Originally Posted by Allan

Yes, if the child is being raised in Canada and one of their parent's native language is English...then learning 1 foreign language is a no brainer. However, if both parents speak in 2 different foreign languages, and the child also needs to learn English...then that's certainly a lot harder for the child to learn 3 languages. Its doable, but not practical for many families.

Not necessarily--that's a huge generalization.
Looking at some of my relatives, one family has each parent speaking their own languages, the kids interacting with both sets of grandparents regularly, and each set speaks in their native languages, and the kids are fluent in both, as well as english. The older kid has been fully fluent in all three languages from the moment he started speaking, whereas it took the younger one a bit longer to embrace english. It hasn't been a problem or "impractical" at all. If anything, it makes it much more practical, since now they have multilingual children who have a huge advantage in a global market, and who feel completely comfortable regardless of which side of the family they're with. This is because the parents made a conscious decision to ensure the kids were brought up this way, even if it meant they were slower learning english--and for the older child, this wasn't even really the case. They're 7 and 4 years old now, and language hasn't been the slightest problem since each of them was two.

both my parents speak other languages to my grandparents, but they didnt teach us any since they saw little point in use learning czech/hungarian while we will never use it again. it sucked during family get togethers since my 2 siblings would sit and talk with me while the rest of our family happily spoke to each other

I'm just going to rattle off whatever thoughts fly off my head, regardless of relevance.

There's 3 types (not independent of each other) of racial stereotyping I've witnessed, and they're all disgusting.

First, assuming you're automatically a better person than people of other races, and thus you're stooping to a lower level if you decide to get involved with someone from another race.

Second, stereotyping based on race itself. Caucasian vs African vs Mexican, etc. It's something quite common in a lot of cultures.

Third, as seen in the video, stereotyping based purely on skin colour. Either you're white, brown or black. This is screams total ignorance and stupidity (not that the other 2 are any better). And this leads to something I found very discomforting and weird when I first came to Canada (and the USA and European countries do it AFAIK), and something I still do not agree with whatsoever, and something, although it's so engrained in society, I still cannot understand why it's tolerated. You guys call people of African descent "black".

You've essentially boiled racism down to it's most basic form and made it acceptable in everyday discourse. You refer to a entire race of people by their skin colour (and it's not even black!), the same element that serves as a reason for so many to discriminate? I know it's such common jargon that no one actually thinks of it as racism, but still, it's scary how something like that is so subliminally engrained into society. Back where I'm from in the Caribbean, it's downright racist and insulting

Oh, and in before the whole "race is a social construct" bullshit. Most people (and yes, a great deal, including science majors) hear this and don't even understand what it means. It doesn't mean that race has no underlying genetic cause; it does.

I forgot what I was going to say.

Okay, wrap up. Race may be a social construct in the sense that "we humans" have created the distinction and discrimination that exists among people from various geographic regions with similar physiological and genetic features, but it exists. Don't try to ignore the fact that it exists. But I believe it should mean jack squat. It should be a non-issue. Almost no decision in someone's life, unless the situation itself entails the consideration of one's race, should rely on race. This includes who you do or don't fall in love with.

(Oh God. I feel the need to elaborate on the last paragraph. Curse my disorganized thought process and my inability to articulate efficiently.)

You shouldn't decide you don't like someone because of their race. However, not liking someone because you don't find the characteristic physical features associated with that race particularly attractive is completely okay. Attractiveness is completely arbitrary.

I guess my point is, don't discriminate. Stay in school. Don't do drugs.

As the product of an interracial couple (my dad's greek, and my mom's chinese) i approve the message of interracial dating

@yogurt, i see ur point about blacks vs african americans. but what about whites? Don't they fit the boat..

Originally Posted by Allan

Yes, if the child is being raised in Canada and one of their parent's native language is English...then learning 1 foreign language is a no brainer. However, if both parents speak in 2 different foreign languages, and the child also needs to learn English...then that's certainly a lot harder for the child to learn 3 languages. Its doable, but not practical for many families.

Me and my sibling learned 3 languages (including English and not including French) while growing up here and it really wasn't hard at all... it's pretty easy to pick up on languages when you're a little kid and your parents constantly speak to you in these languages (and English you can learn from school). I've never even been confused between the 3.

