Dear White Suburban Mom,

Let Your Kids Out of the Bubble

Seriously. Release them. Free the children from the beige fortress. Open the gates of the HOA-protected wonderland, and let your kids step foot into the real world—the one that doesn’t smell like fresh asphalt, eucalyptus candles, and iced almond milk lattes.

I’ve got two kids. One just shy of 18, the other a grown-ish 21, and from day one, I made them a promise: they wouldn’t grow up blindfolded in a curated simulation of “America.” No, my children would actually see the world. Not the strip-mall symphony of Targets, Paneras, and “urban outfitters” that pop up like copy-paste cities across the country, but the real thing. The vibrant, messy, glorious chaos that smells like street food and sometimes urine. The kind of world that breathes, and occasionally wheezes—but is alive.

Right now, my son is spending his summer in West Hollywood. And yes, I can already hear your pearls being clutched from a gated cul-de-sac two zip codes away. To you, West Hollywood might as well be Sodom, Gomorrah, and Burning Man all rolled into one. You say “urban” like it’s a slur. You whisper “public transportation” like it’s a death sentence.

Listen, I get it. You’ve spent your life making sure little Chad and Emma never had to lock the car doors outside of a mall. But let me offer you a little perspective. I was a single mom. I hustled hard to land in neighborhoods with good schools—mostly very white, very manicured, and very “let’s talk about our feelings but not race.” Places like Westlake Village. Gorgeous, sterile, politically predictable. Think wine tastings and Botox. A town so squeaky-clean, the sidewalks practically exfoliate your feet.

But even there, I knew my kids needed more than top test scores and backyard pizza ovens. So I pulled them out of school one semester and took them abroad. Actuallyabroad. We didn’t do the resort-hop or cruise circuit where the most culture you get is a tequila tasting. We went to Ecuador. Mexico. We drove ourselves, wandered into towns without Yelp reviews, and got gloriously lost.

Did people warn me? Of course. “You’ll get kidnapped if you rent a car in Mexico,” they said. As if I were starring in some Netflix narco-thriller. Spoiler alert: no kidnappings, just some really good tacos and better conversations.

Now, like I said, my son is in West Hollywood, with his sister, in her first apartment… real life, no valet, no gated entrance, and yes, the occasional character on the street. And you should hear the excuses his friends’ parents give for why they won’t let their kids visit. “It’s not safe.” “There’s crime.” “The car might get stolen.” Ma’am, the car you’re worried about is a Kia. Meanwhile, there are Teslas, BMW’s and brand-new Cadillacs lining our street. But sure, let’s clutch the steering wheel and pray.

The irony? Many of these people think they’ve experienced “diversity.” Because once, they went on a week-long church mission trip to a small African country, passed out candy and coloring books, and took selfies with barefoot kids. Then they came home and proudly voted for the man whose policies destroyed the very food supply of the villages they think they “saved.” They post their photos with hashtags like #Blessed, never questioning why “giving back” always involves going somewhere brown, poor, and far away.

And vacations? Don’t get me started. Their idea of adventure is flying business class to a luxury resort in Thailand that they never leave. They get off the plane, climb into a Mercedes shuttle with tinted windows, and head straight to the bubble-wrapped beach where the staff calls them “sir” and “ma’am.” The only Thai thing they experience is the massage. On the way back, they clutch their Louis Vuitton purses in the van like Bangkok traffic is one bad pothole away from a carjacking.

This is not the world. This is not exposure. This is a curated safari of “otherness” where they’re always in control and never uncomfortable. And then they wonder why their kids panic at the first cracked sidewalk or a stranger speaking Spanish at the gas station.

I don’t want that for my children. I never did. I wanted them to walk confidently in cities that don’t look like Disneyland, to have empathy for lives that don’t mirror their own, and to navigate unfamiliar spaces without fear or judgment. That’s how you raise adaptable, intelligent, capable humans.

So, dear suburban mom, I say this with love: Let. Them. Out. Of. The. Bubble.

Because if your kids can ace the SAT but flinch at a city bus, then all that “top-tier education” you paid for has taught them nothing about the world they actually live in.