by Anti-Racist Parent Columnist Michelle Myers
I guess at first glance, I would appear to be a good candidate as a contributor for the Anti-Racist Parent: I’m a biracial woman (mother is Korean, father is white) who is married to black man, and we have 3 mixed race children: 2 girls (9-years-old and 20 months) and 1 boy (3-years-old). I also have 4 black, teenage stepsons. I think that when people hear about my background as well as my marriage and children, they assume that somehow I’ve gotten it right—that somewhere along the path of life I’ve discovered the secret to racial harmony and a “We are the World”-type existence. But I can’t say that my family—immediate or extended—could be poster-children for racial harmony. If anything, we live in constant negotiation of identity struggles, culture clashes, and societal pressures.
As a parent, I think the greatest disappointment I continually deal with is how my children are treated by other family members. This includes their grandparents on both sides. This is not to say that they are ill-treated or anything like that, but I have a particular sensitivity for my kids being treated differently b/c they’re part black or because they’re part Korean/white. This sensitivity comes from my own upbringing—my memories of feeling as if my cousin was showered with favoritism by my grandparents and uncles/aunts when we were little b/c she was the blood-haired, blue-eyed princess-of-a-grandchild. After my grandmother died, this same cousin told me that our grandmother had told her that she didn’t want my father marrying my mom, that when my father wrote to her saying he was going to marry a Korean girl he had met while stationed in Korea (he was in the Air Force), she wrote him back saying not to do it. B/c of these and other experiences I had while growing up, whenever I feel like my parents don’t seem interested in seeing our children (like you’d think grandparents would) or when it seems like my husband’s mother makes a point to spend time with her other grandchildren more so than with ours, I ruffle up.
Whether real or imagined, these kinds of negotiations remind me how much race consciousness (or a heightened sensitivity for racial attitudes, etc) has been so much a part of my life. I grew up in a rural area of South Jersey where there were plenty of white people, black people, and Latino people (mostly Puerto Rican) but hardly Asians. I was constantly trying to fit in as a child—“fitting in” usually translating into trying to be accepted by the white kids—but I was always acutely aware of not being white b/c my mother was Korean. And this awareness was not only limited to the way I felt I was being perceived or treated, but how I saw others being judged or treated. My white family were/are racist; they freely referred to black people as “niggers” or Latino people as “spics,” especially behind closed doors. Most of all, I thought if my white family felt the way they did about black people and Latino people just b/c of their race, then what was it that they REALLY thought of me and my brother?
Whatever issues I may still have from my own experiences, I hope, as a mother, that I can be there for my children when/if they have questions like the ones I had when I was growing up. My hope is that I can spare my children from all this drama—that my children can love themselves for all their multi-racial and multi-cultural beauty, and that my husband and I can find ways to provide them with the nurturing and support and hard lessons that they need to be well-adjusted and only moderately scathed as they grow into adults. Toward that end, I hope that the contributors and readers of this blog will help me discover better approaches to raising my children as I personally strive to be an Anti-Racist Parent.
Michelle Myers holds a Ph.D. in English from Temple University, specializing in Asian American Literature. She is a founding member of the spoken word poetry group Yellow Rage, which was featured on HBO’s RUSSELL SIMMONS PRESENTS DEF POETRY
Great to have you with us, Michelle!
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I love this post. It gave me a lot to think about…mostly about how much more complicated things can be when you add more than one racial/ethnic background. Each group has its own set of rules and that can make it really difficult for kids to find a place to land.
I look forward to hearing what you have to say.
When racism comes from a stranger it is so much easier to defend yourself than when it comes from family. These are the challenges that are the hardest to ignore and even harder to address for fear of losing that relationship however hurtful at times.
Michelle: Wordy McWord.
With casual acquiantences or strangers, you feel justified and righteous. With family, you’re left going, “Have they always been like this? What’s been said behind my back all these years? How clueless am I?” It makes you question not just the one person, but the entire family unit, and sometimes the whole dynamic.
One of my uncles has spent 15 years making racist jibes, and otherwise starting trouble or debates without really following through (intellectual honesty not being his strong suit). What started as addressing me with “Ongawa” every time he saw me (some West African greeting he learned in the Navy) turned into affirmative action debates at Easter. He finally apologized last Christmas right out of the blue, and I accepted.
But he just doesn’t understand that my child view of him is long gone, he’s not my funny playmate uncle anymore, and he’s not getting that back. If nothing else, I’m MORE sensitive to any comment he makes and more likely to take offense, even when he doesnt’ mean it, because of that history.
Welcome, Michelle, looking forward to hearing from you!
Michelle, welcome! A few of my friends struggle with similar issues you’ve voiced here and I will be sending them to this intro. I enjoyed your work as part of Yellow Rage and I’m really looking forward forward to reading more of your columns!
I am glad to see others of like mind out there. I am a white mommy of a multiracial girl and had to let my own father go because of his views. One of the hardest things to do but it paid off. He came around and now loves my daughter. He still has his own ideas i know i cant change that. What i have done is laid down the law…. Absolutey no racial remarks or jokes of any kind. He was told in no uncertain terms that to expose her to that from family would cut the deepest. And if it were to happen they would not be allowed to visit with her. Some might see it as extreme but my daughters emotional health is more important. She has her whole life to deal with that b.s. From others it shouldn’t be from family as well.
This is the cousin(you know the blond-haired, blue eyed princess of a granddaughter) of Michelle Myers. The sad part about that statement is that she was actually me grandmother’s favorite. My grandmother raised her for quite some time before my aunt and uncle came back to New Jersey after he was dicharged. My grandmother loved her like her own child and than one day with no notice my uncle showed up to take Michelle home and it broke her heart. It wouldn’t have been so bad if my grandmother could have seen her on a regular basis like any other normal family but my aunt and uncle have always alienated themselves from the family, just like my cousins have. When I read this article I began to cry because during our childhood I always looked up to Michelle. I always wanted to be like Michelle. She was the pretty one, the smart one. My grandparents, parents and my other aunt and uncles never treated Michelle or her brother any different, they loved them and still do. Maybe my grand mother didn’t want my uncle to marry my aunt but you have to remember the time in witch she was raised. I don’t know what kind of racism my cousins may had to deal with from other children but their “white” family didn’t do anything but love them. Maybe my cousins children’s grandparents do treat them differently but speaking for the rest of her “white family” we haven’t even been given the opportunity to meet them. I to have half African American and white children and my “white ” family loves them. Sure I’ve come in contact with a lot of racist people both white and black because I date a black guy. There will always be racist people in this world. I just try to teach my children not to judge people by the way they look or the color of their skin but by the kind of person they are.