To think society is too focused on equal representation?

[Confusedabouttheworld23]

Watching the news today, I saw how there is outrage over a lack of BAME winners at the BAFTAs. As an Indian heritage person myself, I fail to see how this is a huge problem from a few key reasons.

Firstly, , statistically the UK is predominantly a White country and therefore it is not statistically significant if one year there were no BAME winners. In fact a statistician tweeted that you need to look over a period of 5/6 years to see if there is systemic racism in the BAFTAs. In fact in 2021 or 2022, half of the winners were BAME, showing that you cannot read too much into such a small sample size.
As a subpoint, BAFTA voters are predominantly going to be White if this is representative of the UK Population. If it is true that people resonate with those who predominantly look like them, it is no surprise and not a huge issue that the majority of UK award winners are White. If one were to go to India for example, most if not all award winners would be of Indian heritage, this is completely fine and reflective of a country’s demographics,

Secondly, with so many other issues in the UK, I feel that a focus on equal representation is being totally blown out of proportion. We need to focus on just working hard, trying to better ourselves and get through the tough economic times we are experiencing at the moment.
A lack of diversity in acting seems almost trivial compared to other significant issues affecting the UK population - I am much more concerned about rising inflation, housing costs than the number of people who I feel represent me in film.

Thirdly, it is argued that we need to encourage more people from diverse backgrounds to go into film and other arts in the UK, and the main way to do this is to award and recognise BAME artists/actors. However, is it really a huge issue if those from BAME backgrounds go into other sectors of the economy. For example, Indian heritage people often go into STEM, finance etc, rather than the Arts which has resulted in them being one of the most economically successful groups in the UK. This is not a huge issue therefore, and hence there is not a need to push for increased diversity in the Arts to the extent that we are doing so today.
I just feel that everyone needs to just work hard and get through life, rather than focus on issues which in the grand scheme of things are not that significant.

I once met a make-up artist who'd trained to work in TV, but left because 'it was too middle class'. It was a real eye-opener to me that somebody would leave their dream job for that reason. Really nice lady too.

BAME is a problematic term. It lumps anyone who isn’t white in a group.

It annoys a lot of people. Myself included. I’m not white but my family are. I’m mixed heritage but apparently I should be in a different group.

OP - you have succumbed to the same fate as Priti Patel and her sort. Years and years of racism directed against you and you found a glimmer of hope when you realised if you become right wing and ingratiate yourselves with racist people that they will like you and tell you “but you’re okay, I don’t mean you” when they talk about terrible immigrants etc.

Don’t use BAME ffs

So basically you’re saying British Indians are sorted so let’s ignore all the other minorities?

You are part of the problem, OP.

Do you not question WHY there are fewer women artists releasing music/ in the top 100 though?

Maybe there is some problem in society preventing women from becoming musicians.

I do get what you're saying - of course awards should be based on merit - but I don't think you are thinking about it deeply enough.

Where do you think that 'merit' comes from? WHY would white males be winning more awards based on 'merit'? (as they inevitably do if we don't make explicit efforts to recognise diversity).

It is to do with privilege and life opportunities they have which enables them to excel.

We have got to address this at both ends of the scale to tackle it - both in providing more opportunities to less privileged groups, and also by providing more recognition/ awards to less privileged groups.

If there is no thought to diversity then white men tend to bulldoze on all fronts. Therefore I understand that it might seem tokenistic, but it's important.

I think the thing to remember is that to address the structural problems at the bottom of the rungs - why there are fewer good roles for example and why some classes of people find it hard to get opportunities- we have to change every rung

By making sure that people from minorities get visibility - so making an effort to at least check we haven't been lazy in out "merit" based decisions, and where it's hard to call favouring the none white candidate-

I agree with you about the adverts - and TV in general. For instance, schools or extra-curricular activities will often choose an ethnic minority to represent them in publicity, even if in reality they are majority white, and I think a good case can be made for this. Where it falls down is, why would a kid whose parents come from Africa (for example) feel 'represented' by a picture of an Asian kid any more than a picture of a white kid? Or even a picture of somebody who comes from a very different part of Africa? BAME don't all look the same, you know!

I find lumping a very diverse group of people together under BAME, and using it as what is essentially a tick box very, very problematic, and I have mentioned this at work on a number of occasions - and not just for BAME, because there's always the question in work of is a representative representing themselves or a wider group or community, and how to have clarity around that.

... and not accidentally hitting post too soon..

Then we make it more normal to see people on top roles - it helps to overcome bias elsewhere

For example if no none white person ever won an award and you were a film writer you might subconsciously think I want white actors as I want to win awards

It sounds daft but it is what goes on in your pattern matching subconscious

If all colours can win awards pretty well in line with proportions in society - then it's not a risky choice , its a none issue ( to your subconscious)

And if all colours win children know that children like them have a chance making them
Much more likely to try

Yes it's hard
Yes it feels unfair - but life isn't fair and what we want to do is make it fairer

Let's face it as a white person do you think your award has as much value now as it would ina future where you are competing fairly with all colours - today your award was won unfairly as you had so many advantages to get where you are

This is why BAME is crap because south Asian struggles aren't necessarily the same as Black people, as a Black woman I disagree.

