of similar ground on my answer to a question about what the purpose of the Creeds were. Your question mentions the Nicene Creed, but it is by no means unique to Lutheranism. In fact Catholics use it as well. As a matter of fact, so do many Independent Baptists. The statements of that creed are a very basic outline of some basic facts about our faith derived directly from Scripture. Whether you actively use it or not, your fundamentalist baptist beliefs are probably consistent with it as well. 

Basically, the only way for your Baptist church to not be considered Protestant is for you to be a cult. The definition of a cult is pretty simple really. It is a group of people who claim affiliation with a larger established religion but, because their beliefs diverge significantly enough, are rejected as unorthodox by that larger body. This is not the case for most independent baptists4, fundamentalist or otherwise.

Baptists are Protestants. By that, we mean that their beliefs fall under the general umbrella of non-Catholic, non-Orthodox and non-Cult Christian tradition. 
Your individual denomination may trace it's origin to some recent event, but whatever it split off from, it also inherits many of the attributes of its linage. All the other answers have covered the history of Catholic to Anglican to Anabaptist to Baptist history.

All clear now?

You don't have to actively stage a protest to be one of us. After all you aren't Catholic are you? You aren't Orthodox. Cult?

Welcome to Protestantism, my friend :)



1 Except when it comes to StackExchange, English is not my "daily driver".

2 I have started with the NT church only for purposes of keeping this simple, although I would argue we could draw the tree going back to Adam.

3 This isn't to say there weren't divisions / factions / sub-groups. There were.

4 There are a few possible exceptions here, but you would probably agree on those as well.