What LGBT Workplace Rights, #RealWomen and #BlackLivesMatter Have in Common

#BlackLivesMatter. LGBTQ Workplace Rights. The #RealWomen, body-positive movement. None of these happen to be dominating today’s news headlines, but the above triangle of issues are on my mind today, connected by a fragile but significant thread.

First, #BlackLivesMatter. I believe that people are starting to get it. Well, maybe not Elisabeth Hasselbeck, who thinks #BlackLivesMatter should be a hate group, as if asking for an acknowledgement of full membership in the human race means you want to kick everyone else out.

I am talking about important people, like Bernie Sanders who voiced a clear, if chastened and well-schooled about-face at the first Democratic Debate.

I’m talking about the outrage I see on social media from many non-blacks in response to racial injustice.

What people are starting to get is that responding “All Lives Matter” when someone mentions that #BlackLivesMatter, is dismissive and entirely invalidating. No one is arguing that black lives matter more than anyone else’s. Furthermore, #BlackLivesMatter is not the opposite of #BlueLivesMatter. #BlackLivesMatter is not, repeat NOT, an anti-police movement.

The only word implied but not stated in the hashtag is “too.” As in “Black lives matter too.” Black lives should matter just as much as everyone else’s. But sadly, in this country—all over the world, in fact—they simply don’t.

That’s based on piles of evidence, available in the in police reports, medical records, the news stories of blacks who have been brutalized and then left for hours before anyone called for help . Countless photographs of young African victims of war, photos of small, dark children that do not go viral.

I am not pointing a finger in any one direction. Just as police—of all ethnicities—are more likely to pull the trigger if the face of a suspect is black, I am aware that there is plenty of black on black violence all over the world. Sad to say, there are blacks for whom #blacklivesmatter less. I’m not going to get into the history of why this is, only that it must change, and thanks to the BLM movement, it is starting to. Only through (verbally) aggressive insistence—by blacks and non-black allies—will the status quo loosen up a bit.

Next, let’s look at Workplace Rights for the LGBTQ community—the recent winning of which made it illegal to discriminate against anyone based on orientation or gender identity. First of all, how is it possible that Workplace Rights didn’t exist until this past summer? That until the EEOC’s July ruling (that expanded the interpretation of Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act to cover LGBT people), if you were lesbian, for example, and placed a photograph of you and the love of your life on your desk, you could have been legally terminated? What was the objection to Workplace Rights, exactly? Mainly, opponents believed that members of the LGBTQ community shouldn’t have preferential treatment. As though straight, cis-gendered people suffer a loss of some kind when a LGBTQ person is treated fairly.

Finally, the #RealWomen body-positive movement—whose goal is for every woman, cis or trans, regardless of shape or size to walk, run and yes—dance, if she pleases—through this world without shame or criticism. I know, I know. The objections to this movement are often shrouded in concerns for health. The notion of a size-24 woman out for a walk or a run or in a dance class in peace or being photographed looking happy (instead of moping in a “before” picture) is claimed to “promote obesity,” and put those women at risk of serious health consequences. Trust me, allowing a woman to have a good day, participate in life and celebrate her own unique beauty, free of judgment, will not contribute to a health epidemic.

Another objection is that the movement implies that thin women are not “real” women. As if thin women are discriminated against in department stores, in restaurants or on airplanes. Again, I know, “skinny-shaming” is a thing. But so is thin-privilege.  As a reasonably thin woman myself, I have both been skinny-shamed, as well as unwittingly benefited from the preferential treatment non-overweight women receive in this country. I can say from experience that it is easy to bounce back from the suggestion that your single digit dress size disqualifies you from being a “real woman” when your body-type is celebrated by the media as “normal” and healthy.

So, here’s my question for opponents of all three of these movements, those who believe there is a risk to acknowledging the full humanity of blacks, members of the LGBTQ community and larger women—my question for those who express outrage against the movements to support these groups themselves:

Are you standing up for someone who needs standing up for?

If not, it’s okay to sit down for now and listen.

Bone Marrow Donor Registry Drive

Hi all, still taking a blogging break, but I’m happy to announce a special event that will take place here in Montclair at the wonderful Watchung Booksellers.

Here is the Press Release:

Local businesses, organizations, and community members are sponsoring a bone marrow donor registry drive on Saturday, November 14, 2015 from 3 to 5 pm at Montclair’s Watchung Booksellers, 54 Fairfield St, Montclair, NJ 07043. The sponsors are the bookstore itself, multiracial advocacy organization Project RACE, family therapist Lisa W. Rosenberg, comic and writer Alex Barnett, bone marrow registry organization Be the Match, and the authors of Being Biracial: Where Our Secret Worlds Collide.

