{Bringing Up Boogie} My Boy and the White Barbie—Cozying Up Under the Christmas Tree

By BASSEY IKPI

Boogie is in that “can you buy me that?” stage of life. I dread commercials with anything that races, flies, explodes or turns into a robot-monster-dinosaur truck. If it looks like it might kill you, Boogie wants it. When we’re out shopping and he goes through the, bug eyed, mouth wide open, “OH MY GOD!” process, I tell him that I don’t have any money or I only have enough money to buy exactly what we came for. He’ll pout and “oh man!” or say, “Well, do we really need toothpaste?”  but he’s fairly good at listening.

One day at Target, he asked for a Kindle (Yeah. I know.), and I said, “Boy, we’re in a recession.” He looked at me and responded, “Mommy, we’re in a Target.” I’m grateful that he doesn’t throw tantrums like the kids I step over in the toy aisle but still the “can you buy me that” gets a little annoying. 

So this morning when I woke up and found Boogie upstairs watching The Fresh Beats (you know from my post a few weeks ago how I feel about that) and thumbing through a Wal-Mart  Christmas mailer, I groaned to myself. Halloween was last weekend. It’s  not even Thanksgiving yet and can I get some pie before I have to wrap presents? Damn. I watched him for a little bit ,waiting for him to ask for a super Transformer Monster Truck Bicycle Power Ranger Batman car... thing. (He knows better than to ask for a gun.) But when Boogie noticed that I was in the room, he looked up with those  massive brown eyes, long curly lashes and big smile and  said, “Good morning! Can you buy me a Barbie?”

I’m sorry what?

I said, “Do you mean a Barbie like a bar-b-que?”

He said, “No. I want a Barbie. This one.”

And sure enough he pointed to the iconic toy. That’s what he wanted. I took a closer look to make sure it wasn’t some sort of Barbie-shaped gun or torpedo launcher. Nope. It was Barbie in all her Dream Townhouse glory. And I was confused.

Now, don’t get me wrong, I don’t mind buying my son a doll. But he’d never shown any interest in dolls before and I really wish if he did, that it wouldn’t be Barbie, of all hideous things. Before I could say anything else, my brown-faced gorgeous baby boy said, “I want the white one.”

*record scratch*

What? What do you mean you want the “white one?” I immediately went from “You want a doll?” to, “Oh, and now you want a ‘white one?!’ Boy!” Somehow, I calmed myself down enough to say, “Baby, wouldn’t you rather have a black one?”

He said, “No. I want the white one.”

I said, “But the black Barbie is so pretty. Don’t you want a black Barbie that’s pretty?”

He said, “No. I want the white one. I saw the black one in the store and it was nekkid. I want the white one.”

I had no idea where this conversation came from or where it was going, but now I was firmly in Parental Confusion Land. You know, the place when your child says or does something so outrageous that your only response is a confused, “Oh... okay.” Like when I asked him why he had on two watches and he said, “Because I need to know what time it is all day.” Oh... okay.

Now let me clarify the “black one was nekkid” thing. In Boogie’s world, “nekkid” means shirtless for boys and/or wearing a bathing suit for girls. “Naked”means without clothes. I have no idea how he decided to make this distinction, but like with most things Boogie, you just gotta accept it and move on. He gets it and that’s all that matters. So I’m pretty sure that the black Barbie had on a bathing suit and he didn’t want anything to do with that. But still, if I’m going to buy my son a Barbie, I’m buying him a black one, dammit!

So I said, “E, I’m not buying  you a white Barbie.”

And he said, “Why not?!”

And I said, “Because YOU aren’t white! Why would you want white Barbie?”

And he said, “Because it’s cute.”

Me: “WHAT?! Are you trying to say that the black Barbie isn’t cute?!”

Before I knew it, my neck was rolling and I had the black girl finger up. (Let me interject here by saying I knew how ridiculous this conversation with my not-quite 4-year-old son was, but I felt like we needed to have it. I’m not raising no color complex!)

Boogie looked stunned for a second and said “No... the Black Barbie is pretty like you and Kanke and Grandma, but the white Barbie is cute and not nekkid.”

“So why do you want a white one and not a black one? I don’t understand.”

Boogie could tell that he had somehow upset me, but he wasn’t sure why, so he spoke very slowly: “Because I see pretty black people all the time. Plus the Barbie in Toy Story was white.”

Oh... okay.

It’s true. The Barbie in Toy Story was white. I’m still trying to figure out why I reacted so strongly to his declaration that he wanted a white Barbie and not a black one. Raising a brown boy into a black man in this country is difficult; all the subliminal messages about what’s good and what’s bad and who’s good and who’s bad sneaks in before you know it, and I got a little scared that my baby was starting to feel like his brown wasn’t beautiful. Boogie’s concept of race is all over the place. He thinks light-skinned people are white, and he identifies my friends by skin tone. “Chris That’s the Color White.” and “Mychal That’s the Color Brown not Michael That’s the Color White.” (Both of them are actually black men.)

Outside of distinguishing features, ethnicity doesn’t mean much to Boogie and I felt wrong for injecting race in a conversation that was simply about the toy he wanted because of the movie he loved. But at what point is the conversation valid and necessary? 

