Testimony / ONE PERSON’S STORY ABOUT MULTIRACIALISM : ‘We Just Want to Be All of Who We Are’

For five years now, several hundred Southern California families involved in interracial relationships have been coalescing around a group called MASC, which stands for Multiracial Americans of Southern California. There are 25 similar organizations around the country. We formed because there are so many people in similar situations--interracial dating, interracial marriages, people of mixed parentage or families involved in trans-racial adoption--that it seemed necessary to develop a permanent forum for dialogue. It is estimated that there are a million interracial couples in the U.S. Although the media often focus on black/white relationships, the largest group is made up of Asians involved with Caucasians. I am German/Jewish by heritage and a first-generation American. My husband is African-American. Fifteen years ago we decided that, in fact, we did want to be together and to take on the challenge of the institution of marriage. His family was basically welcoming. And my family--because they had gone through the Holocaust, and having to be subjected to a lot of anti-Semitism--was very concerned that their daughter might be asking for a similar scenario. I just could not succumb to that way of thinking. I had faith that we would be able to work these things out. And my father, though now deceased, ended up being best buddies with my husband.

We have two children, 7 and 12, and they are being raised as an equal combination of both of our heritages. But children like mine are often told that you cannot be both. That you have to choose one identity. That is true for many application forms. Even though seeing “other” on these forms is better than nothing, it would be preferable to receive acknowledgment of one’s heritage. It is psychologically damaging to force somebody to choose one identity when physiologically and biologically they are more than one, based on who their parents are. It has been argued that acknowledging multiracial origins causes too many problems and that the children will end up being psychologically confused.

But what has been demonstrated to me by the children that I see in our organization is that when they are raised from Day One to be allowed to be all of who they are, meaning embrace all of their heritages, they do just fine. When the subject is open and talked about at home, the children display a high sense of self-esteem.

The problem is with the attitude of the larger society. Mixed marriage was illegal in California up until 1948 and it wasn’t until 1967 that the U.S. Supreme Court ruled such laws unconstitutional. Even today the census does not recognize multiracial people, so we have a whole population that has never been counted because the census will still tell you that you have to choose. It’s ridiculous. Unfortunately, many multiracial people have suffered as a result of such prejudice.

I’m talking about people who on any application form, if they try to say, well, this is kind of hard for me to fill out because I don’t really fit completely into any one of these categories, are told, I’m sorry, that’s the way it is. Pick the one that you most identify with.

I’m talking about people who have grown up in a situation where you couldn’t even talk about this because the family wouldn’t hear about it. So it’s a secret and a taboo, which, on a psychological basis, ends up instilling a sense of shame for the individual.

I’m talking about individuals who in the workplace are not free to say, I’m a multiracial individual, because they would be scorned to the point where their jobs might be jeopardized. I’m talking about people who might be afraid to put pictures on their desks of their families for those same reasons.

We as multiracial families or individuals are very often accused of trying to deny the person of color within and trying to create another race. That is not true. And we vehemently argue against that. The reality is we are just wanting to be all of who we are, and we are all parts of ourselves equally. This is not a case of a multiracial person who is white and black trying to deny the black part of themselves. On the contrary. These families bend over backward to try to educate their children on the different parts of their culture.

It’s not to say that every multiracial individual is going to be without bias. Or that they are going to be the saviors of the racial problems that exist. But I do have to tell you that the people who are attracted to this organization are some of the finest, most noble, most caring individuals I have ever met. They are people who have been able to transcend many issues of race and have a greater tolerance for other folks and inclusiveness.

It is a learning experience which is sometimes painful, like walking up and down grocery aisles when my kids were young and in the carriage with me. And the assumption on the part of other people that these are not my children. And that’s the first assumption they make. “Oh, she’s so cute. Is she adopted?” “Oh, she’s so cute. Are you baby-sitting?” The last assumption is that they are my own. I would use these opportunities to educate my interrogator and respond in a way that would make me a positive role model for my children. My hope is that through the efforts of groups such as ours, multiracial children will grow up feeling acknowledged, complete and clear about their identity and will go on to produce others who can be pivotal in building bridges between people and groups. During the riots, as an organization we took action; we had a crew that went out and helped clean up the streets. We had a couple of meetings about it and discussed the fact that for multiracial families the situation was unique because we have groups hitting on one another and we may have some parents that are representative of those two groups in the same household.

We are all responsible for understanding each other’s life experience. If we are trying to live together in peace and harmony, we can’t live in a vacuum.