Because passing for black is no better than passing
for white.

As much as blacks bemoan the 'one drop rule,' no one works harder to enforce it and keep it alive. See: blacks' attitude toward Tiger Woods. I thought he was as much a self-hating sell-out as most blacks did with his 'Cablinasian' routine. Then, I heard him say that he didn't consider himself solely black because it was an insult to his mother. That nearly blew a hole in my brain. He's absolutely right -- it is an insult to the mother who carried him, birthed him in agony and raised him. Why on earth should her Thai heritage count for nothing and his dad's black heritage count for everything? If my children ever self-identify as 'white' I'll be crushed. That would be tantamount to saying all my love and sacrifice and devotion meant nothing. Mrs. Woods is not a brood mare and neither am I. If my kids end up identifying as 'black' rather than white or biracial, I'll be secretly pleased. But in the end, if they can go toe to toe with me, they can consider themselves whatever they like.

Given the level of intellectual and moral rigor to which I plan to hold my children, I can't in good conscience as a human being tell them which category to pick, if any. If that means they prefer sushi to fried catfish, so be it. If they prefer Europe to Africa, if they're consumed by environmentalism but not civil rights, fine. Since my son recently whined about wanting a bigger house and blithely opined that 'everyone has a car,' I'm more focused on teaching them about class and injustice than race right now. Still, I dug out all the old family photos of my Jim Crow ancestors to teach them about their forebears as individuals, not via their relationship to whites (that will come later). I've also invested in books like 'I Like Myself,' "The Skin I'm In" and "The Colours of Us" to teach them about all the variations in the human race and among people of colour. I want them to understand that their lives will be enriched by diversity, not by forced field trips to where the Negroes live. We break out the globe frequently and I teach them about Africa and England, the two places I know figure in my bloodline. I ask them to get Daddy to tell them about their Scottish and Norwegian heritage, but I doubt he does. No matter, the world will teach them about their whiteness.

My attitude on all this will undoubtedly evolve with time and my kids will come home with more and more questions about being black. I still don't know what to do with the more exclusionary facets of our culture, like Ebonics or 'on the black man's side.' I don't know whether I'm begrudging them their blackness or sparing them baggage that might hold them back, but we've got time. I look forward to it, because, like the T shirt says, if you love something, set it free. I grew up black. They're growing up multiracial citizens of the world, born to two cultures, neither more worthy or intrinsically interesting than the other. Because passing for black is no better than passing for white.

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