{Bringing Up Boogie} For Black Moms Who’ve Considered the Cuss Out When the Playground Banter Is Too Much

Editor’s Note: I dug deep into the MyBrownBaby Crates for this piece, which I gathered together one Sunday afternoon while I was fussing around on Twitter and came across poet and writer Bassey Ikpi’s tweets from the frontlines—er, playground. What started out as a lazy, playful afternoon for the Baltimore-based mom and her deliciously cute son, Elaiwe, quickly turned into a “get it straight” verbal smackdown when another mom questioned whether her son was “slow.” Right. In one almost hour-long twitter stream, Bassey expressed the fears, frustration, and anger black parents face when others make foul, wrong-headed assumptions about our brown babies. Here, the blow-by-blow of Bassey brilliantly breaking down why it’s just never a good idea to “innocently” verbalize said assumptions about black children to their moms, as told through Bassey’s tweets.

By BASSEY IKPI

• At the park with Boogs. Poor thing needs some friends. He's trying to convince some big kids to let him play soccer. 1:29 PM Aug 30th from twidroid

• This kid isn't afraid of anything! Where did he get that from? I long to be that free and unafraid. 1:31 PM Aug 30th from twidroid

• Ugh! This is why I hate hanging out with parents I don't know. Just because our kids are playing together don't mean you and I should talk. 1:39 PM Aug 30th from twidroid

• E is clearly smaller than your kid. Why would you ask me if he's delayed? Do people do that? Am I wrong? 1:40 PM Aug 30th from twidroid

• I was like… what? He's 2 and a half. She goes, what?? Then she wants to compare notes. He started walking when?? He says what??? 1:42 PM Aug 30th from twidroid

• Bitch, you started it! I wasn't trying to tell you he was a genius. I was letting him play with your barely talking yet 5 year old. 1:43 PM Aug 30th from twidroid

• White people blow me with that! He can't be gifted? He has to be tiny and slow?? 1:44 PM Aug 30th from twidroid

• My 2 year old is convincing your 4 year old not to be scared of the slide and you trying to say what to me? Ridiculous. 1:46 PM Aug 30th from twidroid

• And yes I am tweeting in her face. 1:46 PM Aug 30th from twidroid

• Boogie is having fun but if this chick doesn't stop with the questions. Like I'm going to say well when his home planet was destroyed... 1:50 PM Aug 30th from twidroid

• "Oh his father must be thrilled." Someone is about to be arrested. 1:52 PM Aug 30th from twidroid

• I'm taking my cues from Michael. I'm a lover not a fighter. I just explained to her that her questions come off both rude and racist. 1:56 PM Aug 30th from twidroid

• She apologized and said that she saw how he was behaving and assumed he was older but because he is small she thought he was autistic... 2:01 PM Aug 30th from twidroid

• I'm not sure how that's better... but I asked her why she wouldn't assume that he was advanced for his age rather than slow for his size. 2:02 PM Aug 30th from twidroid

• Hell why not just ask me how old he is? She said she was just stunned bcuz her 4 yo 2:03 PM Aug 30th from twidroid

• Doesn't speak as clearly and isn't as self possessed as E is. I said that has nothing to do with me and my kid. 2:04 PM Aug 30th from twidroid

• Was that rude? I'm not trying to be rude but Boogie is just Boogie. I don't compare him to other kids. 2:04 PM Aug 30th from twidroid

• She shouldn't compare little Dakota or Simon or whatever. No wonder he's so scared of slides. Let the boy live. 2:05 PM Aug 30th from twidroid

• Crap. Stupid bleeding heart. Now I feel bad. 2:06 PM Aug 30th from twidroid

• Boogie: What happened, mama? Me: That lady is stressing me out. B: Me too! Can I have ice cream? (Love this kid) 2:13 PM Aug 30th from twidroid

• E is fine for his age. He's smart but he's not Doogie. So to think he's a tiny 5 year old that's slow? What time is your plane to conclusions? 2:14 PM Aug 30th from twidroid

• It was more how she asked. He started walking early. He started talking early. Yes he eats fast food. Yes he watches TV… 2:17 PM Aug 30th from twidroid

• These are just facts. I'm not all hmph.. give your kid a happy meal. That's what works for ME! (Kinda) 2:18 PM Aug 30th from twidroid

• I get nervous about my parenting but I know I'm doing the absolute best I can. That's it. Leave me alone random white woman! 2:19 PM Aug 30th from twidroid

• Oh I don't feel bad. I know Boogie is awesome. I just was annoyed by the whole conversation. I don't like talking kids with parents.

