over the centuries when whites wielded power over both blacks and amerindians and believed in their inherent superiority over people of color, they created a social order of hypodescent, in which they assigned mixed-race children to the lower-status groups. they were often ignorant of the systems among native american tribes of social classification, including kinship and hypodescent. the omaha people, for instance, who had a patrilineal kinship system, classified all children with white fathers as "white", and excluded them as members of the clans and tribe, unless one was formally adopted by a male member. tribal members might care for mixed-race children of white fathers, but considered them outside the hereditary clan and kinship fundamental to tribal society.