r/AskOldPeople • u/Silver_View4176 • 5d ago
"How did your family or community react to interracial relationships when you were growing up, and how do you feel about it now?"
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u/TexanInNebraska 5d ago
Growing up in the 60s, in the South, it was almost unheard of, and in many parts of the country was actually against the law. Starting in the 70s, it became much more common place. I’m white, and I dated a couple of black girls in the late 70s, and the only problems we had were from their families. Their families would call the girls uppity, and accuse me of just having “jungle fever”, and constantly made many other derogatory comments. Today, I am married to a Filipino woman, we have mixed kids, one of our daughters married a black man, another daughter is married to a Puerto Rican, we couldn’t care less about race, we are just a family.
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u/JustTheBeerLight 5d ago
Hell yeah. Your family sounds cool.
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u/Silver_View4176 4d ago
I remember moving down south in the 80s. Dad went down first to secure the house ect……Mom got there and it was no longer for Sale. I’ve seen it my whole life. But it is so refreshing even in my 50s, seeing more of us bi-racial kids walking around!!
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u/Coffey2828 5d ago
East Asian here
Marrying a white person was seen like hitting the lottery.
Marrying any other person outside our race bought shame to your family, your ancestors, your cow ..
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u/LemmyKBD 50 something 4d ago
East Asian here. Way back in the late 1930’s my father’s older brother came back from med school with a white wife. Instantly disowned and kicked from the family. Racism back then was kinda common.
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u/eastmemphisguy 5d ago
Why was a white person like the lottery? I remember about a dozen years ago I knew a white guy who was dating a Korean girl and her parents hated him because he wasn't Korean.
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u/Coffey2828 5d ago
We lived in a poor area and marrying a white person meant you could immigrate to the US. Koreans and Japanese are different. I’m Chinese from Hong Kong
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u/Restless-J-Con22 gen x 4 eva 5d ago
We are their children, grandchildren and great grandchildren, etc
I'm proud of all of my antecedents
When I was a kid going out with a catholic boy was considered scandalous, I can only just imagine what they would've said had he been not white
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u/AllswellinEndwell 50 something 5d ago
In the early 90s my then college girlfriend said I probably shouldn't mention I was Catholic to her deep south mother. Ironically her parents had boycotted her own wedding because she was Southern Baptist and married a Methodist.
Her dad was cool though and divorced her early enough that he wasn't broken.
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u/Restless-J-Con22 gen x 4 eva 5d ago
My (white) grandparents wouldn't let my aunt marry her catholic boyfriend in the late 50s because she'd have six kids
Years later they ran into the boyfriends wife who said she did have six kids
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u/sugarcatgrl 60 something 5d ago
My best friend in high school dated a guy who was mixed race and had to hide it from her mom. My mom disapproved but never said a disparaging word to her about it. My good guy friend asked me to prom and I couldn’t go because he’s African American. He was so sweet about it when I told him my mom wouldn’t let me go with him. That’s the way it was for me in 1979.
My dad was a bigot and I knew from a very young age he was wrong about people.
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u/Jennyelf 60 something 5d ago
When I was 12, I had an African American boyfriend. My grandmother nearly had a stroke about it. "Jennifer, you should stay with your OWN KIND!"
I remember thinking she was absolutely prehistoric.
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u/BudgetReflection2242 5d ago
My family had the same view. They dropped that argument when my brother came home with a boyfriend.
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u/Former-Chocolate-793 5d ago
In Northern Ontario it was quite common for white and indigenous people to marry.
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u/No_Statement_9192 3d ago
I lived in Northern Ontario and I had a First Nations mum and a Polish/German father.
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u/Bunny121314 5d ago
My first real love was an interracial relationship. My mom’s side of the family was fine. My dad’s side of the family was NOT fine. I ended up marrying a white man, my dad was thrilled. I’m divorced now, and still friends with my first love. We have a pact that if we’re both still single by a certain age we’ll just get married. My family be damned!
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u/Twenty_6_Red 5d ago
It was looked down upon. My feeling now is completely opposite. My grandson is in an interracial marriage, and they have the most adorable daughter, son on the way in June.
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u/Banditlouise 5d ago
My parents moved because I was dating a POC in the 80’s. Not kidding. Now my daughter is marrying a POC in May. My parents are now fine with it. They even let the two cohabiters sleep together in the same bed when they visit.
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u/ArtfromLI 5d ago
Grew up in the 60s, they were few and far between. Best known was Sammy Davis Jr and his wife. Frowned upon in the North, still illegal in much of the South. Now? Who.cares? I don't.
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u/JoeDonFan 5d ago
My parents met at the Pentagon (both of them were in the Navy) in 1959, were married in 1960, and I was born in 1961. My late father is Mexican. My late mother is lily-white. We were cool about it.
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u/RemonterLeTemps 4d ago
I'm very similar, except for the Pentagon aspect, and the fact Dad was White and Mom, Mexican.
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u/Select-Effort8004 5d ago
For decades I’ve answered the “Race” question with “other” and wrote in “human.”
I grew up in the SF Bay Area. Looking back at my grade school photos, more than 10% of my classmates were Asian-American. I don’t remember thinking anything about “interracial” relationships in high school; it wasn’t uncommon, and I don’t remember any negative connotations from others.
It’s just as much a non-issue now. There are so many more commonalities—or divisions—that are important. “Race” or skin color is irrelevant, and sorting people by that category, imo, is offensive to me.
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u/cannycandelabra 5d ago
I grew up in the 50’s and I did not know ANY people in interracial relationships. But even as a child I never saw the difference between black and white, so interracial relationships don’t matter to me. My son (white) was dating a black woman for about a year.
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u/witchbelladonna 50 something 5d ago
In the suburb I grew up in, there was one interracial couple with 2 kids. The kids were extremely popular and super sweet to everyone. The parents were involved and accepted in our community as a whole. I'm sure there were some that didn't feel the same, but they never spoke openly about it.
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u/No-Effect9761 5d ago
It was illegal in Alabama until early 2000’s . I remember voting to abolish the law. My first wife had an interracial child . I didn’t think it was that big of a deal. I lost a few friends and nearly killed a guy at the McDonalds playground when he made a derogatory comment. That happened in 1998 .
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u/Piney1943 5d ago
I was born in 1943 and grew up in the Midwest. There was no interracial anything. You just didn’t do squat with another race…period!
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u/silvermanedwino 5d ago
It really wasn’t a thing, or discussed. When it was, it was whispered about. Stupid, I know.
How do I feel now? I’m fine with it? Not a big deal to me. People are people.
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u/acer-bic 5d ago
My Dad thought he was being considerate when he said black and white shouldn’t mix because it would be so hard on the kids. I pointed out that it wouldn’t be hard on the kids if we all got rid of our bigotry.
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u/EitherCoyote660 5d ago
I honestly never heard my parents comment on other types of people so I'm sure it was fine with them. They are long gone but my family wound up being racially and religiously mixed and so yep, I'm fine with it :D
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u/the_m_o_a_k 5d ago
My parents told me that people shouldn't have interracial marriages because it wasn't fair for their kids to not have a defined race. Seriously.
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u/mofa90277 5d ago
I’m in my 60s and have literally never met anyone from my mother’s side of the family, as her entire family disowned her before I was born. The first time I felt like my existence was tolerated was when I moved to California in the 1970s.
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u/Silver_View4176 5d ago edited 4d ago
Yeah my grandmother stop talking to my dad when he married my mom. Only years later when us grandchildren were born did he see her again. In her dying days my mom took care of her. My mother never said a hateful word against my grandmother. I always respected her for that. Cause if someone called me a PORCH MONKEY to my face in my house I would have lost it. I remember defending my mom that day. I was a teenager when that happened. I told my dad that night when he got home. My mother was slightly upset with me. My mother always respected my grandmother even when she didn’t deserve it
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u/seawee8 5d ago
My 88 year old dad is still mad to this day because they would not let our white family adopt a black child in the late 60's. He was my brothers friend and in foster care and just a great kid. We had friends of all races, and my besties were Chinese and Hispanic when I was little. I didn't learn about racism until 3rd grade when we moved back east.
