Here's a copy of Barack Obama's birth certificate:
As a New Zealander, something here amazes me: the race of his mother and the race of his father are recorded. Does this still happen today in the USA? For what purpose would Hawaii record this information?
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Friday, 24 July 2009
Race on a US Birth Certificate
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6 comments:
C'mon Steve! New zealand is not on another planet where nobody knows the history of the US of A, where some kind of "community gaps" had and still have some importance to lots of people, to say it mildly!
The election of Obama does not erase USA's not so far racist past.
Lots of purposes, including programs to aid minorities these days. 50 years ago or so, the information was used for lots of things, many of them very unpleasant. Google "Rosa Parks" ;-)
We're asked for our racial info a lot, and on most forms it's optional. As KeithX said, its official use is for tracking participation/eligibility for minority programs. Many people who would like programs to be race-blind leave these questions blank.
Interesting. From Hollywood I got the impression that in 1960's USA, the race issues were confined to places like Mississippi (Mississippi Burning) and Alabama (that Whoopi Goldberg movie whose name I forget). I also got the impression that Hawaii was close to an utopian paradise.
Note to self: don't base my views on what Hollywood produces.
In Greece, until 2001, the religion was on the ID card :(
My wife is from New Zealand, and I'm from "The South" --we've actually had this discussion before, me and her. Like the others said, there are some good admin reasons to keep track of race in the US, and maybe in another 100 to 200 years it won't matter as much.
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