Bill of Rights

these both were so insightful, I just had to share them.........


A Bill of Rights for People of Mixed Heritage

by Maria P.P. Root

I HAVE THE RIGHT...

• Not to justify my existence in this world.
• Not to keep the races separate within me.
• Not to justify my ethnic legitimacy.
• Not to be responsible for people’s discomfort with
  my physical or ethnic ambiguity.

I HAVE THE RIGHT...

• To identify myself differently than strangers
  expect me to identify.
• To identify myself differently than how my parents
  identify me.
• To identify myself differently than my brothers and
  sisters.
• To identify myself differently in different
  situations.

I HAVE THE RIGHT...

• To create a vocabulary to communicate about
  being multiracial or multiethnic.
• To change my identity over my lifetime--and more
  than once.
• To have loyalties and identification with more
  than one group of people.
• To freely choose whom I befriend and love.

And two more from Marilyn Dramé's companion article "A Bill of Rights for Mixed Folks" on pactadopt.org:

• I have a right not to fractionalize myself in order to conform to society's notion of race.
• I have the right not to want to fit in exactly.

Transracially Adopted Children's Bill of Rights -

Adapted by Liza Steinberg Triggs from "A Bill of Rights for Mixed Folks," by Marilyn Dramé.

• Every child is entitled to love and full membership in his or her family.
• Every child is entitled to have his or her heritage and culture embraced and valued.
• Every child is entitled to parents who value individuality and enjoy complexity.
• Every child is entitled to parents who understand that this is a race conscious society.
• Every child is entitled to parents who know their child will experience life in ways differently from theirs.
• Every child is entitled to parents who are not seeking to "save" a child or to make the world a better place by adopting.
• Every child is entitled to parents who know belonging to a family is not based on physical matching.
• Every child is entitled to parents who have significant relationships with people of other races.
• Every child is entitled to parents who know transracial adoption changes the family structure forever.
• Every child is entitled to be accepted by his or her extended family members.
• Every child is entitled to parents who know that if they are white they experience the benefits of racism because the country's system is organized that way.
• Every child is entitled to parents who know they cannot be the sole transmitter of the child's culture when it is not their own.
• Every child is entitled to grow up with items in their home environment created for and by people of their own race or ethnicity.
• Every child is entitled to have places available to make friends with people of his or her race or ethnicity.
• Every child is entitled to have opportunities in his or her environment to participate in positive experiences with his or her birth culture.
• Every child is entitled to opportunities to build racial pride within his or her own home, school, and neighborhood.

These are going in James' lifebook -- that is, if I ever have fifteen minutes of non-parenting, non-working time to devote to his lifebook.....