How did I grow up not racist/homophobic etc when my parents were?!

[vminkookie]

I'm in my forties, my mum is in her 70s.

My childhood was okay, worst thing that ever happened to me was being smacked but that was not often and normal among my peers at the time.

Parents (dad now long dead) were never overtly anything but there was a drip feed of racism and homophobia and bias against certain groups.

I remember my dad telling me he would disown me if I came home with a black man. My mum tells me he 'loathed' homosexuals though I don't recall him ever saying anything - he was never a verbose man.

A massive childhood memory of mine is my Nan telling me that black people were brought over to help us but now we don't need them anymore they should all go home. I remember telling her that was unfair and she fell out with me for weeks - I was about 9!

Constant 'little' racist comments over the years from my mum. We lived in a very white area so anyone who did not conform to that, according to mum, did not belong for a variety of ridiculous reasons.

I was not allowed to play with the kids off the council estate even though they were friends from school because they were 'rough' - my mum grew up in council houses!

My mum had (and still does) a massive disdain of anyone who claimed benefits long term. She worked at the local authority assessing benefit claims!

Fast forward to now. We are mum's bubble and I visit, sort out her shopping etc. I mildly resent it but that's probably another thread. I popped in with some shopping and stayed for a coffee on NYE.

Conversation included -
BAME should not get the COVID vaccine, they should all 'go home'.
She likes Rylan Clark-Neal even though he's gay.
She hates Steph McGovern because she's a lesbian and lesbians should not have children.
Relief that Brexit is finally happening, now we can stop immigrants.

That was quite a full on conversation of hate tbh, it's not always that heavy, but she has got worse as she's got older. After each comment I tell her to stop being racist, homophobic or whatever it is she's going on about that day. It's so frustrating. I'm fed up of arguing about it.

Anyway, the question is, how did I grow up with such opposing views when this bullshit has been fed to me my entire life? My sister too, she did vote Brexit but not for immigration reasons (and now regrets it) but otherwise she thinks like I do.

I didn't vote Brexit, I don't vote Tory (mum does), I don't read the Daily Mail (mum does), I don't judge people by the colour of their skin, I make a lot of additional income writing gay romances on top of my days job (but have not told mum this as I cant face the reaction, but maybe I should?), I don't care what benefits people may or may not be on as it's not my business. I could go on.

Has anyone else had a similar upbringing but not taken on the beliefs?

Yes.
My parents and sister are horribly racist, not so much homophobic but proper Sun readers.
We do see my family regularly but avoid politics and race and Brexit and immigrants and benefits.
I don’t know how it happened.

I'd like to avoid these topics when I see her but is like she can't help herself!

She's horrified at Bridgerton for being colour blind. How dare they?

Mine were the same with David Copperfield.
My immediate family (DH and DD) roll our eyes, DD gets irate but has now learned that nothing will change despite her yelling.
Other than their political views, the rest of the time they are perfectly nice people who go out of their way to help people

There's a theory (Adorno, I think but can't remember - and I'm going to simplify something more complicated because I can't remember the details!) that people who are attracted to discriminatory thinking (and authoritarian regimes, which are by nature discriminatory) view the world in a fearful way and look to "strong", paternalistic leadership.

The theory then goes that they grew up in households that were similar.

Not sure I'm in total agreement, but there's something in it that could make sense of your situation.

So, it doesn't sound like you grew up feeling a lot of fear at home. Presumably not at school either (corporal punishment mainly finished by the time you went to school?), from authority figures. On top of that, I imagine you didn't have groups of kids at school who were outwardly LGB and possibly had no real negative experiences with anybody from a BAME community? So you likely had a social message - color doesn't matter, we're all equal - that was different than what you got home, but your own experience of life by and large tied in with that narrative.

Also, if your parents were "otherwise" reasonable, generally "nice" people, then their messages of hatred were incongruous with who they were. Children aren't programmed to hate and by the time you started understanding their messages, you'd also developed the ability to think for yourself. While you may not have understood it all, something didn't make sense and their reactions were unconvincing (ie grandmother falling out with a 9 year old isn't going to change the child's mind!).

Like I say, the theory about upbringing and adult views isn't flawless..and my recollection of it is very far from flawless! But the general idea does have something generally applicable in it, I think, even though it doesn't account for everything in all cases.

The opposite in my families case, my uncle has a immigrant father and had an immigrant grandmother, his wife is Greek and his son is bilingual ... and yet is the biggest Daily Mail reading, far right racist nut-job.

We try and avoid the subject/ignore him when he starts up (and genuinely don't see much of him apart from Christmas and big Birthdays) but I have never worked out how he ended up like that or how the hell his wife copes!

