I won't write about parenting without mentioning Palestine
On the erasure of Palestinians from parenting spaces
This morning, as I was driving back from an ultrasound, I listened to an interview with Feroze Sidhwa, an American trauma surgeon who regularly volunteers in Gaza (I’ve linked the show below). This sentence stuck with me: “At their core, nobody is in favour of blowing up children.”
After everything he has witnessed, it struck me that he still retains a sense of hope, a belief that most people fundamentally want the same things and those things don’t involve harming children. It seemed to me that what he was saying was that part of why we are allowing a genocide to happen before our eyes is that at some point, we convinced ourselves that some children are not in fact children, are not in fact human. At some point, we allowed ourselves to believe that we are not connected.
I recognise many of you didn’t sign up to this newsletter to hear me talk about Palestine, but I’m assuming you did hit subscribe to read my writing about children, young people, consent and unschooling.
And here’s the thing: we cannot separate Palestinian children from children as a whole. In fact, we must not.
When I write about children’s rights, I cannot write about only some children’s rights. When I write about parenting, I cannot write with only a select group of parents in mind. When I write about consent, I cannot speak only to those of us who are housed, fed and relatively safe. All of these topics connect all humans, and bind us to each other.
There is no way to really talk about being a mother, a carer, a parent, an educator, without also recognising the multiple ways these identities and verbs are expansive: they exist within you and me, and also every single human.
I cannot really discuss mothering without reaching for the extremes mothering is pushed to. I cannot really discuss childhood without mentioning the 5 year old in Gaza whose entire family was killed and who wished that they too, had died alongside them. I cannot write about carework without actually caring about the children in the most dire need: children who are intentionally being starved to death by the Israeli blockade of aid.
As a mother, a woman, an unschooler and a human, I want us all to connect to the part of us that knows that fundamentally, we are all one. I am not a particularly spiritual person, and I am not at all religious. And, I believe that in order to carry on as humans under systems rooted in power over, we have been forced and conditioned to actively sever ourselves from the inherent sense of humanity we all share, and that connects us to each other and to all living beings. We find ourselves torn between our existential need to survive our daily life, and our equally existential need to belong as humans among other humans, and as humans in connection to the earth. Oftentimes, those two things appear to be in opposition to one another.
If this is all too meta, what I mean is this: when we use the power we hold to dominate, coerce, extract and get our own way, we ultimately lose our humanity. This can happen at home with our children or partner, in the world with a friend or a stranger, in our work or in our roles representing institutions and systems, up until the moment we are in positions of huge power and choose to use that power to harm, kill, starve. It is all the same, just on a different scale.
It all begins in the same place: that moment when we realise we hold more power than someone else, and need to decide what to do with it.
I am not saying we all need to be vocal in the same way, because it isn’t actually safe for all of us. But I am saying that we can all be vocal in some ways. And so, because I am forever hopeful and forever refusing to wallow and accept this state of affairs as fate, I’m going to share some things below that I hope you can do.
(If you are sick of “what can you do” lists, feel free to skip this part! Scroll down for info on book club;))
If you are a parenting coach or writer, speak up. Say something. Don’t be afraid to make mistakes. Just say that killing civilians and starving children and traumatizing and displacing people is wrong. Just say that genocide is wrong.
Write to your representatives. I know many of us have been doing this since Day 1, and I know it’s disheartening. We need to carry on.
If you are able to give to organisations working on the ground, or to individuals in Gaza, please do. A significant chunk of what I earn on here goes towards these efforts. Some people/organisations I have donated to are the Palestinian Children’s Relief Fund (PCRF), Dahnoun mutual aid group, the Sameer project, El Elna Elak, and several gofundmes like Abla’s page and Kareem’s page, and
Educate yourself. It is never too late and I am always refining my knowledge and understanding. This a collection of films about Palestine. As far as books, I recommend The Hundred Years’ War on Palestine by Rashid Khalidi. Two of my favourite people who write about carework, mothering and how it is connected to the Palestinian struggle are
and . Watch Israelism. I have been watching the What is Politics? channel on Youtube for years and Daniel is making a series of long, super well-researched videos on the Israel-Palestine conflict that attempt to be rooted in historical facts (which as we know, are slippery things at times). I don’t agree with him on everything, but if you are someone who is confused and wants to know more of the history, and feels like social media is too polarising right now, his videos might help.But really, you don’t need to know anything at all to know that genocide is wrong. This morning, I listened to an interview with a trauma surgeon who is volunteering on the ground in Gaza. Scroll past the hosts’ chit chat to his interview on Pod Save the World (a mostly centrist podcast, but even they are now calling a genocide a genocide). It is a hard listen but necessary. Let it mobilise you to act.
Ok, I’ll get off my soapbox now.
I have info about ALU Book Club!
this is a perk for paid subscribers, but if you’re super keen and it’s not in your budget right now, please reach out.
It starts in June. We are reading bell hooks. We’re going to read two of her essays which you can find for free:
Revolutionary Parenting and Feminist Parenting
I have been meaning to re-read her book All about love, so if you feel like diving deeper you could too! And I might take the opportunity to look into her other books. If you want to join but didn’t get to read, thats okay too.
Week of June 16: I will make a post/thread sharing some of my thoughts and we can chat in comments
Week of June 22: zoom call!
Please pick your preferred time in the poll below, if you plan to attend:
If you answered that these times don’t work, could you please comment below with your timezone and what could feasibly work? :)
I’m still wondering whether to make a set time and stick to it every month, or do a poll.
Thank you for being here, and for being willing to read my writing even if it might sometimes feel challenging or affronting. And thank you also for always commenting so insightfully and encouraging me to acknowledge and get curious about my blind spots.
I wish you all a wonderful rest of your week,