Talking with Your Kids about Racism - Begin with You!

Posted with permission from The Santa Fe New Mexican, where this article by Whole Hearted Parenting was originally published online and in print on July 18, 2020.

There are many big, sensitive, and crucial talks that we will have with our children.  They are all challenging, with high stakes and big feelings.  There is one talk that has stakes that go far beyond our individual families.  That is the talk about racism.

As a white mother, I will not presume what that talk looks like for parents of color.  This is for white parents preparing for that talk.  Preparation is needed, because the work begins with us, the adults.  It is disingenuous to speak with our children when we haven’t explored our own racism.  

To begin, I encourage you to read Dr. Robin DiAngelo’s book White Fragility: Why It’s So Hard for White People to Talk about Racism.  To watch online interviews and talks with her, simply search on her name.  There are lengthy interviews that I recommend watching in segments over a period of days not only because of time, but also because they are dense with often stunning revelations.  It takes time to absorb everything. There are also brief interviews that work for a single sitting.

Racism is complex and cultural and personal.  We have a strong sense of “rugged individualism” in our country that tells us that the groups that we belong to – women, men, gay, straight, young, old, black, white – do not play a part in the opportunities that we are afforded and the success we can achieve.  Yet, we know that that is not the case.

We have a belief that we can be objective, reflected in statements such as “I don’t see color”.  Yet, none of us are above our social biases.  We simply don’t see them, and that is a part of our white fragility, interfering in our ability and willingness to pull back the veils around our own racism. 

Two key points that DiAngelo makes can help us in pulling back those veils – that racism is a system not an event and that recognizing our racism is not an attack on our character. 

Racism is embedded in our culture.  We see it in studies showing that black drivers are pulled over more frequently, that black car buyers pay more, and that black home buyers are shown fewer homes than whites.  We saw it after WWII when black veterans were denied their GI Bill benefits.  We see it today in the number of black people killed by police.   

We have an image of racists as “bad people.”  Nice people cannot be racist; therefore, when we are confronted with a racist statement we have made, we see it as an affront to our character rather than a wonderful opportunity to learn and change.  

Before having that talk with our children, we begin with us.  We begin with an exploration of our own biases.  It may not be pretty, and it is what will change the world.