racial discrimination or AIBU???

[hollowsorrow]

Hello everyone, so dh is white, i am brown and we have a 7 month old ds who looks completely white too, blonde hair, green eyes. So when i am out and about with him people(all women so far) start talking to me about my ds and then ask me if i am his nanny/caregiver. The first time i was asked i was taken aback till that time i had never actually thought about the colour difference between my ds and I. I am actually very offended and hurt when people ask me this question and I keep wondering is it just because of the skin colour or are there any other signs. Have other people had this experience and what happens if the colours reversed white women and coloured child? Anyways AIBU or are people just being racist???

Maybe I'm behind the times, I always thought you called a black person a black person, not identify the person as brown/coloured?

You aren't behind times. You are correct. The other terms are outdated.

I am a white older mother with very dark hair and a very blond daughter (white). I'm quite sure some people don't assume she's mine sometimes. What would asking me be? ageist?

I've also been called mum to non related kids when I've had them with me - no problem.
why are you so desperate to claim racism over a reasonable question because you both look different?

See, I have mixed feelings about this. It is ignorant, perhaps, rather than racist, but I don't understand why people need to "understand the relationship". It's none of their damn business.
It's up there with mindless small-talk that people make about others having "only one child, oh what a shame" or asking women who don't have children when they're going to.

Why can't people just say "What a beautiful baby" or "You know, the park around the corner is great for kids" or something like that?

As Narnia said, it's unusual for very light skin to dominate over darker skin so it's unusual for children of mixed race to end up with "white" skin. Just as it's slightly less likely for a child of one brown eyed parent and one blue eyed parent to have blue eyes because brown eyes dominate. That's all this is, I would think.

If the situation was reversed and you were a white woman with a "coloured child" as you put it, then I would not be surprised because this would be the more usual outcome of a mixed race relationship. All the white women I know who are in mixed race relationships have children who are darker than them and have brown eyes. The black women I know who have mixed race children have children who are lighter than them but definitely not white.

So, it's a bit unusual. And interesting to people. And probably that's it.

SanityAssassin I dont want to "claim racism", i just want to know why people are asking me if i am my child's mother, if it happened once in a blue moon it would not bother me, but it is happening quite frequently, which is really annoying me now. If people were asking you this question almost everyday, would you be annoyed??

But it's not really unusual for light skin to contribute, is it?

It's common for children whose parents have different skin colours to be somewhere between their parents' skin tones.

It is a little more unusual for them to be as dark as the darker parent or as pale as the paler parent.

OK well people have said why they think people are asking. Sounds like you already know what you think.

I'm sure it's annoying to be asked a lot. But there's annoying and nosy and then there's racist. It's a big word to throw around when people are just making small talk.

Have other people had this experience and what happens if the colours reversed white women and coloured child?
Have other people had this experience and what happens if the colours reversed white women and coloured child?

No comment on whether it is racism, OP, but I am blonde with almost transparent skin and my dd was a dark baby, taking after her father. We live in Mexico City and I knew from the start that people would think I had kidnapped her, because there was an idea that children were being stolen by foreigners. Nobody ever said anything until after the earthquake, when in one month on two different occasions I was asked if she was an earthquake orphan.

No of course light skin contributes. But it doesn't usually dominate, does it? Genuine question. In my experience it doesn't. Most mixed race children will have skin somewhere on a spectrum between the darker and the lighter parent but not usually at the lightest end. That's all we are saying and I think that is what I've observed in the world. Certainly true in my family.

It's a big word to throw around when people are just making small talk.

Why?

Is it?

I'm white with brown children and get the same response so NO it's not racist.

I once got "what are your kids because they aren't all white" from a Pakistani woman. Blunt, overstepping maybe but not racist.

Racism to me is malicious intent. Questions and curiosity are not the same thing. Rude perhaps if taken that way but bit racist.

backing - yes, that's what I was saying?

Parents' skin colour rarely dominates. It's usually somewhere in between. So people who assume the OP couldn't possible have have a baby with a different skin colour either don't know that, or don't believe she could have had a relationship with a partner with a different skin colour.

Because they are making a pretty normal, acceptable assumption, based on what we normally observe. Nothing discriminatory in there. They may not be right. They may not be factoring in the more unusual genetic permutations that are possible but that's probably because they are just, eg, chatting at the school gate casually.

No it's not racism.
Just asking a question where the skin colour of the people involved is relevant, does not make the question inherently racist. Most people really don't understand genetics. My friend was often presumed to be a nanny or childminder as she was white but with dark hair and olive complexion, and her son was very white with ginger hair.

But, 'discriminatory' means making an assumption about difference, right?

These are not 'unusual' genetic permutations, either.

They're only unusual if you believe that people cannot have children with people from a different race.

