Also why do you not need to hear that? Are you planning to ignore the challenges your kids will face? Like … what the fuck is with these parents cutting people out of their lives when they deliver bad news about their kids’ environment?
If someone came to me and said “Hey there’s a coyote outside tonight so don’t let your kids out”, and I said “Well maybe that’s true but I don’t need to hear that shit” then cut them out of my life, I’d see myself as having failed as a parent right there.
Your job is to keep your eyes open, not take steps to purge unpleasant information from
your life. I’d be disgusted if you didn’t have kids, but since you adopted the responsibility of having kids and are taking this comfort-over-awareness policy, it’s appalling.
I didn’t need to hear it because I lived it and already knew the reality for non white kids growing up here. I didn’t need a middle aged white man telling me how it is. And I’d rather cut someone like that out of my life for myself, my kids weren’t born then, and they aren’t going to hear that story.
Your coyote analogy is flawed. This wasn’t an immediate threat that I ignored.
I know what my job is as a parent, probably better than you do.
This thread is not my autobiography, it is a conversation about politics with a tragic personal aside. You’re getting real intense about taking a side and I would advise reconsidering before you really get dug in. Did you accidentally assume that having known someone for over twenty years, I would casually throw them in the trash, or did you consider that it was a one-paragraph distillation of years of context and history intended to illustrate a larger point about ideology and political violence, which you have used to attack my parenting. Go touch all of the grass in the fucking world, I love my kid and take care of them with everything I’ve got. I loved my friend, and I did my best to save them from an all-consuming madness over several years before it became all to clear I had failed. Leave me to my grief.
I mean, I would fucking hope I misread your story, but you did tell this story. Here’s how I interpreted it:
He tried to convince me
I read this as one night in the kitchen with you two having beers at your place, and he says this. Maybe I assumed that wrong? Was it a whole series of conversations, or was it one conversation? If it was a whole series, that’s worse on his part
that my decision to miscegenate was bad for the “white” race
I honestly think this question is key: was it he who brought up the terms “miscagenate” and “the white race” (those three words in that sequence)?
If he used those specific terms it makes him sound more generally racist. But if you’re introducing them for flavor in the story, that speaks to me of a pattern of amplifying your “he’s racist” interpretation in your own mind.
because of a study he’d allegedly read
Why allegedly? You suspect he made it up out of whole cloth? Or did you suspect he only read about the study but not the contents
of the study itself?
of wherein mixed race people were found to have a higher risk of suicide.
This, to me, sounds an attempt to be helpful.
He said this to a friend of over two decades, as calmly and confidently as if he’d told me yesterday’s weather,
I read this as if he’s not presenting uncertainty, but rather certainty, but he’s only read one study and doesn’t have actual expertise, right?
What exactly did he apply this confidence to? Did he confidently say: “I read a study that said X” or “I know that X” or what exactly?
and apparently expected me to react to this as it it were helpful information.
This is the part that made my blood boil. A parent who doesn’t consider a reported threat to their child, even an uncertain or hypothetical one, to be helpful information just freaks me the fuck out. What?
So, I cut him out of my life,
I read this as you cut him out of your life after two instance of him talking about this study: once to you and once to your mutual friend.
If you did that, after twenty years of friendship, that’s fucked up.
he stalked me
Excellent reason to avoid him. But again I don’t know if I trust your judgment yet.
It seems (unless there’s a lot left out and not even mentioned as ommitted) that one mention of a study involving varying risks to varying racial groups was enough for you to deem him a racist. I guess I misread that? There was more racist stuff he was doing too?
and I fled the country with my wife and toddler in tow
So either you fled the country because of this guy, or you did it for a much larger set of reasons, and you just included that fact to set the overall emotional tone of your family’s story around the same time as the end of that friendship?
All this with the backdrop of a global pandemic and an active insurrection against democracy.
Sorry if I sound too analytical here, but reference to a “backdrop” really makes it sound like you interpreted this guy’s fumbling attempt to help as a plot line in a much larger story about cutting ties and pulling stakes and going on a big journey.
Fuck both your ex-friend and the internet weirdo arguing with you about your family’s safety and value, holy shit. Who asked for their toxic parenting advice/analysis???
You made a decision based on your priorities, and I hope you and your family are doing well, and your child is THRIVING!
There is a gigantic difference between “there’s a dangerous animal outside that you can do something about.” And “your kid isn’t white (absolutely nothing you can do about that) so their life might suck more.”
One of those you can actually do something about, the other is just “sucks to not be white.” It’s pretty much useless negativity.
Did he say valuable, or valued?
Also why do you not need to hear that? Are you planning to ignore the challenges your kids will face? Like … what the fuck is with these parents cutting people out of their lives when they deliver bad news about their kids’ environment?
