News that will probably make some of you ANGRY
on April 21st, 2007 at 7:00 pmInterracial Marriages Surge Across U.S.
(wtopnews.com) Since that landmark Loving v. Virginia ruling, the number of interracial marriages has soared; for example, black-white marriages increased from 65,000 in 1970 to 422,000 in 2005, according to Census Bureau figures. Factoring in all racial combinations, Stanford University sociologist Michael Rosenfeld calculates that more than 7 percent of America’s 59 million married couples in 2005 were interracial, compared to less than 2 percent in 1970.
Coupled with a steady flow of immigrants from all parts of the world, the surge of interracial marriages and multiracial children is producing a 21st century America more diverse than ever, with the potential to become less stratified by race.
“The racial divide in the U.S. is a fundamental divide. … but when you have the ‘other’ in your own family, it’s hard to think of them as ‘other’ anymore,” Rosenfeld said. “We see a blurring of the old lines, and that has to be a good thing, because the lines were artificial in the first place.” (more…)
This reminds me of something that director Spike Lee said a few years ago:
During the promotion of his film Jungle Fever, about a black/white interracial romance, the black filmmaker stated that he disliked interrac[ial]; couples! Incredibly, he said, “I give interracial couples a look. Daggers. They get uncomfortable when they see me on the street.” (source)
Now right about now some of you are thinking that I am about to slam Spike Lee for saying what he did regarding interracial marriages. While I do condemn the statement, I do have some respect for him showing some real honesty about his opinion. While it has become easy for us to bring up the days of young Emmett till and how he was killed for allegedly whistling at a White woman by a bunch of racists, confronting the same racist demons in our own circles are repeatedly justified.
For numbers of us, seeing a White woman clasp the hand of a fellow Black brotha with kids in tow or a White man giving his brown shuga a peck on the cheek really makes your skin crawl (This is the point when some readers will remind me that Whites are just as bad by bringing up various experiences—let’s be real adults here and stop using Whites as a deflection. Let me also remind you that if this does not apply to you, then there is no need to comment).For some of you, Whites marrying Blacks is a sign that “THEY” are removing our leverage of perpetual guilt over them. You may not like reading this, but oh well, I’m in it now.
Dictionary.com does a pretty good job defining this type of person:
“a person who is utterly intolerant of any differing creed, belief, or opinion.”
The word is called “bigot“.
And we all know that there is nothing worse than a closet bigot. Something to think about while many of you are rushing to church tomorrow.
–A lil’ lesson yours truly had to learn years ago.
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