Rachel L. Swarns is a New York Times columnist. She is also, apparently, a black woman. I say “apparently,” because I had no reason to know this until yesterday, when in her column The Working Life, she shared with us “A Conversation About the Police a Mother Didn’t Want to Have.”<\/p>\n
I haven’t yet found the words to describe this column but know that everyone \u2212 especially anyone white who believes he understands \u2212 must read it. Of all the words written and said recently about the different worlds whites and people of color live in, Swarns’ essay is the best\u00a0\u2212 calm, rational, lambent, urgent, universally comprehensible.<\/p>\n
Gently, she brings us all into her life and into her profound concerns, simply by describing what it is to be the mother of a smart little boy whose skin is not white and who asked her some questions.<\/p>\n
She begins:<\/p>\n
We were driving to Whole Foods on a blustery evening last month when my 7-year-old son asked me the question: \u201cCan a police officer be arrested?\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n Of course, I told him, as I navigated through the slushy parking lot. I reminded him about the Revolutionary War and the founding of our nation. We talked about the courts and the law. In America, I assured him, no one \u2014 not the police, not even the president \u2014 is above the law.<\/em><\/p>\n Then my heart started pounding: Why was he asking? Had he heard the news somehow?<\/em><\/p>\n I had rushed to turn off the radio that morning before he sat down for his bowl of oatmeal. I had snatched up the newspapers so he wouldn\u2019t see the front-page headlines. I had done everything I could to keep him from hearing about Ferguson, Mo., but it hadn\u2019t been enough.<\/em><\/p>\n \u201cI heard a police officer killed a black man named Michael Brown,\u201d my son told me. \u201cWhy wasn\u2019t he arrested?\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n I turned off the car and we sat there for a moment in the sleet.<\/em><\/p>\n Read it: Shielding Children From Talk of Ferguson and Garner – NYTimes.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Rachel L. Swarns is a New York Times columnist. She is also, apparently, a black woman. I say “apparently,” because I had no reason to know this until yesterday, when in her column The Working Life, she shared with us … Continue reading