Speaker 1: Hey, fam, I'm Jada Pinkett Smith and this is the
Speaker 1: Red Table Pop podcast all your favorite episodes from the
Speaker 1: Facebook Watch show in audio produced by Westbrook Audio and
Speaker 1: I Heart Radio. Please don't forget to rate and review
Speaker 1: on Apple podcasts on this Red Table Talk. Sometimes we
Speaker 1: see white people who adopting black children is trying to
Speaker 1: be white saviors, and I get why there's not trust.
Speaker 1: Why would your community trust my community with the babies.
Speaker 1: We're breaking down a controversial topic, should white people adopt
Speaker 1: black children? I don't know how every person of color
Speaker 1: has gotten through this. I don't understand. Best known for
Speaker 1: her role as Charlotte on Sex in the City, Kristin
Speaker 1: Davis is a single mom raising two adopted black children.
Speaker 1: So this is gonna be interesting today because I have
Speaker 1: to admit that, you know, I have certain feelings about
Speaker 1: this whole interracial adoption because I think it's really really
Speaker 1: hard raising black children today. Yeah, because it's so sensitive,
Speaker 1: But I think we also have a lot of misunderstandings
Speaker 1: about it. But I'm so glad that Kristen is here
Speaker 1: with us today to just want to share about Yeah,
Speaker 1: they're just cleaning up some of the misunderstandings that we
Speaker 1: have and just to educate us about the process and um,
Speaker 1: what her experiences have been. So I do know love
Speaker 1: is not enough. But here's the one thing I do know.
Speaker 1: We we know this in our own family, right. It's
Speaker 1: not that Black families don't adopt, because we do adopt.
Speaker 1: It's that we don't go through the legal system. We've
Speaker 1: have family members that have had to raise grandchildren five
Speaker 1: at a time. You know, I've taken on right kids.
Speaker 1: I could have taken on more and people that you
Speaker 1: were brought into your home and raised, but you haven't,
Speaker 1: like legally adopted. But that's what that's what people color do.
Speaker 1: We take other people's kids and raise them within our
Speaker 1: extended families, went through the system. Hello RTT family. Today
Speaker 1: we are talking about interracial adoption UM, specifically white families
Speaker 1: that adopt black children. And we have a very special
Speaker 1: guest here Today's Christian Days and she is going to
Speaker 1: talk to us about her journey with adopting her two
Speaker 1: beautiful black children. Thank you so much for being thank
Speaker 1: you for having me. Yeah, this has been a topic, UM,
Speaker 1: really a topic that I've had a lot of questions
Speaker 1: about for me. Yeah, forgave me, and I understand it's
Speaker 1: a hot button. It's something that people have really strong,
Speaker 1: strong feelings about. And obviously I have strong feelings because
Speaker 1: I love my children so much and they've been such
Speaker 1: a gift to me. But because my children are African American,
Speaker 1: I feel like it is my duty and my job
Speaker 1: to do as much research, as much work, built as
Speaker 1: many bridges as possible, because you are their community, and
Speaker 1: that is key, and that is so important. So I
Speaker 1: work at that every day, trying to figure out how
Speaker 1: I can make sure they have access to the black community,
Speaker 1: that they're part of it, that they're not separated from it,
Speaker 1: because we don't want to make it so that they
Speaker 1: don't fit into the black community and they don't fit
Speaker 1: into the white community. Sometimes we see white people who
Speaker 1: adopting black children is trying to be white saviors. You know,
Speaker 1: I do feel like the white savior thing is a
Speaker 1: problem and it's real. So I don't want to say,
Speaker 1: you know that that's just a myth um. It's not
Speaker 1: really what I come across so much. You know, I
Speaker 1: do think too, it's it's tough because are you saying
Speaker 1: then okay, well, don't try to do anything good because
Speaker 1: your skin is white, because that's not going to work out.
Speaker 1: We can't ever succeed without the black community embracing our children.
Speaker 1: You don't have to embrace me. It's okay, I'll be okay,
Speaker 1: my feelings will be okay, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: But I want my children to be able, you know,
Speaker 1: to come to you, and I don't want them to
Speaker 1: be excluded just because I'm their mother. We definitely have
Speaker 1: work in that area, you know, we we just have.
