Multiracial Community Excluded from Population Data!

The Census Bureau embargoed its release of the American Fact Finder population estimates until tomorrow, June 13. The embargo was broken for the area of Washington DC only. From those estimates and the Census Bureau spokesperson quoted below, there is no way to include the multiracial population. In other words, they report in five major categories (White, Black or African American, American Indian and Alaska Native, Asian, Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander) using "Race Alone or in Combination." If they are using some "formula" to reclassify multiracial people, we do not know what it is. We have been assured that we would be given the data on multiracial populations since the 2000 Census.

Apparently the US Census Bureau does not understand that being multiracial means that your races are all equal and no one race is considered "primary." We continue to try and educate them. More on this tomorrow as we obtain additional information. 

District grows younger and more white, census statistics show

The District is growing progressively younger and whiter, as a steep rise in the number of young white adults has outpaced the growth in African American residents, new census statistics show.

The city gained about 6,500 non-Hispanic whites in 2012, accounting for almost half the year’s total growth, and they now make up 35.5 percent of the District’s 632,000 residents.

In contrast, the city last year gained 1,700 non-Hispanic black residents, who make up 48.6 percent of the population. If the 9,300 black Hispanics who live in the city are counted, African Americans maintain the slight majority of 50.05 percent.

One in 10 residents is Hispanic, both black or white, while Asians account for less than 4 percent of the population.

The 2012 population estimates from the Census Bureau show a continuation of trends that have dramatically changed the District’s demographic characteristics over the past decade. Although African Americans remain the largest single resident group, their numbers have been on a long slide since the peak in 1970, when seven in 10 District residents were black and people proudly said they lived in “Chocolate City.”

Over a little more than a decade, the city has rebounded and reversed a population slide that began after residents started moving out to the suburbs. In the past two years, the city’s population has soared by about 30,000 people. That is 10,000 more residents than it gained in the decade preceding it.

The shift has been as much generational as racial. The bulk of the growth since 2010 has been among people between the ages of 25 and 39. That group has contributed to a baby boomlet, adding 6,000 more children younger than 5. As a result, the median age has dipped slightly, from 33.8 in 2010 to 33.6.

The figures for the District also illustrate some of the complexities of determining race in an era when one of the fastest-growing groups in the nation is people who consider themselves multiracial.

The District’s black population, for example, does not include any of the almost 16,000 residents who say they are two or more races. Ben Bolender, a demographer with the Census Bureau, said that because the census does not ask people to pick a primary identity, there’s no way to determine whether the 9,300 people who said they were both black and Hispanic think of themselves more as one than the other.

But even if all black Hispanics in the District are counted as part of the African American population, demographers agree it is probably a matter of time before they slip below the 50 percent milestone, if they haven’t already.

Source: The Washington Post Company/By Carol Morello and Ted Mellnik, Updated: Wednesday, June 12, 11:03 AM

Cape Verde Jewish Heritage Project

Rededicated burial site among ‘beautiful vestiges’ of Cape Verde’s Jewish presence

 

Lisbon’s Chief Rabbi Eliezer Shai di Martino offered prayers during the rededication ceremony of the Jewish burial site in Praia, Cape Verde. The islands are a former Portuguese colony. U.S. Ambassador to Cape Verde Adrienne O’Neal is to the far right; the French and Portuguese ambassadors were also present. Credit: Cape Verde Jewish Heritage Project, Inc.

There are just 10 Jewish graves at the Jewish burial site in the Cape Verde capital of Praia—several with Hebrew inscriptions, the oldest dating to 1864, the most recent to 1918—surrounded by a sea of tombstones in a Christian cemetery. 

Those 10 graves, however, are reminders of the Jews who contributed to the growth of Cape Verde and whose descendants remain prominent in the 10-island, predominately Catholic, African archipelago. 

The Jewish burial site was rededicated in early May, thanks to the efforts of the Cape Verde Jewish Heritage Project, Inc. (CVJHP), which was founded in 2007 by Carol Castiel, who works for Voice of America. 

While many Jews to the former Portuguese colony had come during the Inquisition, they were for the most part New Christians (Jews forcibly converted by the Inquisition) who disappeared into the population. A second wave of Jews—representing some dozen or so Moroccan families—arrived in the mid-1800s, emigrating directly from Morocco or via Gibraltar to the trans-Atlantic commercial hub. 

