What do you guys think about them?
Personally, I don’t have any problem with interracial dating and marriage.
I don’t have a problem with interfaith dating, either. However, I can see potential problems if two people from different faiths (say a Wiccan and a Hindu, or a Christian and a Buddhist) got married.
Just my $0.02.
Whatever melts your butter is groovy with me.
Stompy
Interracial marriage are no problem, as long as the couple is prepared to stand the heat from family, friends and strangers. Interfaith is a little trickier, in that there are things a couple needs to decide beforehand, such as what kind of marriage ceremony are they going to have, and more importantly, if they have children and decide to bring them up with religious training, which religion is it going to be?
But if you can work all that out, go for it.
The interracial thing almost seems like a given for me. I can’t seem to find any other Scottish, French, Polish, Russian, and American Indians to date. I’m dark skinned, but technically more Polish than Indian. So I’d say all of my relationships are interracial.
Interfaith can be touchy, but not necessarily so. Many people are like me, they don’t practice their religion (I’m still a member of the church, and take my kids there, but don’t practice it at home), so its not much of a problem in this household. I’ve also seen couples make it work. It takes a lot of talking ahead of time, especially if you plan on having kids. You might be happy being married to a Catholic, but not so happy raising one. I also think that it works best if one person is less devoted to their religion than the other, and if the religions aren’t diametrically opposed.
My SO is Mexican-American, and I am a mixture of many backgrounds (a great-great grandmother was Native American). So far this has not caused any major problems (one discussion about the way I worded a question, but I have feminist issues I bring up with him in exchange).
We have both had all the children we will ever have, and not with each other. Two of his kids have paler skin tones; the youngest looks just like his dad. I don’t know if this has ever caused problems for him or not. We live in a pretty lily-white area and they are California imports. The area is becoming more diverse, and trying to address issues of discrimination and prejudice.
I know of a couple (sister of a friend from where I used to work) who are Byzantine Catholic and Jewish. The children attended both places of worship, and chose to become Jewish. I think it was wonderful that the parents were able to work it out this way.
My SO is black/hispanic/Piute Indian/caucasion and I’m lily white. At first it was hard, especially in Utah, and especially cuz of my grandparents. But here in CA, it’s not really a big deal and we’re happy. He was also a different religion when we met, I’m LDS, and he identified himself as simply “Christian”. But then he got baptized into the LDS Church, so that particular problem is over.
Interracial: no problem. It may be a little harder because of the stigma that society may impose on the couple, but there is definitely nothing wrong with it.
I do have a problem with interfaith marriages, however. Now I’m not talking about issues like Protestant vs Catholic so much as two religions that by definition are mutually exclusive. If you really believe what you say you do, this would cause a huge problem. First with the couple themselves, then even worse with their kids.
Person1: “You’re going to hell!”
Person2: “Yeah, well you’re going to come back as a lima bean!”
I just don’t see this working…
Fleejagoob, who couldn’t resist the urge to attempt humor about a serious subject.
Ah yes. My great-great-(etc.) Aunt Rose who left her Anglo village to marry that Saxon lout. She’s the scandle of the family.
The only problems I see coming from interracial relationships are external. When my (white) sister was dating a black guy, the cops (Southern California) were always giving them crap, which was annoying. I personally would never let that stop me from dating someone, but it’s a personal choice.
As far as interfaith relationships go, the only real issue seems to be with raising children. I think that if you can expose the kids to both views, and present them as two possible ways to look at things, they’re going to be better off in the long run. They’ll be able to choose the faith that makes the most sense to them, and it’ll be stronger and more personal, because they had to think about it before they chose it. The hard part is giving the kids a consistent message and not telling them that your SO is wrong. I think it would be hard, but definitely doable. (Of course, if it’s really important that your kids believe exactly what you believe, don’t marry someone of another faith. Bad idea.)
If I were to marry a Christian (I’m an atheist), I would have the kids go to church with her until a certain age (e.g. 12), at which point they’d get to decide if they wanted to keep going. I wouldn’t talk up my atheism, but I wouldn’t hide it either.
I am white and atheist. My husband is Nepali (brown, I guess) and Hindu. The color issue just absolutely never really occured to me (except to notice that his skin is gorgeous).
His religion isn’t really a problem for us either. He isn’t very devoted to his faith. It’s more of a tradition thing with him. He has two children who have been brought up with about the same degree of devotion to Hinduism as he has. They also know about Christianity and Buddhism becasue there are Buddhists and Christian missionaries in thier community. We have no children together, but if we ever do, we will be open to telling them honestly our thoughts/opinions on religion. And they will be exposed to plenty of it because his side of the family wants them to learn Hindu traditions and my side wants them to be baptised and learn about Christ. Our opinion is “Fine, whatever you want”. We don’t think any education will harm the kids, so those in our family with faith are free to share their opinions with our kids.
My parents had an interfaith marriage back in the days when that mattered a lot more than it does now. One of the wisest things my father ever told me was that of the top 10 things a couple will fight about, the first four are money, and after you get past not liking each other’s in-laws and the day-to-day strain on things, religion is pretty far down the list.
As far as interracial goes, as noted, Mrs. Kunilou is of Asian heritage, and while that doesn’t have the same repercussions as a black-white relationship, there were moments of prejudice back in the 80s when it looked like the Japanese were going to take over the U.S. economy. I would caution the non-minority member of an interracial marriage that it’s not just your partner who will be subjected to prejudice, it’s you, too. And your partner has had his/her whole life to learn how to deal with it. Some people have troule experiencing that for the first time.
My grandfather was a Welsh Protestant. My grandmother was an Irish Catholic. They feel in love. My grandmother’s father, to prevent her from marrying a heathen boy, sent her into a convent. Eventually, she left, and they got married. I’m so proud of them. 