The drive will highlight an important issue within the multiracial community: the lack of bone marrow donor matches. For patients diagnosed with leukemia, lymphoma and other life-threatening diseases, a bone marrow transplant may be their only hope for a cure. Yet 70% of patients who need a transplant don’t have a matched donor in their family. For multiracial people, finding a match can be especially hard. “As a multiracial person myself, whose father benefitted from a bone marrow transplant, I am committed to helping those who may otherwise have had difficulty finding a bone marrow donor,” said Ms. Rosenberg. “The other sponsors and I are proud and honored to work on such an important cause.”

The first 50 donors will receive a multiracial crayon pack in appreciation for their support!

The Sponsors of the Drive are:

Be the Match (https://bethematch.org/) has a registry of nearly 12.5 million volunteers ready to be life-saving bone marrow donors. Because there are patients who can’t find a match, Be the Match encourages more people to join the registry and be there when they are called as a match.

Project RACE (http://www.ProjectRACE.com/) advocates for multiracial people and their families primarily through education and community awareness. It supports policies that make a positive impact on people of multiracial heritage at local, state, and national levels. Project RACE is active in the effort to find bone marrow donors for multiracial people and sponsors countless donor registry drives throughout the United States.

Watchung Booksellers (http://www.watchungbooksellers.com/) is a vibrant, independent community bookstore located in the heart of Montclair. It is a fierce supporter of the community, contributing to and working with the public and private schools serving Montclair’s children, the Montclair Public Library, Montclair Fund for Educational Excellence, the Adult School of Montclair, and Montclair’s civic, political and religious institutions.

Lisa W. Rosenberg (http://lisawrosenberg.com/) is a psychotherapist, writer and speaker specializing on topics related to body image, parenting and identity. She previously was a ballet dancer with the Pennsylvania and Pacific Northwest Ballet Companies. She lives in Montclair with her husband and two children.

Alex Barnett (http://www.alexbarnettcomic.com/) is a comic and writer. He also is the host of the podcast Multiracial Family Man (http://multiracialfamilyman.libsyn.com/) that explores issues of concern to multiracial people and families.

Being Biracial: Where Our Secret Worlds Collide (http://beingbiracial.com) authors, Sarah Ratliff writes about gender and race advocacy and is Biracial, and Bryony Sutherland is a ten-time published author and the mother of three Biracial sons.

Mixed: A Canvas for the Assumptions of Others?

I’ve let this blog grow cobwebs lately, focusing every bit of my writing energy on my fiction. A quick status report: I’m querying my YA novel again and have reserved a spot among the NaNoWriMo  ranks, hoping to complete a draft of a new novel by November 30^th.

Full disclosure, I wrote the following a few months ago but never got around to posting it. I’m posting this now, in part because I know I won’t make it back here until December at the earliest. I’m also putting it up at this time because it feels very relevant to me.

Recently, another mother—a mother with children whose racial combination matches mine—a mother who is a wonderful advocate for her children, devoted to making sure they have positive identities—said something that I can’t quite get out of my head.

This mother, who is white and shares my own mother’s ethnicity, corrected me when I referred to myself as “mixed.” She offered a different word instead. A word which, to her, is the way to refer to oneself if one is the product of a white parent and a black parent. (As I am, as her children are, but as she is not.) We were having a fast conversation about something we’re working on together, so her correction came out quickly, too quickly for me to process what I was feeling. I corrected myself, used the word she had chosen, and we went on with our conversation. It was only afterward that I realized what had happened. I had allowed her to define me. The word she chose was just as good as “mixed.” It was in fact a word I sometimes do use to describe myself, but it was not my word choice at that time.

Those of us who are biracial, mixed-race, mulatto— whatever you wish to call us—must claim our own words—even if they don’t ring true for others. Many of us say “mixed,” which was once derogatory—like “mixed up”—but we embrace it the way a gay person might embrace “queer.” It’s empowerment by taking back language that was once designed to wound. Or, maybe it just feels right.

Anyway, here is my first post since the summer, as well as my last post until December.

A Canvas for the Assumptions of Others

You are the “other” box. Maybe not quite black, yet clearly not white. Or not visibly black, but something off-white. You are “exotic.” Possibly Armenian? Koori? Dominican? Really, really tan? No, you’re biracial, mixed, mulatto, colored, depending where in the world you hail from. You’re Both/And.

For some of us, the Barak Obama’s the Halle Berry’s and me, black is a convenient short-hand for our identity. It is how we appear to strangers, and doesn’t cause a stir or elicit extra questions. Black is also a way of adding our numbers to a much-maligned minority. But black skips out on half our story, half of our parentage and identity.

For the Jennifer Bealses, the Rashida Joneses, the black piece of the package is what people question. In both situations, there is a parent whose ancestry is less visible than the other.

