Santa As "Educator"??
Shortly before Christmas in 1967, I volunteered to play "Santa" at a kindergarten on an Air Force Base in the Southwestern U.S. That State had not yet instituted kindergarten, and this one, attended by my son, had a volunteer staff. The teacher thought it was a good idea, and agreed. With his three-year-old sister in tow, I appeared as "Santa" in full costume. (His little sister appeared 25 years later in Venture magazine, depicting her role in a Silicon Valley start-up company).
The class was racially mixed, but mostly white. The white kids reacted most viscerally, from puzzlement, to belligerence. One shouted "you're not a "real" Santa! I asked him if he had seen a "real" Santa, or had ever heard of anyone seeing the "real" Santa. He said no. My response was, "there's a reason for that!"
I was prompted to do this because more than one white fellow officer had told me, one in tears, that they were at their wit's end trying to keep raw racism from invading their children and their homes; largely from playing with the other children; who came from all over this country. My children were racially taunted by white children on our block, some as young as 3 and 4 years of age.
Don't get me wrong, I have many and varied emotional reactions to the entire "Santa" phenomenon. I was normally sick from colds or flu following the Christmas event, caused from hiding outside in the cold, at night, doing Santa's work! I got to really resent the "Fat Guy" stealing all the credit for my hard work and thrift. That opened the door to my questioning the entire litany of white, male, super-heros used to keep white supremacy alive. Their mother disagreed, I might add.
Have a "thoughtful" holiday!
Stay Vigilant!
Copyright © 2012: Williams LLC
All Rights Reserved: Williams LLC
All Rights Reserved: Williams LLC
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