Vanity Fair recently came out with “Hollywood’s Next Wave” of teen superstars, and besides the fact that at 25 I already feel too old to know who half of the kids are (25! Too old!), there was one other tiny piece of information that made me feel a little strange. Out of the 28 teens featured in the article, 2 of them were something other than Caucasian.

Either Young Hollywood has systematically sorted out all of its ethnicity, or Vanity Fair is straight up stupid.

A big magazine like VF has loads of money, and the power to change how we as a society view ourselves. They can break down barriers and send that message to hundreds of thousands of readers across the county. Why oh why, then, are they taking Hampton-esque pictures of kids who all kinda look the same (half of whom will probably disappear into obscurity in 3 years), and not-so-subtly telling America that the media is still whitewashed? I’ll answer that rhetorical question. They’re doing it because like most big media conglomerates, they’re more concerned with money than they are with actually saying something of merit.

So go on propagating the theory that minorities don’t exist, Vanity Fair. Keep on pushing the girls-must-be-skinny-but-guys-can-be-hilarious-and-chubby way of thinking. Continue asking lame-ass, ridiculous questions (“Jimmy Choo or Christian Louboutin?“, “BlackBerry or iPhone?“) to anyone under the age of 21. You’re doing a great job being mundane and conservative.

[Have your own "Hollywood's Next Wave" list? We're sure you can do better than VF]

Here’s what I don’t understand (well, here’s one of many, many, many things I don’t understand):

Why does every guy in New York who approaches me want to know my ethnicity?

And I’m serious about this. Because, look. I live in New York City. There are more Jews (such as moi) here than like everywhere ever. I should not be so unidentifiable.

For me, there are two varieties of these guys. The guy cited above fits into the first category: guys who guess. And they always guess Italian, Puerto Rican, or Greek. Seriously. And I am pale like the squishy underbelly of a cabbage.

The other category of guys are guys who want to know if I’m Jewish. These guys are usually Muslim or Israeli and nothing in between. I don’t know why either group bothers–I’m too Jewish for the Muslims and not Jewish enough for the Israelis. So it goes.

And why, friends, why oh why for the love of all that is good and not annoying, why do they need to know my heritage in the first place? When did this become an acceptable thing to ask a stranger?

Please, let’s go back to the relative peace of the days of “hey beautiful” and “baby you so fine.”

And in the meantime, this little Belarussian Jew will be snuggling up to her Chinese-American boyfriend and whispering naughtily in his ear, “Hey baby, what’s your heritage?”

And then probably getting dumped.

Online dating services want to know. When you fill out a profile, they’ll often ask you questions about what kind of people you prefer to date, including questions regarding ethnicity. They seem innocent enough…but are they?

I had a really thought-provoking conversation about it with a friend the other day. “I was sitting behind somebody who was filling out an online dating application,” she said, “and they put down that they preferred not to date Asian people.”

“Yeah?” I said.

“I couldn’t believe it!” she went on. “I thought that was the most racist thing I had ever seen!”

And I couldn’t believe she thought that. “You’re kidding, right?” I said. “People are allowed to have preferences about the looks of the people they date. It’s not racist.”

I can’t remember what the results of our discussion were, but I do remember how intrigued I was by the thought that ethnicity-related preference questions were such a hot topic. She really got me thinking. Were the questions themselves racist? Was somebody who didn’t want to date people in a specific ethnic group really racist?

Here’s what I think. If you like tall guys, you can mark down on your profile that you like tall guys. Some online dating services even let you specify the exact height of the guy you want to date. OK. So if you can specify height…why not race? If you don’t want to date a short person, why can’t you say that you don’t want to date a white person?

If you don’t want to date white people, all that’s saying is that you generally don’t find white people attractive. It’s not saying that you think there’s anything wrong with them, and it’s not saying that you have anything against them. And I’m sure many people would own up to the fact that there are exceptions to every rule.

Even if tall guys float your boat, you might acknowledge that you could fall madly in love with a short person. And even if you don’t think most Asian guys are hot, there just might be one for you out there.

So, is it racist to have ethnic dating preferences? I don’t think so. Some people like chocolate, hate vanilla, and feel mixed about mint chip. It’s all a matter of taste.

CC readers, what do YOU think?