And then there are those in the middle, the racially-ambiguous looking, where the trained eye can see a little of everything. In this spot, you’ll be facing the “what are you?” question more than the others, who tend to quickly be (if incorrectly) categorized by strangers. In the middle, you throw people off.

Now I’m wading into the deep waters of “Ascribed Identity,” a concept I first read about in graduate school when Dr. Elaine Pinderhughes came to present on her book, Understanding Race, Identity and Power.  Ascribed identity has little to do with who you actually are and everything to do with how others see you—their snap-judgments, the stories they tell themselves about who and what you are—based on your appearance alone. No matter how far from the truth these inferences are, you deal with them all day long—in the questions people ask, the treatment you receive. Other people’s stories and judgments—whether you believe them or not, whether you know about them or not—are part of your identity. Even when they are totally false. It’s that flicker of here-we-go-again awareness anytime someone compliments your diction or asks where you are “from.”

When you are mixed, this ascribed stuff can feel like a costume that doesn’t quite fit, but that’s always going to be somewhere in your closet nevertheless. It’s important to be aware of it, to be prepared for the things people say and assume. But the good news is that our ascribed identities need have no bearing on our self-concepts, our behavior or choices. For example, I have been judged for not speaking “black,” for not wearing my hair in braids, even for being the wrong weight for my color. (That really happened).

Sometimes, being biracial can feel like being a canvas for other people’s creative assumptions.

My favorite section of Dr. Maria Root’s Bill of Rights for People of Mixed Heritage (that I think I quoted three or four posts ago) is this one: “I have the right to self-identify. To identify myself differently than strangers expect me to identify.”

Frankly, I think this right applies to everyone—not just those of mixed heritage. But when it comes to us biracial types, there are a great many opinions on how we should identify ourselves racially, ethnically and otherwise.

After hearing Pinderhughes speak, my fellow social work students and I were suddenly thinking about identity more than we ever had before. Our daily vocabulary included not just ascribed identity, but also terms like use-of-self and cross-cultural competence. Like everyone else, I was grappling with what it meant to be me—how I was perceived versus who I was and how my background affected my work with clients. When I identified as biracial, black and Jewish, I was challenged by my fellow students at every turn.

Some white students looked at me as a novelty.

“Wait—you’re Jewish? How did you get Jewish?”

“I guess you could be Jewish, like Ethiopian.” My Jewish ancestry is Ashkenazi, actually, regardless of my skintone.

On the other hand, many black students bristled when I identified as mixed, saying I was black, because it was how I was seen. (Ascribed identity.) If I claimed I was “both,” then I was denying or diluting my allegiance to my father’s African heritage. I countered that I had to embrace all of my heritage, and not deny my mother’s background. I was informed that white people didn’t need or want me; blacks did. If I identified myself as Jewish—which, to me, had nothing to do with my race—students of color said I was identifying with the oppressor.

My Jewish ancestors, by the way, arrived by boat at the turn of the last century. Not one of them owned slaves.

So, eighteen years later, imagine my confusion at this curious phenomenon I’m finding on the internet lately. Dismissiveness, in some cases contempt, toward mixed-race people who identify as black. Now people have always taken issue with the words biracial people use to self-identify. For example, when Tiger Woods called himself “Cablinasian,” people became incensed; he was trying to deny his blackness. When Vin Diesel referred to himself as having “ambiguous ethnicity” while playing one Italian American character after another—people had a lot to say, much of it not for tender eyes.

But lately, as I browse the comments on articles that feature mixed race celebrities—writers, filmmakers, athletes, I’m seeing the pendulum swing a new way.

When President Obama calls himself black, many argue that he’s not black, he’s biracial and should stop “pretending.” They say the same about Halle Berry, who grew up being encouraged by her white mother to identify as black. Again, people take umbrage over Lacey Schwartz, producer and subject of the film Little White Lie, identifying as a black woman. After her film aired on PBS, the internet was abuzz with outrage over the fact that Schwartz, who is the child of a white, Jewish mother and black father, could not “accept herself as a biracial person.” The shocking part is that these comments came from mixed people, who know all too well how it feels to be dismissed by the generalizations of others.

How can one biracial person judge another for identifying “wrong?” And how is it suddenly not okay for people like me to call ourselves black? Sure, you can argue that, as the product of a white and a black parent, I’m only as black as I am white (regardless of my appearance). Since I cannot call myself white (see my profile photo? That would just be silly) I should not be allowed to call myself black. The reason that logic doesn’t work is my appearance.

I am not white. But I am Jewish, by way of my mother’s ethnicity. And in this way, I embrace and embody both sides of my heritage. (If my mother weren’t Jewish, but Irish or Italian, for example, I’d identify the same way, black and Irish or black and Italian. Jewish is an ethnicity as well as a religion.)

