I’m a community manager at a large parenting website, and I am currently in an e-mail discussion with an African-American user who takes issue with our use of “Parents of Color” as the name of a forum. She thinks “Ethnic Parents” would be more appropriate, and that “people of color” is tantamount to calling African-American people “colored”. Think Jim Crow and seperate drinking fountains.
This forum is actually not specifically for just African-Americans, but for all people not of Northern European descent. “Ethnic Parents” to me really has a different flavor than “Parents of Color”. One makes me think of being focused on heritige, rituals, traditions, and folkways while the other is simply about coping as a brown parent in this predomantly white country. And the latter is really what the forum is about.
I’m partially African-American myself and personally think that “people of color” is the best way to designate a group of non-caucasians, including but not limited to people of Latino or Hispanic, Asian, Indian, African and Native American background (as well as others). But now I’m second guessing myself. I really want to be sensitive here, and this user in an e-mail has equated “people of color” with the n-word. I think she’s being over sensitive and imperceptive to the context, but sheesh, maybe I have blinders on?
What do you all think? Is “people of color” a step back towards “colored”? I know people of color is widely used, but that certainly doesn’t mean it’s correct.
I’d love to hear from anyone, no matter where your great-great-great grandma was from. Any opinions would be great, thanks!
Looking around the web, “people of color” definitely seems to actually be the politically correct term that is used for your target group. For instance:
So I can’t see how a derivative phrasing could be considered offensive. And I agree that “ethnic” doesn’t have the meaning you are trying for. OTOH, is there a reason you want to include a Japanese or Mexican parent, but exclude a Hungarian one? Are they not similar issues?
Well good luck to you - I and I mean that from the bottom of my heart, not in a sarcastic way.
I come from a family of many colors, and my first thought was “why are you segregating a parenting board”? This is not a slam, nor criticism, just idle curiosity (you don’t owe me an answer ).
FWIW, my 2 cents says dump the segregated forum. Parents are parents and the more integrated the participants, the better off everyone will be. They can all learn from each other.
I have heard several present day deep-thinkers say that people of color is precisely the same thing as “colored people”, and I tend to agree. In this age of PC-ness where we need soft, padded terms with no rough edges for disadvantaged people, whatever their disadvantage is, we have come up with such absurdities as:
• Dwarfs or midgets -> Little People
• Handicapped or crippled -> Differently Abled
• Fat -> Overweight or Heavy (overweight implies that there is some correct weight, and heavy could be used to describe a piano, which can not be called fat)
I hear most blacks calling themselves “black people”, even though very few of them are actually what I would call truly black in color.
Then what do we call caucasians? Colorless people? People of no color? I am certain that my skin has some color to it- maybe a kind of a pinkish tan, or maybe beige. Doesn’t that make me a person of color?
I’m sure that George Carlin (an outspoken opponent of these kinds of bullshit terms) has spoken out about this, and I wouldn’t be surprized if I am inadvertently paraphrasing him here because I know I’ve read it in at least one of his books.
Labels divide people. We need fewer labels, not more. What next- do we start calling fat people “people of size”?
Why not remove all labels, and use some phrase like “we encourage parents of all ethnicities…” or some such wording?
Then howz about titling the forum “Ethnic Diversity” with a subtitle to the effect that the forum is aimed mainly at people/parents who are not of Northern European descent? To get an idea of what I’m talking about, take a peek at The Straight Dope’s forum list. There are the forum titles, along with a short description or each.
Most of my great, great, (&c., &c…) grandparents came from Germany and Scotland, but I don’t see an issue. It wasn’t said as an insult, and people know what is meant. My opinion is that if you like it, then go for it.
I don’t see what’s wrong with the name “Parents of Color.” “People of color” is a stilted but entirely polite term to use. I’m not sure that it’s as inclusive as you desire, as I almost never hear “people of color” used to refer to anyone but people of African descent.
If “people of color” or “parents of color” brings up memory of the old usage “colored,” so what? “Colored” may be hopelessly out of date, but it was never an insult or slur the way the N-word is, and it used to be the favored term of African-American civil rights leaders. I doubt your good friend is lobbying the NAACP, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, to change its name.
I don’t mean to be the putter of a cat amongst the pigeons… really, I don’t - but please consider:
Commonwealth usage “People of Colour” and the use of the term “Black” by people of Indian/Pakistanti/Sri Lankan and Bengali origin to describe themselves opens a whole new question – why should we have to adopt American terminology when discussing race relations?
My feeling is, if you’re going to have a forum for “ethnic parents” you’d better welcome groups like Eastern Europeans and Mediterraneans with open arms. They’re “ethnic.”
As a parent, Mrs. Kunilou has had several concerns that a white parent might not have – how to maintain the children’s appreciation for their heritage in a society that seems to value assimilation more, how to handle a racial slur, etc.
