How do you ask a user what their race or ethnicity is without causing offense? Simple, use the guidelines set fourth by the OMB of the White House and the EEO of the US Department of Labor. Phew, that was a mouthful.

After a frustrating search for a code snippet that I could copy and paste into a web form, I just decided to make my own, following the guidelines mentioned above. Let me tell you it was loads of fun. So, to save others the time and frustration, I’m posting this code snippet here. Simply view source and copy then paste!

Optional: Hold the Ctrl (PC) or Command (Mac) key and click if you wish to indicate multiple races.

If I understand the guidelines correctly, they allow for the indication of multi-ethnicities but they don’t require all ethnicities to be selected. In other words, a multi-ethnic person can simply select the “two or more races” option if they wish.