I want Boogie to love his skin and his heritage and his people, but I want him to respect and love the culture and heritage of others. When I was in college, I was all Arrested Development, Badu-ified, and I just knew that any child of mine would go to an African school and wear African clothes and speak African... like Africans! Apparently, being half Nigerian wasn't enough.

Now that I’m older and my worldview has expanded, I know I want my son to have a more layered approach to loving himself and respecting others’ differences. I know I have to teach him that before the world teaches him different. I just don’t know how to raise a child who is proud of who he is and accepting of others without upsetting that delicate, child-like innocence that makes so much sense in his big ass head. 

I do know this much: I'm still not buying him a white Barbie.

I'll buy him a gun first. 

Oh... okay.

* * * * *

About our MyBrownBaby Contributor: Bassey Ikpi is a Nigeria-born, Oklahoma-bred, PG County-fed, Brooklyn-led writer/poet/neurotic who is the single mother of an amazing man-child, Elaiwe Ikpi. She's half awesome, a quarter crazy and 1/3rd genius... the leftover bit is a caramel creme center. A strong advocate of mental health awareness, Bassey is currently working on a memoir about living with mental illness and producing Basseyworld Live, a stage show that infuses poetry and interactive panel discussions about everything from politics to pop culture. Find more Bassey on her site, Bassey's World.

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. 

Candy Apples, 12-Inch Subs and Quarter Waters: 3rd Graders Lunches = One Step Closer To Type 2 Diabetes

By NICK CHILES

I was pleased to see that the class trip was a big hit. My daughter Lila’s third-grade class had hit the Salvador Dali exhibit at Atlanta’s High Museum in full 8-year-old curiosity mode. They bounced around the cavernous rooms, wide-eyed as they took in Dali’s unique and whimsical view of the world. They had studied him in class; now they were seeing the real thing, close enough to touch (but keep your little hands off!). A painter who could put the Christ child, floating rhinoceros horns, a waterfall and a lovely portrait of his wife all in the same painting was clearly a genius in their eyes. The High Museum made it extra fun by creating an audio-tour that was narrated by Dali’s “mustache.” When the third graders put the headphones on and heard the silly, French-inflected voice that was supposed to be the painter’s mustache, they all broke into giggles. Nothing like seeing giggles coming from 8-year-olds in an art museum.

I was one of two class chaperones, meaning I had to help the teacher and the other chaperone, a grandma, keep 20 8-year-olds moving along the exhibit at a brisk and coordinated pace. Yeah, right. Certainly you’ve heard the expression “herding cats.”

When we reached the end of the exhibit and the kids had to regretfully hand back the audio kits, we announced that it was time for lunch. They were happy. And that brings me to the point of this here diatribe.

We sprawled out in the museum’s courtyard and handed the students the lunches they had brought from home. I was having a great time eating with my little Lila and sharing our impressions of the tour. Then I heard a whole lot of giggling and loud exclamations to my right. I looked over and saw that one little boy was struggling to put away a mammoth 12-inch sub sandwich.

“That’s too big!” one little girl said, pointing at him and laughing. “You can’t finish that!”

I agreed with her, shaking my head and wondering what form of dementia would move a parent to send a child to school with a sandwich that was bigger than my forearm. But it got worse.

A chubby girl (yeah, I know, a little mean, but I’m just keeping it real) sighed and looked down at her lap. What stared back at her was a feast that could have fed half the class, no exaggeration. The girl had about eight sandwich quarters, cut up and stuffed into a gallon-sized Ziploc bag. She had a large bag of potato chips. And she had three large containers of those cheap, sugar-water-with-food-coloring bottles of liquid that we used to call “quarter waters” when I was little because they only cost a quarter. She had finished the pink one; now she was looking down at two blue bottles, wondering if she should crack open another. But it got worse.

The girl sitting next to her, who also was a bit chubby, was wrestling with a large red candy apple, covered with nuts. I don’t know about you, but I still have nightmares thinking back to those post-Halloween candy feasts as a child when I had to figure out how to eat a candy apple without losing several molars. The idea of handing one to my child in the morning and telling her to eat it for lunch at a museum…well, I really am unable to understand. I checked in with her a few minutes later and she had shorn off the top layer of hard, sticky, red lacquer—much of it of course winding up on her hands and face—leaving the abused, browning flesh of a sad little apple. But it got even worse.

Sitting next to me was another little boy. He wore glasses and he also was a bit chubby. I will call him Raymond. Raymond was steadily making his way through a giant chocolate Twix bar. When I say “giant,” I mean one of those 8 ½ x 11 candy bar sheets that you see near the check-out counter at the CVS and wonder to yourself under what circumstances any person would ever need to eat a pound of Twix. Well, I found out the answer: apparently when you send your child on a class trip. 

Michelle Obama would have had a coronary.

