The past year has called on my husband and I to reassess how we talk to our kids about what?s happening in the world, and last week?s vicious attack on Asian women was another crushing reminder that a year into this pandemic, Asian phobia is still at the top of our family?s agenda. Our kids are affected by it because they are of Asian descent?but instead of worrying about being targeted by it themselves, they are afraid for people they love.
Fortunately, I’m well-positioned to talk to them about it. I know what it?s like to be white-passing and affected by racism.
I spent my childhood summers in the area of Scarborough, Ont., where my Chinese family lived?my grandmother, aunt, uncle and cousins from my mother?s side. It was the ?80s, when kids roamed through neighbourhoods in packs from sun up to sundown. There were five of us; even more if other cousins were visiting. We felt invincible as we travelled through parks, corner stores, arcades and then back to their house when we got hungry for my aunt?s restaurant-worthy noodles and homemade dumplings. We never cared what we were wearing or how many days in a row we wore it. I have no memories of standing in front of a mirror on those long summer days, and we didn?t have to worry about how we looked on a screen inside a phone. And so it was easy to forget. Easy to feel like we were no different from all the other packs of kids we’d run into while loading up on candy or during an impromptu game of baseball in the f...