Is dating someone who's a different race okay?

I have never said that "racism is ok" in any manner or form.

Frankly, I think you just don't comprehend my posts or the points I have been making. And, until you show some evidence that you actually understand what I have been saying, I see no purpose in responding to you.

I deliberately and conciously live in a highly multi-cultural area of my city, where my kids classrooms are about as diverse as they could be.

My brother, as a teenager, became a member of an aboriginal tribe living on traditional lands in a traditional lifestyle,

My mother works in aboriginal health, with my father who is shockingly racist at times.

We have enjoyed Griha Pravesh with our Hindu neighbours of Indian decent who are several generations from Fiji, via New Zealand.

I love the diversity and multi-culturalism of this country, although many who say they support multi-culturalism actually support mono-culturalism with ethnic diversity.

Sure there's all sorts of stuff going on, and there are things I dislike about certain cultures too, but I'll insist that almost nothing can be assumed from skin colour alone, and the things that can all relate to skin colour itself.

(Oh, and I am talking dicitionary because I'm trying to defend this idea that I'm using my own special definition)

Ok, you qualify for me to talk with.
(kidding, but not entirely, I'm not interested in blatant racists)

and who of us posting said things could be assumed re skin color?

The whole thread is predicated on the concept that there are races of human being (which I despute, as does Prof. Graves, an evolutionary biologist and professor of African American studies) and that cross-breading between said races could be somehow wrong... ie, not "okay".

I assume most of us know that already, at least so far on the thread. You are lecturing to people who (generally) agree with you on that.

It's almost quaint to see you trumpet it.

Meantime, Hi, Gracie.

Well, it would seem not. Firefly, for instance, is insisting I don't understand what she's saying. I imagine you, at least, can see that I do, and that I disagree?

I think its been interesting.
Its not dead, yet!





David

I understand you both (how hard is it?) and think you both get each other, while sailing past on the sea.

To me, Eorl, you are way too righteous adamant, like from a pinnacle, closed to nuances that people deal with all the time, and Firefly is all involved with speaking for a woman who may or may not be biased - to me, likely is, at least somewhat, but of course, maybe not.

I understand your sense of smell re racism - not sure you are correct in your diatribe in this case.


Diatribing wrongly is counterproductive.

Firefly, I want you to know that in general, I find your posts on this forum to be very well thought out and thoroughly researched and thus sensible and well worth reading.
I have a lot of time for reading what you write on this forum as I generally do learn something from what you write, even if I don't always agree, because you yourself seem to be someone who's more interested in imparting information in a non-biased fashion than someone who has an agenda, personal or otherwise.
Truthfully, I'd have to put you among the top five posters on this forum when it comes to speaking sense without the need to play any games or make any subject about whether or not you like the posters.

But here, you're splitting hairs. If a parent says, 'I'd rather you not date a person of this race and I'd rather you date a person of your own race,' I think we all know that means that parent is really, really hoping their child chooses a person of his/her own race to 'love' and mate with, wouldn't you say?

And why does the parent automatically discount ALL people of ANY OTHER RACE for her child to date (or love)?
Sorry but I think that's basically what she's saying here, when she says, 'Can't you find a nice white boy to date?'.
Jesus, as if ANY white boy would do more suitably than any other boy of any other race.
Oh yeah , you think it might be because she's just so, so frightened that her little baby will somehow get hurt or ostracized or whatever....again - give me a break.
Maybe it has more to do with the fact that she (the mother) will be embarrassed or not have cute little white grandchildren who look just like her.
Sounds very, very selfish, self-centered and close-minded. Okay - maybe not racist - but insular and close-minded- traits I think you'll find that often go hand and hand with the tendency to be biased and racist.


Yes, and probably has something to do with the fact that I have a black son.
Historically, Firefly, the black boys are the people who are looked at as having overstepped the boundaries society has set when it comes to interacting with or dating and marrying white girls.
And they're the ones who have been more tangibly (read- 'physically') punished for it.
Maybe that's why the mothers of black boys have more right to be afraid for their sons.
And it's the black boys who are looked at as not being 'good enough' for the white girls - not the other way around.
In this way, their sense of self is also harmed. How do you think it would feel to someone to know that they are automatically deemed not good enough or unsuitable to date another's child, based solely on the color of his skin?
Sorry - although I was the white girl in such a relationship - I know for a fact, it's the black boys who have more **** heaped upon them in interracial relationships.
That's why I believe these black mothers have more of a reason for concern for their child's well being than the white mothers do.


Yes, and my mother said exactly this to me when I told her I was dating a black boy. She was a southerner born in Texas in 1932 and conversant with the racial truths about that time and place. I was living in North Carolina in 1982 and conversant with the racial truths about that time and place. So when she said to me, 'Rebecca, I just don't want you to end up at the end of some dark road with a bullet in your head' (those were her exact words)...I reassured her and said, 'Mom - that just doesn't happen anymore. Don't worry about that.'
And that was that. Because that really WAS all she was worried about. She really didn't and doesn't hold any racist views that make her think that her white children are too good for people of other races. In fact, I know for a fact, the man I married was her favorite son-in-law. She told me that. She had the most in common with him and loved him for who he was.
She gave him a chance.
This woman is not giving this boy a chance.
She's painting the worst-case scenario and using it as a tool to keep her family white.


