Today, I came across a couple of articles by Lowri Turner. I had no idea who she was, and still have only a fuzzy notion - apparently she is a Z-List columnist who has been on the telly in one of those celebrity reality gawk shows, and made a fair few quid flogging her wedding to the glossies, and generally she just doesn’t fill your heart with a quiet respectful smile.
In these articles (Guardian and Daily Mail, practically identical sentiments expressed) she wrote about her feelings on being a single mother with a mixed race baby. She is white, her two sons by her first marriage are white, and the new baby is half Indian. She states openly and repeatedly that she loves her baby and I believe her. She also talks about her complicated feelings on the subject of her daughter’s race. In theory she is a white liberal who knows that racism is wrong. In practice she has to a greater or lesser extent the same racist modes of thought that we all do, by dint of living and growing up under white supremacist patriarchy.
The difference between Turner and the rest of us is that she has had to confront those painful, uncomfortable truths as she looks at her own beloved, precious daughter. The difference is that she has to KNOW that she finds her daughter’s darkness strange. She has to CONFRONT that she finds it strange that her sons hardly seem to notice the difference that strikes her every time she sees her baby. She has to acknowledge and actually THINK about her fears for her family: that she worries about her daughter’s future in a racist and sexist world, that she worries about how racist and sexist society will perceive her and her multi-coloured family - a single mother with children of undeniably different fathers, one of them not even white.
Turner has been roundly slapped with the label “racist”. Her racism, directed at her own innocent new daughter, has struck many as particularly vile. People say that this woman, whatever she may feel inside, must not say such things lest her daughter in years to come will read them and realise that her mother does not love her at all.
The Daily Mail comments and these blog posts (one, two, three, four) and comments thereon are all good examples.
Yes, Turner is racist. Her reactions to her daughter prove that. She as good as admits it. But we are all racist, and - for what this is worth - it does take enormous courage for a white liberal to recognise that in themselves and to admit to it. It takes great courage to stand up and say - I married a person of colour, but that doesn’t mean I’m not racist. That doesn’t give me a free pass. I still need to examine myself and to think and to confront the nasty things I find. The parallel with “feminist” men struggling to recognise and challenge their own sexism needs no elaboration.
Yes, Turner doesn’t strike me as the kind of person I actually want to champion - what little I know of her (which may be unfairly skewed) leads me to suspect that she is pretty much taken up with the cult of celebrity, and that automatically makes her - in my book - someone I probably can’t respect. And she certainly says some dumb things about how she feels that her baby cannot possibly look like her just because they have different colouring, or about how anyone who dates or marries a person of a different race is making a political statement.
But then what? Someone, albeit someone we don’t respect much, has stood up and honestly talked publicly (as a columnist, that is after all her job) about racism - she has analysed her own feelings, examined painfully her owned weaknesses, questioned her own hitherto unsuspected racism.
And what are we saying? That she should STFU? That this should Not Be Spoken Of? That she is a Bad Mother if she seeks to start a public conversation about our latent racism, just because her own confrontation with her own latent racism happened in the context of her reactions to her own mixed race baby?
Should we also STFU about post-natal depression or about the difficulties some of us have in bonding with our babies? Should we also STFU about discipline problems, about our “unmanageable” children, or about how we are tearing our hair out trying to cope against all odds because they JUST KEEP WHINING?
Should we just pretend that being of mixed heritage is the complete non-issue that it should be, when it isn’t? Should we pretend that just knowing and believing that racism is wrong and harmful automatically makes us “colour-blind”, when it doesn’t? Should we pretend that by Not Talking About It, the elephant in the room will simply fade away - when it won’t?
Let’s not. OK?
Let’s not pretend.
Let’s not be afraid of our own truth.
Let’s talk about it.
Let’s learn from it.
Let’s grow up.
14 August 2007 at 9:59 pm
“about how we are tearing our hair out trying to cope against all odds because they JUST KEEP WHINING”
I am thinking you may have got some inspiration from a certain ‘bad mum’ who had a meltdown on Friday morning at the big green?
14 August 2007 at 10:49 pm
People say that this woman, whatever she may feel inside, must not say such things lest her daughter in years to come will read them and realise that her mother does not love her at all.
