Episode 7: Who Gets the Black Barbie?

Katie has thought a lot about how she dealt with race when playing make-believe as a child, but she wonders if she will be equipped to handle her kids’ questions about race as they grow older. 

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Katie: 0:10

I think it's weird how we say, you know, this American, that American for other things, and then you're just like, white. Versus like, if we're gonna go world origin - American, let's do it for everyone. That's the privilege, right? It just doesn't feel that relevant. I'm just the background that people don't question, they just...I carry on my merry way. Yeah, that's the privilege right there.

DB Crema: 0:35

This is United States of Race, personal stories of how our earliest memories determine a lifetime of relationships. Each episode features one guest sharing their experiences with race. Keeping these episodes anonymous lets our guests share the real uninhibited stories of their life. And it gives us the chance to listen without prejudice. I'm your host, DB Crema. Today, we're joined by Katie, who has thought a lot about how she dealt with race when playing make believe as a child. But she wonders if she'll be equipped to handle her kids questions about race as they grow older. When did you first become aware of race?

Katie: 1:23

The one memory that stands out as an actual memory versus just this kind of little, you know, drips and drops that kind of fill up your cup over time is of playing Barbies with a couple other little girls. And there were two white Barbies and one black Barbie and we were going to be playing pop stars, right or something like that. I don't know what we called it when we were like eight or something. Not too old to have outgrown Barbies, of course. But not too young that I can't actually remember it. But the three singers who these Barbies were going to be was going to be Madonna and Cyndi Lauper and Whitney Houston. And it was, I don't know, I just had, I had a very strong understanding that Whitney Houston was the one you'd least want to be. Right, that Madonna and Cyndi Lauper were the better Barbies to play. And that Whitney Houston was drawing the short straw. I guess, in that moment, if you would ask me why I would have said Oh, because she's black. I mean, now I can just articulate right? It's this idea of value, just that that is a less valuable person to be even though she obviously has the way better voice, right, in terms of like, being overall talented. Of course, you'd want to be Whitney Houston. She's obviously the best singer. It's so strange to look back and say like, I know that being black was less than. I don't know why, but I just know that it is. And I'm thinking oh, well, somebody had a black Barbie, so that's good.

DB Crema: 2:53

Who had a black Barbie?

Katie: 2:55

I don't know.

DB Crema: 2:56

I don't recall having a black Barbie. I don't recall that being an option.

Katie: 2:59

Oh, yeah. I mean, I definitely remember when it came to like the Christmas... there would be like the orange chiffon blonde Barbie. And there was like the orange chiffon black Barbie.

DB Crema: 3:11

What did you take away from that Barbie experience? All three of you were clearly bringing in this understanding of, you know, what's positive, what's negative?

Katie: 3:20

You know, as I think back, I think, probably the only reason I remember it, versus it just fading into the mists of time is that I felt uncomfortable about it. Like that there was some shame in me that like, I do actually think this is worse, right? Like, I don't want to play the black doll. And it's wrong to think that way. Right? You shouldn't be having these thoughts. You shouldn't say you like this one less, even though everyone kind of like agrees that they all want it less. Like don't own up to that. My guess is that that's why that memory is there because of that little tinge of shame and discomfort. And it's funny, right? I mean, I'm thinking, I probably would not have talked about that experience in kind of such like, an explicit nature and kind of like owned up, like, in my 20s or something. I'm just thinking in my teens or 20s. If you'd asked me to like share a story. I might have pulled that up, but I probably wouldn't have disclosed it because I would have still felt a lot of shame around like you don't have those thoughts. Right. You shouldn't think that that's, you know, don't own up to racism, basically. Right? Don't ever disclose it. You might have those thoughts and feelings but you don't ever talk about it. Because then people will look down on me for having had that thought. I'm bad for having that thought.

DB Crema: 4:37

Hmm mmmhmm.

Katie: 4:39

Just thinking about like kind of the the racial mix of the kids and families. I grew up with just very few black families in our in our neighborhood. Definitely a fair number of Asian kids who I grew up with. Hispanic families. This was the bay area near San Francisco in the 1980s. There were definitely strong racial divisions in terms of neighborhoods on the other side of the hills having a lot of black families living there. And so there was definitely messages like when we would go to an Oakland A's game, and we're like driving through those neighborhoods, there was like, palpable tension in the car as we drove through those neighborhoods, and my mom would kind of narrate, right, like, which neighborhoods were, were bad and to kind of, you know, stay out of or actually, I was too little to go anywhere on my own. So I think the message would be lock your doors, right, when you kind of go driving through a certain neighborhood.

DB Crema: 5:29

Do you remember at that age, connecting the lock your doors, we've taken a wrong term with anything to do with the specific neighborhood like, you know, racial or..

Katie: 5:42

Right, I think it was a correlation with race, poverty and crime. Like, I don't remember the lock your doors aspect, as we were driving through, say, heavily Hispanic neighborhoods that were much closer to our own. I mostly just remembered about like Oakland neighborhoods. But I guess, you know, I think what the kid notices is, I don't see black people very often. The time I do is like, in these situations, when I'm being told lock your doors.

