| Submit your comments on this article |
| Home Front: Culture Wars |
| My unborn child makes some whites uncomfortable. |
| 2006-12-08 |
| by Jason Reilly, Wall Street Journal Your wife, who unlike you is white, and who is expecting your first child, has been receiving the oddest reactions to the news of her pregnancy. Upon finding out, friends can't resist informing her that "interracial children are beautiful." It's said in a tone that suggests deep gratitude and admiration, although the reasons are a little unclear. The comment may be kindly meant, as a sort of reflexive compliment, but it inevitably suggests that she is being congratulated for her willingness to place the aesthetic enhancement of the populace above the imperatives of racial purity. She's heard the remark, or some variation of it, from a dozen different people if she's heard it from one. And more often than not, your wife tells you, it's the first thing they blurt out, even before asking about gender and due dates. . . . A short time later, at a wedding reception in London, your wife finds herself chatting with a Danish woman she has just met. Back at the hotel, your wife informs you that the woman asked her, "How do you feel about having a baby who will look nothing like you? I have a lot of friends who have interracial babies, and they feel totally alienated from their children." Wondering whether to expect more such questions and how to respond, your wife turns to you for advice. You tell her to avoid Scandinavian women for the balance of her pregnancy (and you promise to do the same). It's no surprise that these comments all came from white people; surveys have long demonstrated that blacks are much more accommodating of interracial relationships. More noteworthy is that in all but a couple of cases, the remarks came from white people parked on the political left, the kind of superior folks who might run you down in their Prius for even suggesting that they harbor racial hang-ups. As liberals constantly tell themselves, only conservatives have race issues. But you know the truth is closer to the opposite. It is the left's obsession with skin pigmentation--invoking it everywhere and always, regardless of its relevance--that keeps race front and center not only in our public policy debates but even in everyday life. . . . Go read it all. It would be hilarious if it weren't so sad. Speaking for my little dark corner of the vast right wing neocon conspiracy, at least, congratulations on the new baby, and best wishes for a healthy delivery. |
| Posted by:Mike |
| #14 Been in the States - never heard such a thing from anyone, of any race. This article has more to do about INTER-PARENT DECEPTION, NOT RACE PREGNANCY OR PARENTING. People will tend to ask questionnez iff, as example, the HUSBAND = GROOM is one race/ethnicity and nine months later the WIFE = BRIDE gives birth to an infant of another, absolutely different color than the alleged Father, or even Mother, including their known backgrounds. |
| Posted by: JosephMendiola 2006-12-08 19:51 |
| #13 My unborn child makes some whites uncomfortable. Could be worse. Could be My unborn brother makes EVERYONE uncomfortable. |
| Posted by: anonymous5089 2006-12-08 12:57 |
| #12 It must be agony to look yourself in the mirror and know beyond a shadow of a doubt that you are an utter loser. Tell me about it. Good comment, Anonymoose, some more food for thoughts (my views on the subject are similar, only more confuse). |
| Posted by: anonymous5089 2006-12-08 12:51 |
#11 As did the "Native Americans", when the liberals strongly backed the AIM, and went to the reservations to 'take charge'.Hey, man, don't let 'em bring you down, now. There's a lot of young people in this country just like myself who really know where the Indian's at, and don't worry, pretty soon we're all gonna be out here on the reservation living like Indians, dressing like Indians and doing all the simple, beautiful things that you Indians do... Got any peyote? |
| Posted by: Zenster 2006-12-08 12:48 |
| #10 surveys have long demonstrated that blacks are much more accommodating of interracial relationships May be true, but several of my friends are not accepted by the black side of the family and most say that there are mixed reactions on both sides. Mr. Reilly's problem seems to be not that these are ill intentioned people, but that he and his family can't just fit in and live a "normal" life. I do feel sorry for him and his family in this respect. |
| Posted by: DoDo 2006-12-08 11:39 |
| #9 " I am reminded of my time in hospital with a kidney stone." That never happened to me, I only got sympathetic responses, even from a woman who had had children and kidney stones (not at the same time, I don't think any human could endure that.) Just drawing attention to "interracial children" tends to be a hostile remark, whether or not the speaker is aware of it, almost as bad as coming right out and saying "How do you feel, being so stupid as to conceive a baby who won't resemble your superficial appearances." Very much like saying "I don't have anything against Jews" or "some of my best friends are Jewish." On the other hand, many years ago a young, beautiful, intelligent and accomplished Jewish woman once asked me if I were Jewish (AFAIK, I'm not) and I felt good & took it as some kind of compliment. I mentioned this later to some of my (male) Jewish colleagues who knew both of us and their response was, "Why didn't you say you were, you fool?" Not everything that makes the listener feel good or bad is meant that way, but some of these unsolicited "compliments" are spoken with hostility. And that's just the way people are. If anyone expects they can get through their lives without receiving some kind of vituperation from others, they are really insane. |
