I was visiting my parents in New Jersey and sitting in the living room with my mother when she got a phone call. It was the principal of my little brother’s school telling her that he had to be picked up early from school for hitting another kid, a white girl. The news came as a shock to my mother and I. My brother is the kind of kid who doesn’t speak until spoken to, not because he is shy, but because he is uncharacteristically self-assured for a ten-year-old. Often when we teasingly ask him why he doesn’t speak up more, he responds that he doesn’t feel the need to explain himself. So immediately, I began asking questions: Does he have the right kid? Is my brother being aggressive towards girls? Do we have to tell him that that’s not OK? Surely, we demonstrate that in this household full of women.
My mother returned with my little brother around 1:00 PM, a few hours before school ended, and gave me the full story. She told me that DJ had been confronted by a little girl who had a record of bullying kids. At recess, she tried to take his ball and when he wouldn’t give it to her, she escalated to kicking at him while calling him the b-word. My brother, who recently began Tae Kwon Do lessons, assumed one of the stances he had learned and… punched her in the arm, not hard enough to injure her but hard enough to scare her. She began to cry. They were separated and he was sent home. Later, we found out he was held back from recess while the little girl received no punishment.
The day my little brother was sent home from school, he cried much like Kyle Rittenhouse in court, he felt he was being made out to be a monster. But unlike Rittenhouse, he wasn’t met with sympathy by the institution despite the fact that he wasn’t fully culpable for the incident and certainly did not instigate it. Reading the Rittenhouse court decision, all I could think about was DJ. Who will he or can he become in a world that does not extend grace to black men let alone black children.
He is entering a society with foundations made from the racist belief that black men can’t be vulnerable only aggressive. Early American tropes of the savage black man impervious to pain and weakness because of his animal-like strength have permeated the smallest crevices of our society within the medical industry, the education system, and the justice system. Past and presently, the trope is used to justify the violence inflicted upon us. And unfortunately, at some point, once melded with toxic masculinity, black invulnerability for many black men became a source of pride. Perhaps because even if they could not choose the way they were labeled, they could choose to embrace it. We have made a culture out of sayings of lemons and lemonade: N-word hard “r” to N-word light “a”. And sometimes that means settling for feeling we’re in control even when we aren’t; Feeling like the aggressor, even when you aren’t always, is sometimes better than always feeling like the victim.
This is the context in which my little brother is being raised. Where white children are given grace and the benefit of the doubt, black children are expected to be perfect, invulnerable. The slightest misstep could lead to a lifetime of consequences. A boy with a toy gun dies in a playground; a boy on a run is rundown; a boy wearing a hoodie walking to his father’s house dies in the street.
Not all of these scenarios end in death, often they end in serious injury or jail time. When acting out in school, black girls and boys are more likely to be suspended and because of high police presence in school, jailed. Research has shown that Black kids are more likely to be punished in school for minor infractions and less likely to be tested for ADHD or other learning disabilities. Even when they present symptoms and behaviors similar to their white peers, black kids can’t always expect benefits like behavioral therapy and medical treatment. Black children of any gender whose parents divorce, experience or even witness the death of someone close to them cannot always expect to be allowed counseling or absences from school.
And so, as parents — or concerned adults — we are faced with the question every day: how do we prepare them for a world in which a misstep, or bad luck, could easily become a free fall down a dark chasm. My parents are split on the answer, sometimes taking the traditional route — making sure he’s more perfect, more invulnerable, less weak, and sadly, less human and less child — other times, sheltering him and growling at predators. That day, my mother, usually unassuming but now angry, asked me what to do. I promptly wrote a succinct yet firm email to the principal about how *all* children should face the consequences of their actions — without racially specific language — but expecting to send an even firmer email if the appropriate actions weren’t taken. I wanted that little girl partially suspended too.
Before my mother could send it, my father intervened. My father, an experienced train engineer, has an approach that is reminiscent of an earlier time; one that allowed the un-unionized Pullman Porters to survive another day to see and feed their families : keep your head down, be diplomatic, do your job, give it 1000%, don’t push the envelope. He told my mom to wait on the email. The principal had promised to sit both kids down and work it out, so my father wanted to give him time to make good on his word. A day went by and there was no movement. After my mom gently confronted the principal in the parking lot, the kids were brought in to speak with the principal acting as mediator. They apologized to one another, but still, the little girl went unpunished.
Sometimes, I read too much into things. But I can’t help but peer into the hole of my brother’s future. I imagine if he heads down a path anything like my own — which he very well could, being an extremely bright kid with a stable middle class home and an overprotective big sister — that he may also encounter at boarding school or some other PWI a series of white kids who never seem to have to face the full brunt of their actions. Someone like a Brock Turner, an Olivia Jade, a Brett Kavanaugh, a Miya Ponsetto, a Jake Paul. Someone for whom cancel culture is a few months lost monetization on YouTube or a particularly difficult Senate Judiciary Committee hearing leading ultimately to a Supreme Court seat. All the while, cancel culture for black children and adults will remain life threatening. I flashback to learning that an acquaintance was the only one of her friend group permanently suspended from boarding school after being caught smoking weed, and the only black friend in the group.
The day my brother was sent home early from school, I found him crying in our basement living room. I went downstairs to find him. It broke my heart to see him experiencing pain but especially a pain that I thought he couldn’t fully understand. But when I asked him why he was upset, he explained that someone lying about his character could cause something bad to happen to him.
I was devastated but not surprised that my boy genius had figured it out. I told him that he had something behind him that most other black kids don’t: a family full of lawyers and professionals; a lot of money. I didn’t tell him that that won’t always be enough.
I don’t know how to raise black children. It’s an age old question. When to prepare them for this or that. For now, I am focused on my boy genius’ humanity. I don’t want him limited by the strictures of racism or sexism — meaning the muzzle that blackness and masculinity can become. I don’t want him thinking that he can either be perfect or criminal; weak or invulnerable. I want him to be held accountable for his actions while being given enough grace to become a better person, to grow; I want him and all black children (people) to be given the benefit of the doubt; and maybe most difficult, I want to protect his innocence. But we don’t have a country built for that kind of black childhood yet.