That’s why to be mixed is to be both-and, as well as sometimes neither-nor. Our identities are fluid by nature. No matter how white or how black we appear. So, instead of being canvasses for other people’s creative assumptions, let us be fountains of our own multiple heritage.

I have no claim to monopoly over the words I use to identify myself. All I ask is to self-identify, to claim all my heritage without challenge. We are all-inclusive, often in flux, sometimes leaning one way, sometimes the other. We’re not confused or out of touch with reality.

We’re not tragic either.

Loving Day Re-post: Why I Believe Marriage Equality = Common Sense

In honor of Loving Day, June 12th, 2015, I am reposting this piece from three years ago. Great progress has been made since then. Gay marriage is now legal in thirty-seven states! But the fight for marriage equality is not yet over. There are still bans in place in thirteen states, as well as a number of organizations and individuals who cite religious beliefs to justify their right to discriminate (just as they once did against interracial unions).

As fewer and fewer eyebrows are raised by interracial marriages, I look forward to the day where same-sex marriages elicit the same ho-hum reactions. A marriage is a marriage. Love has no room for bigotry.

So here’s the repost:

I am glad to say that by now—nearly a week after Valentine’s Day, 2012, the day  “The Loving Story” aired on HBO—interracial marriage is more accepted in this country than ever.  According to a new poll from the Pew Research Center, about one out of every seven new marriages in the U.S. is interracial.  (Which you can read about in this link from GOOD Magazine.)  On that note, I believe it’s time to extend marriage rights to same sex couples.

As the child of a very long and happy interracial marriage, I know that it is possible for two people to have a loving, lasting bond even if there are societal barriers to “their kind” of union.

I believe that a marriage between two people of different races is no less a marriage than one between two people of the same race.

I believe that a marriage between two people of the same sex is no less a marriage than one between two people of different sexes.

If you love and wish to marry someone of a different race, and I love and wish to marry someone of my same race, I do not believe that your marriage in any way undermines my marriage.

If I love and wish to marry someone of a different gender and you love and wish to marry someone of your own gender, I do not believe that your marriage in any way undermines my marriage.

But what about the children?  One reason people used to give (and still give) for opposing interracial marriage was the children.   As in: Think of the children!  Won’t they have issues?  Well, yes we do have issues, just as every other group or combination of groups has issues.  We are also teachers, doctors, lawyers, dancers, writers, husbands, wives, same-sex partners, parents … and—oh yeah—the U.S. president.  We’re doing OK.   As are children of same-sex parents, last I checked.

What about that business about undermining the sanctity of marriage in general? 

I believe that if one couple’s inter-sex marriage is undermined by another couple’s same-sex marriage, then the first marriage wasn’t particularly strong to begin with.  Same-sex marriages don’t undermine marriage any more than same-race marriages do.

What undermines marriage is marrying someone because your publicist told you to.   What undermines marriage is doing it for reality show ratings.  What undermines marriage is infidelity.  What undermines marriage is denigrating other peoples’ marriages when you are supplementing your marriage with extramarital partners.  What undermines marriage is going into it while keeping your options open.  What undermines marriage is violence.

My parents—a black man and a white, Jewish woman—got married in Chicago, Illinois in 1950, eight years before Richard and Mildred Loving wed.  At the time, interracial marriage was illegal in over thirty states.  My parents were married for forty-five years when my father died.  In four and a half decades, their interracial marriage did not threaten the sanctity of anyone’s same-race marriage.   Not even a little bit.

I think it is time to acknowledge that marriage is a loving, committed relationship between two people who love and commit to one another.

I’m on a Podcast!

So I’m on a podcast! (As you can guess from the title of this post). I am honored to have been interviewed by Alex Barnett, Comedian, blogger and Multiracial Family man on his podcast, aptly named Multiracial Family Man.

Alex is the white, Jewish husband of a black woman (who converted to Judaism) and the father of a 3 year-old, biracial son. Each episode of his podcast is devoted to the issues that confront multiracial families and the experience of being biracial.

In my interview, Alex asks me basically everything about my experiences of being mixed and part of a multiracial family—from my parents’ marriage to my own, to how I handled my multiracial identity in college, grad school as well as in the ballet world.

Here are the links to the podcast:

On iTunes:

https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/multiracial-family-man-ep./id969793342?i=341813854&mt=2

And on Libsyn Podcast Network: http://traffic.libsyn.com/multiracialfamilyman/Lisa_Rosenberg_Podcast.mp3

By the way, Alex is smart, funny, down to earth and very candid about his family’s experiences. (Fun fact: it turns out he also went to college with my husband, though they never met!)

