Work event.. left me out of the planning

[Notthattimeofthemonth]

We have a work day out next month and they have asked us to bring in a baby picture and they are going to guess who’s who to get us all networking.

I’m the only black person out of 126 people going so wouldn’t take them very long to guess who’s who.

im trying to calm down before I address this as I’m currently infuriated.

how on earth do I proceed with this in the correct way..

OP, YANBU. This ice-breaker is unacceptable; it’s othering you, and there is no excuse for it. Ignore the faux-innocents with their fake bewilderment at how anyone could possibly see this as racist. It is.

I'm sure the last thing they wanted was to cause offence.

Well yes. But not quite so much that they actually stopped and thought about it though.

My hobby horse is disabilities. And people think it's a get out of jail card to say "I'm so sorry, we never meant to cause offence" as someone is sat looking at a stairway to an even with no lift, and then proceed to regale you with all the courses they have been on. And then - there is a parallel to this thread ... "Why don't you use Zoom ?".

"Yes, but you didn't listen" is the stock reply.

It's really stupid of them, and thoughtless.

Although part of me thinks having a wall of all these photos might clearly show them the lack of diversity in their workforce in a clear visual way. It just shouldn't be done at your expense.

Jeez. There's so much I could say but what's the fucking point. I'm stunned by some of the comments on this thread. I thought this level of ignorance had been relegated to Daily Mail readers.

I'll be honest, if there wasn't that level of ignorance in this thread, I would suspect it was AI generated.

You are absolutely right OP, the fact that your colleagues haven't thought about it is racist and non-inclusive at best.

Ignore the posters telling you to get over it, I think make a point and bring in several photos of different black babies as the poster above suggested if you don't want to tackle it head on.

I'm sure if you mentioned it they would provably be pretty mortified.

Good point @SerendipityJane ...

A very tricky situation where I imagine you feel quite "othered" - a compromise: could you supply a photo of you with siblings, or cousins etc?

It's just an ice-breaker, but really there are better exrecises. Can you find a non-personal way of drawing this to your manager's attention? So no-one can say it's you being "over sensitive"

I knw I wouldn't be able to supply a baby photo as my mother has them all, and she's 1000s of miles away and in bad memory loss & dementia.

At the risk of sounding a bit Diane Abboty, likening blackness to gingerness is

1. rude
2. completely misunderstanding race and racism

I'm saying that as a ginger who has mono-toned her 'guess the baby' pictures when similarly invited to play.

You can't just sepia or monotone out your ethnicity, and nor should one have to so as not to be othered by your colleagues.

The only weird thing is you are unable to see why someone in the PO's position might get 'worked up' about it.

I think it’s always been here, usually low-level and in the background, but threads like this tend to bring it to the fore.

no they didn't. It misses the point.

Awful. I had this where my male colleague and I were the only Asian people, and everyone knows they were pictures of just the two us. This was pre DEI and no one would have even thought what the exercise might be like for the non-white people.

I was premature so had no hair as a baby whereas he had loads, so everyone thought I was him. I know most babies are bald but I still felt really self conscious that everyone thought I was a boy! And I just didn’t want to be talked about so much. I wanted the anonymity my white colleagues had.

Hopefully these days you can
push back. Really poor by HR!!?? Sadly believable though.

Yes they did, and no, it doesn’t.

People need to stop looking for reasons to be offended.

for what it’s worth, i don’t think it’s cool at all that you’re being told you’re over reacting, (and truly, i hope all of the people telling you this are also the only person of a particular skin colour or race or ethnicity at their workplace too.) Because yes, ok, the game is intended to be lighthearted and a conversation starter, but it’s still a game which excludes you from the get go/forces you to stand out in a way which you didn’t ask for, and weren’t asked about, when there are other ‘ice breaker’ games to play which wouldnt do this. Something like this doesn’t have to have ill intent or malice behind it before it’s ok to call it unconscious bias, or a microagression, or whatever. Totally fair.

I knw I wouldn't be able to supply a baby photo as my mother has them all, and she's 1000s of miles away and in bad memory loss & dementia.

And actually, thinking further about my post, being asked for a baby photo and not being able to supply it would make me quite sad & feeling left out.

Not the same as your issue of being othered as "not white" @Notthattimeofthemonth but shows how tricky this is an a s-called ice-breaker or team building exercise.

At my work, we did a start of academic year thing which was quite fun - we're a very large academic department & rarely all get together. We were put into small groups and we had to each say something about ourselves/our interests/ etc etc that would be unexpeced. It was set up to be light-hearted & it was fun hearing interesting and unexpected things about my colleagues.

I haven't been on MN that long so I guess I just haven't come across it. This thread is deeply disturbing.

white? work with people who are just like you? never managed to think about how others experience racism? (or sexism or all the other isms)

Op has said how they have had recent DEI training (IIRC) and still she feels that this is uncomfortable. Plenty of people have pointed out why that might be and additionally why it might be hugely problematic for other staff members.

going by recent chats with friends about DEI training they have been through - I'm a) not surprised a racist thing got through HR but i am b) very surprised that nobody has thought how this may out a not-out transgender person in the company.

It is, i think, as a non-black person, to not immediately always pick up on the casual/everyday racism. But we should listen when someone tells us it is happening.

i think it’s also important to examine why as a society we are always so fast - even in the most well-intentioned ways - to require the person who has been affected in matters like this, with valid points to raise - to be the one to quietly and politely withdraw themselves, rather than put an entirely reasonable challenge forward in a case of thoughtlessness/unconscious bias which should be raised.

i rather suspect that (on mn at least) despite it's "reputation" elsewhere on teh interwebz, that if you said, OP, that you now identify as the opposite sex and that a baby photo would out you - a lot of the plonkers telling you you shouldn't have an issue with this might start to understand why.

I have always wanted to believe that the racism here is largely as inflated as the so-called transphobia. I am sadly disappointed that it is not the case.

I am white but can see why the OP is upset. Is this not a perfect example of one of the many microagressions that minority groups are just expected to suck up? It's not ok. This will 'other' the OP and whilst the intentions were good it is fair to make the organisers aware and for them to change the ice breaker accordingly.

how on earth do I proceed with this in the correct way..

ask the organisers if they are going to follow up with a session discussing why this event was problematic?

In addition to the organisers lack of awareness that it would call attention to your ‘difference’ to everyone else it is very likely to be a problem for anyone who has been adopted and potentially people who are estranged from their parents.

Tbh it really hard to organise anything as there is always someone offended by activity.

Photos? Minorities/old/that only bloke in a team will complain.
Some sort of event? Half of team is old/disabled/pregnant or for another reason cannot go.
Drinks? Religion, ex alcoholics and people from alcohol induced abusive homes will not come.
Lunch? Million alergies, religious and personal preferences that cannot be catered at one place.

Just go and sit in the office like all other days as everything is a problem for someone and a reason to cry over most idiotic shit.

I can't see the harm but I'm not you. And you obviously aren't comfortable with it. Not sure what you should do if anything.

MN is just a reflection of the real world.

Only here people get to display their true selves in ways they (well some) have been conditioned to conceal in public.

If a company was hiring the best candidates without regard to race, you would expect the diversity to roughly reflect that of the population. Nearly half of the workforce being minority ethnic points to racism, no matter which way you want to frame it.
I’m minority ethnic btw.