What is Race

On the surface it seems as though the answer would be simple. Most of us older than 40 were taught that there were three races of humans - Negroid, Caucasoid and Mongoloid. This had been the prevalent mindsent for centuries. You were either Black, White or Asian. If you were of "mixed raced", then you were considered the less dominate race. So even if one parent were black and the other Asian, you were considered black because Asians were considered black.

And we won't get into the "one drop" rule that dominated the South and gave us a new vocabulary --mulatto, octaroon, quadroon and the like. Basically, if there was one iota of the thought of the possibility that there was someone in your family who might have been black or had blackness in them, then you were black.

Here's what's wrong with that old premise. We grew up. Well most of us grew up. You see for those born after 1968, you have always been either AfroAmerican or African American. It wasn't until the 1970s that your group became full-time black. Now either is interchangeable. Those of us before 1968, we have been black, negro, colored, darkie. Even now if I run across an older person not of color, I'm not quite certain what I would be called. Negress has been my favorite. It seems the deeper into the south we dive, the less politically correct we are. Somehow, in the deep "dirty south", we have always known where we stood.

While the rest of us were growing up and learning how to not only to tolerate, but to learn about and live together, capitalizing on our similarities, beginning campaigns like "ONE WORLD", and United Colors, some people didn't get the message. We are more than the color of our skin. We all share the same geneology. We are all human. Our ethnicities are somewhat askew, but we are humans.

Stop calling my children, by racial. It's a lie that needs to stop and we as a people need to cease in it's perpetuation. My husband is predonminately, Scots-Nord. I am predominately African American, Native American, French, Cuban, European. I am a hodge-podge of nations, of nationalities, of ethnicities. In retrospect there is more than likely more European blood running through my veins than most that claim that Aryan nonsense. BUT neither of us has a trace of martian, ape, horse, Klingon, Vulcan, Minitaur, Centar, Griffins. We are both human just as I would venture to suspect that most of our readers are human as well.

What is race? It's a tool to further divide us. It means nothing. We are all one race. We are all human, Think about that. Ponder that. Teach that to your children and ingrain it in your lives. You'll see a difference almost immediately.

Each one teach one. Each one reach one.