His siblings and parents are all fairly normal liberal, open minded people

My parents are ardent sun readers and your post could be about them. My mother becomes angry when I don't collude with them or share their views(I never do, so things ate often very difficult). My adult kids become very upset when exposed to their disgusting views. I avoid politics and convo around immigration, race, gender etc but like you say, they always find a way. It really impacts on my relationship with them, but they're both disabled and need help from myself and family. They weren't always like this, they have grown much worse over the years. Began reading the sun years ago when it was 'your 10p sun'. Said they only bought it for the puzzles

I’m the same age as you, parents too.

They were Sun readers, definitely a hint of homophobia but not so much everyday racism, but racist jokes were ‘harmless’.

I remember going to Brighton when I was around 11ish and mum being horrified when she saw a couple of guys walking along the street holding hands. My reaction was an eye roll and telling her they were just people.

Luckily it’s not something they’ve carried forward. They live in an area of high migrant workers and seem to respect and value them. They were Tory voters, but haven’t voted that way for a while and voted remain.

@Namechangebuttercup oh dear I wish I was young enough not to remember my primary school teacher caning some of the boys but alas I remember it all too well. It made sure I never stepped out of line!

You could be right, my parents were otherwise nice! My dad was very well liked and although he allegedly held some racist views he still was the manager of over 200+ diverse people in a Birmingham factory and never showed any discrimination (presumably) because he was well liked by all and his funeral was attended by a diverse group.

Even now my mum is very kind and generous. To me and my sister and our kids etc.

I work hard now as a parent to ensure the kids are accepting of all. They're still young and any questions they ask about skin colour are natural curiosity anyway. They know they can have a partner of either sex when they grow up. I try not to make anything into any sort of issue as it shouldn't be one.

My mum also forgets - when she's complaining about immigration- that my Dad was first generation Son of Irish immigrants.

She hates white immigrants far less than black ones though. There's a hierarchy- white European and Aussie, Kiwi or Americans are not too bad, Eastern European are much disliked... and the darker the skin gets the more she resents them.

I'm the same age as you and my parents are 69/70. We would have been one of the rough council estate families you weren't allowed to mix with! My parents are different in that, during my childhood they weren't racist at all. I didn't experience the type of comments you describe at all.

My Dad was mildly homophobic though I think through ignorance rather than anything else. Since meeting a lot of my gay friends in the 90's it all melted away.

However, racism has set in with a vengeance since the Brexit vote, predictably around eastern Europeans but also around people of Indian/Pakistani descent which is a new thing for him. I've been shocked at some of his comments as it seems to have come out of nowhere.

My parents are late 50s. We live in an area of mixed ethnicities.
Almost every time I visit there will be some comment. Any Asian person is a ‘Paki’, they don’t believe in Covid but apparently they’re to blame for spreading it round.
We saw on the news that a black actor had died - it was because he ‘ate too much fried chicken’.
They have it in for Eastern European’s too.
My brother has turned out the same really but it’s laughable as I have one British parent and one foreign parent and their nationality is no problem at all!
I do think education has something to do with it. I have friends from different races which they don’t, but my dad’s parents were very racist so it’s ingrained.

My father was the same, racist to the core, he’s dead now, prior to his death he lived a few hours drive which suited me as I didn’t want my kids to hear his racist views. My kids have many different cultures as friends and teachers, they will never describe a person by their colour,

I think it’s evolution and almost peer pressure. The education system teaches that homophobia and racism is wrong, plus it is normal to rebel against your parents. You were also exposed to a greater number of “forriners” and “gays” who were (hopefully) more open and safe than in her working life, etc....While, I don’t think I am homophobic or racist, I know I still have a lot to learn and my kids keep assuring me that I am embarrassingly unwoke (sigh) but at least I am accepting (yay!) and not judgemental. (High praise, I hope - they’re teenagers... It’s really hard to tell. Could just as easily be sarcasm or irony - dunno. Need a crystal ball. This has taken a different turn. 😆) Humans are traveling more, the world is smaller and more “instant” due to the interwebs. They might be nicer as a result. (But they are less tolerant towards the “Phobes” of the world. Such a shame....)

Many many people have overcome racist parents. There's a very high generational thing going on. I was a child of the 50s/60s. Racism was almost normal. My grandparents and to a lesser extent, my parents, had racist attitudes. But I don't, and most of my generation aren't (outwardly at least) racist, and of my kids generation, even fewer.

We might have grown up hearing our parents and grandparents spouting such stuff, but our own life experiences trumped that. And in my children's cases, their schools made it clear that racism wasn't on.

Because, contrary to popular belief, we are not just imprint-able beings wholly susceptible to our parent's parenting.

Adults can be responsible for their own behaviour and beliefs without it being anything to do with their parents.

