Dealing with discomfort towards people of another race/skin color
Mandy Ray-Jones
For a little over a year now my son, who is almost six, has been dealing
with discomfort (for lack of a better word) towards people with dark skin
(not sure if this it is only about black people or not because we haven't
been around anyone who is say, for instance, Indian or Native American. But
we have been around Hispanics without a similar reaction). But I did
recently notice that he had talked favorably about a little girl in his
Bible class who was so nice and cute and when he pointed her out to me, she
was Asian so maybe it's safe to make the conclusion that it's about dark
skin as opposed to looking "different" or not caucasian.
Here are some examples of the situation:
-At church he talked about not wanting to sit next to someone because he was
black
-A child on his baseball team was black and he didn't like him and
frequently told us so (this could have been because he just didn't like the
child)
-Several times we have had friends who were black in our home and he's ran
off and refused to come out of his room
-Refusing to watch or making comments about tv shows with black people like
"the Cosby Show"
We have talked to him about this. We've talked about how mom has brown hair
and brown eyes and the other four members of our family are blond with blue
eyes and how would mom feel if someone disliked her just because she looked
different. We've checked out books at the library about racism and read
them like they were just one of the books in our stack (didn't make a big
production about it) and he hid under a blanket and said he didn't like the
book. The only specific thing he has said is that black people have mud on
them. I've told him that this is not true of course.
The other day my 4 year old daughter was watching "Little House on the
Prairie" and there were some black people in the episode. She said, "I
don't want to watch this stuff with black people."
Why I am writing this is because I would like some ideas about how to
respond to him. I honestly don't know where this perception of black people
has come from (maybe the evil tv ;)). If he is scared, I'd like to figure
out a creative way to help him overcome this fear without humiliating him or
anyone else. Perhaps someone on this list has had a similar experience or
might have some insight.
--
Mandy Ray-Jones
Artsy Mamas Executive Director and Founder
http://artsymamas.org/
Child of God, Supermom, Wife, Natural Learning Facilitator, Aspiring Natural
Nutritionist, Truth Seeker, Lover of Life, Friend, and Geeky Blogger
http://www.bonafidemama.com/
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with discomfort (for lack of a better word) towards people with dark skin
(not sure if this it is only about black people or not because we haven't
been around anyone who is say, for instance, Indian or Native American. But
we have been around Hispanics without a similar reaction). But I did
recently notice that he had talked favorably about a little girl in his
Bible class who was so nice and cute and when he pointed her out to me, she
was Asian so maybe it's safe to make the conclusion that it's about dark
skin as opposed to looking "different" or not caucasian.
Here are some examples of the situation:
-At church he talked about not wanting to sit next to someone because he was
black
-A child on his baseball team was black and he didn't like him and
frequently told us so (this could have been because he just didn't like the
child)
-Several times we have had friends who were black in our home and he's ran
off and refused to come out of his room
-Refusing to watch or making comments about tv shows with black people like
"the Cosby Show"
We have talked to him about this. We've talked about how mom has brown hair
and brown eyes and the other four members of our family are blond with blue
eyes and how would mom feel if someone disliked her just because she looked
different. We've checked out books at the library about racism and read
them like they were just one of the books in our stack (didn't make a big
production about it) and he hid under a blanket and said he didn't like the
book. The only specific thing he has said is that black people have mud on
them. I've told him that this is not true of course.
The other day my 4 year old daughter was watching "Little House on the
Prairie" and there were some black people in the episode. She said, "I
don't want to watch this stuff with black people."
Why I am writing this is because I would like some ideas about how to
respond to him. I honestly don't know where this perception of black people
has come from (maybe the evil tv ;)). If he is scared, I'd like to figure
out a creative way to help him overcome this fear without humiliating him or
anyone else. Perhaps someone on this list has had a similar experience or
might have some insight.
--
Mandy Ray-Jones
Artsy Mamas Executive Director and Founder
http://artsymamas.org/
Child of God, Supermom, Wife, Natural Learning Facilitator, Aspiring Natural
Nutritionist, Truth Seeker, Lover of Life, Friend, and Geeky Blogger
http://www.bonafidemama.com/
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Sandra Dodd
-=--Several times we have had friends who were black in our home and
he's ran
off and refused to come out of his room-=-
He'll get older and wiser. Avoid the situations for a while, until he
figures out more.
It's common for a child to be brave for a while, and then to consider
something dangerous or frightening. Slides are famous examples. A
two year old who will go down any slide as long as his mom's at the
bottom might decide at the age of three or four that slides are just
not worth the risk.
If you make a big deal of a child's fear, it makes it worse (not just
the fear, but the whole topic). This could pass unnoted if you try
not to note it.
It's natural for people to be curious about or to avoid people who are
different. You could think of it that way, and be patient for a few
months or a year or two.
