Bug started kindergarten two weeks ago , and she’s doing pretty well. She’s been getting in trouble for talking too much, but I think that’s because the work’s too easy.
Call me shallow, but I’m not worried about Bug’s academic career. She’s smart, she’ll be fine. What I’m
really worried about is if she’s making friends. I want her to have a lot of friends, I want her to be the sweet, pretty girl that everyone likes. Don’t judge me. Isn’t that what every mother wants for her children? Smart, healthy, well liked? She’s got the first two, now let’s go for the third.
So, last night at dinner, I asked Bug if she had been making friends at school. “Yeah,” Bug answered between bites of rice and chicken, “Danielle is my new friend.”
“Oh, that’s nice,” I said. “What is she like?”
“Well,” Bug answered, “She always wears dresses, and she’s shorter than I am, and she has dark skin.”
I found nothing wrong with this description. Short, wears dresses, darker skin than Bug. Cool.
The Agent, however, had a problem. “Bug, we do not describe people by the color of their skin.”
I was really baffled. Bug has very fair skin, so her saying someone has dark skin could mean a Hispanic, a black person, an Indian person…. There’s like 8 zillion ethnicities that Bug could have been describing. “Daddy,” I asked. “What would have been a better way for Bug to describe her new friend?” I was not questioning The Agent, I honestly wanted to know .
“Oh, there’s many ways to describe someone,” The Agent replied, really getting into his lesson. “Like if I was going to describe BK, I would say he has blond hair and blue eyes, he’s always smiling, and he likes to show off his big muscles.”
At this, BK flashed a cheesy grin and flexed his little two-year-old muscles. We all had a laugh, and we moved on.
But I honestly did not think The Agent made a fair comparison. I really think that BK is the last blond haired blue eyed boy left in the valley. His hair is almost white, it really stands out. Of course you're going to be able to find BK by that description. But what if he was to describe Bug? The brown haired, brown eyed girl? Twenty other little girls would fit the same description.
Bug clearly was not meaning anything bad, she was truly trying to describe what her new friend looked like. She wasn’t attaching any negative stigma to the description, she was just saying what someone looked like. I would have done the same thing. If someone came to my office and asked for Monica Ford, I would answer, “she’s the black girl in the red sweater, three cubicles over.”
So, my question is, is that bad? Am I not supposed to say that? What should I say instead? Or is The Agent crazy? Help!
(Feel free to say that The Agent is crazy... even if he is right!)
I read an article once that said something to the effect that it made no sense to not point out differences and pretend everyone was the same. Especially skin color. People have different skin color. That doesnt mean anything to the type of person they are. And can it really be ignored?
ReplyDeleteI totally agree with you that there's nothing wrong with describing people by their skin color. I think it's ignorant to "pretend" you don't notice. I would SO not be offended if you described me as the fair skinned woman with the gray shirt. But if you described me as the chubby woman with unkempt eyebrows and pit stains, I might take offense. I taught my kids it's OK to notice other people's skin color but it's not OK to treat them differently because of it. You were right so be sure to tell him I said so.
ReplyDeleteI completely agree with you. It's not like she's attaching anything negative to the fact that someone else has dark skin. Why would it be offensive to notice the color of someone's skin, but describing the color of someone's hair is okay?
ReplyDeleteI agree, there's nothing wrong with identifying someone by their skin colour. That said, I'm used to being the "Really tall white girl" at work. The skin colour description becomes an issue when there's a judgement attached to it or words used that have negative stereotypes. Otherwise, it's as much a physical descriptor as eye colour, hair colour, height.
ReplyDeleteThat said, I can see why the Agent is hesitant to allow it. It's an area that's uncomfortable (particularly, dare I say it, for the light-skinned males in north america?). The rules of what is okay and what isn't aren't clear.
I always wonder about this too. Because we aren't supposed to be color blind, right?
ReplyDeleteKids speak the truth and it comes from their heart.
ReplyDeleteOf course we all use skin color and eye color to describe a person.
How else?