Single white mother raising a mixed race child

[Dudelsack]

Hello everyone, I hope you can all give me some kind of advice regarding the kind of challenges my son might face due to being mixed race. His dad grew up in Africa so can't give much insight to what it is like growing up as part of a racial minority and I would really like to know what to expect for my son so that when the topics of race and ethnicity come up we know how to deal with them.
He is 3 years old but I have already had some comments about him growing up to be a basketball player and comments about his hair which haven't sat right with me but I don't really know how to respond.

I have read things like young black males are more likely to be stopped and searched by police, black males are under represented at universities, they don't always recieve access to mental health support etc etc. I'm sure there is a long list of ways that he is going to be discrimminated against and I'm just really trying to get an idea of what he is up against. What are the major challenges to look out for and how do you prepare yourselves and your children for them?

I appreciate your sentiment and think it's great you are seeking out to learn - but honestly I don't think you can preempt these kind of discussion.

I think you need to deal with them case by case as situations arise.

In the meantime just ensure you are providing positive images of black and mixed race people so he feels his race is a positive thing - so buy him books where the lead is black, tv programmes etc. I think this is important.

I also think his dad even though hasn't had the exact same experience should be at hand to help deal with such situations as he will have a level of understanding that you may not.

Please don't take that offensively but it's the same as a man helping a daughter through periods and girls stuff - just not the same as if it was to come from the mother.

The simple answer is your can't. You are white and a female. Your life experience has been and will be different. You are already seeing that he is treated different in society from how a white girl would be treated.

Even as a black female there is a limit in what I can do to help a black boy because I am female.

For example when my a couple of nephews were looking for jobs while they talked to me, they found it more useful listening to and talking to their younger uncles (my younger brothers) and my male friends, who are a mixture of ethnicities.

So as well as ensuring your son has positive images of black and black-mixed ethnicity people, also ensure he in real life has adult male role models especially black and black-mixed ethnicity ones.

Yes it does involve you doing more work than you would do if your child was white but it makes a difference.

Mixed race person here who grew up in the 80s as the child of an African mother and white British dad. Now parent to mixed race. Firstly its lovely you're thinking ahead and being aware that there will be difference in your DCs experiences and treatment. As Pp said just keep making sure he sees black and mixed people in books, TV and movies. Always be open about how the world works and whilst I don't think you need to make it all horribly negative, just prepping him that 'be aware, some people aren't very well educated and might treat you differently and these are some of the ways you deal with it' can be useful to stop the shock of someone making a remark which later you wished you'd addressed with a statistic or historical information.

OP saw this article on Lewis Hamilton and thought of this thread - www.theguardian.com/sport/2021/jul/10/lewis-hamilton-everything-id-suppressed-came-up-i-had-to-speak-out

Hi OP. My advice as a white mother of black sons is to start now to do the work on yourself. Educate yourself on white privilege and bias and start now. Doing this will help you in a number of ways. One the reading will arm you with vocabulary to meet the bigots for what they are. You’ll be able to see through them quicker and as a result you’ll be able to advocate for your son faster and stronger. This will help you both and save a lot of heart ache along the way. What it will also do, equally importantly, is that it will help you realise and deal with your own bias as white. You’ll be surprised at what you find. It will be heartbreaking and uncomfortable a lot of the time but this work is crucial. Be brave, and go to the deepest depth of the uncomfortable. Reflect on it, confront it and grow. Help your child to connect with his black heritage and culture. Don’t just raise him as black white person. This is important.
Keep black people close. Friends, your children’s friends, family and work colleagues. Keep them close and show your son that this is heritage and that you see it and want it for him. All said with much love from fellow white mother of black sons.

It's hard to say how things will go OP. But it depends on many things how diverse is your area where you live? Your child's future school. What your own family and friends are like.

I think what really matters is how educated and confident you are about your child's heritage.

Treta him as mixed raced and not black. Embrace all sides of his culture and teach him about his white and black heritage. Remind him he is a child who is equal to all others and deal with situations when they arise. Teach him to be colourblind and to accept others for who they are on the inside - this will teach him how ignorant someone is when they judge him for his colour.

@UnwantedOpinionBelow

Treta him as mixed raced and not black. Embrace all sides of his culture and teach him about his white and black heritage. Remind him he is a child who is equal to all others and deal with situations when they arise. Teach him to be colourblind and to accept others for who they are on the inside - this will teach him how ignorant someone is when they judge him for his colour.

Treat him to be “colourblind”? Says no parent of a black child ever.

I agree with Lndnmummy. There is nothing wrong with seeing the colour of a person's skin. What is wrong, is making assumptions, and stereotyping plus thinking negatively about people based on their skin colour.

@C130

I agree with Lndnmummy. There is nothing wrong with seeing the colour of a person's skin. What is wrong, is making assumptions, and stereotyping plus thinking negatively about people based on their skin colour.

This. There is no such thing as colourblind - at least not when it comes to race.

Anyway, you've had good advice - it's caution taking advice from other white people though. However well-intentioned, the advice can be harmful in the long run, simply because like you, they have no lived experience of racism.

I think you absolutely need to involve his dad in these discussions because you need to look beyond stereotypes for certain things. Black African kids often do have slightly different experiences than Black Caribbean kids. For example all of my black origin friends who went to uni had 1st generation African parents. Out of the friends who didn’t go almost all of them had Caribbean heritage. That kind of divide isn’t just found within black society. Amongst my Indian friends those with 1st gen African parents all went to uni while only 50% of with 1st gen Indian parents did.

But when you look at who managed to find work after uni it’s all a bit skewed towards the Indo-Indian side who all managed to find professional work more easily without going to uni.

I would think carefully about what school he goes to when he’s older. Also echo what others say, lots of black people in his life, tv shows, books all featuring mixed raced/black people. Learn about his hair and how to care for it properly.