why black, white and asian?

Question

why are we classed like this, asian is not a colour or is it?
in the uk on forms that is your choices unless your mixed

the point i am trying to make is about the asian part...you have brownish asians and yellowish asians. but i am sure none of them would like to be classed together so why is it just asian? asia is a continent so why does is not say european, african, american etc...

Answer 1

There should be no colour classification. We should be callled from where our background is from.

Answer 2

What color would they be? Honestly. We have white taken by the Caucasians, black taken by Africans??? Yellow, brown, red???

And like you point out, colour wise, Asians are pale to dark brown so thats no indication (the same can be said for blacks but I bet the term black was picked when the West Africans were being rounded up and most were very dark).

Race isn't a colour really. Look at a Pakistani and a German...they are both Caucasian. An Ethiopian and a South African are both black (Ethiopians are light), and a Laotian and Japanese are both Asian even though Japanese are paler than Laotians (who look brown).

Answer 3

Frankly, I do not give a toss what someone's ethnicity is. Black, white, Chinese, Asian, French, - what the heck. People are people, and it's our planet.

There are times that it is useful to know a bit about people, however. Cooking roast pork would not be a good idea if my dinner guests are Jewish. Taking business clients from India or Pakistan to a cricket match rather than a football engagement could make sense. Were I an employer, I would need to know how many of my staff are Muslim, Hindu, Pagan, Jewish etc, so that additional holiday cover can be laid on for those not of the majority who may wish to take their leave of absence during their major festivals or times of spiritual commitment.

The questions on all the forms are designed to ensure that fairness exists within UK society, and it is hard to know how far to go with such ethnic monitoring. If one took it to its logical conclusion, would I put a Devlin and an O'Kane (Irish) in the same office - there has been a feud going on between these families (over the division of a bottle of Guinness), since 1855.

I feel that the need for such political correctness has passed, and that ethnic monitoring should cease. There should be, however, space indicated for one to annotate anything that is important to you - requirements for Halal or Kosher, for example. I recall, thirty years ago, being sent on a residential course in which we were required to share a bedroom with someone of the same sex. One guy was obviously gay, and no other person would share with him, and no single rooms were available. I don't have a problem with Gays, so I shared with him, on the agreement over a handshake and a whisky that there would be no sexual activity. On another occasion, I was sent on a residential course that I did not wish to attend, and was able to get out of it because they had no kosher food. When I returned to work early, I told my boss why I had left the course and she said "I didn't know you are Jewish - this has cost the Company over a thousand pounds for your place". I said "It breaks my heart that you have wasted this money, but you didn't ask" LOL!!!

Answer 4

Hmmn I am not a believer of stereotypes (categorizing humans based on skin color - primitive much?), I am of Japanese (mom), Black/Irish/Italian (dad) heritage. I look "Asian" and "Latina" mix and have "golden olive/brown" complexion depending on the season.

Summer, I am tanned like a Sicilian hottie and in the winter I am pale like a Japanese lady ... and everywhere in between my multi-cultural back round shows in my "appearance".

I don't know, I say if ur Olive ur Olive ^_^ Who cares - I don't.
All I know is that I am NOT going to raise my kids classifying people by skin color - but by their name. If they are wearing a red shirt, jeans whatever then I would rather hear them being descriptive of a person they may be referring to that way - then saying "oh yeah, this _____ (Black, Asian, White, Latino/a) guy down the street..." I want my kids to be frontier souls to pave the way (as they will also be as mixed as I am).

Mirai -jin baby!! Which means Future race in Japanese.

Ciao!

Answer 5

I live in the UK and when someone says to me 'Asian' i automatically think of people from India and Pakistan and not China or Japan. Asia is a large area and Indians are darker than Chinese.

Answer 6

How are people supposed to distinguish you from others if they can't take a look and say, "Ah, yes Mr Smith, Afro Caribbean rather than Mr Smith Anglo-Asian. What is wrong with stating what someone is? I am usually classed as Other but so what?

Answer 7

Because in Britan we're obsessed with categoirising and sub-categorising. under white you generally have White european,etc And Black, Black african, Black carribean, Black other, and so on. and because allthough this is supposed to be a meritocracy, organisations still like to know exactly who they're dealing with without judging them based on what's important.

Answer 8

it's White people's appetite for precision and quantification of all things human. Just put a neat F.U on the forms and they will get the message.

Answer 9

Wouldnt it just be easier to send them back?

Then ,local councils wouldnt have to employ 20 pointless "diversity officers" who justify their jobs by inventing new ways of supporting minorities.

The reason we are given these forms ,is so that any institutions that dont have a majority ethnic minority in attendance, can be closed.

Answer 10

three bone structure among humans. Caucasoid, Negroid, and Mongoloid.

There is some biological bases for race classification, not just skin color.