To ask parents of mixed race children…..

[SunsetOverTheBeach]

….. how do you deal with the upset caused by racist incidents?

My son is in his final year of primary. Over the past few months there have been a couple of incidents were racist comments have been directed at him without any provocation (confirmed by staff at school). Different kids each time.

The school have gone through the necessary formalities (officially logging incidents, informing parents etc).

My question is how do you deal with the distress it causes? As a white person born and raised in the UK this is new terrain for me.

He came home heartbroken today.

“I've lived in my area for almost 2 decades now and my now DH came from deep South London where it's very diverse. I get what you mean but at the same time why should we have to move just so my kids can live with other kids that looks like her.”

@Freshmind001 I feel so sorry for your child if you can’t see why it might help her sense of identity to live in an area with kids who look like her.

That doesn’t necessarily mean anything! DS was bullied by 2 kids in his school life. One Chinese and one Indian.

We grew up as almost the only non-white children in our school (there were also two Chinese siblings), being the only different faces out of 800 children was horrible.

In my experience as a child schools that are predominantly while British weren’t effective at dealing with racism, mainly as it wasn’t something the staff needed to consider in their own lives, so they didn’t know how to deal with it effectively as it didn’t have an impact on them.

As the non-white parent in a mixed family I would never live in an area that wasn’t diverse and I wouldn’t subject my children to that either. You don’t need to find a pocket if your own ethnicity, there are very very few people of mine and my childrens ethnicity in the UK, few people have even heard of us in the UK, so I tend to call us a different but nearest ethnicity for ease. But being in a diverse area means less racism, children see adults of various ethnicities in a range of jobs, teachers are less likely to pretend that they can’t pronounce an ethnic name, you feel far less alone than you do around one majority ethnicity that is different to your own. In a more diverse area there are more parents who are similar to you, who not only get your struggles, but the struggles of your children.

There is literally no area of the UK that has beyond a handful of people from my ex-husbands nationality it in

I am not sure that matters, as long as there is a multicultural population so your child is not the only one of a different skin colour.
My DCs are at schools that are 80% white - the remainder are Asian & Black, both of which are very very diverse multicultural groups. Within that 20%, there maybe one Jamaican, one Somali, one Sri Lankan, a large cohort of Indian, Chinese etc

I lived in the most diverse areas growing up because of the financial position we were in and, I'll tell you it's where I experienced the most racism and the most bullying in school also! My child is not the only non white in my area or her school, the area is actually brilliant and the schools are brilliant also. My DD has two best friends one white and one black and we also have a more diverse family unit (from dads mainly). My children are actually very content where we are and as I mentioned in my first post, as far as I am aware no one has said anything to her so I have no reason to distress my kids and move them when they are happy where they are. Moving really doesn't solve the issue all the time (depends on your situation) and it just encourages segregation even more. My little cousin lives in SE and he's the only white kid in his school and he's felt the same, so should they move him to an all white area so he can feel more in line with people who look like him ?! I bet that's different though right. My nephew who is half black also lives in a moderately white area, should we move him to an area where there is more black people also?! It's not always possible to move and shouldn't always be a quick 'fix' because it doesn't always fix the problem. Racism is everywhere you go and I find it so strange people think racism doesn't also happen in these 'diverse areas' you think we should move to.

We recently moved from a "naice" white town to a much more diverse town. The difference has been night and day.
Don't make it your child's job to educate ignorant people.
I would seriously prioritise moving somewhere more diverse. It makes such a difference.

I moved my DCs out of a very diverse school after my DD had her first experience of racism there. She went on to a predominantly white PS out of the area for her last year and SS. There was the usual bullying that needed to be addressed but nothing racist at the two other places. The area itself is massively racist and I'd move in an instant if I ever won the lottery.

