Jameil,I remember being sooo shocked that Eleanor ...

tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8010473.post-82780484694798725272008-05-09T10:18:00.000-07:002008-05-09T10:18:00.000-07:002008-05-09T10:18:00.000-07:00Jameil,I remember being sooo shocked that Eleanor ...Jameil, I remember being sooo shocked that Eleanor had called her mom that and was still standing upright! We were on middle school cheerleading squad together and I remember our coach was standing RIGHT THERE and didn't even say anything to her about it. It was CRAZY! I've seen that sort of scenario played out in public many, many times over the years, but I've never seen a black child do something like that. An eye roll is a BIG deal, let along calling your momma a bitch! Actually, the closest I've seen is the few black kids they have on My Super Sweet 16. So maybe those kids think mommy and daddy's stacks are gonna save them from how the world really sees them? Mango Mama, Gosh, I know, it's not so cut and dry, right? I hesitated to even post about this because it can give rise to sooo many generalizations and a parent is not a good parent on the basis of skin color alone. And it definitely could be generational. Alot of folks I know that grew up with a switch/belt/extension cord are trying to shift gears, but don't know what else to shift to. And black parents are like everybody else, hustling at the job for too many hours and feeling like the media is raising our kids instead of us. You make me think about a few things I noticed in my six years experience supervising 1st and 2nd year teachers: 1) Non-black teachers were overwhelmingly reluctant to call a black child's house if the kid acted up because they assumed that the parents would not care or that they'd be hard to deal with, especially the women. I always thought the whole thing was an interesting little window into the modern day relationship between white women (the teacher) and black women (the mom) and reflected so many of the divides we see playing out today given the political climate. And most black teachers had ZERO problem calling the house (not scared of the black mom). 2) Non-black teachers would ask the kids to do something, "Andre, can you sit down, please?" And Andre might be like, "Um, NO, I can't sit down because I'm gonna sharpen my pencil." But a black teacher is more likely to understand that culturally most black folks don't ask their kids to do stuff like that. You don't have a choice. You need to sit down. Now. So black teachers would give a command, "Please sit down in your seat." 3) Non-black teachers tended to punish the misbehavior of black kids but not punish the SAME misbehavior in non-black kids. If two children were talking and one was black, and the other wasn't, guess who was getting in trouble? The black child. Then that child gets angry because they know they aren't being treated fairly, they act out, and then the cycle begins. The teacher then loses all credibility in the black child's eyes and whatever that teacher says is dirt. It wasn't until folks learned how to relate to black children culturally that the misbehavior stopped. It wasn't until they called themselves own subconsciously racist behavior that they could get control of a class, and alot of them when I'd point this stuff out to them, they'd be sooo angry. But if they changed their outlooks, became more culturally aware, read some Lisa Delpit, THEN the behavior of black kids improved significantly. Sorry so long but your comment really made me think about all that!Los Angelistahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17794296990587989214noreply@blogger.com