Horrified. My DS mentioned a girl in his class’s skin colour.

[leggyloop]

just dropped DS age 7 in year 2 to school, a girl’s mum in his class pulled me to the side. DS did mention to me yesterday that he had fallen out with this girl and that in his words “she was being annoying to me and rude to me” so I had assumed a bit of butting heads but he didn’t want to talk about it anymore and then carried on being his usual energetic self.

So the girl’s mum stopped me and said she knows her daughter is no angel because she gives it out to her big brother and can be unpleasant at times, but she said my son was bullying her and he mentioned her skin colour.

I assured the girl’s mum that it is not acceptable and I will have a strong word with him as well as insisting he apologises to the girl.

Never had any situation lime with before and feeling upset for the girl and her mum!

What do I do?

What did he say exactly?
I assume that didn’t call her a racial slur because you used the word “mention” which sounds more minor.
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Do not enter into this dramatically with your son, just have a calm talk with him to establish what happened.

I can still remember asking my mum once (when I was about the same age as your son, OP) 'why is Susan brown?' (Susan was my best friend as a child). I remember it so well, I even remember where we were. My mum replied, sternly 'I never want to hear you say anything like that again.' I knew, at that very moment what my mum meant by that.

The girl's mum has said that her daughter can be feisty but has also used the word 'bullying' about your son - put that accusation to one side while you speak to your son.

Up to about age 7, children are still learning the rules of wider society, and learning which rules can be bent and which rules are very serious.

Things like not stealing sweets from the shop, and not using racial slurs when another child has annoyed them - they learn these are very serious.
Things like waiting for the green man before crossing the road - they learn this is not serious and many adults break the rule all the time.

Don't over-react, your child is not going to grow up to join the EDF. Just make sure he learns the appropriate lesson.

For a child to notice that another child has a different skin colour is not racist. My daughter's best friends are not white and when she draws pictures of them she talks about how she has chosen this pen because X has light brown skin but this other pen is better for Y because her skin is darker. Making any mention of skin colour taboo runs the risk of suggesting to children that having brown or black skin is somehow so embarrassing that we must pretend we can't see it.

Children of course have to learn that there is a sensitivity around skin and in speech it isn't neutral in the way that commenting on someone's eye colour and hair colour is.

For your son, the big lesson is that mentioning someone's skin colour in the context of a quarrel is hugely inappropriate. Of course any comment on personal appearance in an argument is unkind (e.g. it's fine to say 'you are being mean', but not fine to say 'you're being mean and I don't like your orange hair/ugly glasses'). But it's a good idea to reinforce that bringing in skin colour is more unacceptable than either of those.

TBF I'm white (we are Irish and very pale) and as a kid had white blonde hair too. I grew up in a northern area of England which was very undiverse and where everyone else was white and people have mentioned my skin colour my whole life especially as a child. I got pale, pasty, ill, sickly, deathly, turned white, like a ghost, look dead, like death, death warmed up, ghostly, albino etc... all the time.

People couldn't seem to help themselves from saying something, every first time meeting someone but even lots of people who knew me and saw me every day and KNEW I am just this pale still commented on it all the time.

It was rude but it was all white people saying it to another white person and no one clutched their pearls or thought anything of it.

Racism isn't acceptable or a nice but is it always instantly a 'racism' thing, really depends more on what was said, the context and most importantly the intent.

When children are being unkind they will just pick on anything that's different about the other child, hair colour, glasses, size, clothes, skin colour. At 7 years old they aren't being racist they are just being unkind. That is the issue you have here and need to understand why your child is being unkind. The other child may have said something equally unkind to your son, him saying one unkind thing certainly doesn't give the other parent the right to label him as a bully.

Talk with the teacher! They're more likely to have witnessed the exact words used and to have a better idea about the relationships and atmosphere.

We've had some awful racist language used at our school but sadly that's come from children who've obviously heard it at home. It's good that you're surprised about what he's potentially said because that suggests to me that you're not using racist language at home.

Talk with the teacher because you're concerned and you want the bigger picture and you want to nip this in the bud. They should be able to help you talk about it with your child in an age appropriate way if he has said something hurtful regardng the colour of the other child's skin.

It's not enough to just not be racist, we need to be anti racist and I'd be surprised if your school hadn't been on an anti-racism journey in recent years so they should be able to support the children with their understanding around this.

As the other mum also used the words "bullying" I would definitely arrange a conversation with the class teacher. The word gets bandied around a lot even when an incident isn't actually bullying but a disagreement or fight between two children. Again, if I were you I would want the full picture from the adults. Maybe your son is bullying her and it's best that you're part of ending that but maybe he's not bullying her and it's still a good idea to make sure you're proactive about it in partnership with the school rather than just directly with other parents who only get their own child's side of a story.

Agree it does matter what was said. However in most circumstances, in an argument, it's rarely acceptable to refer to someone's skin colour. If it's outside an argument then may be ok dpeendent on context, but if ita during an argument it's always going to be intended as / taken as a criticism and is probably irrelevant to what they were arguing about.

Unless it caused a huge upset I don't think the teacher would likely have heard. I'd therefore ask the mum what exactly was said first

Absolutely this. There is indeed a lot of hysteria around the subject. If you mention someone's hair colour, its no big deal.

