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Report transcript in: Hameed taks about Racism
Please Report the Errrors?
Hi,
can I get you to introduce yourself?
Hi,
I'm Hamid Khan,
and I'm from Birmingham.
And my background is British Pakistani Muslim.
Thanks Hamid.
Hamid,
we're exploring
the stories of co-production,
particularly interesting hearing people from minoritized
communities.
What's your experience as
somebody from minoritized community in relation to co-production
that's working or doing co-production?
Well,
overall,
I'm a great believer in coal production.
I'm a strong advocate for coal production.
I think most places and most times coal production is done with good intention,
and it's inclusive wherever to whatever possibility it can be.
Sadly,
the true fact is that it can also be very exclusive,
or it can create barriers or
clearly outright be.
Show in some spaces be racist,
and I've experienced in some
arenas and some spaces in co-production
spaces,
clear racism
and sometimes racism is not so prevalent in your face that you can
put your finger on it and say this,
sometimes it's done in a very,
like they say this covert racism and overt racism.
Tell me about some of those experiences.
So I'll give you an example of,
I was involved with one co-production space,
and we were working on a project
together,
you know,
about co-production on something.
And I remember that I would say something
and it would get completely discredited.
Like
the person will look at their watch,
they will tap their pen,
they will say,
let's park that for later.
We'll come back or they will
make
almost discredited by that your value,
your view's not that great.
Exactly the same thing would be said by another member of the group
in different words,
and it'd be like,
Well done,
Jonathan.
I've just made up a name that's not a real name,
just made up a fancy name.
Well done,
Jonathan.
That is an absolutely great idea.
We think that would be,
and that was something that made me feel very
devalued.
Um,
I've seen other ways where people,
when it came to looking at cultural sensitivity
or looking at inclusiveness of other minority groups,
people have suddenly said,
oh,
it's not about
the equality on race,
it's about diversity.
What about the working class white people?
What about
the working class,
you know,
and it's almost like I'm not saying that those communities don't need to be.
Uh,
supported and but I'm here focusing on those who are very,
very clearly disadvantaged and are not represented,
and yet something else will come in.
And then I've said,
well,
you know,
for example,
we need to take into mind into account in this particular.
A project around cultural sensitivity and culture.
Well,
it's not just culture for black and Asian people,
even there's a football culture and working class white
community may have a football culture and it's almost like
taking you off the track of what you're saying.
And that,
that was very,
very something that would dishearten me.
Um,
I've had in a space where I know clearly I'm
just there because for the sake of their tick boxes,
but they're not interested in what I've got to say.
And every time I've spoken,
it's almost like just hang on there,
Ham,
we,
we'll come back to you.
Just wait for your turn and it's like,
well,
I've been waiting for 67 minutes now and I've had my hand up before
the two other people you've spoken before me and that kind of stuff,
you know,
and um
sometimes
you could be saying to me with a critical eye,
how do you know it's racism?
And how I know it?
Well,
first of all,
racism is like heat in the kitchen.
You have to feel it to know it.
And if you don't feel it,
sometimes it's very hard for you to understand it.
And I say to people,
racism sometimes cannot be
structurally explained or clearly defined.
It has to be felt.
It has to be
felt.
It has to be that you have to get into that
zone of somebody who's going through it to understand it,
and usually it's the derogative comments.
Is that
I remember once we were talking in coal production
about developing a a mental health service for people from
for all walks of life,
and I said,
what about,
oh we need to think about interpreting,
and one member of the group said,
this is a bit going backwards about 20 years old story,
I don't think they would get away with it now,
but they said.
Something like this.
Oh well,
if I was in India,
they wouldn't get an interpreter for me to translate for me in English.
So why is it so important in this country?
In another co-production meeting,
I clearly remember by the end of it,
I went on a long journey to a different city.
And um
so I won't mention the city just for confidentiality,
but I drove back 2 hours to another city
and I was there for a whole day in a coal production meeting.
And I remember saying to the the the organiser was very sweet and very kind,
and I said to the organiser,
I've been fasting all day,
and is it all right if I take some food with me because there's plenty of food left.
And I thought I'll have,
as I'll be on the motor when it's time to eat up on my fast.
And there was another member in the group who was quite a um.
Influential person in a in a management role,
and
as I was picking my uh bag up and um the food bag on uh he the person he said to me,
Is that for your family at home?
