The Simplest Way to Fight Discrimination in the Workplace

Racism is obviously still alive and well in the wider society, especially the workplace. Legal requirements might stem the tangible, open forms of racism, but they are useless against subversive discriminatory practices which have been woven into the fabric of working life: like bullying, put downs, poor assessments, lack of advancement, lack of fair conditions, proper training, negative labels and name calling, having to carry the burden of 'merit' and feeling isolated from the group. Those are common forms of 21st century racial discrimination.

Discrimination comes out of personal prejudice: simply having the power to put such prejudices into action by discriminating against others, whether openly or covertly. It begins from the recruitment stage, because we tend to recruit in our own image and likeness. Put simply, human beings gravitate towards their own kind for validation, reinforcement, security and comfort. This is no different in the recruitment process. That is why many workplaces remain strongly monocultural and gender biased, mainly reflecting one ethnic/gender grouping. As the majority society sets the standards and has ownership of commerce, racial discrimination begins from the advert stage. From the moment the candidate's CV arrives in front of the interviewing gatekeeper, a minority person is being judged in a different way from their colleagues.

First, they will be judged on their name and ruled out. Then if they make the interview, they will be judged on voice, personality, culture, presentation and perception, that do not match with or conform to expectation. Worst of all, they will be judged on a spurious thing called 'merit'. This word is never used in association with White males but it is always a burden that minorities and other underrepresented groups have to carry. White workers automatically 'merit' a position or seem entitled to it without question. They are used as the invisible yardstick by which all others are judged, hence why they would fail to see any discrimination themselves. However, minority ethnic staff, women and other underrepresented groups, have to prove they 'merit' it, to justify their presence. At the same time, recruiters miss the supreme irony that, as we always recruit in our own image and likeness, many men are hired purely through their gender and very little else!

The Limiting Notion of Merit
The notion of 'merit' is precisely the way minorities are kept out and White males hang on to their power. They let in just the odd 'deserving' minority to give the impression of equality and fairness. He/She is then surreptitiously co-opted into helping to maintain the biased and discriminatory status quo through tokenistic merit rituals and the desire of the proud new appointee to justify their new role and to hang on it at any cost. The real tragedy is that so long as minorities carry the 'merit' concept like a millstone around their necks, they will always be perceived as second best, regardless of how good they think they are.

If the applicant is successful, he/she is likely to be given unpopular tasks, or tasks which might keep them busy but lack the status to attract coveted advancement. Like principals of colleges in Britain, only 4 are minorities out of over 400, yet 16% of students are minorities. This is mainly due to the fact that most minority teachers are given the kind of low status subjects which do not lead to promotion. Later on in the job, when the assessments are due, somehow the minority worker's productivity or approach will never be perceived to be quite up to standard. As most assessors will be from the majority group, who also hold the keys to scarce resources in such a competitive arena, minorities tend to lose out there most of all. That is why so many are on lower grades never seeming to be competent enough for supervisory or management posts.

Add to that the subtle bullying, name calling and the lack of training opportunities and the scale of discrimination begins to reveal itself, but not in ways which can be tangibly proven, which makes its underlying effects even worse. How do you tackle such ingrained imbalance which is regarded as not really being there when those affected feel its effects very clearly? Very difficult, on one hand, where you have narrow minds and closed hearts. Yet the answer to discrimination does not lie in any useless policies or fancy documents. It actually resides in each individual in the way they TREAT one another.

Basic Needs of Every Person
Every human being, without exception, seeks four things in their life, depending on personal aspirations. Each of us seeks to be SIGNIFICANT, APPRECIATED, VALUED and INCLUDED. Being significant is connected to our desire for achievement, being appreciated and included is crucial to our sense of belonging and being valued is tied up with our self-esteem. Minorities would place simply being 'included' as their top priority primarily because they tend to be alienated from the majority society and on the periphery.

Fighting racial discrimination in the workplace does not need paper policies and flowery words of intention, otherwise we would not still be asking this question in 2008, especially in view of the millions of words that have proliferated to combat discrimination down the years; words that have seen so little action. What is needed is a different, much simpler approach, one which emphasises responsibility, respect and accountability from every single employee, not just senior personnel or the policy makers. If every person in the workplace sets out to treat their colleagues in ways which help them to feel significant, as if they matter; to feel appreciated, especially for a job well done; to feel valued, especially as key workers who have a stake in that business/service delivery, and to feel included because they are valued, there would be a dramatic shift in how people feel about themself and their potential, and how they are perceived, regardless of race, gender, age, etc. It means everyone, not just minorities, will be treated with value and fairness, instead of change being left just to the managers, or the White majority, while the general worker is left untouched to continue their subtle and negative actions.

True diversity is the acknowledgement of difference, the full acceptance of it and the celebration of it. Stemming discrimination and valuing diversity is thus an 'inside job', it starts from within us, in the form of the appreciation and respect we have for ourselves, and that dictates how we feel about difference. Unless we feel good about ourselves, and respect ourselves, we cannot feel good about others. Thus, most of the time, discrimination is the end result of basic fear and insecurity - fear of loss in all its forms, and, above all, fear of difference. For example, in the case of the radio ham, Don Imus, who was fired from his job, there has to be some self-doubt and low feelings of worth to call women who are trying to better themselves 'hos'. As Imus has proven, no amount of fine words and intentions in a policy will reduce that fear without the genuine will to change. And not from top-down either, but from the grassroots right up to the plush office of that detached executive in charge.

