This is a revolutionary episode. What would the world look like if we parented in communal groups that supported each other instead of treating every single mom as an island of one? What if we gave kids the agency and freedom to be themselves instead of policing their every move? What if we taught them emotional regulation? How do we do that if we weren't even taught those things ourselves? We talk through these questions with Yolanda Williams, a single mom whose vision of parenting is predicated on the notion that what we've been doing is Clearly. Not. Working.

Yolanda believes that we should base our parenting on neuroscience, and research on what makes people happy. She wants to build a commune of single parents in Arkansas where her daughter can live debt-free without having to work. She wants us as a society to understand that how you parent your child is not a personal decision, because your kid is going to have to grow up in a world with my kid and they are going to influence each other. So yes, the way you parent is my business.

On top of all that, most conversations on parenting happen in spaces mostly created and populated by white women. And those spaces don't tend to talk about some of the most important questions for Black parents, such as "How do we rise above the belief that we have to beat our kids before the police do? How do the effects of slavery impact our parenting? How do we parent nonviolently when the stakes are so much higher for us and our kids have to work twice as hard to succeed?" That is what the work of decolonizing parenting is all about.

Bio: Yolanda Williams is a Certified Positive Discipline Coach and Host of the podcast Parenting Decolonized, a show that unpacks how colonization has impacted the black family and teaches parents how to raise liberated black children without breaking their spirits. When she’s not advocating for the safety and liberation of black children from white supremacy and parental oppression, she’s chasing her toddler around the house and trying to remain sane.

Links: 

Parenting Decolonized website: https://www.parentingdecolonized.com/

Yolanda's Social Media Handles:

Facebook:https://www.facebook.com/parentingdecolonized/

Facebook group for Black parents: https://www.facebook.com/groups/CPTime/

IG: https://www.instagram.com/prntgdcolonized/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/prntgdcolonized

Ways to support Parenting Decolonized:

Give recurring support through Patreon here: https://www.patreon.com/parentingdecolonized

Give a one-time donation through PayPal, Ca$h, or Venmo:

PayPal: paypal.me/parentingdecolonized

Venmo: @parentingdecolonized

Ca$h: $parentingdecolonized

Music is The Beauty of Maths by Meydän.