Thanks, Cheerios

    Obviously by now everyone has seen the Cheerios commercial that started a near riot among racists and closed-minded thinkers everywhere.  But if you haven't, take a look below.  The little girl is so stinkin' cute!

    

    I was hesitant at first to talk about this here, but so many good things keep coming out of this commercial that I really can't help myself at this point.  It's so inspirational.  For those of you who know me in real life, you have probably never heard me discuss race relations except for the occasional anecdote about how often I'm asked about my nationality by random strangers.  For the record, I am black and my husband is white.  You've probably never heard me talk about how being in an interracial marriage affects me.  Do you know why?  Because it doesn't.  I don't even think about it.  And as far as I know, neither does Kevin.  Being in an interracial relationship (for 10+ years) has not even made me more aware of race relations in this country.  What's embarrassing?  I was actually shocked at the outrage over this commercial.

    Part of me feels naive for not being able to predict the negative reaction it sparked, but part of me also feels lucky.  Kevin and I have never dealt with stares, intolerance, or even snarky comments (at least not to our faces).  No one has treated us differently, so I've never thought of as anything but a normal married couple--because we are!  But the backlash from this ad campaign has forced me to look at the issue of race a little differently.  We want kids one day, how will this type of backward thinking affect them?  I hope it won't.  This week, a video popped up online that made me even more hopeful that it won't.  

    One of the other positive things that came from this whole Cheerios situation was brought to my attention by my mom.  It's a blog called We Are the 15 Percent.  It features pictures of multiracial couples and families from all over the world.  Check it out- it's really beautiful.  So I thank Cheerios for bringing this all to light.  I imagine that your PR and marketing teams (unlike me) knew that this ad could be considered controversial and I thank you for running it anyway.  I've considered that maybe it was all for publicity, but the amount of good that has come from this ad forces me to be less cynical about it.  Thanks for putting into the spotlight the lifestyle that we (and many other families) live and consider normal every day of our lives and will hopefully one day be considered normal by all.

  {Happiest day of my life}

    I'd also like to give a shout-out to a couple of other bloggers that have written about this in the past.  Thanks for putting your thoughts out there.  Read here and here if you're interested.

Linking up today with Shanna and Wildcard Wednesday