Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Status:
"everybody getting reported now.."
(set 24 days ago)
Location: Pine Grove,AL
29,560 posts, read 16,548,014 times
Reputation: 6042
Advertisements
Quote:
Originally Posted by california-jewel
Each of the children, see themselves as half white half black, but they hate labels too. They will tell you themselves it is not whites who label them, but people who are black wiill identify them as black, and this bugs the crap out of them. They were not raised in this way. Don't beat around the damn bush, this is the way it is, the way media wants it to be too.
.........
Obama can self identify any way he sees fit, i don't care how he feels. But if he were my child, i too would want him to recognize both sides of the fence, after all, it is the two sides that made him.
This is the experience of your nieces and nephews, but not of all people.
I am a light skinned African American myself and i have had my white friends (who had not met my parents...who are both black) identify me as
" Black too "
when talking about me and their mixed friends. They assumed, i was of mixed race origin and then labeled me as black.
You: But Barack Obama self identifying as "black" is not meant as an insult to his mother, grandparents or European ancestry.
Me: How do you reach this conclusion?
OK, in the video that you posted, the host says that Barack Obama doesn't identify himself as Black. (I don't know whether he does, or whether it's just the media and general public who does - I've personally never heard him call himself Black, but maybe he has - I didn't read his book.)
Also, in the video, he doesn't say a THING about whether or not being identified as Black insults his white relatives. I honestly don't see how you gleam that "Obama self identifying as black is not meant as an insult to his mother, grandparents or European ancestry" by that video. I mean, it's a nice video, but it really doesn't address the question at hand in my opinion.
Here's a very good article about Obama being biracial.
I hope this thread is not too controversial, but for quite sometime, I've noticed that mixed raced children (with one black parent) are often labeled as black. Mixed race children who are white/Asian, Hispanic/Asian, Native American/White, Arab/white, or any other combination are however, viewed as 'mixed,' and not solely labeled as one race.
{snip}
Two things. First, our own federal government does this as a matter of common practice. If you are half black the government does not disqualify you for tuition assistance programs. My kid went to a new school, and they classified any kid who did not look white, as being a black student. All they had on their list was white and black. No Asian, or Hispanic, just white and black.
Second, physical traits that we would attribute to someone who has black hair and brown eyes are very dominate, genetically speaking. The genes for blue eyes and blond hair are very regressive. Overall I think the genes that make a person look white, are not very dominate at all. I know friends who are white, with a black, Asian or Latino spouse, and their children usually do not take after the white parent.
There are MANY light skinned Black Americans who are the product of two Black parents. My father is very light (think Colin Powell) and the vast majority of the Black people that I know are light skinned Black Americans or Black Creoles. I have family members who look as if they don't have a drop of African ancestry but we are ALL proud to be Black.
For many of us, the non-Black ancestor(s) are several generations back in our family tree. Some of us do not "look Black" but we still find it offensive for others to question our "Blackness" or to be referred to as "biracial".
That's a flawed statement that you just made. If the non black ancestry/ancestor in one's family tree was supposedly generations ago then by logic the black ancestry/ancestor was also generations ago and technically you don't know your black ancestors in person. You would therefore be MultiGenerationally Multiracially (MGM) mixed. Think about it, if a black person and a non black person have a child, that child is a mixis, and then that mixed person has kids with a black person, that child will still be mixed as they have at least a quarter of something else, and then that child has children with a quadroon, then their child has kids with a griffe.
Most AAs have more than 1/4 of their ancestry contributed from other backgrounds.
But my point is that if your non black ancestor is generations ago the same can be said for your black ancestors. Technically you are NOT BLACK.
However it's your prerogative to identify how you choose. But ancestry and lineage is another story. IJS
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
