Where Is My Family on TV?; New York Times, 2/8/14

Jenna Wortham, New York Times; Where Is My Family on TV? :

"According to a 2012 Census Bureau report, mixed-race Americans, while still a small minority, are one of the fastest-growing demographic groups in the country, driven by immigration and an uptick in intermarriage. Yet while there are some very public examples of seemingly stable mixed-race families — the de Blasios of New York or even Kim, Kanye and sweet baby Nori come to mind — they are remarkably absent from our screens. (Our biracial president does get his share of screen time, of course.)...

Television is still both a barometer of social change and an evolutionary force that can help change cultural attitudes. So it’s hard not to wonder whether the simple lack of depictions of normal, mixed-race families and well-adjusted biracial offspring in popular culture is in part responsible for the reaction to the Cheerios commercials.

Social media, which erects a two-way mirror into regular lives, also has the power to transform what was once alien and uncomfortable into normal and routine. There are enough online outposts, from photographs on Facebook to Instagram, that can show a variety of diverse families and offer some measure of hope."...

Despite the obvious marketing advantage General Mills hoped to leverage by running a second Cheerios spot, it was still a stirring experience to see my reality presented so positively and naturally on screen.

Later we cheered for the halftime performer Bruno Mars, born in Hawaii, the product of a Filipino mother and a Puerto Rican and Jewish father, and finished our beers, spicy wings and cheese dip."