Ensuring the memory of those Jews— merchants and traders with such surnames as Auday, Benros, Benoliel, Benchimol, Cohen, Levy, Pinto, Seruya and Wahnon that persist to this day—is CVJHP’s focus.

He contributed $100,000 in 2010, the largest donation the tiny nonprofit has received, Castiel says. In a message read at the dedication, his senior adviser, Andre Azoulay, called the king’s support of the project  “representative of Morocco’s attachment to the preservation of its patrimony—Arab, Jewish or Berber.”

The project has the support of Cape Verde’s government, too. 

“By preserving the cemeteries, the Jewish Heritage Project is preserving part of our history and culture,” says Maria de Fatima Lima de Veiga, Cape Verde’s ambassador to the United States.

In addition, she says, officials hope that these remnants of a time when Jews lived in Cape Verde will draw Jewish tourists to the islands.

The project has been a labor of love for Castiel who first learned that Jews had once lived on the islands—and their non-Jewish descendants remain—back in the mid-1980s when she was working on a project for the African-American Institute and spent time in Cape Verde. 

“To see in a predominately Catholic country a remnant of the Jewish people—it touched me,” she says.

Castiel did research, interviewed descendants and wrote articles about these Jews. “Little did I know that later on I would actually spearhead the actual restoration of the cemeteries,” she says.

In early 2007, Castiel met lawyer Richard Popkin by chance; he offered to do the paperwork to help her create the CVJHP as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, which allowed her to begin fundraising and working with Cape Verdean officials to restore the cemeteries. “If we had waited any longer, they would have been beyond repair,” she says.

The restoration of the four burial sites is just one of Castiel’s goals for the nonprofit. She hopes to put together a symposium in 2015, bringing together scholars who have studied the Jews of Cape Verde, including those who may have pre-dated the arrival of the Moroccan and Gibraltarian Jews of the 19th century. “We hope to have a lively and fruitful exchange among scholars,” she says, culminating “in a book on the Jews of Cape Verde.”

This month’s dedication was in a sense a family reunion for descendants of those early Jews. Among them were two American cousins named Wahnon, one whose family remained Jewish, one whose did not. Another cousin, Carlos Alberto Wahnon de Carvalho Veiga, was Cape Verde’s first democratically elected prime minister in 1991. He, too, attended the rededication ceremonies along with numerous other Wahnons.

“There are lots of Cape Verdean descendants of Jewish families right now; there was quite a crowd, getting and sharing stories” during the dedication, says John Wahnon, a Silver Spring, Md., resident who is not Jewish and emigrated from Cape Verde in 1962 at age 20.

“There probably isn’t a person there who doesn’t have a drop of Jewish blood in them,” he says, noting his belief that it is important to know one’s roots, something he has shared with his children.

Wahnon says he is pleased that the burial sites are being renovated and rededicated. “We are celebrating the fact that the person was here and in some form that person contributed to the society in which they lived,” he says.

His cousin, Sheppard, is Jewish—the men’s great-great-grandfather, along with his son, John’s great-grandfather, immigrated to Cape Verde. Another son, Sheppard’s great-grandfather, did not make the move—and lives in New York.  

It was a thrill, Sheppard Wahnon says, “to be somewhere where my obscure name is known and respected.” He believes the restored burial grounds will help give descendants of the Jews “a sense of connection with this past.”

Pointing to some descendants who have returned to Judaism, including Nuno Wahnon, the B’nai B’rith International representative in Brussels, he says, “My hope is for them to start being Jewish again.”

Source:

 JNS.org and filed under World, Features.

By Debra Rubin/JNS.org

More about the Cheerios Ad

Hate talk won't derail mixed-race Cheerios ad

A sweet, mixed-race, Cheerios TV spot has become an unlikely hot button for racist, social media response.

Cheerios — a consumer brand perhaps least-likely to be embroiled in a racially tinged controversy — has found itself in just that.
Social media blow-back has been fierce, nasty and unusually racist after the top-selling, General Mills cereal brand last week began airing — and then posted online — a commercial featuring a sweet, mixed-race girl.

In the ad, she is seeking nutritional advice from her white mother and black father. The spot ends with her pouring a bunch of Cheerios on the chest of her sleeping father — believing it will make his heart healthier.