As I said earlier, there is more historical precedence for worrying about a black boy's safety when it comes to him dating a white girl.
Although, again, in this day and age, I do believe it is simply an excuse to justify keeping one's family 'pure'.
And I find that desire for racial 'purity' in a family, sort of racist - yeah- I do.
But yeah, black people can be racist too.

Anyway - thanks for the links. I have a day off today and I'll read them.

aidan, you may well be right. I'm not sure the mother wasn't being racist. I just wish we actually knew more about the interchange that actually went on between the girl and her mother. If, in response to the mother's saying, "Can't you find any nice white boys to date?" her daughter had said, "Why, what's wrong with Ty?" and gotten an answer, and we knew that answer, then we might have something more to go on. Your mother told you what her fears were for you, she was worried someone might harm you. This girl's mother might have fears for her daughter too, and for the boy as well, even just concerns about the two of them getting a hard time at school from some of their peers.

I actually do think this girl probably knew her mother would be up-tight about her dating the boy because he is black, and that may even be part of the reason she wanted to date him. Gracie describes the mother and daughter as arguing a lot, not that that's so unusual at that age, but I just have the sense that, "Can't you find any nice white boys to date?" might have been said, with a deep sigh of parental fatigue, by a mother who knew her daughter was deliberately pushing her buttons. Gracie also said that the mother's reaction made her friend want to date the boy more. So, more may be going on with the girl than just liking the boy and wanting to date him, it's also a way of aggravating her mother, and she may enjoy doing that. Of course, if the mother's aggravated because she holds racist attitudes, I think she deserves to be aggravated and miserable.

Anyway, maybe Gracie will continue to keep us posted on how things are working out now that the two are dating and whether the mother is getting more accepting of the situation or more open about her real objections. At least the mother likes the boy, matters would be worse if she didn't.

Actually the biggest blow-outs I've witnessed in families, almost to the point of real tragedy, were not about the race of the partner the child selected to marry, they were about the religion being different than the one their child was brought up in. I saw parents acting like maniacs, disinheriting their children, considering them to be dead, driving them to serious suicide attempts, sheer insanity over the thought that their child was marrying out of the religion and that their grandchildren might be raised in another religion. And I saw this happen with families from three distinctly different ethnic/religious groups. So race isn't the only thing parents go nutsy over.

But I wish everyone would stop talking about marriage and having children in this thread. I really hope at the age of 15 or so, give or take a year in either direction, that these kids are more concerned with getting a drivers license than a marriage license, and that they're more focused on getting good grades and getting into a good college than contributing to the growth of the population.

Thanks for the nice words about my posts, aidan, I have always had similar feelings about your posts. A lot of other people are concerned with pushing an agenda, or needing to win an argument, or putting other people down, or playing all sorts of games with other posters. And I know you don't do those sorts of things either. The best thing someone can do for me is really make me think, the best thing a topic can do for me is really make me think. One reason I tend to write such long posts is because I enjoy the process of thinking things though, considering different facets, and organizing it in a coherent way--often I even surprise myself with where it goes. And I hope I occasionally make someone else stop and think. I am more interested in imparting information than just expressing an opinion or caring about whether someone agrees with me. So, your comments are much appreciated. I think I must put a lot of other people to sleep.

Voted you up on that post. I apologize if I've been overly belligerent. I just really abhor racism, and I have a tendency too push my view to hard.

If only I wasn't so damn right so much!

I feel the same way about gun control.





David

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yW_rYLoIR08

Society's Child

Janis Ian

Come to my door, baby,
Face is clean and shining black as night.
My mother went to answer you know
That you looked so fine.
Now I could understand your tears and your shame,
She called you "boy" instead of your name.
When she wouldn't let you inside,
When she turned and said
"But honey, he's not our kind."
She says
I can't see you any more, baby,
Can't see you anymore.
Walk me down to school, baby,
Everybody's acting deaf and dumb.
Until they turn and say, "Why don't you stick to your own kind."
My teachers all laugh, their smirking stares,
Cutting deep down in our affairs.
Preachers of equality,
Think they believe it, then why won't they just let us be?
They say I can't see you anymore baby,
Can't see you anymore.
One of these days I'm gonna stop my listening
Gonna raise my head up high.
One of these days I'm gonna raise up my glistening wings and fly.
But that day will have to wait for a while.
Baby I'm only society's child.
When we're older things may change,
But for now this is the way, they must remain.
I say I can't see you anymore baby,
Can't see you anymore.
No, I don't want to see you anymore, baby.

Please, read this article
Exploring genetic differences in the new DNA age By Amy Harmon
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/09/world/americas/09iht-dna.4.8269929.html?pagewanted=all

I'll place some extracts.

Examine ALL of Pamela Rosa's posts and its clear she's a racist and a bigot. From the same article she cited above:

Which is worse than the other ?

why are you ranking them, David?

I'm not racist. I'm a speciesist!

You are a sick racist of the worst kind and we all can be very thankful that such voices in the public square are now treated with the contempt they had earn.

All the harm done to mankind over the generations by the likes of you is amazing and sad.

Is there not still existing KKK websites where you could feel more at home in talking about the mud people?