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I live on the border of a city/suburbia catchment and I take dc to a little village type school. DH is mixed race, he was born in UK and so was his mother. Dad is from the West Indies.
I have been asked a few times from other mothers down the school 'where is dh from?'
I always reply in UK which is about five miles from the village school. I know full well they are inquiring which country does his dark skin come from but I deliberately say UK, just to see them get flustered.
A mother said to me' yes, I know that, but where is he from orginally'.
Seriously, I don't know how much I can take of this backward little town. AIBU, dh has a strong southern accent, so whats with the stupid questions and more importantly what has it got to do with them?

i have an unuasual name, so people ask me about it, so i dont have the irritation of people asking me where I come from (am british born and bred, but dad is north african).

however, i am proud of my parentage, and wouldnt want to avoid giving out this info to interested/ interesting people that i meet.

i think that there must be a more PC way of asking about ethnic origin, though..hmm... would it be ok if someone asked what his 'ethnic orgin' was? god, no that sounds awful!

i know that some people can be prejudiced and flat footed, but surely your dp is proud of his roots, so why not just tell people?

Message withdrawn

They're only interested FFS.

Of course he's proud, but some of these parents I don't speak to, so without me getting a 'hello, which class is your Dc in? Blah, blah, blah. I am greeted with 'so where is you husband from?'
It is a predominately white area, but I feel like I'm going back in time.
I'm from London, so am not use to dh's colour being a start up for a conversation.

YANBU. I have plenty of black/Asian friends who reply to the same question with the same answer.

'Where are you from?'
'Urm, Deptford.'

etc etc

The point is@schmu - I am white and also have roots in another country, but nobody asks me where I am from. They only ever want to know where DH (black, born and bred Londoner) is from. Thats the point.

Although granted, it doesn't happen that often in north London.

Oh lord, I once asked a friend where he was from and he was really offended. I had to explain that he sounded posher than coming from round the corner from me, as he went to a Grammar school!

Btw, I wouldn't say it is a huge deal for my DH/kids, but it is interesting and if it happened all the time (if, say, we also lived in a small village) I could see patience wearing thin fairly quickly.

lol Hawkmoth

YANBU

I would find it annoying it this what the only type of communication they had with you. They could at least do the general chit chat before being so flaming rude!

I get really hacked off with this response "what is XX's heritage (!)" "Manchester" - If I'm asking it's because I'm interested or trying to make conversation in the playground - I'm just being polite not bring racist!

being
annoying to make typo whilst ranting.

XH used to get this question all the time and he'd always say 'Bristol'.

Got even funnier when we'd go to the U.S. and people tried to refer to him as 'African-American'....um...not African, and certainly not American!

I can appreciate people being interested, but it's not a great conversation starter. YANBU for expecting people to see your DS as a child first, rather than immediately focusing on his skin colour.

oops, I think I misread the original post! But same goes for your DH, he's a person first!

YANBU. There's nothing wrong with being interested, but I can understand you being irritated at the lack of social skills.

I live in an an area where there are very few black/asian people, but wouldn't start a conversation like this, seems a bit it's just something that you would mention after getting to know someone a little.

'Heritage' is slightly better than 'where are you from?'

If I feel the need to ask I usually say 'where are your family originally from'. I do get some (hmm) when I do but that usually softens when I explain its because my OH's family is from the same country.

i.e. I am am sking beicaus I already gensuspect where they are from and I am just checking.

There then follows a lengthy conversation about where, when, if I know old Mrs so and so and what my MIL maiden name is etc. Its a small place!

But YANBU if people ask in that odd way that they do sometimes. But YABU if they are being genuine. Only you can tell

I usually get asked where I/my DH is from - but it's always because of the surname - but there's no way on gods earth that with my DS's first names,and our surname that we're all British born and bred