“Were your families against your marriage because of, you know, the race thing?”
Why, since you asked, let me tell you all about our intra-family race politics in great and excruciating detail! Because that is precisely the sort of simple, carefree, and not-at-all-personal topic I love to discuss with strangers I’ve only just met at a dinner party.
“I’ve found that the farther apart their native countries, the more interesting the couple.”
Yes, ours is truly a story for the ages. Just like a modern-day Michener novel, had Michener ever decided to write about a fascinating interracial couple who met at a BBQ at the university they both attended in the country they are both from.
“With your backgrounds, your daughter is like a poster baby for the UN.”
That is actually why we decided to have a baby. “Now there will be peace in our time,” we said. Still waiting on that one; had another biracial kid in the meantime just to make sure we were doing our part.
“She’s yours? I thought you were the babysitter.”
Oh, I am the babysitter. “Mama” is just her adorable nickname for me.
“Hmmm, they don’t really look anything like you, do they?”
Indeed, I often find myself gazing at them and asking myself, Who are these children? Are we related? Why do they keep following me around? I can’t tell you how many times I’ve clean forgotten whether or not I was even physically present for that combined forty-five hours of unmedicated labor. Fortunately they are both just super great about following me home when I have these little forgetful spells about whether or not they belong to me. They’re such good kids! Whoever they are.
“They must take after their dad.”
Shhhhh, please, I have a pretty good idea who their father is — let’s just say I’ve narrowed it down! — but I would prefer not to talk about it in front of them until I’m ABSOLUTELY sure. Thank you so much, I knew a person as sensitive as you would understand.
“What are they, exactly?”
I see human…children? Oh, god, is that not what you see? Usually they only transform at night, and then only under a waxing gibbous moon, but it’s possible they just got excited when they saw you gaping at them for so long. They like to show off, you know. STOP THAT, GUYS, YOU KNOW IT MAKES PEOPLE STARE AND ASK ME RIDICULOUS QUESTIONS.
“In the future everyone will be beige like your kids, and racism won’t seem like such a big deal.”
I believe that children are our future / teach them well and let them lead the way / but you’ll still need to talk with them about racism because we live in a fundamentally prejudiced society and multiracial families have no power to magically undo generations of aggressive white supremacyyy
“I think kids are so much cuter now that more people are mixing up their cultures.”
Right? Monoracial people — like me for example! — I mean, gross. This was definitely the foremost thought in my mind when I met my spouse, fell in love, and decided to build a life with him — all I could focus on was how adorable our progeny were going to be because of the culture-mixing! I insisted that we put it on our wedding invitations: You are invited to share in our joy as we mix our cultures for the sake of beautiful children. Reception to follow. It led to some rather awkward moments with our wedding guests, of course, but I don’t believe in living with regrets. It was Our Day!
[gif via]
Tags: come on guys get it together, family, gonna have to ask you to think before you speak about my kids, interracial families, race
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I see human…children? Oh, god, is that not what you see? Usually they only transform at night, and then only under a waxing gibbous moon, but it’s possible they just got excited when they saw you gaping at them for so long. They like to show off, you know. STOP THAT, GUYS, YOU KNOW IT MAKES PEOPLE STARE AND ASK ME RIDICULOUS QUESTIONS.
This is so perfect, I wish you really COULD answer such a gross question with this. It’s certainly a kinder response than the question deserves.
I was holding it together pretty well until this one, but this one just killed me.
The version of this I got was, “What’s in your baby?”
Uh… milk…?
O,o
-,-
o,O
wow.
“So, so much puke. Seriously, so much.”
I was gonna say. “judging by what comes out: poop, mostly.”
Keep human children away from bright lights, don’t get human children wet, and NEVER EVER feed human children after midnight.
I have answered questions this way exactly.
“What IS she??”
“Um, a human?”
“”You’re so ĺucky. mixed babies are the cutest!” Yes, only luck that this husband of mine fell from the sky into my life purely for the sake of creating cute babies! Had nothing to do with us–just luck!
And what bugs the crap out of me (okay, one thing that bugs the crap out of me) is that my friends with cute mixed babies where one parent is white get this all the time, but my friends where neither parent is white? Crickets. So it’s like, an extra double helping of racist and supremacist. (Not that I’m wishing crass ‘off-white babies are so pretty’ type comments to invade the lives of Chinese-Indian kids. I’m just pissy that the ‘mixed babies are the cutest’ crowd are unaware of their ‘as long as part of the mix is like us’ subtext.)
