Why are mixed race people constantly referred to as 'black',as for exaple Obama is by the media?

Good article Lanre. You need to sit down with Joseph Harker and explain it to him.

I think we have a generation coming who really don't "see" race. My son (who is 12) was talking about a new friend at school. We know most of his friends, but didn't recognise the name, so we asked our son to describe him. He told us about the friend's height, weight, what he liked to eat, his taste in music etc. Then we arrived at the school gates. "There's Louis", our son said, pointing to a black guy going through the door. This is a predominantly white school in Gloucestershire.

@Readingboy

This may sound glib, but I think it's mostly about skin colour. I am rarely referred to as black, for example, despite being mixed-race ...

There is only one race that you belong to: The human race. At one point there were cousin races to our own: the cro-magnons and neanderthals. They died out, probably killed off by us.

Being a different colour to another human being does not actually make you a different race.

Hope this information helps refine your argument.

Thanks for a very interesting article, Lanre. As a white Brit married to a Ugandan lady and living in South Africa our three children together are what would have been called 'coloured' under apartheid. South Africans who were raised under that system still often have difficulty in looking beyond the four old 'population group' classifications. My kids totally confuse them!

I agree that this idea of 'having to choose a camp' is counter-productive. I understand where the feeling but I feel that it's best to be an individual and find your own identity rather than allow yourself to be pidgeon-holed.

As far as being parents to mixed-race children is concerned, I think that the main thing is to give plenty of love and support while also being alert to any peer-group pressure or bullying which sadly still happens from some people. We've had a conversation with each of our kids at some point in their lives which went along the lines of: "Daddy's white, Mummy's black, you're in-between and that's great. God loves each of us the way He made us!"

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@Tokyo06
Even though the concept of race has little meaning in scientific terms, it's quite clear what's being discussed here.

I think we have a generation coming who really don't "see" race. My son (who is 12) was talking about a new friend at school. We know most of his friends, but didn't recognise the name, so we asked our son to describe him. He told us about the friend's height, weight, what he liked to eat, his taste in music etc. Then we arrived at the school gates. "There's Louis", our son said, pointing to a black guy going through the door. This is a predominantly white school in Gloucestershire.

Most of the wee ones in my extended family are exactly the same, which I always think is a good thing.

Can be a little annoying when older people, purposefully, affect the same just to avoid even the (obviously ridiculous) implication that by noticing somebody's skin-tone they're being a bigot. I started a new job earlier in the year, was advised I'd have to go to IT to sort something out, and I should go ask Barry. Okay, said I, how will I recognise Barry? Barry, I was told, was in his early 30s, quite tall, fashionably-ruffled hair, a bit chubby, geeky spectacles, and likely to be wearing a T-shirt with a Nintendo logo on it... which accurately describes everyone in our IT department. Would have been much easier if they'd pointed out that 'Barry' was a nickname, and that he was actually called Bharjat and was one of 2 Indian people on that floor, the other of whom was a woman. Would have, if nothing else, saved me the awkwardness of umm-ing and aah-ing about staring at people's T-shirts for 5 minutes on my first day.

MrJoe
Don't get drawn in, Tokyo06 is a troll, or at least has dreams of becoming one.

I saw the coverage on the BBC for this topic and wondered if it was not somehow a bit near the line. It seems to be that the interest was not in the number of mixed-race brits, but in the apparently amazing number who were succesful! Is this not a bit patronising, to say the least?
It reminds me of Dr Johnson's comparison of a politically active woman with a dog walking on its hind legs
"It's not that the thing is done well, but that it is done at all is surprising"
Maybe I'm being over-sensitive, but the focus on race made me very uncomfortable.

I find it interesting that it's something that people seem only to associate with those who have different skin-colours. I have a range of friends whose cultural backgrounds are diverse: among them, one half-Italian-American; another half-German; several who have one parent of Eastern European Jewish descent, and another who isn't (and how they have been raised/identify themselves on that score can depend on the sex of which parent was Jewish).

I've one parent of Scots, partly West Highland background, and another of mixed English/Irish/Welsh background. There are cultural differences there, different cultural baggage. As a child in Northern England, I identified primarily as Scots (surname was a dead giveaway, anyway), and got flak for it, because it was seen as "wanting to be different". I regard myself as human first and foremost, then European (my education and interests mean that I feel strong emotional and intellectual ties to a range of cultures and literatures), and variably British/Scots. I don't feel monocultural, and have felt pulled in very different directions at several stages in my life. Colour is only a visible marker for things which many of us experience less overtly. Very many of us, I suspect, are mongrels of some sort. We don't need to make choices, but accept and embrace our diverse origins. What matters is how we choose to use our 'hybrid vigour'.

