With comments on my baby's skin colour?

[MrsNjie]

So I'm White British and my husband is Black African. We've recently had a baby and during pregnancy I received constant comments such as "your baby will be beautiful" "oh mixed race babies are so gorgeous".
Now he's here we get "your baby is very white" "I love his colour" "I wonder if his colour will change" and so on.

AIBU to find this very strange and a bit rude? As if all babies are not beautiful because they're just white or just black? Would you comment on a child's skin colour who wasn't mixed? I can't get my head around the obsession.

You ought to see some of the posts on 'NotAlwaysRight'. Mostly Americans, who think a dark mother is either the child's nanny, or has kidnapped it.

On a separate note; not to derail the thread too much but had Michelle Obama been a white woman, Barack wouldn't have had the same reception he did among the African American community. And indeed Zoe Saldana playing Nina Simone was such a naked piss-take I refused to even watch the biopic on ethical grounds.

MrsDV I largely agree with you whenever these type of threads pop up. I find that we're often repeating the same arguments again and again c.f the one about hair and the other one about cultural appropriation. There needs to be a serious seismic wave of a change in thinking.

It's only recently that for example my black colleagues are wearing their natural hair with no fucks given. Or indeed black women have started to pursue white men with no fucks given because it's just a man they love but on a deeper level, perhaps they feel they'd be more acceptable to 'white' society with a little light skinned child in tow along with a white husband.

It goes back to this idea of 'forbidden' fruit. Black men in society have to be excellent to be considered excellent. A mediocre white male is already privileged to infinity. There is a reason why for example Lewis Hamilton is so recognised and praised - yes he's an excellent F1 racer but how many other people that look like LH are to be found in F1? or indeed Usain Bolt or indeed why even someone like Kwasi Kwarteng is one of the most, if not the most, prominent black conservative male politician. An Eton > Cambridge > Harvard graduate. Anyone with any modicum of ethnicity has to be absolutely 'brilliant' to succeed. If Boris Johnson was black the world would have turned itself upside down trying to get rid of him.

Whilst we're here look at the singer Rihanna. She can't even carry a tune in a wheelbarrow. But lo... she has light skin and green eyes. Hence all her success.

Look at the disparity between the marketing contracts tennis players such as Sharapova and Serena Williams have received. Serena could win against Maria whilst sleeping. But Sharapova has made more money from advertisement/endorsements than Williams.

When Meghan and Harry got engaged there was a series of threads on MN in which I thought I'd end up getting banned because I was calling people all sorts of names because of their opinions on this 'union'.

Race is still an issue. The lucky ones are successful; the other ones are treated with scorn and suspicion. And those of us that manage to be mixed race are lucky too. We're the acceptable face of being 'ethnic'.

People are just weird.
Im mixed & v dark.
My eldest is dark skinned & hair like me. My middle is blonde with green eyes like her dad.
When they were younger & I had them in dbl buggy people would always ask if she was mine.
If people looked beyond the colour of their skin my eldest may have my colouring but looks much more like her dad. Whereas her sister has her dad's colouring but looks more like me.

Dextro I would have replied "oh yes, you got me there, I wonder whatever shall I do about it"

newyear whilst I don't think its always racist or even rude to comment on a darker baby's appearance I don't think you should be explaining racism to people.
Most of us are aware of what it is thanks.
And people are dealing with 'micro racism' everyday even if they are not getting called N**r in the street

I don't have a problem with people pointing out how awesome my kids are but I am not ok with them cooing over the combination of dark skin, blue eyes, 'good' hair and even 'fine' features.

Because that isn't saying 'your children are beautiful', that is saying 'your children aren't black enough to be ugly but have the right mix of features to be deemed attractive in a racist society'
My children have different levels of the 'right' features. My baby with the afro hair and flat bridge to his nose is as beautiful as my baby with wavy hair and a button nose.

I am not going to put up with the idea that one is better than the other.

Read Vlad's post. She has explained why these things matter.

Hadron I literally didn't know what to say, it's rare for me to be speechless but I couldn't think of anything. I just mumbles erm I am ok with my 3 thanks.

DH is a very dark skinned celt and I am very pale, DS takes after his dad, DD me. There are 15 months between them. More than one person has asked me if they have the same father. The cheeky twats.

People do comment in my children’s skin colour but I think that’s more to do with how polar opposite they are. I have two very very dark featured and olive skinned children and one whose so white she’s blue with bright blue eyes and auburn hair.

