Can someone PLEASE finally tell me the truth?!?!? (Portland, Gresham: appointed, neighborhood)

[mscbrown]

So I keep looking up information about Oregon and one of the things I can't get a clear answer on is the dating. I am an AA female and I have no problem dating outside my race or in it. My thing is do the people there? And no indoor mean black men/white women that doesn't count....but I see some people say it's very segregated and races pretty much stick to their own kind but then I hear there's nothing but interracial relationships. Which one is it?!? How can it possibly be both?

[omaraz]

It depends on where you are going in Oregon, are you moving to Portland?

[EnricoV]

The problem is there is no TRUTH. You will get as many answers as there are people. Everyone's experience is different. Being female, old, and white ... I can't tell you. It's just not within my experience.

[oldtintype]

And it also depends on class, socio-economic, job, age, etc. Depends what you're looking for too. If you pay attention and focus on it there are tons of interracial couples here--the thing is I don't think many people focus on it, it just is what it is.

Something important to remember is that as a whole the state of Oregon is fairly conservative and rural. The Portland metro and Portland proper is not conservative at all. So if you're asking if you'll have a hard time in Portland or the surrounding suburbs/metro area, it just depends on YOU. You shouldn't. If you're asking if you'll have a hard time in a small town in eastern Oregon 150 miles from Portland, probably!!

I think the segregation part is not true, UNLESS you're poor or working class. That's where you'll see more segregation among all races in the area (and most cities). If you're middle class or professional you'll see less or no segregation.

[psichick]

From what I have seen, either AA women are with other AA men or Caucasian men. That's been my observation around town and at my dog sport events. Going to the asian markets, I see a lot of AA women with Caucasian men there.

I haven't seen too many AA men with Caucasian women.

[rass33]

Originally Posted by mscbrown

So I keep looking up information about Oregon and one of the things I can't get a clear answer on is the dating. I am an AA female and I have no problem dating outside my race or in it. My thing is do the people there? And no indoor mean black men/white women that doesn't count....but I see some people say it's very segregated and races pretty much stick to their own kind but then I hear there's nothing but interracial relationships. Which one is it?!? How can it possibly be both?

I'm a black male living in Portland so maybe I can help you out. Do you see interracial couples in Portland? Yes. Are there tons of interracial couples in Portland. No, not really. Portland is a pretty homogeneous city, meaning majority white so the great majority of couples you see here are white on white. Like most big cities, the top interracial couples consist of white male/Asian women. And while you do see every other interracial combination represented I wouldn't necessarily call it the norm here. But Portland is a "lifestyle city."People come here to be a part of that lifestyle (coffee, micro brews, rain,bikes, hiking, music etc.) I think if you share in that lifestyle you wont have any problems meeting potential partners across the racial spectrum that could turn into a possible loving relationship. Its true, people are more insulated here and stick to the familiar. But if your familiar is there familiar than regardless of race, you probably found a new friend indeed. For whatever reason, the small community of black people who live in Portland live outside the Portland vernacular. Its hard for me to understand because they grew up here so you would naturally think they would have adopted the Portland culture. But obviously there is more going on behind the scenes that I am not really qualified to talk about because I'm not that well-versed in the racial history of Portland.


Honestly, you will find the majority of blacks (36,000) are concentrated in two pockets of the city of Portland: North/Northeast Portland and out towards Gresham. It doesn't feel segregated but maybe that's because there's so few black people living in Portland. Ok, maybe some areas are segregated but there is more diversity on the east side of the river. When people say North/Northeast Portland is the "black side of town" they don't mean that literally. North/Northeast Portland is still majority white. They just mean that its the side of town where black people are more visible. There are only about 36,000 blacks living in the entire Portland metro area. To put that into perspective, there were 47,000 blacks living in my small neighborhood in Chicago alone. Chicago is truly segregated, in Portland, segregation is not as pronounced at least in certain areas of the city. I live in Southeast Portland and I have neighbors of all ethnic persuasions. Depending on your economic status, being a minority in Chicago means you are more likely to live among people who look like you. Being a minority in Portland you are more likely to live among a mixture of whites, blacks, Asians and Latinos.