Have you got people at home hungry,
and it was almost said in a way that you would speak to somebody
who is 60 years ago who they used to refer to as
people coming off the boat or asylum seekers who are hungry,
but it's it's done in that derogative manner.
And I turned around and I said to him,
well,
actually I don't have a family,
this is me and my mom
and my mom has a special diet.
This is for me because I'm fasting and I've not had lunch.
You know,
and,
you know,
it's like he noticed that I've taken the food,
but he hadn't noticed that I hadn't eaten at lunchtime.
You know,
and
if he was kind,
whereas the other person,
even though they didn't say to me,
Oh,
take the food because you're fasting,
you know,
to eat on the way.
But when I mentioned it,
they were very warm and said,
oh please help yourself.
There's plenty of food there,
you know,
it's going to go to waste,
take it.
But this person was more focused on the bag that I picked up with food,
but I had not noticed I hadn't eaten while he indulged in a whole full plate of food.
I mean,
you talked about.
Like a historical one,
but earlier when we had our uh briefing conversation,
you talked about
this is
most of your experience,
this is happening every day when you're in co-production spaces.
How does that make you feel?
I,
I think that I would be fair and not say that it happens every day,
however,
it happens most places.
Something you pick up somewhere,
you know,
and.
It's not always the facilitators who organise the coal production,
sometimes it could be participants.
Because not all participants come with the same attitude.
Sometimes it could be in coal production,
you work in organisations in that
organisational culture is quite institutionally racist,
and that gets played out
in the,
you can feel it in the meeting.
And one particular project I was involved with,
I had said it 10 times to them,
please avoid having meetings on a Friday afternoon because Friday prayers for the
Muslim community on purpose they would always have it on a Friday,
last Friday of the month.
And they always used to have some excuse that oh we couldn't get a room,
oh so and so doesn't work on a Friday,
oh so and so
said they've got issues with childcare on other,
so it was almost like every other issue is more important
than the fact that you need to go to Friday prayers,
and that meant that I had to make a sacrifice by
not going to Friday prayers and be at these meetings,
otherwise I would have missed out and I would have
to wait another month and still be on another Friday.
So small things like that.
And
what?
You said that this happens quite often.
When you're in those spaces,
how do people react and respond when.
Um,
members or facilitators express
things that are harmful or racist.
Yeah,
I think Isaac,
I want to just again just emphasise because I don't want people to think
that coal production is
full of racist people or racism.
I think me and you both know that
there's a lot of good practise and good people in coal production,
and they are very,
very
strong anti-racist allies
in coal production.
And what I've done is give you a recollection of all the
bad practises or bad attitudes that I've seen in co-production of racism.
And kind of cluster them together
because I think it's really important that people don't walk away thinking
that
all coproduction spaces are racist.
I don't
say that,
but what I'm here to say is
where it does take place,
we have to
raise awareness,
nip it in the bud,
and
support people who may not know what they're doing is racist.
Sometimes people don't know what they're doing is racist,
and that's what our job is to say,
actually,
that is racist.
You know,
and that is racist.
So
I've had one person,
you know,
I remember men,
you know,
in this day and age,
said,
oh,
if you eat halal,
can you not bring your own packed lunch,
you know,
something like that,
you know.
Uh,
but not like,
oh,
we can cater for halal or on the alternative by saying don't worry,
why don't you
get yourself halal lunch and we'll recompensate you back.
It was almost like bring it from home or eat what we got on the table
or things like I made it very clear to people in the first meeting.
tell this another incident of another meeting
where I told the of the incident to this facilitators that by the way,
they bought the lunch in,
but they got the halal chicken
and halal beef
the food on the same tray as the ham because it was a meat platter.
And she said,
Oh,
we've got halal,
that's halal and said you can't have,
can you please ask them to put halal in a different tray and not with the ham and,
you know,
and
Even when I went to the next meeting,
it was the same caterers they ordered from and had done the same thing,
2nd time and 3rd time.
There was no more than 3 meetings,
I don't know if it would have happened 4 times,
but it happened
in 3 consecutive times that I was part of this meeting.
Yeah.
I I want
to go back a bit,
so
clearly not all spaces,
but lots of spaces
may have behaviours that you might challenge.
You talked about tick box being in spaces to be a tick box.
What did that mean?
Like,
explain that to me.
