My boss essentially warned me for racial insensitivity - aibu?

[Sakalibre]

Firstly, my maternal grandparents were born in Morroco and my paternal grandparents were born in India.

I'm in my 2nd year of a grad scheme (financial services).

Last week, we were given a presentation which addressed systematic racism in relation to the BLM movement.

I am the only female in my team of 15 and the only person under 30 so have a unique perspective.

At the end of the presentation, I very sensitively and tactfully stated I personally do not like being viewed as a victim purely based on the colour of my skin. I tried to say this in a constructive way that some non-white people could take offence to some of the things that had been stated in the presentation. I emphasised this was just an opinion

Anyway, I had a 1 to 1 meeting with my line manager following this presentation and I was given what can only be described as a very stern telling off. I tried to explain my position but he was having none of it. In the end, I actually apologised to him. Which I regret now.

Over the weekend I've given it all a lot of thought. Why should my feelings be discounted? Why shut down the conversation?

WIBU? Should I go over this again with my boss tomorrow?

Was any of this recorded because it sounds wrong to me.

Sorry if I've missed this, was your line manager white, @Sakalibre?

It would sit uneasily with me if a non-white woman was being schooled on racism by a white man (or woman).

Anyway, I'd take it up with HR and bypass the manager completely.

@Codexdivinchi

This thread is mental.

OP - had to sit through a presentation at work which called all non whites victims multiple times. I’m non white and told my boss that I personally don’t feel like a victim.

Posters -

‘Ah bit you’re not really black - if you were black you’d feel like a victim’

‘What’s wrong with being a victim?’ Is it the word victim you don’t like?’

‘ oh your not being very clear even though you’ve explained it multiple times’

‘You can’t even spell where your grandparents are from - your obviously a troll’

OP if a white male tells you your a victim - didn’t you know your supposed to be one ...

This! It's madness! Imagine a man coming onto a thread on the feminism board and saying the equivalent... unreal.

@TheMumblesofMumbledom

viques everything the Op has said has been easy to understand for those of us that can read, take inference from and think correctly.

That's what I thought too.

Until I read some of the responses.

Either there are some very poor readers on here or some people with an agenda that makes reading and responding to a reasonable post into a platform for their particular brand of unpleasantness.

The presentation started off as an info pack put together by 2 white male grads, 1 white female and 1 Indian male grad. It was well received by leadership and it is now being circulated and disseminated throughout the company.

So three out of four of the creators were white, and three out of four were male? Great diversity there.

Yanbu OP. There is a lot of workplace “rightthink” over this at the moment and debate - or even rational discussion - is seen as unacceptable. Only applause is allowed :(

The model minority thing is confusing. I am often mistaken for being both Muslim and Middle Eastern. My own brother has been called a terrorist/paki.

Not read the whole thread yet but will do so in a bit.

I just wanted to say that I agree with the OP.

I am a black older woman. I am not a victim. I will not declare my ethnicity on any form or profile. I will not be defined by my ethnicity.

We are not all the same. We have different experiences just like white people.

Just as it is insulting to be racially discrimated against, so it is equally insulting to be classed as a black person who needs special help and understanding from white people.

I am finding all the wokeness happening at the moment infuriating. I have found my own way without anyones help, so I certainly don't need it shoved down my throat, by the media or my workplace with all their talks, workshops, presentations etc.

Having adverts on the TV showing all the mixed race families are so cynical. They are just jumping on the woke bandwagon. 'Look we can reach different demographics in one advert and look PC at the same time'. And before anyone says anything, I have a mixed race son.

As for the multitude of news items on Channel 4 about the latest indignities faced by black people, I have stopped listening. The reason? Because all I am hearing is that we are victims, we are hard done by, we are deprived, we live in the worst housing, we don't do well in education or the workplace. We are to be pitied, we need helping and guess who will do it!

So I repeat, I am not a victim and I do not need or want YOUR sympathy or help.

I Don't know how many Indians were enslaved. Maybe I should. History has had a strange knock on effect for all of us (all colours) I know a friend of mine was near lucky to have her family in Africa just because it meant her family didn't experience life in America as a black person. She could have experienced life in south Africa but she was lucky not to their either. So when she saw someone crying at the monument in her city she didn't understand. I'm glad she didn't but if it was her opinion that she's not a victim. What's the opinion of the person who was crying at the monument.
If your manager was angry he may have thought you were one of the lucky ones whose parents have good jobs and missed being slaves and having no rights or few rights for 3 or more generations and no family history or family name. Cast as lower cast even if you were higher cast and didn't know it.

I had exactly the same as a legitimately and visibly disabled person in a Diversity Training session where 'Disableds' were all helpless little victims in wheelchairs and bereft of any ability to voice their own opinions, but should be patted on the head and told that the grownups (my paraphrasing here, but it was driving the entire morning) would look after them and make those mean big kids at work wouldn't pick on them. By a tutor who moved tables and blocked all access to the exit and refreshment facilities for her own convenience when the original layout had been set up with my specific needs in mind.

OP said she objected to being viewed as a victim, just because of the hue of her skin.
She said what she said!
What part of that do some people not understand!???

Feeling like a victim is also a personal choice. People try to victimise people, but not all of those people want to feel like victims, so they fight and strive to empower themselves out of victimhood. Getting it yet from a rascism point of view?
Succeeding and having options in life for your yourself and generations to come despite rascism. Got it yet?

OP - There's no point trying to have race discussions on MN or many other forums like this because most of the people on here are White. Obviously, not all White people are rascist but you've got the wrong demographic here if you're looking for a sensible, intelligent and honest debate about how society can become anti-rascist without getting trolled by rascists or non-BAME (I hate this term) people who just don't understand.

