AIBU to not know what box to tick?

[MiddleClassProblem]

Filling out DD nursery application and there’s that question I dreaded question asking you to tick the ethnicity. I have a hard enough time figuring out what box to tick for myself being from a mixed raced ethnicity on one side and a British ethnicity in the other. But DD is even the next generation of that again with DH being British and me being a whatever I am.

Short of tracing all the different branches of a mixed family tree or doing one of those dna test that may not be that accurate, I feel a bit confused. And it doesn’t help that different forms have different box options so you can go in looking for the one you thought might be you last time and it’s not there.

Does anyone else dread these boxes? What do you tick if you come from a mixed parent, you’re mixed British and then have a child who is a bit you with British? Do you just tick the same as you?

Also don’t know how much of a difference it makes that she is white and I’m not. It’s such a mine field!

How do I know what ethnicities she most identifies with if she’s 3?

I do celebrate the main 3 cultures but not saints days (I mean not many celebrate saint George’s) or politics but I do cook foods and have things like games we were brought up with, words, clothes from each of those cultures.

FreudianSlurp yes, even if she’s correct she doesn’t have a right to input your data if without your permission

Surely “British” is not an ethnicity though OP, it is a nationality.

I tick “prefer not to say”, partly because I do prefer not to say, but also because I’m mostly white British with some white other, with some black African (seven generations back). I look white, unsurprisingly, but technically I’m mixed.

British is an option under white.

It feels odd putting her under white but I guess she is but she definitely has other cultures in her life.

I have the same problem!

I think, with the greatest respect to other posters on this thread, if you haven't experienced this you don't know how agonising this stuff can be.

My dad is Indian but with some mixed ancestry (family are anglo-Indian with some managlorean Catholic) but to all intents and purposes is a visibly brown guy who was born in India and moved here when he was 5. He ticks "British Asian". I tick mixed white and Asian. I am pretty white passing by the way.

I agonised about this for years like "aaaah but I think I am more like 55-60% white" but they are not asking about exact percentages, those forms are about what your lived experience is. Personally, my experience is to have grown up with one white parent and one brown parent: that's what they're asking about so that's why I tick mixed. (I would never deny I benefit from white privilege in a way my dad does not. )

My partner is white. My son looks white. I can't even remember what the midwife ticked on the form when I was born because I was whacked out on epidural when she asked me - I think I gave a rambly explanation about the entire family and left it up to her. Essentially though my son will have the experience of having two white parents (although one of Russian Jewish descent and one white-passing Anglo-Indian) so "white" is more accurate for him than it was for me. But it does still feel like it's erasing his history.

You're talking about her great grandparents races, not hers. She's at least 3/4 white british.

add your own box

Then they are not gathering data correctly, as you do not have to be white to be British. I would leave it blank and tell them why.

DH is mixed Asian and white. I'm white British. I say our children are mixed race even though they don't look it.

draw your own box to tick and put whatever, human etc next to it.

I feel the same with questions about Religion

I think you’ve had some really unhelpful responses here, OP.
I can’t speak from personal experience, but thought of this: www.elleuk.com/life-and-culture/news/a26855/more-than-an-other/

Pistachiois50pmore I think I’m just a brown version of you lol. AI culture is the confusing part and many people do t understand it as it’s a mixed raced culture. We have Indian British and Portuguese as our main cultures. I don’t feel right denying any of them for myself but Dd is one drop down.

I have no idea what DF puts on his form. Apparently when my brother went to tick white British but my mum had to point out that he wasn’t. He’s darker than me! But he he doesn’t connect with his other ethnicities as I do other than when complaining he got mistaken for an Uber driver.

I doubt anyone is completely English/British or whatever. I'd say I'm white British but if I account for generations past I'm Russian, Irish, Scottish etc etc. I don't think it really matters.

Nationality is tricky too. If one parent is Irish and the other Japanese, with a baby born in the UK, what do you put?

What if both parents are Romanian but their child was born here and will always live here? My friends put Romanian because it seemed bizarre to them that they could have a British child. But when he is 35 and has grown up and always lived here, will he then put British?

AuntyElle thank you for that article. I’ll read it after my massage (DD is driving cars on my back).

And YY to not having to be whit to be British. They have British + another culture but if you’re my brother your just identify as British.

I tick mixed for my son who is 1/4 black but looks white...I did wonder what to tick myself when he was first born (I'm mixed, his father white british) but then I realised that I would hate to erase such an important part of his heritage!

Tawdrylocalbrouhaha great examples

Hummingbirdmama yes that’s it, it feels like you’re denying the culture. And DD definitely is a part of the culture via her favourite grandparent

And me obvs

OP - ha! I feel you. Plus you can never get a straight answer out of an anglo-Indian because I think even in the community people find it confusing! Plus there's an older generation who think it means "white British from the Raj"...and where does the term Eurasian fit in!?!?!

My sister (half-sister on my dad's side, different white mums) is as dark as my dad. It's a funny thing, genetics. A mixed couple could have 10 kids and they'd all look different.

This article on growing up Anglo-Indian is great: www.gal-dem.com/sorry-label-expired-growing-anglo-indian/

And I also liked this on being biracial when it's not immediately obvious: medium.com/human-parts/coming-out-as-biracial-c25d6ae8f2af

You're massively overthinking this OP.

I'm mixed race - my father is mixed Indian/African and my mother is mixed White/Asian. I tick either 'other', 'mixed other' or I just leave it blank.

It's not a big deal!

Anyone know why this question is required?

Surely it's potentially discriminatory. Anyway I thought this type of question was only relevant to the census form.

I am not in UK, but I have never heard of this type of granularity being required for a nursery place anywhere, and I would object to answering it quite frankly!

Thank you. You e given me plenty of reading for bed! I’m so grateful to hear from people in similar situations particularly Anglo-Indian or similar mixed cultures backgrounds. My dad looks very dark, he doesn’t look particularly Indian. No idea where people assume he’s from. I get assumed as Spanish, Lebanese, Egyptian, Indian and mixed race Black, mostly by people from those cultures.