As the white father of mixed-race children, I was determined that my kids not feel the need to obscure their racial makeup by identifying as black. Now both young adults, they maintain a comfortable mixed-race identity, and often employ the somewhat tongue-in-cheek response to the "what are you?" question with the answer: '100% mixed race.'

Even though the concept of race has little meaning in scientific terms, it's quite clear what's being discussed here.

Well good. So if we can all agree to abandon our assault on language and science by not paying lip service to the god-awful notion that the human race divides into races, invented as a partner to 18th century imperialism, that would be swell.

I saw the coverage on the BBC for this topic and wondered if it was not somehow a bit near the line. It seems to be that the interest was not in the number of mixed-race brits, but in the apparently amazing number who were succesful! Is this not a bit patronising, to say the least?
It reminds me of Dr Johnson's comparison of a politically active woman with a dog walking on its hind legs
"It's not that the thing is done well, but that it is done at all is surprising"
Maybe I'm being over-sensitive, but the focus on race made me very uncomfortable.

The Beeb has a very difficult editorial line to walk there, to be fair - they've got to, at once, write an article that highlights the changing face of British society and the success that many mixed-race people are experiencing as a visible indicator of it, and at the same time provide enough ammunition for the Home Counties readers/viewers to squawk at the top of their lungs at how they're "over-represented" and it's all the fault of the PC mob.

The fact that both the left and right seem to feel the Beeb is in thrall to the other side has as much to do with the Beeb's own playing-both-audiences as the fact that extremists on both sides are more than likely to be certifiable.

@ readingboy:

<<Why are mixed race people constantly referred to as 'black',as for exaple Obama is by the media?>>

probably because of the very concerted and rather shrill campaign some years ago for all non-white people to be called 'black'. That was all terribly PC in the not so distant past. The Guarniad would have been very much a flag waver for the blanket 'black' ascription.

Well good. So if we can all agree to abandon our assault on language and science by not paying lip service to the god-awful notion that the human race divides into races, invented as a partner to 18th century imperialism, that would be swell.

I'm afraid you're the one making an assault on language by equating the words 'species' and 'race'.

Isn't it time that the obsolete concept of "race" is abandoned. It carries so much pseudo-scientific and religious baggage and has no basis in fact. I know this will upset those who make a living from "Racial Grievance", but there is no such thing as race apart from the Human Race. Colour of skin, hair, eyes are purely a result of evolutionary climactic adaption..

MrJoe
The more you respond, the more he will have a go. Ignore him.

@Justabloke
10 October 2011 3:34PM

I saw the coverage on the BBC for this topic and wondered if it was not somehow a bit near the line. It seems to be that the interest was not in the number of mixed-race brits, but in the apparently amazing number who were succesful! Is this not a bit patronising, to say the least?
It reminds me of Dr Johnson's comparison of a politically active woman with a dog walking on its hind legs
"It's not that the thing is done well, but that it is done at all is surprising"
Maybe I'm being over-sensitive, but the focus on race made me very uncomfortable.

If you think about it, large parts of British society were quite hostile to mixed-race relationships at the time. Apart from all the complications associated with marriage, people in mixed-race relationships also had to deal with disapproval from their neighbours, their children were instantly identifiable and were also abused quite often because of their skin colour.

It's quite remarkable that a lot of relationships survived under those conditions. It might have been easier for either party to just pack it in or for both people to elope.

@SusScrofa
10 October 2011 3:38PM

As the white father of mixed-race children, I was determined that my kids not feel the need to obscure their racial makeup by identifying as black. Now both young adults, they maintain a comfortable mixed-race identity, and often employ the somewhat tongue-in-cheek response to the "what are you?" question with the answer: '100% mixed race.'

I like that.

Readingboy
10 October 2011 3:09PM
Why are mixed race people constantly referred to as 'black',as for exaple Obama is by the media?

I would say that it's because that has been his experience in the US. With the amount of overt and subtle racism around while he was growing up, and still now, he would have been treated as 'black' everywhere he went.

My best friend from University (in the UK) is mixed race. Her father was mixed race (white and black) from Barbados, her mother was white English. She has a lot of physical features from the black side of her family, including skin color and hair, and was always treated as 'colored', including a hefty dose of racism when she was a child. She tells stories of people heckling her mother and yelling all kinds of racist names at them when they were kids and walking along the street with their mum going to the shops. I think, though, things are much different in the UK than they are here in the US - seeing a couple from different races is much more common in the UK and less remarkable than it is in the US, IMO.

MrJoe

I'm afraid you're the one making an assault on language by equating the words 'species' and 'race'.

Come of it. 'The human race' is a normal, well-known and unexceptionable phrase.

