4 Ways White People Can Support Black People in the Unschooling World Without Being Intrusive

This question came from one of my podcast listeners who supports the show through my Patreon page, and asked this question:

How can white unschooling families best support and make space for Black unschooling families without being intrusive?

Prefer to listen to my responses? Click here to do that on Soundcloud.

1. Check your defensiveness.

I think it’s normal that any of us have a knee-jerk reaction to things that sting. When people say things that highlight the things we feel badly about or guilty about, it’s really easy to try and defend it. One thing white people can do to support and make space for Black and Brown families is to STOP DOING THAT. Leave your hurt feelings for your journals; listen and process what you’re hearing from us without explaining why you feel that way.

Remember, we spend our lives being required to understand and study whiteness — white feelings, white perspectives, white narratives, all of that. You are the one who now has an opportunity to explore our perspectives; try to let your conversations with us be about that. We don’t need to understand YOU in order for racist realities to be dismantled; it’s you that needs the practice understanding us outside of the fear and anti-black/anti-brown focus that media, school curricula, and all of that has been perpetuation for literally 100s of years.

2. Check your friends when they make racist comments.

Some of our friends probably don’t give a shit about what I think, but they might care what you think. When a friend says something about black or brown people that makes you feel some type of way, say so out loud. I’m not saying you have to bash them verbally, but don’t be complicit by being silent. Say to them how their words are rooted in racism; give them an opportunity to face that. So another thing white people can do to support and make space for Black and Brown families is to speak up about racist mindsets because your words might actually reach some folks that our worlds probably will not.

3. Don’t assume Black or Brown people aren’t centering love.

This one is major! So many of us who do this work out loud are labeled as ANGRY. And I can’t tell you how many times a seemingly well-meaning white person has offered me the solace of love and tolerance and compassion as solutions or salves for my experiences. Don’t do that. It’s offensive AF.

I can be loving and compassionate and still be sick and tired of being targeted and hurt because I am black. I can be tolerant and compassionate and still be furious at the reality that my children are not safe simply because of the color of the skin or the kink in their hair. When you say things like “love conquers all” you speak from a place that severely lacks the realistic idea that love doesn’t save my people from your people. And you are defining LOVE as something that you get to characterize, and that I should aspire to based on how YOU see love.

We don’t need to be reminded to love; we love all the time. We just want equal access and safe spaces and room to build what we need without racism coming in to destroy what we are and what we have. Historically, that’s what whiteness has done, and we were never love-less during any of that. We just won’t sit silently while those things happen, and that lack of silence isn’t hate; it’s our human instinct to protect and nurture ourselves.

4. Ask how you can support in individual settings because there isn’t one overall right answer.

We are vast and varied. Just like you’re not the same as every other white person you know, I am not the same as every other Black person you know. If you really want to support Black unschooling families, ask the ones with whom you interact. I hope my responses incite some action, and one of those actions I hope it incites is that each time you connect with a Black unschooling family, ask how you can support them and be willing to follow their lead, and to be uncomfortable, and to risk sounding however you think you might sound when you ask questions.

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Fare of the Free Child is a weekly-published podcast community centering People of Color in liberatory living and learning practices. With a particular interest in unschooling and the Self-Directed Education movement, Akilah S. Richards and special guests discuss the fears and the fares (costs) of raising free Black and Brown children in a world that tends to diminish, dehumanize, and disappear them. Also, connect on Twitter and Instagram using our hashtags: #POCinSDE #RaisingFreePeople