Dec
28
Breaking Free from Family Hate
Tags: race, social justice, youth
Filed Under Motivating Moments | By Tim Love
I just ran across this article in the Intelligence Report, a project of the Southern Poverty Law Center, that tells the story of children rejecting the hate that their parents espouse. As we think about our primary prevention efforts across the state, we can be encouraged by the bravery and sense of justice these children choose to portray in spite of their parents, and we can learn an important lesson about the need for comprehensive efforts that work to change attitudes across entire communities, not just within individuals.
“Overall, there’s not a lot of evidence that, at least in the long term, kids get their prejudice from their parents,” said Charles Stangor, who runs the Laboratory for the Study of Social Stereotyping and Prejudice at the University of Maryland. “I would call it more of a community effect than a parental effect. The community fosters tolerance or prejudice.”
We must remember that working with parents is only a part of the answer, but alone will not make the kind of lasting change we all hope for to end sexual violence. It really does take a village to raise a child, and it takes a village based on equity and justice, where violence of any kind is not a solution, but rather is condemned, to raise a child who can reject hate and prejudice taught at home to become leaders for positive social change.
What can we do, you and I, to build communities that raise peaceful, kind and courageous children?
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