I KNOW WHAT HE MEANS.......
I don't think the issues outlined in the article are a result of Bi-racial, but an issue of Bicultural. No one cares what color your skin is, or your eyes, etc. But as the article pointed out there is a difference in culture and what each one appreciates, like music, dress, food, religion, and the like.
My kids are half French and half Texan
And those children are so very loved by all of the kin it never has entered their mind they might be slightly darker than the average Hwita clan member.
Kin is kin.
Its tough for them , thats no lie.
It not a matter of mixed race; it's more a matter of choosing cultures.
Do you like purple cars and gold teeth? Do you like engineering and harp music? Decisions, decisions, decisions.
I grew up as a human being. When I went to college, I was told by other people I gew biracial. Go figure.
During the early '90s I dated a guy who had a bi-racial cousin. I remember that she would come to their family functions with her mother (white) but her father (black) was never there. I asked my boyfriend at the time, what gives? It seems the father had never been accepted by the mother's parents and older family members. In fact, it was apparent that the mother herself wasn't exactly warmly welcomed at these events by these same folks. I remember how that girl, a young teenager at the time, would sit quietly by herself, picking at her nails, rarely making eye contact with anyone. My boyfriend and the other younger family members would try to include her but she was very aloof. It was really sad to watch. I wonder what became of her.
Solution...don't bi-racial. The kids are the victim in these cases. Until society looks at things as colorless, it will always be this way. And don't plan on a color blind society in our life time.
In Japan such kids are called ha-fu, the Japanese pronunciation for "half" (half-Japanese, half another race). Such people, while sometimes teased as kids (not our experience at all), are often later in life the object of admiration/envy for having the combined beauty of two races as opposed to one (often our experience): namely larger eyes and browner hair, a highly desired trait among many Japanese young people these days who have their eyelids widened and dye there hair lighter shades. Take a look at any pop fashion/music mag in Japan for prime examples.
Tiger Woods is a good example here in the US of a good-looking "bi-racial" person who seems very self-confident about himself.
Joshua sounds like he's simply carrying the racial "baggage" of his parents.
Japan * ping * (kono risuto ni hairitai ka detai wo shirasete kudasai : let me know if you want on or off this list)
I'm ethnically ambiguous. My daughter's friends say I look like an 'old' Vin Diesel. I don't claim any culture in particular although I was raised in an a white world. I identify myself as an American. In fact I am an American patriot. I think the best thing about American culture is that it is a smorgasbord of the best of cultures from around the world and one can take from it what one wants.
When you are racially unidentifiable (don't know how else to say that), you hear the pure racism of everybody. Whites think you're one of them and there is a lot of uncensured racism spoken in non-mixed company. Likewise, blacks have their own brand of hate-whitey. In mixed company, everybody denies being racist. It's all hand-holding and "I have friends who are black..."
The question of "fitting in" is real for a child. It's the grown ups that make the life of a bi/multi racial child difficult. Deny it if you like. Say it shouldn't be so. But it is. Biracial kids definately have a hurdle to overcome in the development of their self esteem, just like all other kids for other reasons. Calling or treating them like victims is just another racist expression - as if an innocent child is a victim of his parents.