It seems obvious to me that, if you make assumptions based on the belief that it is not natural or normal for people to have children outside their racial group, then you are being racist.

You may not realise you are doing or intending any harm, but you still need to examine your biases. It is perfectly natural for people of different races to have children. When they do, their children may not look as you expect - but that's your problem!

OK I'm confused. I think that dark skin dominates over white skin and brown eyes over blue eyes. Brown hair over blond hair. So although a mixed race baby will rarely be as dark as her darker parent (as you said) she will even more rarely be as white as her whiter parent. Is that correct? It's what I think but I don't know. It's true in my family as I've said and my mixed race family members are as dark as their darker parent.

I'm no geneticist though (!) so it may be that this is wrong. I know the eyes thing is right but I've assumed the skin thing through observation.

Either way, mixed race babies more usually look like a mix somewhere on the spectrum than like white babies, hence the OP's DC being a bit unusual.

Vlad " know it's not all racism but the idea of mixed relationships as something novel in this day and age is ridiculous."

Exactly. And what's with all the nosiness? If these people saw a same skin colour parent and child they wouldn't ask.

In general, I do find people ask hugely stupid questions in the name of small talk but it really isn't rocket science to stay away from this one. My best friend was frequently asked if she was adopted. I'm not asking anyone to have knowledge of genetics, I don't have any either. But they do need to quit with the nosey questions and if a mixed race relationship hasn't occurred to them - have they only recently arrived on the planet?

Op I don't blame you for saying "why do you ask". I would stick with that. It's polite but it alerts them to their lack of manners. Well, in some cases anyway - on the "where are you REALLY from" thread we had a few posters saying "yes I'm nosey, so what" so clearly some people are quite happy to be nosey.

LRD, but if the child doesn't look like the parent, then it's not racist to question the relationship surely?

I agree Lorelei - nosiness has a lot to answer for, although to be fair, small talk at the school gate is a nightmare as it is, so just another good reason to avoid!

I get this with my children, we are a right mixed bunch. Dh is dad to both my boys, one is blond haired, thin build, and blue eyes, the other is mid brown haired, built like a shit hoose and very tall, I'm ginger, dh skinny and brown haired.

We don't resemble each other at all.

People do associate family's with appearance, how many times do we say ah he looks like his mother, father, sister, and as horrible as it sounds OP, because you and your skin colour differ people will ask questions, however I don't think it's racism, I just don't think they engage the brain.

Noticing that one person has white skin and another has brown skin is not the same as displaying racism

Of course, but assuming a white-skinned baby can't have a brown-skinned mother, surely is?

Personally I think some on this thread are overestimating how much many people actually care.

If I saw a dark skinned woman with a very fair skinned baby - yes, I might assume the child wasn't hers. If I sat down and thought about it then of course i'm aware it's not impossible for a dark skinned woman to have a white baby. But generally, you don't see black women with white kids all that often - it's fairly rare for there to appear to be so startlingly a difference in race IME.

That doesn't mean i'm agonising over my thoughts or the woman's relationships or the finer points of the babies genes. It's a fleeting thought, maybe a clumsy question to mum if there's a conversation filler needed. That's it. In reality I don't actually care who parented the child.

backing - oh, I follow you now, I'm sorry!

I'm not a geneticist either, but I understand it's complex. But the issue is that, if people assume mixed race marriages are normal, they would not be shocked by a brown mother with a white child. Because it would be one possibility, and even though it is less likely that a white mother with a brown child, it should be an obvious possibility.

I think - and DP does do genetics and explained, but I'm not quite sure - that it varies depending on skin tone and other things. So, apparently, it is not very unlikely to find a combination of dark skin and green eyes. I grew up with Kashmiri- origin Brits who often had green eyes, too. Again, apparently there are certain sub-Saharan African genetic profiles that often predispose you to paler skin if you marry someone white. And I think there's a genetic group in the UK where they think that there's a latent genetic contribution from very dark-skinned people, from way back when, which could of course come out if those people married the right partners.

Yabu for using the word coloured ..THAT is racist. I'm "brown" as you put it and have a whiter than white son with bright blond hair and have never been questioned on whether he is my son or not, so yes it is ridiculous for people to ask but they aren't racist.

Omg no way racism. They glance and see a child that looks different to the adult. End of story. It's like you want it to be racist???
If I saw a white adult with a black child I'd probably assume it was a friend, family member, other parent, childminder. Both ways round.
It's a passing comment nothing more.
I'd laugh it off and say yes despite DC being much fairer, they are mine!

Snor, but loads of parents and kids don't look like each other. Why ask at all? Surely if you're chatting, details like "this is my daughter, my friends daughter, my niece, my charge and I'm the au pair" - these will all emerge without questions?