Reposting this because I posted it in the wrong wrong group earlier. Oops.

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I know this white woman in her 30s. We went to high school together. She was one of those girls that would do things for attention. Whatever it took, she’d do it. No surprise now that she is heavily invested in social media and will post the most ludicrous, staged photos for likes, trying to build her following and become and influencer.

Last year she became a foster mom to a little boy. He’s black. The parents aren’t wanting him back, so she’s adopting him. Ever since she started fostering him, she has tried to point out that he’s Black in almost every single one of her posts. She only dresses him in Black Panther shirts (like Wakanda Forever), or handmade clothes with black politicians on them, or people like Rosa Parks. She bought him Air Force One tennis shoes because “black people wear them”, and she had a bunch of black Santa cookies, pajamas, shirts, etc. handmade. He barely just turned one, and even during the pandemic, she is taking him to black barbers (her barely even has hair), and she walks around a predominantly black neighborhood to show him off and meet other black people. Now... I get that you might say “oh she wants him to know where he comes from” but this just seems SO EXCESSIVE to me. It’s like she is not seeing him for who he is, and just sees him as black. It’s like he is her black arm candy. Her influencer status has a bunch of white followers who constantly praise her for what she’s doing and even buy her and the little boy things. It’s White Savior syndrome to the extreme. And as he gets older, it has just gotten worse. Now she is Photoshopping African flags in the background of her pictures of him. He was not born in Africa, he was born in Tennessee...and she has no idea about his ethnic background other than the fact he’s black.

Honestly, am I reading too much into it, or do you think all of this is actually rooted in racism? It weirds me out that she’s adopting him, when it seems her attitude towards him is completely different because he’s Black. She had a white foster child too and barely mentioned him except that he had problems.