I and all of my immediate family members are multiracial. We are a minority in our town therefore, especially because my kids are triracial.
We are also a religious minority and a political minority.
I have had teachers mistake another child for my son on paperwork, because they knew he looked like me and my real son does not at all.
As for mentioning “black” or “white”, I prefer my kids saying “brown-skinned, short dark curly hair” or “light-skinned, long red hair”. My kids’ sports activities are in an urban environment, and it is better to not mistake a dark Hispanic kid for a black kid or vice versa, let alone multiracial kids who can vary quite a bit in color and may not identify as what you might “see”.
Many people, especially youngsters CANNOT ID any particular race and aren’t trying to be PC. They can state the color of hair, eyes, taller/shorter than them, but race is very tricky. For what ti’s worth, I’m still notoriously bad at figuring out race by looking at any person and there are so many different blends of folks in HI. D was upset when she found out she was all only one race so she decided as a concession she could ID her race and her religion, so she could be mixed like her peers.
As with Hawaii, California also has a significant number of people who may not be obviously identifiable as any particular race or ethnicity, or may be mistaken for more than one race or ethnicity, or may actually be of more than one race or ethnicity.
Going the other direction, describing someone as “black”, “Asian”, “Latino”, or “white” may conjure up a mental image of the person based on assumed appearances associated with those labels – but the person may not look like that assumed appearance.
Bjkmom, that reminds me of a funny story.
My youngest, was in her high school classroom, but I needed to pick her up for an appt. A couple girls were working outside the classroom, and one of them offered to go get her. As I waited, I commented to the kids still in the hall, that I hadn’t said my daughters name, so how would she find her?
They replied, " oh, " Penelope" looks just like you!
I beamed. " Penelope" is gorgeous, even though I am her mom.
When we finished the appointment, I told D, what her classmates had said.
She laughed! She said " Mom, I’m the only white girl in class."
Well, I guess they weren’t fibbing, in that context, she does look just like me!
I could understand the occasional ambiguous Mulatto, Hispanic, or half-Jew, maybe sometimes even full Jew, but you must be talking about a very small portion of people.
“I could understand the occasional ambiguous Mulatto, Hispanic, or half-Jew, maybe sometimes even full Jew, but you must be talking about a very small portion of people or it sounds like you may need to get your eyesight checked.”
In my neighborhood you can tell people are Jewish because of the “little hat” people are wearing walking to “church or temple” on Saturday. That’s why I know my city the religion is diverse. There is also a large Persian population in my city but I’m not sure there is a Mosque nearby. I saw a Buddhist temple nearby because of the architecture of the building. There is a few Mormon church in the city. And there is huge, everybody who is Christian can go there to worship place.
Maybe Vladenschlutte lives in a nudist colony. Although in the U.S., even that wouldn’t be all that helpful.
On the main topic of this thread, it seems to me that a lot of things that people are referring to really have more to do with economic status than with race and ethnicity. I think if the people in your neighborhood are the same income level as you, you aren’t very likely to have many concerns based on race or ethnicity. The only exceptions I can think of might be areas where one group so dominates that services aren’t available for other groups. I was thinking about the town where Orthodox Jews dominate, send their kids to private religious schools, and have wrecked the public schools. I wouldn’t want to live there.
"In my neighborhood you can tell people are Jewish because of the “little hat” people are wearing walking to “church or temple” on Saturday. That’s why I know my city the religion is diverse. "
Those are Orthodox Jews. You’re right, you can often tell by distinct dress. But the vast majority of Jews in the US don’t wear a yarmulke or distinct dress. So how do you tell them?
We found out by genealogy that my quite pale spouse is 1/16th African. So now we are like “ah, his nose bridge is wide, and his beard looks more like an African-American than a white guy”.
My father is not Jewish at all and has a “hook nose”. I am multiracial and have been mistaken for other multiracial combos as well as Hispanic. My son looks Asian but he is just as Asian as his brother who looks like an ad for Aryans.
Think about how alone multiracial people feel in these discussions…
Considering Hispanics can be of literally any race, yes, you cannot tell by looking at someone whether a person is necessarily Hispanic - or any other race/ethnicity, for that matter, so I support the use of ‘brown skinned’ and ‘light skinned’ as opposed to assuming race/ethnicity. Truly an ignorant comment there, Vlad.
Vladenschutte, are you serious? Do you think that most “full Jews” come with giant hook noses and huge thick lips and hunched backs like one of the caricatures in Julius Streicher’s Der Stürmer? You know that Jews – even if you’re talking only Ashkenazi Jews, never mind Sephardic, Mizrahi, Romaniot, etc. – come in all sorts of sizes, colors, and facial and bodily configurations, right? And that someone who converts to Judaism is also a Jew?
And how do you deal with Hispanic or Latino Jews? I have family members living in Cuba, Brazil, Argentina, and Ecuador.
Your comment reminds me of the lecturer on racial characteristics who came to my mother’s classroom in Berlin around 1936 (when she was still allowed to attend a public school) and picked her out of the entire classroom as a perfect example of Aryan girlhood. Much to his chagrin when the teacher whispered in his ear that my mother was a Jew.
How do you see Pope Francis? As a Hispanic, or as an Italian like his parents?
And what’s with the use of “Mulatto”? What’s next, quadroon and octaroon? Nobody has used that word in years. Multiracial or biracial are what people use now.