• So if I'm saying yes he knows a lot of words. Yes he's pretty fearless. Yes he's very confident. LEAVE ME ALONE. 2:23 PM Aug 30th from twidroid

• Ok. I'm done talking about this. You can't be mad and eat ice cream. It's like illegal in 4 countries. Thanks for listening to me! 2:24 PM Aug 30th from twidroid

About our MBB Contributor:Bassey Ikpi is a Nigeria-born, Oklahoma-bred, PG County-fed, Brooklyn-led writer/poet/neurotic. She’s half awesome, a quarter crazy and 1/3rd genius... the left over bit is a caramel creme center. She’s also the single mother of an amazing man-child, Elaiwe Ikpi, who, as you can see in the picture above, be flyer than most, even on a sick day. Get more Bassey at basseyworld.com

If you would like to be a featured contributor on MyBrownBaby, email your essays/ideas/blog posts/rants/musings to Denene at denenemillner at gmail dot com.

Just Say "NO" To the Stereotyping of African American Parents and Other Moms and Dads Of Color

Like, what kid doesn’t dig the park? Mari loved the slide, you know? And the monkey bars. And especially when I pushed her on the swing. Her plea was stickier and sweeter and more delicious than a cherry pop: Higher, mommy! Higher! I want to kiss the sky…

I delighted in watching my baby jump and twirl and fly and pucker up toward the sunshine. Her happiness was infectious. But my hate for the park was equally passionate—searing. Particularly when visits with my then 2-year-old daughter fell outside of official playgroup playdates and it was just me and the kid and my swollen, pregnant belly and my elephant ankles and those eyes—those evil, prying, judgmental, better-than-thou eyes that, in a single glance, would betray the conspiratorial conversations The Playground Mafia dug into when they saw me and my chocolate beauty trotting up the walkway.

It never failed; I always got the distinct impression that neither my baby nor I was welcome there. It was all up in the icy glares. The side-eyes and whispers whenever I smiled in their direction or tried to make small talk. The rolling cloud of sensible shoes and mom jeans and crocheted sweaters that always seemed to stampede toward The Children of The Playground Mafia whenever my baby girl penetrated their invisible barrier bubbles.

Always—always—I’d act like it didn’t matter. For my baby’s sake. But on the walk home, I’d stew and silently wonder what, exactly, ran through their minds—their little, teeny weeny minds—when they saw me. Maybe they thought I was the nanny—untouchable and unworthy of conversation (unless they were looking for a new one, and then I’d get a fresh “family” card pressed into my palm. True story.). Maybe they thought I hitched a ride from nearby Newark, N.J., so that my kid could play in the “good” park. Maybe they thought I was a teenage mom, slumming off the system, popping out babies and intent on scaring all the good, hardworking white people at the park while I waited for their tax dollars to convert into my welfare check.

After a while, I stopped wasting precious brain matter trying to comprehend why The Playground Mafia acted the way they did to my daughter and me. It became painfully clear relatively quickly that it would never occur to them that I was a neighbor, who, while on maternity leave from a high-paying magazine gig, frequented my neighborhood park to escape endless reruns of Teletubbies and The Wiggles back at my more than half-million-dollar home, four blocks away.

It would never occur to them that I always bought my shrimp and Salmon and whiting at the local fish market and the French bread with the wickedly crusty crust from the local bakery and that my neighbors literally held vigil outside my house on block party afternoons, waiting to dig into my huge basket of fried chicken, hot and sweet.

It would never occur to them that I adored George Clooney and collecting art and throwing dinner parties and writing—that I was interesting and funny and smart and madly in love with my husband and growing family.

That I could love.

And was loved.

This, apparently, is not the stuff black folk are made of—at least not in the minds of some suburban white moms. Witness this blog post, written by a mom who got all freaked out when her son struck up an afternoon playground friendship with the son of a man she surmised was a “gang member”:

"How did you KNOW he was a gang member?” I can hear you asking from behind your computer monitor. I'll admit, I'm not exactly up on my "Signs Your Child's Friend's Dad Is A Gang Member" literature. Let's just say it seemed likely. There was the prison number tattooed on his neck, for example. And the cryptic, graffiti-like tattoos all over his arms. And the white tank top. And the baggy jeans. And the bandana. And the unlaced shoes. And the baseball cap worn sideways. If he wasn't a gang member, he definitely wanted people to think he was.

The writer goes on to chronicle how, even though the “gang member” tried to strike up a conversation with her—you know, what normal human beings tend to do when other human beings are around and the kids are playing together—her side of the talking stalled because she wasn’t “well-versed in gang member icebreakers” and she couldn’t think of anything to say to him beyond, “When’s the little guy’s initiation?”

Later, when the two scooped up their sons and tossed each other a “see ya,” the blogger considers telling the “gang member” how much she enjoyed the gang movie Colors, and silently wishes she had a camera to document the occasion so that years later, she could reminisce with her son about “that gang member” who pushed him on the swing. “Such a nice gang member…” she imagined she would say to her son as they flipped through their scrapbook of memories.

