I just saw this post about a 5 year old girl’s incident at school.

It broke my heart to hear how this child, the same age as my son Esteban, would get a message at school that she was scary and to be avoided, just because she is black.

I know there are those who would say that kids have to be exposed to that kind of thing sometime, and you can’t shelter your child always, blah, blah, blah. But I would ask them, “how young would you like to expose your child to attitudes like that?” And, do you really think a 5 year old is equipped to deal with such a reaction? I don’t think any elementary aged child would know what to do with that.

As for the argument that this is a teachable moment? I don’t think it’s the child’s job to teach her peers anything. Why does she have to take eat crap and teach too? Are you kidding me? Where is the other child’s responsibility here? Where is their contrition? Now the child just has the scar, the stress, and the impetus to deal with it.

I don’t know where the justice is in this situation. Maybe if the mother talks to the teacher and the teacher addresses the class? Maybe talk to the other girls’ parents?

Or homeschool in the beginning and deal with people as families, rather than exposing unsupervised children to Lord knows what out in the world?