Skeptical Greg
Agave Wine Connoisseur
I wonder if people who are blind from birth, can grasp the concept of racism ..
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Racial Bias Among Children
- Thread starter cienaños
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slingblade
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They certainly understand discrimination, personal and institutional. The fact that they've never seen color doesn't mean they can't easily grasp the basic concept.
abenja1
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Have you seen the Chappelle's show skit with the blind, black man who is the leader of the KKK
I've got a heart-warming true story that might fit in here. I don't usually 'do' heartwarming, but, wtf, as they say. (Actually, no one says "wtf". Its always in text. I can't even pronounce wtf.)
My daughter was 4 years old; I brought her to a daycare center in our town, and picked her up after work.
She had a best friend at daycare that she told me about. I hadn't met the little girl because she came in after I did, and was picked up before I came back.
One saturday, my daughter asked if her friend could come over to play.
I was all in favor, and made the arrangements.
Keep in mind that we're Irish cracker-ass-crackers; hillbillies; white trash.
So we pick up her friend, and she's black!
This was amazingly refreshing to me, because, with all the descriptions my daughter used to describe her new friend, "dark-skinned" never even made the cut.
She told me how pretty she was, for instance, and she was.
She told me how funny she was, and she was.
I got lucky with my daughters. All grown up now, they remain this way.
My daughter was 4 years old; I brought her to a daycare center in our town, and picked her up after work.
She had a best friend at daycare that she told me about. I hadn't met the little girl because she came in after I did, and was picked up before I came back.
One saturday, my daughter asked if her friend could come over to play.
I was all in favor, and made the arrangements.
Keep in mind that we're Irish cracker-ass-crackers; hillbillies; white trash.
So we pick up her friend, and she's black!
This was amazingly refreshing to me, because, with all the descriptions my daughter used to describe her new friend, "dark-skinned" never even made the cut.
She told me how pretty she was, for instance, and she was.
She told me how funny she was, and she was.
I got lucky with my daughters. All grown up now, they remain this way.
DrKarlKid
Scholar
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I agree with you. when children are educated with and grow up with people of different nationalities and cultures they find it hard to attribute these people with negative conatations unless incidents involving those cultures impinge on them. sometimes the experiences of interaction with people of other cultures can even overcome inherant racism from the home. we can all hope anyway
DrKarlKid
Scholar
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Oh yeah that skit had me on the ground rollingHave you seen the Chappelle's show skit with the blind, black man who is the leader of the KKK
Thanks for doing heartwarming this one time. That really is a cool story.
Juniversal
CIA + FBI + NWO Employee
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My heart has been warmed.
lol But for a personal story i'll tell you my best, best friend from youth (before even entering kindergarden) was white. I'm not as dark as night but i'm dark skinned lol. I'll tell you that I NEVER EVER saw him as my so-called "white friend" and I doubt he ever thought of me as his "black friend". Honestly he was like a brother to me and my actual brother. There wasn't many kids in my neighborhood so we spent many a summer playing together. Also my elementry school was relatively diverse. Not overwhelmingly black or white (as well as having a few asians and hispanics scattered through out lol). So most us black folks had many white friends and vice versa.That's why I personally find it important to be cultured and exposed to different types of people. It's disturbing that in a city like Cincinnati that's just about half white and half black that you have schools that are 90% black (which was pretty much every school I went to after elementry) or 90% white. It's disturbing that many kids don't have the experience I had and only grow up around folks that looks like themselves. Naturally I feel this can lead to skewed perceptions of people.
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I love stories that reaffirm the idea that the a**hole gene is in fact colorblind. Just like the not an a**hole gene is.
Great.
But there's a bigger question here. It has to do with anticipation. It seems to me that if globalisation is already here, it behooves us to prepare kids to work with that which is different rather than work against that which is different.
If globalisation is going to sustain itself - xenophobic anxieties are going to have to become a thing of the past, like super fast.
eta: photo evidence of the a**hole gene available upon request
Great.
But there's a bigger question here. It has to do with anticipation. It seems to me that if globalisation is already here, it behooves us to prepare kids to work with that which is different rather than work against that which is different.
If globalisation is going to sustain itself - xenophobic anxieties are going to have to become a thing of the past, like super fast.
eta: photo evidence of the a**hole gene available upon request
Skeptical Greg
Agave Wine Connoisseur
This implies that you believe kids are currently being prepared to work against that which is different..
What do you base this on ?
In part, this...
...and this
Apparently this guy Thomas L Dynneson has been doing some work in the area. From his bio:
"Civism, as I have described it, is a special insight into the means that states and state leaders use to influence, shape and direct the citizens understanding of their role and their identify in reference to the state. This research has led me to investigate the use of persuasive means for the purpose of influencing the political mindset of citizens in various cultures and societies. After completing two written works on civism, I am working on a theoretical work aimed at specifically clarifying the role of civism in politics, society, and culture. This study includes the development of a means, methodology, for analyzing political rhetoric, which is based on ten common themes related to my studies of civism."
EeneyMinnieMoe
Philosopher
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Contrary to popular belief, children are not color blind. They may notice color less than adults do and may not have been fully taught and conditioned to discriminate on the basis of color but they do notice it. Either in a positive way or negative way. They still respond to people of their own race and differentiate between people of other races.