She and the posse in her comment section thought the blog post was humorous.

Laughing yet?

I’m not...

READ THE REST OF THIS POST ON THE MYBROWNBABY PARENTING POST PAGE AT PARENTING.COM. AND PLEASE DO LEAVE A COMMENT; WHEN WE RAISE OUR COLLECTIVE VOICE, BLACK MOMS ARE A MOVEMENT TO BE RECKONED WITH. BE THE CHANGE; SPEAK UP.

Score Two In The Black Girl Battle Against Lazy Beauty Standards!

Sesame Street's "I Love My Hair" Puppet

Now, no one is suggesting that we African American moms exclusively count on TV, songs, movies and the like to make our babies feel good about themselves. But it would be extremely naïve at best, disingenuous at worst, to suggest that the psyches of our girls aren’t affected by a constant barrage of media images that seek to set the standard for what’s right, what’s wrong and what we all need to fix to get to this stock version of “perfect.” It would be even dumber of us to suggest that non-black children aren't affected by this, either—that they don't come to some not-so-flattering conclusions about their African American counterparts when they have few to no references to refer to when forming those opinions.

So we black moms cloak our babies in the armor—ready them everyday for the battle against lazy beauty standards, pop culture ignorance, and outright black girl put-downs that seem to slap at them—and us!—around every stretch. In my daughters’ cases, I ended up making a border of picture frames filled with pictures of her family on the wall next to their cribs, so that they could see brown faces that look like theirs. I filled their bookshelves with as many books featuring black characters as I could find and requested that my friends do the same. They went to sleep listening to Stevie Wonder and Earth Wind & Fire and Satchmo and Kathleen Battle—artists with soulful voices and incredible, eclectic music filled with prideful messages that both our kids and we love to listen to. And Nick and I would whisper in their ears…you are the loveliest, prettiest, most deliciously chocolatey gifts from God any mommy and daddy could ask for.

But Lord, when we spend our days telling our daughters that their skin is beautiful and their hair is perfect exactly the way it grows out of their heads and their lips and nose and hips and booty are full of goodness and that they are, indeed, visible—that we see them, even if nobody else does—it does something to our girls’ psyche when someone other than their mamas says, “Hey, you’re pretty awesome just the way you are.”

Nobody tells little black girls such things.

But this week, two somebodies did...

To read this essay in its entirety, pop on over to the MyBrownBaby page on Parenting's The Parenting Post—and if you're so moved, please leave a comment. We need to show everyone—magazines, radio stations, ad agencies, companies who depend on our cash to stay alive—that black moms and our children MATTER, and I can't think of a better way to do that than by lifting our voices. 


Have a fantastic weekend everyone!

Standing "O" for the Black Dad Who Threatened His Daughter's Bullies!

Yes, I know I’ve warned before that we moms should reconsider just when, where, and how we should use our Wu Tang Clan-styled Samurai word swords when someone gets out of pocket with us. Hollering on folks—especially with the kids in tow—could leave both our babies and us vulnerable to the whims and violence of crazy folk, like the African American mom who got punched, stomped and cussed out by a man at a Georgia Cracker Barrel last year after she got on him for slamming a door in her 7-year-old’s face.

But sometimes, you just gotta go there. Last week, James Jones did. Pissed that a bunch of 7^th grade boys were physically and verbally harassing his 11-year-old disabled daughter—even going so far as to toss condoms in her hair—Jones stomped onto his kid’s bus and threatened to jack up er’body who could hear the words coming out of his mouth (bus driver included) if anyone even looked at his daughter crazy, much less put their hands on her again.

Now, seeing as he was cussing and threatened to “murder” children, he got arrested and charged with disorderly conduct and disturbing a school function and whatnot. But that’s a fine he says he’d be willing to pay if it means the little buzzards who were messing with his daughter know he’s coming for that ass if they ever again got outta pocket with his baby girl.

For the record, Nick and I are over here giving virtual fist bumps and standing “O’s” to Mr. Jones for being a helluva father and taking control of this whole bullying nonsense. Kids are being harassed and beat down and bullied to the point of suicide—all too many of them choosing extremes (harm to themselves, harm to others) rather than wait on the adults to do what needs to be done to put the bullies in their place and make the schools be accountable to the innocents. Remember Jaheem Herrera and Carl Walker-Hoover? 

Our kids need to know that their daddies have their back. And it is not lost on us that this is an African American father who stood up for his child—a man who, like us, gets really tired of the relentless “black fathers aren’t involved or are non-existent” meme that slaps at black dads at every turn.

