Created Equal

I'm reading an excellent book called The Help, about life in 1962 Mississippi for 3 different women. The book has been featured in many reading groups and the author, Kathryn Stockett, has meticulously researched every detail to make you feel like you are in that world, every time you turn a page. It's an extraordinary writing debut, all about the hard won battles of the civil rights movement. It's 1 inch forward, then back, then slowly forward again in the fight for equality. The basic plot centres around a white woman writing a book of interviews given by black maids. The writing sessions must be kept extremely secret as jail, beatings, job losses and death are a few of the consequences of the races mixing socially for any reason. There is a sense of danger on every page. I'm only halfway through and I don't want the book to end.

It makes me think about all the ways we have improved in our society, and the ground we still have to cover. I am so grateful that my kids live in a world radically different from 1962 Mississippi, in that they accept people much easier, and have no reason to think skin colour makes any difference to the worth of a person. We all have Martin Luther King and many other unsung heroes to thank for that. People who risked their safety, their family and their lives for equality. For me, growing up in Alberta in the 70's and 80's, there was a lot of social racism against Native Canadians. I thought that was a normal attitude and accepted it without question. In my 20's and 30's I had to work through this superior attitude and was ashamed that I would ever think myself better than anyone.

I love that my kids are closer than I was at growing up to be colour blind and gender blind. They see families that work in all sorts of different ways - single parents, working mothers, stay-at-home dads and everything in between. As a child, I thought all men worked and all moms stayed home. My kids will have tolerance for the fact that everyone's situation is different and it's okay to make your own way in the world. I want them to love and accept people as a matter of course, without excess qualifiers - male or female, gay or straight, any skin colour at all - we are all just people, doing the best we can in the world. If we don't look down on one another and feel ourselves superior, life will be easier in every possible facet.

The only way I know to teach this is by example, with lots of conversation sprinkled in. William went through a phase last year where he would see advertisements with dark-skinned people and he would say, "I don't like that person." When Ava went through that phase, I panicked and thought I had failed her in some way and she was growing up to be racist. I think it's just that they don't understand and need to be taught how to respond, like everything else. So I asked William why he didn't like the person, and he said, "They are different" and then I explained that it's good to be different, if we were all the same the world would be a very boring place. We had this ongoing discussion for about 6 months, and a few weeks ago I was volunteering at Ava's school and William and I walked down the hall to the bathroom. We passed a couple of boys and one of them had dark skin. William said, loudly of course, "That boy has dark skin and it doesn't mean anything. Everybody is different and it's okay." The boy smiled at him and I gave a small sigh of relief. The lessons are slowly making their way to the core of my kids. I'm so glad they don't have to wait until they are adults to really know that we are all created equal.