"It" happens

Not so long ago, families adopting from Ethiopia were discussing "strange things people have said." These were not strange things. They were rather normal, everyday, awful (and awful because they are everyday) racist things. The conversation proceeded for awhile before someone called it like it was. It happens, and we know it does. It happens everyday, and just doesn't get labeled racism, as it should.

Recently, someone asked a family member how my son would "know" about things if his sister is black. Know what, about what things? In this case, so far as I could tell, it was know how to identify a bad neighborhood and thus know when to be fearful.

My son, as the white brother of a black child, living in a multiracial family (see "we're all black") is going to know a lot of things children in white families never have to/get to really know. One of these is that the world is filled with dangerously racist people who don't think of themselves as dangerous, or racist, which makes them even more of both of those things.

Dear Ds and Dd I,
How I wish I could protect you from other people's idiocy.

Dear Family,
Thank you for helping me try.