I I really want to understand.
I think,
I,
I think that,
you know,
what I would like to say very strongly that we are in 2023,
and I've given you examples from 2005
to up to date 2023.
So some things I may say and people think,
you know,
may say,
oh well that's a bit outdated.
Yes,
I'm not denying that,
but
sadly the whole of the United Kingdom has not progressed all at the same time.
There are still spaces
in the United Kingdom,
particularly in England.
There are,
there's a variance of
how
things are done in certain organisations.
There's organisations which are very progressive,
and there's some still organisations that are
20 years behind.
So what I would like to say to you is that I remember
one particular day I had to show as part of
um
um putting this proposal together,
this tender to get this funding
for a project
um
uh to design a mental health service,
they needed to show diversity.
And I wasn't selected because
I was skilled.
I was I had knowledge.
I could make a big massive contribution.
It was more about that,
oh,
in our documents and consultation and our tenders we can show we
have a Pakistani male Muslim from an inner city working class background.
He ticks all those boxes,
tick tick tick tick.
But when I was in those meetings,
the senior management just spoke between themselves and
Really didn't make me feel part of the team,
and it was almost like
you just be a puppet,
enjoy the free biscuits and lunch and have a cup of tea,
and aren't you so lucky that we're giving you a 20 pounds,
uh,
thank you,
uh,
what they call it,
uh,
remuneration
award,
um,
and you just be grateful with that,
even though we are all here on an 800 to 90,000 pounds
salaries and our daily rate is probably works at about 500,
600 pounds a day.
Um,
but for you,
you just be happy on the fact that we're giving
you a 20 pounds remuneration and a free lunch,
and you just nod your head like a nodding dog,
so we can say
that we had somebody who,
who agreed with what our proposal is.
And how does that affect you?
And how does that affect
the way you are?
I think,
you know,
I didn't become who I became today because you know me from a long
distance of the last 6 or 7 years on different various
platforms and forums,
but I think you got to know me very well in the last
2 years because of the work we've done through different forums and platforms.
That
my confidence,
my articulation,
my level of speaking very openly has come
with going through a lot of bad experiences.
And sadly I wouldn't want to.
I wish I hadn't gone through those
experiences,
but it's taken out the shyness for me.
It's taken out the,
the,
the,
the,
the hesitancy of,
I better not say that because it might upset someone,
I better not say that,
oh,
that people pleasing,
because I was a very big people pleaser to a
person who's now confidently says things as they are,
speaks very openly,
and
challenges
in a healthy way,
challenges
bad practises.
And tell me about
You know,
you mention this word,
anti-racism.
How,
what can we do to ensure co-production is more
anti-racist,
you know,
like
you said it wasn't all bad,
but
what,
where,
how can we make sure
organisations are
paying attention to the needs of minoritized communities?
I think that
I'm,
it's very sad that we,
we have to have something really bad happen for
us to get attention back on the anti-racist agenda,
like,
you know,
uh,
the case of Chris Carver and George Floyd in um
in the USA and many more like uh Lawrence,
Stephen Lawrence and all the,
you know,
things that happened and then suddenly,
oh,
we need to think about.
Anti-racism,
but I am
proud and I'm very pleased.
I have seen some very,
very proactive organisations that really kind of
Gone through their policies and procedures and their systems and their
staff and said we want to create an anti-racist
organisation and we're going to become a world class anti-racist organisation.
So I think we need to think about how can we develop guidelines.
This is something that's just come in mind.
I'm thinking out loud,
it just come in my mind,
whether we should create a little co-production forum
and we can develop guidelines on how to.
How to have an anti-racist coal production spaces.
Because we've done great guidelines on how to
user involvement,
coal production,
um,
uh,
patient and public involvement and engagement guidelines,
but we haven't actually got a clear set of protocol guidelines,
A for
a couple of pages,
clear key points that say
this is how you demonstrate that you're an anti-racist coal production space.
Because I don't think that people
are racist always
very clear with with intention.
I think there's a lot of racism that takes
place unintentionally because if you look at historically from
only 1967 that we've,
is it 1967 or 1.
5,
I might be wrong,
but it was only in the,
since the mid-60s that we've had actually the Race Relations Act.
So before that,
you could be openly dis people could be racist to you and without any
legal
law as a deterrent.