Speaker 1: It's just a historical thing. It's just, you know. And
Speaker 1: so look, I get why there's not trust. I get it.
Speaker 1: I get it deep in my bones why there's not trust.
Speaker 1: And why would your community trust my community with its babies.
Speaker 1: I understand that I wouldn't either. What made you decide
Speaker 1: to adopt? But I had already thought about it, and
Speaker 1: I don't know why, and I don't know how, but
Speaker 1: it had seemed like an option for me for a
Speaker 1: very long time. I had friends who had adopted and
Speaker 1: wanted to adopt, and so I was kind of hearing
Speaker 1: about it, learning about it and realizing that it is
Speaker 1: quite complex, and as it happens with many of us,
Speaker 1: the time was ticking, and I wasn't really thinking about it.
Speaker 1: I was working, and so when it was really it started,
Speaker 1: i'd say thirty eight, which is, you know, a little late,
Speaker 1: but I really was like, wow, I feel I feel
Speaker 1: deeply that I need to be a mother. I feel
Speaker 1: like I will feel incomplete if I don't have that
Speaker 1: experience right. One of my big issues was could I
Speaker 1: do it by myself? Because once I realized that I
Speaker 1: wasn't in a relationship that was necessarily that type of
Speaker 1: relationship or the relationship couldn't take that, I thought, gosh,
Speaker 1: I'm really scared. But I still felt like there was
Speaker 1: a child out there that I needed to find that
Speaker 1: was my child. I can't explain it. It was a
Speaker 1: spiritual kind of thing. And I think that what happens
Speaker 1: is by the time you get on the road to adoption,
Speaker 1: it is a long road. It's not an easy road.
Speaker 1: The biggest conception is that there's some kind of like
Speaker 1: I like a black child, like that handbag over there.
Speaker 1: It's very, very very far from that um in terms
Speaker 1: of the process, in terms of what you go through
Speaker 1: for that to happen. So this is an example of
Speaker 1: a questionnaire that adopting parents have to answer to actually
Speaker 1: qualify to adopt. And it's pretty I mean pretty in depth.
Speaker 1: It isn't depth. I think people assume that you know,
Speaker 1: you choose a child. You like, when I look at
Speaker 1: this this document and you know the kinds of questions
Speaker 1: that it asks you, like would you be willing to
Speaker 1: adopt a trial that might have significant physical disabilities or
Speaker 1: mild mental health or a child who might have had
Speaker 1: a parent that was addicted to cocaine? And like it
Speaker 1: really is like a self exploration of who you are,
Speaker 1: because really it's deep because you think, hey, listen, I'll
Speaker 1: love any child, right, and then it has here all
Speaker 1: the different ethnicities everything, everything that's right, right, that's right.
Speaker 1: So when you decided to adopt, did you say you
Speaker 1: wanted to adopt African American children? Or did you just
Speaker 1: say I would take any child that needs love? That
Speaker 1: was a little a little thrown off by that paper, right?
Speaker 1: I felt like if you don't mark those boxes, like
Speaker 1: like why would I exclude Like if the if the
Speaker 1: right child is going to come to me, why would
Speaker 1: I say no to this or no to that or
Speaker 1: no to this? God Like, it just seems strange to me.
Speaker 1: It seemed to be saying no, no, no, no, no,
Speaker 1: got it. Do you know That's that's what it seemed
Speaker 1: to me at the time, got it? That's my thing.
Speaker 1: That's kind of my fear. I felt like people are
Speaker 1: so anxious and so desperate wanting a child right that
Speaker 1: they'll say anything right, and they don't really understand right, um,
Speaker 1: everything that would be involved, Like yeah, let me just say,
Speaker 1: oh yeah, I'll take that. But I of course understand
Speaker 1: what you're saying. It's it's a long and involved road.
Speaker 1: And I think even just to get on that road,
Speaker 1: you've already done a lot of soul searching. And then
Speaker 1: when they do show you that paper, you are like, whoa,
Speaker 1: oh did you have to go through like an interview process?