HannahStern, I occasionally struggle with Dun Laoghaire, and, in fact, many Irish spellings of place names. I also sometimes do typos of places that I do know how to spell. I still claim that all of my grandparents were born in Ireland. Do you doubt that?

I've lived in Ireland two years now and there's a place I go to often with quite a long name. It has a gh, a g, and a k in it and I get them mixed up ALL THE TIME. I still can't spell it, though again and again I tell myself "the g comes at the end and the k in the middle" -- or is it the other way around?
Some spelling error do annoy, me is Gandhi, when people spell it as Ghandi. Not to mention there and their and your and you're and lose and loose etc etc
Sorry for the off topic derail...

@MitziK

I had exactly the same as a legitimately and visibly disabled person in a Diversity Training session where 'Disableds' were all helpless little victims in wheelchairs and bereft of any ability to voice their own opinions, but should be patted on the head and told that the grownups (my paraphrasing here, but it was driving the entire morning) would look after them and make those mean big kids at work wouldn't pick on them. By a tutor who moved tables and blocked all access to the exit and refreshment facilities for her own convenience when the original layout had been set up with my specific needs in mind.

I typed above about my disabled ds who said the same things.

I wonder if some people are getting a bit confused and think that by posters saying they don't feel like/want to be seen as victims, that they are saying racism/sexism/disability discrimination doesn't exist or that they haven't experienced it?

Maybe that explains some of the vitriol towards the OP on this thread - posters are thinking she is saying racism doesn't exist?

I'm with you OP all the way.

@SadSoVerySad exactly. I too am not a victim, and would hate to be patronised by having to "perform" or "speak out" about supposed discrimination so that white people can give themselves strokes for commiserating with me, or for being diversity inclusive, or whatever. It does happen.

Boss has a white saviour complex probably (or just felt embarrassed about being subject to critique by the one non white person in the room!)

I’m white. When people who are not white tell me about their experiences, I listen, rather than lecture them fgs. I also don’t assume that their experiences must automatically be universal and that everyone from an ethnic minority group experiences or responds to racism in the same way.

Sometimes, as a woman, I get slightly frustrated by other women who say that they don’t experience sexism with the strong implication that “therefore nobody does”. I don’t get the impression that’s what’s happened here though

@Sakalibre

"OP are you white presenting?"

I suppose I am racially ambiguous but most people assume I am Meditteranean/Middle Eastern.

I would never be mistaken as Anglo-Saxon.

The vast majority of white people in the UK can’t be mistaken for anglo-saxon. That wasn’t the question. The question is do you pass for white? I say this as an Indian from a large community that came to the UK from East Africa in the 70s and has brown hair, light / coloured eyes, and pass for Italian when they’re tanned. (People from darker skinned Indian communities only started to emigrate much later when Britain encouraged skilled emigration).

If you are young enough to have an Indian parent born in this country I imagine you are probably from my community. In which case if you are also half Moroccan then you probably don’t look anywhere close to a person of colour.

@Sakalibreit sounds like what you are saying is you found it offensive to be called a victim and thought other people would be. Even if you and those others have experienced racism.

If this is what you are saying I understand this as the use of the word victim is quite disempowering. For example we say abuse survivors rather than abuse victims. It also place the person experiencing racism in a position where their whole identity is viewed in opposition to the normal ie white. As in they aren't white so are a victim of racism and that's all they are.

I have some experience of community development and this would be called a deficit based approach. Rather than an asset based approach. For example with yourself. You are a graduate, young female with your own interests and experiences. So building on those as assets to bring to a discussion or company rather than you're brown and might have experienced barriers. Just using this as an example of ways of viewing things which may also be barriers because of how society is structured.

It really is unacceptable for you to be told as the only brown woman in the room your feelings about the presentation were wrong. In my opinion we should generally listen to what people have to say and believe them regarding their own experiences.

I really feel this is why diversity consultants exist to do this training and look at how workplaces can be more inclusive and aware. Although probably well intentioned they've got this really wrong. Do you have an hr department yiu could speak to?

@SandieCheeks
I agree 100%
They have to be confused. That or they're batshit crazy.
I usually ignore the racism posts because I just don't have the energy to deal with ignorance, but I get to get involved this time.

I'm a female who openly accepts that I was and still am a victim in areas of my life, (sexism, childhood DV, etc) but I do not have to feel or act like a victim if I do not want to be one. Fuck that shit. It does not mean that identifying with the word victim is a bad thing.

BubblyBluePebbles
OP - There's no point trying to have race discussions on MN or many other forums like this because most of the people on here are White. Obviously, not all White people are rascist but you've got the wrong demographic here if you're looking for a sensible, intelligent and honest debate about how society can become anti-rascist without getting trolled by rascists or non-BAME (I hate this term) people who just don't understand.

This 100%,
so many people on this thread have refused to be reasonable or actually read the op, as they clearly came with their own agenda.

Whether that is wokeness where their white experience knows more than the black and brown experience. Whether it is about "white saviour". Whether it is that they are a racist. Whatever it is, this is why mumsnet is thought of as being racist.

*but I had to get involved this time.

@SandieCheeks

I wonder if some people are getting a bit confused and think that by posters saying they don't feel like/want to be seen as victims, that they are saying racism/sexism/disability discrimination doesn't exist or that they haven't experienced it?

Maybe that explains some of the vitriol towards the OP on this thread - posters are thinking she is saying racism doesn't exist?

Yes! People do like to tell others how they should feel

They don't seem to fathom that just because someone belongs to a group they don't necessarily adhere to society's stereotypical opinion of that group.

@GrumpyHoonMain
She has brown skin, therefore, she does not present as a non-White person.
Read the full thread (RTFT)!

@flirtygirl
Thank you!