'Anti-racist' prof Ibram X. Kendi wondered if daughter inhaled 'smog' of 'white superiority' amid attachment to white doll at daycare

"Anti-racist" professor and author Ibram X. Kendi in his Tuesday essay for the Atlantic wondered if his daughter inhaled the "smog" of "white superiority" amid her attachment to a white doll at daycare.

What are the details?

Kendi wrote that in the summer of 2017, he and his partner, Sadiqa, and their 1-year-old daughter, Imani, moved to Washington, D.C. During that time, Imani grew attached to a white doll with blue eyes and began throwing fits when she had to put it down, Kendi's essay states.

He added that he and his partner "wondered if our black child’s attachment to a white doll could mean she had already breathed in what the psychologist Beverly Daniel Tatum has called the 'smog' of white superiority."

Kendi detailed the history of dolls' skin color, including a recent study concluding that white children "displayed a high rate of 'white bias,' identifying lighter skin tones with positive attributes and darker hues with negative ones." He added that black children also displayed white bias, but far less than white children; the study's author said that's because "black parents actively work to protect their children from bias by 'reframing messages that children get from society' about racial preference." White parents “don’t have to engage in that level of parenting," the study's author found.