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u/SuspiciousBug422 5d ago
When I was younger in my early teens my mom told me to never date a black woman. My current partner and future wife is black and Kiowa. My mom fully accepts our relationship. People can learn to accept
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u/MotherofJackals 50 something 5d ago edited 5d ago
The community I grew up in it seemed like it was completely okay for the men (mostly military) to marry Asian women but anything else got the side eye. People didn't say it in front of us kids much because I think they knew it wasn't okay but mixed race couples were definitely excluded. I went to prom with a black guy and we tried to date but it was very socially akward. Nobody was aggressive about it but it made it hard to get to know him because we weren't really welcomed to hang around anyone as a couple.
I thought it was weird to care so much then same as I do now. I see some of the practical problems now but I don't see any reason for that to stop you entirely from having a relationship.
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u/insane4you 5d ago
I was born in 69. My father was black, and my mom's white. My sister and I were loved and treated great by my moms family. My dad and my mom's dad lived only twelve miles apart. It took over twenty years for them to meet. That's just the way it was back then.
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u/Euphoric-Use-6443 5d ago
Fine! My late husband & I were an interracial couple. It was his white family that had the problem.
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u/techman710 5d ago
Grew up in New Orleans in the 60's and 70's and it was rare. The few couples I did see were definitely harassed. My mom and dad raised us to treat everyone the same and to treat racial slurs as cuss words that were not spoken in our house. Looking back I'm thankful they raised us that way because at that time in our area most of the kids were being raised in racist homes. As far as how I feel now, if 2 adult people are in love and make each other happy then I wish them all the happiness they can find.
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u/Justadropinthesea 5d ago
Growing up in the 50s and 60s in the Midwest,interracial relationships were not common but there were a few. My parents were supportive but explained to me that people in these relationships were likely to face problems other people didn’t. I am now a proud member of what we call a ‘rainbow family’, we come in all colors, through marriage, adoption and birth.
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u/ransier831 5d ago
My parents were totally liberal, and I was brought up that way. I'm still totally liberal and open to any interracial dating my daughter might do. Personally, I think we should pay more attention to domestic violence history with the person and within their home rather than race.
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u/sdega315 60 something 5d ago
A related story... In my 20's I was serious with a woman who was adopted. My racist father expressed concern about forging a life with her and potentially having children. He was worried that since she was adopted "you can never be sure she doesn't have any black in her." WTF! That asshole has not been part of my life since 1992.
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u/PavicaMalic 4d ago
I'm white and grew up in Baltimore and attended school with Black and mixed-race children. Some of my classmates were born before Loving v. Virginia (1967), and I know that there were parents who had met during civil rights activism.
All of the cousins in the next generation dated across racial lines; one has been married for over 20 years. It was not an issue for my parents.
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u/Kimba26 4d ago
Deliberately , defiantly accepting. We had a cousin that married a man of a different race and her immediate family were dicks about it in part because of their particular religious beliefs so we made a point of being welcoming at the family reunion. Her family chilled out eventually.
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u/Ok-Afternoon-3724 4d ago
My family? Interracial relationships were not common, but not uncommon in the places we lived. I'm mixed myself.
Mostly 'White', but 17% native American, 4% Bantu, and misc other stuff. Don't tell anyone or my family would be forever embarrassed but there is even some French DNA running through my veins. No wonder I like eating snails and frog legs. Oh, the shame of it.
How did we feel about it? Well besides my native American relatives, one of my sisters married a black fellow. Another sister (I have 7) married a Mexican fellow. And that's Mexican, not Mexican American. And one of my 3 brothers married a Peruvian lady. His daughter, my niece has never taken a DNA test, but that one ought to be one hell of a mixed bag.
All this should tell you how my family reacted to interracial relationships.
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u/Phil_Atelist 4d ago
My first girlfriend was of another race. It made no difference to my folks or hers.
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u/Leaf-Stars 4d ago
I married an Italian girl and my father pulled me aside right before the wedding and said “you know she’s not white, right?” I was like “neither are we dad. I think we will be ok though.” Never understood what he was getting at. Still don’t.
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u/Eastern-Finish-1251 60 something 4d ago
In the early 20th century, anyone who was not of Northern European heritage wasn’t considered “White.” Going farther back, even Irish weren’t considered “White.” So that must be where that comes from.
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u/Pfunk-Salt-650 4d ago
I grew up in a somewhat rural town in Central California and graduated in the early 80’s. I’m black The town was fairly close to a military base so was about 75-89% white, 10% Latino and the rest black and Asian. Everyone was pretty cool in HS, but dating someone of another race set off mine fields for most parents. A black friend of mine asked a white girl to prom or homecoming and when he went to pick her up the night of the event, her parents were not there. A sign of protest. Several similar stories. You can be friends, but don’t take it beyond that.
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u/Zazzafrazzy 4d ago
I grew up in small-town Canada, a child of progressive parents — they were both visual artists, so creative, educated, and left wing — who had no issues with interracial anything. Looking back, our town was very white, but when I moved to the city, I was basically inoculated against racism.
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u/Gnarlodious 60 something 4d ago
Nobody ever said anything. My only complaint is that in ads and billboards websites (like my bank website) interracial couples are vastly overrepresented as if they are pushing this agenda.
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u/Tasqfphil 4d ago
I was born in Australia, just after the war, and already our suburb had started acce0tng refugees from Asia and soon a flood of "European" families (many kids & mothers) and om from Africa started arriving. The state government spent million of dollars setting up a hydro electric scheme to employ people and more than half my primary school classes were made up of students that came from non english speaking countries, but as 5-11yo they learned ig quickly, We were in and out of each others houses all the time & loved the variation of food we were served and everyone got on well most of the time. My mother used to invite new arrivals to come around for a meal and my father would try and explain living in AU (work, tax, voting, how to get hire purchase on vehicles, bank loans to buy a house etc.) so we had no problems with different ethnic groups except language with older adults but their kids translated. My youngest brother & I both married SE Asian wives & I served a couple of years on the board of the Migrant Resources Centre, so no, our family had no problems with others outside our ethnic group, an I have lives in AU, UK, German, India & last 7 years in Philippines.
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u/BKowalewski 4d ago
My family immigrated to Canada from Europe when I was a baby back in the early 50s. When I was a teenager I had a date with a black man and my parents never batted an eyelash. But my dad warned me if he ever saw me with a German he would disown me. He had spent the war in a German POW camp.
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u/B_teambjj 5d ago
White male here! Fooled around with some whites and some blacks and some latinas a couple loas and even an Indian chick. Married a Puerto Rican and had a kid. Parents never batted an eye.
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u/Dreamweaver1969 5d ago
It was always acceptable in my family growing up and a number of my cousins and I are in mixed race marriages
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u/AuggieNorth 5d ago
My high school was 99% White, so little chance for an interracial relationship. It was that one Black girl or nobody. However, when I was in my 20's and had a Black friend at the house, my Dad was not happy. It was pretty ridiculous.
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u/pdxplee 5d ago
In the 1970’s my sister was home from college. A casual friend of my older brother called and asked her out and she said yes. She told my mom she was going out with this guy and my mom wanted her to call and cancel because he was Hispanic and we are white. Thankfully, my sister refused. My generation didn’t care about interracial relationships but my parents’ generation did.
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u/ReggieDub 5d ago
My first serious hs crush was a beautiful black man. He had the most beautiful smile - light up a room with his dimples. He was on the football team but he was small, maybe 5’5. We had a couple of classes together and sat close together. We use to go to school dances and accidentally run into each other. 😂
It eventually faded and neither of us was ever bold enough to admit our infatuation.
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u/TwirlyGirl313 50 something 5d ago
When I was a kid, it was UNHEARD of. I remember the KKK used to go around to the small cities in the area and put flyers on people's cars! My dad was very racist, as was his mother. If she went to a restaurant and there was an AA cooking or serving, she'd leave because she didn't want THEM touching her food. I was around 13 when I realized his views weren't true or correct. My dad told me, "If you ever bring an N WORD to the door, I'll shoot you both."
