From: sklautky@vaxa.weeg.uiowa.edu (Stephen Klautky)
Subject: Re: Compelling evolutionary reasons for inter-racial marriages (Re: Ten Best Reasons to Date Indian)
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.41    
Organization: University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA, USA
Date: Wed, 7 Oct 1992 08:27:00 GMT

In article <1992Oct6.195252.6891@Firewall.Nielsen.Com>
mgundeko@ad-6.Naitc.Com (Murthy Gundekota) writes:

>One reason not to marry a person with features same as yours is, in 
>terms of evolution, you are not adding to the gene-bank (or nature)
>more variety, at least one more unique genome, that can face up to the
>elements that attempt to obstruct our, that is humans, smooth
>progress.

>Of course, this is my personal concoction. Did anyone come across in 
>science books evidence to support this lockhorn theory?

I don't have a reference for you but I would like to dispel
this notion right off the bat.  There is plenty of gene diversity
in existing races/major race groups.  Occasionally, there is a
nasty gene that is recessive and has a higher frequency in certain
ethnic populations, example: Africans - sickle cell defect, but
the frequency of these is not even close to sufficient to threaten
the population if all non-Africans suddenly disappeared.

It is expected that human breeding has to occur for generations
in a very small population to see prevalent defects appear
consistently.

I hope I am being clear.  I don't know of any convincing evidence
that says interracial marrying increases the survivability of the
resulting children and their progeny as a whole.  (If someone has one,
drop a line with the ref.).

With that said I would like to agree with the rest of the post as
to the political/religious problems associated with interracial
marriages.

>Has any IA or II given thought to their off-spring when their marriage
>is inter-racial..

Yes, I think its going to be tricky.  My impression of American
culture is one that treats East Indians as people in the process
of being assimilated - in the process of becoming "real" Americans.
Hence, there is an attitude (don't know how common this is) that
you should let go of anything that is "native" and replace it with
"real American" culture.  While I don't have strong affinities to
everything my parents like I don't want to be told what ideas or
practices I should or should not be "wasting" my time on.

There is a process that works on many levels that attempts to blur
the distinction between Indian and Caucasian.  I can see this in
some of my friends.  Some people can accept you easier if and only if
they think of you as "white".  But I'm not "white".
(Sorry, this is a really long introduction to the point I'm going
to make):

I think these kids will have to work hard to prevent the force of the
existing culture from steamrolling over their desires/how they want
to live their lives and the sources for these desires.  The present
culture, in the consumer-oriented aspects, has a tendency to hold
other ideas and ways of living as a less important than the ones it
can sell.  If your way of doing things is different (and acceptable)
it tends to be characterized as "cute" rather than as a real
alternative.

I'm probably different from most of you since I'm already part of
an interracial family (indian and anglo-saxon) and have English as
my first (and, sadly, only language).  I don't have problems with
my kids (not even in the planning stages yet :-))  being even more
"non-Indian".

Hope I don't catch too much shit for saying this but . . .
I think an interracial marriage where one partner is African-
American will face a harder time raising their kids than if
that other partner was chinese or anglo-saxon.  This belief is
based what I see around me.  There are so many negative stereotypes
of black males and females that despite the efforts of the black
community those misshapen images and myths still rule the reactions
of many people in the U.S.  I get the feeling I would have to work
extra hard to prevent my kids from buying into those stereotypes.

This does *not* mean that I would not marry black woman.  It means
that if I fell in love, married her, and had kids that I acknowledge
a different approach would have to be taken in raising the kids.
Actually, if there was any other race involved you would have to
take a different approach - there are just different myths and
stereotypes to work against.


>indian vs. african-american
>indian vs. chinese
>indian vs. anglo-saxon
         I
         I
         I-->  "vs."? don't you mean "and".  You see us fighting
               future spouses if there is intermarrying?  :-)  :-)


-=] Stephen [=-       SKLAUTKY@VAXA.WEEG.UIOWA.EDU
Newsgroups: alt.culture.us.asian-indian