'The UK's race report does not match up with the lived experiences of people of colour like myself'
| Date | 01 April 2021 |
| Published date | 01 April 2021 |
| Publication title | MyLondon (England) |
A number of politicians, charities, and think tanks have questioned the validity of the report and its findings.
Halima Begum , director of the Runnymede Trust, has said that the report ‘insulted every ethnic minority in this country -the very people who continue to experience racism on a daily basis’.
And it’s true, the lived experiences of people of colour in this country do not match up to the findings of the race report, evidenced by the outrage across social media by people of colour here in the UK who firmly disagree with what it’s telling us.
The report, in my opinion, seems to be a scapegoat for the government and for many Britons in this country who believe that we live in a post-racial society, making it easier for them to point to it and say ‘we’re not racist’ when people of colour experience racism.
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It’s something every person of colour has faced before, trust me, where we say that we’ve experienced racism whether it’s from someone screaming slurs at us on the street or the almost imperceptible pause in a workplace or pub when you speak your mind -we are then gaslit into believing that it had nothing to do with race, when in all likelihood, it was because of our skin colour.
The report dismisses us as ‘idealistic’, suggesting that we are trying to pretend that this country is racist when in fact ‘the evidence does not support this’, but in reality, experiences of racism have nothing to do with how idealistic we are, it’s about what we see and feel every day of our lives.
In journalism for example, 94 per cent of editors and journalists are white , making it all the harder for a person of colour to get into the industry and feel supported when they do not see anyone like them in those positions.
Additionally, while class and other identity markers factor into many problems within this country, race is a big part of how and whether people ‘succeed’ in the ways they want to.
While this report is meant to be all encompassing, it is ignoring the numerous reports, investigations, and testimonies in the past that show that there are many sectors of the UK that are...
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