Dear Project RACE members:

People have written to me asking what will become of Project RACE since some members of the multiracial community met on March 31 and decided to abandon the multiracial movement. The short answer is: Project RACE will remain working for a multiracial classification on the state and federal levels, just as it always has. Yes, the joint decision of the other organizations and individuals will hurt us, as would losing anyone who once pledged to advocate for a multiracial category and then changed their minds, but that in no way means we should give up the fight.

Why did those individuals and organizations do this? The simple answer would be that they are choosing instead to work toward doing away with all racial categories, but it just isn't that simple. First, they are tired. It's been a long battle, but that doesn't mean quitting is the right thing to do. Some of them merely have web sites. Some put on social events. Some throw press conferences. They don't actually DO the work of an organization dedicated to making a difference. If they are tired, think of how WE feel.

Second, being tired and frustrated, they chose to turn their support over to a man named Ward Connerly, whose sole thrust is getting rid of affirmative action. Mr. Connerly, a Conservative Republican, has never been about equality for the multiracial population or the doing away with racial categories unless it will abolish affirmative action-period. Project RACE members have always differed on how you view affirmative action, and as an organization made up of people with different viewpoints, we just can't take one stand on this issue. Simply stated, some of us might agree with doing away with affirmative actions, but this organization was not built on that issue.

The federal government has tried for years to separate the multiracial community and some of us keep playing right into their hands. People keep getting sidetracked from their goals. An individual sets up a web site on a free internet service and suddenly they are not only speaking for the movement, but they are convincing others to leave the movement! Organizations that sold us down the river are suddenly silent.

Meanwhile, Project RACE weathers each storm. We have members in 42 states and 5 countries and we are growing. Membership increases each week. We now have an active teen division. Our goals are the same as they always have been. We have a mission statement and it has not changed in ten years.

I believe the people who are abandoning the multiracial movement are being short-sighted. They are being as politically naïve as those who locked arms with the NAACP and thought THEY would come to our aid. They didn't. The only bridges that were built were ones that went in one direction-that of the single race organizations, who lobbied the current administration to give our numbers to them.

I personally agree with doing away with racial categories. I think that will happen eventually. Our country is not ready for it. There have been entire organizations that have been working for over 20 years to do away with race. It is not a new concept. It is a worthy goal, BUT it does not mean we should stop fighting for multiracial children and adults in the meantime! I have always stated that WHILE we have racial categories in this country, we should accommodate our families by having a multiracial classification. That has not changed.

Is it any less important now that multiracial children have the respect of an appropriate racial label? Do we really want to be known as the "people who checked more than one race" ? Think of how hard that will be to erase while we wait for Ward Connerly to do away with racial classifications. What if it takes him 50 years? It is simply wrong to sacrifice the gains we have made for multiracial children betting on the remote possibility that the government will do away with racial categories.

Our children still lack any acknowledgement in the health field. The Office of Minority Health refuses to even mention the need for multiracial participation in clinical trials. "The Initiative to Eliminate Racial and Ethnic Disparities in Health" of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services addresses everything BUT multiracial individuals. Ward Connerly is not going to hold bone marrow donor drives for the multiracial community or meet with HHS to try, as we have, to convince them of the need for health data for multiracial children.

I'm afraid there are things that I don't understand about the "new goal" of no racial categories. One by one, the people who abandoned the multiracial category for no category, stood up on March 31 and told what racial categories they had picked on their 2000 Census: some protesting racial categories by checking American Indian, others choosing one, two, three or four races. Huh? How does that action show they don't believe in racial categories? If they are truly for no racial categories, why do their web sites titles and organizations names contain the words "interracial," "multiracial," and "multiethnic"? If they are truly for a "colorblind society," why are they promoting specific racial things like interracial dating services?

Several people who represented themselves on March 31 as leaders of the multiracial community suddenly appeared out of nowhere. For example, at the meeting was a person who walked away from the movement more than five years ago during a critical time, and only recently resurfaced selling products geared to interracial families.

Project RACE does not sell products. We do not send people to sites like Amazon.com so that we can get a percentage of book sales. We do not promote for profit speakers. Our web site is free from promotional banners. We do not promote our own books. We can not be bought.

Project RACE members have fought for ten years. We have passed state legislation, worked with boards of education, fought in our own backyards, worked tirelessly in Washington, appeared numerous times before Congressional committees, met with OMB, Census Bureau representatives, healthcare agencies and others. We have held numerous blood marrow donor drives across the country to increase the pool of donors for multiracial children with blood disorders. We answer hundreds of requests for information each month and process new memberships daily. We work with diversity trainers to include multiracial children in school curriculum.

Our work will not be minimized by those who have changed their minds about fighting for multiracial children. We will not walk away from the multiracial community under the auspices of backing those who want to use our community to do away with affirmative action. THAT is not in our mission statement. Never was and never will be, for that is not what Project RACE is all about.

Susan Graham
Executive Director
Project RACE, Inc.