As one of the bloggers you have linked to, I can say you’ve got it wrong. Freedom of speech is a concept that is often hijacked for ulterior purposes nowadays, but I’m firmly of the “give ‘em enough rope” persuasion: Turner is, naturally, quite free to express her feelings on any topic. But when she, or you, or I, do so in the public domain, we also lay ourselves open to criticism.
She has not just “said” anything: she has let her feelings be known in exchange for money from two national newspapers. You agree that she is racist, and I agree that confronting one’s own racism is to be welcomed, although I am less inclined to accept that that is what went on here. If Turner were really interested in doing so, and with her daughter’s best interests at heart, there are better ways of doing it than in the pages of the Guardian and the Mail.
15 August 2007 at 8:05 pm
Johnbrissenden -
Firstly, I didn’t say that Turner is not open to criticism both for what she has said, and for the fact that she said it. Indeed, you did criticise both, and I don’t say that you had no right to do that. I only say that the various and almost universal criticisms made of her, and of her choice to write publicly on this subject, struck me as unfair and even in some cases slightly hysterical.
Secondly, you say that you are not inclined to accept that what went on in these articles was Turner’s confrontation with her own racism. Personally, I don’t see what other reading you can make of these articles. Turner expressly talks about racism, about her feelings of strangeness at having a brown daughter, and she expressly questions and challenges her own reactions which she calls “shallow” and so on. If this is in good faith - and what reason do we have to suppose otherwise, other than the fact that Turner gets paid to write? - then it is *precisely* an article in which she explores and painfully recognises her own racism.
Finally, I don’t see why the fact that this all happens in the context of Turner’s feelings about her daughter mean she should not deal with the issues in the pages of the Guardian or the Mail - in other words, that she should not write about them in public (for money or otherwise).
It is a reason to be careful, and to make sure that you have considered what your baby daughter might think of it all when she grows up. (Who says she didn’t do that?) But it is not a reason to be silent, or to whisper the truth only in secret. We women are told too often that we must not or ought not to speak our truth. Too often, and too freely.
It is not a new thing for us to be told that writing about our experiences of motherhood - especially if questioning the myth that motherhood is one big fluffy ball of unseasoned love, joy and pleasure - is bad because it will damage our children in later years. It is not a new thing for us to be told that we are bad mothers if we have thoughts or feelings inconsistent with the myth, and to be shamed for admitting those thoughts and feelings publicly.
And that is why, when any woman is shamed or vilified or called names for speaking her truth - even when that truth is painful and difficult and controversial and challenging - it is a silencing that must not stand.
15 August 2007 at 8:07 pm
Hey Erika - No, the inspiration was closer to home!
But if the cap fits…
16 August 2007 at 12:09 am
I think the issue of public versus private discussion is more complex than you suggest. Many people, for example, choose to blog anonymously - I note that you yourself do so. That in itself is a form of self-censorship, is it not? Yet there are many reasons why people, especially women, make that choice, which I fully understand. I used to myself, until I realised that Google’s algorithms were no respecter of such anonymity unless rigorously enforced. As it is, I long ago decided not to write about people I know personally, particularly but not exclusively my children, in deference to their feelings. I appreciate that patriarchy puts such self-censorship in sharp relief, but I would maintain that patriarchy alone is not the only factor.
16 August 2007 at 6:43 pm
Well there’s a difference between “private” and “public but anonymous” which is probably bigger than the difference between whether public speech is anonymous or not.
Either way, I don’t think there’s any basis for criticising a person’s decision to write publicly (or not) or anonymously (or not) just because the topic is personal and/or is about someone that the writer knows personally - especially where as here the topic is one of wider public interest and Turner could reach a wider audience by writing as she did than if she were some anonymous blogger like me. I accept that the situation requires sensitivity, but I don’t have any reason for thinking that Turner was insensitive or that she will not sensitively discuss these issues with her daughter in years to come.
Moreover, I don’t think there is any reasonable analogy between self-censorship (as when you choose not to write publicly about your friends and family) and silencing behaviour towards others (as when you shame and vilify a person for choosing to write publicly about theirs). The one is a personal decision for yourself. The other amounts to policing what others may ethically choose for themselves. Self-censorship is not the same as telling another person they should STFU. Self-censorship is not by any means the same as silencing another person.
