The subject of race relations is still a very sensitive issue in the U.S. Anyone believing that we live in a post-racist society should take note of the case involving Jennifer Crambelett and Amanda Zinkon.
Cramblett and Zinkon, a same-sex couple in Ohio, used a donation from a sperm bank to conceive a child. The white mothers were surprised, however, when their daughter, Payton, was born in 2012 and displayed a skin tone that was “obviously mixed-race.”
Cramblett and Zinkon had chosen a white man’s profile to father their baby but were shipped vials from an African-American donor. The child is now 2 years old, and her mothers are suing Midwest Sperm Bank for the establishment’s negligence, citing economic and emotional losses.
According to the lawsuit, the mothers live “each day with fears, anxieties and uncertainty” about their family’s future. Apparently, they are less worried about the hardships their daughter will face in life as a member of American society because she has two moms and are more worried about the toll that being black will have on shaping her life.
I don’t mean to imply that racial concerns are more significant than issues of sexual orientation. However, it is important to understand and explore the role that race played in this situation.
There is no doubt in my mind that Cramblett and Zinkon will win their case against Midwest. Legally, the sperm bank was negligent by failing to provide the couple with its contractually agreed-upon service. The company will likely soon switch from handwritten records to electronic ones to prevent a mistake like this from happening again.
However, the forces at play here have implications beyond this one incident.
Race is a crucial and indicative marker of the life you will lead in the U.S. Despite claims that we entered a post-racist society following the election of President Barack Obama, institutional racism is still ubiquitous in America.
Because of how unwelcoming Cramblett and Zinkon’s all-white neighborhood has been to their biracial daughter, therapists have advised the family to move to a more racially diverse community for their own safety and well-being.
Now that two white mothers have been negatively affected by racial intolerance, the media listen and express sympathy.
People of color have been voicing their unhappiness with racial intolerance and the detrimental effects that it has on their well-being and safety in America for centuries. Unfortunately, they are often accused of having misguided victim complexes and are berated for “playing the race card.”
If we want to talk about misguided victim complexes, let’s analyze the case before us. Cramblett and Zinkon have expressed emotional distress at their shattered expectation of having a fully white daughter rather than a mixed-race or black child. The mothers have also expressed discomfort at having to travel to black communities to have their daughter’s hair properly cared for.
The lawsuit states that the parents don’t want Payton “to feel stigmatized or unrecognized due simply to the circumstances of her birth.” However, none of their actions since her birth support this claim. Instead of learning how to do their daughter’s hair, they’re suing because non-white hair is now something they have to deal with.
This suit serves to highlight just how pervasive, ugly and damaging the stigmas applied to non-white Americans are. The ugly truth of our society is that race still matters. Specifically, it matters to a lot of people whether you belong to the “right” race.
If we want to advance as a society, we have to begin rethinking about how we view race. We should not fool ourselves into believing our society is post-racist or colorblind. It isn’t. What we should be doing instead is embracing all the differences that come with racial diversity and understand that these differences should be acknowledged and valued, not ignored or disparaged.
Payton has the misfortune of growing up knowing that her parents viewed her race as a burden on their lives as white women. People of color have the misfortune of growing up knowing that white-dominated American society views its race as a burden.
If we want to truly become a post-racist society, we have to first stop devaluing those who are nonwhite or partly nonwhite. Once we learn how to do that, we can start to appreciate the beauty of America’s racial and ethnic diversity.
TehQuin Forbes is a UF sociology junior. His columns appear on Mondays.
[A version of this story ran on page 7 on 10/3/2014]
