The Student Room Group

Not dating anyone of a certain race: preference or persecution?

In the cases where people say “i’m not racist, but I would never be with an X person” is this acceptable? Or is it racism? Do you feel pressure from family to date within your own race?

(These are not my views on dating, but a conversation i’m interested in having as I’ve heard of this happening in a lot of different families.)

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Reply 1
Depends on the reasoning behind it, if it's just attraction then I don't see why it's racist.
Reply 2
Original post by cat_mac
In the cases where people say “i’m not racist, but I would never be with an X person” is this acceptable? Or is it racism? Do you feel pressure from family to date within your own race?

(These are not my views on dating, but a conversation i’m interested in having as I’ve heard of this happening in a lot of different families.)




It would not be considered persecution, but it is one of the few forms of socially acceptable racism.

virtually everyone actively discriminates to a certain degree based on race. Studies even show white people who say they have no racial preference will drift towards contacting mostly other whites on online dating sites rather than non white races.

I use the word racism loosely though as sometimes the discrimination is not based on malice or feeling X race is inferior but because the person does not find the typical characteristics of said race physically attractive on a personal level.

Males generally are under less pressure from families to date within their race, parents seem to object more when their daughters date interracially.
The funniest thing I have ever heard is when people say "I'm only comfortable with dating my own race because its natural"

Surely if its "natural" you would get along with every single human in your race :rofl:
Original post by Ilikelemons
The funniest thing I have ever heard is when people say "I'm only comfortable with dating my own race because its natural"

Surely if its "natural" you would get along with every single human in your race :rofl:


Why's that natural? Loads of animals can't be together and fight to the death whenever they're together.
Reply 5
i don't get how it's persecution.
Original post by Trinculo
Why's that natural? Loads of animals can't be together and fight to the death whenever they're together.


You need to understand my post.
Everyone is racist because we have natural inbuilt preferences which we then use to discriminate with in order to choose the best mate from your in group ethnicity. It is just natural that every race largely speaking is more attracted to the opposite sex of the same ethnicity. Even putting ethnicity aside people are attracted to people who look similar to them in regard to facial features and hair colour.
Reply 8
Having a preference is fine but totally excluding someone based on skin colour or race could be considered racist depending on context. I guess culture clash can be a deal breaker for people and if they feel that it would cause a conflict in the long term. Saying "I wouldn't date people of X race because they're ugly" is unacceptable and believe me, I've heard people say that.
Reply 9
Original post by Tom191
Depends on the reasoning behind it, if it's just attraction then I don't see why it's racist.


Yep I agree, to quote @ParkHyungSuk “If you were to say that you don't find east asians particularly attractive because they commonly have monolid eyes then that is a preference as you are not physically attracted to that” but if it was “I don’t find east asians attractive because they are all X” then that’s not on.
Original post by cat_mac
In the cases where people say “i’m not racist, but I would never be with an X person” is this acceptable? Or is it racism? Do you feel pressure from family to date within your own race?

(These are not my views on dating, but a conversation i’m interested in having as I’ve heard of this happening in a lot of different families.)


Of course it's racism.

The issue is that it's too sensitive and too mind-blowing for almost anyone to come to terms with. The usual alternatives are to make up nonsensical stuff like "it's just preference" - if that were true, then it would be an acceptable rationale for not employing black people because it's "just a preference".

This is the nexus between enforcing non-discrimination on people and the impossiblity of dictating who people are intimate with.
i ll shag ya whenever
Original post by cat_mac
Yep I agree, to quote @ParkHyungSuk “If you were to say that you don't find east asians particularly attractive because they commonly have monolid eyes then that is a preference as you are not physically attracted to that” but if it was “I don’t find east asians attractive because they are all X” then that’s not on.


I agree with this guy, he sounds wise. I heard he was very humble too.
Original post by cat_mac
Yep I agree, to quote @ParkHyungSuk “If you were to say that you don't find east asians particularly attractive because they commonly have monolid eyes then that is a preference as you are not physically attracted to that” but if it was “I don’t find east asians attractive because they are all X” then that’s not on.


Nah, it's nonsense. The same rationale is not acceptable for every other form of race relations. It would be racist in the extreme to say that you do not permit people from the sub-continent in your premises because you don't like the smell of curry, or you find the way they talk to be irritating.
Preference. No-one has a right to be dated by me. Not that that's anyone's loss.
The reason its so contentious is that whenever discrimination and equality law comes to enforcement, it tends to compel people to do things they don't want to.

The infamous gay bakery cases spring to mind. You have people who are compelled to carry out work for people even if they don't wish to - this goes against every single principle of employment law, which usually underlines that people cannot normally be compelled to work - otherwise it takes on all sorts of forced labour or slavery connotations.

The danger is that if sexual "preferences" are recognised for what they are - discriminations - you would have results which might be acceptable to a small number of exceptionally uber-liberal people, but would be completely unacceptable to pretty much everyone else.

There is also no method of enforcement. The best you could do is end up fining someone, unless what we want to end up with is essentially government sanctioned sexual assault.

And why stop at race? Once you have gone down this road, there is no logical reason why age or gender shouldn't also be similarly protected in these terms.

It's racism. 100% But racism that must be protected for the sake of civilised society.
What#2 said. preference ok (depending on reason) other reasons maybe not.
By that logic, wouldn’t “I only date males because I have a preference” be sexist?:smile:
Original post by Anna1029
By that logic, wouldn’t “I only date males because I have a preference” be sexist?:smile:


No lol but 'I don't date women because they're all b*tchy' is. Not dating them because you're attracted to men is simply preference.
imo you can't really say that you're not attracted to a whole race because everyone is different. If you dont like an individual because of their race i would assume that is racist. However, if theres a certain aspect about a certain person that you dont like then it's fine, it's preference. Just dont go around saying 'i dont date X because they are from this certain race'.
However, at the end of the day i believe that everyone should date whoever they want without being pressurised. It's your life after all :smile:

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