Originally Posted by Kathy2

I don't get that lady near the end. She says she loves children, and she feels bad when half black/half white children get picked on and made fun of. Wtf? They get bullied because of people like HER.

that was just an excuse so she doesn't look that bad. I think she made her real thoughts pretty clear somewhere in the middle when she said "your beautiful, you don't have to settle for that" (referring to the black guy)

Originally Posted by Yogurt

Third, as seen in the video, stereotyping based purely on skin colour. Either you're white, brown or black. This is screams total ignorance and stupidity (not that the other 2 are any better). And this leads to something I found very discomforting and weird when I first came to Canada (and the USA and European countries do it AFAIK), and something I still do not agree with whatsoever, and something, although it's so engrained in society, I still cannot understand why it's tolerated. You guys call people of African descent "black".

You've essentially boiled racism down to it's most basic form and made it acceptable in everyday discourse. You refer to a entire race of people by their skin colour (and it's not even black!), the same element that serves as a reason for so many to discriminate? I know it's such common jargon that no one actually thinks of it as racism, but still, it's scary how something like that is so subliminally engrained into society. Back where I'm from in the Caribbean, it's downright racist and insulting.

Tell me, what would you prefer? To be called a safe umbrella term like "black" that undeniably describes you or to be called some "politically correct" term like African-American, when you might not even be African nor American? Okay, we know now you're from the Caribbean, but do you expect the general populous to know that and be able to recognize it on sight?

While I can sort of understand your opposition to "black" as an umbrella term, it's the safest form of identification to use because it encompasses a large subset of people. From what I've seen, people get more offended if you assume they were one race if they're actually another. I'm Chinese, and while racism doesn't bother me much, I think I'd preferred to be called "Asian" than someone automatically assuming I'm Korean or something. Nothing against Koreans, but it just comes off as pretentious to assume you can accurately determine one's racial background just by looking at them. In some cases features are obvious, but there are always exceptions.

And as leeoku said/implied, we all know that "black" doesn't literally mean black like the night sky, but "white" in a racial context doesn't mean white like paper either. Imo, to use these terms isn't "boiling down racism to its most basic form"-- it's actually doing the opposite. Isn't it worse to assume someone is an African living in America just because they have dark skin?

Originally Posted by apples12

Me and my sibling learned 3 languages (including English and not including French) while growing up here and it really wasn't hard at all... it's pretty easy to pick up on languages when you're a little kid and your parents constantly speak to you in these languages (and English you can learn from school). I've never even been confused between the 3.

While it's cool that you and your sibling learned three languages simultaneously, I just hope you're aware that people/families/home environments are all different and that what wasn't hard for you can be excruciatingly difficult for others. I'd imagine that each use of one language detracts from the use of another, and keeping the two languages balanced would be hard enough (let alone three or more)

Also, and this is unrelated to apples' post, I suspect that it may be easier to concurrently learn multiple languages that are similar in origin than two completely different ones (e.g. French and Spanish and Englsh vs. Japanese and Russian and Italian).

Originally Posted by Entropy

Tell me, what would you prefer? To be called a safe umbrella term like "black" that undeniably describes you or to be called some "politically correct" term like African-American, when you might not even be African nor American? Okay, we know now you're from the Caribbean, but do you expect the general populous to know that and be able to recognize it on sight?

While I can sort of understand your opposition to "black" as an umbrella term, it's the safest form of identification to use because it encompasses a large subset of people. From what I've seen, people get more offended if you assume they were one race if they're actually another. I'm Chinese, and while racism doesn't bother me much, I think I'd preferred to be called "Asian" than someone automatically assuming I'm Korean or something. Nothing against Koreans, but it just comes off as pretentious to assume you can accurately determine one's racial background just by looking at them. In some cases features are obvious, but there are always exceptions.

And as leeoku said/implied, we all know that "black" doesn't literally mean black like the night sky, but "white" in a racial context doesn't mean white like paper either. Imo, to use these terms isn't "boiling down racism to its most basic form"-- it's actually doing the opposite. Isn't it worse to assume someone is an African living in America just because they have dark skin?