Ugh this does make me feel kinda bad that I pull the “but mixed babies are cuter!” line whenever my parents ask why I am still not dating an Asian man (At this point Asian is close enough! Any kind of Asian!). I am not quite sure how serious I am when I say it, I just know I’m less serious when I threaten to bring them one in nine months as proof.
I wish you could say these things too. Or, you know, didn’t have a reason to.
LOL, maybe that outbreeding enhancement program will get rid of the nasty sarcasm strain, eh?
I should add that I got the, “Oh interracial babies are sooo cuuuuuttttteeeee,” thing all the time. ugh.
idk, I married someone who is far less of a smartass than I am, and yet the 7yo seems to be making a deliberate study of sarcasm.
Every new bit of information you share about your daughter makes me like her even more.
In an affirming, not-weird way for an internet stranger to like your daughter.
aww, thank you! I try not to bore people (like OMG THERE SHE GOES AGAIN) but honestly, my life these days is pretty much kids + Toast, I have little else to talk about rn. And they are pretty fun!
Proud parenting moment: my 3 year old, replying to some smartass thing I said, to me: “Oh, you sarcastic woman.”
It’s on the whole preferable to encourage these things. It makes being a mom so much fun.
ahhh people are the worst. “what are they, exactly”??? ? ??
“Were your families against your marriage because of, you know, the race thing?” – Have not had this from strangers, thankfully!, but have had it asked by family members of both families, in separate incidents. (Grandpa, I get where you’re coming from, but let’s not ask my father-in-law if he’s an antisemite.)
We don’t have kids, but it turns out the kid-related statements come regardless. Mostly of the “positive cluelessness” variety, I guess? You know the type: “Oh my god, he’s [this] and you’re [that]? Your children will be so beautiful, I want your first-born!” Sure, let me get on bearing that child for the express purpose of you having it because our genes have been, by you, instructed to join in an aesthetically appealing fashion.
“Where did they get those blue eyes / light skin / light hair / straight hair / other features that don’t match up with my stereotypical perception of your race??”
Oh, you know, there was a discount at the Racial Ambiguity thrift store.
Where did you get those blue eyes?
I stole them.
I knew I should not have given away the children’s poetry books. This is from Dennis Lee.
I Have My Father’s Eyes
(with Rachel Wyatt)
My mother took my hand in hers
And as she did she cried,
“You have my hair and eyebrows
But you have your Father’s eyes.”
I soaked them well in acid
To make them firm and round.
I love to see them wobble
As they roll along the ground.
My uncle on my mother’s side
Was speechless in surprise:
“She has my teeth and fingernails
But she has her Father’s eyes.”
I scrubbed them with a toothbrush
Till they began to gleam.
I can’t stand dirty eyeballs.
It makes me want to scream.
An aunt from Athabaska
Said proudly at the table,
“She has my ear, the right one.
I left it here last April.”
Then turning to me sharply
She gave a vicious whack
And roared, “You have your Father’s eyes,
For God’s sake put them back!”
— Dennis Lee
To quote my MIL: “I studied the little Hispanic children in church to try to imagine what my grandchildren will look like. ”
I admire your restraint.
WUT
Also: I’m sure those children (and their parents) did NOT find it BIZARRE in the LEAST for you to be goggling at them for long periods of time. NICE WORK.
It’s a running joke in my husband’s family that they’re building a small model UN because all the cousins happened to marry spouses from different continents, but I can see how it could be super annoying coming from outside the family!
My sis-in-law and I both get the “oh, you’re not the baby sitter?” comment, which I always find surprising. I will admit I take perverse pleasure in answering “Where’s his dad from?” with a cheery, “Oh, New Jersey!” But then I generally relent and add in “but his parents are from Bangladesh” just because it gives me an excuse to mention Bangladesh, as most Americans do not know it even exists.
I am probably a bad person for not minding the “mixed kids are so cute” comments despite the train car of racist baggage behind it because yeah, doy, all the kids in my extended family are crazy cute. 😉
I think my kids are adorable (IT IS JUST A FACT) but it still feels icky when people say they are cute BECAUSE they are mixed. It can feel like exotification, and also seems to be saying something not entirely positive about the commenter’s perception of monoracial people — like, oh, if they were JUST Asian they wouldn’t be as cute, but with some Irish/Lebanese mixed in their “ethnic” features are mitigated/made more “beautiful” because of whiteness.
