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 am mixed and my kids were brought up in London so the topic came up at a younger age.
I would make sure that my son was at a more diverse school from year 7. Being in a white rural area was always going to be even harder for your ds.
Secondary school brings up new issues. Social Media brings up the opportunity to bully and have the messages disappear plus secondary school culture means that snitching will put a target on your back.
I live in the Home Counties now and my kids go to school which is 240 entry (so pretty big) There is racism but kids are more likely to call it out because it's quite diverse.

Your child will continue to experience racism so you have to equip yourself - read. Join multi cultural groups and make sure that your child has role models that look like him as he grows up. Consider moving - it will get worse for him as he gets older especially through secondary.

are making him read and watch things which reflect his racial and ethnic heritage.

This is all very well but being made to read/watch stuff may just foster a sense of otherness from the children around them, and emphasise difference.

In a multiculture you don’t need to look for role models at the end of a telescope because you are surrounded by poc of varied ethnicities which supports identity even in an unconscious level.

What ethnicity is he?

For my son who is mixed black and white, I would watch and read about black figures in history, we have artwork in the house that celebrates black identity, we have a mix of friends from different counties.

Not trying to put boot in but I wouldn't raise my son in a white area like where I grew up. I just wouldn't him to deal with that level of toxicity on a daily basis.

Moved schools. Not worth the trauma.

Do not raise mixed race children in small villages where there is little diversity
My nephew and niece are mixed race. My sister sent them to a school which was very diverse in order to avoid the issues faced by the Op
My nephew and niece are extremely proud of their mixed heritage. They are lovely and confident children

It’s all very well telling the child that it’s not their fault and the problem is with the perpetrators but in the end, it’s the child that has to live through it, ensure it, dread school, fight back the tears and battle it.

chose to live in a diverse area of the city for this reason. still had some racism, notably by teachers at school but the kids don't feel so alone. they have strength from their peers and have mostly been able to challenge it themselves. any upset, we have comforted in the same way as if they are upset for other reasons but always talk about racism, prejudice, inequality etc as we are quite a politically interested family I suppose

'children need to see themselves reflected in the world around them'

i can't remember where the quote is from, but I think it's true

There is literally no area of the UK that has beyond a handful of people from my ex-husbands nationality it in
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It doesn't matter.

My DD, who is mixed, looks very similar in ethnicity to two girls and two boys she plays with at nursery and CM. They are all completely different ethnicities.

Yes it will matter when they are older but as small children they know there are other children who look like them.
**

yeah, I agree, the nationality isn't as important as just not being the only non-white kid

OP I'm white and my DH is Indian, we live in a predominantly white Middle class area.
DS went through the same around Yr 4, reference to his skin colour looking like poo 🙄.
School dealt with it and all we could do was stress to DS that the boys who said it were silly, they were just trying to upset/hurt him and they were using his skin colour because it was something different, like kids who wear glasses, and that he should be proud of his skin. He suffered some awful names from one boy in high school too.
Thankfully he has had really lovely supportive friends who backed him up and had his back.
He's 17 now and it hasn't affected him.
As for some posters pretty much saying its your fault for choosing a non diverse area to live in, I have no words to say how ridiculous that is, they should ashamed 😡

❤

@minionsrule why should they be ashamed?

The posters saying that will not be white and have suffered racism themselves.

they are giving their opinion based on first hand experience of exactly what OP is asking about. it can hardly be called 'ridiculous' or shameful can it 🤷🏼‍♀️

I'm with everyone else I'm afraid. For me there was no other option but to move area.

Your son is affected you just can't see it.

To be fair you can’t always tell. A very old friend of mine is the same racial mix - Indian father white British mother - and he didn’t tell his parents about the extent of the racism experienced at school until he was 30. Children tend to protect their parents.

Getting a teacher to read a kid friendly book about racism to a the class so people understand it wrong or get headteacher to talk to the kids

This.

You will never understand the damage this does to a person mentally, emotionally and even physically. You cannot change the school but you can change your circumstances. You have a duty of care to think seriously about moving for secondary so he is in a multicultural environment. Unfortunately having a child with a non-white person comes with an added layer of parenting responsibility. It shouldn't be that way but unfortunately it is. You will need to do your homework.

My son never experienced it, still doesn’t.

Because sometimes in life you don't always have the means to just move somewhere else on a whim if you have committed to an area before kids.

I live in a predominantly white area but it is generally a great place to raise kids, low crime, lots of outdoor spaces, great schools, its pretty safe and we all love it. My mixed race ds is not miserable because he doesn't have his own people around him, he loves his white mates and gf. Its not a one size fits all.
Are we saying people should now move to diverse areas so their kids fit in or else they are bad parents?
OP hopefully this was a brief incident and it won't continue now the school have handled it

@minionsrule

As @MarmaladeFatkins , who for some reason quoted me, rightly said if you experienced racism during your own schooling then you will look at the reasons why you encountered it and ensure your child isn't put in the sane situation. You will also warn other parents of mixed ethnicity children who ask for advice of what to be aware off. As a white person you won't have this experience.

sozzers @RedWingBoots , meant to quote minionsrule

There has been a lot of discussions about skin colour. Although my son is mixed race his skin colour is very light olive. In summer it naturally goes “golden” and is in line with what a white person who lives in a sunny climate looks like.

He is extremely proud of his heritage. I lived in his father’s home country for many many years. I went there initially as I was fascinated by many aspects of their culture. I speak the language and know quite a bit about their festivals and traditions, He has role models from that country in the world of sport who he keenly follows. He is following their national team in the World Cup and hopes they win. We are also huge fans of food from his father’s country and many other aspects of that culture.

I agree that he needs to be around people from his father’s country and I’ll look into making that happen.

However we are not moving. It’s actually astounding how blaze people are about it. It will not magically solve the issue of racism. My son went to the school nursery from age 3 and is part of a VERY close knit group of friends that are literally our neighbours. He loves living here and is looking forward to going to high school with the same friends he has had since he was 3. I’m not taking that away from him. Aside from these couple of incidents he is thriving! He is extremely confident, healthy and happy.

I am offended by some posters suggestions that he’s living through some sort of hell for the sake of me being close to my family!