So when my father came to this country,
it was very clear where it would say on windows,
no dogs,
no blacks,
no Irish,
and my father remembers that he,
he came into the country,
he was knocking a few doors and saying,
can I rent a room?
And there were rooms to be rented.
And the person will say,
I don't have and look at the language,
the language tells you something here.
They will say to him,
sorry.
I don't hate packies,
but my neighbour will get upset if I have packies as my uh lodgers.
And you had,
you could not challenge that.
You could not say no,
but why?
What's wrong with me?
You just had to
smile and walk off and knock the next door or look for another room in another house.
And that's how clearly the race my dad remembers till this day,
going to public spaces
and they would just look at you and say you can't come in,
not because you've done anything wrong,
just because of your colour.
They would be like uh the example my dad gives was the picture houses,
they used to call them the cinemas,
and once every few months they would go to the cinema
and my dad said we just get
refused just because we,
you know,
in those days that was their day off and they would make a big deal out of it.
The suit and tie it was like a big thing for my
father's generation as young men.
And he said we were very dressed smart,
more than the white community,
really polished,
well
conducting ourselves,
and they would just say to us,
you can't come in,
and it's only because of our colour.
That thread of history and how history
is really important,
I wanted to bring us back to.
Um,
and if it's OK to
co-production,
and you said,
and
yes,
we've known each other and you,
your confidence has grown.
Are there spaces that you still feel?
Um,
it's
challenging or unsafe to raise.
Um,
when people are
being intentionally or unintentionally racist.
Yes,
they are.
And it all depends,
but I went to Cornwall
for a meeting and I couldn't believe it,
the,
the outright racism
that I saw
and very clearly,
you know,
I've also seen something very similar in Plymouth.
I saw something very similar
that I had experienced
in,
and I was shocked that,
you know,
in this day and age that it still happens,
but if you go up to Middlesbrough and
you know,
those kind of places really at uh
in the north,
and then
I also,
even though it's not in the England but in Belfast,
cos Belfast not very long ago that they had.
between Catholic and Protestants and there's
still tension just between those communities,
never mind another colour,
another race,
and you know that's just the same race but different religion.
Well,
not in a different religion,
different denominational religion,
Catholic and Church of England,
and you know,
in Belfast I had
experienced a very clear
Abusive racism when I was walking through a street
to get to my venue where I was staying the night.
So we're focused a lot on the production spaces,
but
clearly.
These experiences are in everyday world,
plus game production spaces.
Tell me about online cos
how do you deal with the online world and
the subtle side of kind of some of the stuff that you've spoken about?
I think online it's a bit more difficult,
difficult,
it's a different type of
racism that's something you could see,
like,
for example,
it might be that when you speak,
people are not paying attention
or you get people cutting you in,
or people just say that's not a relevant point,
we're running out of time,
or we just need to move forward or that,
you know,
or that's not,
that's not a relevant point for this meeting,
that kind of thing.
But also I think,
you know,
what I'm saying is not
something that is.
Uncommon,
I mean,
you know,
I won't mention the name of the organisation,
but an an organisation has done some really tense research and found
that
even professional staff
are facing racism in the workplace,
from their
colleagues,
their management,
and from their service users,
you know,
I'm talking about NHS like patients in this scenario.
So racism isn't just like
for people who are.
Underrepresented or people who are
not educated or people who might be services or carers or patients,
people can be at high senior positions and still face racism,
and those people may feel very
uncomfortable when they're right in senior
positions in co-production with senior people,
and yet they're a senior position themselves,
but they could be facing
racism.
And I think that's something that I need to emphasise that
racism for victims are not just people who are
uneducated or not articulate or vulnerable in society.
You could be in a in a very influential position and still face
outright racism.
Hm.
So
co-production often people will say it's
built on some called principles or values,
so
a mutual benefit,
for instance,
um
diversity.
Um,
inclusion,
all of those kind of things.
How does that fit with
these experiences,
like it feels
like
these experiences don't.
I,
I think that,
you know,
Isaac,
one thing we need to be very clear of.
That
not everybody's at the part of
understanding what coal production is.
We've been doing this for a long time,
and
only recently we've kind of.
Kind of crack the nut
that oh this is what it should be and this is how it should be,
not that it is.
So we still haven't got to the stage how it is,
we're still at how it should be,
we're still discussing that in spaces.
And for some people,
it is a very new concept,
they're very alienated to the idea of what coal production.