I have one paler than a milk bottle and one who is a deep olive. People always comment as both me and DH are very pale. "If she didn't look so much like her Daddy?you'd def wonder..." was my fave.
No offence was intended and none taken. My girls are both beautiful in their own unique ways. Take as a compliment even if a little clumsy in its delivery

Oh wow I work with a guy who is black and his wife is white. Their children are actually beautiful. We had a discussion recently about mixed race children and I mentioned that his are gorgeous. Hardly think I'm racist calling his children beautiful. I generally do think mixed race children are gorgeous. I went to school with girls whose dad was from Hong Kong and whose mum was western white and they were all model gorgeous (their modelling agencies obviously agreed )

I think we're too quick to call racist on people. Nobody is being mean or bad spirited and it takes away from genuine racism

Comments do focus on the unexpected. DH and I are both brown eyed. I have two blue eyed children.
More than one stranger has said DH is not the father. Out and out said that . Both of us are assumed to be white British when people meet us.
I can only imagine the shite directed where the ignorance extends to the ignorance directed at skin colours etc

Obviously YANBU to be miffed as that is your right. However, as some posters have said, people ALWAYS comment on babies. Whether they are ginger, small, chubby, not walking at one year old, not talking at 3, being very pale, etc etc... So I think you are maybe a tad over sensitive. Especially as most people mean no harm by it.

I do get that constantly hearing it may be a bit annoying though. Don't know why people feel the need to say it to people with mixed race children.

I know someone whose husband gets comments several times a WEEK from May to October, about his very pale skin (he is Irish.. born in the north of England, but has Irish parents who moved there before he was born,) and she gets really upset at the constant 'what's wrong with him, why is he so pale, is he ill, he needs to get a TAN' comments.

So yeah, I get that it may be annoying to hear 'your mixed race baby is going cute etc...' I don't get why it's insulting though. Sorry to be ignorant and I have never had to go through hearing it, but I don't get how 'mixed race babies/people are gorgeous' is an insult.

I mean 'your pasty faced husband needs a tan, he looks ill' is rude (and she and he hear it 2 dozen times every summer!) but I don't get why 'mixed race people are very attractive' is insulting.

No offence intended. JMHO.

I agree with @poughkeepskiegirl

I know a number of mixed race/mixed colour people (and children) and they are full-on stunning, like proper, proper beautiful. I don't think it's racist to say that.

YANBU- it could be worse......

My youngest DC is very white, with very light brown hair in spite of my mixed colouring and my husbands naturally tanned skin-both of us very dark haired. I have had tons of "jokey" comments about 'who's the daddy' 'visiting the milkman' etc.
I find it uncomfortable but it's obviously very upsetting for my husband! I genuinely wonder if all the comments make him doubt me sometimes.

Our children are a quarter Indian. Once in the summer, I was in the supermarket with my first child and a lady came and said- to the baby- “ooh somebody’s Mummy’s left him out in the sun too long!”

FFS, to make matters worse, said child is also a girl

I really didn’t know where to start, but actually just walked off.

That mixed race babies being beautiful thing Is incredibly rude and insensative. You might as well say” black skin is ok once it’s diluted isn’t it”.

But weirdly enough I think some white people say things like that to show they are not racist. As if by mentioning the skin in a positive( albeit objectifying) way, they are saying they welcome a mixed race baby. I think most people are not being sly, and don’t mean to be offensive, but for some reason have no idea what a complex and stormy area it is.

@ohyesiam

That mixed race babies being beautiful thing Is incredibly rude and insensitive. You might as well say” black skin is ok once it’s diluted isn’t it”.

Rubbish!

And if we are going to go down THAT road...

Why not say, 'white skin is better once it's darkened up?'

It's no more insulting to black people than it is to white people, to say mixed race people are attractive.

My DS is mixed race. I’m sorry but no- not all mixed race people/ children are beautiful. I’ve seen some not so pretty ones and beautiful ones.

My DDs are mixed race. They are beautiful, they do have gorgeous colored skin. I don’t mind when people comment on how lovely they are, it’s true!

My husband and my children are mixed race, and I am a freckly white skinned ginge.

We all have very different skin tones from each other, and hair colours. I think our variance is perfectly lovely and I find us all fascinating so I'm not surprised if others do too.

Biology is brilliant.

I think on the whole a lot of people talk a lot of crap, particularly when it comes to babies. The usual etiquette seems to abandoned and it is a free for all to comment on the baby's appearance. I don't think it's racism do much as sheer lack of respect for babies and children in the British culture.

After my baby was born (he was about two weeks) we were talking about how beautiful he was to the nurse and got told "now you have to be prepared for the fact his skin color will get darker as he gets on older" I was

We get comments like that from family in the same way as he has your nose or his hair is just like yours type comments.

Problem is, these comments aren't said in a vacuum so it's not surprising that people wonder if there's a racist undertone to them.

And even if you do find mixed people attractive/ mixed children beautiful, I'd find it strange to comment on it to their faces, particularly without a relevant context.

My DD is mixed and I've had weird comments, so I agree people make such ignorant and often racist comments. I've had "oh but she's not that dark" when talking about my DD's ethnicity (like I should hide it)