Mixed Up: ‘I worry about unspoken discrimination. Have you judged me before I’ve even said a word?’Posted in Articles, Autobiography, Media Archive, United Kingdom on 2019-06-12 22:48Z by Steven |
Mixed Up: ‘I worry about unspoken discrimination. Have you judged me before I’ve even said a word?’
METRO.co.uk
2019-06-12
Natalie Morris, Senior lifestyle reporter
 ‘Most of my class called me an “Oreo” and bullied me mercilessly for years’ (Picture: Jerry Syder for Metro.co.uk) |
Marie Farmer is a mother and founder of a family nutrition app. She has Jamaican and Scottish heritage, but she doesn’t identify as either black or white. In fact, she hates being asked to choose.
‘There were only a handful of non-white children in my primary school, which did lead to certain issues in the playground,’ Marie tells Metro.co.uk.
‘Whenever we pretended to be the Spice Girls, I always had to be Scary because I was “brown” – even though I was clearly the best Posh.
‘When I was a bit older I remember reading the poem “Half-caste” by John Agard in a class.
‘I clearly didn’t understand the message as I was really pleased I had a name to identify myself with. I told my mum and she explained why it was a racist term, so I quickly switched to saying I was mixed.
‘That was the first time it occurred to me that being mixed could be controversial. I don’t remember anyone before that pointing out that I was different and that it was a bad thing.’…
Read the entire article here.