The awareness of race starts so young. People say children do not see color but that’s just not true. They pick up things from the cradle, and our response should start there.
When my Asian-born daughter was little I noticed little things…such as the fact that our local YMCA play-room at the rec center AND my daughter’s pre-school had only white dolls. Of course, you would expect no dolls depicting Asians, (they do exist) but no dolls of color at all, and mostly blonde. Does that not send a message what “normal” people are supposed to look like? Also, some dolls depicting Asian people were pathetically caricatured. So I spent a lot of time searching and buying nice-quality dolls of every hue and ethnicity that I could find that were nuanced and attractive to donate to various pre-schools. (They were not very available locally.) Some of the recipients seemed confused and/or bemused by my doing this. Some reported back that they children (of every/any race) preferred white dolls and never played with dolls of color. I said, “so be it!” …it was important to me, whether or not children played with those dolls they could see them representing the human race and that the whole spectrum is considered, at least those limited play settings as “normal.” Some may consider this just a little progressive fluff, but IMO we’ve got to start somewhere!