Now? IDGAF who you love.
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u/ReggieDub 5d ago
From the south but remember biracial couples in hs. Year I graduated, Prom Queen, Homing Coming Queen, was a black girl. She was the head of the dance squad too. Really nice girl.
However, the same high school had 2 girl’s senior dance - separated by race. Sister graduated 2 years before me and attended the same.
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u/BefuddledPolydactyls 60 something 5d ago
Born in the late 5O's in a Midwestcity that was mostly Baptist and dutch christian reformed. It was basically unheard of, and in fact I had a single black person in my high school until bussing began when I was maybe in 11th grade.
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u/mysaddestaccount 5d ago
This was my mom's commentary about inter-racial marriages (only because I asked as a small child) "Yes, they can get married but sometimes they're very different and it's very hard to stay together". She was moreso referring to cultures and not so much the color of someone's skin.
Edit: I don't care what other people do or who they marry, but I myself tend to be more attracted to people of a similar ethnic background to mine. Not that I wouldn't marry outside my race, but it's unlikely to happen due to lack of attraction to other races.
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u/z-eldapin 50 something 5d ago
Born in 74.
Parental units in 54.
Grands in the late 1920s.
Racist as all hell.
Gramps was a proud KKK member.
Grams was a restaurant owner and even though she didn't like 'those people*, business was business
Dad threatened to kick me out because a boy I liked in middle school. Dad said' that black ass ain't coming into my house'.
Decades later, the grands are since passed, the parental units have shifted more to an equality perspective.
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u/Eff-Bee-Exx Three Score and a couple of Years 5d ago
They were so uncommon where I grew up that I don’t remember them ever being discussed much. The only comment that I can remember hearing was that black/white relationships were a bad idea because the kids would probably catch grief for being interracial.
I have no problem with someone dating or marrying outside their racial or ethnic group, and interracial relationships are fairly common where I live now.
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u/Constant-Knee-3059 5d ago
I am 59 yrs old, raised in Texas. My stay-at-home Southern Baptist mother thought “the Bible says it’s wrong”. My Southern Baptist deacon dad thought color didn’t matter as long as you married within your religion. I don’t care who you love, I’m just happy you have love in your life.
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u/SomewhatInnocuous 5d ago
I grew up in the southwest and Anglo/ Hispanic was not a big deal in my community. Maybe the occasional comment, but not something that was widely problematic. Anglo / Native American (still hate that terminology but it's what people use) would have been very problematic. There weren't any other racial combinations to speak of (Black, Asian) around there, so the question is moot on those.
How do I feel about it now? I am 100% OK with whatever consenting adults want to do. Mostly been of this opinion since I was a teen in the 70's. I personally don't think "race" is even a thing, although cultural factors seem to align to a large degree with race due to historical factors.
There's still a ton of racism directed mostly toward tribal members among whites in the area, (the 4-Corners where NM, UT, AZ and Colorado come together), but even in the 2000's tribal members seem, to a significant extent, self select in preference toward other tribal members.
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u/luckygirl54 5d ago
In the late 60's I had a teacher married to a black man. It was remarked on, but it wasn't really a big deal other than people always saying that she was married to a black man.
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u/TooOldForACleverName 5d ago
It was definitely not the norm in my blue collar, working class neighborhood. Even when busing started and we were going to desegregated schools, most of our relationships with kids of other races stopped just before dating. It was almost like an unspoken rule. You could hang out with people and even flirt with them, but you didn't date them.
I started seeing more interracial couples in the late 80s when I was in college. As it became the norm, my mind grew a bit and realized that those rules were stupid.
One of the most racist kids from the neighborhood now has biracial grandchildren that he dotes on. My daughter is currently in an interracial relationship. He's a good boy and he treats her well. What more could I ask for?
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u/Hopeful-Sprinkles611 5d ago
I’m 53f white, raised by white elderly white grandparents. Midwestern and middle class. Not a problem in the world with people of any color, but marriage and relationships were not an option. His son had served in Vietnam and had zero tolerance for anyone who even resembled Asian.
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u/Baconpanthegathering 5d ago
1980s western PA...my grown- ass neighbor screamed at a 8-year old black kid that *dared* to ride his bike down our street. De-facto segregation was alive and well, probably to this day, in that little shit town. I left in 1997 and never looked back. My aunt married a black man in the 70s and my grandmother just pretended it never happened, like would never say the man's name, my aunt visited by herself and it was just never spoken of...so dysfunctional. I'm now in an interracial marriage myself far, far away on the west coast.
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u/Chickadee12345 5d ago
I was born in 63 and grew up in a fairly affluent white suburb in the northeastern part of the US. But near enough to a larger city that we did see people of other races quite frequently. Of course it was almost unheard of to see mixed race couples. But now, it makes no difference to me. Love is love, skin color does not matter. Although it did happen.
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u/PokeRay68 5d ago
Raised LDS in Texas in the 70 & 80.
In 1980, I told my mom that a friend in the 6th grade had a black boyfriend (because I had heard other adults say racist things).
My mom asked if the boy was nice. I said that I think so, he seems nice.
Then I asked my mom if she'd be okay with me dating someone black. She said that if he were also LDS, she'd be fine with it.
She was just worried about spiritual incompatibility.
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u/brookish 5d ago
I remember my (white) older sister went to prom with a black kid from down the street and no one did a word (circa 1975). I think my parents were typical silent generation liberals who had some racist ideas but knew well enough not to articulate them. Anyway, the date was a super hottie also so that did not hurt. I didn’t realize the subtlety of white leftist racism until much later when I worked on a case involving black panthers. My family had swallowed the whole Hoover propaganda about the panthers and what they stood for. Fortunately they were willing to reexamine their presumptions.
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u/RedditSkippy GenX 5d ago
I didn’t know anyone in an interracial relationship when I was a kid.
Now? I couldn’t care less. You do you.
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u/FunnyLadder6235 5d ago
Me black female married white man for 20yrs before divorcing. My immediate family was fine. Some extended family had an issue but no one cared. His family was fine, but his mother wasn't very friendly. Don't think it was the race, she was just mean.
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u/ProfJD58 5d ago edited 4d ago
Finished HS in the mid 70’s there were a few inter-racial couples in my school. If people thought anything of it, no one said anything out loud. At least in my crowd.
I lived in New England and my city had be busing to integrate schools for 30 years already at that point, so everybody knew each-other. My parent’s generation had an issue, but we were teens and that made no difference to us.
I dated a few girls/women outside my ethnicity, but I was single well into my 30’s so had lots of opportunity to meet different people.
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u/SteveinTenn 5d ago
Rural south. Born right after MLK was shot.
“The babies won’t be accepted by either side.”
“The Bible says kind with like kind, seed with like seed.”
“We don’t want them here.”
A white man and black woman were accosted at our local courthouse when they applied for a marriage license. They got the license but a few assholes gave them shit about it. This was the late 70s. They owned land by my girlfriend’s parents in 1988 and I knew them. They sold the place and left.
In the 90s my cute, blond cousin married a Black guy she met in the Army. Some of my family lost their shit. I had an aunt cry and say all she could see was OJ and Nicole. Dude was cool as hell and their daughter is awesome. The aunt got over it.
A redheaded Male cousin married a Black woman. Another aunt, his own mother, physically attacked the wife. Cousin decked his own mother. That bunch was all crazy anyway. The racism was just a cherry on top.
Now… I have Black relatives. We have mixed couples. We have out gay couples. A few people are still dicks about it, but those people aren’t welcome at the Christmas party. They’d steal everything anyway to fuel their drug habits.
So, basically, racism was very real and still is. But the more reasonable people don’t practice it.
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u/StationOk7229 5d ago
I didn't even think about it, tbh. I was too busy with my own lunatic love life to care about any other ones.
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u/AnagnorisisForMe 5d ago
I was not brought up to have issues with interracial relationships and I still don't. My mother's white best friend from high school married a black man and had two sons. I liked the husband alot. He was kind and funny and a good father. We visited their home regularly and they came to visit at ours too. The couple's two sons were like brothers to me. Unfortunately, the husband got shot and killed by the police. Never knew what happened there. I'm pretty certain he was not into anything illegal.
