Responding to the U.S. Capitol Siege

Your Parenting Mojo - Respectful, research-based parenting ideas to help kids thrive

In this ad hoc episode, I outline a response to the U.S. Capitol siege. I provide some suggestions for ways to talk with your child about the events, but also ask that you take two more steps: (1) examine your own role in these events, even if you condemn them yourself (as I do); (2) take action based on your own position and role in the world to work toward equality. You can find my resources on the intersection of parenting and race here. There's a specific blog post suggesting a script for talking with children about the Black Lives Matter movement (which could be adapted for this situation) here. Showing Up for Racial Justice's Action Hours are here [accordion] [accordion-item title="Click here to read the full transcript"] Jen Lumanlan 00:01 Hello, everybody! I am recording live in our Facebook group. And I'm also recording this separately on the camera and on audio only as a way to share this information more broadly across a variety of platforms. I thought it was actually sharing in the group a minute ago, and I am not sure that it was working so I'm just trying to give this another go around. And I think actually, I just got the same message pop up saying that I was not sharing and now I am sharing, so hopefully this is going through to everywhere that it's supposed to be going. So the content of what I want to talk about today is about what has happened at the US Capitol. And it's been a couple of days, it's Friday, today, January 8, and two days after the events happened at the Capitol. And I wasn't really sure what to say and so I didn't want to say anything, I didn't want to say the wrong thing. And I went out for a bike ride this morning and it sort of clarified for me what it was that I wanted to say. And so that's why if you're watching this on video, you're probably seeing a bit of a stripe across my forehead and I'm freshly showered because I kind of came back and was on fire about what it was that I wanted to say. And so you're sort of hearing my relatively raw unedited thoughts. And I'm a little nervous about sharing those with you which is why you probably hear this in my voice. So I want to start with talking with our children about the events that have happened at the Capitol, because I'm hearing questions in Facebook groups and other places online if parents want to have these kinds of conversations with their children, but they don't know how to do it or they're thinking, okay, maybe my children are too young to understand what's going on and I don't want to scare them, and I'm not sure if I'm going to have a conversation with them at all. Jen Lumanlan 01:57 And so, I have published resources on this before I actually have a post on how to talk with your child about Black Lives Matter. And I think that a lot of the principles that are discussed in there are very similar. And we want to do it in an age-appropriate way, we want to lead with their questions, and so I think ideally, this will come from them being out in the world, and they'll see things that they're curious about, and they'll ask about them, and that will lead into a conversation on these topics. But if we are not out so much lately, as many of us are not and maybe we don't have the news on all the time, and so their exposure to it may be much less than it otherwise would have been. And so well, what can we do when that's the case? And we're not sure how to bring the conversation up? Well, I would say the first thing we can do is to talk about it with a spouse or significant other or another adult over dinner, or over some other period of time where it's natural for you to have a conversation. And to just talk about what's on your mind—what's been in the news today? how is today's developments casting new light on? what we're thinking about what happened at the US Capitol? And pretty soon your child is probably going to say, “What are you talking about?” Or something that indicates that they're interested in this topic and I think that that can be a jumping-off point for you to try and give some background and ideally, that this won't be the first conversation that you will have had on current events like this, and you'll be able to talk about in context, Donald Trump and the policies that he has been enacting, and the ways that he talks to people, and whom he talks to. And so, that will provide you with the context that you need to then describe what has happened. Jen Lumanlan 03:46 When they have questions, we can answer their questions clearly and directly. And also not be afraid to say when we don't know, because there's a lot that we don't know. And we don't have to put across the impression that we do know everything to our children all the time. I think it's also fine to share how we feel about the events with our children. It's important for them to see that our words and what we're saying match our demeanor, if we are clearly afraid about something, but we're sort of saying, “Oh, don't worry about it, it's fine,” then what they're learning from that is well, “I can see that my parent is not fine, but they're telling me fine. They're telling me everything's fine. Something really important is going on here,” or they may see, “Well, I just don't trust my own ability to judge how other people are reacting because I'm getting these mixed messages and I don't understand which one to prioritize. It must be what my parent is saying. And so I must not be capable of judging how their nonverbal reactions are supporting that message.” And so, I think behind a lot of these questions around what should I talk to my child, what should I say to my child, there's this big issue of privilege and of having the luxury to make that decision and to decide what we're going to say and to be able to make a decision to choose to say things that don't scare our children. And not all parents have the luxury to do this. So, if you're coming at these conversations for the first time, then welcome. There are resources that I've published available to help you there, a number of them are collected at yourparenting mojo.com/race. There's actually one on how to talk with your child about Black Lives Matter and I think that a number of the principles that are discussed in that post are also very applicable here. And the kind of script that you can use to build on their questions will also be helpful as