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For white families raising children who identify as Black, it is of utmost importance to foster self-love in your child. I believe it is helpful to do so in an introduction and practice of diasporic appreciation for expression. Expression of love, togetherness, family, triumph, and loss. To be Black in this world is to be of the world. This is a pride sometimes lost in the here and now. However, I encourage you to always remember and foster in your child knowledge of a larger connectedness throughout the world. This isn’t something you must perfect yourself, but something to witness and encourage through exposure, knowledge, and a total absence of judgment about what is “good” or “better.”

Consider art, for example. True art in its purest form is simply free creation, the absence of fear. To create freely is to express without the constraint of perceived limits. If we engage only the left side of our brain and never access the right, we become stifled. Black children need to know that celebrations this season reflect diverse global stories of struggle, renewal, and joy that connect all of humanity. Whether Diwali, Hanukkah, Christmas, Eid, or Kwanzaa. Each represents a narrative of perseverance and hope. They may be religious in form, and that’s okay. You don’t have to join a religion to appreciate its story. Understanding how each narrative connects humankind; that’s the story to be told.

You don’t have to practice a tradition to appreciate what it brings to your community. The holiday season need not be reduced to only your family’s experience. Additionally, engagement doesn’t require wealth or extensive resources. It can be as simple as reading a library book about a celebration together, watching a documentary, or having a conversation with neighbors. Explaining each element of a holiday without judgment: the good, the bad, and the controversial allows your child to appreciate diversity, possibility, creativity, and storytelling. This includes difficult truths: discussing “Thanksgiving” alongside the National Day of Mourning honors the complexity of American history and teaches that honest storytelling matters more than comfortable mythology.

Your child’s critical thinking will flourish when asking questions and seeing differences as normal and expected, fostering ease and openness. Practice whatever traditions your family holds dear, of course. However, when others are celebrating, learn a little about it. If you have the means, discover where celebrations are being held to donate, contribute, or simply appreciate. Share stories with enthusiasm, respect, joy, and curiosity.

Your role is to ensure your child develops both strong individual identity and deep connection to broader humanity. We are different, and we are one. That’s the season’s lesson.

Let us remember that Halloween can be magical for children. From their first costume as babies; dressed as pumpkins with orange cheeks and tiny leaf head pieces, or as adorable kittens and witches, to their excited trick-or-treating years, in the United States this holiday centers around childhood enjoyment. I personally love to see the creativity of each person who comes to my door. If it aligns with your family’s values, there’s nothing wrong with celebrating Halloween. However, as we approach Halloween 2025, it’s crucial for all parents to understand which practices cause real harm.

In American tradition, October 31st marks when the veil between our world and the spirit world grows thin. The custom of scary decorations and costumes originally served a purpose: to blend in with wandering spirits so they wouldn’t target your home or family. Children dress as frightening creatures to disguise themselves from actual threats that are now “among us”. Keeping this in mind, may help clarify why using someone else’s identity or culture as your “shield” is inappropriate.

Lets break down some simple examples:

1. Painting your child’s skin black or brown is never acceptable. This practice has deep historical roots in minstrelsy, which depicted Black people as unintelligent performers existing for white entertainment. No character requires darkening skin to complete a costume when done respectfully.

2. Afros are not costumes—they’re natural hair that grows from people’s bodies worldwide. Wearing disheveled afro wigs perpetuates harmful stereotypes that cast Black hair as “unkempt,” “unprofessional,” or “wild” when worn naturally, and beautifully by Black people ourselves.

3. Deities, religious figures, and cultural identities are not props. Hindu priests, Indian goddesses, Egyptian royalty, and historical figures like the Queen of Sheba are deeply meaningful to millions of people daily and around the world. They’re not tools to “scare away demons” or entertainment for Halloween night.