I've had people say to me and I've turned up and said
coal production is something like oh is that producing a film,
is it something to do with filming.
Uh,
and television,
it's something to do with drama.
I'm like,
no,
coal production means where you involve
people of all from,
you know,
to co-produce a piece of work or an activity or a policy,
which means,
for example,
I would say like if you're doing a mental health service designer,
you might involve patients or services who are going
to use that service to look at how,
what kind of service to design.
So coal production is not understood,
it's not like,
you know,
it's not like.
Like
Equality Act 2010 is very clear,
and people can pick it up and say,
right,
this is what the Equality Act is.
Coal production,
even today,
people have different interpretations of it.
If you get 6 people in a room,
they all have a different interpretation of what coal production means.
OK,
right,
so let's go with that 6 people in the room.
So what do the spaces of rooms that you go to typically look like?
Do,
are they
spaces that are diverse?
Are they spaces?
No,
I think predominantly when I go to spaces,
I find they tend to be very white,
very middle class,
very much people who are semi-retired or retired,
who have been in goods senior positions,
or,
or people who are not even been in a senior position but are from a white background.
Usually you find where coal production is heavily.
Black and Asian when it's to do with a black service or it's to do with an Asian,
so if they're developing say a black
African Caribbean service,
then they'll have like 20 black people in the room.
But we don't,
you know,
we,
we are not just experts in our culture,
or
we may have other expertise in other areas,
but then,
like when I worked in an organisation and this is co-production related,
is that
I would,
I,
I was more skilled and more competent and qualified than my
some of my white counterpart colleagues,
but when it came to.
The actual expertise of
what my job was.
Nobody was consulting with me.
I sat around the table and they weren't interested.
When it came to equality,
diversity type of
related issues,
they would look at me and say,
Well,
how,
what do you think how we could do this for the Asian community?
How do you think we could do this for the African Caribbean community?
How do you think we could do this for the black Asian minority?
And I'd be like,
I am a British Pakistani,
I am not the whole.
Continent South,
you know,
Asia.
I'm not the
global citizen of Black Caribbean,
African community and the South Asia.
So how come suddenly I'm an expert in all these cultures when I'm only
not even an expert in
Pakistani culture but
expert in a small region of Pakistan where my culture comes from,
you know.
Does that means it's like somebody I can speak for
a small part of Birmingham where I live,
but it's like you inviting me and saying,
can you speak for the whole of the United Kingdom.
I don't know what life's like in Cornwall.
I don't know what life is like in Devon.
I don't know how people feel in Newcastle.
It's that kind of feeling.
You think I am Asian,
but I'm not something an expert in all Asian cultures.
Yeah.
So clearly I misunderstood.
I thought you was an expert in everything.
Um,
so
what
do you hope for the future in terms of a more inclusive,
more.
Um,
Safe environment around co-production.
I think that we are progressing,
but
we cannot relax and say,
oh,
we've got to become even extra,
we've got to rev up the engines even more faster,
and really go out there and we need to
strongly form allies,
cos a lot of good practises out there in coal production,
there are a lot of amazing inclusive spaces
and like I said in the beginning,
they're not.
Not
all racism is done on purpose or deliberately,
sometimes the unintentionally,
sometimes it's in the policy and it's how it's played out.
Like I'll give you an example of the Friday afternoon meetings.
Uh,
I,
I've been to a coal production meeting where they
had a predominantly Jewish community come to this meeting.
It was in Manchester and they didn't
think about that they eat kosher meat and that their diet is,
they don't have food on the plate that's touched
non-kosher meat before,
even though it's been washed 20 times,
and they
expect these people to be hungry
and all they had to do was
look for a local.
A kosher provider,
the caterer and get the food in,
or the carang those individuals and said,
we understand you're from the Jewish community kosher food.
However,
we can't get kosher caterers.
Can you buy your own lunch and please bring it in
with a receipt and we'll reimburse you on the day?
It's not that difficult.
It's rock,
it's not rocket science.
It's better than
having people hungry to offer them that choice.
And that was in a co-production space
in Manchester where there's a high predominantly Jewish community.
So
sometimes,
you know,
I just think common sense is not so common,
and people don't always
do things on purpose to be deliberately racist or any kind of discrimination.
Sometimes it's the
fact that.
Common sense is not so common and they don't
think.
