When the Black Lives Matter movement picked up pace post-George Floyd I thought it was the perfect reminder for me to consciously address this issue with my four-year-old daughter, Menaal. I don’t think it is enough that she picks up from me subtly that my mother is “colourblind”. Because in this day and age it is not okay to just passively be “colourblind”. It is the need of the hour to be vocally, aggressively, ferociously anti-racist. It is the need of the hour to see all colours and give them equal respect; it is the need of the hour to address and correct all the wrongs our world/society terms “normal” about racism. And what better place to start from than from your own home, from your own child.
We, unfortunately, live in quite an ethnically homogenous location of Pakistan, which means we do not interact with any BIPOCs personally. Another thought that crossed my mind was what if she is too young for this but then I came across an age guide (pictured at the end) which suggested this is the perfect time and hence my fears were allayed. I felt confused as to how I should broach the subject without highlighting the violence around the current scenario—thankfully my friend Bano put up a picture on Facebook, featuring the Sudanese model Nyakim who made it to Guinness for having the darkest skin tone on earth, which gave me the perfect opening.
(Disclaimer: My mind objected to why there was even a need for a skin colour record in Guinness but that is a separate issue for another day.)
I showed Menaal the said picture and told her that this Auntie has the darkest coloured skin in the world, isn’t she stunningly beautiful?! She asked me if the Auntie had painted herself black? I explained that Allah ta’ala had made her this way; that He has ensured variety in all His creations, be it human skin tones, be it animal species, be it fruits and vegetables, be it the different ecosystems (oceans, mountains, rainforest, desserts etc) in the world—how each of them are uniquely beautiful in their own way and how any two things just should not be compared to ascertain which one is superior. Instead, we should train our minds and hearts to find the unique beauty in every single creation and praise the Creator. She understood perfectly well and gave me a great example of how there were so many fruits and how she cannot decide if she likes strawberries or kinoos or aleechis or cherries more—we finalized that we can love them all, there does not have to be a ranking. I showed her people ranging from black to brown to beige to peach to yellow; she happily declared that Ami is “coffee-coloured” and Abu is “Light Brown”, both are beautiful and she loves us both equally. We came back to discussing the original picture and she told me what she loved about this Auntie was how “shiny and shimmery” her skin was; she tried to find if there was any part of her that shone but couldn’t so I counted things which I found beautiful in her even if she did not have shiny skin. She listened and beamed.
I also recounted to her an incident from when she was two—she made an African-American friend at the kids’ section of a retail store in Dubai and the girls played with each other/ran around for 45ish minutes while both mothers gladly scrounged the kickass sale. I told her what drew her to the girl in the first place—her beautifully done cornrows with multicoloured trinkets at the end of each. Menaal was, at that time, fascinated by the amount and variety of pretty things in the girl’s hairstyle and hence started following her around the store. She did not remember it so we googled pictures of girls with corn rows and had a great time choosing our favourites. She wanted to try the same on her hair but I had to explain how this was unique to certain people with a certain type of hair—we came to an agreement that we could try it out on her some day and if we failed we’d give up and stick to our usual hairdos.
It gave my heart peace to find that she had not picked up colour consciousness from our society as of yet but I know my work as a parent is far from done. I know as she gets older she will witness quite a few such comments/situations where beauty is gauged by the lightness of someone’s skin but I am also confident that as long as we discuss why what was even thought (and then brazenly voiced out) was wrong and why we must not indulge in any of it ourselves in order to be the good humans Allah expects us to be, we WILL come out on the right side of the fence on racism. Here’s to raising a better world in any way we can-clink!
Author’s Bio
Rabeea Haq is a LUMS graduate and a fantastic mother who likes to raise her child a responsible global citizen, not necessarily a slave to the prevalent societal standards. That itself is a brave thing to do. She is soon (on avaam ka pur zor israar) beginning her own blog which we all are cheering and raving to devour. Can’t wait to add her to my regular reading list!
She’s also very pretty. Also I love her tons.