We hear a lot of grousing in this country about the poor health of our children, and how we are hurtling scarily toward a day when like half of the population will be suffering from Type 2 diabetes. We shake our heads and wonder how we got to this point. Well, on that recent afternoon at the High Museum, I got a little glimpse at the root of the problem. My wife has written here at MyBrownBaby about how unhealthy and plain bad school lunches are, and how Congress needs to get off its behind and get a Jamie Oliver-type Food Revolution going in all of our schools. But we can't just blame Congress and schools for feeding our kids crap. Nope—some of this has to fall squarely on the parents' shoulders.

I feel compelled to add one more fact: all of the children with the ridiculously inappropriate lunches were African American. Of the 20 kids in the class, about 8 are black. The rest are a little model U.N. of white, Latino and Asian. But only the black kids had the bad stuff. And, I might add, the black kids were the chubsters. Come on, people, we gotta pay more attention to what we are feeding our children! So many of us fight so hard to keep off the bulge as we get older. Let’s not put that burden on our kids before they even learn their times tables.

* * * * *

About Our MBB Contributor: Nick Chiles, a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, is the author of seven books, including the New York Times bestselling tome The Blueprint: A Plan for Living Above Life's Storms co-written with gospel legend Kirk Franklin. Nick also writes for several publications including Essence, where he frequently pens stories about fatherhood and manhood.  

Watermelon, The "N" Word and the Hearts of (Wo)Men

It was fun, I guess. We did all kinds of art projects together and cool stuff like learning how to sew and make sun tea and somewhere in there, there was the obligatory “how to tie a knot” exercises. I remember going to a dude ranch and riding an ornery horse and eating some kind of campfire stew made with canned tomatoes and beans and water that had way too many onions and not enough salt. And in my then-12-year-old world, you just couldn’t beat earning enough pins to make the sash all heavy and stuff.

Good times, Girl Scouts.

Until that one afternoon my cousin and I dared ride my bike on Pennsylvania Avenue. It was only one block away from my childhood home, but it might as well have been Mars in my neighborhood, where black families had only begun to dot the lily-white streets of this mostly blue-collar, working class community. There were streets you walked down if you were black and many others you didn’t—those were the (unwritten) rules, and those of us who lived there just kinda went with it.

My cousin? She was from South Carolina. And a rule breaker. And since she was driving and I was riding, we found ourselves on Pennsylvania Ave., cruising past my Girl Scouts Troop leader’s house. Her daughter—a fellow scout—was having a party with a bunch of girls sprawled all over her front lawn. We’d barely gotten past the yard when the troop leader’s daughter hurled her greeting.

Nigger want a watermelon?

Stunned, scared, hurt and betrayed, I was rendered mute. But my cousin, who had no blind allegiance to those girls and whose mouth was bigger than the Long Island Sound, had no problem saying a few choice words back—nasty enough to get the fellow scout and all of her friends to chase us all the way down the street. All the way off Pennsylvania Avenue.

I never stepped foot back on that block again. And I never went back to Girl Scouts, either, for obvious reasons. And at age 12, I swore that no daughter of mine would ever be a Girl Scout or find herself in a situation where she was The Only and The Others could jump her or verbally abuse her or make her feel unwelcome or a combo of the three.

Of course, my 12-year-old pronouncement is smacking against my very real world mom experiences, which, if I’m worth my mom salt, must include letting my babies pursue their passions and experience the beauty of trying something new.

Thing is, letting my babies be The Only in a room full of The Other is not easy for me. It happens, no doubt; though we seek diversity in most everything we do with our children, the way we live and the circles in which we move and the experiences we have sometimes wind up being as homogenous as a carton of 2%. My daughters can handle themselves in such situations; it’s not a thing for them to be The Only—it doesn’t change who they are in any way or make them feel lesser or want to be something other than the beautiful brown girls that they are.

But it’s not my girls I’m worried about...

To read the rest of my commentary on how I struggle with balancing my daughters' pursuit of fun with the ugliness of homogenous kid programming, check out the MyBrownBaby page HERE on Parenting.com's The Parenting Post. 

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…

Picky Eaters Plus My Dinner Table = A Recipe For Disaster

I. Can’t. Stand. Them. 

Picky eaters, that is. 

They work my nerves with their empty forks and their “I don’t eat that” declarations and their turned-up noses, acting like I just placed a steaming pile of pooh on their dinner plates. What kind of madness is this, kids inviting themselves to dinner and then sitting down to my table, announcing what they will and will not eat, even as they watch me stand over that hot stove, preparing a healthy, kid-friendly home made feast? When did this become acceptable dinner table etiquette? 

What’s got me in a tizzy?

Yet another one of Mari’s friends stayed for dinner a couple nights ago and promptly ran down the list of stuff on my stove that she wasn’t going to eat. Apparently, smothered chicken and sautéed string beans were going to make her hurl a lung. It didn’t matter that she’d never tasted it before, or that both my girls were insisting it was, like, the best meal ever. She was just all, “No.”

“I’m only going to have the rice, please, with lots of butter.”

Huh?