Uh,
with common sense,
or sometimes people are thinking about the average
majority and they forget the
minorities with
different additional needs
or requirements or.
Um,
you know,
cultural needs,
religious needs,
language needs,
and disability needs and all that.
So I think what we need to do is think about
creating a character,
and I always said this to someone,
because this one person taught me this,
it's not my clever brain,
but one person really taught me this and said,
Hamid,
whenever you do work where you want inclusivity,
think of creating a character in your head that's got every,
A different type of barrier that you could think of,
they're disabled,
they got,
they're blind,
they've got hearing impairment,
they use a wheelchair,
they're gay,
they are religious,
they are a female or a male,
depending on what genders you're looking at,
they are.
They have language barriers and then think about how can you create,
how can you meet all those needs of these individuals,
of this character,
and he said most likely when you get people coming forward,
you already have thought about
different additional needs that some of those people may have.
And I thought,
what a wonderful way of thinking,
because normally we think of the average.
We think,
oh,
OK,
we need a venue,
we're gonna get 30 people and then
suddenly requests start coming in,
oh,
I need a hearing impair,
I need a sign language.
Oh,
I need wheelchair access,
uh,
space,
oh,
I need
someone who can provide halal food.
Oh,
I,
and then we start thinking of all that,
and then we get our heads really clogged up because we have short space of time to get
all those needs met.
But if we start to create an environment and
book spaces and create events and create cooperation spaces for
that particular character that faces.
And all the kind of
Discriminations or barriers we could think of,
then we will create inclusive coal production spaces.
Yeah.
Can I ask you about,
so you talked a lot about
er cultural competency I believe um we would say you've talked a lot about that.
So I wonder about facilitation,
so how many of the spaces
that you go to um
have people that look like you
in in them as facilitators?
Um,
I think,
um,
people do look like me.
But very far and few.
I sometimes go when it's like me and maybe if I'm lucky,
there might be one other person of my colour,
not because of my culture
or my religion.
It just might be the fact that I'm from
Pakistan and they happen to be from India.
And if I'm lucky,
sometimes I go to space,
I'm the only person that's supposed to be representing every other.
Minority groups that you could think of,
and I think that we need to think about,
and I would say to people this I want to finish on this point also is that
before we move on to the next point,
is that what people don't realise that
not all minor people from black from ethnic minority background are
underrepresented because they're not able to.
Speak the language or they're not educated or they're deprived and they're
they're vulnerable or they're hard to reach.
We have a lot of black,
Asian minority ethnic communities
with
influential,
articulate,
highly educated people,
and yet they're not coming around the table.
That's where we need to think about how can we make it.
That's why I call it non-traditionally engaged groups because
I think like my mom is very marginalised.
She is from the underrepresented,
she doesn't speak the language,
she's got a disability,
she's
um a female,
she's Pakistani,
she faces all these underrepresentations.
But my siblings are all highly educated university graduate levels in jobs.
But they don't want to come to these sort of spaces,
and I always question why,
and they're like always boring,
why can you do this?
So we've got to think about how can we come across
to the wider community that coal production is interesting,
it's worthwhile,
it's valuable.
It's a long-term,
has an impact on making a difference,
because most people say well what's the difference it's gonna make,
nothing's gonna change.
We've got to change that,
we've got to show people
your involvement is important and there is an impact of that
by showing them the difference it makes.
So you,
you've talked a lot about
your role within co-production,
and the question I was
trying to pose,
and maybe I didn't do it so well,
is that people that are convening co-production and
setting up these spaces and groups,
the facilitators,
the
um
people that are doing social care,
the people that are doing research,
are they from,
um,
you know,
minoritized communities,
like how is that?
Playing out in this space.
I mean,
sometimes,
I mean sometimes you do get people from archized
groups who are in jobs to do coal production,
but very far and few or sometimes
you find that they tend to be more in coal production spaces where it's very
specific to do with a certain culture.
So if they're looking at setting up
about female from South Asian community,
then you'll find a few
people who are facilitators from that community
that happen to have jobs in that role.
But most times it's not always the case.
And sometimes,
even if you are from that community,
but if the organisational policies are very
institutionalised and there's racism in the policies,
it's very hard for you to challenge a whole system.
If
rather than you challenge the system,
you become part of that system,
it's almost like
you're kind of without even realising,
demonstrating racist practises
without even knowing because that's how they always done
things in that organisation or in that co-production space.