The issue is the snubbing of people in favour of white people, some white actors who win are mediocre and win over Black/racialised people who deserve the award. That is the issue not that people just aren't winning

It seems to be largely about those one-off films that capture a moment in the psyche. This year, it was a German war film. In 2009, it was Slumdog Millionaire - lots of 'PoC' actors winning awards, and the film overall won a BAFTA. Pitting black against white actors is too oversimplistic - it's about the films that capture something about the mood of the nation in that moment. Currently, that would be war (obviously, Ukraine). Next year, who knows?

I think we are. And as you say, in terms of representation, we fall really low when it comes to representing the working class.

I believe OP is saying that tokenism is problematic and so is victim mentality. Not that they are 'sorted' because clearly there isn't very much British Indian representation in film awards. But I can't speak for them, of course!

I think you need to tackle it from the bottom up, not just hand out awards to minorities to fulfil a quota, I wouldn’t want to win something just because I’m a gay woman, I want to win because I’m the best.

The only way we can have fair representation of minorities is to create equal opportunities, so we need to look at why the film and TV industry is dominated by white middle class people, and we need to look at why the music industry is dominated by men and start there. I think scrapping the female sex category at the Brits was a mistake, but having a female category was also just masking the problem.

British Indians are not ‘sorted’. No group is ‘sorted’ you must see how ridiculously bigoted it is to talk about people as a random group rather than an individual!?
it’s down to an individual to decide how to change their unconscious bias and essential ‘not be a dick’ it’s not down to the system to force discrimination of a ‘special’ group cause their the flavour of the month. Work hard = get rewarded. It’s the Tory dream! It’s up to the individual to take some responsibility for not being dick. How can so many people be at a such a lazy place where they need society/the government/school/the BAFTAs to police or control them not being a dick!
overheard in Waitrose:
‘im sorry maam I’ve tried so hard but I just can’t stop being rascist’
‘don’t worry dear, we’re all rascists, if we stick at it long enough someone else will fix this for us’ *rolls eyes

To tackle the bottom you also need to tackle the top

For example - there are not a lot of class x coming through so it doesn't matter they aren't seen in the awards

But the reasons they don't come through include the fact that they don't think they belong because they have no role models they identify with, because they aren't given a chance because they are too different to previously successful people ....

The top has to offer a leg up where it can or the bottom won't ever change.

Change across the board is needed

This!

This shows how many non-white people are complicit in not only their own oppression but the oppression in others. Black or brown skin fighting to maintain white supremacist status quo doesn’t make it better. Take note Priti Patel, Suella Braverman, Kwarteng et al.

And an individual can't address their unconscious bias in isolation from society

Your unconscious picks up clues from society and makes rational conclusions and humans have unconscious bias because no one has the mental resources to think everything through all the time

I agree that just looking at 1 year in isolation doesn't work as there can be an outlier at any point.

I also think we get caught up too much in what types of diversity we value. The current outrage over the race/heritage of the winners for example when there are approximately 4% of the population of black heritage yet 17% who have some form of disability, yet you never see complaints about no disabled winners.

On the other hand if 40% of nominations weren't yet 100% of winners were white that is a slightly unusual statistic. But not worth getting worked up about as a one off, if a similar pattern persisted over the next 2 years it might be an issue.

Good point, I, too, often find I’m far too busy and important with my life to spare any mental ressources to think about the way I make decisions and how they affect people.

You would be surprised at what your head does and how it limits the options you are choosing from

There is some really good research in this area - how people really believe they make decisions based on merit and can be proven tjme and again to actually be using lazy processing

Try looking for the impact of blind auditions on the diversity of orchestras - the mix changes when people can only hear the music - despite them thinking they only want the best in their orchestra they were choosing mostly white men when they could see who they were choosing . Far fewer white men got in on merit alone.

The trouble with unconscious bias training is that it increases unconscious bias because people think they k ow about it and so will be overcoming it through the strength of their mind

This is also a fun way to see what your instincts tell you

implicit.harvard.edu/implicit/takeatouchtest.html

I agree @Confusedabouttheworld23

A problem I have is with the always have to make sure the trans/gay/bi/gender neutral angle is covered. Now bearing in mind the population of the UK that state they fall into those groups is very small why so much representation in everything. The trans tiny group are shoved down our throats all the time as being side-lined -it's rubbish of course and they pop up everywhere so lots of opportunities. My friend lost out in a job to a person who identified as a lesbian - she wasn't but got her an edge since she represented an 'under represented group'.... I mean seriously, what happened to the best person got the job/award/credit?

BAME - as so anyone that isn't white. So a film awards for everyone and moans if people from BAME don't win much and then a separate Black awards for people who are black. Ummmm I wonder why people get a little 'here we go again...' it doesn't help with equality it hinders it.

Sad isn't it that people put you in a different group from your family. We are all the same group regardless of colour of skin.

The trans tiny group are shoved down our throats all the time as being side-lined -it's rubbish of course and they pop up everywhere so lots of

Your language is transphobic, not to mention childish. Swap your "trans tiny" with gay, Asian, Black, Jews. Do you see? @GiveMeStrengthNow

I'm gender crit btw, so you can save the backlash.