I mean, I get the three-year-old who only eats beige food and the occasional peanut butter-smothered carrot stick. I had one of those. If it wasn’t a chicken nugget, a french fry, applesauce or popcorn, she wasn’t eating it. But we put an end to those shenanigans around age five; by then, if she wasn’t eating some version of the same meal the rest of the family was eating, she wasn’t eating. By age six, she was subjected to the same rule as every other kid in the house: You have to try it at least three times in three different meals before you decide you don’t like it. (Almost always by the third try, they’re total fans, trust.) And even if you don’t like it, oh well, then you don’t eat. I’m not hiding vegetables in your sauce to get you to the magical number of daily servings; I’m not cooking something separate from what everyone else is eating; and sitting at my table without eating your veggies, protein, and healthy starches is not an option.

And from now on, I declare before Sweet Baby Jesus and 10 episodes of Jamie Oliver’s “Food Nation” that the same rules will apply to visitors. Because here’s what I’m not figuring to do: I’m not short-order cooking for your kid because you allowed her to go through 11-years-worth of dinners without so much as tasting salad and turning down all 300 of the Earth’s vegetables, and empowered her with the right to tell grown-ups what to put on her plate.

Yeah, I said it.

I’m a foodie, see? I appreciate that the world is full of beautiful food and incredible flavors and delicious aromas and eclectic textures, and I happen to think my kids should be blessed with that knowledge, too. Mari, Lila, and Mazi are on their way, for sure: They eat sushi and okra and Jamaican ackee and codfish—ox tails and brussel sprouts and all kinds of fish drizzled with fancy sauces. The little ones are enrolled every summer in our local Young Chef’s Academy so that they can learn their way around the kitchen and try out some new recipes and pick up a few more stove skills, and together, we catalogue our recipes in our Home Made Love Family Recipe Book so that they can document their favorites and keep them for meals they’ll make with their own families someday.

Turning down a dish because they don’t like the way it looks or smells never occurs to them; if it’s food, they’re going to try it and most likely like it and want to add it to the repertoire (if you can cook, of course). Suffice to say, they’re not going to be the kids who go to another country and bypass the world’s best cuisines for a Quarter Pounder with Cheese. Ain’t happening.

And I’m not hardly about to entertain anybody else’s little one running my kitchen and my dinner table and driving me up the wall with their requests for something other than what I’ve put on their dinner plates.

So if your kid is a picky eater, let her get her grub on before she comes over to the house, or be prepared to come pick her up before dinner time, m’kay? #sooverit.

NOTE: This piece originally was written for my column at Parenting.com's The Parenting Post. To see the rest of my columns there and to enjoy great mom-to-mom advice on raising children, visit Parenting's MyBrownBaby page. 

Salma Hayek, Kim Kardashian and "Creepy" Breastfeeding

I mean seriously: What gets people so worked up about breastfeeding? The baby is hungry, nature put milk in your boob to satisfy that hunger—pop a boob in the baby’s mouth and everybody’s satisfied. It’s free. It’s (relatively) easy. And it comes with some health benefits for the kid and some quick weight loss for you.

Everybody wins.

Why, then, all the vitriol? I swear, when I made the conscious decision to breastfeed both of my daughters for at least a year, everyone from the nurses where I gave birth to some of my closest family members and friends tried to shove Similac into my refrigerator—as I recount in THIS BLOG POST. I always felt like at the base of it, folks were so busy sexualizing my boobs that they couldn’t accept that I wanted to put them to use for purposes other than turning on men.

This was on my mind recently when I read the June issue of In Style, when Salma Hayek expressed shock over a legion of racist hate mail from people who took pen to paper to express outrage after the Mexican starlet breastfed a hungry, crying African child while on a humanitarian trip in the motherland:

This baby was hungry and I was still nursing [my daughter] Valentina, so I fed the child. What was shocking were the hate letters I received. What offended some in particular was that I breastfed a black child. It was not even in my universe, such a thought. For me, it was a baby who was just born and was hungry. He was healthy but malnourished at this hospital – it was really just a clinic in the countryside – and I was able to help.

My girl Erica Kennedy of The Feminista Files had me sending up hallelujahs when she broke down why someone would waste printer ink, paper, a stamp and the spit it took to make it stick to an envelope hollering at a woman whose sole purpose was to feed a baby:

I think this has to do with the messed up, puritanical ideas we have in America about sexuality and our own bodies. A rich Latina woman married to a white French billionaire whose gigantic tatas are always on delicious display on red carpets letting a poor black child s uckle on her golden bosom on camera for ABC News? That could keep a whole army of shrinks writing books for decades.

Indeed.

Which had me thinking that maybe the deputy editor at a top UK-based parenting magazine, should ask HR if her health benefits cover a couple of couch sessions to discuss her hatred of breastfeeding.  Just this past week, after Kim Kardashian tweeted her disgust of a woman who was breastfeeding in public, Kathryn Blundell of Mother and Baby magazine WEIGHED IN WITH AN ESSAY in which she proclaimed her “fun bags” were strictly for lovers, and the idea of putting them in the mouth of a “bawling baby” is “creepy.” She added that she formula fed her child to give her boobs “at least a chance to stay on my chest rather than dangling around my stomach.”

