Everybody, let’s talk about it: 🧵 I’m a 27-year-old white female kindergarten teacher with a small class of about fifteen 5- to 7-year-olds. I’m honestly one of the most progressive people I know, so I thought I was prepared for anything. Yesterday we read a children’s book whose main character was a Chinese girl. The pictures were realistic, not cartoony, which I loved because representation matters. At the first picture, a white boy in my class asked, “Why are her eyes so small?” I handled it like a pro and said, “She’s Chinese. Chinese people usually have small eyes.” He then asked, “Can she see?” I said yes, she can see almost as well as he can, which I think was a great way to normalize it. Then I told him to be quiet so I could keep reading. A couple of pictures later, he said, “I like my eyes better.” That’s when I realized this was serious. Kids don’t just say things like that. It’s instilled in them by their parents, and I’d honestly bet money on that. I mean, I don’t know what goes on in their household, but children absorb things, and somebody needs to take responsibility for that. I ignored the comment for the moment because I’m very strategic and planned to deal with it after class. At pickup time, I left most of the kids with my assistant teacher (who, to be fair, is not very proactive) and took the boy and one of my Korean students into a separate room. I didn’t want to make a scene, and I thought she’d be perfect to have there since her eyes are just like the girl in the book. Korean, Chinese, I figured the point was the same. Obviously I understand there are cultural differences, but at that age I really didn’t think the distinction was relevant. I didn’t ask her if she wanted to be part of this because I didn’t want to make it weird or make her feel singled out. I was actually trying to do the opposite. I told him it’s okay to look different and talked for about five minutes. I was pretty much crying by the end. I know how terrible racism is, and I think my tears showed both kids how much this matters. I wanted him to understand that comments about somebody’s appearance can hurt people, and honestly I think having a real emotional response made the lesson more meaningful.

Everybody, let's talk about it: 🧵 Hey everyone, first off, thanks for being open to this. I'm sorry if it comes off wrong, I know this stuff can be sensitive. I'm a white guy and I'm about to come out as nonbinary. I want to start fresh and leave my old self behind. For a while now I've wanted to go by Kwame. It just feels like me: playful, energetic, kind of magical. I grew up loving African culture, and around a lot of Ghanaian kids so the name has always felt familiar and close to home. My partner is Ghanaian, but American born, and they're totally fine with it. They actually helped me pick it out. But I know Kwame is a Ghanaian name with cultural meaning I might not fully get, and I don't want to accidentally disrespect anyone. That post the other day about the woman who didn't want to take her partner's last name got me thinking about this a lot. It made me realize people should get to choose a name that feels true to them without everyone weighing in. I still want to do this the right way, though, so I'd love to hear what you think, especially from Black and African followers, since you know this better than I do. Any feedback is welcome as long as it's kind. Thank you! 💛

Everybody, let’s talk about it: 🧵 So my girlfriend is apparently considering taking our kids and going to stay at her mom’s house because of something that happened with my grandma, and I honestly think she’s taking this way too far. A few days ago, I arranged a video call with my grandma, who has dementia and lives in a care home. I was told she was having a good day, and my girlfriend was excited because she’d never met her. I explained beforehand that my grandma has been making racist comments lately. She grew up in the Deep South with extremely racist parents but became a progressive woman as an adult. She loved everybody and was one of the sweetest people you’d meet. Unfortunately, dementia has brought back some of the things she grew up around. I’ve heard stories from the nurses about things she’s said to the Black staff. Calling them slurs, telling them they’re dirty, asking why they’re allowed in her room, refusing to let them touch her, saying they belong outside, and accusing them of stealing from her. Apparently, she’s even told staff that people like them shouldn’t be allowed around white people. It’s awful, but this is where her mind is right now. I told my girlfriend all of this, repeatedly warning her that something offensive could happen. She kept saying she understood and that I shouldn’t worry because she wouldn’t take it personally. The call started off great. My grandma was smiling, asking questions, and seemed happy to see me with my girlfriend. About ten minutes in, she suddenly got confused and started screaming that a dirty n-word was watching her, that we were going to hurt her, and that she didn’t want those people in her house. She started saying we were dangerous and that someone needed to get us away from her. She kept repeating herself until the nurses came over to calm her down. I ended the call and said, “That sucked.” My girlfriend immediately burst into tears and walked away. When I followed her, she said she was disgusted and horrified by my grandma.

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CATMAN STATEMENT ON DORKY'S ARCADE OWNER LES VOROS-BOND It was Saturday, August 8th back in 2015. The scene was Dorky's Arcade in Tacoma. I had brought my friend and actor Noah Hathaway, known best as "Atreyu" from the classic 1984 film The Neberending Story there for an evening of retro fun for the community, with a long line of fans waiting out the door to meet him. On that next morning, I had received a phone call from Caroline, the co-owner of Dorky's. She was crying and in hysterics. I instantly thought that something happened to Noah. Marjon and I had left him there the night before as he wanted to stay super late and play video games. We had cats and sleep to tend to. Before my mind could even go there, Caroline asked if I had heard about Les, Leslie Voros-Bond, her fiancee and co-owner of Dorky's. It turns out there there had been a Black Lives Matter protest that morning in downtown Tacoma, literally at the intersection where Dorky's is located, temporarily shutting down all traffic to the area. But what happened next was not something I needed Caroline to fill me in on being that there was a viral video posted online. Les had grabbed a megaphone from inside Dorky's and proceeded to go crash the protest, blaring music out of his megaphone and dancing wildly through the protest. But that paled compared to him approaching a young black male that was participating in the protest, getting with an inch of his face and repeatedly shouting the N word at him. If the video had come out today, everyone would have assumed it was AI. Unfortunately, this was very real. I don't know how many times I watched it that morning. And every time I was more and more in disbelief as to what I was witnessing. While I had had only a couple of interactions with Les over the years, we had come to know Caroline. And her and Les had a young child maybe a year or two old. Calls for a boycott were immediate. As they should have been. But something more concerning was brewing.