you're navigating this kind of conversation. Jen Lumanlan 05:50 So, that's the issue of talking with our children about this topic, but I think that there's a broader issue that I want to make sure isn't neglected. Because I think it's really critical to examine what is our role in this system, in the system that has made it feel to some people like Donald Trump is the best option who's available to me, and what he says is what I'm going to do. Because I think that it's really easy to point to those people and say, “Well, those people are racist, and I'm not like them, and it's all their fault, their problem,” and instead, I think that we all need to examine our role in the system that has created these events and to take action related to that. And so what does that mean? Well, I worked for a consulting company for a long time. And I worked in sustainability consulting for a number of years, which I really enjoyed, but it became apparent that there was a point in time where it was obvious people, companies were not willing to pay the premiums that my company wanted to sell this work for. And so, I was on the verge of getting laid off and an executive that I'd worked with previously, who appreciated my work said, “You should come to work on my team,” and I said, “Sure.” And so, we were in a portion of the business where we were selling outsourcing services and other things as well, technology implementation, but we were also selling outsourcing services. And so what I was essentially doing was supporting proposal development work, and so directly involved in selling the company's services related to outsourcing in countries like India and the Philippines, which would take jobs away from American citizens and outsource them to those companies where it's cheaper to operate. Jen Lumanlan 07:59 And I remember reading in the news several years ago now that my company would force the American workers to train their new replacements on their jobs as a condition of receiving severance pay. And so, you know, I don't want to point to you and say, “You are the problem, you listeners, you watchers are the problem,” because we are all part of this problem. I was selling work that was taking jobs away from people who are many of them now are supporting Donald Trump, and sending that to other countries. And of course, there's a lot of complexity involved here, maybe I was involved in lifting the standard of living for somebody who was in those countries. It's not cut and dry. But I am not uninvolved in this system and neither are you. No matter where you sit in life, you have a role to play in this system. So maybe you're a teacher, and you participate in systems that involve awarding points for children who are reading books, and so that they can collect points and win rewards for reading books, as they're learning how to read. Well, what does that do? It pits children against each other, and it directly undermines the kind of cooperative systems that children from many other cultures learn at home and says that the way of being that you've learned in your culture is not valued here, competition is valued here. And if you want to do well, if you want to get ahead, then you need to get on board with that competitive approach. If you are teaching at any level at all, have you evaluated your curriculum through an anti-racist lens? You know, even if you're at the university level, are you looking at the contributions that Black people have made in your field? And are you teaching that alongside all of the contributions that the much better-known White inventors, scientists, and whoever has made in that field? If you're in government, how are the policies that you are creating, helping to perpetuate the system? Or how are they helping to break those systems down? If you're in business, does your business incorporate anti-racist principles? Are you actively working to lift up all people? I will say that I have been searching for a number of months now for a consulting company to help me look at embedding anti-racist principles into my business. Jen Lumanlan 10:33 So, if you're watching this, and you work for somebody who does this, or you know of a company that does this, I know there are many companies that do it for multinational businesses. I am not aware of anyone who is yet doing it on a very small scale. I'm very interested in piloting something around that if somebody wants to develop an offering that can be taken to many small businesses. So this work needs to continue, even though I'm no longer working at the consulting company, it still needs to continue within my own business. If you don't work outside of the home, if your work involves raising children, then you still play a role. If your child is in daycare, or school, or preschool, where whatever situation they're in how do you advocate for resources for your child? Do you look at policies at your preschool daycare school? And look at those through the lens of well, “How does this benefit me? And how does this withhold benefits from other people?” Does this level the playing field? Does it help to lift up a group that has historically not been able to access resources as well as the group that I'm a member of has been able to? Does your child come home after the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr, holiday? And I think that well, he made a speech about having a dream and there was this woman called Rosa Parks, and she sat on a bus and now we're good. Racism isn't a problem anymore. If your child is coming home with that kind of message, then there's some work to do here. Jen Lumanlan 12:06 And I would say if you're listening to this and thinking, “Well, that sounds exhausting to look at everything I do through that lens,” then I would say, “Yeah, maybe it can seem like some extra effort.” But it's not as much effort as being on the other end of these principles that are actively working against your existence, your right to exist in this world. And it is our responsibility as parents who have more privilege to examine our role in this system and to take steps to, break that system down to the extent that we can within our particular role in it. And so, I also want to link this idea to patriarchy, because I think that it's all connected. It's all connected because patriarchy does three things. Firstly, it creates scarcity, it creates a scarcity of jobs, it creates a scarcity of money of resources, and then it pits people against