I read this article once by a white woman who had a child with her black partner, and when he was born the VERY FIRST WORDS he heard in this world were the nurse’s remark “oh, isn’t it nice that his skin is so light”.
This makes me want to hit things. And that nurse.
My sister has actually gotten the “are they yours/are they adopted” questions when she was in the middle of breastfeeding.
I’m a shameless eavesdropper on the bus. This happened years ago. A blonde, white (this is relevant to the story) mom is sitting at the front with her wee baby in a stroller. He’s very outgoing and attracts the attention of an older white woman. The older woman makes usual comment about cute biracial kids and finishes with “He’s so dark. He takes after his father.” To which the mom gives a sweet smile and says, “Funny. People usually think he looks like me.” Silence. I wanted to applaud.
So…how do you respond to “that kid is going to be so beautiful!” comments, anyway? I should observe that (a) the fetus in question isn’t even mine, it’s my sister’s, and (b) both parents are biracial themselves, so my impending Puerto Rican-Czech-Thai-Korean* nibling is extra super mixed for, I don’t know, maximal world domination or something?
I am already getting this crap, and it isn’t even my kid!
*Not the actual combination, but it gives you a little bit of the flavor.
I have honestly never found a good counter to this and I’ve had YEARS to ponder! Sometimes I’ll say “all kids are beautiful,” and sometimes I might press a little and try to get them to explain/think about what they said. But biracial and multiracial people seem to be so fetishized, or admired for just the wrong reasons, that I think a lot of people honestly believe this is not a problematic statement at all and will not understand without a longer lecture than I usually have time to give.
Yeah, I think a lot of people honestly believe they’re saying something super nice.
“Nah, the parents aren’t that good looking. Kid’s gonna be homely.”
I guess that doesn’t really work if the person saying it knows both parents.
“God, I hope so! Ugly children should be sent to live with witches.”
Oh, I like the obvious trollery thing. “Actually, it’s even more complicated than that–Bro-In-Law is half Vulcan.” Aw yeah.
Is there a way to pull the ‘”why do you say that”, repeatedly, until they trip over themselves’ maneuver on this one? it probably doesn’t work as well as with jokes, but I’m imagining pairing it with the neutral, long pauses and/or sudden topic changes for maximum funtimes.
“please proceed, Governor”
There it was, the comment that not only made my day, but made my month, accompanied by the parting of the clouds and the air-fists and maybe some happy kicking too.
I don’t know either, and I’ve been working on it for a while. I’ve generally only gone for the polite “thank you”. One time I tried the awful truth: “No, actually, the poor kid is probably going to wind up with unruly hair, bifocals, and crushing social anxiety” and it was appropriately awkward and silent afterwards.
I actually need to go with awful truth next time we get this question.
Sometimes I try to earnestly go with “hahaha I am just hoping for a healthy baby!” especially after last year when one of my in-laws had a baby who was prematurely born with a developmental disorder and died shortly after and giving birth is still a major surgery so, COLD HARD REALITY. It’s amazing how much it takes to have a happy baby, sometimes.
“You think so? Dammit, I was hoping for they’d be ugly because it will build their characters.” ?
Good thing I named him Sue.
I have to admit, I have often thought the “beautiful future children” thing about other couples, no matter the races, just because of how attractive both of the partners are. I don’t think I have actually SAID it to anyone except a very close friend who was actually planning to have a baby (a white woman with lovely dark hair and eyes, and a white man with blonde hair and bright blue eyes.)
(I’ve also joked with friends about things like “He’s so handsome! And I’m so average. We could get together and have some very average looking children.”)
“beige like your kids”
I cannot get past this. Beige. Like your kids. Beige like your kids. BEIGE like your kids. Beige like your KIDS. WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK.
Things that could be described as beige:
– Interior wall paint
– Couch fabric
– Car exterior
– Oatmeal
Things that ought NEVER be described as beige:
– Human beings
Maybe I’m just weird or used to strange remarks, but the beige part didn’t bother me so much as the implication that people should intermarry/have multiracial kids because racism is such a DRAG and that would just FIX it, you know?
Oh man I have heard an unbelievable number of people talk about their desire for “little brown babies” and it never ceases to shock me.
