By early childhood, young children are reasoning about race and their social world and developing a moral understanding of fairness and unfairness, equality and inequality with input from those around them. Young children perceive much more than we realize: Research shows that infants as young as three months show racial preferences that grow into racial discrimination by elementary school without intervention.
[image_caption]Gail M. Ferguson[/image_caption]
Among the parents in the study who did mention Floyd’s murder or the unrest, most mentioned race in a vague manner but did not point out longstanding racial injustice in U.S. policing. Only 17% of white parents in the study used color-conscious or power-conscious language or parenting strategies, meaning that only they directly acknowledged race, racism or Black Lives Matter in discussions with their children.
These study results showed that most white Minneapolis mothers surveyed avoided discussing Floyd’s murder or systemic racism with their children, despite the high-profile event happening in their community. When parents and other adults are silent about race, it communicates apathy or approval of racism, even if that’s not what adults intend.
Importantly, the study also found that white parents’ own level of racial identity development was closely linked to how they socialized their children. The subset of parents who used color-conscious and power-conscious parenting showed more advanced white racial identity development than other parents based on their responses. In other words, it appeared that white parents parented their children around race only up to the level of their own maturity in handling racial information.
Self-reflection + courageous parenting
So what can parents, especially white parents, do to help their children become antiracist? The findings from this study suggest a two-pronged solution: active self-reflection to develop a healthy white racial identity coupled with courageous antiracist parenting.
A white person has a healthy white racial identity when they are fully aware of systemic racism, acknowledge their own racial privilege and role in perpetuating racism, and are committed to self-reflection, self-education and other antiracist actions. White parents seeking this personal growth can join a local chapter of an antiracism organization or use an antiracism workbook.
The other prong of this solution is for white parents to explicitly acknowledge race and racism with children. One common misconception is that having conversations with children about racism will make them racist, when in fact the opposite is true. Such conversations are essential to giving them the skills they need to detect and challenge their own biases and the biases around them.
Adults teach children about concepts like fairness and unfairness and justice and injustice, but these lessons often happen in the context of abstract conversations at home or at school. Children need real-life examples to deepen their understanding of these concepts in relation to race and racism.
White parents can use everyday experiences and events in the media to provide children with concrete examples of justice and injustice, accountability, and antiracist action. They should also engage children’s empathy by humanizing victims of police brutality and racism. Mr. Floyd was someone’s father, son, brother, friend and neighbor, and white children need adults in their lives to help them imagine how they would feel if he had been their father.
If you are new to conversations around race or racism, it also can help to make a plan about how to have a discussion with your children. Short, frequent conversations that occur naturally during teachable moments work better than having one long discussion about the topic.
Race matters in the United States because racism still exists. Parents, especially white parents, can play a role in addressing racism because of the power and privilege they hold in our racialized society. Taking time for honest self-reflection and explicit conversations with children about race and racism (including your own) is, in and of itself, an important act of antiracism.
Gail M. Ferguson, Ph.D. is an associate professor in the Institute of Child Development at the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, where she directs the Culture and Family Life Lab.
WANT TO ADD YOUR VOICE?
If you’re interested in joining the discussion, add your voice to the Comment section below — or consider writing a letter or a longer-form Community Voices commentary. (For more information about Community Voices, see our Submission Guidelines.)
How about teaching your children of any race the truth? Parents need to teach children that the world is filled with good and bad people, always has, always will. Those people will come in every skin color, religious beliefs and from different parts of the world. Your job as a parent is to teach your children how to discern between good and bad people, regardless of skin color. If you find a person who will lie, cheat and steal stay away, no matter the skin color. If you find a caring, helpful, unselfish person get to know them better, regardless of skin color. People will eventually show who they are, stay with the good ones, avoid the bad ones.
This nonsense that you are either oppressed or an oppressor depending on your skin color is ridiculous. That your life is predestined due to skin pigmentation takes away any decisions you personally make and throws life into a lotto system, which you have no control. Parents need to teach children to make good choices, find good people and take control of your life. Your life will be a reflection of all the choices you make, try to make good choices and understand you will make mistakes. Take responsibility for your mistakes and move forward…. That is life!
Thank you, Joe Smith, whoever you are.
“Many white parents often use well-meaning but ineffective strategies that ignore the realities of racism in the United States, said study co-author Leigh Wilton, PhD, an assistant professor of psychology at Skidmore College. Some harmful approaches include a colorblind strategy (e.g., telling children “Skin color doesn’t matter,” or “We’re all the same on the inside”) or refusing to discuss it (e.g., “It’s not polite to talk about that”).
Wow, what an unhealthy and misguided point of view. And I’ve got news for you Ms. Ferguson, it’s not just white parents who encourage a colorblind attitude in their children. Plenty of Black parents and other parents of color do too.
I grew up in a bi-racial home in the Rondo neighborhood in St. Paul. My mother was full-blood Sioux and my father was an Irishman. My four siblings and I went to predominately Black public schools but we had friends and neighbors of all races. And guess what? We never talked about race. I can’t recall a single incident or sit-down conversation with either my Indian mother or my white father about race. If my memory’s failing me and race did come up in conversation, I can guess that two of the things said would have been: “skin color doesn’t matter” and “we’re all the same on the inside.” In fact, a common lesson Sioux parents teach their children is “mitakuye oyasin.” Meaning, “we are all related.” We are just human beings and the lessons they taught us were how to be a decent human being to others.
I played high school sports. I served in the military. Both environments are commonly multi-racial and guess what? Same thing. We never discussed race. Our common mission of winning the game or defeating the enemy was all that mattered. Perhaps those who are so race-obsessed need to find something in their lives that takes them beyond a meaningless idea such as race so they can focus their energies on something important.
Society is better served when we focus on what we have in common than in how we differ. Especially in ways that are not only irrelevant, but are divisive. Some would say divisive on purpose.
“The study didn’t address exactly when or how adults should talk with children about race, but Wilton said this can begin early.” What does that mean, exactly?