Now, I get why Kim Kardashian’s ignorant ass would tweet some anti-breastfeeding sentiments. I mean, I find it ironic that a chick whose claim to fame is making uninspired, butt-naked sex tapes with Ray J, is bothered by a mother feeding her baby in public. But nobody ever accused Kardashian of being the brightest porch light on the block anyway, so her dimwittedness makes sense. But the editor of a parenting magazine going hard against breastfeeding? Really?

Of course, after all hell broke loose, Blundell explained herself, but stood surprisingly firm, even in the face of a firestorm of criticism:

My motivation behind writing this feature was to give a voice to those many women who simply do not want to breastfeed, and as a result of this choice have felt guilty, alienated and distressed. 
I also wrote with humour as I wanted to take a more relaxed approach to the topic, in a climate where unfortunately the type of milk a woman feeds her baby seems so open to serious judgment and criticism.

Exactly. Emphasis on judgment and criticism. How, exactly, does one try to stop mothers from judging and criticizing other mothers for their baby feeding choices by judging and criticizing women who breastfeed? I'm confused. 

Here’s an idea Ms. Blundell: How about we accept the fact that God put milk in our breasts to feed our babies, and that all over the world except here in the backwards ass United States and apparently the UK, it’s actually considered a GOOD, HEALTHY way to keep your kid alive.

It’s not creepy.

Or nasty.

Or abnormal.

And I don’t know about anyone else, but I got two-baby boobies—and they sit up right nice, thank you very much.

If you choose to feed your baby with formula—cool, do you.  Your choice. Just like breastfeeding was mine. Let’s leave each other alone about it already.

Something Stinks At Seattle's Thurgood Marshall Elementary School.

Sweet baby Jesus.

It took me a minute to shake the tomfoolery that went down last month when a high school teacher—one in the lily white sticks of Lumpkin County, GA, no less—dressed up four of her students in KKK outfits and paraded them through the school lunch room on her way to teach a “history” lesson about racism. The teacher gave a “my bad,” and the school slapped her with some sensitivity training and so, you know, all the little Negro children who may have genuinely been offended/surprised/frightened by what looked like a gathering of the homegrown terrorist organization that systematically lynched, raped, tortured and murdered African Americans, needed to, like, hurry up and get the eff over it.

Right.

And now, THIS from The Seattle Times: A third-grade teacher kicked an 8-year-old black girl—the only brown baby in the advanced placement class—out of the classroom because the Organics Olive Oil Hair Moisturizing Lotion her mom uses on her natural hair made the teacher, who allegedly has allergy issues, want to vomit and faint. Yup, you read that right: The smell of the baby's afro made the teacher throw up a little in her mouth and almost pass out.

DEAD FISH EYES.

Hold up, though—it gets better: After the teacher, a 3rd grade instructor at the Thurgood Marshall Elementary School (isn't the irony of the name of the school just delicious?) pulled the baby from the class and had her sit out in the hallway, she sent the girl to another non-gifted classroom full of black students, and then refused to respond to the parents when they questioned what was up with all of that. 

Now, the parents are in a tizzy and won't let their kid go back to school (with good damn reason); the NAACP and lawyers are involved; and the school district, citing the lawsuit, has zipped its collective lips on the issue, except to say that they're positive the teacher's actions weren't racially motivated.

Uh huh.

Now, I'm all kumbaya on the teacher having allergies or sensitivities to smells or whatever. And a little web investigation revealed that the teacher handed out letters in the beginning of the year explaining the sensitivity and asking the parents not to send their kids into the classroom smelling any kinda ways, lest the teacher suffer an attack. But er, um, you mean to tell me the only way this adult—this teacher who is responsible not only for molding students' minds but also their emotional and mental well-being, no matter their size, skin color, sexual orientation, looks, hairstyles, and, yes, smells—could keep from throwing up and fainting was to a) single out the one black child in the class; b) tell her she stinks in front of said class; c) banish her from the gifted class to one that is educationally inferior to the one in which she was placed (Lord, this alone is worth a whole 'nother post), and; d) refuse to give the parents a head's up or return emails and phone calls to explain?

I mean, come on, son—really?

I'm the mother of an 8-year-old, 11-year-old, and 17-year-old, and they regularly assault my wolf nose with the funk of a 1,000 years—stank, deodorant-less armpits, farts, sweaty shin guards and soccer cleats, shard-filled underwear, Cheetos-induced exorcist vomit slicks, head-to-toe Tag body spray spills you can smell a quarter mile away. And those are just my three. I can only imagine how gross a class of 30 or more 8-year-olds must be, with their sweaty, playground bodies and their stinky peanut butter and banana lunches and their  sparkly, strawberry sour pucker lip glosses and their "I just forgot to brush my teeth this past week" morning breath.

Simply put: Kids smell. Moms and teachers alike have to put up with it. 

And feign as much ignorance about it as you want to, but moisturizer to natural black girl hair is like water is to the human body: We have to have it or our hair dies. And sometimes, that moisturizer's got a little something in it to make your hair smell nice.

And if a teacher can't handle normal, average, everyday kid smells (scratching my head trying to figure out how the teacher keeps from fainting and vomiting at the grocery store, on the bus, at the mall, in church...) and the fragrance of a little girl's afro puffs, well then maybe said teacher needs to find a new damn job instead of kicking smart little black girls with afros out of the smart kid class and refusing to explain what's up to her parents, leaving the parents to make a federal case out of it.

