AIBU to asked if mixed race people are classified as BAME

[redskyatnight2020]

Not that I am pro labelling people but the way but obviously we are all classified by our ethnicity in statistics and health outcomes etc.
My children are mixed British/North African. Would they still be classed as BAME?

I only heard of BAme in the last couple of years and more on mumsnet really.

In terms of Obama and megan and people asking they are seen as black when the are 50 50, surely it's because their skin is black?!

Meghan and Obama are mixed race. That's it.

Surely you don't mean that literally, do you?

Why do people say someone's skin is black when they've probably never seen a literal black skinned person? I don't think that's what being "black" means though.

If Megan's skin is black, then my actual brown skin or Obama's or Michelle's is...well, non-existent.

@Ditheringdooley I am BAME. It came about in 2000 from the politicians when I googled it you was right.

I think when people use race terms it’s suppose to mean your actually race biologically other wise it becomes complex. Like your saying different shades of black and we wouldn’t know who is who. I do think you sort of need main umbrella terms just to distinguish and learn in a way.

FWIW I know a few people who's skin is literally black.

@Fressia123

Very interesting. I'm Mexican (so Hispanic/Latina) who's also Jewish (that its own can of worms). My children are half me half white British. I've always considered myself BAME and the same for my children because even though we don't look like the typical /more common British minorities they're still mixed and Hispanic/Latina is definitely its own ethnic group.

Whereas MIL (South American) never uses the term Hispanic/Latina and DH and his siblings consider themselves white (British father, brought up in UK), as does everyone they meet except the odd American. DH would tell a doctor his heritage if it was relevant but no-one else.

Zadie Smith writes about this in Swing Time. The African characters think the mixed race Brits are 'American'. The mixed race Brit thinks the Brazilian is white. The Brazilian thinks of himself as black.

Race is a manmade concept to other the people we see as threats. Someone Hispanic is so unusual and exotic in the UK they don't need to be othered but in the US they do because there are lots of people from South America in the US.

Humanities disciplines actually reject the term 'race' because it implies a biological difference that doesn't exist. We use the term 'ethnicity ' instead.

Mixed ethnicity is just that regardless of skin tone. Black is black, white is white.

"Why do people say someone's skin is black when they've probably never seen a literal black skinned person?"

What do you mean never seen a black skinned person? Of course people have seen a black skinned person. There are different shades of black. You dont have to be the blackest of black, to be black.

OP's question uses the passive voice, asking whether people like her kids "are classified" as BAME, kind of implying that there's an objectively correct answer, or at least that there's, somewhere out there, an official BAME adjudicator whose job it'll be to pass judgement, but I don't really think there is here.

North African people whose recent ancestry is on the Med coast [most of them] can in most cases easily pass for someone whose ancestry is on the other side of the Med [e.g. Greece or wherever]. The offspring of someone like that & a white British person, well, they're clearly not B or A, I suppose they might, by some people including themselves, be classified as 'ME', but I'm not sure.

Geography does in a few cases throw up certain 'bright lines', e.g. if all of a person's ancestry going back 500 years is say Australian, or sub saharan African, they'll usually look a certain, easily recoginsable, way, but north africa isn't on any particular side of any such 'bright line', & a White British parent makes things even less clear-cut.

They would be classed as BAME.

@Orchidsindoors

"Why do people say someone's skin is black when they've probably never seen a literal black skinned person?"

What do you mean never seen a black skinned person? Of course people have seen a black skinned person. There are different shades of black. You dont have to be the blackest of black, to be black.

I could be widely assuming here but what I think you mean is different shades of brown.

Just like most white people don't have literal white skin.

Point is if you think Megan's skin is (a different shade of) black, then we must have a different colour black in mind.

Interesting to think DD could identify/be identified as white or Mediterranean but would/should still classify as white/black for health reasons. I'm "50/50" black and white so she maybe has a wider nose, tanned skin and loosely curly hair and her dad it white British so she also has light eyes for now (not sure what colour, grey/green?).

Also in the case of things like programs/scholarships for BAME people she should be eligible, right?

This was my question on the thread that got deleted about the advert for legal apprenticeships that were only for male black people. For some reason, after nearly 24 hours and I think around 650 comments, MN decided the OP was "goady".

Anyway, I made the point that if you restrict a job to black males (or females), how do you deal with mixed race applicants and how do you decide who is dark enough to qualify?

While writing this I've also thought about black trans men applying but lets not go there

I find the box ticking really tedious. Ethnically, I am mixed white British and Irish but so many forms make you choose one or the other. Surely there are millions of people like me in the UK who are ethnically both? I can imagine it's 100 times worse if you are mixed race/skin colour.

A different colour black in mind? You pop out with the skin tone your DNA dictates! It doesn't change your ethnicity.

I agree. Didn't say it did. You must have read my post differently.