Why isn't Obama described as Bi-Racial?

[Laura PourMeADrink]

I know this contest has NOTHING to do with race. It transcends it and takes people to a higher plane, but I have been curious...Why doesn't anyone describe Obama as bi-racial?

He and his mom:


On his trike:

[avaistheone1]

1. Perhaps because it is not politically expedient?

[ClassWarrior]

2. Sadly, that's not how we regard people of color in this nation.

It probably has a lot to do with the so-called "one drop rule":

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One-drop_rule

NGU.

[shraby]

3. Perhaps because it's neither

here or there..it's immaterial. The last time I looked at him, I saw a member of the male half of the human race.

[Laura PourMeADrink]

5. Well, of course, I know that. It just strikes me that a bi-racial person

symbolizes something much bigger - the end of racial division.

[pnwmom]

9. Growing up, I doubt he thought of himself as a symbol.

And that's when he formed his identity as a black man.

[IndieLeft]

18. I hope I say this right.

Most of us are bi/multi-racial. Unless you are 100%... something, you are either bi/multi-racial.

I am Native American, Irish, Scottish, Dutch... You know what I mean.

And honestly, and I don't know why, but bi-racial just seems to have a stigma to it.

Many nationalities in other countries, and even in some areas of this country, will not accept you if you are percieved to be... "unpure" I guess would be the word.

I hope I am making some kind of sense here, and not coming off as an asshole.

[RethugAssKicker]

4. Because in America, if you have 1 drop of black blood in you...

You're black

[pnwmom]

6. Because HE has chosen to identify as the black man

that most strangers on the street would assume he is.

[Laughing Mirror]

7. Because if most Americans passed him on the street, they'd say there goes a black man

Few would think to say, there goes a bi-racial man.

[shaniqua6392]

8. He is a self-described African American.

It is not a label someone else gave him. I think it is not talked about so that the media can hype the first African American president.

[Occam Bandage]

10. Because in America, you are black or you are white.

[Barack_America]

14. And how prevalent was the term "bi-racial" when Obama grew up?

Sure it's common now, but in the 60's and 70's when Obama was forming his identity?

Should he be expected to now change his self-identity to suit the times?

[stillcool]

11. What Makes A Person Legally “Black”

http://www.washingtoninformer.com/ARLegallyBlack2005Dec8.html

Special Report: What Makes A Person Legally “Black”?
By Robert N. Taylor
Thursday, December 8, 2005

The history of the notion can be traced to slavery and the period right after slavery called Reconstruction. Originally, in a bid to stop slaves who had been fathered by white slave owners and overseers from claiming freedom, property rights or possible inheritance, several Southern sates passed laws that in effect defined a black person as anyone with any “discernible amount of colored or African blood.”
------------------------------
Our high school history classes and Black History Month presentations have given us a distorted idea of who Plessy was and what he was about. We have generally been led to believe that Plessy was a black man arguing that blacks should be allowed the same accommodations as whites. This is not true. Plessy was actually a light skinned black man arguing that “he” should be given the same accommodations as whites because he had “7/8 caucasian and only 1/8 African” blood. Thus, he argued that he should not be treated as “black” under an 1890 Louisiana law requiring blacks and whites be seated in separate railway cars.

It was the Supreme Court which largely ignored Plessy’s “I am not a negro” argument and told him if he did not think he was black he would have to go back to Louisiana and argue that issue on the state level. The Court then went forward and assumed Plessy to be black and rendered its decision saying a state was within its rights to mandate separate accommodations for blacks in order to keep the races apart.
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The next major attempt to legally define “blackness” took place in the 1920’s when the eugenics movement spurred the passage of laws in at least 30 states barring marriages between blacks and whites – so-called anti-miscegenation or anti-gene mixing laws. The fear-based book which set this movement in motion was entitled “The Rising Tide of Color Against White World Supremacy” by Lothrop Stoddard (1893-1950). Stoddard told whites that if intermarriage was allowed to continue “whites would disappear.”

But in order to bar blacks and whites from marrying, it was necessary to define who was black and who was white. In typical white supremacist style, the politicians passing these anti-miscegenation laws chose to define “blackness” and not “whiteness.” The law passed in Virginia best illustrates the attempt at defining who was black. Virginia ’s Racial Integrity Act of 1924 defined a black person this way: “every person in whom there is ascertainable any negro blood shall be deemed and taken to be a colored person.” In plain English, they were simply saying. “If you look the least bit black, you are black.”

[Jed Dilligan]

12. For much the same reason Alexandre Dumas did not visit our country

Being of 1/4 African descent he would have been eligible for slavery, despite the popularity of his books here.

[Bad Thoughts]

13. One drop of blood

Take a man with African descent in America. Now, if he were completely black, he would be an African-American. If he were half black, he would be an African-American. If he were one-quarter black, he'd be an African-American. See how this works?

It's been the standard in many parts of the US for centuries: one drop of black blood makes one black. Only in some cases does hybridization work the other way. The offspring of Native Americans and Europeans were often counted by the government as white. This was an effective way of defeating Native Americans' claims to sovereignty. Within Latino groups, one drop of whiteness is often used to counteract whatever African ancestry is present. Of course, this just makes them Latino, not white.

[Vinca]

15. Because it doesn't matter. nt

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

16. the old "one drop" rule

racism at its worse, but the rule was that if you had "one drop" of African blood in you, you were considered black.

[jenmito]

17. He mentions his white mother very often and as you show, he has her in an ad,

but he is still considered "Black" because that's how it works here. For example, if he wasn't known, he would still be stopped by the cops for "driving while Black" even though he's half White. It's just how it is-my family wonders the same thing since we have lots of kids in our family who are bi-racial, too.

[alcibiades_mystery]

19. Because nobody's biracial in America when they get pulled over at midnight

Race is about social effects, not genes.

[nomorewhopper]

20. for better or worse in this country, if you have one black parent, you are considered black

walking down the streets of harlem when he was a student at nyu, the people who saw him, made judgements about him - he was always seen as black. his experience growing up was definitely the experience of a black man.

obama gets props from me for transcending race, and indeed his half white heritage, his half black/half asian sister, married to a chinese canadian.

to me, this guy isn't black. he isn't white.

he's america.