Halloween offers endless creative possibilities: zombies, witches, vampires, scarecrows, spiders, ravens, ogres, ghosts, skeletons, and countless other spooky creatures. Focus on these traditional elements rather than appropriating identities, cultures, or appearances that aren’t yours to wear for fun or entertainment. Teaching your little ones to stay within the moment

Let’s keep Halloween about children’s laughter, spooky fun, and candy bags they won’t want to share, while ensuring everyone can celebrate and we can actively reduce racial and cultural harm at the same time.

This seems straightforward, but most people reading this will immediately resist that description. If you pause a little longer, you might realize something crucial: if your children are Black and your household doesn’t actively understand and engage with issues that uplift or impact the Black community, you’re effectively leaving your child to navigate that terrain alone.

There’s a razor-thin line between othering your child and truly accepting the reality that your entire household is affected by what affects them.

If you’re a non-white parent who doesn’t understand society’s impact on Black children, this understanding is imperative. It’s not enough to simply know the statistics—the likelihood that your child could (and most likely is) experiencing racism in school, extracurricular activities, or while engaging with social systems as basic as riding the city bus.

What’s imperative is navigating the nuances of such ignorance with a deep radar for being gaslit and dismissed back into your comfort zone. If your gut is telling you something is off, it is off. If racism wasn’t in your top two explanations, double-check whether you’re avoiding what has been normalized in your world—not necessarily the world your child experiences daily.

If you find yourself asking, “Could it really be…?” It could. And most likely, it is.

What This Looks and Sounds Like

The manifestations are countless:

• Assumptions about behavior leading to predictions of “nefarious pathways”

• Presumptions about likelihood and capability

• Adults showing apparent lack of experience with Black children, then either refusing accountability or using “not knowing” as justification for inaction

• Absence of dialogue around the impact of cultural, racial, and ethnic experiences in our society

• Describing appearance with coded, generally negative words: “wooly,” “frizzy,” “little monkey,” “hyper,” “loud” (when referring to excitement or energy)

• Labeling children as “different” when the real issue is adults’ lack of exposure to Black children

I could go on. They can go on as well.

Some of these incidents might seem “silly” to address. However, your position should align with your child’s experience, not your own understanding of it. It’s crucial that your child isn’t taught to comply just to get along.

Every issue that affects a Black person must fully affect your household. Without this perspective, you effectively leave your child alone to address the fear and, ultimately, the shame of their involuntary inclusion in whatever the Black community is being charged with.

Everything charged to the Black community is being charged to yours.

One privilege of being white is that when the white community faces behavioral accusations, it’s not charged to the entire community. For example, though most mass shooters are white males, we haven’t labeled this demographic as “dangerous when angry and in crowds.” Yet any deficit attributed to the Black community—whether an individual act or not—lands as the responsibility and reflection of the group entirely.

Your child is no exception.

Your Essential Role

As parents, your job is to ensure that in a world directed at invalidating your baby’s existence, you empower your child with this truth: there is nothing—NOTHING—wrong with how they exist.

Your active commitment to engaging with Black history through the eyes of the Black community is essential. You don’t need to be different people. You do, however, need to be well-informed and an active advocate for your child and their community to live unharmed.

Parents are parents—you don’t want anything to happen to your precious child. This is precisely why it’s imperative to examine which lens you’re using when teaching your child how to be in this complicated society.

White parents especially must address their fear of their Black child navigating an aggressive world. (I’ll explore this more in a future post.) After consistent work on your own personal experiences, narratives, and conditioning, the short answer is this: don’t teach them to fear what being Black means.

There’s often a hidden narrative that white parents carry—one that positions their Black child as somehow complicit in persistent stereotypes, or as having innate knowledge about their “racial role.” This usually isn’t conscious.

There is a solution—many, actually. First and foremost: teach your child a deep understanding of their strength, and of the strength, beauty, and brilliance that is their Blackness, however that presents itself.

This foundation of strength and clarity will prove far more valuable when the day comes that they must stand up for themselves—and that day will come.

The concept of a Black home isn’t just about recognition—it’s about transformation. It’s about ensuring that every child who enters your door knows they belong not just in your family, but in this world, exactly as they are.