People will say that around me, sometimes not knowing I am an adoptee, and I have to do, like, calming breathing exercises to keep from throwing objects
I knew a girl a long time ago who was positively obsessed with having “half-asian” babies. She managed to marry a sufficiently Asian man but they divorced before the “half-asian” babies achievement could be unlocked.
I am shocked to hear they divorced.
I WONDER WHAT COULD THE PROBLEM HAVE BEEN
I had a roommate that said the same thing, and at the time we were roommates she was dating a guy of Korean descent who was adopted into a white family and you’d think she knew better, maybe, but apparently not.
The only time I ever heard the phrase “little brown babies” was when a Seneca woman I went to school with explained her reasoning for only being willing to marry another Native American, preferably Haudenosaunee (Iroquois). Thinking about it now, I’m surprised she didn’t say red babies, because the tone of her comment was very much in the spirit of reclaiming words and confining her comments to her own experience, but she didn’t. I am now totally confused about the possibility that anyone can appropriately use this phrase, but it’s also a moot point because it’s not a phrase I, as a white women, will ever feel it’s appropriate to use. Still curious though.
Some Indian folks that I know have talked about why they would want to marry within the Indian community and “adorable little brown babies” was one of the reasons. I think maybe that’s acceptable? But I agree with your “not my word, and that’s ok” stance.
My sisters and I used to be “adorable mixed race babies” (middle sister also has Downs, so you can imagine how cute she was), and boy howdy, we were all sick of this by the time we got through elementary school.
Both sides of our family are usually pretty smart about this, but one day we all went to the beach, whereupon all of our white relatives were chuckling because I GUESS YOU GIRLS DON’T NEED AS MUCH SUNSCREEN, LOL. Given that middle sister and myself both got our complexion from our white mom, we absolutely did, but my youngest sister takes after our Puerto Rican dad and proceeded to darken at least seven shades, even wearing SPF 50.
You can imagine the freakouts that ensued, because OMG *NOBODY* IN THIS FAMILY CAN TAN, WE’RE ALL A BUNCH OF LOBSTERS.
One of my best friends in college was Korean-American (ok, she still is) and I can’t tell you how many times she had this conversation:
Person: “So, where are you from?”
Roommate: “[Suburban town less than 100 miles away].”
Person: “You know what I mean.”
Like it was incumbent on her to satisfy their curiosity and they were IRKED that she didn’t. One guy pursued it until she told him her parents were from Korea and then he paused a beat and followed up with, “You ever watch M*A*S*H?”
100% true story. I witnessed soooo many of those conversations, but that was the worst.
OH MY GOD
I actually was on the opposite end of that, once. For context, I am lily white, but my wife is from South Asia.
We were at the wedding of one of my wife’s cousins, and the aunt of the bride cornered me and started asking questions.
Aunt: “So, where are you from?”
Me: “I’m from Tennessee.”
Aunt: “No, I mean your parents.”
Me: <Figures it out, plays dumb> “Oh, they’re from Illinois.”
Aunt: “I mean _originally_.”
Me: “Oh! Virginia, mt great grandparents moved from Virginia.”
Aunt: <Literally starting to foam at the mouth> “Where in Europe I mean Europe what kind of European are you?”
Me: “I dunno, probably most of it, we never kept track.”
I’m always reminded of that bit on The Office where Michael Scott asks Rashida Jones’s character “You’re very exotic, was your dad a GI?”
Ugggh. And then in REAL LIFE someone asked her if she’d been somewhere tropical lately, because of her “tan!”
Oh god, I was recently trying to read in one of those seating areas in the library when a young kid, probably 14, of Asian descent walks over and also sits down. And IMMEDIATELY this old white dude sitting nearby starts asking him about where he’s from, no where are your parents from, and then hurtles straight into a long story about how he served in the military in a DIFFERENT COUNTRY. I got up and left once he asked the kid “are you a christian?” but the conversation was still audible from across the library. Poor kid was too polite to just walk away.
THIS IS THE OPPOSITE OF WHY I CAME TO THE LIBRARY
“Yes, I do know what you mean. I was just hoping I was mistaken about you being a racist jerk.”