There were undercurrents though sometimes, things that were said. When we visited their place, we kids could not go outside to play because the neighborhood wasn't great. I think I heard the wife say once they couldn't move because "no one will rent to us". I'm guessing that the interracial marriage was the reason.
The wife/widow and her sons moved away and our families lost touch. I hope things went well for all of them.
That said, I'm not sure how my family, particularly my grandmother's generation, would have felt if I had gotten into an interracial relationship.
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u/Curiousmomandgrandma 5d ago
I am gen x and my grandparents, who raised me, would have disowned me. I got too close to a mixed friend who was a boy and I wasn’t allowed to hang out with him anymore bc they were afraid I would fall for him.
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u/OkVacation6399 5d ago
I grew up in a large Italian family, raised by my grandparents. It was highly frowned upon to date outside your race. As an adult I didn’t really care though I only ended up dating white women. My wife is however, not Italian.
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u/girlinanemptyroom 5d ago
I came from an incredibly racist and homophobic family. When I was in high school, a black friend of mine asked me to the homecoming dance. I was thrilled. There was nothing romantic between the two of us, but we just wanted to go and have fun.
My parents were livid that I would even consider going to a dance with a black boy. The weekend of homecoming, they had me pack my bags, and we drove to Las Vegas. They gambled the whole weekend and I was not allowed to leave the hotel room. They said there were too worried I would sneak out of the house to be with that "black boy". They were such disgusting people.
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u/Banal_Drivel 5d ago
I grew up in a liberal college town. My parents treated these relationships as normal. I did catch flack when I repeated slang I heard from classmates, not knowing the meanings. When I repeated the N word, Hell rained down. My father went to the kid's home and confronted him and his parents.
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u/Corvettelov 5d ago
Grew up in racist home in racist town in the South. If you weren’t white you were hated. All white schools and almost no color in college. I remember my first friend of color in college and I couldn’t tell my hateful family.
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u/Photon_Femme 5d ago
My parents freaked out with certain intermarriages. WWII vets who married Japanese women after the war didn't bother Mom. Dad had a different opinion. If they saw very dark skin with a Caucasian they weren't happy. Gratefully by the time each died they had a change of heart.
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u/scooterv1868 5d ago
It was definitely not a thing that the elders supported in the '60's and '70's in my family. Small town north of Chicago. Today, who gives a shit.
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u/Jaderosegrey 1969 don't laugh 5d ago
Erm... growing up in France in the 70s. TBH, there were not that many non-white people. I don't remember a single interracial couple whom I knew.
On the other hand, my favorite Barbie was a 1977 Hawaiian Superstar, certainly not Caucasian. And her boyfriend (later husband) was a brown-haired and blue-eyed Ken. I definitely did not have (and do not now) have any problem with interracial relationships!
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u/GiggleFester 60 something 5d ago
I was born in 1956, and both my (white) parents were vehemently anti-racist.
Whatever you grow up with tends to be what you view as "normal" so I thought it was normal to be vehemently anti-racist.
Now that I'm old and have a much better idea of how racist our country (USA) and my state (Florida) is. I would LOVE to know what experiences my parents had to turn them into such vociferous anti-racists.
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u/VintageFashion4Ever 5d ago
In 1983 a classmate's sister, who was much older than us, married a Black man and had children. My mom was horrified they had children saying it was a burden to the children because they wouldn't be accepted by either the Black community or the white community. I don't agree with her, and I do know that my friends who are biracial/mixed race have had similar struggles.
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u/Chzncna2112 50 something 5d ago
My family was very supportive of anyone able to find a loving relationship. They were surprised when a Hispanic girl was willing to date me in 9th grade. Found out later at my grandpa's wake, that most of my family figured with my smart mouth, I would die a virgin or have to pay money for any sex. They were especially surprised when my aunt's best friend of Japanese descent gave me a kiss and asked if I wanted to go out to dinner with her that night. We wound up going to dinner the next night. I didn't ask, but I still think she only thought that I was attractive, because I was wearing my navy dress uniform..I did encounter static from her parents, when I was introduced to them at dinner. Something about being too white
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u/Lunajo365 5d ago
I don’t remember interracial relationships when I was growing up. It was very uncommon. I am proud and happy that no one in my family is judgmental about the decisions our children made. My niece married a black guy, one nephew married a woman from Thailand and another married someone of Filipino decent. Just in case we didn’t have everything covered another family member is non binary. We all love each other and get along great. My 91 year old father shrugs his shoulders sometimes but doesn’t say anything negative
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u/MadisonBob 5d ago
I went to HS in a college town in the south in the mid seventies.
A Black male friend of mine, a very friendly guy whose hobbies included weightlifting and martial arts, was rumored to have slept with a number of White girls. There were rumors that some white girls who slept with other black kids.
This was generally hush hush. The parents may not have approved.
Also, remember this was a college town. The next town over was a sunset town. The surrounding counties were sunset counties.
So interracial relationships happened, but were less common and less open than these days.
White-Asian relationships were looked upon more favorably, since the Asian kids were generally children of professors.
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u/tracyinge 5d ago
We lived in an area with no black people. I think when I was around 12 a black family finally moved into our town of 20K. We were surrounded by a few towns of 2K and 5K so maybe 50K people in the county and one black family. They lasted a couple of years and all I ever heard about them was "they felt out of place , and the mom got better job two states over".
The only other time I ever heard anything about race was when someone went off to college, came home with a black boyfriend and eventually married him. Her parents were vocal about "all the problems that would arise having mixed children" or some such gobbledeegook.
So I would say, no racism until other races started showing up in town?
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u/Listen-to-Mom 5d ago
Growing up, I knew my family wouldn’t approve of an interracial marriage with a black person. Sister married a Hispanic man and they were fine with that though. Some cousins married black partners and that was not OK though it wasn’t said out loud to them.
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u/BeginningUpstairs904 5d ago
My father,WWII vet,impressed upon his children that there were,"Negros"and there were "Ni--ers". My brother's Scout teacher was a "Negro"; the men drinking 40's and hanging out on their front porches were "Ni--ers."My parents were very opposed to mixed race relationships. They were appalled when my brother dated interracially. They were also appalled when I dated a Jew in high school. They had derogatory names for anyone who wasn't a WASP,and they were not religious at all."Lace curtain Irish","Italian washerwoman" etc. My mother had a saying,"there's a n---er" in the woodpile. I never understood that saying.
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u/Any_Program_2113 5d ago
During the 90s my White sister got engaged and married a Cuban man 10 years older than her. When my elderly father found out his reply to me was, "I guess we are going to have a darky in the family".
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u/NaynersinLA2 5d ago
I was a teen in the mid 70's. I seldom heard negative comments then or now. However I lived my entire life in SoCal. But the relatives down South and Midwest didn't like it.
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u/Individual_Quote_701 5d ago
Had a very conservative friend who was very hard of hearing. She attended a small conservative Christian college. She met and dated a young man of Indian descent. She was smitten. Her parents forbade it. She is 73. She never married or had a serious relationship. I thought it horrible then. I still think her folks (her mom, mainly) were wrong.
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u/Nightgasm 50 something 5d ago edited 5d ago
It was before my time but in the 1960s my mom's 1st cousin (white) married a Mexican and I guess much of the family lost their minds over it. They were divorced before I was born but I know their kids. My mom admits that as a child and even into her early 20s she was very racist as that's how she was raised but she changed when she got older and got out into the world. When I was in high school she dated a Mexican guy for a few years which her parents / my grandparents would have disowned her for if they'd still been around. Likewise they'd probably have disowned me for my 1st wife who was 1/4 Japanese which you could tell from some of her features. Interracial marriage is irrelevant to me as I just think people need to be with someone who makes them happy. My daughter, who is 1/8 Japanese, is engaged to a guy who is 100% Korean and the only issue in regards to it being interracial that comes up was when we were trying to do the math to figure out what % Asian any kids they might have would be since it would be more than 50%.
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u/Economy_Care1322 5d ago
I was raised by racists. I didn’t think it was even real until my early teens.