DB Crema: 6:13

So why do you talk about it now? Why would you share that story now? If you, if you think, you know, in the 20s, that's not something you would feel comfortable sharing, but now you can confront it.

Katie: 6:24

Oh, wow. I mean, if you hadn't asked the question, like that story would not have pulled out of the, you know, the vaults of antiquity for me. So kind of speaking of identity, right, there was no questioning about my racial background. I was, I was teased for being so pale. And so I had some strong feelings about that, and kind of, you know, why can't people just accept me as I am? Why do you have to constantly be telling me to get a tan? Like, it felt bad. But speaking of messages we get about what is like good and preferable - Definitely, my mom, spoken with pride. Ah, yes. Right. You know, Revolutionary War, blah, blah, blah, like, long standing, blah, blah, blah, kind of too far back to trace, all that kind of stuff was not set in a neutral tone. It was as a as a point of pride.

DB Crema: 7:17

Is it about ownership, belonging?

Katie: 7:21

I don't know. It's interesting. Thinking about just kind of like the thread of ownership that runs through American history, this idea of Anglo Saxons being like the real Americans. People love to show up somewhere first, and then tell anyone who shows up later, like too late for you, right? Like...

DB Crema: 7:40

There's also this implied purity, or fascination with purity?

Katie: 7:45

Uh huh. I think part of it hooks into my mom's own personal loss of status through her family having been wealthy before she was born. And then their huge loss of financial status when she was maybe like two years old. And so even if we don't have financial wealth, we still have, you know, the status of our background, right? The status of our lineage that can never be taken away from us, even if we're, you know, considering applying for food stamps, you know., So, it was like, these are the messages I got just talking about us and not really talking about in the context of others, but just the us, right, this is who you are, right? This is what you should be, like, proud of. This is what makes you special. So I think that's where it's kind of interesting, there wasn't a lot of discussion of the other. But there was more discussion about here's who you are and why you should be proud.

DB Crema: 8:42

So you have small kids who are mixed race. Do they, do they approach you? How do they approach you on this topic?

Katie: 8:50

So they have not approached me. We have from an early age really just kind of talked about different human characteristics as just differences, right? I mean, they're still pretty small. So my son is not yet seven. And my daughter is not yet four. And their grandparents are... Well, certainly their grandfather is the darkest skinned of our family. And then their dad and grandma are kind of a slightly lighter brown shade. Rthnic background wise, his parents both grew up in Trinidad, of Southeast Asian and Indian origins. So as far as they kind of know, their family members came from Southeast Asia, in like the 1830s or so to Trinidad as indentured servants. So it's interesting even in terms of kind of describing, like, the background of my children and my husband's background, right. It's not just like, it's not a simple story, just in terms of like, oh, Why are you Brown? Right? So how we talk about to our kids, right? Very much just about well, there's lots of different ways that people in our family look right. I have a hard time describing my skin tone, right? We can talk about their various shades of brown, but like, I don't really have like a lot of brown in my tone. But I'm not like a classic pink color. So like, what am I right? Because I like white is not an accurate... I'm also not, you know, the color of a white sheet. It's like, peachy, pinky, something, right? So language fails on that. But at least for the children and their dad and their grandparents, right, we can talk about these different shades of brown. And we started early on reading, you know, colors about different, you know, skin tones and hair tones and those kinds of things. But we haven't really gone beyond that yet. Other than with my older, my older child, my son, starting to talk about how, in American history, there have been some people who think that based on what you look like in your family background, some people were better than others. And that that was really a bad thing to do. We don't want to do that anymore. So he's old enough to be learning how to read. And so part of his homework assignment is reading these little, like a little website with little kids, you know, first grade appropriate reading level stories. And one of them was about Harriet Tubman, right? Like a very brief Harriet Tubman kid story. And talking about wars, right? And talking about well, in the US, there was a, you know, kind of talking about American history, like, what is our country? Okay, well, we fought this war so that we could be separate from England who used to kind of be in charge of the, you know, the people who lived here, and that was called the Revolutionary War. And then later on, there was this other war that we fought like, within ourselves, because some people thought that it was okay to own other human beings. And other people thought, No, that that's not okay. anymore. We're not going to do that anymore, and so they had a war. And we're glad that the, you know, people who won were the ones who said, No, that's, that's not okay to do that. So then, right, we read the little Harriet Tubman book. And, and at some point, there's actually a little map and it shows like what the slave states were and what the free states were. And, I wish, I wish I'd had a little tape recording going at the moment cuz it was, I can't, I want people to get his phrasing. Correct. But it was so interesting, is he basically said, something along the lines of like, "your people lost." Like me, being white people. Right? And I had this little defensive reaction. I was like, Well, my people lived in the north, right? Like, my family were the good guys who were fighting on the right side. Like, Oh, God, it was so funny. I didn't quite say it that way. But well, well, you know, like the people from from our family who were living there, then they were fighting on the side to, to end slavery. He kind of stuck with his guns a little bit like, still though, you know, was the the people who thought, you know, white people were better were the ones who lost. And I was like, Yeah, you're right.