each other to vie for those resources. So I think a lot of parents who listen to the show feel a lot of pressure to give their children the skills they need to get ahead in life and to put them in the best daycare situation, and the best school situation so that they can get a job and place it in an elite university, and get a job from there at a White collar consulting company that I used to work for, or an investment banking firm or something along those lines. And that when we're doing those things, we are contributing to the perpetuation of this system that we're not seeing that this scarcity is in many ways artificially created as a way to keep us working against each other instead of working with each other. And that's sort of a separate, the second thing that patriarchy does creating separation, it makes us say, “Well, we're different from them and I want those resources, I need my child to go to an elite university so that they can get ahead and have a better life than I had. And there isn't enough stuff for me and my family to have it and for them and their family to have it and I need to make sure that my family has it, so I'm going to do everything I can for my child to get that and for their child to not get that.” Jen Lumanlan 12:06 And we may sort of have this veneer of well, everything's equal and everybody's the same, but at the end of the day, if we are advocating for resources that benefit our child in the way that they do not benefit all other children, then we are part of this system that is perpetuating this problem. And then finally patriarchy creates powerlessness. And I think this is sort of a hypothesis of mine, but we see that people who are supporting Donald Trump are angry. And anger is always something that conceals other things underneath it, anger is never the only thing that's going on. And very often what anger conceals is a sense of fear, and maybe a sense of shame. And that the people who are angry are scared underneath all of this, they're scared that they won't be able to feed their family or whatever it is that’s going on for them. And because we have these other elements of patriarchy we're being pitted against each other, they are seeing well, if those people are being lifted up, then by default, I am not being lifted up and I need more, and we can't both have more. SoI think that, for some parents who are listening to this, they may be thinking, well, you know, all of this is politics. It's all stuff that's going out in the on out there in the world and this is not really connected to parenting, and that somebody who's talking about parenting doesn't have any business talking about politics. When I am coming to a certain place to get information about parenting, I want to just be able to get information about parenting and not have to deal with all the political stuff. Jen Lumanlan 16:25 And to do those parents, I would say, “Okay, there's plenty of places where you can get that,” and increasingly, that is not going to be here in the Your Parenting Mojo community because this is directly connected to parenting. Adults use force to resolve conflicts that they're having because they learn this from their parents. And if you're thinking, “Well, I don't use force, I don't spank my kid. I'm not doing those things,” then I would say, okay, then we need to take a closer look at what's going on. And again, I'm not pointing fingers at you here, I'm saying this is all of us. This is me included. You know, sometimes we will sugarcoat our force, popular parenting advice says, “If your child is being difficult, and can't choose between what they're getting, you know, on the suite of options of what they're going to wear in the morning, then you give them two choices that you can live with both of them and that's what they get to choose between, or you have to brush your teeth, but we can use the pink toothbrush or the blue toothbrush. And at the end of the day, we're still applying force here, we're still saying, you're going to do this, you are getting dressed. And I'm going to make it seem like you have some choice by allowing you to pick between these two options and I think that's a really key idea here, that if you are allowing the child to pick, then that's not really choices. The same as in school, where you're allowed to pick between two assignments, the teacher is determined are acceptable, but you don't actually get a choice in terms of what you're learning. And we do this all the time, and I think it was in a conversation I had with Hannah and Kelsey on the upbringing podcast, where they were talking about having attended a Black Lives Matter protest, and you know, everybody there is saying, fight the power, fight the power and then they're getting home, and it's time for the kids to go to bed and saying, “Well, you're gonna brush your teeth now,” and so if you're sort of in public having this fight the power message, but at home, you're then forcing your child to do things against their will, then we are still perpetuating this same approach, we're still saying, “I don't care about how you how you feel about this.” Jen Lumanlan 18:51 We may even be early in the stage of working through sort of a more peaceful parenting approach. And we know that we're supposed to hear our children and we're supposed to validate their feelings. And then so often, what I see is the parents will then jump to a solution and say, “Well, this is what we're going to do. I hear that you're frustrated and this is how we're going to do it,” and so then they wonder, well, a lot of times questions will come up around, well, my child won't engage in problem-solving with me, and they just walk away or they just say on and on and on I'm not listening or I just don't care or something like that. And the child has learned that they have no power in this interaction, that it's going to seem like they have some power, but actually, they have no power. So I think sort of the bigger thing that I want to convey here is that we're going to be exploring these ideas more and more here on the podcast and in other places that I'm active. We're not leaving the research behind, we're still going to be taking a very research-based approach to understanding what's going on with our children, but increasingly, we're going to be questioning the system that the research sets with it, and saying, “Well, how do we know that this is even the right question to ask? How do we situate this?” And what