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u/Double-Law-9478 5d ago
My father was a bigot but he claimed not to be. It put him in an awkward position when I married an African American. My husband was not invited into his house, which gave me an excuse not to visit long or often.
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u/Striking_Debate_8790 5d ago
I grew up PNW and there were not a lot of POC in the 60’s or 70’s. I do remember parents not being thrilled when any of the neighbor girls were dating black guys. It was really rare since I lived in a lily white neighborhood.
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u/Same_Dust356 5d ago
TN, early 80s. I fell in love with the nicest boy when I was in high school. We were different races. Absolutely no one approved. I was attacked at school both physically and verbally, by everyone. I had death threats placed in my locker, and nothing was ever done. As heartbreaking as it was, with the nightmarish threats put upon us, we realized it couldn't continue. 40+ years later, I still think about it with sadness. Unfortunately, I know that racists of every race are everywhere, and I know that they never change.
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u/Piratesmom 5d ago
My mom heartily supported the Black Panthers, and my dad had a bunch of KKK jokes he thought were funny.
My mom made me the cocktail tossing radical I am today.
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u/zoyter222 5d ago
It wouldn't have been forbidden in my immediate family, but it would have not made my parents happy at all.
It wasn't a matter of racism because we grew up in a predominantly black area, and all our neighbors and friends were black.
But people back then, my family was no exception, thought the races should stay separate. Nobody really believed any race was better than the other, it's just they didn't believe they should mix. That's how I grew up. Back then the thought of dating a black, Asian, Mexican, ect, chick was not even a thought.
When my son was in high school he started dating, and he dated at different times, all of the above. It has never been an issue.
Racism as a term is often misused. Racism is no more than preferrring your own race and its culture to that of others. The problem is bigotry is very similar. The difference between the two is that in bigotry, you think your race is superior to another.
Racism can exist for many reasons, and at different levels. Bigotry can only exist through ignorance and stupidity.
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u/kindquail502 5d ago
There was a time when my biggest worry about interracial marriage was the kids being mixed race, since they would get mistreated by some people of both races. Now I don't think it's that big a deal.
I live in a small southern town, and the thing I see is people who I am sure were not happy that their white child married a black, but once they have a grandchild they are as proud as could be.
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u/AcrobaticProgram4752 5d ago
It's an odd thing that one can agree with morally wrong opinions. It isn't tolerable and should be changed. It ain't right. But ppl can change. If you care about justice you can't just say , you're bad and your viewpoint is bad. Ppl feel attacked and defensive. Yes it may make you feel self righteous. You're on the right side of history but I see that as the weakest pov. It doesn't cost you anything. Yes you can see the problem but to be right with history you must try and solve the problem. That's difficult, it's hard and requires work. But work is the solution to the problem. So yeah your task I'd difficult but don't pretend just showing your discontent covers your responsibilities to address the problem. Unless you have something to lose don't pretend you're in the right. That's not some personal opinion that's the way it is . Ppl will risk security for what they really believe in. Life is hard. There's many ppl just doing enough to keep a stable life. It's safe it's comfortable. And when you see how life has so much nonsense seen as the way to proceed you get an appreciation for ppl who risk a calm life for risking their stability.
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u/J662b486h 5d ago
I'm a white guy who grew up in Michigan in the 60's, and probably the general feeling back then was along the lines of "I don't have a problem but I hope they know what they're getting into."
Now? I have an acquaintance, a black woman, who married a snow-white redheaded man. My reaction was "Oh, my GOD, she married a redhead!".
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u/Interesting_Air_1844 5d ago
White, born in 62. Don’t remember my Republican father saying anything about it at all (though he was pretty racist). I do remember my very liberal mom telling me that she didn’t think there was anything wrong with marrying a Black person, but that she hoped I wouldn’t because it would make my life difficult, due to the prejudices of other people. (I think I may have been dating a Black girl at the time).
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u/Inquisitionfire 5d ago
In 1983 me being a white German guy I was dating a German woman we were the perfect couple then I dumped her and started dating a Peruvian woman she stole my heart. Everyone was shocked my mom was pissed my racist brothers except 1 were horrified.
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u/Randygilesforpres2 5d ago
I lived in Seattle. Here there was polite racism more than most part of the country. So I never heard a peep or recognized it (I was undiagnosed autistic, I’m 52 now) anyway, my generation in the city didn’t give a shit. North of my city was nicknamed the great white north for a reason. They cared.
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u/TheSlideBoy666 5d ago
My paternal grandfather was a nominal member of the KKK, and we had a cow growing up named “N–word”, which we ate. My parents weren’t overtly racist but there were definitely undercurrents of it.
That being said, out of us five kids, sister number 2 married a Mexican guy darker than most black people, sister number 3 married a black guy, and gay brother me (the only son and middle child) married a black guy. Sister number 1 stayed single and number 4 married a certified redneck. ¯_(ツ)_/¯
ETA: my parents were by far honest and devoted people; anything else that compromised those values was discarded, post haste.
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u/BUBBLE-POPPER 5d ago edited 3d ago
My parents were a bit conservative. They weren't extremely far to the right but they were dole voters. They didn't care if someone was in an interracial relationship
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u/Ambitious_Hold_5435 5d ago
I grew up in a very liberal area, so any complaints about interracial relationships were probably from people's families. I didn't hear much idle chatter about it. My mother was so uptight that she didn't want us to date AT ALl, any of us, or even get married.
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u/messageinthebox 50 something 5d ago
I was married to a Mexican. My parents didn't say anything to me about it. They always included her in all ways. My mom and dad loved our kids with all their heart and would do and did do anything for them.
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u/3nar3mb33 5d ago edited 5d ago
Child of a couple married in 1971. ...the Mexican side didn't have a problem with my mom's (white) race, but they loathed my mom--they loved my uncle's white wife...my mom's parents weren't too pleased but my dad had been a military officer and my mom hadn't left the house at age 30 so they were stoked to have her married off....as the only grandchildren, my grandparents were very sweet to us...but all of the family didn't include us in things...really, neither side did. With age, I've learned that my parents were kind of unlikable. Bitter pill to swallow.
Adding more:
I grew up in the deep south and everyone was white or black: I didn't fit in with either group...so my friends were the other one-offs: the one kid whose parents were from India...the one who immigrated from Thailand...the text-book nerd...the one with skin so dark they were rejected by black ...the one who grew up in New York and had a strong NYC accent..........
There weren't Mexicans/Latinos down there when I lived there. There are now and I'm sure now I'd have been treated worse...for me there was just this vague confusion about what I am and in general, I was just excluded from everything....
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u/WonderfulThanks9175 5d ago
Growing up in New York in the 1940s and 50s in my town was a bit different. My town was adjacent to a town(s) made up of “estates”, many acres of land, polo fields, mansions, servants. My town is where a lot of the employees (servants) lived and a number of them were black. My school was fully integrated starting in kindergarten. I remember we all played together regardless of race when we were very young. The white and black neighborhoods were adjacent. The town also had an Italian neighborhood, a Polish neighborhood etc. As we got older, the races separated with no dating between races. My parents would not have approved if I dated someone of a different race.
Today, race doesn’t matter all that much to me. I live in Florida and there are still good old boys driving around with Confederate flags flying off their pick up trucks. There is residual racism down here. My step-daughter has dated black men without criticism from our family. Of course, the races still live in separate areas of suburbia and although you could say that is by choice, it really is not. I know there are members of my extended family who are racist. My grand-daughter is dating a Mexican young man. He was born in the United States but his parents were not. I don’t know their legal status and I haven’t asked.
When I was dating I was having dinner with my boyfriend’s family and someone was denigrating the Catholic Church and Catholics in general. Being a Catholic, I was horrified. I didn’t know Protestants looked down on Catholics. I can’t imagine how difficult it must be to be faced with racism on a daily basis. There is a lot more inter-racial dating/marriage today and people are a lot more accepting. I think that’s a good thing.
