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agonyaunt2021-06-15 12:02 pm
minoanmiss) wrote in agonyaunt2021-06-15 12:02 pm
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Dear Care & Feeding: My Daughter Is Scared of Black People
In counterpoint with the other letter:
I am white, and growing up, my parents never had anything negative to say about any race. I never knew racism was a thing (a great privilege, I know) until I got into high school and became aware of what was going on around me. I adore people of all colors, racial backgrounds, faiths, and nationalities and have always taught my two girls that our differences are as important as our commonalities. I have made sure they knew how people of color experience racism for being themselves, the staggering amount of contributions they’ve made to society, and have chosen movies and books that show people of color in a positive starring role. When we moved, my husband and I chose a neighborhood that was made up of many different races.
You can imagine my surprise when my (then) 4-year-old became hyper fixated on her white skin. She talks about how beautiful her skin is daily and how happy she is to look like the rest of her family. I try to gently steer the conversation to other features we have in common, like brown hair and freckles, but it keeps coming back to our white skin. She loudly points out families with black skin while we’re out, and exclaims that we’re different because we have white skin. I’ll agree that while it’s awesome that we look the way we do, the other families are just as awesome and just as beautiful. Recently I’ve sat her down and gently talked with her about it, and she confessed that she’s afraid of people with darker skin but doesn’t know why.
I don’t know where this is coming from. She doesn’t go to day care and is always with me. I don’t have any friends who are racists and call out (loudly) any inappropriate racist jokes that I hear. She’s never been scared of my adult daughter’s boyfriends, all of whom have been Black men, and she’s never had a bad interaction with a person of color. She’s kind and sweet to the Black children in our neighborhood and has never show a preference toward skin color when choosing a playmate or doll. I’ve stepped up reading Black-positive stories, played more movies with people of color in them, and made sure to compliment Black people on their hairstyles and clothing when we go out. Is there anything else I can do? Should I be worried? Is there anything I’m doing wrong or could be doing better?
—Rainbows are Beautiful
Dear Rainbows,
I don’t think you should be worried. Your daughter is still extremely young and is trying to navigate her away through this crazy world we find ourselves in.
It really comes down to this: We fear what we don’t understand. Her fear could come from a book, movie, or television show where the villain was dark (this happens extremely often) and now she’s carrying it over to people.
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I’ll give you a quick personal example. Many years ago, one of my white colleagues brought her 6-year-old daughter into the office to hang out for the day. When I met the kid for the first time, she was deathly afraid of me. It was at the point where she would cower in fear behind her mom whenever I walked by. It made me feel awful, because I like to believe I’m a nice guy, but I was determined to show her that she didn’t have anything to fear. I found out that she really liked cinnamon rolls, so I brought one into work and eventually her guard came down. As we ate the cinnamon roll together, we laughed, joked, and talked, and she realized that I’m just another guy—even though my skin is darker than hers. As time went on, she would run up to me and give me hugs, and she hung out with me at work more than she did with her mom.
Like I said, we fear what we don’t understand. You’re doing all of the things you should do in order to raise a child who believes in racial equity, but you need to have her spend time with a Black adult. I’m not talking about a quick hello from your adult daughter’s Black boyfriend, I’m referring to spending one-on-one time with her, like I did with my co-worker’s daughter back in the day. These human interactions can go so far to help kiddos deal with the fear they experience from different races. Hell, if more people would spend the day with someone of a different race or ethnicity and engage them in meaningful conversation, we would see a significant drop in racism.
The fact that you care so much about this is all of the evidence I need to know that your daughter is going to turn out to be just fine.
I am white, and growing up, my parents never had anything negative to say about any race. I never knew racism was a thing (a great privilege, I know) until I got into high school and became aware of what was going on around me. I adore people of all colors, racial backgrounds, faiths, and nationalities and have always taught my two girls that our differences are as important as our commonalities. I have made sure they knew how people of color experience racism for being themselves, the staggering amount of contributions they’ve made to society, and have chosen movies and books that show people of color in a positive starring role. When we moved, my husband and I chose a neighborhood that was made up of many different races.
