To not invite this child to DS's party?

[MyShinyThing]

I've said he can invite 6 friends to his party & I was going to send invites out tomorrow as it in January.

But tonight for the second time in the last 3 weeks he's come home from school saying he doesn't like brown people because they're all muslims & there are too many muslims & they're all bad!

This absolutely hasn't come from us or any of our family or friends. We've talked about racism & different religions again & I'll be talking to the teacher (again) tomorrow. I've made my feeling extremely clear to him!

Apparently one friend has been telling him this & says his mum has told him he shouldn't play with another friend because he's brown & a Muslim!

I'm completely disgusted. But do I say this boy can't come to his party because he's saying this? They're only 6 so it's obviously all coming from the parents. Do I leave him out? I feel really torn.

If it was a case of inviting the whole class I wouldn't exclude him, but would be having a word with the teacher and asking him/ her to tackle the child's parents. If you are only inviting select friends then I wouldn't invite him. I know he is just repeating stuff, and your Ds will have to make his own mind up about whether to be friends with this child in the long run, but I wouldn't be encouraging the friendship/ accepting play dates etc. Why expose your kid to those sorts of attitudes? Teach him to challenge them, absolutely and show by your actions that people that behave like that, even kids must face consequences.

Do the parents of the child that's being bullied know the bully is going to be there? Because to be honest I'd not be letting my child go into a situation like that!

I would not invite the little bully boy. He's not just racist he's aggressive and controlling (telling your son who he can be friends with).

As well as discussions on racism you could be talking to your son about choosing friends who are kind, thoughtful and don't treat others badly. About the friends we choose reflecting who we are.

I cringe when people say 'you wouldn't do x if y happened', there is some set in stone human reaction to each situation!

Well no. There isn't any 'set in stone' reaction' is there? Otherwise there wouldn't be massive swathes of the world where people cut little girls up with rusty knives when they get to six. And there'd be no AIBU.

There's culture and values and what's acceptable to us as individuals. And some people are suggesting that 'you can't play with him, he's brown' is as bad as 'you cunt'.

Personally I'd much rather dd (6) said the latter.

I don't understand that post.

I wouldn't invite him.
It wouldn't be much fun for the poor child who is being bullied at school to then have to see his bully at a party.

You said there is a set in stone reaction to given situations. There isn't. In some places things are acceptable (like FGM) which elsewhere are thought to be utterly unacceptable and that's the case for different groups and individuals as well as cultures. AIBU shows us that.

I'm not sure what reactions you think are set in stone?

Or did you mean that there ISN'T some set in stone reaction?

Ah, totally my fault sorry! I've just realised I've missed out quite important words in my post... try again:

I cringe when people say 'you wouldn't do x if y happened', as if there is some set in stone human reaction to each situation!

( I agree with you there is no set in stone reaction for anything)

If my child had repeated racist rubbish on more than one occasion there would be no party for anyone to be invited to.

Never in my wildest nightmares would I send my son (black) to a party like this. My son, who I would throw my life away for, go to a party where kids his own age look down on him. Never. Not even if I sniffed potential racism. My child is no ones guinea pig.

Yes these children are only 6, but it's still unacceptable and should be punished. Personally, my son will know life as the Amish do if he ever dared to repeat those words after explaining to him why he should not.

I agree with pp who say that you need to show ds some more serious consequences or you'll hear him make such racist comments again. Do it now before he graduates from "saying" to actually "doing".

As for the racist kid, I wouldn't invite him. Just like you wouldn't want ds to hang out with a drug addict, you shouldn't want him be influenced by racist kids. To help both ds and this kid understand that such sentiments are not tolerated by you (and many others), you should just be very frank and tell them both that racist kid is not invited because of his racist attitude. Should he change in the future, you'd be more than happy to welcome him back into ds's life.

I wouldn't invite the racist child to my sons party, I'm not one those parents who thinks a party should be inclusive for all. Sod that, my son has a 'friend' who whacks my son in self defense if he accidentally bumps into him, his dad told him to punch all bully's so in his primitive mind he's doing just that, he wasn't invited, it's not my job to teach him right from wrong. One day he'll learn when he punches a bigger kid and gets his comeuppance for it, he'll deserve it. He's a imbecile that knocked my sons tooth out. So basically I invite nice kids who wouldn't ruin the party. Wether that's right or wrong I don't care.

Please dont invite him to the party. For the sake of the other kids but also to reinforce in your sons minds that you are not friends with and do not tolerate racism.
I had my breathe taken away by a child of 8 who we took to a rugby match. When they were announcing the players he booed. I told him we dont boo the players in rugby. He said we do in football especially the black ones. I have rarely been lost for words but it took me a few moments to speak. In reality if it is that ingrained there is chuff all you can do at that age other than correct it. It may well be that they form a different view when they get older but i would not do anything to show any sort of friendship.