DB Crema: 13:11

Do you and your husband talk about race, the experience, your experiences growing up what to do with your children, how to take them forward?

Katie: 13:18

So my husband, I definitely had more conversations about this kind of earlier in our relationship, right in terms of just getting to know each other and right, talking about our experiences. And his experiences are interesting, because he, as he's getting older to me, right, he definitely kind of reads more, more Indian, especially when he hasn't like shaved his head recently and he's got, you know, he's kind of bald on top and kind of getting the stubble on the side. But when he was younger, sometime in high school, he started shaving his head is like his preferred hairstyle. And he to most people read as black. Most people kind of assume that he was a light skinned black guy. And so he described numerous experiences of being pulled over by police for like, not wearing his seatbelt. Right, just as an excuse to kind of suss him out. One time walking through this... well, we were walking together, actually. So this is one that I experienced. I was like, what's happening? And he had to translate for me what was happening because we were in this little, this little enclave in the Bay Area called Clayton, which is very, very white. And we had just been to a restaurant, we're walking back to our car, and we're walking past somebody else's car. And they like, lock their car as we were walking by, right, and it did the flashing and I almost like jumped out of my skin because it startled me. I was like, What the hell was that? And like, my husband had to explain, oh, they were locking their car because I was walking past it and made them feel nervous. And I was like, looking around, like, who the hell just did that, like, how dare you like, What the hell's wrong with these people? I was so...

DB Crema: 14:58

Incensed.

Katie: 14:59

I was so incensed. Because also it was it was new to me, right? He's had like 30 years of this. And so he's like, Oh, yeah, that's what that is. Right? He's over the what the fuck period, with that.

DB Crema: 15:10

You can't live your life in the what the fuck period. You'd get nothing done.

Katie: 15:12

Right! Exactly. So, gosh, we have had conversations about the importance of giving children a strong racial and ethnic identity, right? Well, non-white children, they need to kind of know their heritage, feel good about it, feel connected to it. But then beyond that, I feel like we haven't really had many follow up conversations about how to do that. I'm just thinking about... So my son is... I don't know. He has yet to report that anybody has questioned him about his ethnicity. So I will be curious when that becomes a thing. And just to see how he responds to it and, and who he comes to with it. Right? Will he come to his dad, with it? I don't know. And ven as I say that out loud. I'm ike, I wonder how equipped he eels to answer that question. r if he'll be like, I don't now, right? Like,

DB Crema: 16:07

Do you think he would understand why someone would ask him where he's from? Do you think he would understand why people are asking that or what they're what they're trying to ask?

Katie: 16:17

Part of me says, like, no, he'd be like, What are you talking about? That's just an interesting part of the journey, yet to come. I mean, partly, I've, like I care about these things. But I also, I also feel supremely ignorant and ready to defer to my husband's expertise on it. Like, I'm a well intentioned white person. But I just don't know, right? I just don't know what it's like. And so I don't know, necessarily the best thing to do. And I'll give it my best shot, but, but I always want to refer to the lived experience of someone who actually knows. But even then, right, like, my husband doesn't know what it's like to be biracial. So...

DB Crema: 16:56

Have you thought about whether or not and how to approach your kids regarding the negative experiences they might experience?

Katie: 17:05

I've talked in general, right, that idea of like, some people think that some people are better than others based on how they look or what their best guess is about, you know, what their family background is. And that's wrong. Right. But some people, some people still do it.

DB Crema: 17:24

I guess the question is, do you warn them that they might be at the receiving end of that?

Katie: 17:30

I have not?

DB Crema: 17:31

Or do you let them figure it out? In the preparing them for it, you create...It's you, then, that becomes the driver of the anxiety,

Katie: 17:40

Right. That's, that's part of it. I don't want to cause them to worry about something before it happens. And not to say like, get ready, it's coming for you. Right, like, but to say like, some people do that. And that idea that, yeah, just that that way of thinking is ...is like so whack, that it will land less. And then also to talk very favorably about what they look like. Right. So to say, right, your beautiful brown skin, your beautiful brown eyes, you know, your beautiful brown hair, right and to really just be loving and complimentary of, of what they look like and who they are. Hoping that when they meet, you know, whoever that unknown asshole might be, that they feel like, well you're obviously wrong, because I'm awesome.

DB Crema: 18:43

Thanks for listening to United States of Race. This podcast was produced by me, Your host DB Crema, and our artwork is designed by Aly Creative. If you love great storytelling, go ahead and subscribe to United States of Race on Spotify, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts and show us a love by rating and writing a review on Apple podcasts or Podchaser. You see podchaser.com is the world's most comprehensive podcast database. So rating and writing a review there helps us get the message out and helps other listeners discover this amazing show. And you can also share this podcast with your friends, and anyone who believes in the power of building connection through sharing personal stories. You can also follow us on Instagram at unitedstatesofrace. And as always, if you, Yes, you have a compelling story to share and would like to be featured on an upcoming episode. Send us a message at unitedstatesofrace@gmail.com. Until next time.,