And for the idiot “expert” at the end of the video who suggests the father was wrong and made his daughter feel weaker and helpless by taking charge of the situation rather than giving her the tools to handle the bullies on her own: Let’s put his daughter on a bus with a bunch of billy badasses and see how “empowered” she feels to have to handle that crap on her own. I bet you he’d be out there on the bus stop tomorrow morning with his Louisville Slugger, too. Trust me on this.

Check out the video...

Make MyBrownBaby THE BEST BLOG FOR BLACK MOMS

MyBrownBaby was selected as a finalist in the 2010 Black Weblog Awards for BEST PARENTING AND FAMILY BLOG!

*insert image of Denene doing the wop here*

With more than 32,000 nominations made and 10,000 ballots cast, MyBrownBaby is proud to be recognized as one of the best blogs about parenting and families on the web. I work hard to advocate for and celebrate black moms and moms of beautiful brown babies in every single post that makes its way onto this site, and I’m so pleased that you, my readers, cast your votes in support of the work I do here. For you. For us.

Now, you all know how much I like those “Black Weblog Awards Winner” buttons. They’re fancy. And so am I. And I want one. So I neeeeeed you, my dear sweet MyBrownBaby readers, to vote for MBB one mo’ gin. You have the entire month of August to vote to make MyBrownBaby a winner, but you might as well go on ahead and do it now, my sweets—while it’s on your mind. Please, please, PLEASE go through the entire six pages of the voting, include your email addy (they do not use it to spam you, promise!) and VERIFY YOUR VOTE, or else it will not count. And I'll lose. And you won't be able to see the YouTube video of me wopping it out to one of my favorite late '80s songs.

Oh yeah, you read that right: I will post on my YouTube page a video of me wopping. Want to see it? CAST YOUR VOTE FOR MYBROWNBABY HERE.

Winners will be announced sometime around September 1.

I invite you, too, to check out—and vote for—a few of my other blog favorites, including:

A Belle In Brooklyn

Black Girl With Long Hair

Kiss My Black Ads

Sister Toldja

The Black Snob

Very Smart Brothas

Thanks for your help! 

We Need More Black Children's Books On Borders's Bookshelves NOW.

My neighborhood Borders was running a children’s book drive for a local hospital and since Denene loves the children and books, I offered to purchase two books for donation. Grateful I was participating, the cashier offered up a stack of books for me to choose from. And what do you know, not nan one of them—save for a lone "Princess and the Frog" book buried all the way in the back/bottom of the pile—featured children of color.

Not. One.

Now, you know how I do: I’m a huge proponent of children’s books featuring characters that look like my girlpies, and I’m especially gangsta about getting these books into the hands of ALL children, not just black kids (as chronicled in my post EVERYBODY Should Read Black Children’s Books). So I insisted that I be able to by-pass Borders's pre-selected (white-washed) offerings to select and donate a few of my favorite children’s books from the children’s section.

Problem was, they didn’t have any black children’s books. There was no "Ruby and the Booker Boys." No "Tar Beach." No "Wilhemina Rules." No "Pruella and the Boo Hag" or "Dancing in the Wings" or "Home Made Love." Not one book with a child of color—ANY color—up on those shelves, within arm’s reach for kids to grab and read and giggle at and enjoy. And with every second I had to dig, my anger became more palpable—much to the chagrin of the Borders employee charged with helping me pick books to donate.

Me: I’m not really clear why there aren’t any books for or about children of color here.

Borders Chick: Well, if no one buys them, we don’t order them.

Me: Well if they’re not here to buy, then it’s kinda hard for us to buy them, isn’t it?

Borders Chick: It’s headquarters that decides what books will be stocked, so my guess is they have more of a selection at Stonecrest Mall. (Note: This would be the “black” mall. About 40 minutes from where I and many other black moms who buy books for our children actually live.)

Me: *massive side-eye* I don’t live near Stonecrest. I live two minutes from this store.

Borders Chick: I found one! *triumphantly waving in my face a copy of Sharon Draper’s “Sassy,” which she dug from the back of a dark shelf near the floor. As if she'd just found the solution to world peace.* 

Me: *another massive side-eye and a lip twist* Y’all need to do better.

I was still ranting by the time I made it to the register with my book donation purchases—the lone copy of “Sassy,” and a copy of my latest book, “Miss You, Mina,” a tween book in the popular Scholastic Candy Apple series. (Amazingly, they had three copies in the Candy Apple section, but it took longer than it should have to convince another Borders Chick that I was the author and that it would be a good thing if I autographed my book.) While it is honorable that Borders was collecting books for kids, why didn’t it occur to them to include a mix of books that feature kids of all races—white, black, Latino, Asian, Indian or whatever?  And why should I have to drive 40 minutes to the “black” store to get black books for my kids? And good God, why was the Borders Chick STILL perpetuating the ridiculous notion that somehow, books featuring black children should only be purchased and read by black children?