Speaker 1: You have a homesteady process, so social worker comes to
Speaker 1: your house and interviews you at length for days and
Speaker 1: days and days. I was super nervous about that the
Speaker 1: first time. I was like cleaning and scrubbing, and you know,
Speaker 1: you're just very scared, like they're gonna judge you on
Speaker 1: the cleanliness of your house, which is not what they're judging,
Speaker 1: of course, but they want to ask you have you
Speaker 1: thought about if you adopt an African American child, How
Speaker 1: will you include that child's culture in your lives? What
Speaker 1: will you do? And you're like, oh my gosh, I
Speaker 1: gotta think about this. And then they'll say, well, what
Speaker 1: if it was an Asian child, what would you do?
Speaker 1: Because I hadn't marked, you know, I had not you know, yeah,
Speaker 1: I was like, the child would come to me that
Speaker 1: I'm supposed to have. So the social workers during your
Speaker 1: home study, which is about like do you own any
Speaker 1: dangerous animals? You know? Blah blah blah, all of those things.
Speaker 1: You have a pool, you know, and then also asking
Speaker 1: you a lot of questions, asking you all about your
Speaker 1: parents and how you were raised, making you sign something
Speaker 1: that you will never use physical punishment. Wow. Yes, Maybe
Speaker 1: they might say to you, we don't think that you're
Speaker 1: suited to be adopting a black child. They might say
Speaker 1: that you know a good lawyer, would I think? Or
Speaker 1: maybe your social worker might write down on the paper
Speaker 1: this person has no plans to include the culture. I
Speaker 1: don't think she should adopt a black child or a
Speaker 1: Latino child. That could happen for sure. So then your
Speaker 1: agency says, okay, now you need to do your education piece.
Speaker 1: You need x hours, I feel like it's sixty or fifty,
Speaker 1: and you get a list of all these online courses
Speaker 1: that you can take. So when you signed up for
Speaker 1: the course to raise an African American Child, what did
Speaker 1: that course look like like? What was some of the
Speaker 1: information the course gave you? There were a lot of courses.
Speaker 1: One was just about hair. Yes, yes, because people panic,
Speaker 1: people panic lessons. Okay. I was like, you know, it's
Speaker 1: a big thing. I still learning. I'm still learning, okay
Speaker 1: to learn, I'm hit it. Well, what I learned is
Speaker 1: that it's a big thing and it has a whole
Speaker 1: long cultural history to it, and you absolutely need to
Speaker 1: learn because it's a bonding situation and you can't just
Speaker 1: like send her off somewhere, him off, you know, to
Speaker 1: have his hair twisted, breaded or whatever that you need
Speaker 1: to just like you would your own child to birth,
Speaker 1: to learn what is best for their skin, in their hair,
Speaker 1: and that if you don't, you will be judged harshly basically. Okay,
Speaker 1: So what happened now? Did I come about that your
Speaker 1: daughter became the child that was available for adoptions? We weren't.
Speaker 1: I was chosen. I say we because I think of
Speaker 1: me and her being together. Of course I was chosen
Speaker 1: by her birth mom. You know they have choice, Yeah,
Speaker 1: they have no Okay, Okay, her more birth mother chose you.
Speaker 1: The birth mothers picked the adoptive parents. Wow, Okay, let
Speaker 1: me say this before we continue. I also want to
Speaker 1: acknowledge the birth mothers, who I feel do not get
Speaker 1: acknowledged enough, because no birth mother does this for like
Speaker 1: a casual reason. It comes from a tragedy or or
Speaker 1: a situation that is a negative situation, and it is
Speaker 1: a sacrifice of gargantuan level that they make have now
Speaker 1: met through the course of my process, many birth mombs
Speaker 1: and different situations led them depict from different perspectives, like
Speaker 1: somewhere just worried about safety. So we're just worried about
Speaker 1: having a really strong father figure because they hadn't had
Speaker 1: when kind of trying to fulfill different you know, different elements.
Speaker 1: It is difficult. But I never ever want to say
Speaker 1: that people shouldn't adopt. I just want to say, you
Speaker 1: need to be always digging into what's hard. How has
Speaker 1: raising black children made you more aware of white privilege?
Speaker 1: This is what I want to say from a white
Speaker 1: person adopting you absolutely do not fully understand. There's no doubt.
