Okay, Halle Berry is now in a custody battle with her ex-boyfriend, Gabriel Aubry (the most beautiful person in the world. Halle is drop-dead gorgeous, but when they're photographed together she almost looks like a dog in comparison... here's the proof), over their equally insanely beautiful daughter, Nahla.
Here are some recent statements from Ms. Berry:
‘I feel she’s black. I’m black and I’m her mother, and I believe in the one-drop theory.’
Niiiice. The one-drop theory:
The one-drop theory (or one-drop rule) is the colloquial term for the standard, found throughout the USA, that holds that a person with even one drop of non-white ancestry should be classified as "colored", especially for the purposes of laws forbidding inter-racial marriage.
Now, if you're unaware, Halle's mother, who raised her, is white. I felt quite badly for her during Halle's Oscar-night thank-you speech, filled with her tears for black women as her white mom sat in the audience.
Halle says:
'I identify as a black woman, but I've always had to embrace my mother and the white side of who I am, too.
'By choosing, I've often [wondered]: "Well, would that make her feel like I'm invalidating her by choosing to identify more with the black side of myself?"'
Here's her plan for her daughter:
When asked to define her daughter's race, Berry - who has both white and African-American heritage - tells Ebony: 'What I think is that that's something she's going to have to decide.
'I'm not going to put a label on it. I had to decide for myself and that's what she's going to have to decide - how she identifies herself in the world.
'And I think, largely, that will be based on how the world identifies her. That's how I identified myself.
'But I feel like she's black.'
So the problem with her ex is that it made him crazy when she identified their child as black. To him, at the very least, she's mixed. And she is... 75% white, 25% black.
And if Halle would have shut up at this point I'd probably leave her alone (or maybe not).
I understand how those with African heritage choose to identify with it on a political level to remind and shame others about how blacks were treated in America. I. Get. It.
But it's enough. We certainly shouldn't be passing on that idiocy to yet another generation, especially a generation as post-racial as the youths currently growing up in America.
(For a great take on post-raciality, and an excellent slam on Obama's own racialist obsession, read this excellent WaPo OpEd by Elizabeth Chang: Why Obama should not have checked 'black' on his census form)
And anyway, the only race Halle is is the beautiful race... she doesn't just make top 10 gorgeous black women lists, but just top 10 gorgeous women lists. Make-up contracts, feature films, magazine covers, starring roles... she has got to start just being grateful and at peace with who she is.
But anyway, here's where Halle goes right off the rails... just ridiculously self-obsessed and silly...
She says: 'Well, first thing I want to say is that I'm very connected to my community and I want black people to know that I haven't abandoned them because I've had a child with a man outside of my race and I'm dating someone now outside of my race who is Spanish and French.
And then someone should remind her that a white man isn't any more outside of her race than a black man is. Good grief. Just because she has convinced herself that she is black doesn't make it so.
Poor thing. And then I immediately think, "Which one?"
Poor Halle.
Poor Gabriel.
Poor baby.
Poor all of 'em. What a ridiculous mess.
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