When you say the parents are informed etc OP does this include sanctions for the children? Look up the schools behaviour policy etc and inform them if it's still occurring their policies aren't working and need changing. The problem we had was the staff would discipline the children and then the parents would come in kicking up a fuss at the staff for daring to tell their little darlings off. I was pleasantly surprised recently when a child made a remark in class towards DS that they wasn't aware was racist. The whole class downed their pens and refused to continue learning until the teacher addressed it. I just wish my DD had had the same support from her classmates when she went through much more. 😪

Just keep reminding your dear DC that the problem is with them and advocate for him every single time one of these incidents occurs as I'm sure you already do. As others have said try and get him involved in the communities so he can learn more about his background and be proud of his heritage.

I am very sorry your son is experiencing racism at his school. I don't agree that you made a poor choice living where you do. You live where you do for family support and I am totally on board with that. It's the school that has the problem, not you, nor your son. If these pockets of resistance to mutual respect continue as they have always done, they will never change and continue to be no-go areas for anyone who looks different to them. (I grew up in a rural white area, I am white, and I now live in London. My brother has two mixed kids, and brought them up where we grew up. Because they are "only" a quarter black, and a quarter Latin, I've been told by other relatives that "they pass" for white, which is wrong, wrong, wrong.)

Make an appointment to see his teacher or even headteacher and discuss ways to make him feel included. Are there pictures on the school walls of children from diverse backgrounds? Do they have assemblies about issues such as racism, sexism and bullying? Is there a robust bullying policy in place, and can your son talk to his teacher without feeling dismissed? Are there books in the library with diverse characters? Does story time include stories from other countries and continents?

I wish you both well.

I'm white British, my DH isn't, and having mixed-race kids together has taught me a lot about the subtlety of what racism is, and about the micro-aggressions which perpetrators and bystanders never even notice or acknowledge. What I have noticed seems really to help is encouraging the DCs to take pride in their heritage: the fab food, the cool YouTubers, traditional music and stories. I remember the time a child trying to bully DC1 said "I bet when you visit your auntie you don't get as much ice cream as I do" and my DC1 responded "yes but when I visit my auntie I get to use a whole new alphabet".

@Freshmind001 i’m not actually talking about racism, I’m talking about identity which is different. The drive towards introducing diversity in toys, films and the arts isn’t about racism, it’s about inclusivity and allowing children to see people like themselves on screen etc. Representation matters because when children see others who look like themselves outside of their home it helps them to feel like they fit in and are normal and, for young girls, it helps them to accept their skin colour and hair as normal and beautiful. This is why the original Barbie - blonde and blue eyed - can be damaging to the self esteem of girls of colour because they are learning that darker skin and curly hair is not what the world thinks of as beautiful.

“My kids are mixed face and we live in a very 'white' area. My DD in the last few months has been coming home saying she hates her skin and wants to have my skin colour (I am the white parent). She says her skin is ugly and my skin is more nicer. Obviously this upset me to my core and we have been trying to teach her all skin is beautiful and there is nothing wrong with being different to others. I've consulted her school who seem unaware of anything and she says no one said anything but I don't n ow. She's 6 years old btw. What's worse is she keeps referring to people by their skin colour and I'm mortified and don't know where she is picking this stuff up from. We do tell her off and we are trying our best to help educate her on it. I hate the fact kids have to lose their innocence so early on!”

Your 6 yr old is already telling you that she hates her skin and thinks your white skin is nicer - this is exactly what I’m talking about. As someone who is black and has a mixed race child, I am telling you that this is going to be partly because she lives in a very ‘white’ area and feels very different to the children that she goes to school with (and therefore spends the most amount of time with). It’s not enough that you are trying to educate her, she has to see it for herself. You don’t have to move if you don’t want to but this is going to be a significant downside of staying where you are and you have to be aware of the issue.

If you haven’t already, I suggest you buy your daughter more mixed race dolls and books featuring mixed race role models. Choose Disney films and princesses who are diverse. Does she know about Misty Copeland (a beautiful and incredibly talented mixed race ballerina)?

I grew up in the diverse mixing pot of south east London and now live in the Home Counties because I was worried about gang culture and the safety of black children in London. Although I left London, I very deliberately chose a diverse location where a black or mixed race child would not stand out. My (white) husband preferred a more rural location with no diversity at all but I refused to be the “only black” in the village and to raise my children in an area where they would be a novelty.