Speaker 1: There's no doubt. There's no way you could because you
Speaker 1: could understand that you live in white privilege and that's
Speaker 1: the theory, and you could see things. But it's one
Speaker 1: thing to be watching it, you know, happening to other people,
Speaker 1: and it's enough other thing when it's your child and
Speaker 1: you haven't personally been through it. It is it's a
Speaker 1: it's a big issue. It's something that I think about
Speaker 1: every day and every night. That is very interesting, okay,
Speaker 1: because it's when you're looking at situations, specifically racism happening
Speaker 1: on the outside. But then now you have this child
Speaker 1: who was your ole, she's your treasure, and now you
Speaker 1: have to confront prejudices, biases, racism in a hole different way.
Speaker 1: What have you experienced? Well, it was terrified, right, you know,
Speaker 1: I'm still having it. It's hard to it's it's hard
Speaker 1: to put into words, really. I mean, there's been so many,
Speaker 1: so many things over the years. Jem seven now. But
Speaker 1: the first couple of things that happened when she was
Speaker 1: a baby and I'd be holding her in my arms,
Speaker 1: people would say to me, won't she be a great
Speaker 1: basketball player? Wow? And I would just have to be like, right,
Speaker 1: this is a baby. Wow, how could you say that
Speaker 1: without just being mortified? Mortified? Oh, that was when it began.
Speaker 1: And I would just you know, I'd be holding the
Speaker 1: baby and I'd be trying to be polite, but I'd
Speaker 1: just be like, this is really deep and bad and
Speaker 1: how dare they limit my child? And how dare they
Speaker 1: make that assumption? And how dare they not even know?
Speaker 1: Like how could they just say it like that, like
Speaker 1: so casual? I was like, what have people been dealing with?
Speaker 1: This is just crazy? Like that was the beginning of
Speaker 1: how I still feel basically it. So then I was like,
Speaker 1: oh God, please don't let this be everybody. But you know,
Speaker 1: as we know, our country is built on this. It
Speaker 1: is institutionalized, and that's what you really come to realize
Speaker 1: as time goes on. The next really big, you know,
Speaker 1: super turning point for me was we had been going
Speaker 1: to this group where Gemma was the only African American
Speaker 1: really fully dark black child, and there were swings, right,
Speaker 1: and there was you're supposed to wait your turn, right,
Speaker 1: And so I'd be with Gemma, and my Gemma is
Speaker 1: like the sweetest soul, right, and she'd be waiting. I'd
Speaker 1: be sitting with her. Time would be passing. These kids
Speaker 1: would be swinging. This one girl in particular would stop swinging.
Speaker 1: She would hold the swing. She would call to another
Speaker 1: white girl across the yard and say, I'm holding this
Speaker 1: wing for you. Gemma would just sit there so quietly,
Speaker 1: and I'd be like, I can't swear right, Like what
Speaker 1: I'd be like, hello, Like what my child is sitting here? People,
Speaker 1: Gemma sitting here, and she's sitting here so patiently, and
Speaker 1: she's following the rules so beautifully, yet she is still
Speaker 1: being excluded, like over and over and over by this
Speaker 1: particular group of girls who are white. And it's a problem.
Speaker 1: So finally I go in to the office. I'm just like,
Speaker 1: you know, Steve, and was coming out my head, I
Speaker 1: don't understand why you're not stepping in. And they said, well,
Speaker 1: you know, you don't know what those other girls are thinking.
Speaker 1: And I was like, yeah, I don't know, and I
Speaker 1: don't care. I don't care. What do I care about
Speaker 1: my child? You don't know what my child is thinking.
Speaker 1: My child is probably thinking it's because she looks different.
Speaker 1: Right then they said, you know, we just see them
Speaker 1: all the same. We don't see color here. Mmmmm, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's a classic one. It's such a classic thrown in
Speaker 1: my face, yeah, because I actually think that when people
Speaker 1: say that that they're being liberal. Yes, and that's the
Speaker 1: Actually it's such a harsh Yeah, it was a very harsh,
Speaker 1: harsh moment of understanding understanding. I don't know how every
Speaker 1: person of color has gotten through this. I don't understand
Speaker 1: how you could take this every day every day, right
Speaker 1: because mind jo it happens um in situation that it
Speaker 1: doesn't have to be with a white parent, but just
Speaker 1: putting black children in those situations where they're in in
Speaker 1: all white environments, it's not Yeah, and that's what really,
Speaker 1: that's what it taught me. That that was the thing
Speaker 1: that it lit a fire under me where I couldn't
Speaker 1: like be relaxed or casual. But I will never be black,
Speaker 1: no matter how hard I tried, I will never be black.
