I’m not entirely sure how to start this blog. I hate being
cliché and talking about what everyone else is talking about, but sometimes you
realize that you’ve been messing up and you just want to let people know about
it.
I’ve had difficult conversations with my kids. We’ve talked
about gay marriage, drugs, smoking and safe sex. I’ve tried to be up front and
approachable so that they can always come to me with questions. We’ve
established the Four Golden Rules: Always respect women; Don’t smoke; Don’t do
drugs; Always practice safe sex. And I thought if they followed those rules and
we talked openly about the hard conversations, they wouldn’t do anything that
could royally screw up their lives.
But I’ve omitted a topic that frankly, I didn’t want to talk
about. I haven’t been talking about race and discrimination. If I’m being
honest, I thought I shouldn’t have to talk about it. Racial discrimination is
mostly a thing of the past right? We don’t see it other than isolated incidents
and those we can attribute to the outcasts in society, anomalies. We see Nazis
in an Indiana Jones movie or in the Blues Brothers and we make it clear that we
too hate the Illinois Nazis! But those movies are from the eighties – that kind
of ignorant idiocy doesn’t happen anymore. Except that it does.
As a white American who wants to believe the world is better
than it is, I’ve been privileged in that I can ignore the ugliness of the
world. Why teach my children about race? We see everyone as equal in our
family. In fact, we see everyone as equal so much that we don’t even need to
talk about it. And that’s where I’ve fucked it up. For some reason, I thought I
needed to be clear about smoking, drugs, sex and women so I’ve talked about
those things. I didn’t want to talk about race. I assumed that if I didn’t
preach hate and discrimination, then my children would just know that “we don’t
do that.”
But kids don’t learn anything by the absence of teaching. Silence
teaches nothing. If we don’t talk about it, someone else will and who knows
what they are going to say. I need to control the message. We live in an age
where we know about everything that is happening in the world. Horrific events
are now live streamed on Facebook. We have found new ways to insult people
anonymously online so we can still seem like decent people in the flesh. And
I’m watching the nightly news and seeing the fucking Nazis walk among us. Oh,
I’m sorry. Alt-right. Because rebranding hate makes everyone feel so much better.
Well done marketers.
I’ve sat back passively
for too long. I don’t get involved and talk politics much. I don’t know why –
maybe because I don’t think I could have a respectful conversation with someone
if I so strongly disagree with their beliefs so instead I opt to stay quiet.
I’m going to have to learn how to get better at that because too many of us have
sat back and let others do the talking. Look at where we are. We went from a
black president to white supremacists walking openly in the streets. Did I
contribute to this with my silence? You bet I did.
What can I do to change the world? I am one person but I’m
raising two boys that will impact people around them. Their actions will affect
those around them either positively or negatively. It is my civic duty to teach
them wrong from right, to teach them proactively what our values are instead of
thinking they would just pick up on the fact that we don’t hate people based on
their skin color, their religion or who they love.
Why is this so difficult? Why can I talk about condoms and
STDS and where babies come from but I can’t talk about the struggle for people
of color? I’m afraid I’m going to mess it up. And I’ve got to get over that.
Look, I mess up parenting regularly. If I could have a “best of” reel of my
mistakes, we could watch for days. The one thing I know about parenting is that
I will probably screw something up today. But what’s great is that if you are
open and honest about messing up, kids will usually give you another chance.
Through trial and error, I’ve learned to be a better sideline parent. I’ve
learned that analogies should not be used in sex talks. (No glove no love? Glad
we caught that one before my kids wore mittens in the bedroom.) We’ve talked
about gay marriage and how people can love whoever they want – we will not judge
love in our house. But I’m very anxious about talking about race because as a
white woman, I’m sure I have committed microaggressions of my own. Does this
mean I shouldn’t try to do my best to have discussions about race? Nope. I’m
going to forge ahead.
I’m going to mess up. That’s guaranteed. But maybe the
more conversations I have, the better I’ll get at it. I’m sure I’ll need
re-dos. Heck, my first sex talk was a disaster but I’ve gotten better at it.
You have to start somewhere. At least now I’ll be trying and my kids won’t
wonder where I stand on issues of race, religion and orientation.
What’s that going to look like in our house? It looks like
us driving in the car and I’m going to bring it up out of the blue. We are
going to talk about it at the dinner table or while we watch TV. I don’t need
to wait for a segue or a news clip about race to talk about it. People talk
about God openly in their houses; we can talk about race, religion, and
orientation openly. It’s time we start preaching our values instead of thinking
they will passively become installed in their brains. I’ve made that mistake
long enough. It’s time I get over my discomfort. Pretending the world is a
different place than it really is simply because I wish it were so is naïve and
no one has time for wishful thinking. Maybe if we have those talks with this
generation we will eventually get the world that we want. One where everyone
really does accept everyone for who they are. Love wins.
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