Here's an anecdote about it. I'm acquainted with an elderly Jamaican woman who is an educator and anthropologist. She was shopping one day and saw a white woman with a beautiful little Ethiopian boy. She stopped to talk to them and found out that the woman and her female lover had adopted him from Africa as a baby. As the adopted mother and the Jamaican woman were talking, the little boy suddenly pointed to the Jamaican woman and said to his mother "Mommy, mommy, look, look, this lady is brown just like me! Can she come to our house?!".
The adopted mother became so jealous at the way he responded to the woman that she didn't give her a call back (they had exchanged phone numbers).
Here's an anecdote about it. I'm acquainted with an elderly Jamaican woman who is an educator and anthropologist. She was shopping one day and saw a white woman with a beautiful little Ethiopian boy. She stopped to talk to them and found out that the woman and her female lover had adopted him from Africa as a baby. As the adopted mother and the Jamaican woman were talking, the little boy suddenly pointed to the Jamaican woman and said to his mother "Mommy, mommy, look, look, this lady is brown just like me! Can she come to our house?!".
The adopted mother became so jealous at the way he responded to the woman that she didn't give her a call back (they had exchanged phone numbers).
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Delvo
Дэлво Δε&#
"Children" is too broad anyway. It's common to go through phases at different ages, in which the same person will respond to the same stimuli very differently. For example, clowns and people who put on big costumes on the job such as Disney characters or Smokey Bear are taught not to try to interact with kids in a certain age range at all or at least to be quick to bail out at the slightest sign of trouble, because kids in that age range are likely to be scared of them, even though kids of a different age range are more likely to think those characters/personas are cute and fun.
Generally speaking, I'm not sure it is a popular belief that children are colorblind [in salad bowl societies]. What you're saying is closer to the truth, I think. There is variation in what kids believe regarding skin color and that variation is great. Obviously it's a composite reflection of what their parents believe, along with what they pick up at school and in the media. As taxpayers, which of these three variables can we adjust? Should we?
In terms of the U.S. - the ripples of slavery and the civil rights movement help paint a clear picture. Like say, in regions where [for whatever jambalaya of reasons, including economic] integration occurred at a faster pace, there seems to be a higher tolerance for "that which is different."
Here's an anecdote about it. I'm acquainted with an elderly Jamaican woman who is an educator and anthropologist. She was shopping one day and saw a white woman with a beautiful little Ethiopian boy. She stopped to talk to them and found out that the woman and her female lover had adopted him from Africa as a baby. As the adopted mother and the Jamaican woman were talking, the little boy suddenly pointed to the Jamaican woman and said to his mother "Mommy, mommy, look, look, this lady is brown just like me! Can she come to our house?!".
The adopted mother became so jealous at the way he responded to the woman that she didn't give her a call back (they had exchanged phone numbers).
To be clear, I am not advocating colorblindness for kids or adults or tweens or any such nonsense. Not that you're suggesting I am Eeney, I just wanted to put that out there. PS. I dig the Ethiopian kid story.
Skeptical Greg
Agave Wine Connoisseur
Besides being somewhat dated, I see nothing there that suggests young, USA school children ( kids ) are currently being prepared to work against that which is different..
@Skeptical Greg
Having provided some simple leads for further research [should you choose to examine dates and whatsuch], I'll assume you were just being cute. About dates and whatsuch.
To the heart of the issue, I never stated "USA school children ( kids ) are currently being prepared to work against that which is different." My parentheticals tend to snug the word.
What I am saying, again, is that the absence of preparing kids to "work with that which is different" - the absence of that, is the failure. It's passive, like neglect - as opposed to aggressive, like pollute.
Having provided some simple leads for further research [should you choose to examine dates and whatsuch], I'll assume you were just being cute. About dates and whatsuch.
To the heart of the issue, I never stated "USA school children ( kids ) are currently being prepared to work against that which is different." My parentheticals tend to snug the word.
What I am saying, again, is that the absence of preparing kids to "work with that which is different" - the absence of that, is the failure. It's passive, like neglect - as opposed to aggressive, like pollute.
Skeptical Greg
Agave Wine Connoisseur
And I am sugesting as long as you don't prepare them to work against it ( that which is different ), there default direction will be to be more tolerant..
In actively teaching them to be tolerant, you bring their attention to differences that may now become an issue for them ...
Children appear to be tolerant by default, which is what I suggested originally ..
In actively teaching them to be tolerant, you bring their attention to differences that may now become an issue for them ...
Children appear to be tolerant by default, which is what I suggested originally ..
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This is the part I disagree with.
In order for there to be idea "differences that may become an issue for them," there must be an already established space where these idea "differences" exist. Kids don't bounce visual cues into the ether, they look to their families and their surroundings. The "already established."
Skeptical Greg
Agave Wine Connoisseur
You seem to be agreeing with me without realizing it ..
The ideas may not exist for a particular child, until they are brought to the child's attention in a teaching environment ..
i.e. The child is essentially free of prejudice until they are taught that such prejudices exist..
themusicteacher
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Isn't that a bit like saying, "In teaching them to be safe with sex, we're actually bring attention to it and condoning that they do it."?