Mixed matches

What is it like growing up in a multi-race family? The first findings of a two-year project reveal some surprises that should put an end to the stereotypes. Picture the parents of a mixed-race child, and what do you see? If you believe the stereotypes, you will probably imagine a youngish white mother, probably on a council estate, pushing her frizzy-haired baby in a buggy, with the unreliable black father nowhere to be seen.

Such characterisations, epitomised most recently by Little Britain's Vicky Pollard and her black boyfriend Jermaine, have thrived in the absence of evidence to the contrary. But they are about to be challenged by the first piece of research to examine who mixed families really are, where they live, and what, if anything, they have in common.

This Friday, at a conference in London, Rosalind Edwards, a professor in social policy and director of the families and social capital research group at South Bank University, and Chamion Caballero, a research fellow in the group, will present the first findings from their two-year research project into the parenting of mixed-race children. Funded by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, the research used data from the 2001 national census to assess the socio-economic and geographical characteristics of mixed couples, and interviews with parents to find out how they negotiated the racial, ethnic and faith differences within their families.

Middle class

What they found may surprise you. Contrary to assumptions about broken families and poverty, the census analysis found that most parents of mixed-race children (55%) are together, whether married or co-habiting, and that mixed families are overwhelmingly middle class, with most of them educated to degree or professional level and living in homes they own.

The areas where mixed families live also offers food for thought. The research identified a band of mixed couples running down the centre of England, from Leeds and Manchester in the north, to Birmingham and Leicester in the Midlands, and London and Brighton in the south, raising questions about why mixing was happening less in other areas. Although, as might be expected, most mixed families lived in areas within multicultural cities, there were also significant numbers in more prosperous suburbs and small towns, with further groups in traditional manufacturing and industrial areas.

The results of interviews, too, were thought provoking. Caballero and Edwards interviewed 65 parents from around the country about how they brought up their mixed-race children. The approaches varied. Some tried to give their children a distinctly mixed identity, either by familiarising them equally with aspects of both cultures - particularly through food - or trying to foster mixedness as an identity in itself. Others stressed a single aspect of their child's identity - often their religious beliefs - while a third group adopted an "open" approach, telling their children that they transcended categorisation.

The parents interviewed came from a range of social, ethnic, racial and religious backgrounds, and a number were mixed themselves. Their overall message, whatever their background, was how much their status as a mixed family was not an issue. Yes, some had faced opposition from their own families to begin with, but in many cases having children had helped overcome this. Other extended families had gelled from the beginning, sharing aspects of each other's cultures and increasing their awareness of issues such as racism in the process.

"Generally, problems are perceived to be inside mixed families, but parents told us it is people outside that tend to have an issue with it," Caballero says. "People are saying they are happy and their children are happy. But once a child starts school or comes into contact with the community, people's attitudes can be negative."

Misrepresentations

There are questions to be asked about whether it matters that the majority of mixed-race families are middle class rather than working class. Should we necessarily be happy that mixing is happening more among professionals than we may have expected? This deserves thought, but it is important that misrepresentations are challenged. As Caballero puts it: "Everything before was assumptions. This is concrete."

The research, which will be published early next year, introduces the real voices of mixed-race people and their families, offering a much-needed challenge to those who seek to speak for us and about us. Although further research is needed into the experiences of lone-parent families, the fact that so many mixed couples are getting on with it should challenge the notion that relationships between people of different races or religions are inherently difficult.

But it also should not blind us to the problems that do exist. The fact that so many spoke about negativity from the outside world impinging on the stability of life inside the home should ring alarm bells. It should also be noted that the happiness and stability of mixed-race families and individuals depends a great deal on context.

This summer, I wrote about Gareth Myatt, who was 15 when he died in a children's prison in 2004. A mixed-race boy growing up on a white council estate in Stoke-on-Trent, he struggled with his identity. But when his mother tried to get him help she was advised to send him to an African-Caribbean youth club, an experience he found uncomfortable. Had Gareth's family had the means to move to an area where there were other mixed teenagers, or known about the many grassroots organisations offering support to mixed families around the country, things might have been different for him.

Fearful

When I first wrote about this subject a year ago for Society Guardian, I was fearful of the response. It was an article I had to write, but I didn't know how people would react to what I was saying. I was worried about being branded a self-obsessed, "poor me" journalist - but, more especially, of being accused of not wanting to be black.

The emails I got - and am still getting - from readers, were like a confirmation. To date, there have been around 150: from teenagers struggling with where they fit; from adults extolling the virtues of a mixed identity; from parents of mixed children wondering what all the fuss is about; and from more isolated single mothers asking where to go for advice. They came from all over the country and abroad, and included letters from mixed Asian and white and Japanese and white people, who pointed out my own bias.

