When actor Sterling K. Brown recently explained on Dax Shepard’s podcast why he posts photos of his sons online, many listeners were surprised. Shepard said he avoids showing his kids’ faces on social media for safety reasons. Brown said he does the opposite. For him, as the father to Black boys, visibility and proximity to celebrity can mean protection.

“Your children are obviously White; my children are Black. I feel like the more I put them on social, the safer they are," Brown said. "I’m trying to make sure that they make it home.”

For parents of Black children, his words reflect a reality that all of us are only too familiar with, a reality that begins far earlier than most Americans realize.

I’m a law professor who has represented survivors of domestic violence for decades in the family court system. I have seen firsthand how institutions treat people of color differently while insisting they are neutral.

I also find myself in a precarious position as a parent speaking about this because I am White. My children are Black. And that means I have become something I never expected to be: the sentinel standing watch over experiences that are profoundly different from my own.

Parents of Black children walk a tightrope

My children are often treated as if they are older than they are. They receive punishments that feel outsized for their transgressions. They are inappropriately sexualized. And yes, all of this happens while they receive education in the very same progressive and liberal institutions that I attended myself. 

I suspect I share something with many Black parents in this position – a constant uncertainty about where to begin. How much do you push back? How loudly do you object? When does advocating for your child turn into becoming that parent – the difficult one, the hypersensitive one, the one schools and camps quietly begin to avoid?

Every decision feels like walking a........

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