Sandra
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he's ran
off and refused to come out of his room-=-
He'll get older and wiser. Avoid the situations for a while, until he
figures out more.
It's common for a child to be brave for a while, and then to consider
something dangerous or frightening. Slides are famous examples. A
two year old who will go down any slide as long as his mom's at the
bottom might decide at the age of three or four that slides are just
not worth the risk.
If you make a big deal of a child's fear, it makes it worse (not just
the fear, but the whole topic). This could pass unnoted if you try
not to note it.
It's natural for people to be curious about or to avoid people who are
different. You could think of it that way, and be patient for a few
months or a year or two.
Sandra
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Jill Parmer
> -=--Several times we have had friends who were black in our home andWhen Addi was about 5 or 6, I took her into a classroom (Unitarian
> he's ran
> off and refused to come out of his room-=-
>
> He'll get older and wiser. Avoid the situations for a while, until he
> figures out more.
Universalist church, where one of the principles is tolerance) where
a boy who had cerebral palsy was lying on the floor; he was wiggling
and making gurgling noises. Addi pointed to him and said loudly that
she didn't want to be in there with him and she had to get out of the
room at that moment. I was terribly embarrassed, and thought I had a
little kid who was going to for sure grow up to be an axe murderer.
Zoom ahead about 6 years. Addi was about 11 or 12, and out of the
blue, she asked if I remembered that incident. Yeah, vividly. Then
she went on to tell me that she was so scared (for the boy) that day
and not one of the adults was helping him.
To me, it looked like his mom had given him some time out of his
wheel chair. He was doing the most his body could do, wiggling
around on the floor making the noises he made.
To Addi, it look like he was in serious trouble choking on a banana
or something and his mom was not helping him!
~Jill (Addi 15)
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Jenny Cyphers
***For a little over a year now my son, who is almost six, has been dealing
with discomfort (for lack of a better word) towards people with dark skin
(not sure if this it is only about black people or not because we haven't
been around anyone who is say, for instance, Indian or Native American.***
Margaux has gone through a similar thing. We have an extended family network that runs the gamit. Our closest, in proximity to our house, like 10 mi away, family are a bi-racial family. I'd say that Margaux's first experience with someone who has very dark skin is the dad in that family. Both of my girls have gone through periods of being terrified of him. Chamille's experience came after already living in a very multi ethnic neighborhood with a best friend who'd dad is black and mom is white, so her experience was different than Margaux's.
The man is very tall, and he's not a big friendly giant. He tells amusing stories if you can take the time to understand his accent, which I imagine Margaux didn't, but more than that, his own children are terrified of him, he's not a soft spoken gentle father. To add to that, the girl in that family is a couple of years older than Margaux, and she is NOT nice at all and the little boy who is one year older than Margaux, spent many years being destructive towards everyone and their things. So, combine that with the worst neighbor kids in our neighborhood right now and Margaux's view of people with dark skin has been tainted in an unfavorable light.
Disney shows have been very helpful in providing a much more balanced look at many different people with many different backgrounds. We also have a photography book called 1000 families that's not really a picture book but more of a documentary for the coming of the year 2000. It has pictures of families from all over the world, in their environments with captions of what they hope for in the coming millenium. She has spent many hours looking at those pictures of families. She has seemed most interested in the nomadic families with camels and how they avoid land mines, or not, and how people without legs or limbs survive in those environments.
She's coming to a better understanding of people in general, she's 8, but it's taken time. She still won't mix her barbies, although she has said that the black barbies are more valuable and I have no idea why she believes this, espeically since she rarely plays with them because they don't have kids and husbands to match them with. As an interesting side not, when we lived in a different part of town, the toys stores had predominately black barbies and were almost always out of the white ones because they never stocked that many to begin with. She has seen that most stores around where we live now are almost always out of the black barbies because they don't stock as many.
I certainly wouldn't push it. It's common in some areas to be the only black person or the only white person. That's about demographics and that IS something we talk about. Especially in light of how stores stock barbies and baby dolls of color.
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with discomfort (for lack of a better word) towards people with dark skin
(not sure if this it is only about black people or not because we haven't
been around anyone who is say, for instance, Indian or Native American.***
Margaux has gone through a similar thing. We have an extended family network that runs the gamit. Our closest, in proximity to our house, like 10 mi away, family are a bi-racial family. I'd say that Margaux's first experience with someone who has very dark skin is the dad in that family. Both of my girls have gone through periods of being terrified of him. Chamille's experience came after already living in a very multi ethnic neighborhood with a best friend who'd dad is black and mom is white, so her experience was different than Margaux's.
The man is very tall, and he's not a big friendly giant. He tells amusing stories if you can take the time to understand his accent, which I imagine Margaux didn't, but more than that, his own children are terrified of him, he's not a soft spoken gentle father. To add to that, the girl in that family is a couple of years older than Margaux, and she is NOT nice at all and the little boy who is one year older than Margaux, spent many years being destructive towards everyone and their things. So, combine that with the worst neighbor kids in our neighborhood right now and Margaux's view of people with dark skin has been tainted in an unfavorable light.