There was hostility, too, although far less than I expected. If it was so hard for you, one email implied, doesn't that prove that inter-racial relationships should be discouraged? Hostility also came from the black press, with one newspaper accusing me of "demanding a divorce from the black race" by speaking up about my mixed identity, and describing the many readers who wrote in as tainted by "self-hatred".

This is a sensitive area for black people from the Caribbean and Africa, who have a long and painful history of being divided up according to colour during slavery and colonisation. But the response, "Just shut up and be black", is inadequate for people with one white parent, whose authenticity will always be questioned. Just ask the Rev Jesse Jackson, who got into trouble last week after apparently accusing the presidential candidate, Barack Obama - mixed race, but often described as black - of "acting white"; or the rapper Kanye West, who last year described mixed-race women as "mutts".

Since writing last year's article, my own views have been reshaped through conversations with the many academics and grassroots activists working in this area who, having functioned for years in relative isolation, are increasingly being brought together. I have realised that even as a mixed person, my own assumptions have been tainted by our hidden history, in which the white women who had relationships with the black seamen who settled in Britain early in the last century were branded prostitutes, their offspring tragic mongrels who would regret being born.

Such characterisations have long tentacles: I have spoken to more than one white mother who feels her mixed child is seen by others as evidence of her promiscuity. Yet people continue to have relationships, as they have always done, and - as the Joseph Rowntree research shows - are not weighed down daily in some kind of cross-cultural battleground.

Last September, I described mixed-race people as "the elephant in the room", ignored by public bodies and political rhetoric. I am happy to say there has been progress. Earlier this month, a series of meetings between the Department for Communities and Local Government, the Commission for Racial Equality - long considered to have ignored the issue - and the Runnymede Trust equality policy research organisation culminated in an online conference aimed at formulating government policy "that delivers equality to all mixed-race people". Discussions will continue at South Bank University this Friday, when a range of interested parties are brought together in person.

Celebration

That such events are taking place is a cause for celebration. Although it remains to be seen how they will actually affect people's lives, it is exciting to hear the range of viewpoints emerging as the debate grows - including those from the many mixed backgrounds that have long been sidelined. After years of being absent, our voices are finally demanding to be heard. I will be listening with interest, and I'm sure I won't be the only one.

· Parenting 'Mixed' Children: Negotiating Difference and Belonging will be published early next year by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation. For more information about Friday's conference at London South Bank University, go here (pdf).

Guardian

Directory: organisations supporting mixed race people and families
Map: where mixed race families live
Table: where mixed ethnicity families live

How's this for filth?

If you want to know the truth about the British National Party, read the Covert Undercover Nuisance Tactics blog, a page of filth that would horrify anyone with an ounce of decency in them but which apparently amuses Nick Griffin, the fascist BNP's leader.

This page, which surely ranks well below the Sunday Sport in the peculiar world that nazis inhabit, has launched attacks on everyone from anti-fascists to those we would ourselves refer to as fascists but with whom the owners apparently disapprove. Sharon Ebanks, who as a former BNP candidate in Birmingham's Kingstanding ward, thought she had won the election last year after a miscounted vote but who was then disappointed, has come in for particular vile criticism - not, as you might expect, for turning on the BNP leadership for refusing to pass along the money donated towards her High Court costs by party members following the Kingstanding recount, but simply for being the offspring of a mixed-race relationship.

But there's worse. Following the tragic events at Virginia Tech a couple of days ago, the Covert team has outdone itself with this short piece of filth.

'YAWN!

We've heard it all before

As the dust starts to settle over the Virginia Tech incident the stories of bravery start to emerge. Ofcourse the media picked up on one of the dead teachers straight away. Liviu Librscu like millions of other jews since the end of the second world war was a holocaust survivor. The term itself 'holocaust survivor' seems to have been branded onto every jew like some kind of merit badge to be displayed in times of crisis and this time it was the turn of Librscu to have his paraded. So what of the media headlines?

'HOLOCAUST SURVIVOR KILLED IN VIRGINIA TECH SHOOTINGS'

"Librescu, an aeronautics engineer and teacher at the school for 20 years, saved the lives of several students by using his body to barricade a classroom door before he was gunned down in Monday's massacre, which coincided with Holocaust Remembrance Day."

So what brave act did this survivour of the Nazi and Communist oppression do? According to reports "Librescu, an aeronautics engineer and teacher at the school for 20 years, saved the lives of several students by using his body to barricade a classroom door before he was gunned down in Monday's massacre, which coincided with Holocaust Remembrance Day."

We think what really happened was the kids were thinking "gook with a gun, quick lets use the jew as a sandbag" and then the media played on the holocaust remembrance day thing. And who needs to remember the holocaust anyway on one day when we are reminded of it 365 days a year? Anyway, we don't want the anti semitic brigade accusing us of lies while we are just delivering our own thoughts on the issue and you can ponder on the issue at your own pace now.'

