Racial Identity Theft On The Rise!

          Ok, so it isn't really theft, but it is a problem that has been going on unnoticed for a long time.   The issue here is racial assumption, the act of thinking someone is from a certain ethnic group just by their look. An example of this is when people look at Oprah, they think that she is black. It may seem that way, but really, she is a mix of African, Native American, and East Asian. This whole assumption thing poses a big problem in my mind, and it is triggered by a few various things.
          The first thing that I would like to bring up would be the large yet somewhat realistic stereotype of the so called "Black" people and their crime rates. According to the official government Bureau of Justice website on the statistics of homicide trends by race, between the year 1976 and 2005, 52% of all homicides in the United States were committed by one who was recognized as an African American.  But, if you go to the site, there is no listings for hispanics, and the only other statistic is listed "other", and the rates for other are extremely low compared to White and Black, never exceeding 5%.  First off, this does not give a good name to the word "Black" at all, almost giving an excuse for racial stereotypes.  Second,  it is almost shameful for the great American government themselves to give out statistics such as this because of the fact that they do not include any sort of information regarding mixed race people, and, the statistics seem a little off because they do not include hispanics.  The fact that it does not include hispanics, and if hispanics were included in the group labeled "other", then they would have committed less than 5% of every homicide in America since 1976.  Does that make much sense to you?

          The next point I would like to make is what we have done with the professional people that have made it far in America.  Obama, the next president, is, believe it or not, is not "Black".  Obama is not the first black president, but he is the first multiracial president.  The news has given off a nice sort of story that is almost convincing everyone in america that we have the first black president, and the black people have come such a long ways in America.  Do you really think so?  Obama's mother was white.

          The big question now is, does putting the name "Black", with all of its negative connotations, on to some one of the multiracial status of Tiger Woods, or Barack Obama, bring the negative connotation of the term further toward the positive side? Or does it make the person the connotation is being applied to look worse?  The big picture here is, we really have not put much thought into how we as a people refer to others, and that in turn has led to a lot of assumptions, some of which can possibly be very dangerous.