# Interacial relationships on Dr. Who/Torchwood **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [February 24, 2011, 7:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interacial-relationships-on-dr-who-torchwood/572486 "2011-02-24T19:22:34Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2011, 10:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interacial-relationships-on-dr-who-torchwood/572486/21 "2011-02-25T10:41:31Z")
> [@Ryan\_Liam](#): > > We do take a more relaxed view of it here. It is quite common. I don’t think it’s so much that anyone is up in arms over it as there’s a strong culture gap. It’s difficult to meet someone who runs in an entirely different social network, and once you do it’s hard to have a long, successful relationship if your cultures are too much in conflict – you just get all the cues wrong. ---
**Author:** ![Aspidistra](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aspidistra/32/3894_2.png) [@Aspidistra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aspidistra)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2011, 12:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interacial-relationships-on-dr-who-torchwood/572486/22 "2011-02-25T12:04:38Z")
The UK has a white population of 92%, black population of about 2%, 4% south Asian, and 2% anything else. Dating only within your own ethnic group would be enormously restrictive for anyone who wasn’t white. Contrast the USA with 12% black Americans - staying within your own ethnic group must be a lot easier, and a lot more common. ---
**Author:** ![WotNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e19b73/32.png) [@WotNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WotNot)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2011, 1:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interacial-relationships-on-dr-who-torchwood/572486/23 "2011-02-25T13:21:19Z")
> [@Aspidistra](#): > > The UK has a white population of 92%, black population of about 2%, 4% south Asian, and 2% anything else. Dating only within your own ethnic group would be enormously restrictive for anyone who wasn’t white. Contrast the USA with 12% black Americans - staying within your own ethnic group must be a lot easier, and a lot more common. Those figures don’t really tell the whole story, either, because “black” covers a pretty diverse group (as, of course, does “south asian”). I strongly suspect that **Sage Rat** is right, and that it’s more to do with culture than colour. Someone whose parents or grandparents came to Britain from Trinidad in the early sixties will be likely to have more in common with a white colleague from work (for instance) than they do with a recent immigrant from Nigeria. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2011, 2:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interacial-relationships-on-dr-who-torchwood/572486/24 "2011-02-25T14:01:11Z")
> [@Buck\_Godot](#): > > I still think mixing it up with something not compatible with your DNA is a step too far Actually, it has some appeal in the “not get them pregnant” kind of way. Or it used to, anyway. Thanks, _Mass Effect!_ \*Yeah, I know, Trek did it first, but that doesn’t count as SF. ---
**Author:** ![Giles](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/giles/32/60_2.png) [@Giles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Giles)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2011, 3:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interacial-relationships-on-dr-who-torchwood/572486/25 "2011-02-25T15:16:18Z")
> [@Aspidistra](#): > > The UK has a white population of 92%, black population of about 2%, 4% south Asian, and 2% anything else. Dating only within your own ethnic group would be enormously restrictive for anyone who wasn’t white. Contrast the USA with 12% black Americans - staying within your own ethnic group must be a lot easier, and a lot more common. However, as recent immigrants often do, they cluster. For example, cities like Bradford and Leicester have very large South Asian communities. Living in some of those neighbourhoods, white people can be the minority. My mother came from Leicester, and so I’ve visited there fairly recently. There are four religious groups in Leicester, roughly equal in importance: Christianity, Islam, Jainism and Sikhism. One street near where my wife and I stayed was full of sari shops, jewelry shops, etc., and restaurants, all of which (as I realised after walking up and down the street) were Gujarati vegetarian restaurants. I suspect a young person there with Gujarati parents would find it easier to date another person from the same community. ---
**Author:** ![Aspidistra](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aspidistra/32/3894_2.png) [@Aspidistra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aspidistra)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2011, 8:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interacial-relationships-on-dr-who-torchwood/572486/26 "2011-02-26T08:22:12Z")
> [@Giles](#): > > However, as recent immigrants often do, they cluster. For example, cities like Bradford and Leicester have very large South Asian communities. Living in some of those neighbourhoods, white people can be the minority. My mother came from Leicester, and so I’ve visited there fairly recently. There are four religious groups in Leicester, roughly equal in importance: Christianity, Islam, Jainism and Sikhism. One street near where my wife and I stayed was full of sari shops, jewelry shops, etc., and restaurants, all of which (as I realised after walking up and down the street) were Gujarati vegetarian restaurants. I suspect a young person there with Gujarati parents would find it easier to date another person from the same community. I’m sure they do. But my experience, in Australia where there are lots of immigrant communities, is that it’s the first generation (the one that’s already partnered up) that clusters the most. Second and subsequent generations tend to _de_-cluster, separate from their parents’ culture (to an extent) and embrace more of the surrounding local culture. I don’t know if that happens so much in the US, where African-Americans, after all, are not an immigrant group, and there’s no particular reason for the younger generation to reject/move away from their parents’ neighborhoods and culture. ---
**Author:** ![irishgirl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/8edcca/32.png) [@irishgirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/irishgirl)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2011, 12:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interacial-relationships-on-dr-who-torchwood/572486/27 "2011-02-26T12:38:27Z")
Do any of you remember [This Life](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/This_Life)? Again, a British TV show with interracial couples, both gay and straight. Or [Cold Feet](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cold_Feet), where the mother’s reaction to Rachel’s marriage to her black British husband (played by Lennie James) was summed up by an exchange which went something like: Mother: But what about the culture clash? Rachel: What culture clash, he’s from Oxford. Interracial dating is common in the UK, and basically _not a big deal_, it is depicted in most TV shows, everything from _Skins_ to _Eastenders_, not as propaganda, rather as a reflection of reality. As a non American watching US TV the LACK of interracial dating is what stands out, or the fact that when an interracial couple is show it is a) a major plot point and source of angst b) almost never a white guy/african american woman- it’s much more often two non white characters (i.e. asian guy, african american woman), a white woman and a non white guy or a white guy and a Latina or asian woman. ---
**Author:** ![What\_Exit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/what_exit/32/10652_2.png) [@What\_Exit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/What_Exit)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2011, 1:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interacial-relationships-on-dr-who-torchwood/572486/28 "2011-02-26T13:57:51Z")
Weird, the first interracial couple that wasn’t a one off plot device I recall were the Willises on the Jeffersons. A white man and black woman. But I am drawing a blank on later ones. ---
**Author:** ![Kamino\_Neko](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kamino_neko/32/34_2.png) [@Kamino\_Neko](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kamino_Neko)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2011, 2:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interacial-relationships-on-dr-who-torchwood/572486/29 "2011-02-26T14:56:17Z")
> [@Intergalactic\_Gladiator](#): > > Yuck, I could never do that. Sure the cat guy was a nice enough dude, but I’d be sneezing way too much. I’d be more concerned about just how much the Catkind anatomy was like Earthly cats. \>\_\> (Only a concern with the males…I’d jump Novice Hame in a New New York minute…) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interacial-relationships-on-dr-who-torchwood/572486.md?page=1)