*off

Let's just end with this nonsense of identity politics. Who cares if you're white, black, mixed race, brown, gay, straight or whatever you may be. Equality would only be achieved if your defining characteristic is not a narrow ethnic one, but rather the common culture and values that you share with the rest of the population of these islands.

MrJoe
Don't get drawn in, Tokyo06 is a troll, or at least has dreams of becoming one.

No

MrJoe

I'm afraid you're the one making an assault on language by equating the words 'species' and 'race'.

I literally haven't even mentioned the word species. You have no idea what you're talking about. The human race doesn't break down into different species or races. If you really wanted to stretch the difference between people you'd refer to ethnicity. And even that takes you few places worthwhile.

Really interesting piece and agree with the thrust of it.

I'm interested in how you think it's possible to de-politicise race when it's something that's constantly referenced in 'official' areas of life whether it's applying for a job, filling out the census, getting stopped by the police etc.

I'm mixed race and am proud of the diversity in my heritage. But that's precisely why it's so hard when having to pick which box to tick. It always feel much more complicated then how the state or a potential employer wants it to be seen.

Anyone who's been stopped and searched will know that when it happens, the officer is required to put down their ethnic impression of you on the slip before you define your own. When it happened to me, I was classified as Asian before I was allowed to tick the 'mixed other' box which I normally do. If authority isn't able to palate the full spectrum of British diversity, do you think it's ever possible for race to become fully de-politicised?

I've always said that in such cases it's up to the individual to define themselves.

I wonder if the bloke you refer to at the start would've changed his mind if he could have looked into the future and beheld the likes of Leona Lewis?

p.s.That Maureen - on the first picture in the article linked to - is a dead ringer for Carol Vorderman.

I remember watching a programme a few years ago in which a white middle-class man, I forget who he was - forgive me I have lived well over a century and so had an awful lot of names to remember in my time - had his DNA tested as part of an experiment involving several people, and discovered that he was mixed race, with his great-great-grandfather having produced offspring with a black servant, and apparently at the time this was not uncommon.
So maybe mixed race has been around for centuries but only recently gained favour, which is great by my way of thinking because as opposed to the heinous arguments of the Nazi Eugenicists, anyone who knows a damn about creating the perfect race will tell you that expanding the gene pool to include all races is the ony real chance of reducing hereditary diseases and creating a stronger race.
So here's to more of the same.

Apologies in the last post I stated that I had lived well over a century when in actual fact I meant to say half a century.
I mean I do feel older than my age sometimes but not that bloody old!

Tokyo06 is right, MrJoe is completely wrong. Biologically current thinking is that we are homo sapiens sapiens and Neanderthal man is * homo sapiens neanderthalensis - an extinct race of our species. In fact, all Europeans are "mixed-race" because we inherit Neanderthal-specific genes, while many Africans do not. What's more, many Bristolians ( and presumably Liverpudlians) are known to have Afro-Caribbean gene markers. And then there's all the Anglo-Celts.
If this rather stupid survey had actually used any kind of DNA sampling, they would have to conclude that most of the British population is "mixed-race" and doesn't define as such.

The term "mixed-race" is racist in itself and needs to die. You could say that its use is trying to stir up differences between people that have no basis in reality.

Have children with anybody from any part of the planet and any colour of skin you want. Anybody who objects isn't worth listening to in the first place.

Be 100% Human..

@ softMick

I was going to say: Christ, I thought ... they type quicker than me!

@Meitnerium278

I agree, and was rather clumsily attempting to say the same.
So if we are all originally mixed race why bother using the term, here's to calling everyone a member of the human race, and describing them in other less racial terms.

@pretzelberg

A senior moment I'm afraid, though not quite as senior as I led people to believe.

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As a few have said, we are all 'mixed race' really, it becomes only more of an issue when there are obvious physical characteristics that set people apart and make them more noticeable in a society which does not approve of people of certain race(s).

I believe and hope that now in a more tolerant society these differences of appearance do not matter and people can be free to explore their identity and be proud of who they are.

'Let's just end with this nonsense of identity politics.'

will never happen not all the time it is a nice little earner for the self appointed community leaders and activists and other players of the 'race card' for political advantage

Very good article. Almost everything gets politicised these days - race, climate change, economics - and yet often they aren't political questions. People just like to take sides and fight someone, for something - they feel like they're making a difference.

I'm interested in how you think it's possible to de-politicise race when it's something that's constantly referenced in 'official' areas of life whether it's applying for a job, filling out the census, getting stopped by the police etc.

I'm mixed race and am proud of the diversity in my heritage. But that's precisely why it's so hard when having to pick which box to tick. It always feel much more complicated then how the state or a potential employer wants it to be seen.