This reminds me of one of the small joys in my life. So in academia, “Where are you from?” can often mean “Who is your advisor/what is your institution?” and I derive a lot of joy from telling people my advisor’s name and home institution when it is obvious that what they really want to know is why I am not white.
i worry about this sometimes because in the city i am currently living in, most people are not from here. so i ask this question fairly often whenever i meet new people, but i never want people to think i am asking it because they are not white. i try to always follow it up with “how long have you been living in this city?” or offer where i’m from, but 🙁
Instead of starting with “where are you from,?” can you start by asking “are you from around here?”
That one can be somewhat disarmed by flipping the question around, and as a DC person for 10 years but not a lifetime myself: “Are you from DC?” “Did you grow up local?” “How long have you lived in DC?” (ETA: Right, you’ve said this last one, I am very good at reading things, my suggestion is just to make it the *first* question instead.)
It makes it clear you’re looking for a neutral conversation about that person’s biography, not a complex treatise on ancestry and the emotionally complex concept of ‘home’.
If it helps at all, I feel like I have usually been able to discern intent from the context of the conversation. It’s pretty clear when I’m in a group of people talking about their original hometowns or how they wound up moving to my current city that “Where are you from?” isn’t a kind of icky othering behavior.
If you really want to be careful, maybe you can start with “I moved here in <year> from <other city>, how long have you lived in this city?” It’s pretty clear all around that you’re talking about length of residence in the city and not, being all “Soooo I see you’re not white.”
you guys are all awesome! you’re right, usually the context is enough to make it clear, but a few times i’ve seen looks cross people’s faces and been like, shit, that’s not what i meant. i like @ThatOtherWench’s suggestion of asking ‘how long have you lived in this city’ first, i’m definitely going to try to add that to my arsenal of how not to be a dick.
My childhood best friend is Tongva (i.e., native to the Los Angeles area) and he used to answer this question with “oh, my family’s been living in LA for about three… maybe four… thousand years”. The look on people’s faces was GLORIOUS.
I am hearing all of these in the voices of various well-meaning and painfully earnest people that I know, and it makes me cringe from secondhand mortification.
“Do you think your son looks more white or Asian?”
We were going for South American but I guess we missed huh.
“White-Asian babies are so beautiful!”
My son isn’t beautiful because he’s mixed race, he’s beautiful because he’s MY son and I am fucking gorgeous. (I actually did say this once)
Bless you for that. You are an inspiration to us all.
Normally all I can think to say is just “uuuuhhhhhhh….” but that one time I managed to be clever.
I HATE the “do you think they look more white or Asian” question. As if ONLY ONE CAN SURVIVE.
“Do you think he looks more white or Asian?”
I cannot tell. The Valar have decreed that they alone must decide to which kindred they belong. To be counted among White People and dwell in Numenor listening to Ben Folds Five and eating Chipotle until departing forever from the confines of this world; or among the Asian and set sail into the Uttermost West where they are “really from.”
THE BEST RESPONSE!!!
I recently eavesdropped on an old lady at a mall as she interrogated a white woman with her (adopted? mixed race?) baby daughter. At one point the old woman said, “So what language does she speak?” and the mom was like, “Um, nothing. Because she’s a baby.” SO AWKWARD.
That is terrible, but also I did laugh because … ? People are dense.
I laughed too just because it’s so ridiculous. But then I sobered when I remembered volunteering for a kids’ book fair, and some people are NOT okay with the books in Spanish. She might have been fishing for an excuse to say “You should only teach her English.” Still dumb, and I’m glad she was denied the chance!
Commenting on my own post! At a work party of my husband’s, one of the bosses’ wives was saying unfortunate things about my kids as well as other Asian ADULTS in attendance (“she’s very tall, for a Chinese!” A. CHINESE.) and no one could really say anything — even if we’d thought of something to say — because: boss’s wife. When she saw our kids, she asked me if I thought their skin would “get darker” as they got older, and was amazed that they had my spouse’s curly hair. She actually asked if she could touch it and I was like, no. NO YOU MAY NOT.
#notallwhites
(my submission for Nicolle’s next deleted comments piece)
Oh my god, how awkward & horrible.
“In the future everyone will be beige like your kids, and racism won’t seem like such a big deal.”
So, IIRC, the evidence is actually mixed*, but at least some academic-ish people do claim that as time goes on, mixed race relationships will increase, which will lead to a more homogenous looking population**. BUT EVEN IF IT’S TRUE, THE ACTUAL KIDS IN QUESTION WILL BE LONG DEAD BEFORE IT HAPPENS, SO, WHAT, PRAY TELL, IS YOUR FUCKING POINT?????