Big Brother's Unhealthy Secret Weapon

In a few days the Big Brother suspense will be over. The ever clamouring chink of cash tills would have been both swelled and silenced by the final dash to the telephones to acclaim the hot 'celebrity' favorite. The winner would have been decided and, in this case, the only surprise will be that the winner will not be White.


Shilpa Shetty has to win this competition for two main reasons. First, having been made the whipping-girl of the competition, if they took her out of the programme now, it will suddenly lose all its attention and revert to the boring reality sitcom it was. There will be little left worth watching. Second, Shilpa will be paid off for being in that position by getting the prize. Then everyone will be silenced by the charge that she won it, so all is well. But all is not well in reality land.

Channel Four was brought in with a remit for ensuring minorities were well served and championed in the programme output. Yet Channel 4 is behind such a vile programme purely for money and attention. The main questions are two: Where does it stop using someone as human fodder for entertainment purposes? And, even more disturbing: What message is Channel 4 sending out to all these youngsters watching the programme about bullying and, quite obvious, racist bullying of the worst, subtle kind.

Let's be clear about the nature of the bullying, in case anyone is still unsure. As race and diversity expert, I am saying categorically that the bullying Shilpa Shetty is being exposed to is racist, pure and simple. There might be obvious class allusions in it but to refer to someone's difference in pointed cultural ways, like calling her a 'pappadom', telling her to go back to her slums and other pointedly cultural differences is to be racist. Then to have this one person in the firing line who has no emotional support from someone similar to her, as her tormentors have, is disgraceful in a programme that has reached an all-time low.

The Biggest Weapon
With this kind of behaviour, the housemates are deliberately reinforcing the biggest weapon in Big Brother’s armoury to unseat contestants: an unhealthy and discriminatory dislike of difference! From the moment each set of new occupants take centre stage in the Big Brother house, the secret weapon comes into play. That is why those who were genuinely different, like Ken Russell and Leo Sayer, walked out early. If you watch all the Big Brother programmes, those who are most individual and quirky leave first and they usually include all the minority candidates. That's why we have reached the 6th series of Big Brother with not a hope in hell of Black candidate winning, except to be used for racist fodder. Only this time, they have gone too far.

A similar thing happened to Narinder Kaur in the second series who perked up the show tremendously, but did not last too long either. Narinder was beautiful, bubbly, bright forthright and confident. She proved far too outspoken, and too much of a threat to the other women, and the more vulnerable men, for her own good. As she complained in the diary room, they would not even pay her the courtesy of saying her name correctly. She wondered whether they had ever dealt with an Asian before. The mother of the main perpetrator, Helen, could not see what Narinder was whinging about. The fact that she dared to expect the courtesy of being accorded her correct name and revelled in being different made her presence untenable to the others (whose names suffered no such distortion!) and she was gone in a flash.

This is just an entertainment show, right? Harmless fun watching people naked in every sense of the word, baring their souls, their fears and their aspirations? Wrong. This surrealistic low-brow drama is primarily a reflection of our unhealthy prejudices and dislike of diversity and I wager £1 that no Black person will ever win Big Brother without suffering racially first. White contestants have the privilege of not going through that kind of disrespect and ignominy. But that White majority privilege ensures they can mete it out to others with impunity. That is the main problem with such a programme which seeks to be 'multicultural'. That very diversity is the key weapon for getting rid of each contestant.


Personal Power and Bigotry
One is never certain to what extent Black people, gays and others with that extra ‘obvious’ difference are preys to the personal power and bigotry of people who wish to exercise their prejudices. This makes nonsense of the pretence that all housemates have an equal chance of winning the money, and makes any other similar claims rather spurious. People tend to select in their own image, their own likeness, their own gender – unless that person has special appeal – and conformity to their own beliefs and values. When those are missing, difference becomes an irritant, instead of being welcomed. The cult of superiority then sets in as diversity loses its attraction and becomes threatening. It is only tolerated when the person involved deprecates themself, is entirely non-threatening or becomes the court jester so that every one can laugh at their expense.

Shilpa obviously valued herself much more, took herself too seriously, wanted to be treated with the respect she felt she deserved and was also too beautiful and rich for such a situation. That did not augur well with either her fellow inmates or the public. Yes, the public has played a huge part in the way this has gone. Notice how the attention increased the minute the racist slants began when they should have turned off their TV in droves. If this was a situation in reverse, where Black housemates were being pointedly racist towards their White colleagues, it would not have been tolerated on British television.


Channel 4 needs to decide whether it wishes to push bullying and racism as healthy forms of life in our multicultural community, to encourage prejudice among the population in a thinly disguised form of respectability while condoning subconscious malice, or whether it really wishes to truly entertain ALL of us, instead of a favoured majority who already benefit from the advantage of White privilege. This channel cannot have it both ways and the only way the public, especially minority groups can stop this disturbing charade is for decent, respectable people NOT to watch it anymore. Money talks, so hit them were it hurts. Most important, it is time for visible minorities to stop taking part in this cynical and manipulative programme that simply uses them as racist fodder to increase its revenue while the prize always goes to the racists themselves. That is so shameful, but can only be stopped by the participants themselves.

Big Brother 7 is now being auditioned. I trust it will be boycotted by all intelligent Black and Asian members of the public, depriving it at one stroke, of its oxygen of racism.