Anyone who's been stopped and searched will know that when it happens, the officer is required to put down their ethnic impression of you on the slip before you define your own. When it happened to me, I was classified as Asian before I was allowed to tick the 'mixed other' box which I normally do. If authority isn't able to palate the full spectrum of British diversity, do you think it's ever possible for race to become fully de-politicised?

That is a brilliant comment, and it's not just the examples you mention - an expectation to be able to self-define yourself as one of a certain number of categories seems to be becoming more and more pervasive. The health service in particular seem very keen on it these days.

I wonder why most of these organizations even want to gather the data? And what use they put it to after the fact? When one realizes that statistics such as 'x out of 10 people searched are black' are based entirely on self and police categorizations, it does make one wonder what on earth the point is.

Florence5:

I would say that it's because that has been his experience in the US. With the amount of overt and subtle racism around while he was growing up, and still now, he would have been treated as 'black' everywhere he went.

The US is very different. I recall some very odd conversations with an American friend of Hispanic descent (European, not part-Native American) when she visited the UK. She was on the alert for anything that she could construe as 'racism', but it had to be explained to her that we do not regard Hispanic people as a different 'race' at all: they may speak another language, but they're still 'White European'. In the US, it seems to be a different matter.

Seriously, this stuff matters today?

More shocking is that people actually tick the ethnic boxes. If someone asks me and wants to tick the box for me or my children, I tell them to choose one.

Let's just end with this nonsense of identity politics. Who cares if you're white, black, mixed race, brown, gay, straight or whatever you may be.

The state, for one, cares what ethnicity you are - they ask on the census.

The Tories, especially, care if you're gay or straight, as how else are they going to decide if you've got the right to adopt kids or not, or stay in a B&B?

Equality would only be achieved if your defining characteristic is not a narrow ethnic one, but rather the common culture and values that you share with the rest of the population of these islands.

I'm going to take a punt and guess you're a straight, white, middle-class male?

That old "straight, white men are the most discriminated-against people in Britain" line is a self-parodying joke, you know, it's not designed to be taken remotely seriously. Equality of opportunity is fine, but you can't ensure equality by giving everybody the same thing (the same education, the same taxes, etc) when some people start out with an advantage based on sex, ethnicity, race, class, etc - the trick is to offset those advantages by helping out those that don't have them, ie: actual equality, because fairness doesn't mean treating everyone the same and anyone who thinks it is is pretty stupid, to be honest.

I worked in a bar where one of the regulars had a croft on Stornaway. As he was planning a vist he said would I like some blackpudding from Charley McFarleys?

I said that would be grand but I wouldn't manage a whole one, he encouraged me to try the white pudding as well, so i asked for a half one of those as well. Next to my name on his order list he wrote.
Xuss: ½black ½white.

I raised an eyebrow and said, "Well I prefer 'Anglo-Indian,' Dave..."

But the look on his face changed as he spoke about the races mixing; it became one of genuine fear. He didn't want the UK to become a "mulatto nation".

Ironic that often it is members of those same immigrant communities who are terrified of their children "marrying out".

@ManWhoFellToEarth
What makes the most difference is class, someone who is born into a multimillionaire family is going have far more advantages in life than someone who is born into poverty.

The only thing I don't agree with is positive discrimination since it's still discrimination and not choosing whoever is the best at whatever.

As someone who is adopted, and therefore has no race or racial identity, i wish all people, white, black, or mixed would all just shut about their race or how they identify, I find it tedious and obnoxious. I couldn't give a flying crap how you identify or why.

Damn good article. It’s silly that we feel the need to define ourselves primarily via race. It really should be no more significant than our eye colour.

There are no "mixed race people," you "fool."

Everybody is mixed race,

Except me, of course.

Ironic that often it is members of those same immigrant communities who are terrified of their children "marrying out".

It would be ironic if it were true, but simple arithmetic will tell you that we couldn't be living in the feared "mulatto nation" if it were.

@softMick

anyone who knows a damn about creating the perfect race will tell you that expanding the gene pool to include all races is the ony real chance of reducing hereditary diseases and creating a stronger race.
So here's to more of the same.

While I share your sentiment I'm not sure this is actually true. Aside from how you can select "a stronger race" when by and large populations are adapted to some extent to particular environments, the thing is that if you took a couple of Europeans selected at random, and a couple of Africans selected the same way, there is no reason they would share more genes in common within "race" than they could between two individuals of the different "races". Also each population often has increased risk factors for particular diseases (eg diabetes, high blood pressure, etc) so I'm not sure increased mixing would have much effect (unless you applied some artificial selection which I assume you would find unacceptable.).