You need to know what your son actually said to the girl. Noticing someone's skin colour is different, and passing comment on that fact, is vastly different to using derogatory language regarding it.

Also if this incident happened in school, did the girl tell a teacher? Again, you need to find this information out. If the girl did tell a member of staff, then your son should have been spoken with. I wouldn't necessarily have expected staff to tell you, unless they believed your son did indeed make a racist comment. If the girl didn't tell a staff member, then why not? Surely this would be the exact time to tell someone. Instead she went home and told Mum.

Personally, I would approach the teacher, ask if she's aware of the incident. The teacher then can speak to the girl and then your son. I've worked in Infant/Junior schools a long time, and it's always important to get the facts from both sides, before making an opinion. Children do lie, they also exaggerate and can misunderstand.

The Mum hasn't told you what was said. She hasn't asked you to speak to your son, to get his side of the story. Her daughter could absolutely be telling the truth, you son may have made a racist comment but equally he might not have done. She could have lied to her Mum, she could have exaggerated a comment made to her or completely misunderstood.

Speak to your son and then the school. If your son does admit to using language he shouldn't, then this is the time to teach him about racism and make him realise how wrong and hurtful it is.

Are some skin tones so horrifying that it is now even an insult to mention them?

Surely no-one is ashamed of the colour of their own skin to the extent that it must not even be referred to or is this the case now?

I'd venture that most of us with darker skin tones do not care if it is mentioned in a non-derogatory way. I don't really mind if I am drawn with brown skin, either by a child or an adult, for instance. My skin is brown and I like it.

I agree with this, the obsession with not mentioning skin colour is not helpful or natural. It makes children feel like there is something wrong with other skin colours that we must not mention.

We are Middle Eastern and our family ranges in skin tone from light to dark. I tell them everyone has different skin colour, just like hair or eye colour. I also tell them not to make any personal comments about people where they can hear because it might make them feel uncomfortable ie 'Look at that old lady' or 'Why is he so tall.'

Obviously you need to get the facts of this specific encounter, but you need to do it with caution and nuance, not overreact because it's a forbidden topic. You don't want to unintentionally teach your children that darker skin is a bad thing that you can never talk about.

I would get him a couple of books for kids about racism and explain about protected characteristics in general and how mentioning those even if we are cross with someone crosses a line and is unacceptable

Exactly!

I once watched someone try to describe a black colleague without actually saying she was black. I would have been pretty insulted if I was her, as if her very skin tone was so bad it must not be mentioned.

I would find out exactly what he said and what was said just before.

Would you really force your son to apologise to this girl if she'd been insulting or pushing him physically for ten minutes beforehand? Even her own mother says the girl is unpleasant which probably means she had been really awful to your son prior to the incident.

That doesn't means he should have insulted her using her skin colour but it does mean you should look at yourself.

You responded the right way and your ds is young enough to learn.

OP said it was mentioned when her son was bullying the other child. Of course, we only have one side of the story, but the clear suggestion is that skin colour was used in a negative way.

OP needs to refer to the school to find out what happened (and, I'd suggest let them deal with it and keep an eye on both children), but separately have a conversation with her child (not necessarily mentioning this specific incident) about appropriate and inappropriate uses of language.

You don't know what went down between kids. Mum of the girl wasn't there either.
Don't worry, if you are not like that, your 7 years old isn't either. He is still learning a lot from you, whatever oozes out of you. It's still some years when you'll complete with his peers.

I think that you need to stop engaging with this woman and go through the school. Maybe what this woman is saying is completely accurate but you need to go through the school, it just makes it worse otherwise.

As for skin colour, I wouldn't jump to conclusions. Sometimes kids say what they see and don't have the same motivations as an adult when they say it. There's a way to teach them to be sensitive to issues around race that doesn't blame them or accuse them of being racist.

Yes, get the facts first op!

You do not actually know what happened. I'm not sure why you instantly believed the other parent. Never just believe the other parent because I can guarantee the truth lies somewhere in the middle of what your DS will say and what the other child's parents is saying.

Speak to the school, find out the facts. What was actually said? Who said what to who? How the school dealt with it? etc.
If the school have not mentioned it to you, its likely what the child told her mum is not true. Bullying is a repeated and targeted action. A one off instance is not bullying. Mentioning a child's skin colour can be innocent - are we really in the place where even acknowledging someone is different is racist.

I've dealt with the mum going around saying my child was bullying hers. 100% was not true. Her daughter was verbal having a go at my child every day and one day he punched back. Obviously my child was not in the right either but I 100% stand by the fact that it was not bullying and the other parent was throwing the word around to make her daughter seem like the angel she is not.

You're being very sensible, leggyloop; clearly it would be completely unacceptable if he used her skin colour as a negative, but you don't know that yet so context, intent and what he actually said are all

Also don't forget that this allegedly originated with her being rude to him, and some parents tend to grasp at whatever will put their own "in the right" if it comes to a challenge

Yes agree

OP

Were you so dumfounded when you heard that your son had mentioned the little girl's skin colour that your wits deserted you and it didn't matter what had been done or said to your boy?

When she admitted that her daughter could be unpleasant, why on earth wasn't your first question to ask what she had done or said?

It sounds as if all it took to make you shake in your shoes and be horrified was this mentioning.

It seems you couldn't even gather yourself to ask what form exactly this mentioning had taken.