45: I deeply regret not saying anything to her

I had forgotten about this story until this week. My brother started a relationship with a mixed race woman and the relationship was enthusiastically embraced by my whole family. My mother, in particular, was effusive about how lovely this woman was. And she is! We all love her. The part I had forgotten was this. When they got engaged, my mother said in the flow of telling us about the engagement, "I've said to D. [my brother] 'you might have a black baby'." That was it. It took my breath away and I was so shocked and confused that by the time I'd recovered my senses the conversation had moved on. Afterwards I played it over and over dozens of different responses I could have made, but I didn't make. Looking back, I deeply regret not saying anything to her. And that's the clincher isn't it? It's my white privilege that has allowed me to avoid this conversation ever since. And that's what so many of us white people do, we avoid the conversations because usually the context catches us off guard and we're not prepared. We don't have the language, the framing, the training to know what to say to challenge racism respectfully yet firmly. That needs to change. We need to, have to, find ways to challenge racism. It's not good enough to say, "but it's too hard". Racism makes us all less, white, black, brown. It doesn't matter. We all lose out. We have to break the silence. In writing this story out I'm making a commitment to change that now. It may have been 12 years ago, but I'm going to have a conversation with her to unpick that remark. She was born and grew up in colonial Africa and I think the 'colonisation of the mind' of cultural imperialism was instilled at a young age. I am going to ask her about the comment and I'm going to ask her what she was taught to believe about black people and white people. That part is not her fault, but it is her responsibility to deal with the unconscious racism. It won't be easy or comfortable but I am going to start at home and have that conversation with my mum.