And make a federal case out of it, they must. Because the damage caused to that little girl, a black child already charged with having to fit in to a class full of kids who don't look like her, could be irreparable if the parents aren't standing up, speaking out, and talking to that baby about how special she and her natural hair—the hair God gave her—is, no matter the reaction her insensitive, dummy of a teacher has to it. No matter how many people stand at the ready to question why she wears it that way and why she doesn't just pull a hot comb or some relaxer through it.

Are these teachers—the "Let's play dress up in KKK robes" one and the "I faint at the slightest whiff of afro juice" racist? I don't think so. But they're both ignorant as hell, and inexcusably insensitive to the students and parents who do not look like them.  And they absolutely do not deserve a pass for the foolishness. Two snaps up and a twist to the reader who left this brilliant comment at the end of THIS PIECE written by the little girl's father:

It's unlikely this teacher was thinking about the significance and connotations of hair -- and that's because for her, as a member of the "default" racial group, hair doesn't have significance and connotation. She has the luxury of having "default" hair; she has the luxury of never feeling singled out or racially defined by her hair. Does this mean she's off the hook, because she didn't know or because it didn't occur to her? Can the racial connotations of a white teacher singling out a student of color by making an issue of her hair be dismissed? Absolutely not. White people plead ignorance all the time for things like this: "I wasn't being racist when I said/did that -- I just didn't know any better. I didn't know that was offensive." 

Well, I think that's pretty weak (I'm white; I kind of think it's my own damn responsibility to be as conscious of the role race plays in our society as everyone else, who is being fucked over by it, is). Race is an issue in this story the way it is more and more frequently in America -- not because of an overt act of aggression, but because of a passive act of inconsideration.

  

Say word.

Deep Sigh.

This mess right here?

I can't.

And I won't.

But somebody's mama clearly should have.

Press play to see what I mean.

On the Parenting Post: The Little Millionaire Next Door

Mommy would slip into the dressing room at Macy’s or Bloomingdales or Saks or Penny’s with an armful of fancy dresses and pants suits and blouses and two tags in her fists—one that allowed her to bring in six items, and a second that made it so I could vouch for a half dozen more. And then she’d prop me up in the corner and, for what seemed like hours, she’d climb in and out of one outfit and then into the next, twirling and striking glorious poses that would make supermodel Tyra Banks take pause.

She was stunning, my mother—tall and slender and lithe. Those pretty church dresses and pastel suits and Jordache skinny jeans always fit her just so, which meant that she always ended up at the register with a majority of her haul and a fistful of plastic magic.

And what did I get out of these glorious shopping jaunts? A ice cold double-scoop of strawberry Baskin Robbins, and an ice cold warning not to tell my Dad about all the pretty clothes she routinely stowed away in the trunk until the coast was clear (read: she could sneak her myriad of purchases into the house when my Dad was sleep/working/otherwise too preoccupied to notice that her wardrobe and wicked shoe collection grew by at least 15 percent every payday.)

Yup, Mommy was totally all, “Hello, my name is Bettye, and I’m a shopaholic.” And I was her faithful enabler.

I’d love to pretend like her wanton spending sprees didn’t affect me, but, um—yeah. Let’s just say that when I see pretty things, I want said pretty things. And if I have the money to buy those pretty things? I’m buying those pretty things.

Except that thanks to technology, my husband Nick, who checks our bank account statements online practically more than he googles, can pin down my purchases before I even make it to the parking lot. What do you know about the post purchase phone call—“Um, what did you just buy at Anthropologie?”

But what’s worse is that in some screwed up twist of fate, the karmic Gods sent me an IRS agent for a daughter—Mari. I mean, this kid keeps tabs on my spending like she’s got a job and I’m using her cash. Or like her Daddy put her up to it. Witness:

Me: *strolling through Francesca, fingering the leather purses and drooling over the rack of summer blouses so fresh and so new they hadn’t even been matriculated into the rest of the clothing racks. *

Mari: You’re supposed to be buying a present for my teacher.

Me: *Tossing a mean side-eye * Ooo-kaaay. But this purse is so cute and that shirt would go perfect with my blue capris and I’ve been looking for a cute dress for a minute so I’m going to try these on right quick.

Mari: *Silent. Slow blinks. * Okay, but that’s it, or I’m going to have to tell Daddy… *

Uh huh. That’s my Mari. Always looking out for her damn Daddy.

I’ve tried to ignore these little snide comments -- to let my light shine bright and the sparkles fill the air regardless of her threats. I’ve even offered sugary treats and a clothing item of her choosing -- to no avail. Alas, her allegiance is to frugality and her father...

To read more about Mari busting me out on my shopping sprees and the top reasons why Lila is all Team Mommy, all the time, CLICK HERE to read the rest of this piece, exclusively on the Parenting Post.

Boycott Arizona

Last week, I had the distinct honor of attending a dramatic reading, poetry slam and awards ceremony for the Marel Brown Creative Writing Program, an arts and cultural enrichment program administered by the Boys and Girls Club of metro Atlanta. I gave a speech meant to inspire young writers, but I was the one who walked away with the gift; these children, with their poems and their puppet shows and their dances and their readings, moved me in ways that reminded me why I fell in love with writing, and especially why I adore children.

