Child's Play.

Who remembers the verrry politically incorrect childhood game, where one pulls the corners of their eyelids up and recites,

My mother is Chinese...

then down...

My father is Japanese...

then one up and one down:

... and I'm all mixed up!

I hope this child, whose mother is writing about him self-identifying in the New York Times today, is able to laugh at old childhood jokes like that after he grows up... as an American kid.

 There will be surprises in my own household when it comes to racial identity. According to the Pew study, biracial Asian-whites are more likely to identify with whites than they are with Asians. This line made me sit up: It never occurred to me that my sons could possibly identify only as white. I’m forced to think more carefully about what it is that actually makes me uncomfortable with that idea: It’s not that I want my sons to experience discrimination, but if they do choose to identify as white, there is something about being a racial minority in America that I would want them to know. As a child, I most wanted to fit in. As a young adult, I learned how I stood apart and to have pride in it. In the experience of being an “other,” there’s a valuable lesson in consciousness: You learn to listen harder, because you’ve heard what others have to say about you before you even have a chance to speak.

American, momma.  Listen to me:  your son is an American -- no matter what he eats, or where he applies.  More and more, as racially mixed children don the spotlight, we will see them for who they are:  people.

And you know something?  It's simply untrue that the pairing of diverse racial lovers enhances their offspring's ears for listening.  That's a myth.