Racism

The topic of this blog is going to be racism. As I am sure you can tell from the picture on my profile I am a white woman so I am not necessarily the best person to be writing about this topic but I wanted to give some musings following a recent conference I attended where the focus was all about racism.

We did an activity to help us recognise our own privilege. I was sat with colleagues from multiple different cultures and countries. Throughout the activity I was completing my own but also watching how other people were responding to it. It was a list of scenarios or situations and if it was relevant to you then you had to add something to a bag. There was a list of approximately 25 statements. I think I added 6 to my bag but I watched as colleagues added easily double if not triple the amount that I did. I found that it made my heart feel heavy because although I know I have privilege for some aspects of my identity there are some aspects where I do not. I could see people specifically remembering situations they had been in and how they had felt in that moment by the way their faces reacted to the statements posed to them. It was hard to watch because some of it I had never had to worry about or experience. Although some of the statements that were not specifically about race we had both experienced.

Although I have attended multiple training courses regarding racism I have not personally experienced it. The way this activity was done made it hit harder because I could see the specific ways in which it had impacted other people. I have also discussed this activity with other colleagues and students since who have had different experiences to me due to coming from a different cultural background. They had even had some of the questions asked to her this week which led to an interesting discussion around the context and tone in which people ask certain questions can sometimes change the way they are received.

When I got back and had a conversation with my husband about the day and my musings from it he commented about white privilege and that when I am talking about it, it is very much from an England perspective and how it may be experienced very differently in a country where white are not the majority. I explained that within one of the workshops a colleague who splits her time between England and Zambia talked about how white people are still treated as more important or influential even in that environment. I decided to have a look further into why being white or paler is seen as more than, from what I read it appears it is because being white has throughout history been a sign of wealth and power. This is demonstrated by the amount of white usually men who are in power in many areas. They still seem to make up a majority in a lot of board rooms and places where important decisions are made.

Throughout the day we did different workshops and one of these focused around racism. Statements were given and we were asked to stand at different points in the room depending on whether we agree, disagree or are unsure. One that I found opened up a really interesting discussion was the statement “I call out racism or oppression when I see it”. I put myself in the unsure category because I work with older people. I queried whether it would be appropriate to call out racism if working with someone with short term memory issues caused by dementia. If they are not going to remember the conversation in 5 minutes time then what is achieved by calling it out? I absolutely do not agree with what they are saying and would in no way be complicit or engage in what has been said but in that scenario I could spend a long period of time explaining why that is not okay but that would be forgotten so it would not change future behaviour. I would argue that the reason we call out racism, oppression or discrimination is to enact change for the future, although there are situations where you may not get the outcome you want or the person will not actually change their behaviour in the future there is at least the chance that they may get something from the discussion or go do some research to alter their view whereas in scenarios like the one I have mentioned regarding Dementia that it not the case.

Within this conversation there was an interesting mix of different perspectives. There were a mix of cultures, ethnicities and races who took part in the activity and some of the discussions that came out of it were really thought provoking. One that really got me thinking was when someone talked about not feeling like they can call it out because of the stereotypes related to their own race whereas my expectation before going was that they would be the first people to call it out. I would have never thought about the fact that they do not want to be seen a particular way or exacerbate the situation further. As Social Workers we fight for justice and challenge inequality, oppression and discrimination when we see it but that is definitely easier said than done when in that type of situation. As a white woman I sometimes question how I am best to approach a situation where I observe racism and discrimination. I know that I should speak up but I do not always know how. This is definitely something I need to expand my skills on and speak with colleagues and peers who could potentially give me further information on the best way to approach this.

Another topic that was brought up was asylum seekers or immigration. We were talking about how the media depicts immigrants as people who are coming to take our money, benefits or jobs. I have spoken with a couple of friends who moved to England from African countries to study and they talked about what it has cost them to come here and study. They do not get student loans, grants or maintenance loans to study like UK citizens do. They pay tens of thousands of pounds per year to come here and study. People talk about them coming to take jobs but when speaking with people within Adult Social Care where you require a degree to be able to do your job, how does that work? If they do not have the qualifications to do the job then how has it been taken from them? Or the other end of the spectrum where people are coming into the UK to work. They usually take on jobs that British citizens would not want to do for the money that is being offered. Yet another situation where what the media tries to spin does not match up with what exactly is happening.

I was discussing this blog with people outside of Social Work who mentioned situations where they have noticed people automatically responding to rejection as being due to race and I question whether this could come from a place of someone expecting that someone is going to be racist towards them so they mention it or call it out before it even happens even in situations where this would have not have necessarily occurred. Obviously this is something I have not personally experienced so I do not know if that is the thought process but it would be interesting to discuss this further with people to open up the conversations and lines of communication to learn more about their experiences, expectations and how that situation is viewed from their perspective.

I did some research into the statistics surrounding people's experiences of racism. I found that stop hate UK reported that of all the incidents that were reported to them in 2023/2024 43.7% of them were related to race, a total of 761 incidents. Looking at it from a more global perspective UNESCO's Global Outlook on Racism and Discrimination was released in 2024 and showed that race accounts for 38% of reported discrimination cases globally. These are still such high numbers when you hear people argue that it is not as bad as it used to be. That may be the case but realistically it is still a major problem when statistics are showing that over a third of discrimination cases globally are linked to race or that 761 people experienced hate crimes due to race specifically.

We need to be doing more to speak up when we see racism, discrimination or oppression but also as individuals it is extremely difficult to make change. We need to be coming together and speaking up against the issues of systemic racism that are causing bias for people before they enter specific organizations or situations. They are starting on a back foot before they have even begun so end up having to work twice as hard if not even more so to achieve the same as someone who has a different race or cultural background. Shouldn't we be doing better in 2026?