But it was one club in particular that moved me to tears. The group of about 10 girls did a dramatic reading of a play about the children of illegal immigrants; in it, each child took turns relaying what it feels like to have high hopes for integrating into our culture and grabbing hold of the American dream, but live in constant fear that their already fragile home lives would be unravelled by their parents' illegal status. In one scene, one little girl tried to comfort her sister by helping her practice English while they lay in bed, waiting for their mother to arrive home from work. Even as they spoke of their hopes of learning the language, they were worried sick that their mother's tardiness was a sign that she'd been "taken away just like Papi." There was real fear in their voices—and sadness. So much sadness. These children, no more than 10 or 11, brought home for me just how tenuous are the lives of children who, through no fault of their own, can never, ever get comfortable here in a country (of immigrants) that has displayed, under no uncertain terms, that they don't give a flying fig about immigrants (of color).

It is this that I was channelling when I read THIS STORY about Arizona enacting a law meant to identify, prosecute and deport illegal immigrants. According to The New York Times:

(the law) requires police officers, “when practicable,” to detain people they reasonably suspect are in the country without authorization and to verify their status with federal officials, unless doing so would hinder an investigation or emergency medical treatment.

It also makes it a state crime — a misdemeanor — to not carry immigration papers. In addition, it allows people to sue local government or agencies if they believe federal or state immigration law is not being enforced.

Any reasonable person can see where this is going, and I'm going to raise my voice in calling it what it is: Racial profiling. You can not tell me that police will be stopping blonde-haired, blue-eyed Arizonans and checking their wallets for immigration documents, or that their "reasonable" suspicions of who is an illegal won't focus on our Latino and Mexican brothers and sisters. Hell, I got a couple people in my family that could pass for Latino; if they find themselves in Arizona, they better keep their drivers' licenses handy, lest they find themselves on a flight headed South of the border.

Here's what's got my goat: Whenever there are any threats from government enforcement of immigration laws, or changes in them, the place where you see the impact the quickest and most severely is in schools. A lot of these families have a precarious enough lifestyle as it is, which sometimes makes it difficult for their kids to stay in school for an entire year. But when they fear that the school may become a place where a family will be targeted, they'll keep their kids home—thus keeping the family trapped in poverty for another generation.

The beautiful thing about America has always been the way immigrants could use education to lift themselves—the ranks of millionaires and billionaires in this country are filled with people who came here with nothing, got an education, and created a product or business that improved the lifestyles of us all. In fact, there have been many complaints by the science and computer departments in our universities that our tougher immigration laws are keeping brilliant, creative minds out of the United States, and those people are taking their talents elsewhere. Imagine if the immigration laws of today were the same 20 years ago: There would be no Google.

Now, I'm all for making folks caught trying to sneak across our borders turn it back around until they can find a legitimate way to get up in here. What I'm categorically against is harassing the ones who are here already, and certainly dragging legal American citizens through the mud to get at the illegals, many of whom, at the end of the night, just want to make it home from a hard day's work to their children—children who might be sitting next to your kids in class, or kicking around with them on the soccer fields every Saturday, or taking turns with them on the swings at your local park, or just living their lives, trying to be something bigger and better than their mothers and fathers could have ever imagined. These children may be your children's friends. Their mothers may be passing out cupcakes at the end-of-the-school-year party. Or a fellow member of your PTA.

You never know.

Lest we forget, we moms of color and moms of children of color know exactly what racial profiling is and how devastating it can be to be targeted by law enforcement simply because of the color of our skin. Racial profiling is real and humiliating and infuriating—and leaves everyone on the opposite end of the nightstick feeling so very powerless. I say we stand up in solidarity with our fellow people of color and boycott Arizona (it wouldn't be the first time; we gave a collective middle finger to that state years ago when John McCain refused to support the bill that eventually made Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday a federal holiday): don't go to or hold any conventions there, don't vacation there, and don't support any businesses based there. And while you're at it, sign THIS PETITION calling on your fellow Americans to do the same.

If for no other reason, do it for the children.

To Hell With Marriage Vows

I've been itching to write about all this cheating husband mess running all up and through Hollywood, but my girl/co-author Mitzi of the hysterical Mitzi Moments said all that needs to be said on the subject and then some:

It looks like the state of marriage continues to rapidly deteriorate. Not only did lameass Tiki Barber leave his pregnant wife of 11 years for an intern but it seems Garcelle Beauvais-Nilon's husband has also been outted for his five-year affair. So how many celebrity husbands are in the shit house behind women probably not worth the gum on the bottom of my shoe: Steve Phillips, Tiger Woods, Shaq, Jesse James, Tiki Barber... Nice, very nice.

Keep it classy ya'll.

