Geographically and Culturally Diverse
You may remember from last year images of the crowded beach at Durdle Door, a Dorset beauty spot. With overseas travel curtailed, many UK citizens took the opportunity to explore their own countryside and coastline when lockdown permitted, with many destinations much busier than normal as a result.
Last month the Lulworth Estate, which manages Durdle Door, launched a petition to get support for promoting the country code, and issued a statement that blamed ‘geographically and culturally diverse’ visitors for environmental degradation. Whatever could they mean? If there’s a problem with littering and illicit barbecues, just say so. When you blame the problem on cultural diversity, it’s both a ‘keep away’ message to people of colour and a dog-whistle to those for whom the British countryside is best preserved in 1950s aspic, with brown and black people staying in their inner city estates.
Of course, some will say this reaction is a result of over-sensitivity, that ‘culturally diverse’ is just an innocent phrase, which may be unfortunate, but was not wielded with ill-intent. It’s not like the US basketball commentator blithely using the n-word during a racist rant in the latest hot-mic incident. We have seen much of this kind of plausible deniability and gaslighting in the ongoing “Meghan vs the Press” soap opera. Comments were misinterpreted, or offence was not intended, or it was a one-off incident, or talking about it is worse than the original act and we should all move on. Anything except acknowledge individual racist acts or systemic racism. Anything except face up to the fact that UK society continues to treat black people differently to white people.
A study by researchers at King’s College London published earlier this month showed that one in seven of the UK population believed that black people were more likely than white people to have lost their jobs during the pandemic because they “lacked motivation”. Another 4% of people believed it was because they lacked intellectual capacity. That’s right, 1 in 25 of your fellow citizens believe black people have less intellectual capacity than white people. In 2021.
The Football Association reported a 53% increase in reported racial abuse during the 2019/2020 season. This despite much of that season being played behind closed doors.
Yesterday The Observer published research that showed a wide gulf between black people and white people in the perception of race relations in the UK. According to the survey, more than half of black Britons believe race is not talked about enough. Less than a third of white Britons agree, while a quarter of white Britons think race is talked about too much. Perceptions of how black people are treated by various institutions – the police, the health service, government – were similarly divergent.
What has this got to do with trail running, you may be asking. Well, the trail running ‘community’ is part of our wider society. It is not somehow separate from it, populated only by models of liberal virtue. And even if it was, ignoring the inequalities and discrimination in wider society enables their continued existence. It is not enough to be non-racist; it’s necessary to be anti-racist. Ignoring the problem is part of the problem.
Next time you or a running buddy suggests their club or the running community is inclusive, take a moment to consider whether it really is different to the wider society of which it is a part. Is trail running merely tolerant of diversity, or does it openly seek diversity out and celebrate it? If the latter were true, Black Trail Runners would cease to be necessary. Until then, we’re here, working, campaigning and representing.