Little Farage :D

Yeah, um, I'd be pretty hard-line on this. I was raised by very racist parents, and there were a couple of occasions I parroted their phrases and used bad words. The world around me came down on me like a TON of bricks. The school. The other child's parents even spoke to me. I was MORTIFIED. I was shamed and re-educated - more importantly, I learned that such views were NOT acceptable if I wanted to b a pleasant citizen in the world.

I was, like, 5, so we're not talking some late teen Damascene conversion here, but still, those 'talks' really stuck with me.

I would not invite the child. 6 is old enough to learn you don't say rude things, and if you do say those things or hold those views, you will not be included in polite society. You will be shunned and excluded until you can behave and be kind.

Really this is the sort of thing we should have been doing with racists all along. Every aunt who made a grim comment over dinner, every racist BIL who sneered, every 'mate' who said something rude about a minority colleague. They should be challenged, stood up to and told "that is unacceptable."

Instead we shrugged them all off as 'just what they're like', 'bit of banter innit', and now look where we are. All firmly out of the woodwork.

A little humiliation and shunning goes a long way. If the kid asks, or his parents do, be bold. Explain your reasons. Hopefully if he's anything like me, he'll realise the utter shamefulness of his comments, never again repeat them and begin to challenge his parents when they say them (as I did - eventually we all just stopped talking about it, although now they're practically seig-heiling their new Fuhrer and I don't see them much.)

I'm not sure where people are getting that I haven't come down on it hard. Should I be cancelling xmas as well as his party which is over a month away?

The first time it happened what he actually said was "x says his mum says he can't sit with y because ..."
. I didn't feel that needed punishment or warnings but we did talk about racism & how it's unacceptable.

This time he said what's in the op and We made it perfectly clear to him exactly how we felt about it. He's been told what will happen if it continues (I have said I'll cancel his party if it does).

I've spoken to the head who knew exactly which child I was calling about which I thought was revealing. He has spoken to DS as well & both know that we are on board with any punishment handed out if he repeats these things in school. He's been told he needs to tell an adult if he hears anything like it again.

I'm not sure what else I can do other than to continue exposing him to a wide mix of people & ensure he knows that it's not acceptable in this house.

As I said before though the town is extremely white & ukip/BNP are very popular round here. So I doubt it's the last time he will hear this sort of thing, it's certainly not the first time I have.

Also MiniFarage did make me laugh!

Sorry, if my DS had come home spouting that kind of talk he wouldn't be having a party at all.

It's a tough one OP.

I had the opposite problem. My DD told her friend, whom she's been close to since nursery, that she was going to marry him when they were grown up, to which he replied "No" and told her she was a white girl and so wasn't allowed to marry him. This was in Year 5 and they're still friends online. Now puberty has happened and he is not so influenced by what his parents believe or want for him, I rather suspect she'd get a different answer if she proposed again!

Same thing will happen with this little boy. He'll believe what he's told at home until he's at an age to question it, and he'll see for himself and eventually come to his own conclusions depending on his own life experiences.

If both boys are going to make up two of the six invitees then it's a start to this process. I say invite him. Let the child start forming his own ideas. If he never mixes with people who are different to him then he has no reason to question what he's told at home.

I'm with the kid tbh.. I wouldn't invite someone to my child's party that they didn't want to spend THEIR birthday with.

He does want to spend his birthday with him, that's why he's asked to invite him!

Presumably his mum wont want him to come when she knows you've invited the other boy as she has control over that, rather than at school where they have to mix.

FWIW my ds round about that age out of the blue said he didn't like x coloured people ( not at all sure where that originated from) said it more when he got the talk from me so wondered if it was an attention seeking thing. A few years later he is definitely very tolerant of other people with regards to any differences.

Children learn through example, I bet the six of them would love the party and get on well and the colour of their skin wouldn't come into it.

According to their teacher they do all play together at school. The head told me the other mother hasn't raised any concerns with them, not sure he should have told me that to be honest.

You haven't said if the mother of the child being victimised knows this little bully is going to be at this small party?

You may live in a very racist area, doesn't mean you invite it into your home.

Aside from anything else that is sending your son a mixed message 'we don't like mini farages attitude or what he's teaching you but sure we'll invite him to our home, feed and water him and make him welcome. Never mind the other little boy that he's bullying hell just have to deal'

By inviting this child you're not reinforcing the message you say you want to convey.