*yes, that was intentional. I’m groaning too.
**I believe the counterexample is “but…. Brazil….”
Also, even in countries where most people are relatively homogenous, it’s not like racism goes away. People either find one group that’s still somehow separate, or they start to draw the lines between groups based on finer classifications. There’s virulent racism in the Dominican Republic (not picking on the DR here, it’s just a country that I have some personal experience with) that’s based on shades of brown and a person’s levels of European vs. African vs. Indigenous heritage. And some of the differences are functionally imperceptible if you aren’t immersed in the culture. People like to categorize and ostracize other people, unfortunately.
I was unfortunate enough to read a book where all future people were the exact same shade of brown, and “pure-raced” humans were raised in special, Truman Show-like zoos. OH NO WE ARE ONE STEP CLOSER TO THIS AWFUL FUTURE.
That is so gross
Wasn’t that book by Orsen Scott Card? I read it too, and it was super gross.
Sounds familiar I think? I was thinking Race Against Time by Piers Anthony. At this point, just saying his name makes me feel like I need to take a shower.
I was often told a story by my mom and grandma (mexican women) about the time that I (blonde baby with hazel eyes and very light skin like my white father) wandered an aisle from them in a Payless Shoe store. They caught me being led out by a white woman who was convinced I had been abandoned or was lost. No idea what she was planning on doing with me.
Anyways that’s my “Hmmm, they don’t really look anything like you, do they?” kind of story. I wonder what kind of stories me and my very dark skinned half white/ half Filipino SO are going to be curating a few years from now…
I have a white relative who married a black man and when people see their kids and ask her some variation of “are those kids yours?” she offers to show them the stretch marks. Seems to make people go away pretty quickly. YMMV, but wanted to throw this line out there in case anyone needed it.
THE BABYSITTER THING, UGGGGGH
That happened to my mom all the time, especially with my little sister who was fairer and had lighter, finer hair than my brother and I. We also lived in a gated community for awhile and they’d always ask my cousin whose lawn he was working on.
Oh, ew.
The number of times my wife has come home from the park (or wherever) positively fuming because someone assumed she was the nanny…. oh, this article hurts so good.
100% not the same thing (I am privileged for not having having been the target of racism), but my whole life people have said “oooh look so Swiss” when they hear where my mom’s from. Funny thing is, I look nothing like her side of the family. She actually got the babysitter thing a lot when I was little. It’s weird how people constantly need to rationalize why other humans look the way they do.
“Indeed, I often find myself gazing at them and asking myself, Who are these children? Are we related? Why do they keep following me around? I can’t tell you how many times I’ve clean forgotten whether or not I was even physically present for that combined forty-five hours of unmedicated labor. Fortunately they are both just super great about following me home when I have these little forgetful spells about whether or not they belong to me. They’re such good kids! Whoever they are.”
This is amazing. Tiny humans can be pretty resourceful when need be.
… 45… hours? Split between a mere two children?
Unmedicated?
Please excuse me while I call my mom and apologize. Again. For everything I ever did.
Also maybe you should be president.
The only problem with this article is the title. Things you WISH you could say? Go ahead and say them–they’re perfect.
I managed to avoid a lot of the bi-racial stranger grossness because my parents have very similar complexions and hair color . . . enough that all my friends from school when they first met my dad assumed he was my asian parent. He is not.
I hadn’t realized how lucky I am in that regard until recently.
My first husband was Filipino, and his mother was very quick to inform me that if we had children, they would look like him, not me. I never really knew how to take that.. But we ended up not breeding anyhow, so it’s a moot point. Just seemed like such an odd thing to say.
All I can think of while reading this is the bit in Absolutely Fabulous where Eddie finds out the father of Saffy’s baby is black and she declares mixed kids to be “the Chanel of babies.” If you sound like Eddie Monsoon in real life, you ought to know you’re in trouble.
As a multiracial adult, I personally love people playing “guess the ethnicity/race” (I get some really off-base guesses!) and/or people asking me “where are you from?” (Just up the road, actually).
“We’re having a mixed race baby!!! We’re having a mixed race baby, the very CHANEL of babies!!!!!”
