Interracial Dating: Still Taboo?

My grandmother was a white woman with blonde hair and blue eyes. We went everywhere together. Looking back, I'm sure it looked strange for people to see a little brown girl holding hands with an elderly white woman. The waiters and waitresses at the Olive Garden we frequented probably wondered if I was really her biological granddaughter. But I didn't notice. I didn't notice that our skin was a different color or that our eyes were different colors or that our hair differed in texture. All I knew was that she was my Grandma Betty and she was my favorite person in the entire world.

I grew up in a house where race didn't matter. I have a black mother, a half white/half black father who everyone assumes is white, and a white grandmother. In high school I had friends of all ethnicities and a white boyfriend. I always loved seeing interracial couples. To me they were reminders of how far our country had progressed. Fifty years ago a black man and white woman could never walk around in public holding hands, and now not only can they date but it happens fairly often. It wasn't until I got to college that I started seeing interracial relationships in a slightly different light.

Up until college I had primarily non black friends. This changed my freshmen year at USC when I decided to live on the African American themed floor. I was surprised at how negatively my new girl friends would talk about interracial dating, especially when it came to a black guy dating a girl of a different race. They informed me that they had known black guys in high school who claimed that they would not date black girls. The guys gave all types of reasons for their discrimination, saying they were less attracted to black girls than girls of other races and that girls of other races were easier to get along with. This was shocking to me! I had never heard anyone say that they wouldn't date a specific race ESPECIALLY their own. Then I started to see it. At parties many of the black guys would approach girls of different races before they would approach the black girls. On campus there were certain groups of black guys that I would only see with girls of other races and never with black girls. I became more and more bothered by the thought of interracial dating.

As I mentioned before, when I was in high school interracial dating never bothered me. It happened, I was even a participant, but I always felt like the motives behind each interracial pairing came from a good place. There would be black guys who would date a black girl, move on to a Hispanic girl, then move on to a white girl and it was no big deal. I never experienced feelings of betrayal and never questioned the reasons why that black boy asked that Asian girl to the dance instead of a black girl. Is interracial dating common in high school now? Is it something that happens often? Is it talked about? Does seeing a black boy with a girl of a different race somehow make you feel less attractive or less desired?

It’s been seven years since I first started having these conversations with my college friends and my feelings on the topic still flip flop. A fair amount of people would probably say that there's nothing wrong with not wanting to date outside your race. Many of us were raised with the “Cosby Show” ideal, hoping to one day become a successful black woman with a successful black husband and five well behaved black kids. That is indeed a great picture, but who's to say that you can't have just as strong of a relationship with a white boy? Or that you won't have plenty in common with a Hispanic boy? The black family is a beautiful thing and something to be admired, but by placing limits on who you will interact with and who you allow yourself to like, you might miss out on new, exciting, and potentially life changing experiences.

On the other hand, I DEFINITELY think it's wrong to say that you won't date within your race. To me, that is an example of self loathing at it's ugliest. It's so fitting that I'm writing this article on Martin Luther King Jr.’s Birthday. A man who spent his life fighting for equality would probably be appalled to see such discrimination within his own race. In some ways we've come so far since the "I Have a Dream" speech, but in other ways we have so far to go.

Personally, I believe in love. I believe that you can't help who fall in love with and you shouldn't help who you fall in love with. I think a black girl can fall in love with a white boy, a black boy can fall in love with an Asian girl, and a white girl can fall in love with a Hispanic boy. My grandmother, the white woman with blonde hair and blue eyes, was disowned by her family and chased off the family property with a shotgun because she married a black man. But it was worth it to her because she was in love. She didn't let her family's perception of black people or society's assumptions about black people keep her away from my grandfather. In the dating game, don't let any prejudices or stereotypes keep you from doing what you want to do. Remember that no one person or one race is the same, and if you keep yourself from having a relationship with a person of a certain race because of your own biases and stereotypes you will only be limiting yourself.

-- Karissa Allen

Guest Blogger