As Nick Griffin and his vile party seem to be proscribing everyone in sight at the moment - including, apparently, his murderous former deputy, the terrorist, Tony Lecomber - perhaps he might like to order a proscription notice against Covert Undercover Nuisance Tactics. If, as he claims, he has no problems with Jews nowadays (to the point where there's at least one in the party) perhaps he might like to speak out against those who dishonour them, the Holocaust and a single Jew who sacrificed his life for the lives of his students.

BNP snubs NNP election deal

Griffin leadership challenge mounted?

An election deal offered to the BNP by New Nationalist Party leader Sharon
Ebanks has been snubbed by the BNP.

Ebanks made the offer on the Nazi Stormfront website, a known hangout for many BNP leaders - even though the same leaders have prohibited their members from posting there.

Responding to a BNP accusation that Ebanks's NNP was splitting the racist vote in Birmingham, Ebanks said:

"I'll do you a deal right here in public. Pull your candidate out of Kingstanding and I'll pull ours out of Shard End. If you refuse, it is you who are splitting the vote. No BNP leaflets have gone out in Kingstanding YET, and no BNP member has this year helped a single person in Kingstanding. Do we have a deal?"

Today's news that the BNP is to field a full slate of candidates across Birmingham seems to indicate that Ebanks does not have a deal - good news for anti-racists, since the BNP and NNP votes in at least two Birmingham wards will probably cancel each other out.

Sharon Ebanks is regularly abused by BNP members on ultra-right forums due to her allegedly mixed-race heritage, and her tiny party is clearly a thorn in the side of the BNP leadership, which moved quickly to have Ebanks's offer deleted from Stormfront.

Strangely, no such move has been made to quash rumours that Chris Jackson is to mount a challenge to Nick Griffin's leadership after the May local elections. At a time when the BNP is riven with disaffection for Griffin, Jackson's candidature will come as unwelcome news to the BNP chief and the unpopular clique running the party.

The BNP's founder, the late John Tyndall, wrote of Jackson: "A very able and well-respected organiser, Chris Jackson, suffered intolerable interference from people at party Headquarters and was driven to resign." Tyndall was referring directly to the Griffin clique.

Predictably, as the Jackson rumour surfaced, the NNP's Sharon Ebanks (posting as "Ontology" on Stormfront) hastened to widen the breach: "Excellent news. The NNP will be at his full service should he require help or assistance, and I hope the BNP will put democracy first and allow the BNP Bulletin to be handed over to both candidates to make their views heard to the entire membership. This would show the public and members that the BNP knows how to run things properly and fairly. I also admire that he is choosing after the May elections to challenge, the previous challenger disrupted the Euro elections to make his challenge."

Just as predictably, the BNP leadership's parade of sock-puppets were immediately deployed to deride the challenge and hint of damage to the BNP's local election prospects.

Given Nick Griffin's propensity for getting rid of potential challengers, Chris Jackson would do well to take the advice offered by many BNP members as news of his challenge spread - Watch your back!

Article supplied by DG at Voice of Reason

Hope not hate Update: Stop the race hate

The Sugababes on the bus of hope

The Sugababes broke away from their sell-out tour at the weekend to back the Daily Mirror Hope not Hate anti-racism bus campaign. The night before performing at Coleen McLoughlin's 21st birthday party in Cheshire the girls boarded the bus backstage at Birmingham's NEC.

Amelle Berrabah, the newest member of the group, said: "We were all always brought up by our parents not to judge people by their religion or the colour of their skin."

As a mixed-race band the girls are a great example of a modern multi-cultural Britain. Keisha Buchanan added: "To discriminate against someone because of the colour of their skin is completely unacceptable. There's enough hate in this world."

The bus was in the Midlands and the Potteries all weekend, visiting the NEC, Birmingham City Centre, Dudley and Stoke-on-Trent on its journey from London to Glasgow. Yesterday a special Hope not Hate action day was held at West Bromwich African-Caribbean Centre with food stalls, steel bands and a guest appearance by singer-song-writer Billy Bragg.

Local boys UB40 also lent their support to the campaign. The band, formed in Moseley, in 1978, still have the original eight-man line-up. They were one of Britain's first multi-cultural bands and represent a wide ethnic mix - Yemeni, Welsh, Scottish, West Indian and Irish. UB40 vocalist Astro said: "I've experienced racism - more so when I was a teenager. You kind of expected it."

But he warned: "In some respects it's better these days but years ago everyone used to mix in together, which was good. Nowadays everyone has become insular. Jamaicans won't go out of Jamaican areas, Asians are sticking with the Asians. There are no-go areas now. From that respect it's got worse and it worries me."