Speaker 1: That is the truth and we have to accept it.
Speaker 1: And therefore I will never be able to say to Gemma,
Speaker 1: I understand how you feel, because this happened to me.
Speaker 1: That's what's painful and hard. It made me on a
Speaker 1: mission to find a place where she was exposed to everything.
Speaker 1: It made me on a mission to put her in
Speaker 1: situations where I was the only white person or maybe
Speaker 1: there was a white person. You know, she's with it
Speaker 1: like a close friend, Like she has really close girlfriends.
Speaker 1: And I amazing, amazing African American moms who have been
Speaker 1: I mean, like did they helped you? How? Those African
Speaker 1: American moms? I mean them, And I asked them stuff
Speaker 1: like what would you say in this situation or what
Speaker 1: would you do or what would you tell your child
Speaker 1: about this that's happening in the news, Like I just
Speaker 1: like to hear. Not everyone agrees, of course, everyone handles
Speaker 1: it differently, but like I just need to learn. I
Speaker 1: just need to learn because I can't trust all of
Speaker 1: my instincts because I want to protect no. I think
Speaker 1: that's great that you've put together a village of women
Speaker 1: that can actually be a lifeline for you, and they
Speaker 1: are so important. So I found a really fantastic inclusive school.
Speaker 1: So many cultures actual black kids, like you have to
Speaker 1: look hard in LA and you also need to find
Speaker 1: black teachers. That is so important. What are some of
Speaker 1: the questions that Jemma has asked you? Just looking at
Speaker 1: you and knowing that there's a huge difference in how
Speaker 1: you look and how she looks, like discussed from the
Speaker 1: get go. There were times when she was like like
Speaker 1: four or five and we'd go into a place and
Speaker 1: people would look and stare, and I don't know if
Speaker 1: she knows why they're staring or what she might think
Speaker 1: about why they're staring. So that was when I started
Speaker 1: to try to enter into you know, you're black and
Speaker 1: I'm white, and I mean look from the beginning, she'd
Speaker 1: be like, Mommy, my skin is dark. My skin is
Speaker 1: like chocolate and your skin is like vanilla. And I'd
Speaker 1: be like, yes, it is, and this is how people
Speaker 1: are born and melanine makes your skin dark. But also
Speaker 1: your past is that you have African American ancestors and
Speaker 1: they've been through so much. Like I try to make
Speaker 1: it positive where she's like to you, don't you start
Speaker 1: a baby? It's appropriate, right, But also at the same time,
Speaker 1: I have to prepare Gemma that the world is not
Speaker 1: fair and there are racists in the world, and it's
Speaker 1: just governenting to have to do that and know that
Speaker 1: you also adopted your it is also African American. How
Speaker 1: did that happen? What that happened. When Jim was five,
Speaker 1: she started asking for a brother. She said, my man,
Speaker 1: I could really love a black little brother. And I
Speaker 1: was like, I totally understand, baby. I said, you know what,
Speaker 1: I'll go talk to the people who helped me adopt you,
Speaker 1: and I'm going to see I I don't know, I
Speaker 1: don't know the state of things out there. I just
Speaker 1: told them that our hearts were open and our home
Speaker 1: was open, and if a baby needs us were here then.
Speaker 1: So then one day, there he was. And I tell you,
Speaker 1: my daughter didn't bad nye. She was like, there, he
Speaker 1: is so beautiful, and then she held him, then she
Speaker 1: fed him, and I mean she's just the best big sister.
