‘If you look white, then you are white’- what is this now?!

[OwlBeThere]

I’ll start this by saying this is a conversation I had on tiktok. Yes,it’s mostly younger people on that app, but there is also some fantastic political discourse and discussion around linguistics which is my field so that’s what I use it for.

I am mixed race. My mother is Asian (Japanese), my dad is Welsh. I have the kind of skin that is very pale until I see the sun then I tan quickly. I don’t ‘look’ very obviously Asian, I suppose. I do have very straight, very dark hair from my mother, and I do have a relatively flat bridge to my nose. In my welsh village where I was raised from age 4 (born in Japan, moved to Denmark when I was 2, then to wales) I was ‘that Chinese kid’ a lot in the 80s, I had my share of casual racism thrown my way. I speak Japanese, welsh and English.
All that backstory is just to explain why I was completely baffled when in a discussion around racism I was told that because my ‘phenotype’ is white and I’m ‘white passing’ then I am white and have no business taking part in a discussion on racism as I’ve ‘probably never experienced it’.
Many people ask me my heritage, so I think it’s pretty clear to most people that I’m mixed in some way because otherwise they wouldn’t ask, right?
Have any other people mixed race people come across this as a thing? This phenotype argument that appears to negate half of my family?!

Xenia again makes an interesting point I was talking to one of my sons about it yesterday in the light of the comments that someone made in the press that it was wrong Prince P's family were white/the funeral guests were white. Well he was white.

I've seen these type of comments too and again, I find them borderline racist. To suggest that it is somehow racist to have a family of one racial origin and to invite them to a family event is so nonsensical that it makes a mockery of racial discrimination laws.

To me, it seems part of an overriding desire on the part of some people to label being white as being racist in itself. Ironically, as a mixed race Asian/white person, I am aware that due to ignorance, this might lead some people to label me as a white and therefore "part of the problem".

Crazy times, and this type of anti-white casual racism (and stereotyping of any other people who can supposedly "pass white") needs to be tackled as much as any other type of racism.

@circlewithincircles I don't think it is anti-white racism to be honest.
Both because, according to most definitions of racism, you cant be racist against the majority power (so it would be prejudice at most) but also because I think that misunderstands some of the reasons behind the language used at the moment. For one thing, of course "white people" have had a key part to play in privilege and racism (as DeeDeeCherry said). But for another, if you want lots of people to buy your book about racism, you need to put "white" in the title, because that encourages more white people (the majority in the UK and US) to buy it and the publishers will sell more. Selling a lot of books is very important to publishers, reaching a large audience is generally important to authors. Therefore you see an explosion in books with titles such as "white tears, black scars", "white feminism" etc etc. Thats NOT to say that those books arent important, or that the authors are wrong in the points they make. But to people who arent that engaged with that world, it can look suddenly as if there are a lot of books "attacking" whiteness specifically. Thats not whats going on. 1. The books are addressing racism so of course they are going to mention race; 2. the titles that seem provocative are actually designed to make (liberal) white people read them.
I probably havent described that very well but it certainly isnt a plot to label white people as racist.

Unfortunately, it DOES mean that to the over-enthusiastic/less smart people of the internet mixed race people's very real experiences of racism can be ignored. I dont think thats the fault of the authors of books mentioned, or anti-racism campaigners though. I also don't think that "tackling anti-white racsim" is a hill Im willing to sit on TBH.

@AlexaShutUp

Yanbu at all, OP. Of course your heritage is important, regardless of what you look like.

My dd is mixed race (50% white, 50% South Asian). I think it's pretty obvious to most people, but we occasionally encounter some people who are surprised to find that she isn't white. Fortunately, she has not experienced a great deal of racism herself but she is hyperaware of it as an issue because she has seen her dad's experience of it on many occasions.

