Swirl baby

Posted by ESC on January 14, 2003

In Reply to: Swirl baby posted by Bob on January 14, 2003

: : : SWIRL BABY - Multiracial. "She's bummed because she isn't a 'swirl baby'- the term at school for being half white and half something else. It is the 'in' thing here - not boring all white!" From an online discussion group, accessed Jan. 13, 2003.

: : : I'm guessing it refers to the ice cream swirl of vanilla and chocolate.

: : This has all the hallmarks of a phrase that will, in the near future, be roundly condemned by the great and the good and certainly mark any user as a racist of the worst kind. I speak from experience since I find it unwise to openly discuss the activities of my childhood as a wartime evacuee when I roamed the hills and byways with '[word removed in order to comply with Google's Publisher Policy]', my beautiful black curly haired spaniel, without substituting with the name Rex - they might have waited until I was dead before outlawing that word.

: You'd have to be roughly 175 years old to have that make sense.

Well, I wouldn't call anyone a "swirl baby." But the poster was saying it was a positive term. We were discussing a beautiful young woman who was ostracized because she is multiracial. The poster was saying that in her community "ethnic is in," as she put it.

Racial topics are always sensitive but the term was too interesting not to post.