But not for nothing, there's been such a varied response to the cheating by all the wives. Don't ya think? Let's see: ESPN analyst Steve Phillips' wife sued him and homegirl; Elin chased Tiger's ass with a golf club; Shaunie O'Neal snatched the kids and went to LA; Sandra straight disappeared; Ginny Barber immediately started crying to the press, and; good 'ole Garcelle... Well Ms. Thang sent a damn email to the ENTIRE talent agency where her husband works. Mmm-hmm, talking about:

"I found out today that MY husband of almost 9 yrs has been having an affair for 5 yrs with some slut in Chicago. I am devastated!!!! And I have been duped!! Our boys don't deserve this!"

JUST LIKE THAT.

I gotta say, it's been a bad run for unfaithful men over the past seven months. And sure, I'd like to be optimistic about the situation. Cause you know, not everyone has to put his hand on the fire to figure out that it burns. But it's just... I mean honestly? Interns, waitresses, low budget internet porn stars, party promoters and your homeboy's fiancee? It's a lot. Le sigh.

Jesus be the secret bank account in your mama's maiden name.

And this right here is why I love me some Mitzi: She's a fool all day, er' day—and she always gives it straight, no chaser. Check out more of Mitzi's musings HERE at Mitzi Moments or check her out on Twitter at @mitzimoments.

Cheetah Girl Gone Wild

I get it: It's never been an easy fete for a child star to make the transition into adult (working) actor, right? I mean, Hollywood Blvd is littered with the broken careers of people who were a very big deal when they were cute and short and smoochy and all, but became about as relevant as a snowsuit on Waikiki Beach the moment puberty hit. (I'm looking at you, Gary Coleman. And you, too, Todd Bridges, Danny Bonaduce, Scott Baio, Tina Yothers, Jaleel White, Corey Haim and Macaulay Culkin. Alla y'all.) So if you were hot at 10, you better figure out how to sizzle at 20, or get real comfortable in the tight, itchy mall security outfit.

One can only guess that this is what singer/actress Kiely Williams of The Cheetah Girls fame was thinking when she poured herself into some sparkly hot pants, pulled out her best stripper moves, and got to extolling the virtues of drunk, unprotected, random sex in her new, decidedly adult single, "Spectacular." Check it:

Last I remember I was face down
Ass up, clothes off, broke off, dozed off
Even though I'm not sure of his name
He could get it again if he wanted
Cause the sex was spectacular
The sex was spectacular (yeaaah)
The sex was spectacular
The sex was spectacular

Uh huh. There's more:

You can say what you want but
You can call me a slut but
What he did to me last night felt so good
I must have been on drugs
I hope he used a rubber
Or I'mma be in trouble
Promise I don't remember
Except for rolling over

DEAD. FISH. EYES.

This is the same little girl who starred in The Cheetah Girls movie series—the trio of hugely popular Disney flicks that encouraged little girls to value friendship, follow their dreams, and embrace girl power. My daughters love those movies—so much so that when the second and third Cheetah Girls movies debuted on the Disney Channel, we had our own little Cheetah Girls parties to celebrate. My girls own all three movies, know all the dance moves, their iPods are stuffed with Cheetah Girls music, and they absolutely adore the books, written by our friend Deborah Gregory. And though the flicks have been around for a few years, to this day, whenever they're on TV, Mari and Lila watch them like it's their first time seeing them.

Sooo... how do you go from the fun and super innocent, "The Party's Just Begun" to "ass up, clothes off, broke off" and "I hope he used a rubber or Imma be in trouble?" And, even more, how is it even remotely okay to put an ode to drunk sex—which to a grown ass woman works overtime to condone and damn-near encourage men liquoring up women so they can get uncommitted, raw random booty without too much of a fight (in a court of law, this is called DATE RAPE)—up on a site that little girls visit on the regular? YES! The girl put the video on her website, KielysWorld.com—the same place where she gives (surprisingly good) video advice to young girls. How, exactly, am I suppose to explain "Spectacular" to, say, Mari, at age 11? Because really, it wouldn't be too far out of the realm for Mari to Google this fool, land on what she and I would think is a safe site, and end up getting an eye- and ear-full of mess my 11-year-old isn't ready to see or hear and I'm not ready to explain.

Thanks, Kiely. Way to educate the kids.

Now Kiely released a video statement HERE claiming that she was simply telling a story—one that's familiar to 20-something's everywhere. Girls go out, get drunk, and sometimes sleep with guys they don't know. "I wrote 'Spectacular' and made the video to bring attention to a serious women's health and safety issue. Please don't shoot the messenger,” she added.

Right.

So singing about how "spectacular" it is to have drunk, unprotected sex with a random dude who's name she doesn't know is a public service announcement? For what? The quickest way to get HIV? Raped? Pregnant? Called a ho?

Thanks, girl. Good lookin' out for my girls. Just the message they need.

Um, so look: If this is how we stay relevant these days, Kiely, go for it: Get your edgy, wanna-be Lady Gaga on, do the Beyonce half-naked booty pop, rip out your soul and lay it at the altar of a Timbaland Euro beat—do what you can to keep the kitchen cabinets stocked with something other than Ramen Noodles. But really, girl: Leave the babies out of it. At least have the decency to admit the song sucks, the message sucks harder, and you just did it to avoid having to kick rocks for the rest of your life.

And then go kick rocks.