Speaker 1: YEA say for me, I so worry for you. Yes,
Speaker 1: with trying to raise a black boy in America, I'm
Speaker 1: worried too. I mean, listen, every day, every day something
Speaker 1: new happens and I think about it. And I also
Speaker 1: have friends who have black sons, thank goodness, and I
Speaker 1: asked them so any questions. But he's still really young, right,
Speaker 1: He's still only a year, and so I guess you
Speaker 1: have time time every night, every night, I worry. I mean,
Speaker 1: I just but it comes up sooner than you think
Speaker 1: you have to be on the on the field right now. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you get you know. One of the things that I
Speaker 1: would ask you, because you raised since what did you
Speaker 1: say to them when they were little. I was telling
Speaker 1: Jaden when he was four or five six years old,
Speaker 1: no red, no blue. You're gonna know right now you
Speaker 1: live in l A. No red, no blue. And I
Speaker 1: was like, I've had too many incidents being in certain
Speaker 1: places with friends of mine who had on the wrong color.
Speaker 1: And we had to teach him early how to deal
Speaker 1: with being pulled over by the police. He and will
Speaker 1: tell me, tell me, tell me. Um. We started talking
Speaker 1: to our boys that young six six years old and
Speaker 1: even just um, being aware of your surroundings, you know,
Speaker 1: always be vigilant, you know, because things run up when
Speaker 1: you quick. And as they've gotten older, they've they've come
Speaker 1: across real world situations. Jade has run into situations with
Speaker 1: the police, has Willow. Willow has talked about being stopped
Speaker 1: by the police and being terrified. But just being where
Speaker 1: I was from, I like the fact that because of
Speaker 1: how I was raised and just the environments I was in,
Speaker 1: I was prepared and I just wanted my kids to
Speaker 1: be prepared. I just didn't want them to be caught
Speaker 1: up there. Yeah, trust me, it ain't easy, and we
Speaker 1: all do the best we can. And you know, I
Speaker 1: just love hearing just your passion and how um aware
Speaker 1: and sensitive. You know, you know what you know, and
Speaker 1: you're very open and talking about what you don't know.
Speaker 1: And that's constant to learn, sending you to learn and grow.
Speaker 1: And I have to. I don't want to miss something
Speaker 1: or I don't want to be um under the you know,
Speaker 1: crazy white privilege assumption that everything's going to be fine,
Speaker 1: because I can't make it fine. So we have to
Speaker 1: deal with reality and we have to compare them well.
Speaker 1: You know, I just want to say to you that, um,
Speaker 1: you know, I at one point had a very difficult time,
Speaker 1: you know, thinking of white families adopting black children. And
Speaker 1: I've gotten I've gotten an education over the years for
Speaker 1: many people that I know who have done it, and
Speaker 1: even sitting here with you today and getting even more
Speaker 1: of an education so much that we didn't understand or
Speaker 1: I definitely didn't understand that that process, right, you know,
Speaker 1: And you know, for me, one of the things that
Speaker 1: I had to discover about myself um and and some
Speaker 1: of my bias towards it was that I was actually
Speaker 1: my attitude towards it was actually perpetrating the very thing
Speaker 1: that I fight against, which is racism right and exclusion right,
Speaker 1: the idea of thinking that black children only deserve black love,
Speaker 1: you know, and that I really had to open my
Speaker 1: mind and understand that love is love and to say that, yes,
Speaker 1: it's challenging, but loving itself is challenging. We as black
Speaker 1: parents are challenged loving our black children, and white parents
Speaker 1: are challenged loving their white children. Everybody's challenging and just
Speaker 1: knowing how to love. This is an important conversation. I
Speaker 1: think it will educate people and give people a different perspective.
Speaker 1: I really really do. I just commend you now. I
Speaker 1: just really I appreciate you just coming here and talking
Speaker 1: to us about this. You know, it will be fun
Speaker 1: of your village, one of your lifeline. Thank you, Thank you, guys, appreciating. Okay,
Speaker 1: are you ready to Hey, everybody, we have Kristen Davis
Speaker 1: with us today. We are talking about transracial adoption. So
Speaker 1: swipe out, swipe You've got it. Smooth you guys. Hey,
Speaker 1: R T T family, Join our Red Table Talk group
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Speaker 1: Thanks for listening to this episode of Red Table Talk podcast,
Speaker 1: produced by Facebook Watch, Westbrook Audio, and I Heart Radio.