On Being a Mixed Person of Color

This is a blog for those of us who are forgotten in the mainstream anti-racism movement. Those of us who are biracial, multiracial, and multiethnic and have struggled year after year with establishing our identities. This is a safe space for all mixed people of color.. This space encourages stories, submissions, art, poetry, photos, research, links to articles, questions, and whatever else you would like to submit! We hope to create a space that highlights that not every person of color is monoracial and not every problem we face can be looked at through a monoracial lens. Enter, submit, ask, and enjoy. Home Meet The Mods Tag Directory Submission and Ask Guidelines - Please Read! (function(i,s,o,g,r,a,m){i['GoogleAnalyticsObject']=r;i[r]=i[r]||function(){ (i[r].q=i[r].q||[]).push(arguments)},i[r].l=1*new Date();a=s.createElement(o), m=s.getElementsByTagName(o)[0];a.async=1;a.src=g;m.parentNode.insertBefore(a,m) })(window,document,'script','https://www.google-analytics.com/analytics.js','ga'); ga('create', 'UA-81910401-1', 'auto'); ga('send', 'pageview');

[weareallmixedup]

First Time on Tumblr

Hi Coyote,

Please forgive me in advance for a) not following etiquitte b) posting in the wrong place or c) all of the above; I just signed up and this is my first post. But I found your blog yesterday and have been reading through the posts, and felt inspired to communicate because a) I’m mixed and have many feelings, 2) a deep part of my emotional self needs to engage with a community of like-spirited folks, and 3) you and I share the same name.

Look forward to figuring out how this whole thing works. Feel free to move or delete this posting if a) or b) above applies.

-c.

Hey friend! I’m glad the blog resonates with you! Ngl, we been lowkey uhhh not quite half-dead, but quarter-dead at least for Reasons™ but just in case it wasn’t clear, I’m not the only one running the blog! I just happen to answer a lot of the asks all at one time so a bunch of them get pushed out with my name on them at once

Hopefully we can help you find some sense of community here! Feel free to hit me up on my personal blog as well at @otahkoapisiakii which won’t let me tag myself for some reason pff

--Coyote

[weareallmixedup]

what if you take a DNA test and learn that you're actually mixed even though you were raised white, I'm asking bc im adopted and it's never been clear whether I'm Mexican or not, but my mom has always leaned towards thinking I probably am bc of something my biological grandmother told her (sorry this is really specific and weird)

Tbh that may not even tell you anything either. I’ve spoken before about genetic testing for ancestry is iffy at the best of times. It’s still relatively new and at this point what we’re working with is borderline almost entirely pop science

We’re trying to do brain surgery with a steak knife here. Not as unwieldy as a chainsaw, but not precise or skilled either

Anyway, there are definitely white people from Mexico. If you got a DNA test to confirm/deny “Mexican Ancestry” it would be attempting to pick up for Indigenous Ancestry mostly and Iberean Península

I’m on mobile so I can’t fetch links rn but if you go back over even just recently from what’s been posted there should be an article or two about genetic testing and how imprecise and sometimes flat inaccurate it can be

If you are also on mobile and can’t search; Google Dr Kim TallBear. She’s a professor at UAlberta specializing in racial politics and she’s written and spoken a ton about this

I mean. Outside that; what you choose to do with information regarding your heritage is up to you. Everyone’s entitled to the legacy of their Ancestors imo

Adoption can often add a frustrating layer to the mix when it comes to genealogy nevermind a potential whole identity shift

But, even so, I can’t give you the kind of concrete answer you’re looking for because it’s not a question with only one answer or even a best answer; certainly not one given by someone who isn’t you

—Coyote

[weareallmixedup]

hi, my name is rowan, and i’m a mixed aa/pi doing research on multiracial identity development for one of my classes! i would really appreciate it if you could share the link to the study with your followers! participants should be at least 18, have parents of different races, and have grown up in the US. the survey will take around 5 minutes, and it would help me a ton in gathering data for my research project!

feel free to contact me if you have questions or if you would like more information about the project!! thank you! feel free to reblog or share with your friends who might be interested, even if you don’t personally qualify!

[weareallmixedup]

I'm the last anon about conditionally white passing. Sorry for being confusing. I wasn't talking about a post but asking about a good way for me to make a distinction when I'm talking about my privilege without implying that I try to pass as white on purpose. Every time I see that phrase I think about how that's what it meant in history, people passing as white on purpose, and I can't separate that from the modern context.

