Another day, another story about parents getting into disagreements on the internet.
This story comes to us from a well-known parenting advice column that probably wasn’t expecting a question regarding a “racist baby”.
Of course, the internet had some thoughts about this letter and honestly, I don’t know whether to laugh or cry.
Parents, it’s totally normal to feel confused when you’re raising a child.
You’re tired, you’re frustrated, and the baby won’t. Stop. Crying. I get it. Heck, I’ve been there. It’s perfectly normal to ask for advice.
With the internet, parents can reach out to other parents from all over the world.
It’s a great way to get help and support. I’m in a few online parenting groups and they have been such a great resource.
One of the most popular online help forums for parents is Care and Feeding from “Slate Magazine”.
It’s basically like a “Dear Abby” column for millennial parents. Parents anonymously write in with their problems and writer Nicole Cliffe responds with advice and suggestions.
However, one recent letter caught Nicole’s eye for all the wrong reasons.
With what I’m sure was a very well-intentioned letter, one mom wrote in asking for help with her “racist” baby. Yes, you read that correctly.
“Dear Care and Feeding,”
“I’m a white parent with a white family, in a predominantly white area,” wrote this parent.
The letter goes on to explain that this parent tries to have books with diverse characters and that they hope to move to a more diverse area one day.
Here’s where it gets interesting.
According to this mom, she recently brought her four-month-old to a work party.
At the party, one of her co-worker’s guests, who is black, offered to hold the baby. The baby began crying.
Somehow, the mom took the baby’s crying as a sign of its race preference.
“I’m embarrassed and unsure if I should address the situation with my co-worker or pretend it didn’t happen. Any thoughts on how to handle my racist infant?” she wrote in the letter.
However, the rest of us were very, very confused by this whole situation.
At four-months-old, babies are still on the repeat cycle of eating, sleeping, and pooping.
I don’t think they have the capacity to be racist at this age.
Of course, people took to Twitter to share some thoughts on this letter.
As one Twitter user pointed out, it’s normal for babies to be scared of strangers, or basically anyone who is not their mom or dad.
My son actually went through a phase where he was afraid of his own father and couldn’t handle having both of us in the same room together. True story.
YUP.
Babies. Cry. All. The. Time.
Well, not all the time, but since they can’t really communicate it’s hard to know exactly why they’re crying. I swear, my son cried one time when I ate a Cheerio off his plate.
Others wondered if it was really the mother’s own discrimination surfacing.
We’ve established that it is impossible for a baby to be racist, but perhaps the mom was projecting her own anxieties on the situation?
Some people were wondering how we could capitalize on this whole thing.
Hey, I’d watch that show. Weirdly, I don’t think it would be the worst thing that TLC has produced in the last few years.
One Twitter user was reminded of this “Newsweek” cover.
Yes, this was a real Newsweek cover that ran in 2009. I’m not sure who approved this, but I’m sure they’d rather forget that this ever ran.
I think this perfectly sums up most of our reactions.
Tbh, I think my jaw has been gaping this entire time. I’m still struggling to comprehend this “racist baby” scenario.
As for the advice columnist, she offered a pretty solid suggestion.
“I firmly and unreservedly forbid you from ever speaking or thinking about this utter nonevent ever again,” she wrote .
Okay, I am dying over the word “nonevent”.
This letter could have just as well said, “My baby just cried. What do I do?”
Unfortunately, this mom had to blow it way out of proportion. At least we got some laughs out of it though.
In all seriousness, this mom seems like she was trying to do the right thing initially so we really shouldn’t judge too harshly. What do you think about this story?
