freckles Archives - The Race Card Project

Freckles don’t make me a freak

May 23, 2024 freak, freckles, GA, Karlee Hedden, Young Harris

Karlee Hedden,
Young Harris, GA

Growing up, I was often picked on for having freckles. As I got older I began to hate them and wanted to cover them up and have them one day removed. In the last few years I received many compliments on them and it became a trend for young girls and women to give themselves freckles with henna and different makeup products. I never understood why I received the comments on them I had received as a child until my view on them began to change. I now love them and don’t know what it would be like without them. I get to watch them pop more in the Summer and enjoy my friends randomly asking me if they can connect the dots all together one day.

Why isn’t my Quincenera proof enough?

January 20, 2024January 20, 2024 blonde, Columbia, father, freckles, hispanic enough, LA, pale, PROOF, Quincenera, Red Hair, Saint Francisville, speak Spanish

Emily Angelica Roldan,
Saint Francisville, LA.

My father is from Colombia and my mother is from Georgia. I have pale freckled skin, glasses, and I am a natural blonde with bottle red hair. I did not grow up speaking Spanish (my siblings and I the only cousins who do not speak it). When I was 15, very few of the people I invited to my big day believed that I was Colombian American. It was like if I wasn’t “Hispanic enough”, I didn’t deserve the party at all.

Can’t see beyond my white privilege

February 7, 2022February 8, 2022 black girls, CA, first experience, freckles, friends, Jessica, names, pale skin, Race, school, See, Spanish, stupid white girl, white family, White girl, white privilege

Jessica,
CA.

I am a white female living in California with my white family. I grew up in an area where I was one of a few white girls in my school. I made friends of all different races and came to understand the benefits of diversity, however, it wasn’t always a pleasant experience. I was bullied by girls who were both Mexican and black. They called me names like, “stupid white girl,” and made fun of my freckles and pale skin. Many girls would laugh and say things about me in Spanish because they knew I couldn’t understand. I would come home crying to my mom because I was not a fighter and would never have done anything to fight back. My mom would tell me to ignore them, but it only made it worse. A group of black girls even threatened to jump me after school and I would hide in the bathrooms. These experiences made middle school and some of high school pretty miserable, but yet because I am white I am always treated like a racist. If I am racist then why is it that I was bullied so badly by other races when I never bullied anyone because of their race? If I speak on the matter, I am ignorant and people say that only white people can be racist, not other races. In other words, I am privileged so I can’t speak out about how people treated me. I find that to be really sad. It shouldn’t matter what color you are: racism is racism. If you dislike someone simply because of their skin color, you should be called a racist. But if I point this out, I am simply someone who can’t see beyond my white privilege.

Mixed heritage. Feeling strange growing up

January 27, 2022January 27, 2022 Auburn, bi-racial, blue eyes, brother, brown, father, freckles, GA, growing up, hair, hate, heritage, Katie Moore, look, mixed, New Echota, proud, shades, sister, skin, strange, wavy hair

Katie Moore
New Echota, GA

I used to hate the way I looked growing up. My mom & brother had fair skin & freckles & I had darker skin & hair. I like the way I look now. I’m proud of my heritage. I am of cherokee, creek, German,& African decent. I stand taller than most women & my hair is almost to my knees & very straight with several shades of auburn & browns. I have a daughter now that took after her father more; wavy hair, fair skin, & blue eyes.

“What’s wrong with your skin?” Freckles.

December 14, 2018December 14, 2018 Amanda Claiborne, freckles, Hawaiian, HI, Minority, Pahoa, skin

Amanda Claiborne,
Pahoa, HI.

Asked of me by a typical Hawaiian child of mixed background, brown skin, hair, and eyes. A reminder that blue-eyed freckled folks like me are a minority here.

No one knows unless I tell

March 10, 2018March 10, 2018 birth certificate, Black, freckles, frizzy hair, hair, irish, knows, Natasha Smith, PA, Philadelphia, racial identity, white

Natasha Smith,
Philadelphia, PA.

I am white. I look white. I am white? Pale skin, red frizzy hair, littered with freckles. Often I am asked “Are you Irish?” The answer is “No…” and I wonder if it is the time to go into my family’s racial identity or my own struggles with my racial identity. My dad’s side of the family is black. My mother even put on my birth certificate that I was black- my father apparently rejecting this idea and her stating it would be beneficial.

I think what I often feel is that I have to convince people that I am what I say I am. “No really, my dad IS black. “

Oh, you’re white, right? No, actually.

December 20, 2017December 20, 2017 actually, American, assume, CA, cheeks, freckles, Hilary Forrest, Hispanic, ICelandic, impossible, latina, nationality, Pasadena, right, skin, white

Hilary Forrest,
Pasadena, CA.

Every single time a person meets me, they’ll assume my race is “white.” That’s where you’re wrong. My nationality is American; my ethnicities are Hispanic as well as Icelandic. But no, of course because of the paleness of my skin or the freckles adorning my cheeks, I always get a, “No WAY! You’re not Latina. That’s impossible.” So shoutout to all the people who just think I’m a total white girl because of the way I speak, how I sometimes struggle with my Spanish and am critiqued because I can’t speak their tongue as well as they can, excuse me, and especially because of how my family appears as well.

Hispanic? Really? You’re white to me.

November 27, 2015November 27, 2015 CO, Danielle Perea, Denver, freckles, Hispanic, light skin, white

Danielle Perea,
Denver, CO.