If you want to know whether minorities are well dispersed throughout the city of Portland you might be a little disappointed. You will naturally see whites and some Asians all over the city. (Asians are the largest minority community in Portland) Hispanics more out towards Gresham and blacks in North/Northeast Portland. People just tend to stay in there own little pockets of the city. Its hard to tell whether its because of the small minority community or whether it is a perceived threat from society. I been here a half a year and I'm still trying to figure it out. You can live wherever you want in Portland but a lot will depend on your economic status. Here in Portland, If you are doing well financially you will mostly live among whites. If you are poor and working class, you will live among poor and working class people regardless of race.

[oregonwoodsmoke]

OP, you want to know if you will be successful in dating in Oregon and nobody can answer that question for you. That is why you can't get an answer to your question.

[Copsgirl73]

Of course people in Portland date interracially. Portland is a very liberal city. But it is also a very small, white city so while people do date other races you wont see it as much as you would in LA, SF, NY, etc.

[NWGirl74]

Well, here's the "truth" from my perspective as a white girl. I've been single for almost 6 years but have only really been ready to date again for the past couple of years. I've tried speed dating and I've been on every online dating site at least once. My last date was 6 months ago-it was a setup and it was clear meeting me was greatly inconvenient to his schedule. (Needless to say, there wasn't a second date). Prior to that, it had been 2.5 years since I'd been asked on a date-including online.

Not for purposes of meeting anyone, I'm active in Meetup and I also volunteer regularly for a couple of different agencies and have taken a couple of different classes here and there (kayaking, rock climbing, photography). I'm just going about my business enjoying life and not actively looking to meet someone at the moment. However, as I'm not sitting around the house, I'm often in social settings and the events I attend do give me an idea of the singles scene.

A lot depends on the age range you are seeking to date. If you are interested in men who are between 30-45, my single female friends and I are finding there seems to be a lot more of us than them in this range. At a recent girl's night out, one of my friends commented she just wants to meet someone in his 30's and there were several head nods of agreement. I'm sure they exist-just don't know where to find them. It seems most of the men I've met in the last two years have been between 25-29. And when I was doing online dating, the majority of the men in the 30-45 age range whose profiles I looked at had 35 for their upper age limit. (I'm not saying the majority of the men PERIOD were like this, just those who appealed to me).

[danwilsonbsee]

Originally Posted by NWGirl74

Well, here's the "truth" from my perspective as a white girl. I've been single for almost 6 years but have only really been ready to date again for the past couple of years. I've tried speed dating and I've been on every online dating site at least once. My last date was 6 months ago-it was a setup and it was clear meeting me was greatly inconvenient to his schedule. (Needless to say, there wasn't a second date). Prior to that, it had been 2.5 years since I'd been asked on a date-including online.

Not for purposes of meeting anyone, I'm active in Meetup and I also volunteer regularly for a couple of different agencies and have taken a couple of different classes here and there (kayaking, rock climbing, photography). I'm just going about my business enjoying life and not actively looking to meet someone at the moment. However, as I'm not sitting around the house, I'm often in social settings and the events I attend do give me an idea of the singles scene.

A lot depends on the age range you are seeking to date. If you are interested in men who are between 30-45, my single female friends and I are finding there seems to be a lot more of us than them in this range. At a recent girl's night out, one of my friends commented she just wants to meet someone in his 30's and there were several head nods of agreement. I'm sure they exist-just don't know where to find them. It seems most of the men I've met in the last two years have been between 25-29. And when I was doing online dating, the majority of the men in the 30-45 age range whose profiles I looked at had 35 for their upper age limit. (I'm not saying the majority of the men PERIOD were like this, just those who appealed to me).

32m, recently single with a career - boom!