Like Kathy I grew up in a very VERY non-diverse area and I think never became prejudiced because there was simply never anyone to learn to be prejudiced against. I guess you just can't learn the attitudes or the names if you never hear them. Maybe that sounds weird but I came to the big city at 17 never having met anyone who wasn't white and I had no idea that there was any such thing as racism. It was a HUGE shock and completley outrageous to me the first time I heard someone swearing at an Asian person because of their race - it was totally inconceivable that anyone thought it was OK to talk like that.

My husband (who was raised in outback Australia and barely met any non-family members until he was 16) and I now have dinner parties that look like a United Nations meeting but at the end of the day we are friends with these people because they are great people - not because we are "being tolerant" if you know what I mean. Some of our friends say that sometimes being pandered to can be as bad as being discriminated against.

Just wanted to give you another take on the effects of being raised in a culturally non-diverse area.

I grew up in an area that was about as diverse as a KKK meeting. Their attitudes weren't that far off either. I now live in a central Indiana area that is about as white bread as you get. Yet, I am very tolerant, belong to a GBLT friendly chorus, am very spiritual, but not Christian and my husband and I seem to be the only people with Democratic leanings in the whole county. My kids accept these views as acceptable. Now that's not saying that they don't come home from school with a few interesting ideas from time to time, but these provide an opening for discussion. I'm not saying it is/was easy. For the first few years after I moved here I felt like a lonely fish out of water. But then I met one...two... and eventually a large group of people I could fit in with and provided the diversity I so craved. You will be fine and so will Bear. He will follow your and CD's example. That, building on the foundation you have already laid, will produce the tolerance you are already fostering. I actually think you might want to worry about what will your answer be when he asks "Why aren't there any(or more) black/Indian/Asian/etc people living here?"

Some practical advice from a life-long East Coast/Mid-Atlantic/Southern resident:

Look for a community that is in a town with a large, land-grant university. Big schools have very diverse populations of students and professors. The surrounding towns or cities can be an oasis of diversity in otherwise homogenous surroundings. Property values may be a bit higher in the actual town, but it's worth it to have a multicultural school system.

Don't be put off by the actual population of the town or city, instead, look at the makeup of the professors on a faculty...their kids go to school somewhere, their families shop for groceries somewhere, they play in playgrounds and enjoy the parks in town.

My county is 99% caucasian and the town I work in and that my kids attend school in is about 70% white. Because of the university, we are able to find friends and form relationships with families from all corners of the globe. I grew up in a lily-white southern town but both my parents were professors at the university and our house was the gathering place for a very large international community. Fun and good, good food.

And Marketing Mommy is right; bigotry is everywhere. Teaching our kids to recognize, hell, recognizing it in ourselves, is a life long job.

CD is wonderfully sensible. Not that you aren't, my friend.

Prejudice is everywhere. Even in some surprising places. I chose to live in Oak Park because it reminded me of my hometown, the diverse, left-leaning Arlington, VA. Yet even there my 12th grade AP English teacher, an African-American Baptist, told me "I know you can't help it, but your people killed Jesus."