On Saturday, I took my son Tristan to his basketball game. I only do this on occasion--it's normally something my husband enjoys doing with his fellow basketball-lover, and his games are also often scheduled at the same time as my Saturday Zumba class. But my husband was not feeling well, so off I went.
As we were driving to the game, I said, "Tristan, I'm excited to see your game today! I haven't been to one this season."
"Well, we might lose." Tristan replied. "We're playing a black team today, and they're really good!"
I didn't know quite how to respond to that, so I just told him to do the best he could. Inwardly, the dialogue began.
Oh, no. He's already absorbing stereotypes about race and sports. What can I do to make sure he doesn't grow up believing generalizations about groups of people?
It also seems kind of strange that a team of eight and nine year old kids would be all black. Most of the teams I've seen have been a mix of kids. And how would he know in advance the team he was playing today was an all black team? Did someone tell them that? That's odd.
I was still formulating the conversation I would have with him later about race and the sports world as we walked into the gym. And there they were, the opposing team, wearing black uniforms. All kinds of kids wearing black uniforms.
Score:
Tristan, 1 (being a kid)
Mommy, 0 (over-thinking)
Though the conversation about stereotyping is one I'm sure we will have to have at some point, Saturday was not the day.
My son's blue team stomped the black team, and my son scored his first basket of the season! I was elated I was there to see it.
No comments:
Post a Comment