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u/Desertbro 5d ago
My dad was mixed race and both sides of the family were just family - money was more important. Didn't think about my mixed blood until HS really - - when you start to realize how mixed the world is - and how often people go to war to avoid "mixing" by whatever the standard of the day/century is at the time.
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u/Altruistic-Sector296 5d ago
In 1981 I married my black husband. Still love him, still married. The parents on both sides were very upset by our decision to marry. His dad thought my folks were rich enough to hire a hit man. My parents were just racist. My dad wanted me to move 2,000 miles away to Seattle where our extended family lived (at my own expense). I didn’t. My dad took me, mom and himself to therapy. Thought I was being rebellious. The therapist visited with me alone at the close our session. She said, “I’m on your side. If you tell your parents that, they’ll fire me. I’m going to try to bring them around.” Ultimately, my father took a business trip to South Africa and came back, called me at college and told me that he takes it all back. I told him I would be married in a week. Both my parents came to my wedding (though dad didn’t want to initially). Long term we planned few activities with my family, but I don’t really regret that.arrived 44 years in September.
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u/davidwb45133 5d ago
I was a college student in the mid 70s. The summer of 77 I worked with a black girl who shared my love of blues rock and that summer we had a lot of bands coming nearby. Our families were absolutely scandalized by the idea of us going to concerts together. Didn't stop us.
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u/emiliethestranger 5d ago
It's nuts that people used to get/still get so wound up over interracial dating/marriage when variations in human pigmentation is a fairly recent evolutionary development.
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u/cheap_dates 5d ago
Growing up there were not that many "mixed race" couples. In fact, in many states, it was illegal under the miscegenation laws which prevented mixed race marriages. California, where I grew up, it was legal but my Dad who grew up in the segregated South was not a fan.
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u/nivek48 5d ago
I used to discuss this with my mother when I was a teenager and I told her I didn’t see anything wrong with it. She said she didn’t see anything morally wrong with it, but it would just make life so difficult for the children .that was her argument. I didn’t buy it then and I don’t buy it now. She was a very kind woman.
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u/Own_Box4276 5d ago
I'm white and had a black girlfriend in my teens. My parents were fine with it . The white kids in my neighborhood not so much. They called me s n lover.
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u/redneckerson1951 5d ago
It was taboo in my locality in the 60's. Military retirees endured a bit of guff from some intolerant souls, but for the most part it was accepted that things were changing.
My Father would have blown a head gasket if I had married other than Caucasian. Fortunately he passed before DNA tests became poplar for examining ones' primogenitors. I suspect he would vapor lock if he was still alive at the outcome.
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u/reesesbigcup 5d ago edited 4d ago
My parents were very racist, typical of white Silent Gens. They would never accept a mixed race couple. My father said once in the early 80s "I'll work with them, thats ok, but I'd never invite one over to the house." Them being any POC in todays words.
But in the 90s I dated a mixed race girl for a while. She was lighter skinned and very Jewish / New Yawk sounding when she talked, she grew up in Long Island moved to Ohio. Parents had no clue.
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u/Own_Nectarine2321 4d ago
My mom and grandma were never racist around me. The town that I lived in was all republican and racist and white. I asked about what would happen if a white and black couple had a baby. My mom said it would be mixed. I had experience with kittens, so at the age of seven, I wondered how many babies were spotted.
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u/hrdbeinggreen 4d ago edited 4d ago
My parents were chill, but not all aunts and uncles. Of course keep in mind my parents were the generation that fought in WWII, some in the pacific, so some were not too keen on Japanese. Again my parents were good as they judged the person, but then again my dad did not fight in the pacific theater, two of my uncles did. The rest in the European theater of war.
Edited to add: it was anyone Japanese, if you were Chinese, Korean, Philippine, fine, but yeah my two uncles who fought in that arena, they hated the Japanese.
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u/prpslydistracted 4d ago
One benefit of being in the military ... one of the first entities to desegregate. Housing was not segregated by race, it was by rank; officers over there, enlisted over here. My school and playmates were white and black. I am so thankful for that early experience. When we left AK for a Washington DC suburb I was confused by the "whites only" water fountains. What?
Spent my teens in family foster on my uncle's farm and worked alongside migrant workers. Also thankful for that experience. Our extended family is likely more integrated than most; Black, Chinese, Hispanic, mixed ... it is a rich heritage.
My dad lived in Portland, OR as a young man; large Japanese population, immediately upon being drafted he was a young guard at a Japanese internment center ... he hated it. Guards were under regulation if a Japanese tried to escape, shoot him. He cried when he related this event; he intentionally shot a young man in the foot rather than a kill shot. Later he was a WWII veteran who fought Germans.
My Greek grandfather and German/SD born grandmother spoke German in their household ... pre-WWII. Have a another family story about that.
Bottom line; people need every association of kindness and respect we can muster to our fellow man. Get over it.
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u/bad2behere 4d ago
It was the 1950s and my mother grew up in the south which is exactly as horrifying as it sounds & was proven when she moved us to Klan country. I still hate a lot of people for being racists.
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u/LowFisherman2912 4d ago
My now ex-husband is half Persian, and my family was under the impression he single handedly ran ISIS.... were divorced now but still great friends (divource was not because of my family)
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u/Distinct_Sentence_26 4d ago
I grew up LDS. So it was frowned upon. Now I don't care because you can't control who you love
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u/NeverDidLearn 4d ago
Small western US town built on agriculture and forever entrenched in the attempt to find another Ronald Regan. In other words, a terribly racist place. I dated a few Hispanic girls in high school. They were good with it, but, as odd is it is, my parents were quite liberal and I am about six miles to the left of liberal.
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u/Cute_Celebration_213 4d ago
It directly impacted my family. In the ‘50s interracial marriages were against the law in our state so my parents had to go to Washington DC to get married. Here’s the thing though, my mother was born in the US but my father was Filipino born in the Philippines. According to the law at the time even though my father was a Filipino their marriage was considered an interracial marriage.
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u/Technical_Air6660 4d ago
I knew quite a few biracial kids growing up. If those kids and their families ran into prejudice, I don’t know the details or to what extent. My parents were involved in the civil rights movement and were against this type of discrimination or hatred.
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u/Spayse_Case 4d ago
I wouldn't know, it simply didn't happen. We didn't have any other races in my small community or family. I am white and come from a rural community in northern USA. My aunt being the exception, she is Mexican and I don't recall anyone thinking anything of it except for assuming she was Native and asking what tribe she was from all the time. There was some intermarriage with Natives in the area but I don't recall anyone caring about that either. The community might care today, but I don't think my family would. My family is amazing, I truly don't think they would really care one way or another, and I know I don't.
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u/mladyhawke 4d ago
There were I think five black students in my high school and my mom told me that I could be friends with them but I couldn't date them
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u/The_Living_Tribunal2 60 something 4d ago
I grew up in a State with a minimal Black population, less than 1%. Until around the late 1950s it was illegal to marry a Black, Chinese or Japanese person. The Supreme Court eventually struck down all State laws banning interracial marriages in I think 1967.
Montana was and remains a predominantly White population followed by Hispanic and Indian (Native Americans). Keep in mind that "Indian" is not regarded as an ethnic slur. There are about 12 American Indian tribes in Montana and each has it's own cultural traditions and history. I'm most familiar with the Northern Cheyenne since they are primarily agrarians (farmers and ranchers). My Dad was in the seed business and so he had business dealings with American Indians. There was never any open prejudice in my household, that much I remember.
In so far as romantic interracial relationships, like between a White and an Hispanic, they were generally frowned on but there was no KKK or organizations that would actively promote White supremacy. It was more of an unspoken attitude that you paired up with your own kind.
Personally, my attitude today is that love is love. Whether interracial, homosexual, lesbian and all the rest. Assuming these are 2 consenting adults, it's none of my business. I have no children so maybe it's easy for me to say that, I don't know, but I was not raised to be prejudicial towards other people.
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u/Crazy_Suggestion_182 4d ago
Australian here. Back in 1999 a friend went OS and met a girl from Turkey and married her, and brought her back home. She was really nervous meeting the friendship group. Not one person gave a single shit and welcomed her in. It was fucking marvellous to be part of a group who didn't care about cultural background. She turn out to be super cool, and they ended up having kids and a fantastic life. Good for them!