I would try to get the child to understand that the behaviour is really "on" the perpetrator. And that the perpetrator will seize any difference/feature possible to bully someone. Your ds's skin colour is one of many things that a bully can easily seize. In my ds's case, it was disability. It is really about the shortcomings of the person making the comments to your ds, rather than a reflection of how most people feel about someone with a different skin colour to them. I suppose in summary that most people are not racist - ie it's very unlikely that the perpetrator is a decent person in the rest of his life aside from making these comments to your ds. The perpetrator is essentially a wrong un and no amount of racism education will change this, because he wants to bully people.

I think you’ll need to be as proactive as possible in raising it as an issue at school EVERY time it happens (and discussing it with your child) and in finding ways for your child to socialise and bond with other children who are black or mixed race, to raise their self esteem and sense of belonging.

If I’m being brutally honest, if you talk to ANY black or mixed race person that has grown up in a white area, attending a very white school, almost everyone will say it wasn’t great. Even with loving, supportive parents and family, racism is crushing to a child’s spirit and being ‘the only black kid’ is problematic for a child’s growing sense of identity.

I deliberately chose not to leave London because of this (not being smug - totally get that it’s not a choice for some people) because I wanted my kids to grow up around people who look like them (important when they’re little) and can understand their experiences in a way that I (white Mum) am never going to be able to (becomes SO important in their teens, trust me!).

@SunsetOverTheBeach im sorry that your son is experiencing this. In case you are not aware of it, there’s a Black Mumsnetters subgroup that you might generally find helpful is I think I recently saw a post about racism in schools.

If I were you I would be on to the school. Have they complied with their own policies in respect of racism and bullying? Have the children making the racist remarks been properly disciplined in line with school policy? Yes, the school has told the parents but children don’t just say racist things, they learn this stuff from others, usually the home, so just telling parents doesn’t cut it.

Make a formal appointment with the headteacher to discuss this and what they are doing to prevent it happening again. Ask for confirmation in writing so that you have something to refer back to if the same problems keep happening.

Separately, to help build your son’s self esteem and resilience I would work towards making sure he has a lot of mixed race role models that he can look up to. He will be better able to withstand racism if he is proud of who he is and knows that his mum (and dad if in the picture) will go to bat for him whenever is subjected to racism at school.

We already do all that, and strongly encourage it also (with the toy stuff and films). My kids are half Latino and although my area is most white, that's not to say it doesn't have other people from diff cultures & races also and a lot of non English white people like myself. Point being my child is exposed to all kind of identities in different ways but she also watches a lot of online videos and girls she likes to follow who are all white. She's also really into a Korean pop band and randomly watches these Korean shows and can identify people in different ways so she's not isolated in that sense. My kids have the same parents but are both so different my eldest has a tan and my youngest is completely white and I'm quite white and my DH is very tan. Her friends are also of mixed ethnicities so I don't think she's losing identity but I do think she may have heard something or seen something. Her school is very small also and it works for her, I went to take her to a school that's very diverse in that aspects that your mentioning but it was bigger and she didn't want to go she said she likes her school.

“when a child made a remark in class towards DS that they wasn't aware was racist. The whole class downed their pens and refused to continue learning until the teacher addressed”

This is phenomenal. I only experienced white people standing up to racism after BLM Never before. It was was seen as a black/ brown problem.

This is why as a mixed race muslim women, with even more diverse of a mix children, I could never live in a white area.

That is why you see people of colour living in certain areas but struggling financially because they know that their children will suffer if they move out of a big city.

It is not something that you can just say to your child "people are ignorant" and then move on. It is insidious and teachers downplay it because they just want to get through the day.

It is also the micro aggressions too. Being picked last for stuff, everyone around you discussing things that you cannot relate to. People bringing in race to shut down your voice when you are winning an argument.Visiting school friends homs and they have racist parents.

