Fatherhood and Black History Month

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Some recent thoughts of mine about fatherhood and February (aka Black History Month), originally expressed 140 characters or less at a time on Twitter.

Looking forward to teaching my daughter (who I last wrote about here) about some black heroes in February & beyond. At 3 she's smarter than she should be, a learning machine.

Her daycare has done a nice job of teaching more than ABC 123. She comes home talking about recycling & Haiti & Martin Luther King's dream. Way to go!

Still, her mom & I are her primary teachers as all good parents should be. Kids pick up everything so must be careful what info is put down.

Parenting a little kid is as much about re-teaching nonsense she picks up than about passing on knowledge of our choice.

The only President of the United States my daughter has ever heard of and knows anything about is a black man. How cool is that?

Actually that's not totally true. She's also fascinated by George Washington because he's on money, we drive over GW bridge regularly to visit family, & on account of his wooden teeth.

Ultimately I want to teach her that there should be no need for a month dedicated to black history, it's a year round thing to be proud about.

And while she happens to be black, I want her to know this fact is a segment of how she is defined, not the full scope of her world view.

I've taught her that music education begins with Stevie Wonder & Bob Marley, not because they're black but because, well, you've heard them so you know why.

I teach my daughter nothing is beyond reach or too good for her. No restrictions or barriers to her success. And that I'm the boss...for now.

My daughter has yet to express interest in becoming a doctor, lawyer, CEO or POTUS. For now a princess with a pink castle will do as top goal.

Prior to Tiana [star of The Princess & the Frog in case you're wondering] the princesses she saw (mostly courtesy of Disney) were fair skinned with long straight hair and rather wimpy, waiting on Prince Charming to come and save the day.

Eventually I found fairy tale book series by Jump at the Sun. Yeah, ownership can be traced to Disney, but a step in right direction.

After finding Jump at the Sun books (which cover fairy tales we’re all familiar with, but characters made black) I discovered HBO's Happily Ever After. International flavor.

So now my daughter has the option of seeing her favorite fairy tales told in multi-cultural fashion, with narration by Robert "Benson" Guillaume.

My daughter knows that presidents and princesses and Barbie dolls can and do come in a variety of shades, way more than I knew at her age.

If I was a dad in 1950 or '60 I'd have to work overtime to instill black pride at home because the world outside our door would reinforce opposite. 2010 is easier yet more complex to negotiate.

Rather than strictly praising blackness I'll need to focus on teaching that intelligence/creativity/self-esteem = beauty before she comes to associate beauty with booty shaking video sirens.

Right now America kinda promotes "black is beautiful" one month a year, but hip hop videos & housewives of Whore-ville are year round 24/7.

I'm smart enough to know the allure of the latest cleavage & belly baring pop star will blow away tidbits about Frederick Douglass.

But if I do my job early & well enough I'll give her a fighting chance to distinguish between flash & substance, self-worth & crafted image.

And as the praised images you'll find available for purchase by clicking on the link at the end of this sentence show, she'll know she's a princess by her own shifting definition of what true royalty is - http://tinyurl.com/ylxjv3m

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Artwork provided courtesy of Erin Go Paint

MY BLACK HISTORY MONTH PINTEREST BOARD

The Princess and the "Controversy"

The announcement that Disney would be making its first Princess movie with a royal African American lead was of great interest to me, but what I found truly fascinating was the reader discussion it sparked in the Comments area of the Black Voices web site where I learned of it. The writer purposely worded the final paragraph of his announcement, referencing how much browner the princess is than the prince, to stir up controversy. And based on the reactions elicited, he clearly succeeded. Following is my response to what a variety of people had to say about Disney's daring "casting" choices for The Princess and the Frog.

First off, the Disney movie factory is all about the princesses. The prince is secondary at best. They don't sell Prince Charming dolls (or certainly not too many of them), only Cinderella. Just look at the majority of the movie titles. It's Pocahontas, not Poca & John John. The Little Mermaid, not Lil Mermaid and What's His Face. Beast got top billing alongside Beauty, but look at how much time he had to spend in the makeup chair to earn it. I suspect that not even the carpet riding smooth talker who gave Aladdin its title drummed up many action figure sales. It's all about that temptress, Jasmine. The news here is that Disney finally decided to create an African American princess. When the movie does well, perhaps even better than the typical Disney princess flick due to excess black support (or does all of that go to Tyler Perry for some inexplicable reason?), no doubt there will be others and a black prince will be inevitable. Secondly, Disney is actually taking more of a risk featuring a mixed race couple than if they had made the expected move of combining a black princess with a black prince. No one is shocked or upset by a black couple but plenty of people still have a problem with interracial couples, so kudos to Disney. True they've already covered this territory in Pocahontas, but that movie was loosely (no doubt quite loosely) based on a true story so the races of the characters was not a choice by Disney. This time around it obviously was a conscious choice, and a mildly bold one at that. I say "mildly" because the dude (at least to my eyes) is clearly Hispanic rather than Caucasian, and a black-brown mix is less of a "shocking" statement than black-white. Last but not least, not every decision is a STATEMENT. Cinderella and Snow White and Sleeping Beauty (and their respective suitors) are white because the writers chose to make them so. In this case the writer(s) decided to make the princess African American and the prince a former member of Menudo. The characters are what they are and little to nothing is being preached to the audience in a friggin' Disney cartoon. I wasn't offended that the guy who woke up Sleeping Beauty wasn't Asian or Pakistani so why should I (or anyone else) be bothered that the prince in The Princess and the Frog isn't black. That said, when Disney does get around to creating a black prince I hope they consider using me as the model. See my portfolio below.

- Roy

p.s. - A reader pointed out to me that the name of the Prince is Naveen, which is an Indian name, so that puts Indian as lead candidate for his ethnicity over Hispanic, Caucasian, Philipino, etc. Is Disney basically doing a remake of Mississippi Masala? :-)

x

p.p.s. - The artists who animate Disney/Dreamworks/Pixar/etc. movies are pretty impressive, but if you really want to be blown away check this out.