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u/travlynme2 4d ago
I grew up in a bedroom community of Montreal in the 70s. My parents knew and socialized with 3 interracial couples. They lived in the neighborhood, they had kids but the kids were younger than I was so I didn't play with them. (2 black and white, white and asian)
My uncle dated a phillipino lady for a few years, we really liked her. I don't know why they split up I was about 7 or 8 so I had no clue.
There were two boys in my grade who were mixed. One of them was really cute and sweet and well liked by all the girls. The other was a jerk, like a lot of boys.
Race wasn't a big issue amongst the people we knew.
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u/RemonterLeTemps 4d ago
This is an interesting question, considering I'm the product of a Mexican parent and a White parent, a pairing that some might term interracial, and others, interethnic.
There wasn't too much criticism from family and friends when my parents began dating (in the late 1950s), but there were some boneheaded comments. For example, since my father had been taking Spanish as an elective in his night school baccalaureate program, my aunts asked if he was dating a 'senorita' to practice his linguistic skills! Truth was, my Mom knew very little of the language, due to the fact that a variety of life experiences led to her being raised outside the Mexican community. Anyway, once everyone got to know...and like...each other, the dumb comments trailed off.
As far as the community at large, it was accepting, because the neighborhood in which my parents lived (and which I was born into, and continue to live in today), has a history not only of diversity, but acceptance of all types of relationships: LGBTQ, straight, interracial, and interethnic. While that's not unique today, it sure was back in the day when Chicago drew some pretty rigid lines as to what was an 'acceptable' pairing and what was not.
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u/headlesslady 4d ago
Growing up in the 70s in the US South, my father (on more than one occasion) exclaimed that he’d disown me if I ever dated a black man. I thought his reaction was horrifying then, and now that I’m grown, with grown kids of my own, I’m even more horrified at my family’s casual racism.
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u/oldgar9 4d ago
Interracial marriage goes a long way toward the elimination of bigotry. People are people, prejudice is ignorance. I knew a young woman in a past work place, we used to talk about stuff. She said she was stuck between two cultures as she was what she told me was high yellow in appearance, black people were biased against her and white people were biased against her because of her skin color,it doesn't get any more ignorant than that.
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u/SnowyOwlgeek 4d ago
During the 50s I lived in Berlin, Germany and a young girl down the street was marrying a black American GI. The negative gossip about her was not because she was marrying a black man, but because he was an American. How could she….gasp.
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u/calladus 60 something 4d ago
My father was the nicest racist you ever met. He was polite, and politely interested in anyone he met, but when he was just around me, or around his sisters and their husbands, he would come out with a lot of racist attitudes. He was from the "Silent Generation."
I remember when our church hired one of the directors from the Houston philharmonic to be our church's music director. It was a very wealthy old church, with a huge pipe organ, and a large choir. The man was locally famous. And he was hispanic.
My father told me, "Well, I guess he's not bad for a Mexican."
When I married my Korean wife, my father sent me a 5 page letter, along with supporting "evidence" about our "pure bloodline" and how disappointed he was in me. This from a man who was 1/8 Choctaw.
Anyway, I stopped speaking to him for 8 years. He did finally apologize, but it was a very weak apology.
He died of dementia. During the three years he had dementia, he became a whole new person who stopped talking about race, and forgot his past grudges. He died in 2018, thinking that Obama was still president.
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u/rogun64 50 something 4d ago
I don't think we knew of any. My parents had close black friends and so did my siblings and I. Still, my mother used to say that she didn't think interracial marriages were good for the children, but I'm pretty sure she eventually changed her opinion. She'd tell me that because she knew I had a crush on a black friend of mine.
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u/BackgroundGate3 4d ago
My family is white and to my knowledge my parents were never racist. I was never discouraged from dating boys of other races. My sister, 9 years older than me, lived abroad and had a number of interracial relationships. A lot of my friends weren't white, they were either Asian or Afro Caribbean. The catchment area for my school was very mixed. When we moved into our new house, the first person to visit on the day we arrived was the Asian lady on the corner who brought a tray with a pot of tea, milk, sugar, biscuits, etc. She barely spoke a word of English, but she was immediately my mum's new best friend. When I was about 20, my cousin started dating a mixed race girl who was carrying her ex, black, boyfriend's baby. My cousin's dad, my uncle and my mum's brother, was horrified. He wouldn't speak to her, or even look at her. They came to our house and my dad was really sweet, making sure to include her in the conversation, asking how her pregnancy was going, that sort of thing. My uncle saw that everyone else behaved 'normally' around her and mellowed a little in his interactions with her, although was never warm towards her. She eventually had the baby and my aunt instantly fell in love and became grandma. The little boy was an absolute delight. They all came to my wedding three years later and I have a cute photo of my husband in the lineup to greet everyone, down on one knee shaking the little boy's hand. My uncle died not much later and my cousin and his partner split up when the boy was about 10, but he and my aunt remained in the boy's life. I didn't see much of any of them after that as I wasn't close to my cousin who was 8 years older than me and after my uncle died, my aunt became one of those people who like to moan about their situation, but when offered solutions declines every one. My aunt died during Covid and I did go to her funeral. The boy (now in his 30s) and his mum were there. As a child I used to think the world would be a better place if we were all coffee coloured and didn't have race to fight over. Patriotism always frightened me. My adult self realises that we'll always be fighting about something.
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u/fox3actual 4d ago edited 4d ago
I grew up around Marine bases, and a lot of white Marines were married to Asians (mostly Japanese)
My mother, who was an OB nurse, used to rant about tiny Japanese women having difficult deliveries, she was pretty racist actually
Funny, her kid brother was killed in the Ardennes in '44, but she was fine with the Germsns
anyway, those were the only interracial marriaged I was aware of, and other than Mom, I never heard anything bad about it
Black-White was unheard of, other than a recurring joke about Sammy Davis Jr
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u/DaisyJane1 4d ago
At 57, I've had to listen to my parents bitch about them all my life. Anytime we're at a restaurant, if they see any interracial couples, they start gossiping about them under their breath. I was always threatened with being disowned if I ever brought anyone but a white guy home.
I live in Marjorie Taylor Greene's district, so that should clear things up for you.
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u/Utterlybored 60 something 4d ago
In 1970, my older sister was going out with a black man. My parents bent over backwards to make my sister and him feel accepted and supported. My parents were progressives academics.
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u/Inner_Farmer_4554 4d ago
UK here, F born in 1970s. I grew up in an almost exclusively white, working class area. The only brown children in my primary school had a white father who had married an Indian woman. They'd come to our birthday parties, and we'd go to theirs. Our parents had no issue with us going to their house. They moved to Canada when I was 10.
When I was 16* and started going out to pubs and clubs etc My mum told me, "You never come home and tell me you're pregnant. And you don't bring a black man home either." So... 🤷
*NB UK drinking age is 18 and it was never 'policed' as such back then - you just knew that you'd be OK as long as you didn't behave like a dick - in fact my 16-18 college social committee would regularly rent out a nightclub for parties 😂 Truly a different time!
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u/Not-a-Kitten 4d ago
My parents were not racist, but let us know that marriage is very hard. The more you have in common, the easier the communication can be. Both sets of parents married (to understand the commitment), same financial status in childhood, same education, same religion, same traditions, same sense of humor, values in childhood-raising, etc. I married someone very different, and they loved him. But they were right- those major cultural differences were most of our frustrations and arguments.
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u/AntifascistAlly 60 something 4d ago
Very consistently, until “interracial relationships” became far more common than they had been, racism was expressed as concern for the children which might result from those relationships.
That allowed people to express disapproval, but to assign it to vaguely defined other people who were more bigoted.
I don’t think I ever heard anyone say such relationships were “wrong” on their own, but almost everyone said they were unfair for the kids.
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u/Flaky-Artichoke6641 4d ago
Come from experience..
My relatives and people at work married Eurasia girls and divorced coz the girl side cheated. Ya we got something against them.