While it's cool that you and your sibling learned three languages simultaneously, I just hope you're aware that people/families/home environments are all different and that what wasn't hard for you can be excruciatingly difficult for others. I'd imagine that each use of one language detracts from the use of another, and keeping the two languages balanced would be hard enough (let alone three or more)

Also, and this is unrelated to apples' post, I suspect that it may be easier to concurrently learn multiple languages that are similar in origin than two completely different ones (e.g. French and Spanish and Englsh vs. Japanese and Russian and Italian).

Its actually easier to learn different ones as a child, and similar ones as an adult. Children have a hard time distinguishing similar languages like English and Dutch (English and French are not considered similar, just btw) when they are very young (like newborns) so its easier for them to distinguish two languages from different families.
Of course, if you're learning multiple languages at the same time you may be delayed in one or more of the languages but you catch up fairly quickly. 'Normally' developing kids learn roughly the same amount of words around the same age so when you learn multiple languages you still have the same number of words, just spread out over different languages. It all evens by the time kids are in school and children have no trouble (normally developing, again) to distinguish the code switching. I can like you to studies if you'd like.

Originally Posted by Allan

I have cousins who are mixed, and they don't speak my family's native language. They have pretty much been outcasted from the family, as it is impossible for socialize during family gatherings. I feel bad for them, and its not their fault...it was the choice of their parents and now they have to suffer.

.

lol this is true. i have lots of brown/white mixing in my family and friends and all of them don't know much about their brown side. i havent seen any brown/white mix who knows his brown stuff yet. its because the browns who marry the caucasians were mostly brought up here in north america and had already been losing the touch with their native background. thats how it is with all that i have seen at least.

Do all of you want children of your own? So it's just me who wants to adopt only?

F*ck if a girl doesn't wanna be with me because she wants "pure" kids -_-

Originally Posted by Afzal

Do all of you want children of your own? So it's just me who wants to adopt only?

F*ck if a girl doesn't wanna be with me because she wants "pure" kids -_-

exactly bro, it's her loss. I wouldn't want to be with someone who's dumb enough to think they have to keep their race pure anyways.

As someone who is the product of an interracial relationship (white Canadian mom, guyanese indian dad), I've just grown so jaded and disenchanted with the whole idea. What people don't realize is it's not as much about love as it is status. Non-white people strive to date white people because of the higher status that comes with it (when was the last time you've seen an Asian or an Indian with a black person before?). With me non-white people make a huge deal out of skin colour and me being mixed whereas white people don't really seem to care. I'd like to say that I'm open to dating anyone regardless of skin colour, but sadly it isn't that easy. From non-white guys I always get this bullshit talk about how I "look like their sister/cousin/other female relation" and how they prefer "true Canadian" girls, and white guys only date me because they can't get other white women. Maybe I should just give up on dating in general.

I plan to adopt domestically once I can support a child financially, because the world's already overcrowded as is and every kid deserves a real family. I don't think I would be too concerned about the ethnicity of my children. I'd learn everything I could and do the respective genetic screens so that we'd know if they had any ethnicity specific genetic disorders and take it from there. I'd raise them without a strong influence of either culture but an appreciation for every culture because IMO, that's a much more rewarding life experience. If they wanted to immerse more in their own culture as they grew up, I'd support that decision as well.

While I understand the idea behind marrying/dating for cultural preservation, culture isn't...genetic. It's social, and its learned. I value a person's qualities much more than their background and IMO, it isn't really a big factor to me at all unless the culture becomes an obstacle that cannot be overcome as some people are not flexible with certain cultural practices.

It's saddening to see that interracial relationships are frowned upon so immensely by some people. Each person is entitled to their opinion and perspective, and everybody's got their reasons, but they're all still human beings and .. in the end, it's the couple's decision and their relationship will be what they choose to make it, not what their culture does. Yes, it's tough and yes it's still alien to many people and not understood by many, but...at the end of the day, it's their personal choice and that should be all that really matters. Hearing people make blanket statements about interracial marriage that do not involve them in any way is unsettling because...they don't have to do it if they don't want to. They just have to accept another pair of human beings and respect their perfectly acceptable adult decision but do not wish to.

Originally Posted by tyrant

maybe they think the sex isn't as good, that's why they mentioned the sweet part.....

LOL

/12char