Mm.
So
thinking about the systems of co-production.
Are are you saying that some of these systems
are structurally racist or?
Yes,
and we can't,
uh,
that's not my words.
That's clearly
been shown through
many,
many research projects,
even through the Equalities,
uh,
Rights Commission.
I think they used to call the Equality Human Rights Commission.
And before that,
the race relation,
um,
what was it called,
the Equality Commission and all those different
organisations we've had over the years,
and even till today we know
that that's not me saying it,
that is very clear.
That's why they developed after Chris Carver and George Floyd,
that they created
a race equality impact assessments and,
you know,
not policy,
um,
a framework on how to become an anti-racist organisations.
And,
and.
What do you say to those people that
Because there are people in the world that
disagree that systems are structurally racist or.
I just say
it must be quite comforting for you to think that
either you're not,
you don't,
you're not,
you're not experienced it because you're probably from the supremacy,
you know,
the white supremacy type of
privileged background,
because we know research shows that if you happen to be
white
and you happen to be
um from middle class background,
you're in a very different position to
somebody who's black from inner city working class
poverty background.
So that's why also I think people find comfort in denying that.
I mean,
my dad for many years,
many years would say I've never faced racism.
You know,
he didn't really understand the concept because he always thought
I must keep my head down,
I must be really appreciative of the fact that I've been let into this country
and I can earn it pounds and I can go and work in a factory.
And I should be grateful.
And we grew up in saying,
look,
it's their country,
you know,
it's OK when they get on the bus if they give you actually let them have the seat.
It's OK,
you know,
if somebody pushes you in your dinner queue at school because it is their country.
It's only when we grew up and we went to college and university,
we started to talk to our dad and he then started.
Open up and realise that
how much racism he has faced very openly in his face,
but I think he found comfort in feeling,
oh,
it doesn't exist.
It was almost a way of surviving the trauma of
racism by denying the fact that he'd been through racism.
So he would have
put it down to the fact that,
oh,
they didn't like me.
Not because I'm Pakistani,
not because I'm Asian,
not because I'm Muslim.
They just didn't like me as a person or that person just had an attitude on that day,
or that person maybe,
you know,
he would,
he found comfort in making excuses,
but when we grew up and we started to talk about it and we weren't going to put up with,
when I say we,
my,
my siblings and me,
we weren't going to put up with the racism our parents put up with.
He started to to realise how much racism he had gone through in his.
Coming to this country prior to the Race Relations Act 1967
to to
up to,
you know,
recently when he,
I think the first time we had this conversation,
our dad was in 1996,
so from
36 to 196,
he had talked about all the racism that he had gone through,
but it was more for him to think he didn't go through racism.
Mm.
It was always more a way of blocking the trauma.
Yeah,
really
profound that feeling and sense
that this intergenerational.
So I just want
to,
to call out something because I think it's important that we call this out
in this space.
You,
you said it's really important that when
as a person from a minoritized community,
when talking about racism.
That you talk about it in a particular way,
why is it important to talk about it in the way that you've spoken about it,
cos I know you're really passionate about.
Not blaming and
not shaming and.
I,
I'm,
I'm not,
um,
sorry,
I,
I'm not afraid to.
Shame in a very positive way,
not in a way it's like I'm shaming you
because you're bad and you're terrible and it's awful,
more like
I'm shaming you in a way to help you and support you to
think about how you can,
you know,
get rid of these stereotypes or get rid of this racist attitude
because you might not even realise that what you're doing is racist.
So in that sense I'm not afraid.
Um,
sometimes I'm not blaming the individuals,
sometimes people get caught up in the system of racist.
or the culture of the organisation of racism or and it's about
raising awareness to say
actually you're in a good position because you work in that organisation,
you're part of that culture to say hang on a second,
this is actually disadvantaging certain communities because it's actually.
Showing it's actually
a way of being racist because this puts this this community under um in a,
in a,
in a,
in a disadvantaged position,
and that's what I want to do.
I want to create,
I want to have to be able to be vocal to support people
to
look at how it's about what's the right word.
I want to change people's hearts and minds to become anti-racist,
that's the right word.
What's your own journey with um racism being like in terms of.
You know,
your own learning and your own experiences.
Um,
what's been my experience of racism?
