A few months ago, a former classmate of mine posted on Facebook that he was embarrassed when his daughter asked him, “What’s diarrhea?” He didn’t know how to answer.
For me, that question would have been a no-brainer: “Runny poop.” A simple explanation that answers the question without overwhelming a child with details too complex for their age and maturity. In fact, talking about runny poop is right up most kids’ alleys. But considering how parents are befuddled by the easy questions, it’s not surprising that many of them avoid the tough stuff entirely – like politics, religion, sex, and race.
Chapter 3 in Po Bronson and Ashley Merryman’s book NurtureShock covers the discussion of race with young children. Unsurprisingly, the findings are fascinating:
“For decades, we assumed that children will only see race when society points it out to them…However, child development researchers have increasingly begun to question that presumption. They argue that children see racial differences as much as they see the difference between pink and blue – but we tell kids that “pink” means for girls and “blue” is for boys. “White” and “black” are mysteries we leave them to figure out on their own.”
Bronson and Merryman point out that parents routinely address gender differences. But parents should take it further: “The same way we remind our daughters, “Mommies can be doctors just like daddies,” we ought to be telling all children that doctors can be any skin color.” Kids recognize differences; it’s up to us as parents to acknowledge and explain those differences, even – or, especially – when we’re not so different after all.
I’ve taken this guidance to heart, speaking more explicitly about race with my kids. I’ve asked CJ, gesturing to the TV screen, “What color are those kids?” When she replied, “Dat one is brown, an’ dat one is kind of pink,” I then asked her, “Are brown people nice? Are pink people nice?”
She gave me a look that told me just how tiresome she thought my questions were, and then she sighed, “YES. Both of dem are nice.”
Weeks later, she and Kyle were coloring together – a picture of Cinderella and the prince. Kyle began to color the prince’s face a peachy pink, and CJ objected: “All men are brown!” She took a brown marker and colored over the offending pinkness.
I’m not sure what to make of that, given that she had a peachy pink (and decidedly male) example coloring alongside her. But I admit it tickles me that she wanted the prince to be brown.
In spite of my willingness to discuss a variety of tough topics with my kids, I haven’t yet broached the subject of slurs. I know that they will hear words that I don’t want them ever to repeat. I want them to realize that when people use those words, it’s a reflection on the person who’s speaking, not the person or group they’re maligning.
But I can’t do that without saying those words myself – without teaching my children those words that they’re not to use.
I’d never heard the “N” word; I didn’t recognize how wrong it was when a classmate said it. Should my parents have told me first, explaining how some white people use it to derisively refer to black people? On one hand, I’m proud to say that I didn’t know that word. But on the other hand, I wish I’d known it so that I wouldn’t have been baited into saying it too.
I’ve used the “R” word; I’m embarrassed to admit that. But when I fed the URL of this site and of mothergoosemouse into the “R” Word Counter, I was proud (but not surprised) to see that both of my blogs were “R” word free.
Tacy peeked over my shoulder and asked what I was doing. I stumbled over my explanation, telling her that some people say terrible words that hurt other people, and that this site showed that I didn’t say any of those terrible words on my blog. It was a ripe opportunity to tell her that the “R” word is one that I never want to hear her say and that I hope she will choose friends who don’t say it, and yet I didn’t know how to do it.
I’m fine with talking about runny poop. I’m comfortable pointing out racial differences while reinforcing humanness. I’ll gladly answer any questions put to me on the topics of politics, religion and sex.
But I’m struggling with how to teach my kids about those words I’d rather not say.
Agreed. I talk very candidly (at an age appropriate level) with Laurel about the human body (real terms), gender, race, etc… but slang words have yet to come up for us. But I think that when it does happen, I’ll just grit my teeth and dive in. It would be painful, but better than having her learn and use slang via a classmate, without understanding the impact of those words.
This reminds me of my growing up — my parents had a mom and pop grocery in a rough neighborhood of Boston. One day we got there and there was graffiti with the “G” word (slang for Asians) all over the door. To this day I still cringe when I think of this and can’t bring myself to utter the word aloud.
On a lighter preface note, I need to say that I had no clue what the r-word was. I couldn’t pull it out of my feeble brain cells, so I had to click over. Of course! Amen on not ever using that word. My kids know better. (Or am I deluding myself into thinking they only “know better” in front of me?) I think they get it as both older ones have jumped on friends’ use of the word (in front of me). What startles me most, far too often, frankly, is adults’ use of the word.
I will make a point of speaking up the next time it’s used in my presence. Regardless of the age of the utterer. And I’ll think of you next time.
Oh, kids see color, they just do not assign a value to it. My kids love pointing out the all of the different shades between us. They just do not know yet that 1) they can probably pass for White and 2) that there are folks who think less of their Indian father because he is brown and has a foreign passport.