| Posted by: Anguper Hupomosing9418 2006-12-08 11:38 |
| #8 blacks are much more accommodating of interracial relationships. Oh really? Talk to a sister sometime about white women (especially blonde white women) who date black men. |
| Posted by: Swamp Blondie 2006-12-08 10:13 |
| #7 surveys have long demonstrated that blacks are much more accommodating of interracial relationships. Surveys? Where? Who? It may be true but, from experience in my single-days, it's not by much. |
| Posted by: Pappy 2006-12-08 09:57 |
| #6 Limousine Socialists - bigoted, small minded, segregated privileged class. And you then understand that these people don't know anyone in the American military or have been near any large American military reservation. American servicemen have married the locals and brought them home since the Greatest Generation. The joke is that any major military installation is far closer to the ‘liberal’ ideals that the effete snobs articulate but in practice abhor in anything other than quaint self moralizing moments. |
| Posted by: Procopius2k 2006-12-08 09:49 |
| #5 Liberal race-consciousness is defined as: keeping them down so you have someone to feel superior to. One way in which this is seen is in how liberals seek out the most stereotypical example of the "downtrodden ethnic" they can find. Then they want them to be "cleaned up", so they can put on a show for them and their 'elite' friends. (I think of "performing animals" like Tracy Chapman.) Another version is how liberals are always at the forefront of volunteering to "lead" people they want to feel superior to. The NAACP was founded by white liberals, and the ungrateful "coloreds" then threw them out as soon as they could. As did the "Native Americans", when the liberals strongly backed the AIM, and went to the reservations to 'take charge'. Efforts at "inclusion" and "fairness" only apply to those who are inferior. Why give racial preferences if you think that other race is equal, or can in any way, ever, compete fairly? This goes hand-in-hand with the discomfort that liberals feel in the presence of an ethnic minority who *obviously* isn't inferior, who is, in fact, superior. People like Condoleeza Rice are damnable to liberals, who even try to deny them their race, because "her people aren't like that." She is a race traitor because she is not an ignorant, humble and groveling servant. She has no right to be sophisticated, extraordinarily intelligent, cultured, talented and powerful. Because "her people" are like the obscene caricatures portrayed on MTV and in Hollywood gangsta movies. All of this is one of the big reasons that liberals backed the welfare state. The design of welfare was that once on it, the rules are such that it is extremely hard to get off of it. But this transcends even race. It is intended to breed inferiors. Because, in the final analysis, liberals feel so terribly inferior that they will do anything to feel superior to anyone. To think of themselves as intellectuals and elites, above the common herd, is a great motivating factor. I like to recognize the book "Cannibals All!: or Slaves Without Masters", by George Fitzhugh. Truly a liberal screed of the first order written before the Civil War. It was more than an apology for slavery, it said that slavery was such a good thing that 9 out of 10 people should be slaves. Because slaves lead such happy, carefree lives. Of course, the reader would assume that they would be in the 1 in 10 who are masters, and that the masters, the elite, should be praised because they were doing all of the "hard work" that masters have to do to control their slaves. This was not a unique theme to Fitzhugh. The "great" American author Ralph Waldo Emerson also wrote at length about mankind returning to an "Earth First" version of existence, again to be led by an elite few, his "Orphic poets". The State of Nature fallacy, going back to Rousseau. From Emerson to Al Gore and John Kerry. The chain of inferiority-superiority remains unbroken. The neurosis is almost unchanged from the 19th Century. It must be agony to look yourself in the mirror and know beyond a shadow of a doubt that you are an utter loser. |
| Posted by: Anonymoose 2006-12-08 09:30 |
| #4 I am reminded of my time in hospital with a kidney stone. The pain was horrific but what really pissed me off was the long line of people telling me that at least I now had some idea of the pain of childbirth. I still want to throttle those people. |
| Posted by: Excalibur 2006-12-08 09:06 |
| #3 Kill yourself Jason, it's the only answer to your particular problem. |
| Posted by: bigjim-ky 2006-12-08 08:17 |
| #2 "White [sic Liberal] Guilt," Shelby Steele tackles this phenomenon with his usual peerless eloquence. He describes the endless frustration of dealing with whites "who have built a large part of their moral identity and, possibly, their politics around how they respond to your color." It's a vestigial part of their olde Burden Thingy! >:-) |
| Posted by: RD 2006-12-08 08:08 |
| #1 Mixed race makes for some of the prettiest darned babies I've ever seen. I've seen plenty of negative reaction to mixed couples from the darker skinned community as well as the whites, though I can't speak to their reaction to mixed race kids. I will say that I think mixed couples and their kids are going to face more challenges because of it, but those challenges will be less than even an all white family would have faced in life 100 years ago. And, to a significant degree, Nietzche was right - 'that which does not kill us makes us stronger', so facing a bit of challenge growing up is a good thing. |
| Posted by: Glenmore 2006-12-08 07:42 |