Even in an era when the nation's African-American president is in his second term in office and with minorities soon to become a majority population, much of the social media response to the mixed-race ad has been poisonous, leaving some wondering what kind of reality such Internet response actually reflects.

The YouTube comments section for the ad, which had been viewed more than 1.7 million times as of midday Monday, was disabled late last week. "We are a family brand and not all of the comments were family-friendly," says Camille Gibson, vice president of marketing for Cheerios, in an e-mailed comment.

Perhaps the real issue it that it's no longer just edgy brands trying to portray the real American consumer, says Ken Smikle, president of Target Market News, a firm that monitors African-American marketing. "We think of Cheerios as a great American icon," he says. "There are going to be people who feel that their image of what's American is now being challenged by these iconic brands."
Call it new reality vs. old prejudices.

"A progressive-looking commercial collides with the ugliness of the Internet," says Barbara Lippert, media and pop culture columnist at MediaPost.com.

General Mills is standing by the spot and has no plans to stop airing it or to take it down from its YouTube channel. "There are many kinds of families, and Cheerios celebrates them all," Gibson says. Despite some serious, negative response online, "it's been a very positive response overall," she says.

Marketing experts are applauding General Mills — which first introduced the brand in 1941 as "Cheerioats, " and in 1945, changed the name to Cheerios.

"They can't bow to this incredible ugliness and underbelly of hatred," Lippert says. "If the father had not been black, it would have been just another spot."

General Mills, meanwhile, is not bending. Asked how this might affect casting for future Cheerios commercials, Gibson replied, "I don't think it does."
Source: Bruce Horovitz, USA TODAY

25,000 Hits for Multiracial Advocacy Blog!

25,000 Hits! THANK YOU!

I would like to thank every one of you who takes the time to read and comment on our Project RACE blog. We appreciate your interest in the multiracial advocacy and the work our Project RACE volunteers do every day!

Susan Graham

Executive Director  

Cheerios Ad

This Is The Mixed-Race Cheerios Ad All The Idiots Are Complaining About

A new commercial for Cheerios featuring a mixed-race family has become a target for idiots on the internet.

The anodyne spot features a Caucasian mother, an African-American father and their biracial daughter, but contains no overt messaging, politically correct or otherwise (except that Cheerios are good for you).

Nonetheless, Adweek noted the spot had been propelled onto the front page of Reddit, where it received a plethora of racists remarks. Concreteloop.com noted a YouTube commentator who allegedly called the spot an "abomination."

Comments under the video have since been disabled — a sure sign they were overwhelmingly negative.

It's 2013, but apparently some parts of America are still not ready to see miscegenation when it comes to cereal.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=kYofm5d5Xdw

Source: Business Insider/Judith Grey



Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/multi-racial-cheerios-ad-2013-5#ixzz2UsJzRBKh

Race and Writers

White Writer, Black Characters: Bad Idea?

Emma Stone, Viola Davis, Octavia Spencer, Alison Janney and Kathryn Stockett from the movie The Help (AFP/Getty Images)

"I'm a well-known writer of women's fiction. I want to incorporate black characters into my books. How does a white woman write black women correctly? For example, is it disrespectful to have a black woman have a bit of a thing for white men? What's the best way to introduce a black female character in a book? Do I write something like, 'Despite being African American, Carissa found blond men attractive'? Or something like, 'Right or wrong, Carissa loved white boys and had picked one out to take home with her'?

"There's a sad dearth of people of color in romantic fiction. I doubt it's racism. I think it's mainly because so many white writers, like me, simply don't know how to get it right, so we stay in our comfort zone. Any advice?" --Too White to Write?

If, by saying you want to write black women "correctly," you mean "in a way that's guaranteed not to inspire any complaints, constructive critiques or outright criticism," you should probably just stick to your genre's safely monochromatic cast of characters.

After all, views on depictions of black women in media are as diverse as their audiences. We aren't all alike, and our assessments of whether your book should be awarded a Nobel Prize or used for kindling won't be, either.

Of course, you're right to anticipate heightened sensitivity surrounding the characters you're contemplating, and that's with good reason. Quick background reading assignment: Iconic: Decoding Images of the Revolutionary Black Woman. In it, author Lakesia Johnson chronicles how figures from Sojourner Truth to Gabby Douglas have had to counteract media-fueled negative stereotypes thrust upon them (angry, emasculating, Mammy and sex object, to name a few).