“I mean, I’m buying 'Artemis Fowl'—arguably, a white book—for my daughter, who clearly is African American," I said, handing over my debit card to pay for the two black books and the third in the Artemis Fowl series, which Mari is completely flying through as I write this. "Why shouldn’t her kid read ‘Miss You, Mina?’” I demanded, jabbing my finger at the white woman waiting on line behind me, trying her best to pretend like she wasn’t listening to the conversation.

The cashier shrugged and mumbled something about corporate making those decisions and it all being out of her hands. Curiously, corporate didn’t seem to have a problem filling up the “African American Interests” section with a crap load of street fiction titles so risqué I had to steer Mari clear of it, lest her 11-year-old eyes got singed by shelf upon shelf of book covers featuring scantily-clad vixens and chocolate hot boys in compromising porn positions. Apparently, none of us should have to drive 40 minutes out of the way for the mess that makes us look like a bunch of sex-addicted, skank stripper hoes chasing random peen between drug deals and jail breaks. Nope: Those car rides, which use up a good $15 worth of gas, are reserved for $4.99 black children's books.

I’m. Tired. Of. This.

Exhausted, really.

Aren’t you?

And more importantly, what do we do about it? I’m open to suggestions…

Party Goods Featuring African American Children: What Would YOU Like To See?

I can throw a helluva kid’s party—for real. I mean, I go all out, you heard? Mari’s first soiree was an all-white party in the middle of an animal reserve we dubbed “The Secret Garden,” and for her second, I invited all of her friends to “buzz on over” with their blankets for a lady bug picnic in our backyard. By her fourth, I was hand-rolling marzipan daisies for a really live garden of flower cupcakes I served up at a backyard carnival replete with homemade games, personalized t-shirts, and enough food to feed a small army of preschoolers and their ‘rents. And don't get me started on my annual Halloween parties; what do you know about neighborhood costume parades and spooky basement antics? Let's just say the kiddies who came to my New Jersey spooktaculars are still talking about them!

Of course, I'm a creative being, but I forced to be that way. I mean, until the MyBrownBaby Princess and the Frog Party I threw for Mari, Lila, and a few of their buddies last year, there really weren’t ANY party supplies—from invitations to decorations to plates, napkins and banners—that featured children who looked like mine—chocolate brown girls with curly hair. So princess themes were out. Same for anything having to do with ballet. Barbie was a no-go. Indeed, we were stuck with generic party decorations—lady bugs or flowers or just fancy colors—to illustrate the joy we were trying to create for our little ladies. And for the life of me, I couldn’t understand why somebody—anybody—couldn’t just break down and make a plate, a napkin, a balloon—hell, anything!—with a little black girl’s face on it so that African American children could celebrate themselves at their own birthday parties, just like every other child.

There is one company that is trying to help a sistah out. Birthday in a Box, an online store that packages and ships more than 100 high-quality, imaginative children’s party kits, wants to up the ante on the offerings they have for black parents. So they’ve put together a survey they want African American moms and moms of  children of color to take to gauge what, exactly, we’d like to see in party kits featuring our kids. And get this: They’re giving away a $50 gift certificate for www.birthdayinabox.com to one lucky MyBrownBaby reader to find out. Simply take the quick and easy three-minute survey (it really is only three minutes, promise—I did it, too!), sign up to receive BIAB's weekly newsletter (full of great party planning tips and ideas like this sleepover party I’m totally going to hook up for Mari and Lila’s next birthday bash) and you're done! 

Take the Birthday In a Box Survey HERE.

In the meantime, check out some of the super cute multicultural offerings Birthday In a Box already has online, and click around the site for some great party ideas.

Thanks for participating! 

Make MyBrownBaby THE BEST BLOG FOR BLACK MOMS

Ohmigod—MyBrownBaby readers are the BESTEST! I mean, like, I heart you. I really, really heart you. Like the cast of Jersey Shore loves dranks. Like Terrell Owens and Chad Ocho Cinco love them some white women.  Like Kanye West loves himself.

That’s Mary J. Blige REAL LOVE y’all.

And why, my darlings, am I professing my profound affection for each and every one of MyBrownBaby’s readers? Well, because MyBrownBaby was selected as a finalist in the 2010 Black Weblog Awards for BEST PARENTING AND FAMILY BLOG!

*insert image of Denene doing the wop here*

With more than 32,000 nominations made and 10,000 ballots cast, MyBrownBaby is proud to be recognized as one of the best blogs about parenting and families on the web. I work hard to advocate for and celebrate black moms and moms of beautiful brown babies in every single post that makes its way onto this site, and I’m so pleased that you, my readers, cast your votes in support of the work I do here. For you. For us.