The "white passing" thing is interesting. For some people, I think white is just so much the default that they just don't notice the evidence of other ethnicities unless it's really, really obvious. Others are much more aware and identify mixed heritage quite easily. Meghan Markle is a good example of this - there are so many people who claim not to have realised that she was mixed race, even when it's blindingly obvious to others.

I was furious when she was younger, and a white acquaintance commented that she "could almost pass as one of us". I told him that she was "one of us", whatever that was supposed to mean. Silly fuckwit.

I think I read that Meghan Markle had plastic surgery on her nose, she straightens her hair as well so I think that might give mixed signals. My DD is mixed race and very like MM but she hasn't had her nose done but she does straighten her hair. It does make a difference as her natural hair does change her look, well obviously or she wouldn't do it.

When I say she straightens her hair to change her look I don't mean it is to do with identifying or not identifying with being mixed race but she obviously likes straight hair or she wouldn't spend the time and money doingit.

One reason I am not too happy with all the breaking people down into categories going on at present, as well as it divides not unites us, is what we were taught at school about the awful way people were split into groups and allowed to do XYZ, go to certain clubs in South Africa for mixed race or only for whites but not blacks and all the different categories of people. It was so divisive now and so it is today.

Whilst watching out for racism I do think we do with being more colour blind for the good of unity and try to treat everyone equally.

If one woman wants to change how she looks and another doesn't - that all is all fine with me. I don't wear make up and I like my freckles. Other people do wear it and some want to cover over freckles and keep out of sun. We are all different. I particularly don't want young teenage girls to feel they have to alter how they look if they don't want to - even in the 1970s we were doing things ilike not shaving under arms if we didn't feel like it. It is our bodies whether white or black or anything else. More tolerance of different views and less shouting that there is one right way to be would be a good thing.

And no my ancestors were not full of white power. They were down the coal mines aged 10 years old, white and poor as church mice just about to a man back to at least the 1700s, suffering famine in Ireland and I presume masses of them died so no I take no personal responsibility at all for whether a white or a black slave master took any action. All I can do is make sure every day I try to treat everyone as kindly and fairly as I can and avoid breaching UK discrimination law which includes discrimination against whites as much as blacks. As well as discrimination on grounds of sex - again that is the law.

you cant be racist against the majority power

The majority power is not white in every country

Thats not whats going on. 1. The books are addressing racism so of course they are going to mention race; 2. the titles that seem provocative are actually designed to make (liberal) white people read them

This doesn't make any sense. Nobody is going to buy a book just by looking at the title. They will read what it's about before buying it

@Xenia no is asking you take personal responsibility for things you weren’t alive for. What you’re being asked to take responsibility for is the advantage being white affords you now. White privilege doesn’t mean all white people have lived charmed lives, just that their struggles are not due to skin colour.

@mustlovegin that is true, but even in countries where white is not the majority there has often been an imbalance in their favour. Look at South Africa, Zimbabwe.
I don’t subscribe to the notion you can’t be racist to white people btw, it just isn’t often the case that quite people suffer systemic racism. Which is a different thing.

you cant be racist against the majority power

Also the majority power doesn't necessarily mean at a 'society' or 'country level'. It can mean a group of four people of a specific race on a deserted street against one person of a different race approaching them (who, in that particular situation will be the minority).

@mustlovegin of course people read books based on the title alone. Moreover, the title piques your interest enough to find out what the books about.

there has often been an imbalance in their favour

True. But reality is also dynamic and the situation at present in some places may be completely different to what happened in the past.

I am white (fair skin, bottle blonde highlights) and my partners’ Asian, we gave two mixed race children. The eldest has olive skin, dark brown hair and eyes and mostly you wouldn’t assume an Asian heritage on first glance. His brother has slightly darker skin colouring and striking brown eyes and black hair.

We were walking today and a woman stopped to talk. The was admiring my youngest son and gushing how lovely he was. After five minutes of her fussing over him she turns to me and asks “is he yours....?’’

It’s a harmless comment, but I’ve been asked that several times in his two years of life. Never with my eldest.

