When a person is born their childhood is already defined what jobs their parents have and what they have. As they grow older they are more and more defined by whatever their parents are able to give them. they are influenced by what their parents go through, because until they are old enough to understand what they have or who they are they are defined by the previous upbringing of their parents.
When a child is brought up in a multiracial household they face the discrimination that both parents endure. They see the struggle of each race or skin color faces. They are told stories of the oppression and have to hold that on their back for the rest of their life.
These children grow up to face many uncomfortable situations that many monoracial people would see as insulting and rude, these situations have an effect on their psyche. In an article by Astrea Greig, Understanding the Stressors and Types of Discrimination that can Affect Multiracial Individuals, situations discussed include being forced to choose one race rather than being able to identify as mixed, or being called an “other”, situations come up where you are assumed as one race and the group of people starts making racial slurs against a race you identify as.
A research article, Understanding the Unique Experiences of Multiracial Individuals, raises awareness about the importance of understanding multiracial people when they are receiving therapy. When dealing with multiracial clients a tool used is the Multiracial Challenges and Resilience Scale, MCRS. A study was conducted asking multiracial people in urban areas to answer a series of questions concerning; others disbelief regarding racial background, lack of family acceptance, multiracial discrimination, appreciation of human differences, challenges with identity, and pride with racial background. The three studies conducted showed that on average 75% experienced discrimination specifically related to being multiracial.
So what nobody dares to talk about is the possibility of other ethnicities having the privilege or is privilege even a real thing.
Privilege is believed to be an advantage that you are born with, you are not acquired privilege. When applying the idea of privilege to race a person’s advantage varies from being hired over another based on skin color to have an easier time buying groceries at a grocery store. It is defined by Merriam Webster dictionary as “a right or immunity granted as a peculiar benefit, advantage, or favor”, with this definition it is assumed that only white people experience privilege or experience more privilege than another race.
Privilege is not even brought up when being raised because privilege is what your parents can provide you. Privilege has nothing to do with skin color because of how broad the subject is. In the research of privilege done by Linda L. Black and David Stone it cannot be determined whether “birthright” privilege is real because by definition privilege is “…any entitlement, sanction, power, and advantage or right granted to a person or group” multiracial people are being more discriminated against as they are believed to have more of an advantage over someone else who is part of one of their races. Nature Duran-Smith from Affinity Magazine has experienced first hand “Being… the black sheep” and being “…exposed to stereotypes of every race you are mixed with.”
Privilege is a hard pill to swallow but skin color and race are not the only things people need to stop and think about. A study group by Black and Stone showed that there were 20 categories of privilege. The category of privilege is broadened by gender, sexuality, age, religion and so forth. The idea of privilege is too broad to believe that because a person is multiracial that they face more privilege than the less desired race.
Rowan Counterintuitive 
Naturalist, your argument will never be persuasive if you continue to speak only in broad generalities that hint at particulars. You can make any claims you like about how people are privileged or stereotyped, but the closest you’ll get to convincing your readers is a shrug. (“That’s possible,” we think, “I wonder if there’s any evidence for that?”) We’re waiting for examples, test cases, statistics, illustrations. Something we can visualize.
An example: You offer us this short paragraph.
Presumably, the child is biracial, born to parents of different races, but that is not clear. In a multiracial household, the parents might themselves be biracial or of mixed race. You compound the ambiguity by adding the detail of the struggle each “skin color faces,” which we have to guess means “skin of a color that indicates a particular race but perhaps inaccurately.” The next detail, “stories of oppression,” we imagine, means the parents tell the child how the parents have suffered oppression, but that’s not clear either. Possibly a majority-race parent and a minority-race parent (maybe even a minority-race parent who “presents” as majority) share stories of how the minority parent was oppressed. Is the oppression the same for minorities whose skin color is ambiguous? We’d like to be sympathetic to the children—and you very much need us to be sympathetic for your argument to have any impact—but we don’t know what it is the children are carrying on their back.
You might answer me by saying that all those variables—and more!—are possible, and that your point is: mixed-race kids of all types suffer a category of oppression common to them all but that manifests as many variations. We can handle that. But if that’s your point, you need to tell us that. Run through some of those variations for us. You’d be providing a very valuable service by illustrating the many ways prejudice manifests itself.
So far, your observations occupy a vague middle ground: neither specific nor deliberately universal.
Of course, we also have to work on your citations, which as they stand offer us no assistance finding the original sources. In an essay that will make uncomfortable assertions, we very much need to be able to locate your evidence. We’ll work on that process again in class on MON APR 16.
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Naturalist, you haven’t been posting arguments with citation routinely throughout the semester, so this is the first time I’ve had a chance to see your citation and references technique.
We’re not using the Parenthetical citation technique in this class, so don’t put the Author or Title credit at the end of your sentence.
Instead, review this lovely model of in-text citation (with signal phrases), and the equally lovely model References list from a brush-up lecture on citation we reviewed last week.
You’ll have to pick up this skill promptly to incorporate good citations into your Portfolio.
https://rowancounterintuitive.com/syllabus/syllabus/informal-citation/
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The study is obviously flawed since most likely 100% of multiracial individuals have experienced some kind of race-based discrimination. The outcome is more likely a validation of the view that a startling percentage of multi-racial respondents are in denial. Am I wrong about this, Naturalist?
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the questions that were asked were very specific relating to be multiracial. Such as not dating a person because they did not want to date a multiracial person.
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I appreciate that you’re beginning to credit sources for your research (and the survey is a good example of how to incorporate academic data), you’ll have to provide a References list at the bottom of your argument to help readers know what you mean by (Black Stone) or the even more mysterious (Ebsco Host), which isn’t a source but a compendium of millions of items of source material.
Again, see the Model in the lecture note above, and ask questions very soon if you need clarification on appropriate technique.
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