The son of a white mother and a black father, President Barack Hussein Obama marked “Black, African Am., or Negro” on his 2010 Census form. In case you had any doubts. [NYT]
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fredo777
what is this, a late April Fool’s?
fredo777
also, One-Drop Rule.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One-drop_rule
tjr101
Gasp! Shocker! He’s been doing this his whole life, what’s the news here?
fuzz
I thought those things were supposed to be confidential…
tjr101
@fuzz: Apparently when you’re president nothing is confidential when it comes to personal matters.
Tackle
How is this news or surprising? He’s been saying this way before he got elected.
Sexy Rexy
@fredo777: The “One-Drop Rule” is one of the most idiotic traditions the US has. It should be banned.
fredo777
@Sexy Rexy: “should be”, but hasn’t been.
Luxury
It’s official… I hate Queerty… *sigh*
Sexy Rexy
@fredo777: Fredo777 – I have three white great-great grandparents, why can’t I be white LOL?
fredo777
@Sexy Rexy: you can be whatever you want to be, sweetheart. ; }
Sexy Rexy
@fredo777: Okay, I am Swedish!!!
Thanks :)..great minds think alike.
D'oh, The Magnificent
Interracial issues are often difficult to address in the U.S. given our racial history. How is it handled in places like Latin America and Europe?
Chitown Kev
@D’oh, The Magnificent:
Well, in Brazil and most of Latin America it is far more complicated than it is here.
http://encyclopedia.jrank.org/articles/pages/6027/Brazilian-Racial-Formations.html
In Europe, you do have the “white-black” thing ana the issue with Arabs but you also have the classifications of “white people” to deal with. Think of the treatment of the Roma in may parts of eastern Europe and even the treatment of Eastern Europeans (East of….say, Germany) in Western Europe.
afrolito
What a stupid story to post.
Barack Obama is the textbook definition of african american, since he is the son of a white american, and an african. Get it? African-American. Not that complicated, and it has nothing to do with the one drop rule, since he couldn’t pass for a white man if he tried.
fredo777
@afrolito: The story, I gather, is not so much about whether Barack could “pass” as white as much as the fact that he is part white + only listed himself as black.
shrimpton "princess" johnson
fredo777, you are correct.
queerty would like to create more fake controversy by baiting their racially conservative readership to gratuitous anger, inappropriate dispesct and laughable, ultimately tragic expressions of sub-conscious cultural resentment and misplaced JEALOUSY(!) .
the politics espoused on this site are as murky and confused as the copy editing of its own tortured, bratty headlines…
queerty readers: this site holds its own readership in contempt.
shrimpton "princess" johnson
disrespect
Sexy Rexy
@fredo777: That’s what I got out of it too, Fredo…’cause he sure did use his ‘white’ side of his family history to get white people to vote for him.
fredo777
@Sexy Rexy: Yet, if he had listed himself as White, he would have still been correct. Partly. Just as he’s partly correct in saying that he’s Black. He is black. He is White. Not sure why (or even if) he didn’t list himself as multi-racial, but I suppose the census is meant to be confidential.
Mara
Recently, I found the 2010 Census form hanging on my door. As I began filling it out, I came across a dilemma. The U.S. government wants to know if my children are adopted or not and it wants to know what our races are. Being adopted myself, I had to put “Other” and “Don’t Know Adopted” for my race and “Other” and “Don’t Know” for my kids’ races.
Can you imagine not knowing your ethnicity, your race? Now imagine walking into a vital records office and asking the clerk for your original birth certificate only to be told “No, you can’t have it, it’s sealed.”
How about being presented with a “family history form” to fill out at every single doctor’s office visit and having to put “N/A Adopted” where life saving information should be?
Imagine being asked what your nationality is and having to respond with “I don’t know”.
It is time that the archaic practice of sealing and altering birth certificates of adopted persons stops.
Adoption is a 5 billion dollar, unregulated industry that profits from the sale and redistribution of children. It turns children into chattel who are re-labeled and sold as “blank slates”.
Genealogy, a modern-day fascination, cannot be enjoyed by adopted persons with sealed identities. Family trees are exclusive to the non-adopted persons in our society.
If adoption is truly to return to what is best for a child, then the rights of children to their biological identities should NEVER be violated. Every single judge that finalizes an adoption and orders a child’s birth certificate to be sealed should be ashamed of him/herself.
I challenge all readers: Ask the adopted persons that you know if their original birth certificates are sealed.