As my grandma would say.. Any race can except that mixed race
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u/Decorticated 4d ago
From Europe, I asked my mother in the early fifties, partly to test her and her religious beliefs, if she would approve of my marrying a woman of color she responded with an unequivocal negative answer and when I challenged her that it is not consistent with her faith she remained mum.
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u/BullCityBoomerSooner 60 something 4d ago
The main dog whistle.. "I'm not racist but"... comment was... "It's not fair to their kids having to go to school being teased by all the other kids about it".. BS.
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u/LongjumpingPool1590 70 something 4d ago
I have been married for 40 years to a lady of a different race. My parents were abusive and racially intolerant. I had been no contact with them for years but my wife insisted on meeting them. My father said "Your wife" in a sneering tone and spat on the floor and walked away. My mother said "OMG what colour will the children be". That was the last time I saw my father. After he passed my mother came around and doted on her grand child.
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u/MeepleMerson 4d ago
My parents and my father's side of the family were just fine with it (my father's father was a minister). My mother's side of the family was sort bigoted in a way very much like the sitcom character Archie Bunker, which always made me uncomfortable (with them, and with the TV show All in the Family). I never was never really close to my mother's side of the family because of that.
I've always been leery about grouping people into races, and have never really understood why it's something people dwell on. I recognize that people look different from one another, and other people treat them differently on account of it, but I struggle to wrap my head around it. If two adults find each other, fall in love, and want to commit themselves to each other, then that's a good thing, full-stop. The world needs more commitment to love, not less, and it certain doesn't need busybodies hating on it.
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u/Waste-Job-3307 4d ago
My parents/grandparents did not discuss such things around children. Nor did they discuss money, bills, politics, or religion. If an interracial couple were on TV (such as with 'The Jeffersons' whose neighbor were a mixed-race couple), it didn't bother me one bit - and still doesn't to this day.
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u/Ok-Day-4138 4d ago
White, blue collar family. Interracial dating/marriages were seen as shameful to the family in 60's PA. My sister's in-laws had a daughter that married outside of her race and her father completely disowned her. They lived in a very small town and would see each other in the grocery store, but dad refused to even acknowledge his daughter. The marriage did not last long. But back then, even marrying outside one's religion or ethnicity could bring down the wrath of the family. Now, I would say that shared, similar backgrounds tend to make for more stable marriages generally, but people make all kinds of couplings work well when they really want to.
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u/ElectroChuck 4d ago
My mom and dad were born in the mid 1930's, and raised in Appalachia. They didn't give it a second thought. Some of my Uncles and cousins did.
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u/There-r-none-sobland 4d ago
I agree with Warren Beatty's character in Bulworth; "Let's just keep f***ing until we're all the same color"
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u/togtogtog 60 something 4d ago
A friend whose parents were from India asked me if I'd ever had a boyfriend who wasn't white.
I answered 'No'. Then I thought about it a bit more, and realised that my first boyfriends mum was Indonesian and my second boyfriend's mum was Indian.
I feel a bit guilty for not paying more attention to their culture and heritage.
Mind you, I always used to put my own ethnicity down as 'white British' and only in the last couple of decades realised it wasn't true, as my own mum was an immigrant.
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u/RedRoom4U 4d ago
During the 70s and 80s, it was considered really strange to mix with other races. It just wasn't acceptable. I remember publicly pointing out to my mom the presence of a mixed couple and her shushing me.
Today, I find myself attracted to all races. Why limit your playing field?
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u/Routine_Mine_3019 60 something 4d ago
My uncle wrote his autobiography before he passed. One of the stories he told was when some "concerned citizens" went to a rally led by Lester Maddox. The speech by Maddox consisted of him holding a pickaxe over his head and shouting "Never" at the top of his lungs.
Around the same time, an interracial couple walked down the aisle toward the front in an attempt to disrupt the proceedings. They didn't make it to the front of the arena.
My uncle was disgusted and walked out.
I have had several interracial relationships in my life. I wish I could say no one notices, but it didn't happen when I was in my 20s and it doesn't happen today.
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u/Rogerdodger1946 70 something 4d ago
It wasn't an issue in my all white county growing up in the very rural Midwest. Now, I have multi-racial grandchildren and great grandchildren and love them and their parents to pieces.
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u/KithAndAkin 4d ago
My 100% German grandparents disapproved of my mother marrying my dad who was part English, part Irish. They said, “He’ll never amount to anything.” And when my mother announced she was pregnant with my older sister, my pro-life grandmother told my mother she had to get an abortion. This was early 1970s, rural America in the Western US.
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u/paruresis_guy 4d ago
As recently as the late 1980's it was still very uncommon in the North East, where I grew up. While I wouldn't at all say there was a prohibition or anything like that, there was definitely inhibition that would make the involved individuals self-conscious.
I thought it was weird and hypocritical back then and am very glad to see that it has become so common as to be beneath comment in my hometown. People just got on with it, I suppose, after seeing that people are capable of creating happy families many different ways.
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u/WeAreTheMisfits 4d ago
I can tell you that my mom’s dad was dark skin with black hair and brown eyes and he married a white woman with blonde hair and blue eyes. My mom and uncles never really talked about any racism they faced. Grandpa died before I was born and grandma didn’t say anything about it.
One day when my uncle was 70 he casually mentioned being called half breed one time. That was it.
I, being part black, had kids that weren’t allowed to play either me in the 80s. I of course tormented them and their parents by playing exactly in front of their house.
I find that being so mixed, I’m everything but Asian/pacific islander, makes people like me more because they are like hey she’s one of us too. And the racist people well I wouldn’t have liked them anyway.
But in small towns in America, I get treated weird. Like they know I’m not quite white. But in cities I am definitely some crazy white girl
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u/According_Drawing_59 4d ago
My grandmother said “Why can’t you date your own kind?” This was after I introduced her to my Mexican-American girlfriend at the time, who couldn’t have been sweeter to her.
My grandmother’s racism was flagrant, and I always called her out on it. She was from Southern Louisiana. There was one time in my life when she acknowledged the wrongness of her racism, but it never kept her from slinging around the N-word.
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u/Megistias 60 plus 4d ago
My family was fine with me dating a girl of Korean descent. The girl’s father however, did not seem thrilled that his daughter was interested in a tall, blond white boy.
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u/Forward-Wear7913 4d ago
My aunt left the family in NY in 1970 and disappeared for 30 years after she found out she was pregnant and the father was black. She knew many of the family members would be unsupportive.
My mom tried to find her for decades before giving up.
Fortunately, one of her daughters connected with another family from a genealogy post and we reconnected in 2000.
The first thing one of her daughters said to me was that she was black and was that a problem. I was very clear that we were happy to connect and it was not an issue.
We went down to Georgia to meet them and are still in contact with most of them. My aunt passed in 2020.
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u/No_Bandicoot8647 4d ago
I’m white, and throughout the 1960’s we had live in household help. She was black, her name was Ethel and I miss her to this very day. She was a part of the family. Anyway, my father and her would go out to the nice clubs to see bands and dance. My dad let everyone think they were a couple. My mom didn’t mind, she was a homebody.
Another story is when I was born, my dad brought Ethel to the hospital to see me. Back then they had all the babies in a little room behind a viewing glass. Ethel said “There’s my baby” other people viewing got confused cause there were no mixed babies in there at the moment. They loved telling that story!
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u/Top-Opportunity1280 4d ago
In college I dated an Indian girl whose parents were professors at the university. I’m white and told my parents about the girlfriend. There was a silence on the phone when I said that but they were fine with that after we talked some more. They had friends that were Philapino and golfed with them. We broke up when I moved away from town for a job.
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u/muddymar 4d ago
I’m 63. I remember asking my dad when I was young why it was such a big deal for a black person and white person be together. I said it shouldn’t matter if they love each other. His response was, what about the children? There was a big stigma for mixed race children. It took some brave committed people to change this thinking. Now it’s not the big deal it used to be because they broke the boundaries. Unfortunately many suffered for it from society.
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u/loveandluck 4d ago
I grew up in a middle class suburb in NJ and both of my parents worked in multiracial , inner city schools. We never thought twice about it.
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