Now, you all know how much I like those “Black Weblog Awards Winner” buttons. They’re fancy. And so am I. And I want one. So I neeeeeed you, my dear sweet MyBrownBaby readers, to vote for MBB one mo’ gin. You have the entire month of August to vote to make MyBrownBaby a winner, but you might as well go on ahead and do it now, my sweets—while it’s on your mind. Please, please, PLEASE go through the entire six pages of the voting, include your email addy (they do not use it to spam you, promise!) and VERIFY YOUR VOTE, or else it will not count. And I'll lose. And you won't be able to see the YouTube video of me wopping it out to one of my favorite late '80s songs.

Oh yeah, you read that right: I will post on my YouTube page a video of me wopping. Want to see it? CAST YOUR VOTE FOR MYBROWNBABY HERE.

Winners will be announced sometime around September 1.

I invite you, too, to check out—and vote for—a few of my other blog favorites, including:

A Belle In Brooklyn

Black Girl With Long Hair

Kiss My Black Ads

Sister Toldja

The Black Snob

Very Smart Brothas

Thanks for your help! 

Searching for a TRUE Media Image of Black Moms and Kids

By DENENE MILLNER

It was a playground ditty as melodic as Miss Mary Mack, but much more ugly—menacing, even:

If you’re white, you’re all right

If you’re brown, stick around

If you’re black get back…

The message, which, sadly, was promoted and reinforced by my African American friends and family members, was clear: Little girls who looked like me, with my dark skin and my short, kinky hair, needed to play the rear—to acknowledge and embrace the universal truth that no one with my features should expect to be seen, heard, or, by God, think she was cute. I spent a lifetime getting “back”—receding and retreating and hiding, all the while feeling ashamed that my skin couldn’t be lighter and my hair couldn’t be longer and straighter. That I couldn’t look more white to be more “right.”

It took me a long time to step forward—to face myself in the mirror and actually embrace me. Dark skin, kinky hair, thick lips, black girl hips and thighs and booty. All of me. Indeed, it was my guy friend—a true friend, not a love interest—who coaxed me out of my shell. “Look at you!” he demanded, holding a mirror up to my face. “You are beautiful, Denene. I can see it; why can’t you?”

Today, with a few more years under my belt, a lot more confidence, and a specific mission to make sure my two chocolate girl pies don’t ever feel ashamed of that which God gave them, I can look in the mirror and really appreciate what I see. Shoot—a touch of mascara, a little lip gloss, and a cute shoe is all I need to strut like I’m a supermodel on the grandest of catwalks. And walking right next to me are my two beautiful little girls—both of them chocolatey and all natural and still, thankfully, oblivious to the “black get back” madness that haunted me for way too many years to count.

Still, I feel the need to do damage control whenever my daughters flip absentmindedly through my magazines or stumble across a questionable music video or even see a simple TV commercial featuring black girls, because it’s all-too-clear that the “white is right” ditty is still very much ingrained in the mindset of the editors, producers, and ad agencies. Don’t get me wrong: I think we’ve come a long way when we can turn on the TV and see African Americans in ads for popular products, stores, and services. But I kinda take it personal when practically every black female—both child and adult—in videos, commercials, and ads has brownish-blonde curly hair or long hair that stretches well past their shoulders, light skin, and hazel eyes, European features that make them look more “other” than black. It’s not exactly screaming “black get back,” but to me and mine, it certainly whispers, “closer to white is preferred.”

Read the rest of this blog post, HOW ABOUT A TRUE MEDIA MIRROR, exclusively at DOVE.COM. 

Nominate MyBrownBaby For A Black Weblog Award (Or Four)

 

The 2010 BLACK WEBLOG AWARDS NOMINATIONS are going on right now. Be a dear and head over there to nominate MYBROWNBABY for Best Personal Blog, Best Writing in a Blog, Best Parenting Blog, and Blog of the Year.

Why nominate MyBrownBaby? Well, because mama works hard to advocate for and celebrate black moms and moms of beautiful brown babies in every single post that makes its way onto this site.

From calling out the injustice of thoughtless teachers (like in this piece about the little girl kicked out of her gifted class for having smelly natural hair) and demanding justice for victims of police brutality in predominately black and Latino communities (like in this post about the police raid that resulted in the death of Aiyana Jones) to waxing poetic on Salma Hayek's breastfeeding tatas and the simple joy of embarrassing the hell out of my daughters in the grocery store aisle, I try to use my love of the written word to inspire,teach, commiserate, inform and profess my profound love for beautiful brown babies and the joy of parenting them. I hope I’m fulfilling the mission.

 

If you think I am, show your support by clicking on the Black Weblog Awards 2010 Nominee button and make MyBrownBaby the most nominated website in the Best Personal Blog, Best Writing in a Blog, Best Parenting and Family Blog and Blog of the Year categories. You’ve got until midnight July 25^th to cast your vote (but you might as well go on and get it done now); each vote gets me thisclose to the August finals, which will have the most nominated blogs duking it out for the crown.