I do sometimes sound like Eddie in real life but mostly it’s because I like to say things like “Not right now darling, Mommy needs a drink”. I probably sound like Patsy more often.
Ah, well that’s different. Personally, I often wish I had a glass fridge full of nothing but champagne and vodka (for stoli-boli), and I wish I could hide things in my hair like Ms. Stone.
My first and last name are very, very foreign. Most people in the US have never and will never encounter anyone with either of my names. I hated having to introduce myself when I waited tables, because I inevitably got “Oh, what kind of name is [Bugpaste]?” After a while I developed the perfect response: a dead-eyed stare, followed by “I’m Middle Eastern*. Are you ready to order?”
It turns out, white people are REALLY AFRAID of Middle Eastern people. Like, really afraid. I love having that kind of power over idiots.
*I’m secretly half-white, but they don’t need to know that.
excuse me while I snicker uncontrollably, picturing this encounter
excellent use of power over idiots
Did fear inspire good tips? That’s the most important thing.
My partner is mixed race, and his (white) dad had come over to help move his stuff. His flatmate watched them interacting for about half an hour before tentatively saying, “is… is that your dad?”
My partner didn’t miss a beat, and said: “Yeah, sorry, he’s not wearing his turban today”.
My dad has a (fake) long red beard & leprechaun hat that he enjoys wearing out on St. Patrick’s day. Last year, at the bar he & my mother were at, a woman who had been chatting with my mom said “You have to see that guy with the hat and the beard, it is just too funny!” My mom looks over and says “Oh yeah, that is my husband!” The woman responds, “No, no, he’s the black guy.” My mother goes “…yes…so is my husband.” (If it wasn’t clear my mom is white.)
PEOPLE ARE THE WORST. Also this article is my life.
STOP. How can this be real. And, your mom his hilarious. “So is my husband.” Haha.
My (very blonde, very German) mother gets a perverse pleasure out of using her (obviously Spanish) married name, just to throw people off.
I’m half Asian and am a little disappointed that my mom actually grew up in a place in Asia because then I can’t troll people when they ask, “Where are your parents from?” (after asking “Where are you from?” and hearing “[Suburb 40 miles from here]”, and then asking “Where are you ORIGINALLY from” and hearing “[Suburb 40 miles from here]”). However, my best friend’s niece is also half Asian but like fourth-generation, so I like to imagine the conversations like “Where are you from?” “L.A.” “Where are you originally from?” “L.A.” “Where are your parents from?” “San Francisco.” “Where are your grandparents from?” “San Francisco and L.A.” “Where are their parents from?” “San Francisco and L.A.” TURTLES ALL THE WAY DOWN
I’m a Korean adoptee with a white family, and I’m also disappointed I can’t troll people endlessly since I actually was born in Korea. I can stall for a while when they ask where I’m from, where I grew up, where my family’s from. . .but eventually (if I can’t shut them down) they hit, “Where were you born?”
Funnily enough, I worked in Korea and got the same questions about my family. But it didn’t bother me, since their intent was usually to figure out why I couldn’t speak Korean without seeming like they were blaming me/my parents, instead of trying to ask what I’m doing in America since I’m not white.
When people hear I’m a Korean adoptee they just assume I was born in Korea, but nope, I’m one of the very few Koreans placed for adoption domestically, here in the U.S. As a kid, I DID enjoy telling everyone I was born in Seattle.
But if you get “Where are your parents from?” you can say “_____” (in my adoptive parents’ case, Ohio), and then just keep going back! Secondhand trolling?
Haha, the lady from a “Brief history of time”! Turtles all the way down..
I have a coworker who think I am Jewish, because he says I *look* Jewish.
I am not Jewish. My dad is, but my mom isn’t, and dark curly hair does not a Jewish person make!
Ha, I got a lot of people asking if I was Jewish when I went to college in New York, which absolutely blew my mind the first couple times. In retrospect it kinda makes sense, since I have my dad’s thick, dark, curly (Hispanic) hair and some other “non-white” features, but coming from a small-ish midwestern town, I had never made that connection. It’s actually kind of funny, because when I was a little little kid, my family lived in a Jewish neighborhood in Cincinnati and my siblings and I all went to the local Jewish Community Center for preschool; my family makes latkes at Hannukah time, hamantaschen at Purim, we didn’t need too much guidance to accommodate my brother’s girlfriend when she started keeping Kosher, etc. It just happens to be a weird coincidence that apparently I look kind of Jewish.
