Half Caste: Free To Be Me 4 1
While her tone would be no less patronising were she
to replace the term ‘half-caste’ with ‘mixed race’, she
would probably come across as less blithely ignorant.
Though it has a politically correct twang, it’s a tag I
am comfortable with, proud of even, if in a deeply
apolitical, rather holier-than-thou kind of way. After
years of feeling uncomfortable in my skin, I am
delighted to say to myself – and whomsoever should
care to listen – that I am mixed race, and not to give
a damn what anyone else thinks.
However, sitting at a PC as a 26-year-old man, proudly
attesting to my happiness with being mixed race is
rather different to the experience of the rather timid
13-year-old me, cringing away from a spittle-flecked
playground accusation of being ‘an “alf-caste”. At an
age when fitting in was everything, being the only
mixed race kid at a school split roughly down the
middle between asian and white children, was
sometimes hellish.
Although it is doubtful that it would have been of any
comfort at the time, I was unaware that I was part of
what is now the fastest-growing ethnic group in the
UK. In 2001, for the first time, the national census
form included a box in the ‘Racial Group’ section
marked ‘mixed’. Nearly seven hundred thousand
people ticked this box, and we now represent 11% of
the country’s ethnic minority population. And with
figures from 1997 showing that half of all British-born
black men currently in a relationship are with a white
partner (as well as a third of black women), it seems
that like it or not we are here to stay.
Rest assured, some people do like it. And some people
most certainly do not. More than any other ethnic
group, mixed race people in the UK are in a strange
position where, even once we have left the schoolyard
we find ourselves the conduits for the hopes and the
prejudices of others. On one hand, mixed race people
are often the victims of hatred and ignorance from
both black and white communities alike. At the same
time, we habitually find ourselves sanctified, idealised
and, inevitably perhaps, commodifed by those who
would see us as foot soldiers for some utopian, coffee-
coloured future. When all most of us want to do is
be who we are, we find ourselves the living, breathing
representation of a new multicultural age: Generation
M, some have called it, the value of which lies firmly
in the eye of the beholder.
It would be easy, and comforting, to think that the
taboo of interracial love has been broken, and there is
no doubt that the attitude of mainstream society has
softened appreciably. Mixed race couples are a
common sight on our streets, and celebrities who
marry someone of a different racial background can
now expect only a single-figure number of dog turds
through the post in the wake of their big day.
“ What the fuck are you?
You is an ‘alf-caste, innit?”
Yet, a large reservoir of intolerance remains in both
black and white communities. The notion of the
‘white race’ being besmirched and diluted by
interbreeding is a staple of far-right dogma, and taps
into a deep-rooted fear of ‘the other’ that resonates
throughout society. Similarly, to some in the black
community, a mixed race relationship is inherently
subversive, a concession to the white man: evidence
of the perceived self-hatred that has led some
commentators to declare ‘the death of black love’.
To such people, the mixed race child is the
embodiment of their bitterest fears and prejudices.
Rather than having two cultures to embrace and be
embraced by, mixed race children risk being rejected
by both. Identity depends on recognising similarity
and difference in others. It seems that, for some,
we are just too different.
Like many mixed race kids, I learned this the hard
way, in the playground and the classroom. While the
teasing I endured was minimal compared to some, it
was enough to leave a mark; enough to make me
resent my background black, Guyanese father, white,
English mother - for many years. For me, my »