Barrack Obama is.......
- Thread starter Barking_Mad
- Start date
AnnO'Neemus
Is so vanilla
The results when I checked this thread:
Black 10 - 20.83%
White 0 - 0%
Mixed race 33 - 68.75%
none of the above 2 - 4.17%
Sorry to come over all philosophical, but I'm curious, Obama had a white American mother, and a black African father, and I'm wondering how and why this works the way it does, he's bi-racial, but the 'white' part of his identity is seemingly subsumed by the colour of his skin, when there's more to identity, and culture, surely, than just the colour of a person's skin? Or is that the be all and end all of who we are?
How come 10 people think he's black, 33 people think he's mixed-race, and no one thinks of him as white, even though, in a way, he's just as much white as he is black in terms of being bi-racial?
Black 10 - 20.83%
White 0 - 0%
Mixed race 33 - 68.75%
none of the above 2 - 4.17%
Sorry to come over all philosophical, but I'm curious, Obama had a white American mother, and a black African father, and I'm wondering how and why this works the way it does, he's bi-racial, but the 'white' part of his identity is seemingly subsumed by the colour of his skin, when there's more to identity, and culture, surely, than just the colour of a person's skin? Or is that the be all and end all of who we are?
How come 10 people think he's black, 33 people think he's mixed-race, and no one thinks of him as white, even though, in a way, he's just as much white as he is black in terms of being bi-racial?
kyser_soze
Hawking's Angry Eyebrow
Where's the 'Don't care' option?
bluestreak
HomosexualityIsStalin’sAtomBombtoDestroyAmerica
I'm going to check that later and if you're right you'll win an internet.
goldenecitrone
post tenebras lux
He's a black guy of mixed race.
littlebabyjesus
one of Maxwell's demons
It's because race is essentially a cultural construct. Biologically speaking, we're all mixed race.
But in this particular racist ex-slaving society, while plenty of black slaves were raped by their white owners, the opposite did not happen - the white owners' wifes were not raped by the black slaves. So while the vast majority of the descendants of slaves in the US - those considered black - will have 'white' blood in them from the days of slavery, the same is not true of the descendants of the white settlers.
That his or her daddy was a white slave owner did not mean the child of a slave was not also a slave.
littlebabyjesus
one of Maxwell's demons
A hell of a lot, I would have thought. Go to West Africa and look at the people there, then look around the black neighbourhoods in the South. Given that the vast majority will never have had licit relationships with white people, the difference between the two can be put down almost exclusively to slave rape.How much of the race mixing comes from slave rape?just wondering. What does it matter race-wise if Obama's dad wasn't an American? Culturally it makes a good case but race, no. I agree with you - what he calls himself shouldn't matter.
He's the definitive African-American.
danny la rouge
Ninja swords for all disabled people
Barrack Obama is...
all things to all people.
all things to all people.
Shippou-Sensei
4:1:2.5
i got an image gave it a blur to try and even out the colour and then tweeked it a little by eye
AnnO'Neemus
Is so vanilla
"But when I was asked [on R4's Today programme] whether Obama is considered black or mixed-race, I thought at first that I was hearing things. I simply didn't know what to say but then got angry. Not at the formidable Sarah Montague who had asked me the question, but at whoever thought the question a legitimate one.
Suddenly, I was whisked back to the language of the pulp fiction I used to read in my youth during the "blaxploitation" era of the 1970s: novels called Mandingo, Slave, and all of the other tosh that sold by the truckload and featured slaves kicking the butts of their white masters.
The question was worthy only of the pub, the blogosphere, and under the hairdryer. If the BBC had had someone "black/black British/mixed race" (or whatever the individuals might choose to call themselves) in charge of things, this would not have been given airtime."[/quote]I really disagree.
I don't think there's unity of opinion within the black community at all about what terms are appropriate or inappropriate, different terms have different connotations to different people, or at least that's the impression I get, I'm not aware of there being any definitive guide out there as to what is and what isn't offensive or outdated when there are as many opinions as there are people. The difference being that if you're non-white, those differences are more 'legitimate' in some way, whereas a white person using the same terms risks being judged as racist, because the reality is that it would be a lexicographical minefield.
A random example: years ago, I shared a flat with a British-Nigerian woman, and one day I happened to say the term "half-caste" when describing someone and was told, tersely, "mixed-race, if you don't mind". Fair enough, consider myself corrected. Fast forward a couple of weeks and her sister (same Nigerian parents) came to visit, and her sister used the the term "half-caste". So not even people of different communities, i.e. one being Caribbean-born, or African-born, and another being British-born, so having different experiences, but two sisters born of the same parents couldn't even agree on what terms were acceptable and which had racist connotations, so how I as a white British person was supposed to know, I've no idea. And I've also, more recently, been told not to used the term "mixed-race" but to use "dual-heritage" instead.
So I think it's incredibly stupid of Bonnie Greer to suggest it would take "someone "black/black British/mixed race" (or whatever the individuals might choose to call themselves) in charge of things" and it wouldn't be an issue, it wouldn't be a problem.
And she even hints at that herself. By her own admission, "'black/black British/mixed race' (or whatever the individuals might choose to call themselves)" it's very individualistic and subjective.
What if there was a black/black British/mixed race "someone" in charge of things? What if they thought of themselves as mixed race, and disapproved of or disliked the term black American, and believed African-American to be most appropriate? Then you'd end up with one person projecting their individual preference and perspective on others and being the arbiter of all things skin-colour related, and that would be bound to cause some offence to others, because that might not be how another person chooses to define themselves, because if that "someone" in charge ruled that African-American was the appropriate term, there would be people out there who were offended by that term and who thought he should be referred to as black.
The media can't win either way. Either the issue is the elephant in the room, and you run the risk of causing offence and people pointing out your ignorance and your use of 'politically incorrect' terms. Or you say, hey, how should we be referring to Barack Obama, what the heck is the politically correct term? And you run the risk of causing offence and people pointing out your ignorance and your use of 'politically incorrect' terms. (And btw, I'm no fan of Sarah Montague, she's woefully ignorant about Islam and Islamic issues, so I'm absolutely not knee-jerk defending her.)
It's a lose-lose situation. We had a style guide that pointed out that while 'black British' was okay in the UK, African-American was the preferred term over the other side of the pond. But then again black, and black-American seem to be okay afterall. And maybe mixed-race. Or maybe not.
As I've been sub-editing stuff, I've had the sinking feeling that whatever term was used, it would be guaranteed to offend someone, somewhere. Like I said, you can't win.
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