Mirror

...and from Ros Wynne-Jones' blog

On to Stoke...

Saturday morning - it turns out there's no more racism in Britain and we can all go home!!!Oh, April Fool...

The bus went to Stoke today for a children's fun day. I spent most of the day hiding from oversize vehicles, planning for next week, answering emails and getting some washing done.

Two things:

1) who should I see in the lift at the hotel but two freshly scrubbed Sugababes in fluffy dressing gowns, showercaps and no makeup, on the way up from the spa downstairs.... (We stayed posh on Saturday to cheer ourselves up). "How embarrassing," mutters Keisha, hiding behind her hands. In flat spa slippers, the Babes are miniscule. They were still nice enough to wish us well with the bus though... And they were getting ready for Colleen McLoughlin's 21st birthday bash. Now that's going to be a party - like three series of Footballers' Wives rolled into one episode of Shameless as photographed by Hello...

2) On Friday night we had a bus night out in West Bromwich. Nick Lowles, the man without whom this trip would never have happened, had told us about a fantastic Sikh pub on the high street. None of us had ever been to a Sikh pub, and in the interests of exploring Britain's cultural diversity (and scoring a couple of pints of Guinness) it was an irresistable proposition...

We got there late (we get everywhere late) and the pub looked a bit dodgy from the outside, but inside it was rocking with Guinness-soaked Sikhs on a Friday night out. Better still, there was a hatch at the back where you could order every type of curry, kind of like Christmas and birthday rolled into one....

Hero of the day: Chefs at the back of the Sportsman pub in West Bromwich

Observation of the day: You think people are different and then you go into a Sikh pub and you find everyone's the same.

Quote of the day: "The biggest arsehole in two shoes..." (Another Forest of Deanism from Tony the driver)

Smell of the day: Freshly scrubbed Sugababe..

Tune of the day: Anything by Robbie Williams (not current album), as the bus visited his home pub, the Red Lion, in Stoke...

Mirror

BNP activist took part in terror campaign

· South Africa bomb past of web expert revealed
· He says now: 'I was young. I made a mistake'

A white supremacist who planted a bomb at a mixed-race school in South Africa as part of a campaign of terror designed to destabilise the post-apartheid government has become a leading figure in the British National party's online operation.

Lambertus Nieuwhof, who now lives in Hereford, was given a suspended sentence after he and two other men tried to bomb the Calvary church school in Nelspruit in 1992. The bomb, which was made from 25kg of stolen explosives, failed to go off.

Now it has emerged that Mr Nieuwhof, who moved to the UK in 1994, has helped set up a number of BNP websites through his company Vidronic Online, as well as helping to establish a BNP branch near his home last November.

Researchers at the anti-fascist organisation Searchlight, who uncovered Mr Nieuwhof's terrorist past, say his appearance is part of a wider trend. "We know that several far right extremists have left South Africa and have put down roots among groups such as the BNP and pose a growing problem," said Gerry Gable of Searchlight.

At his home this week, Mr Nieuwhof admitted his role in the bomb plot. "I was a young man and impressionable. It was in the evening and we were trying to make a point because it was a mixed-race school, not hurt anybody." He said he had turned his back on violence and now believed in the "power of the pen and the ballot box".

"Everyone should be allowed a mistake," he added. Mr Nieuwhof was an activist in Eugene Terre' Blanche's rightwing Afrikaner Resistance Movement [AWB], which in the early 1990s engaged in a terror campaign aimed at provoking a race war. When the bomb he planted failed to go off one of his fellow AWB activists handed himself in, naming Mr Nieuwhof as one of his two accomplices. Mr Nieuwhof says he received a 12-month suspended sentence.

Mr Nieuwhof is not the first far-right South African to turn up on the political scene in the UK. He told the Guardian that he is close friends with another exile, Arthur Kemp, who has played a key role in several BNP campaigns since moving to the UK. Mr Kemp was linked to the murderer of the South African Communist party leader Chris Hani in 1993.

He was one of a number of far-right activists arrested after Hani's death, but was released without charge. However, information drawn from a list of names produced by Mr Kemp and said to have been passed to the wife of far-right South African MP Clive Derby Lewis was found at the home of Polish-born Janusz Walus, who was convicted of shooting Hani. At the trial Mr Kemp admitted producing a list of names but denied having knowingly supplied a "hitlist".

"He is a very good friend of mine," said Mr Neiuwhof yesterday.

Mr Nieuwhof's company is involved with a number of BNP projects online, including the website for Barking and Dagenham, the party's most successful branch, where the party has 11 councillors, and he is the administrator for the BNP's online members' forum. He is also named as the administration organiser for the Solidarity trade union set up by senior BNP members to protect the rights of "British" workers.

Guardian