I’m a light-skinned, freckled Hispanic woman just trying to deal.

“Is that mud on your face?”

July 6, 2015July 7, 2015 Anna Shaw, Bahamas, Deltaville, difference, face, freckles, mud, skin, VA

Anna Shaw,
Deltaville, VA.

This is the question that my brother and I were asked by native children in the Bahamas. Each member of my family has freckles and these are not the cute sprinkle over the nose—these freckles, especially during the summer, become large dots that cover our entire bodies. At the time I really could not understand why anyone would be questioning my skin I really do not think I notice any different between others and myself. Looking back I can understand that huge role that the color of skin plays in everyday life, and sadly even in the lives of children. We see people and the first thing we see is there skin—in our minds it does not represent diversity or merely the geographic difference of people —-we see DIFFFERENT– an ugly different.

I look white. But I’m not.

March 9, 2015 Anoymous, freckles, genetics, light eyes, mixed, USA, you look white

Anoymous,
USA.

I’m 1/4 white genetically. But I look white–light eyes, fair skin, freckles–despite the fact that my full-siblings don’t. My best friend is half white and looks white. Mixed-race kids who look 100% white do exist. And we did grow up in the same neighborhoods, with the same families, in the same cultures as our visible counterparts. Which is something a lot of people on both sides of the fence seem to forget.

I am simply human, nothing more.

February 5, 2015 Anacortes, attributes, curly hair, freckles, human, one race the human race, Patti J Baines, WA

Patti J Baines,
Anacortes, WA.

I belong to the curly haired, wide bottom affiliation of short women with freckles that inhabit this part of the world. I’ve come to wonder how it is, that based upon a collection of attributes and features we gather ourselves together or at other times serve to drive us apart.

I’ve grown to hate white people.

October 7, 2014October 9, 2014 Asian, Chiyoko, defense, freckles, hate, Japanese, racial slur, sex, smart, stereotype, USA, white people

Chiyoko,
USA.

I am one quarter Japanese. I have auburn hair, light brown eyes, and freckles. I am five foot nine, and my skin is paler than even my white friends’ skin. But my name is Japanese, which leads people to ask me where I’m from, no, where I’m REALLY from. I’ve been called J*p, Chink, Chinky eyes, squinty eyes, and J*p Bi***. A White boy came up to me when I was thirteen and asked me for oral sex, because “that’s what you people like to do, right?” I have been told to my face that the only reason I’m doing well in school (I’m seventeen and starting my second year of community college) is because I’m Asian. Even when I was in second grade, white people would come up to me with their eyes pulled to side and asked how I could see like that. White people have come up to me and called me Ching Chong Lingalong instead of Chiyoko. White people are the ones calling me names and making me fear for my safety in middle and high school. But what truly surprised me is how Japanese people treat me. I met a Japanese woman at my garage sale, and when I spoke some Japanese to her, she was surprised, but was genuinely interested in me. She told my mother that she picked a good name for me, and that I seemed to be a good daughter, making my mother laugh and tell her that seem is the operative word. Whenever I meet a Japanese person, they encourage me to study Japanese, to go to japan, and take good care of my grandmother. I am more white than Japanese, but white people have hated me all the time. I am not a racist, it is my defense mechanism.

Cracker? You burnt piece of toast!

July 14, 2014September 20, 2020 1962, burnt toast, cracker, DE, first experience, freckles, kickball, Middletown, Norview High School, Patti Bear, school, skin, suburbs, teacher

Patti Bear
Middletown, DE

This was a exchange when I was in 5th grade, over a call in a kickball game. I know now what I was supposed to call my friend after she called me a cracker but I thought she was making fun of my white face with freckles so I responded with a comparison of her skin. Her response? She laughed so hard she fell down and we remained friends the rest of the school year. This was in 1962 and I was one of two white kids in the class. We moved to the suburbs a couple of years later. My junior high school was all white, but my high school was 50/50. I was the president of the bi-racial committee and vice-president of the student body. Enjoyed both activities and loved high school. Felt more at home in Norview High School.

“If you’re Puerto Rican, I’m white!”

May 2, 2014 Aguadilla, Casey Creech, dark hair, freckles, NC, Pinehurst, Puerto Rican, San Juan, snow white, white

Casey Creech
Pinehurst, NC

My mother was born in Aguadilla, Puerto Rico and my grandmother was raised in San Juan. All of my cousins have dark hair and eyes and tan so easily, but I don’t. I am snow white with green eyes and freckles but thick, thick spanish curls. When I bring up my culture I am mocked for “not being dark enough.” People used to be, and still are, punished for having dark skin. Why condemn someone for the opposite of that? It didn’t work the first time, it won’t work now.

Raised mixed, married mixed, had mixed.

April 3, 2014 Alisha Partlow, beauty, Eugene, freckles, married, Mexican, mixed, OR, raised, Red Hair

Alisha Partlow
Eugene, OR

My mother is red haired, blue eyed Danish/German. My father, dark haired, brown eyed Mexican. I married a man whose biological mother was a 6foot blonde of Swedish decent, and we assume his father was African american. Our offspring consists of a 22 year old, red haired, green eyed freckled face beauty of a girl, and a 6’5″ tall carmel skinned, blue/grey eyed 19 year old son. We all get asked: Where are you from? Answer: Oregon. We all get asked :What are you? It gets complicated.