You're probably familiar with those tropes, and with reactions to works like Kathryn Stockett's The Help, the novel-turned-blockbuster film about African-American maids working in Mississippi in the 1960s.

"Despite efforts to market the book and the film as a progressive story of triumph over racial injustice, The Help distorts, ignores and trivializes the experiences of black domestic workers," the Association of Black Women Historians said in a scathing statement in response to the film, adding that it "makes light of black women's fears and vulnerabilities turning them into moments of comic relief."

To be fair, black writers don't get a pass here, either. The ABC series Scandal, brought to us by Shonda Rhimes (and currently causing between-seasons withdrawal symptoms among plenty of African-American viewers), has been accused of "send[ing] the message through its high-powered protagonist that black women don't deserve loving and healthy relationships," and "continuing perpetuation of the stereotype of a black woman whose libido and sexual urges are so pronounced that even with an education and a great job, and all these other things, she can't control herself."

And there's not even room to get into all the ubiquitous teardowns of the work of Tyler Perry. As the Washington Post's Vanessa Williams put it very diplomatically, his "films are often criticized for their cartoonish depiction of African-American life and, especially, his depiction of black women as either abused, struggling beings who are rescued by good men or ambitious shrews who are brought low by bad men." Plenty of others take it a step further and call his portrayals flat-out "dangerous."

Clearly, there's no box to check and no source of permission that will guarantee your work doesn't offend a single reader. But does that mean you should abandon your interest in making black women your protagonists and even -- gasp -- protagonists who are attracted to white men? (I can assure you, that's probably not as controversial as you think it is, Scandal being one example.)

No way, says Marita Golden, author of a dozen works of fiction and nonfiction, including Skin Deep: Black Women and White Women Write About Race. "White people, because of the emotional legacy as well as the historical and political legacy of racism, often feel that they do not have access to the black soul and the black spirit," she told me, "but I think writers have the right to write about anything." In fact, she said, "I really feel that white people should write about black characters."

But the key is that "comfort zone" you mention. You have to get there well before you put pen to paper.

The best way for you to do that, said Golden, is to "stop saying to yourself, 'I'm writing about a black woman.' Just write about a woman."

Easier said than done, surely. That's the reason "write what you know" is a literary cliché. And also the reason that Girls creator Lena Dunham decided to skip including women of color in her show altogether (she stopped short of renaming the show White Girls as some have recommended), telling NPR in 2012 that "there has to be specificity to that experience [that] I wasn't able to speak to."

So here's a start. Develop relationships that will allow you to become confident that can begin to speak to that experience, because you know African-American women as individuals. "Usually, white people who write meaningful books with black characters, they do have black people in their lives who they know deeply and respect," said Golden. To be clear, that's "as friends, not as research. Serious, meaningful, complete friendships with black people."

This is your first step toward allowing your new characters to emerge more naturally. Not as science projects, in which you're cautiously throwing in different ingredients and trying to predict the public reaction. And not through some sort of literary quota system. But by keeping their individual dilemmas, not demographics, in the front of your mind as their stories evolve. By seeing them as humans as complex as your real-life friends.

"Once you're ready to write a story that doesn't start with labels and stereotypes," Golden said, "don't worry about race, and don't worry about the reception of readers. Just write."

Source: The Root/By: Jenée Desmond-Harris

Source URL: http://www.theroot.com/views/white-writer-black-characters-bad-idea

Racism on Rise in Europe

Fear of a black Europe: Racism rises on the Old Continent

Analysis: Economic pain is bringing out the worst in some Europeans.

ENLARGE

What do you think?

BRUSSELS, Belgium — The appointment of Italy's first black cabinet minister was a cause for celebration for anti-racism campaigners in Europe.

Their joy was cut short by reactions to Congo-born Cecile Kyenge taking office.

"This is a bonga bonga government," said Mario Borghezio, a member of the European Parliament representing Italy's Northern League party. "It seems to me she'd be a great housekeeper, but not a government minister."

Borghezio's comments were widely condemned within Italy and across Europe.

Yet in the days that followed, more outbreaks of racism illustrated what activists denounce as a trend of growing intolerance fueled by Europe's economic crisis.