I STILL remember all the racist shit people would say to my mother when we were out and about when I was 5. Mom’s white, I’m Asian. “Oh, is this your granddaughter?” (My mom was like, 40 at the time) *Loud whisper* “Is her father ORIENTAL??” *Even louder whisper* “Does she know she’s ADOPTED?” Hell of a way to find out if I somehow hadn’t known.
My nieces are biracial and it annoys us when people refer to them as “half-Korean, half-American.” Come on, “American” doesn’t just mean white.
“half-Korean, half-American” UGHGHHHH
I also just don’t like describing my kids, or any other people, in terms of fractions. They’re Korean, they’re Lebanese, and Irish, and yes, American. And they don’t owe anyone a breakdown/explanation, in fractions or percentages.
“Does she know she’s ADOPTED?” really someone said that out loud with their own little mouth?
I’ve been asked:
-what is she? (and for the door prize, a person of approximately similar appearance to the actual child asked this question in a polite way at the appropriate time, e.g. when she was in the presence of both the child’s white parents and NOT the child: May I ask what her ethinicity is? I don’t see that many kids with white parents who look like me, so I was wondering if she is _________.)
-does she eat rice? (um, she’s a baby, so she eats whatever we put on the spoon and fly like an airplane into her mouth?)
-don’t you think _________ people are better looking? (refrained from ‘than who?’ because the white-centeredness was dripping off; went with ‘Yup, we turned down a referral for a white kid’)
But someone asked your mother if you knew you were adopted? So, since you recall that, I’m extremely interested in what your mom said. Because I’m rude and sarcastic and just don’t give a damn, if that isn’t clear from the above.
Same here. My siblings and I are all pretty much white-passing (or not much more than “vaguely ethnic” as I like to say) and our last name isn’t super recognizable as Hispanic. On the other hand, it’s led to some surprised comments a couple times when people meet my parents without knowing I’m half Mexican. I kind of enjoy these moments when I get to shatter people’s perceptions (same with whenever I talk about my sister, who lives in Ecuador with her Ecuadorian husband; they met at *prestigious east coast college*), but I’m sure I would enjoy them much much less if I had heard it my whole life.
Beige???
And:
“Hmmm, they don’t really look anything like you, do they?”
PEOPLE ACTUALLY SAY THAT? Don’t they know that is the OPPOSITE of what you say to parents???
okay tbh they are kinda beige and so am I. We have almost the exact same skin tone. But yeah, it’s generally not a great way to describe people, as a rule.
and yes, many people look at them and then look at me and I see the puzzlement, which is SO bizarre, because honestly they could only look more like me if they had black hair/were my actual clones.
Oh my god. I find it so gross and/or surreal that people actually say these horrible, ridiculous things to your face. But props to you for responding with humour rather than a punch in the face (no one would blame you). Your snark should win awards, seriously. I was dying of laughter. Extra points for the kdrama heroine pic and gif. The expressions on Park Shin-hye’s and Lee Min-jung’s faces speak for us all.
Oh my god. I find it so gross and/or surreal that people actually say these horrible, ridiculous things to your face. But props to you for responding with humour rather than a punch in the face (no one would blame you). Your snark should win awards, seriously. I was dying of laughter. Extra points for the kdrama heroine pic and gif. The expressions on Park Shin-hye's and Lee Min-jung's faces speak for us all.
Such a great post!
A couple weeks ago I took my daughter to the doctor for a shot. The nurse looks at her and tells me how cute she is, then follows up with "So, are you her nanny?". I just lightly replied that I am her mom. She stared at me with this weird expression, then she says "oh, because she looks like a little Hawaiian baby". As if that somehow explained everything. (My husband is from the Philippines, I am white).
The best one I’ve gotten was: “I’m surprised that your daughter actually looks like you!” – yes, we are related . . . . . . And because our friends’ baby is mixed race like our baby: “I’m surprised that [the babies] don’t look more alike” yeah, they’re not related . . . . . . .
Our interracial family. The most we’ve gotten is that they don’t look like either of you
Our interracial family. The most we've gotten is that they don't look like either of you
This is very belated, but that's a dangerous one, because then you may get the HYBRID VIGOUR speech, which I have actually heard. About humans.
Of course, you could then counter that with "are you saying my children are mongrels?"