{"id":1335,"date":"2012-04-26T14:10:44","date_gmt":"2012-04-26T19:10:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/frenchrevolution\/?p=1335"},"modified":"2014-07-14T12:52:23","modified_gmt":"2014-07-14T17:52:23","slug":"i%e2%80%99m-a-white-republican-raising-a-black-child-deal-with-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/frenchrevolution\/2012\/04\/26\/i%e2%80%99m-a-white-republican-raising-a-black-child-deal-with-it\/","title":{"rendered":"I\u2019m a White Republican Raising a Black Child: Deal With It"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

My husband and I \u2013 and consequently, my children \u2013 live a little bit in the public eye.\u00a0 As a writer and memoirist, I\u2019ve chronicled funny and poignant stories from our family\u2019s lives in two books<\/a>, and as a conservative activist<\/a> I\u2019ve taken my children to various political events across the Southeast.\u00a0 In 2006 at the Southern Republican Leadership Conference in Memphis, a reporter for Newsweek interviewed my son and discovered he was skipping kindergarten for the conference.\u00a0 \u201cMitt Romney, however, is pro-education,\u201d I made sure to note. In 2008, my kids heard speeches by all of the GOP Presidential candidates \u2013 they were so young then, I had to distract them when the candidates talked about hot button cultural issues like abortion and gay rights.\u00a0 (We hadn\u2019t had those<\/em> talks yet.) \u00a0\u00a0Now, four years later, they\u2019re far more aware of the issues and are frequently the only school aged children at these conferences.<\/p>\n

(It\u2019s not that I necessarily want my kids to live and breathe politics, rather I simply would prefer to have them with me than with a babysitter.)<\/p>\n

\"The<\/a>
The first photo we have of our daughter (taken in her orphanage)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

This Presidential campaign cycle is very different for our family than the one in 2008.\u00a0 This time around, we have a four-year-old daughter we adopted from Ethiopia two years ago.\u00a0 Now that she\u2019s a part of our family, she too has been to political gatherings with a big bag of crayons and coloring books to get her through the speeches.\u00a0 For example here is her CSPAN debut when my husband won the Ronald Reagan Award at CPAC<\/a>, here she got to meet Gov. Romney<\/a>, and she\u2019s attended book signings with the Palins<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Because we\u2019ve had the audacity to appear in public with our family, we\u2019ve been getting hate mail from liberals who are deeply offended that a white family would raise a black child (the Huffington Post<\/em> posted a video of Naomi and me at CPAC and it generated more than 1,000 comments, many of them utterly vile). Usually, I laugh at baseless criticism and it inspires me to work even harder at artfully annoying my critics.\u00a0 But when I get accused of actually harming my daughter by daring to raise her, it infuriates me.\u00a0 See, for example, an excerpt from tonight\u2019s Facebook message:<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel so sorry for your little girl! She has a hard complex life ahead of her! She should not be raised by people who vote against her best interests.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(It was longer and much<\/em> more offensive.)<\/p>\n

What is that, dear reader?\u00a0 You don\u2019t understand how my family traveling to a poverty stricken African tribal area to take a starving, abandoned girl into our American family and loving her as fiercely and deeply as we love our biological children could be considered a bad thing?\u00a0 Well, see, you don\u2019t realize that my family is\u2026.\u00a0 how can I put this politely\u2026.\u00a0 Republican<\/em>.\u00a0 We are white conservatives, and the little girl we got from Africa is black.\u00a0 While most won\u2019t come out and say they wish we\u2019d left her in Africa to starve rather than be exposed to conservatism, I\u2019m not sure what other conclusion to draw.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
She now has two parents, a brother, and even a sister!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

As Christians, we believe we should take care of orphans<\/a>, to give fathers to the fatherless.\u00a0 We didn\u2019t adopt to save the world, or to politically clone ourselves, or to annoy Democrats.\u00a0 We did it because children need loving parents, a warm bed, and good food (and, yes, a Happy Meal counts).\u00a0 We did it because as a two-year-old she weighed only 14 pounds.\u00a0 (Of course, as is frequently the case with adoption, we got her thinking we were preserving her<\/em> life, we soon discovered that we\u2019re the ones who are blessed by her presence.)<\/p>\n

Are my husband and I Republicans?\u00a0 Yes. \u00a0And we also love our little black child.\u00a0 I\u2019m learning, for example, how to braid hair with colorful beads, I\u2019m learning which colors look good against her chocolate colored skin tone, and I\u2019ll teach her about her country of origin right after she learns her ABCs.<\/p>\n

But to all of you liberals who are concerned I\u2019m going to indoctrinate our children with conservative ideas?\u00a0 Rest assured I\u2019m doing everything within my power to make sure all three of our kids grow up in the party of Abraham Lincoln and Ronald Reagan.<\/p>\n

You can\u2019t limit or dictate her political options or her cultural values just because of her skin color, and your constant criticism shows that you are less concerned about the truly poor and more concerned about propagating your narrow and destructive \u00a0identity politics.<\/p>\n

So, yes, I\u2019m a white Christian conservative Republican raising a black child whom I love with my whole heart.<\/p>\n

Deal with it.<\/p>\n

UPDATE: \u00a0David\u2019s been reading my article, the comments, and the other online discussions it\u2019s spawned and has weighed in with his own thoughts. \u00a0Check out<\/p>\n

Race, Politics, and Adoption \u2014 Following Up<\/a>.<\/p>\n

A Poignant Moment for Me<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

The Joy of Pretty Things<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

A Military Wife\u2019s Letter to her Local Church<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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