Please know: I ain’t too proud to beg. MyBrownBaby won two Black Weblog Awards last year; I’d like to get more of that art for my sidebar. Yup, I’m fancy like that.

Thanks in advance for your help!

Black Moms and Ghetto Parents: They Are NOT One in the Same

Five years ago, Nick and I traded in our home in a lovely, comfortably upper middle class neighborhood in New Jersey for a house in an equally beautiful neighborhood in Georgia that just happens to be a stone’s throw away from a town full of working class/blue collar Georgians who have, shall we say, some interesting child-rearing tactics.

They cuss around and at their kids in the middle of the cereal aisle.

They fight with their significant others in public, in front of their kids, and slap the little ones when they get out of pocket, especially if there’s an audience to witness their discipline.

They let their kids roam the streets until somebody else’s mother tells the kid to go home.

They ride around in their cars with the windows rolled up, chain smoking while their babies bounce around in the back seat, sans seatbelts and boosters—their little lungs taking in a lifetime of carcinogens, their little bodies one sharp brake from flying through the back window.

When it comes to showing up for parent/teacher conferences, or sending in donations for a teacher gift, or chipping in at the PTA-sponsored events, they’re nowhere to be found.

This is bad parenting—messy, sickening, wrong. Now, close your eyes and conjure up an image of the mothers and fathers who go all in on their kids like this—who exhibit the worst kind of parenting acumen. Who do you see?

Chicago Sun-Times columnist Mary Mitchell would have you believe that these are characteristics of “ghetto parenting,” a phrase she coined in a recent column about a trio of black brothers whose lives were turned upside down when, Mitchell writes, their drug-addicted mom’s bad parenting led to the tragic death of her 5-year-old son and last week’s murder conviction of her 23-year-old son. Mitchell’s claims the boys are victims of “ghetto parenting,” and, in her column, "Ghetto Parenting Dooms Kids," she goes on to explain exactly what that is:

Ghetto parenting is cursing around, and at, a child. 

Ghetto parenting is brawling with your man or your woman in front of your child.

Ghetto parenting is letting your child roam the streets until somebody else's mother has to tell the child to go home.

Ghetto parenting is putting your child off on friends and relatives because you want to hang out in the street.

Ghetto parenting is getting so hooked on substances that the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services has to remove your children and place them with strangers.

Now, where I come from, “ghetto parenting” would be considered code for poor, urban black and Latino moms and dads who are real good at making kids but who suck at raising them, leading to a never-ending cycle of poverty, abuse, crime and broken lives. The word “ghetto” falls right in line with the clever and really subversive evil game people play with adjectives to describe black people in the harshest, most stereotypical ways.

So in the course of a 700-word column, Mitchell racialized bad parenting, essentially intimating that falling down on the job as a mom or dad is “ghetto”—i.e. negative and black.

The hell?

I assure you black moms and Dads—impoverished black folks in particular—don’t have a lock on bad parenting. Indeed, the incidents I described at the beginning of this post were all meted out in and around my predominately white neighborhood here in Georgia by white parents. The first time I saw a white mom draw her hand back at her baby, and drop the “F” bomb in front of her little ones—and mine!—in the middle of Wal-Mart, and let her kids wander in my yard to play without any knowledge of where her kids were, I got real clear on this one simple truth: A bad parent knows no color, no economic level, no background, no class. And sometimes, what we consider a hot ghetto mess is actually just a mess, and not indicative of anybody’s ghetto (where, by the way, for every bad parent who clogs up the system, there are 20 good ones doing right by and their best for their babies, despite the statistics, despite the odds).

In other words, Mitchell needs to go back to the drawing board on that “ghetto parenting” phrase. It ain’t working. And it’s insulting as all hell. It’s hard enough trying to escape the stereotypes and labels and boxes society hangs on black moms—I’ve written passionately about those stereotypes in my posts “Black Moms Are Different and That’s Okay” and “Can You Name One Positive Portrayal of Black Moms in Hollywood?”—without a fellow journalist—an African American one, to boot—hanging her hat on stereotypes of a whole group/class/color of black moms.

Bad parenting is simply bad parenting.

What’s being ghetto—and black—got to do with it?

Hennessy In My Starbucks Cup

Isn’t this just the most delicious book title? I can’t claim it; it belongs to my friend and fellow author Kimberly Seals Allers, who wrote THIS thoughtful, humorous post on Mom Logic about all of the white mom Parenting While Drunk (PWD) books flooding the market. In the piece, titled, "I'm Fed Up With Drunken White Moms," Kimberly lists no less than 10—count ‘em, 10!—books with titles extolling the virtues of raising children with cocktails in hand, and laments that black moms would NEVER, EVER, NEVER EVER EVER get to joke, much less write about,  PWD in our own parenting books and blogs, lest we’re comfortable being labeled unfit moms. Here’s her take on the double standard:

The reason it works for white women is, it's assumed that a white woman is educated, capable of drinking all the time and still parenting and is really only joking... 