Disney shows have been very helpful in providing a much more balanced look at many different people with many different backgrounds. We also have a photography book called 1000 families that's not really a picture book but more of a documentary for the coming of the year 2000. It has pictures of families from all over the world, in their environments with captions of what they hope for in the coming millenium. She has spent many hours looking at those pictures of families. She has seemed most interested in the nomadic families with camels and how they avoid land mines, or not, and how people without legs or limbs survive in those environments.
She's coming to a better understanding of people in general, she's 8, but it's taken time. She still won't mix her barbies, although she has said that the black barbies are more valuable and I have no idea why she believes this, espeically since she rarely plays with them because they don't have kids and husbands to match them with. As an interesting side not, when we lived in a different part of town, the toys stores had predominately black barbies and were almost always out of the white ones because they never stocked that many to begin with. She has seen that most stores around where we live now are almost always out of the black barbies because they don't stock as many.
I certainly wouldn't push it. It's common in some areas to be the only black person or the only white person. That's about demographics and that IS something we talk about. Especially in light of how stores stock barbies and baby dolls of color.
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Sandra Dodd
-=- Both of my girls have gone through periods of being terrified of
him. -=-
My husband Keith is scary looking to little kids. When young girls
would first come to visit (or our neighbor Kellee, even after several
visits) if Keith was sitting in the front room, I would need to escort
the child past Keith, to safety, nearer the kids' room.
He just looks scary, Keith does. And with long hair and a big beard,
and his prominent brow...
When he was in college he played the giant in a production of Jack and
the Beanstalk which was performed for lots of kids in Albuquerque. He
was at a horse show at the state fair grounds, and said a little boy
kept looking at him and then looking away quickly, and he overheard
the boy tell his grandmother, "It's the GIANT!"
If we lived where blonds were rare, we might attribute that fear to
Keith having had long blonde hair and spooky-light blue eyes in a
squinty, scary brow.
Scary is scary, and part of helping kids feel safe might be protecting
them from people we know are not scary, until they're old enough to
feel differently.
Sandra
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him. -=-
My husband Keith is scary looking to little kids. When young girls
would first come to visit (or our neighbor Kellee, even after several
visits) if Keith was sitting in the front room, I would need to escort
the child past Keith, to safety, nearer the kids' room.
He just looks scary, Keith does. And with long hair and a big beard,
and his prominent brow...
When he was in college he played the giant in a production of Jack and
the Beanstalk which was performed for lots of kids in Albuquerque. He
was at a horse show at the state fair grounds, and said a little boy
kept looking at him and then looking away quickly, and he overheard
the boy tell his grandmother, "It's the GIANT!"
If we lived where blonds were rare, we might attribute that fear to
Keith having had long blonde hair and spooky-light blue eyes in a
squinty, scary brow.
Scary is scary, and part of helping kids feel safe might be protecting
them from people we know are not scary, until they're old enough to
feel differently.
Sandra
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Jenny Cyphers
***But I did
recently notice that he had talked favorably about a little girl in his
Bible class who was so nice and cute and when he pointed her out to me, she
was Asian so maybe it's safe to make the conclusion that it's about dark
skin as opposed to looking "different" or not caucasian.***
I wanted to say this too... that sometimes that is all it takes, to meet someone who you think is very different than you, to find that you aren't all that different and that you actually really like them!
One of Margaux's really good friends, who's mom is on this message board, is just that sort of girl! Margaux adores her and really likes her father too, even though he is a big guy, he IS a gentle giant and he's fun to be around!
That's how people learn tolerance I think, being open and accepting and able to get past things you hold to be true from your previous experiences.
And I can totally understand why any kid would not want to watch the Cosby Show, those parents are mean in a quietly shaming and controlling sort of way! Although Margaux has enjoyed the "That's So Raven" connection.
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recently notice that he had talked favorably about a little girl in his
Bible class who was so nice and cute and when he pointed her out to me, she
was Asian so maybe it's safe to make the conclusion that it's about dark
skin as opposed to looking "different" or not caucasian.***
I wanted to say this too... that sometimes that is all it takes, to meet someone who you think is very different than you, to find that you aren't all that different and that you actually really like them!
One of Margaux's really good friends, who's mom is on this message board, is just that sort of girl! Margaux adores her and really likes her father too, even though he is a big guy, he IS a gentle giant and he's fun to be around!
That's how people learn tolerance I think, being open and accepting and able to get past things you hold to be true from your previous experiences.
And I can totally understand why any kid would not want to watch the Cosby Show, those parents are mean in a quietly shaming and controlling sort of way! Although Margaux has enjoyed the "That's So Raven" connection.
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