My 4 year old has been asking a lot about reproduction lately. He is really into animals, and we do discuss mammals vs birds vs reptiles, etc. I am not shy about telling him the truth human reproduction, but am more worried about him getting the details mixed up and relaying incorrect information at school. I am trying to keep it as simple as possible, but human reproduction is pretty tricky, eh?
This is so important. I still remember as a kid using the word “sped” interchangeably with nerd, geek, whatever. My dad (who happened to be a professor of special education) sat me down and explained that the word was insulting (a contraction of the term “special ed”) and why and that he did not want to hear it ever again. It (obviously) made an impression.
I’m totally with you, Julie. Talking about body parts, no problem. Talking about race, much harder. It’s because I know how important it is, and I don’t want to make a mistake.
I don’t ready many parenting books myself, but (RookieMom) Heather does and she drops her knowledge on me all the time. When she mentioned the Nurtureshock discussion of avoidance, how we don’t acknowledge that the people in our lives who have “brown skin” have it, I felt inadequate. I need to take care of this duty as a parent, but still need to figure out where to start.
For us, since gay families are part of our everyday lives due to an abundance of family and friends in that category, I may be able to point out some injustices toward them, and then give examples of race and other “differences” as analogies. Just brainstorming here…
My boys have grown up around all colors of people in church & school, but you know, we’ve never brought it up for discussion. My husband DID decide to tell them ALL the bad words they shouldn’t say (while I was away at BlogHer) but we haven’t gone over racial stuff. That is important to me.
We are extra sensitive about the R word, as well as other words that people could say innocently not meaning to offend (but it hurts) like when someone dances or moves about or compares something to “looking like they are having a seizure” – not cool with me, especially if my son is around, BUT just as I don’t want my boys talking like that, I also want them to know that most kids don’t mean it the way he might think. Maybe their parents haven’t had a talk with them about it yet, etc.
This stuff is hard, but so important. Thank you for the reminder.
Steph
This is one of those hard things about being a parent. In my experience, these kinds of issues tend to present themselves for discussion at some point. I don’t feel the need to teach my children words that I don’t want to say or want them to use. I’d rather wait until they hear it, then explain why we don’t say it. My explanation to my 3 year old who learned a swear was that it’s a word that makes people sad when they hear it. I think that racial and other slurs are not as easily explained to smaller children, but many times by the time it comes up, you can explain to them why it’s not cool to say it.
We have had conversations before, always prompted by my son, about “why almost all the people in our town are peach” and other similar topics. The thing that has become clearest to me — brought home after a truly horrifying moment of repeated conversation he told me about where another child at his school told someone he couldn’t play with them because he had brown skin — is that he SEES physical difference but has absolutely no concept of the ways those physical differences are loaded with racial meaning for some people. So, he didn’t understand why the comment about his friend having brown skin could be hurtful. His wide-eyed response was, “I don’t think his feelings were hurt. He DOES have brown skin.” So then I had to explain to him that of course that observation was a fact, but that telling him there were things he could or couldn’t do because of his skin color was hurtful and mean. “Like, how about if someone told you that you couldn’t play with them because you have black hair?” THEN he got it.
With all due respect, I actually think that I would avoid making the kinds of generalizations that questions like “are brown people nice?” raise. I think it is important to try to convey that whether our skins are peach or tan or brown (all the words my son uses), we are all individual — and we may be very good friends with one brown person and not such good friends with a peach one. Not because brown people are nicer than peach people, but because that *particular* brown person has similar taste to us, likes the same games we do, etc., while that *particular* peach person happens to be a bully.
I do struggle terribly with how I will address the inevitable name-calling and slurs. I’d rather not teach them words they don’t know. Particularly because there is such a short time of relative innocence when their minds are not loaded with the baggage of category-based judgments. But it’s so hard to know what is really best. Thanks for such a thought-provoking post. (Sorry to write a book in the comments.)
There’s some great info in NurtureShock on your first point – specifically, that kids’ brains “can’t help but attempt to generalize rules from the examples they see.” That is, if they see primarily white people doing something, they extrapolate that it’s something black people can’t or don’t do. The reverse is true too. So kids often make faulty generalizations and need to be corrected – gently though, without making the topic any more difficult than it already can be.
Which leads me to my response to your second point about generalizations. Absolutely, we are all individuals – and older kids can grasp that. But younger “kids are developmentally prone to in-group favoritism,” per the book. They seek out people who are similar to themselves, with skin color being one of the most visible attributes. The book presents study results regarding racial attitudes among a group of white children from families that embrace diversity and want them to grow up color-blind. The results were quite shocking: “In this supposed race-free vacuum being created by parents, kids were left to improvise their own conclusions – many of which would be abhorrent to their parents.”
In short, based on their natural inclination to prefer people who look like they do, kids unfortunately often draw negative conclusions about people who look different. That’s why I’ve been convinced that it’s necessary to be so open and blunt with my younger kids.