Make sure to check out Alex Barnett on the Web:

www.alexbarnettcomic.com

Youtube: www.youtube.com/alexbarnettcomic

Facebook: www.facebook.com/alexbarnettcomic

Twitter: http://twitter.com/barnettcomic

The Heartbreak of Striving

I know the heartbreak of striving. If you’re a dancer or a writer or anyone who has ever put your all into something, be it an art or sport or pursuit of a truth—knowing the odds of success might be questionable—you know it too.

It’s the moment “hobby” turns to passion. “Like to” turns to “have to.” “Want to” turns to “my heart will break if I don’t.”

For me, that shift happened in ballet when I was at that pivotal age of eleven. For years my friends and I had danced happily, loving the music, loving the combinations our teachers asked of us. High on childhood and music and ballet, we had a rose-colored view of ourselves. Blind to the work ahead, we could imagine that we were ballerinas already. We were being taught technique in such a loving way, it fed our dreams without building the muscles of self-critique. We soared on our dreams.

But suddenly, around the age of eleven, something dawned on all of us—especially those with talent. Ballet is hard. Really, really hard—even if you have talent for it. It’s a strange phenomenon. As you get closer to being a real dancer, as your teachers demand more of you and you demand more of yourself, you begin to feel the pain of not being good enough. Not yet. Your ability to happy with the pictures you make in the mirror must be delayed. It was a hard realization. To suddenly feel inadequate at the age of eleven. My first heartbreak.

The thing is, in order to become good at ballet, I needed to recognize that there was room for improvement. We all did. We needed to push through to become better at it. Our teachers impressed this upon us. We were not good enough yet. Those of us who truly loved ballet understood that it would take years before we were good enough. And because ballet was what we wanted, we were willing to do the work and to wait. Even though we were just kids. Even though we knew that, even with work and time, some of us might not make it. I hope I do, we’d say. I hope I make it. We were competitors, fellow strivers and fellow sufferers.

One day half the girls in my class had learned they were going on pointe. The other half—myself included— were told we weren’t strong enough and would have to wait one more excruciating year to get our satin pinks. No matter how hard we’d worked, we were not ready. A second heartbreak.

Beginning then, our four-times-per-week ballet class was extended fifteen minutes. Our teacher would clap her hands say the words—ladies, put on your pointe shoes! And the lucky half would run for the corner to wrap their toes in lamb’s wool and slip on their hard-tipped shoes, lace up the gleaming ribbons. The rest of us, with heavy hearts, joined in their special exercises in our normal “flat” ballet slippers—our dreams deferred as our classmates blistered and bled, building callouses they would later show off.

The year passed. I got my shoes, then my callouses. Another year later, no one in our ballet class could remember who had gone on pointe at eleven and who’d had to wait. But now the work of becoming real ballet dancers kicked into high gear. We had ballet class six days per week, knowing that other girls our age danced three classes per day to our one. Still, there was plenty of blood, sweat and tears. Some of us made it.

As a writer, I have revised my novel umpteen times, received great feedback, but also rejections. I will continue to revise and work until my book is good enough. Just as I did with my dancing. If you are to strive for something you love, no matter what the endeavor, there will be heartbreak along the way.

I saw a germ of this in one of my little ballet students just two weeks ago. I was teaching the class a new skill—a single pirouette from fourth position. We’d been building up to it, working on passé, passé relevé, spotting the head, opening and closing the arms, proper placement. This girl was ready to turn, I thought. So I stayed with her as she worked through the steps and tried the turn. I was patient and encouraging in just the right measures, I thought. She was determined—I could see it—and I would not let her give up.

“That’s it,” I kept saying, between more technical instructions. “You’re there.” I kept pushing, gently, sure I was going to get a result that delighted us both. She’d have that feeling of balance, of landing, of making the illusion of spinning.

“Once more.” As I said it, I realized it was too much. Her brown eyes were welling up, spilling over. Soon she was sobbing, having put her all into something that was not working. Not yet.

I felt awful. So guilty. I had made a child cry. But then I remembered how many times I had cried while I was striving for my dream—sometimes because I was hard on myself, other times because I was scolded by my ballet teachers. Granted, in my day, adults were more openly critical of children in ways that weren’t always good. Today, we have expressions like “It’s all good.”

Of course, in ballet, it isn’t all good. As teachers, we have the difficult task of expressing that in a non-damaging way. I don’t believe it’s necessary to be negative with children, to “draw the talent out of them,” as some teachers did when I was growing up. Instead, I think we need to find creative ways to inspire children, to nurture their passion for art or sports or science or music. When they love what they are doing, striving—having a self-imposed standard to meet—comes naturally. And, though there will certainly be heartbreak along the way, hearts are resilient.

To my little, tearful student, to all children moving from play into passion, my advice is as follows:

Whatever your dream—enjoy the journey, keep your eyes on the prize, and don’t give up when it’s tough. You’ll get there.