I grew up in an area like your son and never again will I live in a non diverse area or put my children through it.

what my parents did well though was laugh off and joke about the racist incidents and make sure I understood that their actions reflected on the racists not on us. My parents could do that though because they were black too so we were kind of all in it together. But it really helped me as a child because to focus on the reality of the situation would have been depressing and dire. It’s only now as an adult that I’m working through the childhood racism and the impact it’s inevitably had on me and how I relate to white people but my childhood was very much survival. I’ve also had to forgive my parents for not moving us to a more diverse area as that was an option if our welfare had been more important to them.

All you can do is try move to a more diverse area and build a black community around him. Might not be what you want to hear but it’s the truth.

Does your son have relationships with his black family?

My kids were mixed race, the only two in an otherwise white school. O problems ever. If it had can only talk to them about how ridiculous the racist is being and in a way pity them for the way they had been brought up. Luckily mine were at centre of strong friendship groups, decent kids who would not have tolerated anything. Still a mostly friends.School had a wonderful inclusive ethos and a caring head.

I’m black not mixed but I think some people here are forgetting the structural effects of racism that you can encounter in maj white areas.

you can tell your child that it’s the racist that had the issue, but when they report it to the teacher who does little, your child gets the message that they and their feelings don’t matter, that they are not protected.

It actually runs deeper than the racist comment/micro aggression.

I’m in my 40s. When Miguel Garcia called me a n*gger on the maroon mat in a U.K. class room at age 9 Miss Murray told me I should have shared my book (green ham and eggs) with him.

What does the above tell you?

Sadly there will always be racist children/people. With my godson who is growing up in a rural part of Ireland his father and mother are making him read and watch things which reflect his racial and ethnic heritage. And just working on his confidence. I think the key is for him to be taught that some people are small minded and will pick on others for all sort of things and that there is absolutely nothing wrong with him but the issue is simply the others. Every time there’s an incident escalate with the school and don’t put it down to it’s happened again just forget it. It always needs to be challenged and if he can do this and you can support him with this when he is little he will be confident about it when he is older. Sadly children pick up things from their parents followed by their peers and it is never okay. Xx

For the record, while the above is hopefully rare in the U.K. now, I’m praying my DC don’t face the trauma of situations like that and do my best to avoid it (we live in a just about diverse London suburb, maybe 60% white).

Its easier to avoid the damage rather than having to fix it.

I wish you all the best OP but to an extent all the diverse books and films in the world do not counteract feeling safe and protected within your environment.

You will need to be your child’s advocate, your child will need to witness you protecting them.

It’s not just about the school coming down hard in bullies @SunsetOverTheBeach
they need to be encouraging active ally’s hip and anti-racism.

what are they doing to expose children to diverse role models? To teach about the importance of diversity? To celebrate the benefits of multiculturalism? What are they doing to foster pride and a sense of community?
those are the questions I’d be asking them

It's tricky, DS went to a primary school that was very white dominated - he was one of 6 in his 90 place school year. We had two incidences of racist issues during his primary school life (that he told me about). One in year R and one in Year 5. Both handled well by school and DS seemed to take it in his stride. He's now 19 and I still occasionally think about it. Both were racist terms that I felt could only have been learnt from adults and that makes me pretty angry

There are only a handful of non-white kids in the kid’s school (we are not white). She has spoken about blond hair being the best- maybe because her best friends are blond? I do challenge this and encourage her to value herself.
I do feel guilty for not paying for her to go to a PS which is really ethically diverse. I do think that this would make her feel differently about herself, but the school she is at gets excellent results too.
However, there is structural racism is so many areas of work/ life- that I think she’s going to have to live with micro-aggressions anyway? There’s been nothing overt she or we have faced where we live.
I have done well for myself - as has DH, and our work lives at least do not appear to have been affected. Reason being- we have worked hard and have not been held back due to our skills.
Personally -life in village - we have really lovely neighbours and most parents are friendly. Some of the school parents are frankly weirdly unwelcoming, it’s tiring to keep putting it to one side for sake of DD - but difficult to pin down to racism per se. It does make you wonder though.

It’s really obvious which posters are white & oblivious to racism & its effects.
glaringly obvious in fact.

Theres a presumption that any racism will come from children & the adults will all rush along to sort it out. Those children come from those adults. There is no one to sort it out. They are one and the same.