Thank you for explaining this more. My children (ages 6 and 3) are mixed Japanese/Caucasian but do not “read” as Asian to most people. They think of themselves as peach or tan, though my son is very proud of his black hair that matches my husband’s. I wonder a lot about how they will identify themselves as they grow older. And I worry that while they have a lot of other Asian kids around them, they have few African Americans in their schools — worry for the reasons you mention about them drawing troubling conclusions. I clearly have to get NurtureShock. I can’t thank you enough for this!
I had to click your link to see what the r-word was! I am very conscious of not using that word because I have family members who work with people who have special needs.
About race, when my kids bring up differences, we talk about them, and their school is very, very diverse so they do a lot of teaching about race there as well.
As the parent of a mixed race child, I think I pay more attention to explaining people colors, simply because Gabriel has asked about them.
Questions he’s asked – How come no one we know whose dad is brown has a dad who lives at home but almost all the kids with white dads have dads that live with them (it just happens to be that way with all the kids I know/who go to his preschool, but it’s a topic that comes up repeatedly)
Why is he pink when his dad’s brown, but his half sister has a white mom too, and she’s brown like his dad (launching into a genetics discussion with a 3yo seemed…challenging)
Something I worry about addressing as he gets older – the acceptable use of the N- word by black people (kid gets exposed to too much lyrically inappropriate hip-hop)
The book notes that minority parents talk directly with their kids about race three times as often. Also, your examples of Gabriel’s questions are right in line with those cited in the book – e.g., “Why do only brown kids eat breakfast at school?”
Let’s just say I was raised in the south. I learned words that I didn’t know the meaning of and am embarrassed now that I used at all, even though when I used them I literally didn’t know any better.
We moved “north” (still below the Mason-Dixon line) and I met my first ever people of a different color. What’s interesting about this? I invited A (an African-American friend) to my slumber party and it never occurred to me to mention to my parents that she wasn’t pink. My dad was in shock.
I figured out on my own that some words were simply not acceptable to say and that I shouldn’t ever say them or even think them. I got off to a rough start, but I figured it out. My kids are learning, slowly, that people are different colors, different genders, and have different strengths and weaknesses. They’re also learning to treat everyone the same. I just hope it sticks.
I remember how hard it was the first time I said vagina – I even blogged about it. Funny now, it doesn’t seem strange at all. I guess the first time is always the hardest and the good thing is, after that it just becomes par for the course.
I’m more worried about trying to explain God than skin color these days. Halp.
Really loving this post – especially the comments discussion! My husband is mixed race and so this discussion has absolutely come up in our house. We’ve talked about hurtful words and why Grandpa W is dark skinned but Nana is not. I was prepared for questions at the family reunion this summer where half the people were varying shades of brown and black and half were white. My kids never skipped a beat though – I guess our life in general and their school experiences have provided enough diversity.
I try very hard to be as clear as possible about all “difficult” words with my kids – I want them to appreciate the differences in people and realize that the differences don’t make people worth less, they just keep things interesting!
You rock, sister.
We talk body parts. We talk bodily functions. We talk wheelchairs and walkers. We talk languages and we talk people living in different countries. But, honestly, I don’t think we’ve purposefully talked of someone as x race. There’s a lapse, there.
Mind you, I also emphatically avoid the pink for girls and blue for boys thing….!
I too had to click the r-word link – I haven’t actually heard anyone say that since I was a kid. I’m sure something similarly offensive will come up, to be discussed; but it hasn’t yet…
I don’t think it’s necessary to introduce them to words you don’t want to say. I do, though, think you should ABSOLUTELY address it if and when they ask or use those words. I think it’s akin to curse words… I’m not going to teach my kids the eff word so I can tell them not to use it. That being said, I don’t think it can hurt to preemptively address the issue, either.
If you want your kids to not associate value with skin color, you have to expose them to different people.
When I was in undergrad in NYC, I babysat for extra money. Some of my families were in the upper ranks of society, which was cool because some of the perks were awesome
Anyway, one of the little girls was such a sweetheart I usually chose her over the other girls if I had several babysitting gigs. On day Lucy looked at me and said “you’re dark like Rosie (the maid).” She didn’t mean anything by it, she just noticed that I was the only other “dark” person in her life. I have to wonder if that realization would have been as huge to her if there had been other dark people in her life.
Race has NEVER been an issue in my life. It was another child in school who pointed out that we weren’t all the same color. When I went home and asked about it, my grandmother did the crayon speech. It was never mentioned again.
I plan on raising my son that way. Currently, he knows as many white people as black people.
As to your other dilemma, please do NOT teach them those words. While I agree with your inclination to teach them the words so that they can combat them, I’m afraid that won’t happen because kids will be kids. I see grave consequences: using the words out of peer pressure, using the words in a last ditch effort to be hurtful, using the words because they aren’t mature enough to understand their meanings and consequences. I think it’s best to keep your ears open, and when you hear them uttered in your kids’ presence use that opportunity to teach them how unacceptable they are.
Good luck!
Thank you – makes a lot of sense. It just pains me still that I was so ignorant and may have inadvertently hurt someone.