Hungary's third-largest political party warned the country was being "subjugated by Zionism" as it protested against the World Jewish Congress holding a meeting in Budapest.

In Athens, authorities clashed violently with a Nazi-influenced party whose electoral support has soared.

Fans shouting racial abuse of black players halted a match between two of Italy's top soccer teams.

"There is definitely an exacerbation of negative perceptions of migrants, and ethnic and religious minorities, with the current economic crisis," said Georgina Siklossy, spokeswoman at the European Network Against Racism, formed by campaign groups from 26 countries.

"It's become common to accuse migrants and ethnic minorities of stealing jobs, benefiting from social services and abusing the welfare state," she said.

Pan-European figures on racism are hard to come by, due to differences in definitions and reporting among national authorities. Support for openly racist or anti-immigration politicians is on the rise in several countries, however, and activists report a rise in hate crime and discrimination.

Greece, the country hardest hit by the euro zone crisis, has emerged with serious racism problems linked to the rise of the Golden Dawn party.

The Nazi-inspired movement saw its support rise from 0.3 percent in 2009 elections to 7 percent last year — winning 21 seats in parliament with the slogan: "So we can rid this land of filth."

Its black-shirted followers are blamed for several of the 154 incidents of racist violence documented last year by Greece's Racist Violence Recording Network, which was set up in 2011 with support from the United Nations' refugee agency.

In the latest high-profile case, a 14-year-old Afghan boy was left with severe facial scaring last week after a beating from a group of men dressed in black, one of whom attacked him with a broken bottle, Greek media reported.

“Democracy in Greece is seriously threatened by the upsurge of hate crime,” Nils Muiznieks, the Council of Europe's commissioner for human rights, said after a study visit to the country early this year.

"Rhetoric stigmatizing migrants is widely used in Greek politics."

Greece is a special case, says Ioannis Dimitrakopoulos, of the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights, who rejects the idea of a generalized increase of racism across Europe resulting form the economic crisis.

"The economic crisis does feed into a variety of reactions and racism is one of them [but] it's quite localized and depends on specific local conditions," Dimitrakopoulos said from the agency's headquarters in Vienna. "The data we have does not indicate a general movement across Europe."

He points to the lack of a Greek-style backlash against migrants in Spain or Portugal, where the economic crisis has also taken a heavy toll.

In northern Europe, he says, anti-immigration parties have suffered losses in recent Dutch and Danish elections.

Traditionally a country that exported emigrants, Greece attracted an immigrant influx during good economic times in the 1990s and 2000s. Its location on Europe's southeastern flank has also made it an entry point for undocumented migrants and asylum-seekers from Asia, Africa and Middle East heading into the EU.

The sudden arrival of newcomers combined with the economic collapse since 2009 have created a perfect storm for racism to develop in Greece. But there are warnings the prolonged recession is whipping up prejudice against minorities elsewhere.

"In Europe we see rising intolerance; growing support for xenophobic and populist parties; discrimination," Italy's Foreign Minister Emma Bonino warned in speech this month.

"Fear and prejudice are being spread across Europe mainly by nationalistic and demagogic groups, who are exploiting the current malaise and social despair," Bonino told a conference on the state of the European Union.

GlobalPost in-depth: Echoes of Hitler

Data published last year by the EU Agency for Fundamental Rights showed ethnic minorities face a high level of hate crime in countries across Europe.

Eighteen percent of sub-Saharan Africans and a similar number of Roma Gypsies suffered assault, threats or serious harassment, according to the agency's survey carried out in 2008across the 27 EU nations.

Beyond far-right parties like Golden Dawn or Hungary's anti-Semitic Jobbik, anti-racism campaigner Siklossy says more established politicians are increasingly scapegoating migrants and minorities.

She says that ignores the positive contribution migrants make to European economies, particularly in countries where declining birthrates are leading to a growing number of pensioners dependent on a shrinking labor force.

Without new immigrants, the labor force would have contracted between 2000 and 2010 in Britain, Luxembourg and Italy, according to a report last year by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.

Siklossy cites studies showing migrants in France make a net contribution of $15 billion to state tax revenues and that Germany's Turkish community adds $49 billion a year to the country's economy.

Sourch: Global Post.com http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/regions/europe/130524/european-racism-greece-italy