@Ytrigging

I got another stupid comment like this yesterday. Apparently, because I'm not Muslim, I should not present myself as a native Arabic speaker. I am a native Arabic speaker. Since reading this thread I am noticing how much people police other people's identities more and more and are extrememly unhappy with people who don't fit into their framework of the world. I find it off that it is mostly young, liberal people who talking about being kind and embracing minorities who do this. When did it start?

This to a large extent seems to come out of the business around appropriation. If you don't have a "right" to speak that language, or wear that outfit, to do so is, in this thinking, racist.

I have a beautiful outfit from Vietnam one of my children was given as a gift, which has been outgrown for some time now. I've been thinking of passing it on to my nephew. We have no connection to Vietnam at all however - what will people say or think? It's such a waste and there is no gain for anyone in terms of acceptance, justice, or what have you.

OwlBeThere I agree with many of your views. But I'm also trying to mention some points which seem to be overlooked as the rhetoric on some of these issues appears to be so rigid

liberal people

They don't seem very 'liberal' to me

Owl, I agree. Everyone has some advantage over someone else so if all of us can be kind to others (my only instruction to my twins when they went to university) that is probably one of the best things we can do in life. Those with a lot of power in any community mostly do know that comes with responsibility.

I avoid the use of the word "liberal" in these contexts as again it seems to divide not unite people and has different meanings to different people. I support the UK Equality Act 2010 (never mind the original 1970 Act) - I was born before that one.

Smoked that is one of the things which changes with the times I suppose - the clothing. There is a picture of my granny in the 1920s after she came back from working as a servant in India (1921-1922) (she was white and about 50% Irish and certainly no privileged in most senses of the word). It was a fancy dress thing at the church and she is wearing a sari. I am absolutely certain she was not being racist in the 1920s given how appalled she was as a Catholic in India to see if she sat on a bench with the child she looked after if an Indian or anyone else not white was sitting with their child they got up as there was some kind of apartheid even there she said. Today you need to be a lot more careful about dressing up like that. On the other hand I have the muslim clothes I was given for 2 business trips to Iran and required to wear as soon as I got to the air port on my first trip - they sent me off immediately to put it all one as it is legal requirement there. I have no so far met a client off a plane at Heathrow and given them English appropriate clothing to wear before they leave the departure hall...... Anyway all we can do is try to be good to others as much as we can and not put our foot in it too often. There is obviously a balance that we do have our freedoms here in the UK which I do not want curtailed . Most people who come here like those freedoms but we need to keep a watch to make sure those are not chipped away... mind you the biggest breaches of our freedoms in the UK since at least 1945 if not longer - to leave the house, to meet friends have been removed in the last year - we were not even allowed to sing at my daughter's wedding last weekend - so perhaps the UK is much less free than some other places now. Enough - I have gone off topic far too much and am putting off starting work.

And by “white” I mean the ethnicity not the skin colour. I’m aware that skin colour does not equate to ethnicity. Which is why I’m irritated that you misquoted me.

Corona I see you're still puzzled and disputing the existence of mixed race Asian people. You really don't like us, do you? What a disgustingly bitchy post?

Are you going to claim to be a victim again? It's all me, me, me......

@CirclesWithinCircles

Corona I see you're still puzzled and disputing the existence of mixed race Asian people. You really don't like us, do you? What a disgustingly bitchy post?

Are you going to claim to be a victim again? It's all me, me, me......

Where am I disputing the existence of mixed race people? Where do I say I dislike mixed race people? This is the problem with this thread. Any disagreement at all with the OP or with you means I dislike ALL mixed race people. Or else don’t believe they exist.

Reported several of your posts for being racist Corona. This is disgusting to read on here.

@CirclesWithinCircles

Reported several of your posts for being racist Corona. This is disgusting to read on here.

Very hard to have any discussion with that approach.

Think indirect racism Xenia, with the same remarks being repeated over and over again for no discernable useful purpose.