It's not uncommon to react against your upbringing. My grandfather was a staunch left-wing Labour activist. All of his kids turned into DM-reading Tory voters (or Brexit Party, even BNP in the case of one of them!).

My Dad was more centrist but my Mum remains a hard-core Tory supporter with thinly-veiled racist sentiments who used to enjoy listening to Nigel Farage on the radio. Both my brother and I are pretty left-wing, so we've gone in the opposite direction to my Mum.

@Fastforwardtospring

My father was the same, racist to the core, he’s dead now, prior to his death he lived a few hours drive which suited me as I didn’t want my kids to hear his racist views. My kids have many different cultures as friends and teachers, they will never describe a person by their colour,

If they never describe a person by their colour then they are still stuck in political correct mode and not genuinely understanding that people being of different racial heritages is a fact, and is perfectly ok. It's not racist to notice that Janine in sales is black. It's not racist to mention that if you are trying to explain who Janine is to someone (Janine? Yes, she is the tall elegant black woman who has a red coat, sits near the window, near the water cooler on the second floor?) Trying to pretend that you haven't "noticed" someone's skin colour just shows how very aware of it you are.

My father was vocally racist but thankfully I went to a decent school where even the hint of racism (or any other bullying) was slapped down hard.

Even as a primary child I saw no logic in disliking someone because of the colour of their skin. I was more interested in if they could do maths or draw.

The other thing that puzzled me was my dad was in the RAF in WW2, and hated Hitler and hated Jewish people with equal vehemence. To a child it was very confusing.

By the time I was 12 I'd written him off as a complete idiot.

I think a lot of these things are based on fear and massively influenced by messages received by surrounding media.

When they grew up films at the cinema showed cowboys being attacked by 'red indians' and black Africans as savages. Homosexuality was illegal and men went to prison if caught doing 'despicable acts'.

You have grown up in a much more multicultural society than they did, and homosexuality was legal before you were born. TV reflects different races there are homosexual characters in many TV programmes.

Nowadays my highly intelligent DD's friends are starting to believe that people can change sex if they want because that is what their media is full of.

It's a drip feed from different sources and some people are more influenced than others. Often more than they are by their families' views.

You grew up with different messages to them so you think differently.

You could be describing my parents OP, I find it very upsetting as they are so selective in their disdain, if someone of BAME or gay can help them ie a medical professional then we get the phrase "yeah well they are not like the others" so selective hatred, I work alongside people of all groups and it grinds my gears and as I'm a lady of a certain age I find it almost impossible to not argue with them. They also have excessive hatred for people who are 'different' ie tattooed, overweight, dress differently to them. They too are Daily Mail readers and I hope they are a dying breed, especially as a previous post stated the generations bellow them treat people as they find them due to their experiences of actually spending time with a diverse group, I feel if someone is nice they are nice , if someone is rude they are rude no matter what their ethnicity, size, sexuality but my parents have an innate hatred of anything that's different to them. They were born and bred in Manchester and die hard reds so don't get me started on their spitting hatred of anyone who supports a different team than them.

Yes, my parents and ILs.
Daily Mail, Brexiteers, with racism and homophobia to boot.

I grew up hearing shit like "if you ever bring home a black man, I'll disown you". Hilarious seeing as my DH is Asian and my DGM adores him (I was raised primarily by DGM, egg donor wasn't really in the picture and we're now NC). She still bands around the 'P' word but never around him and I've gone LC over the last few years for a number of reasons.

My DC don't see colour or race and if asked to describe someone, will describe what they wore or their hair colour, never their skin colour etc

Given what shit I heard growing up, it's a wonder that I'm able to have any sort of relationship with another human and even DH has commented on this.

Oh yes @iamaMused my mum has some health issues and without exception the consultants are of non white origin. They are apparently acceptable even though they are (insert race here).

I don't claim to be perfect by the way. I have a lot to learn in many ways.

I remember in uni having a black housemate. We are still good friends. She came home with me for a few days in the holidays and got really upset when she was the only black person in the pub and basically the whole town. I was shocked because it genuinely had never occurred to me that she would feel this way because I've never experienced it and had no clue. This was 20 years ago and I'm a lot more aware now.

My parents were similar. Both left school at 14 and we’re obviously overtaken in life by immigrants in the 50s and 60s who worked hard. They had a strong, begrudging sense of losing out on health and social care and housing to “the other.”
They were ambitious for us. (Always had to comment on the number of brown-faced sari wearers they saw at my grammar school parents evening.) When my sister came home from university with liberal ideas she became their reference for how posh, educated people behaved and learned to keep these opinions to themselves, (though they resurfaced through mum’s dementia.)

Education counts for a lot. If yours comes from The Sun and The Mail you are very vulnerable.