Sheepville

I read an interview she did not long after winning her Oscar for best actress and some of the questions were related to a few disparaging comments some prominent blacks had made about her winning that boiled down to her not "really" being black. She said that if she told people she were white, they would put her away. I thought, "Why can't she call herself white?" She was raised by her white mother without her father, and I couldn't see why it was any more wrong to consider her white than black. Of course I've always considered her black.

It reminded me of a post Tracy made a long time ago stating that she had always been a minority. I understood what she said, but I didn't understand what she meant. I would rarely think of her racially, but when I do I consider her Asian. I know she was raised by her Korean mother and she likes Asian foods, but that's not why I see her as Asian. For me I see white people as white whether they are a southern baptist, a KKK member, or a Swede, and they see me as white regardless of any other differences. I have lived my whole life and just taken for granted the fact I have a race that I belong too.

If you are bi-racial and you are always seen as the "other" race, there has to be an emotional impact to that. Growing up for Tracy and her sister and being seen as "white" was probably the most difficult part and now in her adult life to the people around her, her bi-racial status doesn't really matter - at least until it comes to choosing a race on some document, which all of them I've seen make you choose one or the other. I think of Tracy as Tracy and I wouldn't care if she was green with pink spots. If I didn't know her and someone asked me what her race was, I would say she was "half asian" and I suppose if an Asian was asked they would probably identify her as "half white". That seems very unfair.