You can imagine my surprise when my (then) 4-year-old became hyper fixated on her white skin. She talks about how beautiful her skin is daily and how happy she is to look like the rest of her family. I try to gently steer the conversation to other features we have in common, like brown hair and freckles, but it keeps coming back to our white skin. She loudly points out families with black skin while we’re out, and exclaims that we’re different because we have white skin. I’ll agree that while it’s awesome that we look the way we do, the other families are just as awesome and just as beautiful. Recently I’ve sat her down and gently talked with her about it, and she confessed that she’s afraid of people with darker skin but doesn’t know why.
I don’t know where this is coming from. She doesn’t go to day care and is always with me. I don’t have any friends who are racists and call out (loudly) any inappropriate racist jokes that I hear. She’s never been scared of my adult daughter’s boyfriends, all of whom have been Black men, and she’s never had a bad interaction with a person of color. She’s kind and sweet to the Black children in our neighborhood and has never show a preference toward skin color when choosing a playmate or doll. I’ve stepped up reading Black-positive stories, played more movies with people of color in them, and made sure to compliment Black people on their hairstyles and clothing when we go out. Is there anything else I can do? Should I be worried? Is there anything I’m doing wrong or could be doing better?
—Rainbows are Beautiful
Dear Rainbows,
I don’t think you should be worried. Your daughter is still extremely young and is trying to navigate her away through this crazy world we find ourselves in.
It really comes down to this: We fear what we don’t understand. Her fear could come from a book, movie, or television show where the villain was dark (this happens extremely often) and now she’s carrying it over to people.
ADVERTISEMENT
I’ll give you a quick personal example. Many years ago, one of my white colleagues brought her 6-year-old daughter into the office to hang out for the day. When I met the kid for the first time, she was deathly afraid of me. It was at the point where she would cower in fear behind her mom whenever I walked by. It made me feel awful, because I like to believe I’m a nice guy, but I was determined to show her that she didn’t have anything to fear. I found out that she really liked cinnamon rolls, so I brought one into work and eventually her guard came down. As we ate the cinnamon roll together, we laughed, joked, and talked, and she realized that I’m just another guy—even though my skin is darker than hers. As time went on, she would run up to me and give me hugs, and she hung out with me at work more than she did with her mom.
Like I said, we fear what we don’t understand. You’re doing all of the things you should do in order to raise a child who believes in racial equity, but you need to have her spend time with a Black adult. I’m not talking about a quick hello from your adult daughter’s Black boyfriend, I’m referring to spending one-on-one time with her, like I did with my co-worker’s daughter back in the day. These human interactions can go so far to help kiddos deal with the fear they experience from different races. Hell, if more people would spend the day with someone of a different race or ethnicity and engage them in meaningful conversation, we would see a significant drop in racism.
The fact that you care so much about this is all of the evidence I need to know that your daughter is going to turn out to be just fine.
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I mean, LW's trying a little too hard, but I FAR prefer her take on things to the soi-disant Liberal White People from the previous letter.
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That was when LW won my heart, yeah. They're actually committed to understanding other people, and extend that understanding to their daughter, which is surprisingly and sadly uncommon in the realm of parenting..
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I do wonder if Daughter has been getting some odd messages somewhere, because the bolded snippet really is an odd thing for a four year old to fixate on.
(Race itself, not so much... at least, until the parents stifle it in the name of polite colorblindness. That's counterproductive at best, but people... or at least white people, idk about everybody else, do tend to do it.)
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One absorbs what's in the air, and what's not in front of you. And for young kids, a year is like, *forever*. So when I was six, I had a music teacher I didn't like. She was doctrinaire and syrupy, as I recall. So I said to my mom, "I think I don't like black people."
And my mom... paused. And said, "Really. Why's that, do you think?"
And I explained about my teacher, and my mom said, basically, "Oh, well, could it be that you just don't like your *teacher*?" and I was like, "...Oh."
So, yeah, just, keep having the right kinds of conversations, and don't be *worried* if/when your kid absorbs weird things. Just keep talking to them, and don't react as if they are The Bad Thing. It's hard to compete with the air around you, but not impossible.