My daughter is not politically correct !![blush]

[mummyloveslucy]

Our daughter is nearly three. about 5 months ago she chose a black baby doll. She loves this doll and calls it "my brown baby", which we thaught was sweet. A little black girl has recently started at Lucy's nursery. Lucy loves her and she is her new best friend. The problem is she calls her "my brown baby". We correct her when she says this saying her name, but Lucy can't say it. She somtimes points to her and says my friend is brown.
To her this is a good thing and like saying that she's beautiful or special but it sounds awfull. The little girl is only 2 and dosn't mind at all. But I'm a bit worried what her Mum might think. What would you do ??

could you get a photo of this little girl, and use that to teach Lucy the girl's name - DS was useless with names at that age, I found photos really helped.

i am sure mum will find it cute too.

don't worry

Don't think there's much you can do at that age - they're so blissfully unaware of all the baggage a 'different colour' brings. My dd was about 3.5 when someone I worked with, who happened to be black, came round for dinner and dd innocently asked him "why are you brown?", was moderately embarrassed but we all laughed it off and I explained to her simply that everyone's different, ie some people have blonde hair etc etc. All you can really do at that age, IMO there's no point burdening them with all the PC stuff until they can understand it much better.

I think her mum might get a bit offended, tbh - I understand why you're concerned. Just work on the name, like you're doing.

I explained to my two at about that age that some people thought it mattered what colour your skin was and that they wrongly thought that black skin was worse than white skin.

Ds's closest friend at nursery (he started there when he was just 3) was 'a boy with a brown face'
The boy was from Pakistan.

Incidentally both boys are now 8, in the same class at school and still friends. Ds has completely forgotten he ever used to say that, and to be fair, it was nothing more that an observation to him. And an accurate one at that

I think you should not worry, and be proud of your dd for being so at easy with our multicultural differences And I am sure her friend's mum will see it this way too.

My dd said things like that all the time. My nephews are mixed race and she has always said that she 'wants brown skin like x ' when she grows up. When friends visited she would comment on their dc-running up to them and touching them and shouting 'mummy , look x has beautiful brown skin"
I found it a bit embarassing and tbh people we didn't know that well looked a bit uncomfortable but I would just explain that everyones different and agree that yes x is beautiful, isn't she/ he
What else can you do? Their innocence is so beautiful but awkward for us as grown ups.

My nephew is mixed race and when he was born he was very small and hairy and dd loudly informed mil that her aunty had a monkey. There was no malice intended it was obviously what he looked like to her 5 year old mind. Now she is 6 and thinks that everyone has a mixed race cousin, if anyone black is on the tv she says "oh i bet he is someones cousin". We explained that everyone looks different and different people live in different ways this also helped when we told her about her gay uncle.

I don't think you have anything to worry about. After all, her friends skin IS brown!! Just maybe practice saying her name?

That's so funny mrsruffallo and oliviaelanasmum. They are so innocent arn't they? I'm hoping that her Mum won't understand what Lucy is saying because she is quite hard to understand as she has a speech delay. I know that if the little girl called Lucy Pink baby, I would find it funny.

I used to call my next door neighbour the "brown boy". I can remember my babysitter being horrified and me not understanding why because he WAS brown!

dd is 4 and i have found that she does not even see peoples colour. her class is very mixed in ethnicity but when i was trying to work out who she was talking about skin colour was totally irrelevant and not something she had registered at all. i think we got there through hair length and style in the end.

weork on the name

it cant be that difficult - your dd will come up with her own version of it

I think I would maybe find Brown baby amusing once or twice but would think it odd not to persevere with name

Remember when my DD first noticed that someone had a brown face. Had actually seen people of all different nationalities all her life, but this guy had very white hair as well. I got 'Mummy, that man has a brown face', cue awkward pause, then 'and mummy, your face is orange' .

Made the mistake of relaying this to MIL, at which point she said 'and grandma, your face is grey'.

Must do somethibg about my foundation...

I'm sure her mum won't mind my friend has 2 mixed race children and it happens all the time she doesn't mind at all, my ds tells people that him and x are different because x is brown.

Where we lived when I was 4, London, all the other kids in that street were black except me and my bro and I told my Mum I wanted to be a "brownie". She said i could be when I turned 6 (she was assuming Brownie, like Girl Guide!) I went away very happy about that.

@ noughty

mommafeelgood, that's so sweet! We have been practasing saying her name together and she can say her own version of it. The little girl has only just started at the nursery so hopefully she'll start using her name soon. I'm sure the nursery staff will encourage her to do so when I'm not there.

Oh and when I droped her at nursery this am, she saw her friend and said "hello and her name" she then looked at me and said "she my friend". I think we might have cracked it!.