If someone came to me and said “Hey there’s a coyote outside tonight so don’t let your kids out”, and I said “Well maybe that’s true but I don’t need to hear that shit” then cut them out of my life, I’d see myself as having failed as a parent right there.
Your job is to keep your eyes open, not take steps to purge unpleasant information from your life. I’d be disgusted if you didn’t have kids, but since you adopted the responsibility of having kids and are taking this comfort-over-awareness policy, it’s appalling.
I didn’t need to hear it because I lived it and already knew the reality for non white kids growing up here. I didn’t need a middle aged white man telling me how it is. And I’d rather cut someone like that out of my life for myself, my kids weren’t born then, and they aren’t going to hear that story.
Your coyote analogy is flawed. This wasn’t an immediate threat that I ignored.
I know what my job is as a parent, probably better than you do.
This thread is not my autobiography, it is a conversation about politics with a tragic personal aside. You’re getting real intense about taking a side and I would advise reconsidering before you really get dug in. Did you accidentally assume that having known someone for over twenty years, I would casually throw them in the trash, or did you consider that it was a one-paragraph distillation of years of context and history intended to illustrate a larger point about ideology and political violence, which you have used to attack my parenting. Go touch all of the grass in the fucking world, I love my kid and take care of them with everything I’ve got. I loved my friend, and I did my best to save them from an all-consuming madness over several years before it became all to clear I had failed. Leave me to my grief.
I mean, I would fucking hope I misread your story, but you did tell this story. Here’s how I interpreted it:
I read this as one night in the kitchen with you two having beers at your place, and he says this. Maybe I assumed that wrong? Was it a whole series of conversations, or was it one conversation? If it was a whole series, that’s worse on his part
I honestly think this question is key: was it he who brought up the terms “miscagenate” and “the white race” (those three words in that sequence)?
If he used those specific terms it makes him sound more generally racist. But if you’re introducing them for flavor in the story, that speaks to me of a pattern of amplifying your “he’s racist” interpretation in your own mind.
Why allegedly? You suspect he made it up out of whole cloth? Or did you suspect he only read about the study but not the contents of the study itself?
This, to me, sounds an attempt to be helpful.
I read this as if he’s not presenting uncertainty, but rather certainty, but he’s only read one study and doesn’t have actual expertise, right?
What exactly did he apply this confidence to? Did he confidently say: “I read a study that said X” or “I know that X” or what exactly?
This is the part that made my blood boil. A parent who doesn’t consider a reported threat to their child, even an uncertain or hypothetical one, to be helpful information just freaks me the fuck out. What?
I read this as you cut him out of your life after two instance of him talking about this study: once to you and once to your mutual friend.
If you did that, after twenty years of friendship, that’s fucked up.
Excellent reason to avoid him. But again I don’t know if I trust your judgment yet.
It seems (unless there’s a lot left out and not even mentioned as ommitted) that one mention of a study involving varying risks to varying racial groups was enough for you to deem him a racist. I guess I misread that? There was more racist stuff he was doing too?
So either you fled the country because of this guy, or you did it for a much larger set of reasons, and you just included that fact to set the overall emotional tone of your family’s story around the same time as the end of that friendship?
Sorry if I sound too analytical here, but reference to a “backdrop” really makes it sound like you interpreted this guy’s fumbling attempt to help as a plot line in a much larger story about cutting ties and pulling stakes and going on a big journey.
You should slap your father for not having the common decency to wipe you on the curtains.
I’m an emotional wreck right now, and I thought I was feeling better after these few years.
I won’t say more. Feel free to assume the worst of someone who made the mistake of being vulnerable around you.
Not sure if you read my last comment at all but it was a lot of effort to identify and step away from assumptions I made.
Sorry you’re an emotional wreck right now. Hope you feel better soon.
Not a lot of people here will say this, but props for recognizing you were in the wrong here. It’s not easy to do.
Fuck both your ex-friend and the internet weirdo arguing with you about your family’s safety and value, holy shit. Who asked for their toxic parenting advice/analysis???
You made a decision based on your priorities, and I hope you and your family are doing well, and your child is THRIVING!
😖👍
How the fuck is anything I said arguing about this person’s family’s value??
What the fuck?
you’re still here?
I hate being bullied. When I get treated with this level of disgust and contempt, it makes me feel undignified to just slink away.
You’re being bullied?
Someone shared a personal story and you took the side of the aggressor, and then tripled down on it.
And you’re being bullied, huh?
There is a gigantic difference between “there’s a dangerous animal outside that you can do something about.” And “your kid isn’t white (absolutely nothing you can do about that) so their life might suck more.”
One of those you can actually do something about, the other is just “sucks to not be white.” It’s pretty much useless negativity.