Being the product of an interracial relationship you can engage both sides of your racial identity. You can form strong bonds with both sides of your family. There are times when you find out that that uncle you loved so much and thought was so cool when you were younger, actually is guilty of making nasty racist remarks towards people of color, the same people of color you share family ties with. There are also times when you’re sitting with a new group of friends and a woman goes on a tirade over afro-pessimism and how we, as black people, should not associate with caucasian people, yeah that means my caucasian father and his family too. Sorry, pops.
I strongly believe that the duality of experiences experienced by mixed individuals is an important conversation to contribute to our analysis and discussions on issues that contribute to race. But, with that said, we must continue to keep our mixedness in check.
While it is a terrible habit to have, one of my favorite things to do while I am passing the time is scroll my Facebook feed for the unnecessarily long arguments on issues regarding culture and race. I get a kick out of these arguments because they always end up resorting to the racial logic of the past. The past logic of Jim Crow, miscegenation, and de jure segregation. It is both sad and amusing to witness the logic people create on these threads. Although arguments over Facebook always end up in the wackiest of places, there are times where I pay special attention to the people arguing and how they handle certain issues of identity. It is always a treat and a cringe fest when I see a post read, “I am mixed so I can say…[insert issue on white police officers, Republicans, Black on Black crime etc..]” if there were a statistic on the amount of feedback these posts get I am confident that the stat would be very high indeed.
These particular Facebook posts are both intriguing and cringe worthy because I become obsessively interested in how their “friends” respond to the post, and I cringe at the poor choice of privileged words. Prefacing a post or a thought with “I am mixed so I can say this…” is a way of turning up your nose as if you’re at a higher advantage over everyone else. We as mixed individuals might have a different perspective as others, but that does not give us the right to invalidate others opinions because they do not share a mixed experience. Just because we are mixed does not give us an exclusive backstage pass into a discussion over certain issues. Those of us who are mixed and lighter skinned should constantly be aware of and checking the privileges we hold, and should be cautious when trying to convey our perspectives into issues that relate to our multiracial experiences.
No one experience or perspective is going to be the fix to our American racial issues. Contrary to popular belief, mixed people and mixedness are not going to be the magical cure to racism in this country. Sorry mixed Americans, we are not some special medicine to cure our wacked out racialized system. Our perspectives are no better than the Americans who don’t define themselves as mixed. I enjoy discussing issues and theories on racial identity, we can go for hours on the topic, but using your mixedness as an advantage over others to further prove why your argument is on the correct side is something that we as mixed people need to keep in check and leave at the door.
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Kenneth Miks was born in Tracy, California, a small town right outside of the Bay Area. He is in his final year of his undergraduate studies at the University of California Los Angeles. Kenneth will be graduating with a major in sociology paired with a minor in African-American studies and will be continuing his intellectual journey into graduate school, with a focus on the social and cultural impact of the African diaspora that is felt globally.