An opinion poll conducted by The Gallup Organization on interracial dating in June 2005 showed that 95 percent of people between the ages of 18 to 29 approved of blacks and whites dating, and 60 percent of that age group said they have dated someone of a different race. According to USA Today, 6 percent of marriages are interracial in the United States.
Loving vs. Virginia was a landmark civil rights case that took place in 1967, and it ended all race-based legal restrictions on marriage.
Even with the increase of the country’s biracial children and interracial marriages, some people in the United States still don’t agree with interracial dating.
Kristen Solomon, 18, a sophomore biology student from Atlanta, said she wasn’t personally interested in dating people outside of her race.
“I wouldn’t do it, but others have the choice in doing so,” Solomon said.
Solomon said she was raised to date within her race.
“My mother would question me if I brought home someone outside my race,” Solomon said. “She would give me lee-way in the sense that he and I are associated, but she wouldn’t expect me to marry the guy.”
Angela Loynes, 26, a community psychology graduate student from Camden, S.C., also said she would rather date within her own race.
“I guess I don’t have a problem with minorities dating other minorities depending on how you define the term, but I think that whites and blacks come from two completely different cultures for the two to conform effectively,” Loynes said. “It’s not positive for black people and I would teach my children the same morals I obtain today. They would be dating black people too.”
Melina Diaz, 19, a freshman food science student from St. Thomas, Virgin Islands, doesn’t agree with Loynes and Solomon. She is currently in an interracial relationship.
Diaz is of East Indian and Hispanic descent, while her boyfriend is half black.
“It’s simple,: we’re boyfriend and girlfriend,” Diaz said. “We have good communication and we’re very trusting and very fond of each other. I never saw it as right or wrong. I grew up around complete diversity. Everyone I knew was mixed.”
Henry Onubogu, assistant director of counseling services at Florida A&M University’s Sunshine Manor, has never participated in an interracial relationship, yet he said he isn’t against interracial couples.
“I don’t see anything wrong with it. If both [people] have a mutual and clear understanding of their probable situation, I don’t see why not [date interracially],” Onubogu said.
Onubogu said he wouldn’t prohibit his children from being in an interracial relationship either.
“As long as he or she is happy and as long as he or she is compatible with their partner, these are reasons sufficient enough for me,” Onubogu said.