Ohhh I gotcha, thank you for clarifying. Honestly, these days, White-passing hardly means you’re doing it on purpose in the context of discussion on racial dynamics and privilege. Now, it can obviously depend on the context but usually if someone drops the “White” in it, they’re implying intent like: “Sarah is White-passing and she passes whenever she’s in the South” is two different thins. The first half of the sentence is just a fact, Sarah is White passing. The second half is implied intent, She passes in the South because it’s dangerous to be non-White 

It’s more of a contextual linguistic quirk than anything that really has a different definition tbh. Usually, if you’re talking about passing intentionally for whatever reason, that’ll be clear in the discussion but any materials written prior to maybe 1980 the assumption should be the other way around unless context clues tell you otherwiseI know that’s super unhelpful for easy differentiation in modern use, but I genuinely don’t know of any other specific term for intentionally passing as White --Coyote

[weareallmixedup]

How do you say you’re conditionally white passing while not implying that you try to pass as white on purpose? I know it’s not that serious but I can’t help but think of how people used to try pretend they’re white for the benefits of white supremacy, and how it hurt black people who can't pass as white historically and still today. And I feel weird about using the term because my non-black mom altered my appearance to make me pass when I was a child, marking that I was white on forms and stuff.

Can you point to a specific post or who you’re talking about? I’m confused as to what and who you’re referring to --Coyote

[weareallmixedup]

my white mom, whenever race is brought up, eventually says something along the lines of "you look native" or "if you went out into the sun you'd get super dark" because i'm micmac and somehow it irks me? i can't really explain it but i feel really weird when she says stuff like that. is it exoticism? i just don't know. :/

I feel you. It’s definitely lowkey exoticism, like a microaggression; a “positive” racist comment is still a racist comment and it’s annoying af. It’s tough when it’s family, especially parents, cause a lot of the time they tend to want to argue with you about your heritage that they don’t share. I wish I had a solution for you, maybe someone else has some tips but I feel you--Coyote

[weareallmixedup]

I'd rather be discriminated for something I am than being called "interesting" for something I'm not. I was born in the UK, raised in the UK, I've never been to Ghana and I don't speak the language! Call me white trash please because that's what I am - even though I don't look like it! Just don't call me African because I literally have NOTHING to do with my dad's culture. You can call me racist for saying that but it's just about my identity. I can't "be proud of my culture", it's not MINE!

Yikes

You know, I was just gonna delete this cause this feels like trolling for Discourse, but I’m gonna publish it because people really think like this. White supremacy got us so twisted up we’ll actively reject our heritage(s) if not our culture(s) as well

No one can make you identify how you don’t want to but being actively antagonistic towards your non-White heritage is not the wave. It’s sad. Incredibly sad and my heart goes out to you for the pain caused to you to make you wanna feel this way. Especially because even if you’re mixed with White, White people aren’t gonna see you as One Of Them which leaves you where? 

Feeling that kind of untethered is so lonely even around other people who think like that. My heart really goes out to you and anyone who feels like this. I hope there comes a time, and soon, where you find peace--however that may manifest to you--and that even if you don’t want to come Home, metaphorically speaking, you won’t feel like you have to assert that you don’t know the people who live there, if you catch my meaning --Coyote

[mylangbox]

BIG NEWS

[weareallmixedup]

So at my new job my (white) co worker asked me what ethnicity I am (asian, white, Polynesian) and I told her. She then said that I ‘didnt Look Chinese’ (I am not Chinese) and then mentioned that she had a mixed son and then that she didn’t consider me mixed, that she only considers black and white mixed to be mixed. Like wtf. Just bc she has a mixed son doesn’t mean she knows better than an actual person of mixed race or that she can speak on it bc she can’t.

White people who have mixed relatives really outchea thinking they’re the arbiters of who’s mixed. It’s annoying af

Like, okay Susan, I didn’t know you were an expert on other people’s family trees or that your White ass knows what every combination of mixed person looks like? 

--Coyote

[weareallmixedup]

I think that anon's family meant that black ppl might be prejudiced against their japanese half and say they're not, I don't think they meant being racist against their black half or being jerks bc they're light. Idk though, @ that anon is that what you meant?

Either way, the answer is the same tbh--Coyote

[weareallmixedup]

Hiya! So Im mixed, my dad is black and my mom is half japanese and half white. My skin tone is just like meghan markles. So ive had a hard time defending that im a black woman. But my whole life, my dads side of the family has said to be careful of other black people because they can be racist even though they claim they cant be. What do you think?