Mixed in America: Closing the Arch

In my last post, Does the “White Privilege” Umbrella cover Black and Biracial Children?, I introduced my White Umbrella Project, including a survey, about the experiences of other black and biracial people whose early guides to the world were white parents. Since the survey went live, here and on various multiracial Facebook groups, responses have been coming in steadily—people sounding off on what it means to reside on both sides of the bridge between black and white.*

This project has been brewing in me for years, but there is a reason I’m launching it now.

This past fall and winter, in the aftermath of the killing of Michael Brown and Eric Garner, in the wake of the protests and the speeches and the clashes, the calls for justice and calls for dialogue, I kept hearing about an America divided along racial lines. It wasn’t a new phase by any means, but one that rears up and becomes prevalent every few years.

There is a black America and a white America and never shall the two see eye to eye, was the message—expressed most eloquently in the New Yorker cover of December 8^th, 2014, by Bob Staake, a “post-Ferguson” depiction of Eero Saarinen’s iconic Gateway Arch, centerpiece of the St. Louis Skyline, in this case shaded black on one side, white on the other, the arch broken, its ends reaching in vain for reconciliation.

I took in that cover with a heavy heart, registering the sentiment loud and clear. I am one of many Americans—the president of the United States included—for whom black and white are inseparable. It is what we are.

It’s worth mentioning, too, that all the blacks, whites, Asians and Latinos I know have varied and nuanced views of the events, to say nothing of the fact that the protestors and police defenders seemed to come in all races.

I’m not naïve. I recognize that the black/white rift is more stark in some parts of the country than others, that the multiracial mobs with linked arms hailed mostly from the two coasts and from university towns. But it’s my pet peeve when the press oversimplifies and disregards those who live in the middle. With interracial marriage on the rise, as well as more multiracial people than ever identifying as such, the racial “grey” area is becoming more and more populous.

It goes beyond America too. Trevor Noah, the South African comedian of black Xhosa and white Swiss parentage, who is slated to replace Jon Stewart in the Daily Show, also grew up in two separate worlds—being shuttled back and forth between his mother’s home in black Soweto and his father’s apartment in largely white Johannesburg. In a New York Times article, Noah describes being alternately embraced and rejected in both settings.

This echoes the experience of so many mixed-race Americans. The both/and-ers, the neither/nors. For some of us, like Barack Obama or Halle Berry, our African ancestry is plainly visible. For others, like Wentworth Miller and Carol Channing—not so much. Many of us have identities that resonate sometimes black and sometimes white, depending on where we are, which side of the family we’re with—regardless of what we look like.

I was raised by a black father and a white mother, but because of their work schedules, it was my mother who accompanied me most places. My early view of the world came through her eyes. Whether we went to her friend’s pool club in the summer, or shopped on the Upper East Side, I assumed—correctly or not—that I would be accepted and embraced. I didn’t grow up feeling particularly different from the white or black people I met. It was not until college that anyone demanded I choose my allegiance.

Everyone’s experience of being biracial is different, but I suspect I’m far from alone in my cringe-reflex when I hear about the irreparable chasm between my two sides.

Does the “White Privilege” Umbrella cover Black and Biracial Children? (Survey included)

This is the first post I have written soliciting responses to a survey—so I’m stating it up front: At the end of this post is an actual, honest-to-goodness survey for those who are interested and who fit the demographics* I’m looking for.

So, what is this about “White Privilege?” Sounds kind of political, kind of threatening, no?

The first time I heard the term “White Privilege,” I was in my late twenties and teaching at a very exclusive, private girls’ school on the Upper East Side of New York. Peggy McIntosh, PhD., the feminist, antiracism activist and associate director of the Wellesley College Women’s Project, had been brought in by the Parents’ Diversity Awareness Committee of said school. McIntosh, who is white, was there to discuss her famous paper, White Privilege, Unpacking the Invisible Backpack, as part of a workshop for staff, parents and students about the ways in which whites unwittingly benefit from racism on a daily basis.

I was fascinated as McIntosh described white privilege as an

invisible package of unearned assets which [she could] count on cashing in each day, but about which [she] was ‘meant’ to remain oblivious.

However, as she began to list these assets and privileges, I found myself thinking: hold on a minute—I grew up with a lot of those assets and I’m not white! What gave?

As I thought it over, I realized that, as a child—regardless of my color—I had walked through the world in the care and company of a white mother. I had un-harassed entry into upscale department stores and swimming pools. Most everywhere I went, people had treated me with the same respect they paid my mother.

