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How does a mother explain hate to her children?

Adrienne Charles has grappled with this question since her two sons began the year at McCaig Elementary School in September — a span in which she saysthe kids have repeatedly been the target of racial slurs from a few of their classmates.

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“My eight-year-old asked me, ‘Why don’t they like us? Is being black a good thing? Maybe I’m too dark-skinned,'” said Charles, whose boys — age 8 and 11 — attend the school in Rosemère. “My oldest son has been in denial lately. He said, ‘Yeah, they called us n—ers but they were only talking about my little brother.’ … They’ve gotten so used to it that I think they only come to me when it’s gotten unbearable. I feel powerless.”

The children have reported five incidents of racial taunting to their mother; ranging from two girls calling them “gorillas” on the school bus to classmates using the N-word in reference to the boys. Charles says she reached out to McCaig four times and in each instance the school looked into her complaint.