White privilege... really? In schools??!

[stellenbosch]

To quote Bastille, 'the world's gone mad' ...

You can assert that, but how can it not detract from your achievements to be told that the other runners started behind you?

Maybe you put yourself in the other person's shoes and consider how it would feel to see someone pretending the playing field was entirely equal when you started three paces behind them?

But of course in the "race of life" some people start further back or further forward! If you take a class of kids doing GCESs for example, Cs would not be an achievement for my privileged child but they would be for another child who started further back. And As would be an achievement for my child, but would be a greater achevement for a child starting further back. It would be churlish to think otherwise.

@sprinklesinmyelbow well that depends on your age (I won't ask) but if we are similar ages then no, short of sleeping with your boss or prospective bosses you got your job on your own merit.

I really don't think it's helpful to have a victim hierarchy, Huw about we all just look at each other as humans ?

Hulk, are you in Kamloops?
On the back of Canada 150, I would like to be able to see political involvement in this type of balancing campaign as a positive, but I struggle to rationalize it. There are too many politicians who are willing to be literal poster children for this type of campaign, but who were equally supportive of the many Canada 150 events that were essentially a celebration of colonial rule. Some places (notably Vancouver - who celebrated 'Canada 150+', so that the '+' denoted the thousands of years of indigenous peoples prior to '150') did make some efforts, but there is way too much public tokenism. It's all very worthy to make tokenistic gestures like this poster campaign, but it is another thing entirely to eradicate the huge disadvantages experienced by First Nations people in their own country.
Those of you who are pshawing and deriding the UK's role in this situation need to get a fucking grip. Who do you think is responsible to for today's appalling situation in Canada? Sins of the fathers indeed.

My Kamloops contact (a staunch Green supporter) has just moved to Toronto (and is today lamenting Doug Ford's win for the 'progressive' (Bahaha) conservatives, so I've no idea how the school system is locally organised. I suspect that like elsewhere, there are schools where the majority of First Nation kids attend, and schools where mostly 'white' kids attend. White in this context does not mean white. It means anyone other than First Nation. Once you get to Vancouver, the Asian kids outstrip the 'white' kids in vast numbers at UBC. During the uni visit season, dd1 and I were usually the only white people on public transit to and from the university (and that's not because the white people were driving lol). For the purposes of this poster, Asian kids are white kids. Black kids are white kids. Literally everyone is in a privileged position in comparison to the gut -wrenchingly awful position that the vast majority of First Nations people start in, from drinking water to disappearance.
On the back of Canada 150, I am slightly heartened by the poster, but I'd be a damned sight happier if everyone that saw it, and the politicians responsible for it, actually got off their arses and fixed it. Dismantling bloody years of essentially British colonial rule and the racism of the Indian Act ain't easy.

Huw about we all just look at each other as humans

That's great. Really useful. However, UK society has designs and structures that seem to make life easier for some and more difficult for others.

It's easy to see how mechanisms and policies can make life just a bit more difficult for some groups - but the people who implement them aren't even aware of their effect.

You see in on MN all the time. People suggest solutions that are totally unworkable because of issues that the person suggesting them isn't even aware of.

Example - the Government moves more and more services online. That leads to digital exclusion - and certain groups are much more likely to be excluded as they have less access to digital technology.

If you have a background where digital access is just taken for granted, it's hard to appreciate that certain groups such as the elderly are less likely to have access.

If someone is there to say ' hang on, what does this policy mean for groups who don't have digital access', then maybe people will think about how those people can be included.

“I really don't think it's helpful to have a victim hierarchy, Huw about we all just look at each other as humans ?”

Why is it having a “victim mentality” to accept that some people have it easier than others and think of ways to level the playing field? I really don’t understand that.

I'm more concerned that Bestiality is legal in Canada as long as it's not penetration to give two hoots about this another division nonsense. Humanity is insane. Sign the petition to make it illegal in Canada and stop animal abuse.

Me either Bert. It’s like saying I am in a wheelchair because i can’t walk but I should just try and compete with the able bodied woman whose parents paid for athletics coaching from the age of 7 after all I’m not a victim

Again what are the designs and structures you talk of ?

Again what are the designs and structures you talk of

I just gave a perfectly good example of a design that makes life just a bit harder for older people.

As someone who is not black, I have not lived in your shoes or the shoes of any other black person. Nor have you lived in mine. The way the world is designed for me and treats me may well be very different to the way the world treats and is designed for you.

Maybe you don't think that your skin colour has in any way affected your opportunities in life. Have you had the same conversation with other black people?

And I'm telling you it's not that hard being black

So there's no BME pay gap then?

Are black people having the same opportunities as white people to earn as much money, get the same access to jobs in all careers and there are no issues there then?

And I'm telling you it's not that hard being black

Do you think that it might be harder in communities that are less multi cultural - outside of London and in smaller towns?

I don't care if you are black.

It's a racially abusive term.

Shock, non white people can also be racist.

Are you serious @mapluck ? This is the real face of the progressive. I change my mind I have faced racism.

OK. I’ll offer my ds as an example. We live in an exclusively white area, so white privilege is not really relevant. But we do live in a very economically and socially diverse area. The school he went to is in the catchment of an area of significant social deprivation. By contrast to most of his classmates he was very, very privileged. He has a stable home life, enough money, good food, a secure safe warm home, two graduate parents. A stereotypical “mumsnet” child. The school does very well by its catchment children- a lot of Cs and Bs at GCSE, which is very good considering where they started from. But considering where ds started from, Cs and Bs would have been significant underachievement. And yes, awareness of his privilege would sure as hell have detracted from his achievement if that’s what he had got. So it would have been possible to celebrate his friends B as a significant achievement and be disappointed in Ds’s B as an underavhievment. Because he started several steps ahead. Does that make sense?

I am black and he is being an uncle tom.
I'm not going to type what you're being....

@mapluck so because I disagree with the belief racism is suppressing black people in 21st UK I'm subservient and eager to please whites ? You really are a truly horrible vile human being.