When McIntosh went on to list the ways in which her skin tone worked in her favor:

“I can turn on the television or open to the front page of the paper and see people of my race widely represented …When I am told about our national heritage or about “civilization,” I am shown that people of my color made it what it is … Whether I [use] checks, credit cards, or cash, I can count on my skin color not to work against the appearance of financial reliability.… I can swear, or dress in second hand clothes, or not answer letters, withouthaving people attribute these choices to the bad morals, the poverty, or the illiteracy of my race.

I started to see her point. Okay, maybe all of those privileges hadn’t been mine, but under the umbrella of my mother’s whiteness, the world had been a different, more accepting, place than it might have been otherwise.

When I was alone with my father, we visited restaurants  and little shops in Harlem—which was mostly black at the time. It was a world apart from the Englewood, New Jersey pool club my mother’s friend belonged to, where Mom and I went almost every day in the summer. As a child, I felt equally welcome in both places. However, if the whole family had shown up together in either location, there might have been stares or even questions.

My father taught me to be aware—and sometimes wary–of racism, that I might be treated differently because of my color. But my mother took me everywhere; the hostility, if there was any—was subtle enough for me not to notice. I believed I belonged anywhere my mother did.

The stories of black and biracial children raised by white parents are as varied as humanity itself. I know my own, but am curious about others. For this reason I’ve started a project I’m calling Under the “White Privilege” Umbrella: Children of Color in their White Parents’ World.

As part of the project I have created a survey where I ask adults of color, like myself, who were raised by at least one white parent, to reflect on their childhoods. My purpose is to understand the experience of growing up black or biracial** in the care and company of a white parent, to learn whether–and how–any of us benefited from the day to day privileges our white parents might have experienced.

*If you are between the ages of 18 and 70, identify as biracial or mixed, the product of a white parent and a black parent, or if you are adopted, either black or biracial/black-white, and raised by white parents, interracially married parents (one of whom is white), or by a single, white parent), I would love to hear from you.

Please note, I have no hypothesis to support and no political agenda. And here is the link to my survey.

**The reason I’m only including black and white in this project–at first at least–is to understand whether parental “white privilege,” dilutes the very specific biases directed toward blacks.

To Dance Again: Return to Self

A few years back, when I started this blog about body image and identity, I was thinking a lot about my relationship to ballet. It defined me from late childhood, though adolescence and into my late twenties. It was my niche, my career, until I left to find out who I was without it.

To recap: some time in 2012, after who-can-even-count how many years of not dancing, a friend lured me back to ballet class. I was flooded with all kinds of emotions—excitement, dread, nostalgia—but most of all, an overpowering sense of return-to-self.

Return-to-self isn’t anything I learned about in social work school, but I’d have to define it as a process of acute identity repair.

Earlier this week, I had a conversation with a sixty-something-year-old guy on the table next to mine at physical therapy. I was there for my knees—the culprits who’d distanced me from ballet. He was there for a leg or back injury, I never asked what. I should mention that my physical therapist, to distract patients from their agony, has large-screened TVs on every wall, all synced, streaming sit-coms from the 1990’s—Friends, Frasier, Everybody Loves Raymond. Depending on the hour of your appointment, you can usually predict what will be playing.

At the time of my narrative, Will and Grace was on. After my neighbor and I shared a chuckle over Karen’s alcohol-fueled antics, he mused about how the country had changed since the show had aired.

“You can’t make cracks about alcoholism anymore,” lamented the guy with the back-or-leg injury. “You can’t even say words like Jew or Black on primetime without a lawsuit.”

Whether that’s true or not, I kept listening. Soon, the conversation led to the guy sharing some of his history with me.  He’d been an outdoor sports guy, he said. Hunting, boating, motorcycle racing. Sure, he’d suffered various wounds from these high-risk diversions. He’d been shot Cheney-style more than once (he showed me a shoulder scar), thrown from bikes and boats—all minor events he’d shrugged off at the time. But the injury he faced now (again, he did not specify, but later I saw he walked with a severe limp) had sidelined him from everything he loved to do. Everything.

“But my faith is in him,” he aimed a thumb at our PT, “and Him.” He re-directed said thumb toward the ceiling. “You watch. I’ll get back on that bike if it’s the last thing I do.”

I could see he meant it. Getting back on his motorcycle was worth that much to him. Life just wasn’t life without the thrill-rides he loved. That I understood.

For me, the sine qua non endeavor was ballet, as I wrote back in 2012, when I went back to ballet for the first time. I didn’t stick with it back then; my knees wouldn’t permit it. But I kept ballet in my heart, blogging about it, watching my favorites on YouTube, penning a novel about teenage ballet dancers in New York City. Through my characters, I still lived ballet, still danced in my mind and through my fingers on the keyboard. I kept thinking, should I try dancing again? Or should I let this be enough? I ran for exercise, so it wasn’t like I was completely sedentary. (Running, oddly, has no negative impact on my knees.) But every so often I’d wonder: is it really over? Will I never dance again?  That sounded so sad, so final. I pushed the thought away, rather than try to challenge it.