Black people don’t have the institutional power to be racist. We can be prejudice, sure, bigoted even, but racism requires the ability to apply that prejudice and bigotry systemically

I mean, your milage may vary of course, but being lightskinned or (conditionally) passing in the Black community is never as “hard” as people tell you it is in my experience. For me, it was my non-Black family always blah blahing about how Black people wouldn’t accept me because I’m not ~full Black~ or whatever, but the biggest “problems” I’ve had in Black circles where I don’t know a lot of people, is people think that I’m a “negligibly Black” Latinx but fr all that ever takes is “nah, I’m not” and that’s about it

I mean, yeah, I get roasted for being lightskinned but getting roasted for shit is just the Black American Experience. It’s not a big deal. Light skinned and White passing/conditionally White passing Black people have way more privilege because of colourism than people in the community who are darker--especially dark skinned women

I mean, I guess the answer to your question is ultimately; no, Black people can’t be racist even to other Black people--it’s prejudice/bigotry/colourism/even lateral violence in some cases but tbh, darker skinned Black people have more to worry about with those of us who are lightskinned and or mixed than we have to worry about them--Coyote

[weareallmixedup]

So I just started a job and on orientation I accidentally overshared info and said I had a 6 siblings (which I do, 2 full and 4 half siblings) and I didn’t mean to. I’ve never met these siblings but I still claim them. And if this waitress that I told ever gets my parents (bc they come in and eat a lot at the restaurant I host at) my (white) mom will kill me, and make me feel bad about telling them tht info and about me cleaning my half siblings. Help?

Oh man, I dunno, Anon-Friend. That’s kinda one of those things that once it’s out there it’s Out There™ and you just gotta hope the blowback isn’t as bad as it is in your head

You could, assumably depending on your relationship with the waitress in question, just tell her like “hey, could you not bring up my siblings with my parents if you get them? It’s a really touchy subject and I didn’t really think it through when I said something”

If you want to be more detailed with her, go for it, but that’s plenty of information for any decent person to not say anything imo--Coyote

[weareallmixedup]

This is kinda weird but honestly compared to my other mixed family members I’ve always felt like I’m not “pretty” like them and I always felt ugly a lot because I wasn’t like the “pretty mixed girls” because my skin is darker, i have 4a hair and dark eyes and my hair is dark too and I’ve just always struggled with not looking pretty enough and I remember when i was young i was crying in the mirror bc i wanted 3a/3c hair but i ended up with 4a hair and it’s just really confusing honestly.

That’s that internalized racism talking to you, friend. You as a darker skinned person with more textured hair have to fight that voice so much harder than other people and that’s real shitty

Your hair is beautiful, your skin is beautiful, your eyes are beautiful, I don’t know you, but I know these things for absolute certainty. Carrying the reflections of your Ancestors on your face, on your body, is beautiful always

Just like with any form of internalized racism, you’ve got to actively fight against it. Eurocentric beauty standards are bullshit. They put the bar on the ground for a huge swath of White people and the closer you get to those standards, the lower the bar is for you

A lot of light skinned people, especially in the Black community, get big ass heads cause we think being fetishized and exotified is the same thing as being valued and good and it’s not. It’s really not

It sounds goofy to do this, but positive affirmations and self-cheerleading are some skills I learnt in CBT classes for therapy that are really helpful in situations like these too. Every day, at least once a day, compliment yourself. I know it’s gonna sound and feel super insincere and weird at first, but it’s like anything you don’t do very often, it always feels strange and “incorrect” until it becomes a habit

Look up Google Images or Flickr photos of people of similar or same backgrounds/looks as you. Focus on what’s similar about you, not what’s different, not what you like better on them, but what you share with that person

Racist beauty standards are invested in tearing down everyone who doesn’t fit the status quo or deviates in an “unacceptable” manner. You don’t have to help them, friend. They’re not right and they’ll never be right

No matter what you look like, you have value and worth and are worthy, okay? But even with that said, you are beautiful. Not in spite of the traits and features that make you different from the “pretty mixed girl” stereotype, but because of those things

I wish I had some quick and easy fix for your feeling like this, I really do. The damage done to POC by racist society is never our fault, but the healing is our responsibility and we don’t have to do that alone. You’re not alone--Coyote

[thechanelmuse]

US Open Final

“I don’t cheat to win. I’d rather lose.” —Serena 

I followed this US Open up until the the final match that I ended up missing today. After seeing what transpired, I’m glad I did. I just knew it was gonna be a tough, nail-biting, exciting match between two Black women—one who’s the greatest athlete of all-time and the other who’s a young, hungry, explosive player who’s competing against her idol—who were gonna put on an amazing, historic show.

That didn’t happen.

