Multi-ethnic folk like being that way

Politico - Majorities of multiracial American adults say they are proud of their mixed-race background and feel that their heritage has made them more open-minded to other cultures, according to a new Pew Research Center survey .

Six in 10 expressed in pride in their background, and 59 percent said their multiracial upbringing made them more open to others.

Pew estimates that 6.9 percent of the U.S. population could be considered multiracial, including in its estimate the 1.4 percent who chose two or more races for themselves, 2.9 percent who chose one race for themselves but said that one or both of their parents was a different race or multiracial, and 2.6 percent who said at least one of their grandparents was multiracial or of a different race than their parents.

The share of multiracial babies has grown 10-fold in the past four decades. Just 1 percent of children born in 1970 were termed multiracial, compared with 10 percent in 2013, according to Pew.

The Census Bureau has estimated that just 2.1 percent of the population is multiracial.

... Pew says it used a different method than the Census Bureau to determine an individual’s racial background, taking into account the racial backgrounds of parents and grandparents. As a result, biracial adults with a white and American Indian background make up half of the United States’ multiracial population. It’s the largest multiracial group in the U.S., but its members are the least likely to call themselves “multiracial.”

The survey also found that many adults of mixed racial heritage have experienced some form of discrimination, though the specific races that make up a person’s individual background factor into this. Among biracial black and American Indian adults, 71 percent said they have been subject to slurs or jokes, for example.

Among biracial adults who are partly black, experiences with discrimination appear to reflect those experiences of single-race blacks. In the survey, 57 percent of blacks who said they are no other race said they have received poor service in restaurants and other businesses, the same share of biracial black and white adults who say they have experienced similar discrimination. Among biracial black and white adults, 41 percent say they have been unfairly stopped by the police.

As a point of contrast, 25 percent of biracial white and Asian adults say they have gotten poor service at businesses, and just 6 percent say their mixed racial heritage accounts for being stopped by police.