I think,
sorry.
Sorry,
please repeat the question.
Yeah,
I lost you,
the,
the internet cut a little bit.
What's your own journey around learning about anti-racism being like?
What's been my journey been like with racism?
I think it all depends on which area you're talking about,
you know,
I came in this country in the 80s,
84,
and at that time it was very clearly,
you know,
we were told not to go to certain areas and if you went there,
you saw the skinheads,
uh very clear,
you know,
outright racism in your face.
And then I saw racism,
where
law was weak,
like it was there but really wasn't really taken
seriously and people were racist in the workplace.
I remember one manager saying to me,
Oh,
you know,
tough,
you can't have a lunch.
I said to him,
Well,
is it possible?
instead of giving me a lunch break between
12 and 1,
can I have my lunch between 1 and 2 so I can run to the mosque and do my Friday prayers?
And he said,
no.
You know,
work is work,
and um that is a shift that you're on and if I did that for every person,
and you know it was that kind of straight attitude,
racist,
you know,
he said,
I be religious in your own home but not in the workplace.
Whereas now it's great,
the world isn't like that,
you know,
you can now have your religious needs met
and people will accommodate your religious needs.
So I remember to that level,
you know,
racism in my face on the grounds of religion or,
or
I had one person who say to me things like,
oh,
your food really smells.
Oh,
it stinks.
It didn't stink.
It was spices and you know,
it was a food that people go out to eat Indian takeaways.
They love the Indian takeaways in the restaurant,
but they had an issue.
This individual.
Had an issue with my
food in the workplace,
but the other chapter was bring a fish and chips in
and smelling the space out of fish and chips.
Um,
and,
you know,
somebody would open a pack of crisps like smoky bacon.
That smell didn't bother him.
But as soon as I would have a samosa,
nothing even
too codified,
suddenly it was a big issue,
you know,
it was a big issue.
So what I was asking me to.
And you've given me so much,
and you made me smile when things about the fish and chips.
Um,
and I could smell the vinegar and I could smell
the coffee and all of those things I love.
Uh,
this is a really serious subject,
right?
So,
I'm trying to explore with you
what's your own learning journey been like around anti-racism,
because a lot of people may never have come across the word anti-racist or
even started to learn about this stuff.
What's been my experience around anti-racist?
Your learning journey.
So like,
you know,
you,
you've used lots of words like anti-racist and you Yeah,
I think that I've been fortunate that I've been working
in forums and arenas where we talk about equalities,
we talk about
discrimination.
We are there to create inclusive
space that we are a voice for the voiceless.
That's why my learning journey's been quite positive
that I've had an opportunity to learn.
And don't get me wrong,
I had a lot of stereotypes.
I've had a lot of,
um,
you know,
biases,
conscious biases,
but I'm very fortunate that I've been challenged or I've challenged myself,
and over the years I have changed
and I've become a better person,
more inclusive,
but sadly not everybody gets that opportunity.
To really,
some people get more comfort in believing what's not,
what's full of nonsense,
because that's what they've been told and that's what they believe,
you know,
and um.
But
my learning journey has been quite lucky that I've worked in organisations.
I've worked in jobs and I've worked in spaces,
and I've
been an advocate.
I've done volunteering and I've done campaigning.
I've been an activist all my life
looking at challenging
all types of discrimination,
not just racism.
Have you got any final food,
uh,
final
words or final thoughts that you wanted to um share with me?
Yeah,
my final words would be that,
you know.
Coal production is cool.
Coal production is meaningful.
Coal production is a way
forward.
However,
don't be shy to challenge racism in coal production spaces
to make it inclusive and make it
meaningful and have it that it's
coal production is for everyone.
We've got to make it inclusive by challenging
racism and any other forms of discrimination,
not just racism,
but because this
today we're talking about race and we're emphasising on challenging racism,
but I would say
any kind of
discrimination that oppresses people is not
acceptable in coal production environments.
Thanks.
I haven't got any questions for you.
Do you have any for me?
I think it's been great that we've had an opportunity
to reflect and talk and a space to think,
and um I hope that
people will see our recording when they watch this from a positive point of view
that we're not criticising with progressing and
we won't be seeing this as a progressive
discussion around how we can make it.
Anti-racist coal production environments.
Thanks mate.
Absolutely.
I'm gonna stop the recording there if that's OK.
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