I still dreamed I was dancing, though. One night I even dreamed I was still good. I got back my arabesque, my turns, my elevation. The very next day, I got an email from a friend, a former dancer who runs a dance, theater and drumming school in town. Would I teach ballet for her one night a week, she wanted to know? Two classes, for ten to twelve year old girls? I thought it over and rose to the challenge. How could I possibly say no? Especially after the dream I’d had.

So back again I went. It’s been over a month. I never thought I’d love teaching children to do something that could be painful and frustrating as well as beautiful. But, guess what? I do. Because I value ballet for its elegance, its purity and the way it lets you merge with the music, I believe I’m giving these children something precious. I’m stricter than I thought I’d be, but also loving, because I can see that they love what I’m sharing with them. I don’t allow them to not point their feet; I don’t allow them to give up. But I do lavish praise on effort and hard work. I say things my teachers used to say—grow taller as you plié, drop the tailbone, roll back your shoulders and keep breathing!—and I mean them.

I have begun taking a weekly ballet class in addition to the ones I teach. What has happened is curious and hard to describe. I don’t do everything full-out, but as I dance, I can almost hear my soul clicking into place.

I still have my psychotherapy practice; I am still writing fiction—both of which I love. But now, the dancer in me is back from hibernation.

So what about you? How many years has it been since you did that thing you used to live for? It might have been a hobby or a passion—dirt-biking, fly fishing or found-object sculpting—any activity that completed you, that was your dessert after a hard work week. Maybe you performed with a band whose members all had day jobs. Maybe you wrote poetry you never shared with anyone, but that sustained you nevertheless. Or maybe you were one of the lucky few whose passion—be it acting or football—was once your career.

What took you away from that passion? An injury? The practical reality of needing to make more money? Lack of time? Maybe you can’t immerse yourself in the activity like you once did, but there might be a way to reconnect yourself with it. For example, one woman I danced with years ago, benched by a back injury, became a dance photographer. A friend and former performer—another psychotherapist—writes plays in her “spare time.”

If you ever look back on the days when that activity was part of your life, and think: That was when I was most fully me, you deserve this. Dust off your old passion and find a way to take it back, in any way you still can. Whatever it is, I wish you hope, courage, and a safe return to your Self.

Don’t hate your Thighs, Baby!

---

 

I almost rolled my eyes at the PC police. Granted, as a member of three at-one-time-or-another oppressed groups, I tend to applaud the PC police. When something is politically incorrect, that means it has the power to hurt someone. And why is it okay to hurt someone if only to get a laugh out of someone else who’s standing there going, “Lighten up already?”

But this time, I almost said, “Lighten up already.”

Until I thought the issue over for half a second. The issue is a onesie for babies, printed with the phrase: “I HATE MY THIGHS.”

It’s funny, okay? It’s funny because it’s so ludicrous. I mean, who doesn’t love fat thighs on a baby? And what baby has any opinion whatsoever about his or her thighs? What baby even knows he or she has thighs? I am sure that’s what the people at WryBaby were thinking when they created said onesie as part of their infant apparel line, marketed at new parents and their friends.  I am sure they did not expect the uproar that came.  Who, us? Fat-shaming babies?

Were people really getting up in arms about baby clothes? I wondered. Even if the baby did have body image issues (like that could seriously happen) babies can’t read!

But then, I remembered who else might be reading. The babies’ older siblings and cousins, for a few. My daughter could read by the time she was five. I used to stand in line at the A+P checkout with her, wishing I could cover up all the tabloid headlines waxing catastrophic about Jessica Simpson’s cellulite. Check out all the best and worst beach bodies! Guess who gained a hundred pounds? (Answer on page 27.) My daughter would study the pictures, read the headlines and then ask me questions I had to come up with answers for.

“Mommy, why does it say Kirstie Balloons?”

“She was blowing them up for a birthday party.” Thinking fast, Mom.

Remembering those days, I could only imagine what a newly reading four-year-old might think about seeing her baby brother suited up to declare loathing for his own little gams. Kids that age are concrete thinkers, yet absorb every piece of information around them. Wondering why Baby Ezra hates his thighs might lead a young child to wonder if he or she should start hating his or her own thighs.

Doesn’t seem like a big deal? Think I should lighten up? Take a joke? Well, maybe you’re right about that. Often, it takes much more than a little joke to set body image issues and disordered eating in motion. But, just as often, all it takes is a passing comment, a few misguided words.

Just saying.

P.S. Since the controversy, WryBaby has replaced the onesie with one that makes the healthy declaration: “I Love My Legrolls.”