"Perhaps the problem isn't the message, but rather the messengers" sums up this piece for me. What people do with the knowledge about unconscious bias that reinforces inequality rather than remove barriers to fair and equitable treatment of all (and making billions within the industry that may not actually promote beneficial change) is the issue. Thank you for another thoughtful exploration of a hot topic!
That's exactly it — instead of removing barriers, there seems to be a reinforcement of inequity that comes out of a lot of the approaches within the training. There are some efforts I've seen that are more focused on the former and I think they are wonderful and much more effective.
I agree - there are some great initiatives that are borne from communities based on their understanding of the needs and what will be most beneficial. Overall, the problem lies in organisations that see an opportunity to exploit a social problem, institutionalising the 'solution', using their growing influence across industries to sell their service without accountability to have a beneficial impact...only to reinforce status quo. People making assumptions about what an individual knows, how they think and that they're automatically racist because of their appearance isn't going to fix the problems that emerge from the same lazy thinking process.
"Perhaps the problem isn't the message, but rather the messengers" sums up this piece for me. What people do with the knowledge about unconscious bias that reinforces inequality rather than remove barriers to fair and equitable treatment of all (and making billions within the industry that may not actually promote beneficial change) is the issue. Thank you for another thoughtful exploration of a hot topic!
That's exactly it — instead of removing barriers, there seems to be a reinforcement of inequity that comes out of a lot of the approaches within the training. There are some efforts I've seen that are more focused on the former and I think they are wonderful and much more effective.
I agree - there are some great initiatives that are borne from communities based on their understanding of the needs and what will be most beneficial. Overall, the problem lies in organisations that see an opportunity to exploit a social problem, institutionalising the 'solution', using their growing influence across industries to sell their service without accountability to have a beneficial impact...only to reinforce status quo. People making assumptions about what an individual knows, how they think and that they're automatically racist because of their appearance isn't going to fix the problems that emerge from the same lazy thinking process.