Carlos Ramos, the asshole umpire who called a coaching violation against Serena during her match against Naomi Osaka at the US Open Final, called the same thing against Venus during her match against Alize Cornet at the French Open in 2016. Both stood their ground and refuted it. He’s doesn’t do it to the men, even after Rafael Nadal threatened him at the 2017 French Open. 

Many of the fans were already on edge because they were rooting for Serena. To bring his bullshit to the game, intensify an uneasy atmosphere, and cause Naomi’s first win to be overshadowed by it to the point that she tearfully apologized during her speech to the crowd almost as if she was sorry for winning, is ri-fucking-diculous. 

Serena is not a sore loser, which people who dislike her always peg her to be. She’s a gracious competitor. Always. She demonstrated it again today. She embraced Naomi, calmed down the crowd, and made sure was Naomi wasn’t only celebrated, but felt celebrated. 

Sad it had to all go down like this…

Naomi, who’s Japanese-Haitian American and representing the country of  Japan, is the first Japanese to win a Grand Slam singles title. That woman is gonna go so far. 

[dontwantthenextcommanderiwantyou]

“Williams told Ramos “You stole a point from me and you are a thief.” Ramos took the remark as verbal abuse, and awarded a game to Osaka.”

Serena is A True Queen, even after being robbed of a game by a hating ass umpire, sis is still GRACIOUS and showing love to her opponent in their win. 

“Osaka played the way you have to play to beat the greatest athlete of all time, but it should never have ended like this. An umpire’s feelings should never decide a game. Serena is absolutely right that men say a lot worse things and never get a violation. Bad moment for sports.” - Michael Skolnik

[weareallmixedup]

This is aside from being mixed or what not, but lately I’ve been having trouble w my mom a lot. I just turned 18, and I’m not allowed to do anything. My mom is controlling and won’t let me go anywhere by myself, is obsessed w looking through my phone to ‘keep me safe’, and is convinced that I will get pulled into sex trafficking if I go anywhere alone. She said she ‘doesn’t want anyone looking at me in an attractive way, and ‘joked’ that she was going to cut my hair off and make me wear 1/2

2/2 and make me wear oversized clothing, and then got mad when I got upset about her saying that. I fear that I’ll never be able to be independent, and that I’ll always have to deal with her, and it’s making me hate my life so much.

I’m sorry your mom is violating your privacy and letting her anxiety take over your life. That’s hella shitty. Are you in school at all? If you are, I suggest going to your school counselor and or student health services and get in touch with a school counselor who’d have more solid and helpful advice than I could give you here

Moving out is never feasible in these situations honestly because if you could move out of the situation, you would have done it already and even if you did, it wouldn’t address the root of the problem which is your mom being overbearingly overprotective so I really think this is something you should talk to someone who’d have knowledge of resources for you about–Coyote

[weareallmixedup]

Well, for example, there's an article that defines White-adjacent as PoCs who benefit from a White-positive world. Another link was saying only Asians/Mixed-Asians can be White-adjacent (so sorry, the site is not allowing me to add links to them here). So these were some of the reasons why I was confused about the definition, honestly, and they're why I'm wondering if it's possible for us who are PoC to be White-adjacent?

Gotcha. It could be they’re using “White-adjacent” as it shows up statistically. In the US (idk about anywhere else but I’m sure Google would know), East Asian groups tend to poll similarly to the White majority on a ton of topics (this is not a moral judgement, it’s just a Thing in statistics)

It could also be that they’re talking about the “Model Minorities” of which (mostly East) Asians tend to be touted as. Like, racist White people still hate Japanese people, but they’ll bend over backwards to find justifications for fetishizing Japanese women and pretending to learn Japanese martial arts or bastardize Bushido, yanno?

It really depends on context. Modern socio-cultural issues are kinda difficult when it comes to definitions because as living societies, a lot of phrases have different meanings depending on context and vocabulary is being added, dropped, and adapted at unprecedented paces thanks to technology making the world and our own countries a lot smaller than they used to be--Coyote

[weareallmixedup]

I hope you don't mind me continuing the questions about White-adjacent. I read somewhere that those of us who are PoC can be White-adjacent. I mean, is this true or even possible? If this is possible, what context would I or anyone who's PoC be White-adjacent? Or is this just one of those fallacies of the Internet that spreads confusion rather than awareness?

I’m not sure I understand the question. If you’re a POC, you are, by definition, not White. Being White-adjacent would put you in that nebulous fence-sitting category of Whiteness and non-Whiteness described in the other ask but outside of that, if you’re a POC or mixed POC and people read/treat you as White, you’re either conditionally White passing, or regular degular White passing --Coyote