Mariah Carey is opening up about her experiences with being a biracial woman and mother. The superstar singer talked to Andy Cohen on an episode of Watch What Happens Live. On it, she was incredibly candid about how racism has impacted not just her life but the lives of her kids. She even shared that her son, 9-year-old Moroccan, was recently bullied by a white supremacist.
"Rocky just got bullied the other day by a white supremacist person that he thought was his friend," the 50-year-old singer said. "It's like, insane. This is the world we live in."
It's troublesome to imagine that Mariah's kids are having some of the same kinds of experiences that she herself had as a child. She likely hoped that raising kids in today's world would be easier and that perhaps they wouldn't have to combat so much racism in 2020. But there is still so far to go in terms of easing racial tensions in America.
The always candid Mariah Carey is talking about her experiences with racism. But sadly, Mariah's experiences are not just limited to many years ago. They are still happening today, even to her children.
Mariah appeared virtually on Watch What Happens Live and shared that her 9-year-old son, Moroccan — whom she calls "Rocky" — was just bullied by a white supremacist. For Mariah, the experience hits very close to home. She says she was traumatized by racist encounters.
Mariah actually recently published her memoir. She introduced it in a segment on Oprah's series The Oprah Conversation. The memoir actually turned out to be very timely, in terms of the Black Lives Matter movement, Mariah says, since so much of the book talks about her own experiences with being a biracial woman.
Mariah is very open with her kids about her experiences, too. She says she's even using her own book to help them understand the impact of racism. "I'm reading chapters to them that are helping to illustrate my encounters with racism, and how they can then have a greater understanding, and ultimately a greater reservoir with which to deal with the situation itself," she explained.
It's pretty inspirational, actually. Mariah is digging into her painful experiences in hopes that it will help her kids and anyone who reads her words. The fact is, though challenging, sharing these kinds of experiences can influence the world we live in. By that measure, she's turning her pain into a positive.
Sharing stories has a lot of power, and Mariah is giving her own voice power, in a totally different way than usual. She even detailed some of her experiences to Andy, including the time she says she was "traumatized" as a young girl by teachers who insisted she was using the wrong color crayon in a drawing of her father, who is Black.
For Mariah, and for so many biracial people, racism takes its toll. The singer said that it's really always been something that has been so present in her life. "It's been a struggle for me since I was aware that there was such a thing as race," she said. "And the only reason I was aware so early on was because it became a subject of humiliation for me as a child."
Even as one of the biggest stars on the planet, Mariah had immense struggles when it comes to racism. In her book, she also delved into a moment in her young life that involved girls she thought were her friends. It's another experience she says was traumatic for her.
Mariah used it as a teaching moment with her young daughter, though, who is also 9. She read her the excerpt, and her daughter had a sweet response. Mariah said, "I let her hear that and it was really sweet, she goes, 'Mommy, those girls, they feel so bad now. I bet they wish they could be your friend.'"
Mariah's story is already making waves. Just yesterday, Mariah shared that her book is No. 1 on the NYTimes bestseller list. "Thank you to everyone who has taken the time to read my story and make this impossible dream a reality ," she wrote. "It almost makes it tolerable to have lived through these experiences! LOL ."
Clearly, Mariah's story is one that a lot of people needed to hear.
