The wonderfully colour blind younger generation

In the wake of Obama's election Alice Thomson in the Times has been taking quiet pride in the colour-blindness of her children.

"“Why does it matter that the brown one won?” my six-year-old daughter asked. “What about beige or yellow or pink? Anyway his hair is grey. I think they voted for the one with the whitest teeth.” My eight-year-old son didn't understand the colour issue either...

He still didn't understand after a conversation about the slave trade and segregation. “That's history. I want him to win because he smiles a lot, he's clever and he doesn't like bombs.”

His class has never discussed race. Korean, Asian, Nigerian and Scottish, they distinguish each other by their Top Trump and football skills. My son doesn't want to know that Barack Obama is half Kenyan, half Kansas and was brought up in Hawaii, unless it means he can surf. He is vaguely interested in Mr Obama's African relatives slaughtering goats but more intrigued by the fact that his children don't receive Christmas presents. What he cares about most is what he can do. “Lewis Hamilton didn't win because he's brown,” he said. “He's just the best.”"

We had a similar conversation at the Corrigan dinner table yesterday evening. Isn't it great that our kids are so much smarter than us.