Oh, and in case this needs to be explained, by “silencing” I don’t mean that Turner’s critics physically stopped her from being published. I mean that the virulent reaction against her articles is behaviour aimed at or having the effect of stopping or discouraging her or others like her from expressing her thoughts on this subject (or at all) in the future. If you think a person shamed and vilified for speaking on a particular topic might think twice before doing it again, then you know what I mean. If you think a person who sees another shamed and vilified for speaking on a particular topic might think twice before discussing that topic herself, then you know what I mean.
And, for the record, this is not about giving a white woman priority over a brown baby. It is about allowing a white woman the space to talk about her brown baby. In the interests, I might add, of exploring latent racism. Who suffers? I don’t see any real disadvantage to the baby. If I were a grownup brown baby reading something like this written by my white mother - if I were a grownup girl baby reading something like this written by my father who wanted boys and is trying to recognise the sexism he might unwittingly have in him - I’m pretty sure that I would not be hurt by it. Especially not if my loving parent were honest enough to discuss these kinds of issues with me as I was growing up.
So what is it all about? Are we really trying to protect children from harm? What harm? When I ask myself, what is it all about? - the only harm I see is the harm caused by pouring vitriol upon a woman simply for having the audacity to write publicly - for money! - about something sharp and personal.
21 August 2007 at 2:25 pm
You said……..Someone, albeit someone we don’t respect much, has stood up and honestly talked publicly (as a columnist, that is after all her job) about racism - she has analysed her own feelings, examined painfully her owned weaknesses, questioned her own hitherto unsuspected racism……..
Repeated readings of both articles written by Turner do not reveal an honest analysis of her feelings toward the baby. Both articles appear glib, faceaetious and contradiction-filled. They give the strong impression that they were dashed off as soon as the concept occurred to little Lowri, without the honest analysis you attribute to her. Her article (with all the particularly crass things she says, that you yourself have noted!) reveals her to be a dreadfully shallow, status-obsessed, snobby, class-ridden, pink-frilly gender-role teaching, thoughtless racist.
The only honest part is her written, implied (never ’stated’
admission of racism.
Re your point that our comments are ’silencing’ - Lowri has not been, and neither should she be, silenced. As a fully grown, media-savvy, professional writer she is an established part of that tough, hard-nosed coterie of female columnists who continualy serve up the fabric of their daily lives for Daily Mail reader consumption (and cold hard cash). Believe me, she wrote her piece, she got paid for it and she moved on to the next ‘controversial’, ’sensational’, article and cheque. Save your sympathy for more deserving cases; you couldn’t silence Lowri if you tried! And as a professional, she should be more than capable of weathering the criticism.
In any event, when you put yourself out there and state your position as she has done (particularly with the total freedom to comment in our brave new ‘Wild West’ internet environment)
it would be credulously naive not to expect others to do the same in their responses. And like I said, she is a hard-nosed professional of years standing. She can take it. And she should - that is what being a writer is all about.
If you say stupid things, be prepared for others to pick you up on it! If you say ugly things, people will point it out, and if you imply racist feelings toward your baby (as follows):-
['I am shocked'; she seems so alien'; 'can't shake off feelings of unease'; 'didn't realise her looking different would matter so much - know it shouldn't, but it does'; 'frightened of my reactions to her'; mastering pakoras and serving them in a sari'; 'I find myself examining my daughter for signs that her skin is becoming a deeper shade of brown and being perturbed if I find them'; (and my own personal favourite - the most ignorant of the ignorant, the crassest of the crass) - 'People say my daughter has my eyes or my mouth, but I know they are just trying to be kind']
then people will point out (quite correctly) the inappropriateness of the self-stated opinion.
In posting this comment I find myself struggling to ignore all the other divisive, throw-away unpleasantries (’Tracy-Towerblock’ Colours of Benetton’ Wayenetta Slob’
and am trying not to go into why, in this day and age, she panders to the idea that having children by more than one father is a stigma; why would anyone even care?!
As you are a feminist, (and therefore someone whom I am hoping has socially intelligent attitudes and mores) you may be ‘amused’ to know that she has written equally ignorant, ill-thought through drivel about her gay friends. And that her ‘black baby’ article has been taken up by various neo-nazi websites such as American Patriot and Nationalist Dissident Voice . And you describe her as a white liberal?! How on earth do liberal viewpoints end up on far right websites?! By the way, her views on the dreadful ‘Wright Stuff’ TV show are anything but.
