Multicultural Moms (Still) Confront Race and Class

Moms of all hues with babies of all hues continue to struggle with outsiders' assumptions about race and class.

Two stories were told in a recent post on the New York Times' Motherlode blog. One was the familiar story of the dark-skinned woman married to the white man with the pale baby. Nicole Blades, a writer who lives in one of those famously diverse places that are supposed to be tolerant and accepting, wrote of her terror of "It." "It" is a question that she gets from all kinds of women, something that, according to Blades, simultaneously diminishes her relationship to her child and knocks her down a few rungs on the socioeconomic ladder.

Blades tells us the question "'Is that your baby?'" comes in many forms:

… on the playground: 'Are you working part-time for this family? Because we’re looking for a new nanny and you’re so loving with her.'

… at the school’s front gate: 'You’re one of the most prompt babysitter’s I’ve met. That must be such a relief to her mom.'

… at the market: 'Please tell his mom that this little cutie is so well-behaved.'

And all of it in front of the children. No wonder the 'I Ain’t the Nanny' T-shirts are becoming so popular."

The second story is becoming more common: It's the single white woman with the black baby. Novelist Debra Monroe recently published a memoir (excerpted in the Dallas Morning News) about her experiences raising an African-American daughter in a racially homogeneous town in Texas.

The issues she describes are some of the textbook reasons why social workers have long discouraged this particular formula of transracial adoption. However, I feel about Monroe's experiences very similarly as I do about Blades. The "thing" that needs changing isn't the mamas or the babies, but the way we collectively view race and culture. Babies are wonder-inspiring beings, but they're not museum exhibits. No one should feel free to (outwardly) marvel at their eyes or hair or skin tone in any way that makes their parents uncomfortable.

Back when transracial adoption was a media favorite, a white mother of two biracial children happily remarked on CNN that her children were "a welcome curiosity" to her town of mostly white people. This is not okay. A child shouldn't bear the brunt of constantly having to engage in "teachable moments," because he lives in a community of people too self-centered to notice that everyone isn't the same.

The burden should always be on the inquirer, the person who is ignorant about something. Don't expect someone to teach you anything or explain anything to you about their child. Just know that they are the mother (or father) and google anything else you're curious about.

Photo credit: stevegatto2