If a black mother joked that she drank all the time while parenting, somebody would call Child Protective Services in a heartbeat. White women are safe. There is no stigma attached to their drinking—in fact, there is even a trendiness, and some lifestyle cachet. My drinking would scream "unfit mother" in glaring lights.

Because black women are barely viewed as smart, savvy moms in the first place, the thought of us touting and even celebrating drinking-on-the-job would be preposterous. And we certainly couldn't build a marketable and profitable branding platform on the idea. Nobody, not even I (and you guys think I'm pretty bold), would go there. I'm not foolish enough to assume I have that luxury.

(READ THE ENTIRE POST HERE). 

I’m with Kimberly on this one. Indeed, the whole reason I started MyBrownBaby was because of the parenting double standard of which she writes; there is a dearth of parenting information for us moms of color (and moms of children of color) when it comes to rearing our kids, and what little there is out there is often so negative and beyond our reality that it’s not worth paying it any attention. Wouldn’t it be lovely to read a book about Parenting While Black that doesn’t have anything to do with poverty, drugs, poor education, absentee fathers and the like, but speaks specifically to the joys, challenges and wonders of raising our kids (even if some Hennessy is involved) from a moms of color perspective? I’ve got one up my sleeve. Would you read it?

Kudos to Kimberly for pointing out the inequity and making it plain. Of course, the non-moms of color are all in a tizzy over her piece and leaving some pretty nasty comments (as usual, whenever the hated call out the hateful/blissfully ignorant on their mess, people can’t help but act the fool in the comments section). CLICK HERE to read her piece and leave a comment of encouragement for her!  

Confident Black Girls

I get why my mother did what she did. When you’re overworked and way underpaid, and you’re of a generation that thinks kids are to be controlled, rather than reasoned with; and you’re afraid of having to deal with the cascade of hormone-driven adolescent problems that come with being the mom of a girl child, you search for silence. Demand it, even. Talking about tween stuff like periods and first kisses and confidence and beauty wasn’t an option for her, because speaking about it somehow condoned and encouraged a flurry of inappropriate behavior—invited her daughter to be difficult.

Let’s just say difficult wasn’t an option for my mom.

Of course, her no-nonsense parenting style had its plusses: I stayed out of trouble and it kept me focused. But her be-quiet-and-do-only-as-I-say approach gave me a wicked case of low self-esteem—made me uncomfortable with my body, with the opposite sex, with the accolades that came with my successes.

Coping with these things is still a struggle, but I promised that it would be much less so for my girls. From the moment I found out Mari is a girl, I made the conscious decision to help her square her shoulders, walk with her chin held high, be comfortable in her skin, and appreciate who she is, no matter what.

And I work hard at this every… single… day.

For instance, every morning, I lean in and kiss my girls—Mari, 11, and Lila, 8—and triple dog dare them to be brilliant. “Who are you not to be?” I ask. They are, after all, smart girls. And their dad and I invest a massive amount of time and cash on art and music classes, academic enrichment programs, science camps, even Mandarin lessons, to show our girls that our world is huge, and that they don’t have to be average when culture, class, and yes, brilliance can take them places their parents and grands have never gone.

It is these constant reminders—those high expectations—that not only keep the A’s coming, but make my girls proud of their smarts. They are trying to please their parents, sure. But they’re also impressing themselves—planning to be great. Something I was too afraid to do when I was their age.

I was also profoundly uncomfortable with my looks; my kinky hair and my dark skin and my curvaceous body seemed always to be a study in what was wrong with, rather than what was beautiful about, me. And so, ashamed and terribly shy, I hid—always tucked myself into the shadows of my prettier friends, avoided talking to boys at all costs.

I don’t want this for my girls, so I tell them they’re beautiful—every inch of them—everyday. I also make it clear that there is true beauty in being different—kinky hair and plump physiques are just as amazing as any other characteristic pop culture serves up as an ideal. Knowing this not only makes my girls comfortable with their loveliness, but encourages them to forgo judging others because they don’t fit whatever “ideal” others serve up. Do I run the risk of creating conceited monsters? Maybe. But there is honor in loving oneself—in appreciating you, even others don’t.

The most important thing I teach my girls every day, though, is...

To find out  the most important lesson I give my girls, CLICK HERE to see in its entirety this post, written exclusively for Unilever's Don't Fret the Sweat campaign. For tips, confidence-building tools and stories about how moms are helping their tweens navigate those sweat-inducing "moments," check out www.DontFrettheSweat.com.