to be called racist

[UpsyOne]

in a nutshell

I am white with white children, friend of several years is black with black children.

I was looking after friends DS who is under 5 at her house. Her elderly mother lives with her as she is poorly and not well enough to look after children - she was there with me.

Her DS was attention seeking in a cute way, kept pretending to fall over and bump his head to get me to fuss him. When he did it I would call him a little monkey, make monkey noises and encourage him to make monkey noises back to me.

In hindsight I do realise that racists will call black people monkeys as an insult.

But I believe in evolution and therefore believe that we all descend from monkeys. Not only that, I do the whole "you little monkey" thing with my own children.

My friend has been really off with me since as I apparently upset her mum (wasnt aware of it at the time) and her mum actually called me a racist!!

Am I being unreasonable to think the whole thing is just ridiculous or was I somehow out of order?

Whether youa re a racist is about intent IMO,asracism is an active thing

I think goblinchild had the right answer to this, and I would suggest a letter explaining you didn't relaise the commonattions it ahd and youa re desperately sorry you unintentionally upset them and simply used the term as you do with your own children, but would now know.

FWIW I learned about the use of monkey as racial abuse on a MN thread years back myself, didn't know until then. I grew up in a rural area with only white British people (and moved to an area with loads of ethnicities, to did a degree in world faiths, so you know -rectified that slightly I hope). You don't know until you are told. My Dad didn't know not to say coloured until I told him last night, now he knows he won't use it, fair enough. Never occurred to him it could upset anyone.

YANBU - grandmothers do have their quirks so perhaps forgiveable from her but I'd have been pissed off too, if I were you. And more importantly narked that my friend didn't know mw well enough to realise that obviously I wasn't being racist. Hope you manage to resolve it.

Milly R, your posts have been v interesting, particularly 17;39 sunday. ive enjoyed reading them. There is definately a lot of value in the suggestion that if we didnt get madly defensive at whether or not we are being called racist, when its pointed out we may have inadvertedly engaged in racist behaviour, but took a look at the behaviour and learnt from it instead, the world would be a better place.

I agree with those that suggest you apologise and be the bigger person. FWIW I would not dream of using a term like that in front of black/mixed race kids as I know it could well be misconstrued. I think your friend is naturally siding with her elderly mother. As alot of said this used to be a v racist term so no wonder the poor lady was upset. I can see why you are upset, bit a simple explanation and apology should clear the air I hope....

Along with the idea of not meaning to cause offense (presumably through ignorance) is the idea of not taking offense when none is meant. I think that these two ideas should have equal weight in social interactions.

I also think that there is a kind of one-up-man-ship around what is and what is not considered racist. Many people are ignorant of many things and it is not acceptable for others to feel superior because they are 'in the know'.

I obviously committed a terrible faux pas this Christmas at the IL's when I asked my DN (white age 10) if there were any black children in his hip hop class. My BIL and SIL (both white) sneered at me and then in a very 'superior' tone asked 'why?'. They then began to 'polish their halos' as I grappled around for an 'acceptable' reason for asking the question.

What was my reason? I loved the idea of DN doing hip hop alongside his 'black' peers as a shared cultural experience. Is this wrong/racist?

Sorry for hijacking the thread.

I was thinking of starting my own but it seemed appropriate to post my comment/concern here.

Does anyone have a response to my previous post?

Thanks .

Thanks for that Harpy .

I would ask the question, does it matter whether there are any black kids in the hip hop class? What is the relevance?

But I don't claim to be morally superior to anyone. Perhaps that is your hang-up, rather than that of your BIL and SIL.