Friday, March 16, 2007

Being American

I remember when I was a kid in South Carolina. People would come up with me and say "So where are you from." At first I would say, "New York". And they would say, "No, really. Where are you from?" I sort of played along, but it always annoyed me a bit because I was from New York, at least in my mind. I mean, it was not like I was from Asia just because my parents came from there many years before I was born. So later, I was thinking about whether or not I wanted to marry an Asian guy. It was not like they were thick on the ground in the Deep South. But then I decided I wanted someone who would partner with me to raise our children as Americans with Chinese accents (figuratively, not literally LOL) . And when I got to college, I met David and the rest is history. Now we have our little All-American Boy. Okay, so most people may not look at him and say that, but I totally see that when I look at him. And now I would like to see him on the cover of a scrapbook magazine with that title. :) I quickly went through my 2006 and 2007 issues of one of my scrapping mags and there are no minorities on the cover. I only looked at one because they are organized on my shelf and most of my other mags (I subscribe to 5) are hanging all over the house, but it is a decent representative sample. Is it because there are no great ethnic minority scrappers? Or because these covers sell better? I am pretty sure it is a business decision either way, and as a business person, I get it. But it does make me sad as a mommy. After all, for every one of those all-American towheaded little kiddos on the cover, there is a little one like mine who probably never will be. I hope that our industry can lead the way in reflecting our society as it is. And I cannot wait until July 4th someday when they have a little non-Caucasian kiddo hold a sparkler with the words "All-American". Jonathan agrees. :)

5 Comments:

Blogger Shirley said...

Come on, D, they were all over the place....you just had to look. BWahahahahaha! Love the pictures - he'll make cover yet!

3/16/2007 05:24:00 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Your son is gorgeous and if they got ready to pick a non-caucasian beauty, he'd be a front runner! I think you oughta shoot a couple of emails along the lines of your blog post to the magazine editors and give it a shot!

Christy O

3/17/2007 04:56:00 PM  
Blogger Andrea Wiebe said...

He would be perfect for a cover....sooooo cute! i love his little teeth :)

3/18/2007 07:44:00 AM  
Blogger kaela said...

such beautiful photos of jonathan! you're an awesome photographer!

3/19/2007 02:34:00 PM  
Blogger lacintha said...

Well written Deb, and I couldn't agree more with the sentiments you've stated here.. :)

3/20/2007 07:48:00 AM  

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