Therefore, she would feel at home in a forum of non-white parents.
However, Mrs. Kunilou is not of African-American heritage, and she would be deeply offended if she were invited to an African-American forum only because she also isn’t white.
She has no objection to be referred to as a person of color in such instances. Nor, appratently, does the Rev. Jesse Jackson, who popularized the term in building the Rainbow Coalition.
To paraphrase from a Bloom County Sunday strip, after Steve Dallas had been zapped by space aliens and became very sensitive and politically correct.
Mother: Look at that adorable little colored girl playing outside. Steve: Ma! Don’t say colored! Mother: Can I say National Association for the Advancement of Colored People? I don’t think Negroes mind at all. Steve: Don’t say Negroes! You can’t say Negroes! Mom: Can I say United Negro College Fund? Steve: You are BAITING me. Father: That’s it, we’re outta here. Mother: Oh, sit down, Reginald. Our son isn’t done shaming us into political correctness yet. Steve: Ok, ok. Let’s all calm down, and agree to use the new, politically correct term, ‘people of color.’ Mother: People of color. Steve: People of color. Mother: So … colored people? Steve: NO! Father: I’m leaving.
Thanks everyone for your replies - you have given me a lot to think about. This is a really sitcky issue - I’m finding myself writing and deleting because I’m sure that no matter what I say I’m going to offend or come out sounding racist, but the main point here is just as kunilou said: non-white parents may have specific concerns.
Just to clarify a bit:
We have about 500 different forums and the Parents of Color is only one amongst many. Our forums range from Stay-at-home-parents to first time parents, from bereaved parents to parents of toddlers. We even have a boards for most world reigons or nations, and many of the major world religions or spiritual groups.
We aren’t trying to be devisive, but there are different issues that may arise as a parent, and we try to have a forum for most of those issues. In our experience, parents like to be able to find others dealing with very similar issues, and having such a diversity of forums allows this.
Really everyone is welcome in the Parents of Color forum, heck anyone can post wherever they care to, but we’d like it to be a place where parents can talk about the special concerns that come up for non-white parents.
The most I’m getting out of all of your replies though, is that People of Color probably really does have the connotation of meaning only African-Americans. So perhaps I should change the forum name for that reason if no others.
Except, as I previously noted, that many non-African-American persons of color find the term “people of color” to be somewhat more inclusive.
Like Attrayant suggested, maybe the best thing to do is simply use the description of the forum for its name and forget about snappy titles. Something like “Discussions of racial and ethnic issues” gets the point across.
In fact, my color is the one Crayola says is
‘flesh-colored’. Anybody a different color has flesh
that’s colored like something not flesh, I guess.
Anyhow, I’ve never liked ‘People of Color’ because it’s
so meaningless, and clumsy. I could deal with one or the
other, but not both. Why use a hard word for something
when it doesn’t buy you anything meaning-wise?
What are the issues you see non-Caucasian parents having
that would belong in the forum? Maybe you could name it
that way.
Why not just put “non-caucasians”? It seems its ok in American society to be non-PC with them… you might piss off the KKK but who cares? They’d get pissed you had a non-white forum no matter what you call it.
Apparently it’s been a while since you scribbled outside the lines, bup; according to the Binney & Smith Crayola website, “flesh” colored crayons were voluntarily renamed “peach” in 1962.
It seems to me if “black” counts as a colour, then “white” should be too, leaving aside the issue of how many people there are that are perfectly black or perfectly white…
Embarrassing. Actually, the problem is that I glibly
named ‘Crayola’ - I’ll have to check which brand it was
with my wife, who I hope has a better memory than I do.
Our son had a ‘flesh’ crayon just a few years ago, and
my wife wrote to the company, which was apparently not Binney & Smith.
But since she wrote the letter, she’ll probably remember.
The only problem I would have or see someone having with the “non-Caucasian” label is that essentially you are saying, “Here are forums for parents and here is a forum for all of you non-white parents.” It gives the impression that “parents” in general, are assumed Caucasian.
“Ethnic Diversity” sounds like a good choice. If I understand correctly, the forum is being created out of need, much as the IMHO forum was created. For those who haven’t been here long enough, IMHO was created because MPSIMS was housing a great many “What’s your favorite…” or “What do you think of…” threads. Since these threads were thriving, and making up such a large percentage of MPSIMS threads, the mods (I assume) decided to create a forum strictly for polling, so people could find such threads easily instead of digging them out of MPSIMS.
I’m guessing that the forum is being created because many threads in another forum were addressing situations such as kunilou described, enough to warrant their gathering place. Not the back-of-the-bus situation that you’re envisioning, evilbeth! Calling the forum “Ethnic Diversity” makes the purpose more clear: it’s not the ethnicity of the parents, but the children, that is the issue. It takes the focus away from the problem of defining “race”, and removes the possiblity of anyone feeling excluded.
).