It’s hard to keep up
It’s hard to keep up. And I’m not talking about my pace on the trails. I’m talking about the news cycle, and how stories confirming the need for anti-racism work follow hard on the heels of each other, so there’s little time to breathe, take stock or respond.
If I was writing this three weeks ago, I could have focused on the parliamentary committee report that suggested working class white boys were underachieving because of the term ‘white privelege’, which is a whole new take on the ‘talking about racism causes racism’ argument.
The following week I could have been writing about the ignorant responses from well-known figures in the trail-running community to publicity for the fantastic Maverick/Ultra Black Running collaboration, simultaneously claiming and disproving the inclusivity of our sport.
Last week there was FINA, the world governing body of swimming claiming without irony that there was no need to approve a swimming cap designed for afro hair because there were so few black international swimmers. How out of touch does a governing body have to be not to realise the incoherence of that position?
Of course, last weekend, there was the immediate, entirely predictable racist abuse of black members of the England men’s football team, effectively sanctioned in advance by our own Prime Minister and Home Secretary refusing to condemn the booing of the players’ anti-racist actions.
Before we had time to process that, an article in Runner’s World highlighting the abuse an Asian American woman received while out running prompted another predictable round of dismissal and denial from white keyboard warriors who also happen to be readers of Runner’s World, and therefore presumably part of our ‘inclusive’ running community.
And that’s not to mention the tv news channel that apologised to its remaining viewer (who hadn’t boycotted in protest) for a presenter showing solidarity with England footballers’ anti-racism.
All of this makes it clear why communities such as ours are necessary. To provide support for those of us struggling to process this barrage of abuse and gaslighting. To continue to educate and work to improve real inclusivity and diversity.
What is also clear is that many would-be allies have a lot of work yet to do. On Monday, social media was awash with people expressing shock and anger at the racist abuse aimed at young black footballers. Anger was an appropriate response, but shock? How was this shocking? Black people watching the match on Sunday evening anticipated this as soon as Marcus Rashford’s spot-kick hit the post. We knew it for certain when Bukayo Saka’s penalty was saved. Rashford, Sancho and Saka knew it too. The following morning, our pain at the abuse was added to by the hand-wringing, and white-centring of those who claim to abhor racism but do little or nothing that is actively anti-racist. This is what the Home Secretary could rightly call gesture-politics.
We know it’s difficult. The more privileges you have, the harder it is to recognise them. But the more important it is to acknowledge them and use them in the service of those without. At Black Trail Runners, we think we’ve gotten pretty good at speaking and acting for the benefit of black would-be trail runners. We know we have much more work to do to recognise other inequalities and support other minorities and disadvantaged groups within the running community, including disabled people, indigenous people and Asian people.
Why does it matter to go beyond our own personal identities, to examine our own assumptions and explore intersectionality? Because inequalities perpetuate and amplify each other. A recent guest on our podcast, Jordan Marie Brings Three White Horses Daniel, put it succinctly: “You can’t have racial justice without climate justice. You can’t have climate justice without social justice or economic justice. It’s all interconnected...When you advocate for one, you advocate for the other.”
Yes, we’re advocating for would-be Black trail runners. We know we aso need to advocate for others who would benefit from our voice and support.
We’ve all got our own work to do, to use our privileges to help each other. Let’s keep doing it until inequality and discrimination is no longer news and the work is no longer necessary.