Brother Jim and Margaret at the Famous Stonewall (New York City) TavernTEACHING TOLERANCE

For years to come teachers in California will be seeing in classrooms and on playgrounds the results of often subtle and sometimes outrageous displays of intolerance leading up to the November 2008 election. For several days before the election, clusters of “Christian” zealots lined the corners of intersections and overpasses urging passersby to vote YES on Proposition 8. Alongside adult demonstrators were young people holding and waving yellow signs of intolerance. The young people were being carefully taught. They were learning the lesson of intolerance. The intolerance they were learning was undoubtedly being reinforced in their homes and in their churches. In sermons and lessons about God’s LOVE, many pastors had been sprinkling the idea that God HATES, that he hates homosexuality. Those preachers may insist that they are saying God hates homosexuality; but young people in their congregations are hearing that God hates homosexuals. On Sundays before the election, pastors were busy urging their congregations to believe that God is intolerant, so therefore they should be. Of course, the pastors weren’t using the familiar language, “GOD HATES FAGS,” but that is exactly the message many young people were hearing; and that is exactly what many of them will be saying on playgrounds.

So in a culture where messages of intolerance are taught and preached by people whom children are supposed to trust, how do you raise a tolerant child?

The important, deeper question is: Where does a kid learn prejudice? He doesn’t learn it in social studies class. He learns it first at home. He learns it when his parents say they are looking for an elementary school without so many Black and Latino kids. He learns it by hearing parents say he may not get into the college of his choice because the pool of Blacks and Latinos is so large. All of the intolerant, bigoted kids I encountered when I was a teacher were themselves suffering from feelings of inferiority and inadequacy. A teacher soon learns that the bully in the classroom is the one who hears at home that he is stupid, that he is a moron when he does something an adult doesn’t like. The bully doesn’t come from a nurturing, understanding home. The bully comes from a home where abusive language and aggressive violence are used by bigger people to control weaker people. It’s about power. At home the bully is controlled with verbal and physical aggression, and he is made to believe he has no power there. He is made to feel smaller and less powerful than others in the family. Outside the home he looks for power in a negative and anti-social way. He finds people whom he considers inferior, and he tries to make them feel smaller and less powerful than he is.

It’s not just the bully who grows up to become an intolerant adult. Sadly, even a child who is treated with kindness and understanding at home may be learning lessons of intolerance at church. The basic message of many churches is the old Jonathan Edwards idea that all people are “sinners in the hands of an angry god.” My advice to parents who find themselves and their children in an intolerant church: Hurry away from any environment that tells children they are worthless sinners in danger of hell fire and other torments arranged by a god who may or may not “save” them depending on whether or not they have learned the appropriate lessons and behaviors.

Enough about learning intolerance! How do you teach a child to be tolerant? Kids learn what they live. The day I completed my student teaching assignment at Gray Avenue School in Yuba City, California, my master teacher gave me a wonderful gift. It wasn’t a present in a box. It was a single sentence. She said, “Remember, Jerral, you teach what you are.”

So I pass the gift on to any parents who want their children to grow up to be tolerant adults. If you want to raise a tolerant child, set the right example. Express sadness at newspaper and television reports of individual or mob acts of intolerance in the community. At home and at school there is no substitute for direct discussion. Ask your child, “How do you feel about prejudice? How do you feel about people who make comments about other groups? Blacks, Asians, Latinos, Homosexuals, Jews? Talk about prejudice. Say it is thousands of years old. Talk about the damage it has done? Talk about racism. Define it. Talk about the Holocaust. Ask you child if he knows about the troubles between tribal groups in Central Africa. When a crime is committed because of bigotry, talk about it. Personalize the victim. Help your child see that the victim has a name and a family and feelings. If your child has misconceptions, try to straighten them out. Use events such as the election of Barack Obama to talk about the progress the country has made in the area of racism.

Avoid environments where intolerance may be learned. If it isn’t obvious that your child’s school environment or a church environment is teaching tolerance, be suspicious. Ask school leaders and church leaders how they feel about homosexuals. That is probably the quickest, simplest test. If you ask how they feel about an ethnic group, it may be easy for them to put on a tolerant false face; but if you ask how they they feel about homosexuals, you’re likely to see immediately if they are intolerant. If the response is not one of tolerance and acceptance, take your children away from that environment as quickly as possible.