So, Lowri has written all about her feelings and opinions and I have written mine. Discourse has been served.
Just one more thing; good and responsible parents protect their children from mental, physical and emotional damage. I really hope there is someone out there who will protect this mixed race baby from Lowri.
21 August 2007 at 7:24 pm
Hello Spymum,
Thank you for this.
Your criticism of Lowri is strong but honest and factual: I like that. Specifically, I like that it is directed at what Lowri actually said, and how that stacks up with other things she has said. It is not like the “criticism” I was primarily complaining about, which was hysterical or hateful or shaming. I don’t agree with all you say, as is probably obvious - although I certainly take on board some of your points - but the issue for me is also how the discourse is being conducted and in that regard I thank you for doing it properly.
Finally, although I don’t want to rehearse all the issues again in yet another overlong comment, I am finding it hard not to respond to your last paragraph.
The suggestion that Turner is a bad mother whose children need to be protected from harm troubles me. OK, she does seem to have a number of ignorant and/or illiberal views, as many parents do. And although she has taken the first step, she still has a journey ahead of her if she is going to come to terms with the unease she feels about mothering a brown baby, as many white parents of brown babies do.
But. I just don’t like to see a woman (even a hardnosed professional who can take it) subject to this kind of very personal attack on such limited grounds. So she isn’t the perfect parent. But then, who is? I’m not. And which one of us is ready to have “someone out there” come and protect our children from being damaged by our flawed parenting? I’m not. Because while I am not perfect and while I know I will make mistakes, I also know that nobody else out there has any better qualification for this very hard job than I do, whereas I have the ultimate qualification - I am her mother, and nobody loves her or knows her or cares about her like I do.
Best wishes and thank you again.
22 August 2007 at 11:27 am
Ah now Maia, you’re more than welcome!
But the main reason that Lowri Turner’s two articles provoked such a massive and shocked response is that mothers (and fathers too) almost never feel unease at parenting their mixed race baby. As you rightly note, many parents have ignorant and illiberal views, (something I see at the school gates almost every day) but Lowri’s self-stated one is a real doozer.
We have all read the poignant stories of ‘Forties and ‘Fifties British women forced to give up their brown GI babies by the social climate and racism of the time. The one thing that sticks in my mind is how desperately they wanted to keep these black kids, and how colour mattered to everyone else but the mother.
On almost any topic related to parenting I would wholeheartedly agree with your last paragraph; Lord knows I am a dreadfully flawed mother sometimes myself (remembering yesterday’s row with son over sloppy homework with deep regret!). But I cannot agree with regard to Lowri’s racist attitudes towards her much longed-for daughter.
Racism is everywhere, a nasty, pervasive, slimy vice. But everyone who has commented on Lowri believes is that the one place you shouldn’t find it is at your mothers breast (and in your fathers arms). I didn’t. Despite the very, very active racism of my grandparents.
If this is how Turner really feels that baby is going to need a lot of support. Let’s hope Turner gets some too.
22 August 2007 at 7:26 pm
I wish I could believe that white parents only rarely feel unease about parenting a mixed race child. But it’s just not my experience. I’m not saying that such parents do not love or want their children as much or care for them as well - I’m saying the opposite, fervently. *But* even so they will (depending I guess on their own background) almost inevitably face issues or questions that all-white families do not have to deal with.
Personally, I’ve got a list as long as your arm - but I won’t write about them publicly because I’ve seen where that gets you.
23 August 2007 at 7:28 pm
Hey Maia and Spymum, I don’t have anything very illuminating to add - I’ve already expressed myself on my own blog and over at John Brissenden’s: I don’t think I was hateful or hysterical in any of my responses, it is not my nature to be so. Of course racism exists, one would be hopelessly naive to say otherwise, but Spymum hits the nail on the head when she says the last place you would expect to find it is in a mother of a mixed race child. I think that’s what truly shocked people. I personally have never come across such a point of view, until Lowri Turner’s. I believe that having racist feelings towards your own child is very different from feeling uneasy about what that child may face in the real world.