A View from the Editing Suite

Black people in white majority countries are taught from a young age how unacceptable their full selves are in white company. I dare to add that if you're Gay as well then you often lack access to the Black community's support. A deference for white people is the insidious norm- even when families teach their children to be wary of white authority whether awarded or assumed. As example, I was abused by a nasty white woman with her brood, one of which I caught green-handed having reached over my garden fence to yank off a hunk of the clematis growing there. Despite the hideous female repeatedly calling me a "stupid fokkin' cont' at the top of her lungs, she, of course, reported to the police that she and her children where confronted by a big, frightening Black man and, the rest is history. - Of course they took the word of a semi literate mother (of three kids by three men) over that of an articulated and educated BLACK man. It is such a cliche it is almost funny.

My awareness of the social editing I'm talking about goes right back to my parents' arrival in UK sixty years ago. My mother had to adjust from a life where she had academic qualifications,  status and material comfort, to washing dishes in a department store kitchen whilst my father dropped from a policeman to working for London Transport- until he lost his temper and SIX policemen were called to subdue him and lost his job.

My mother had clear plans for me which included me going to a grammar school before studying medicine or law at university and looking after her until her death. She went to odd lengths like giving me elocution lessons so that I would not stand out too much even though I was one of less than a handful of Black or Asian pupils. Standing out is an enduring experience for me: not only have I often been the only or one of a few people of colour in a situation, I spent much of my life being taller and bigger than lads my age.

By the time I was a teenager it was already important to me that when people singled me out, they saw something that I consciously created i.e. MORE than (just) a Black guy. I experimented with my hair, I wore coloured streaks, I relaxed it, had extensions and created uncommon (lol) hairstyles which were all my own! I loved fashion though I could rarely afford to spend much on clothes! But when I did, I chose clothes of interest and variety which were rarely what was in vogue at the time. And then, once they were looking at what I had constructed of myself, my voice would usually finish them off- they rarely expected the clarity I could produce.

All of that DID get me into leadership/management positions. Problems started when I realised I was often still the lone Black person. I sometimes felt "tamed", certainly restrained. I found myself working for people who declared "excitement" at my appointment and then spent all their energies reigning me in. The hardest thing was to realise that to some Black people, what I was doing was "trying to be white"!!! Whilst I was angered and shocked by that, once I'd calmed down I saw how they had concluded that. My articulacy was derided as "talking white". I was very aware of how 'lucky' I was to have achieved what I did achieve- of having had more opportunities than most poor Black lads in 1970s & 1980s London- thanks mainly to my indomitable mother. I was always eager that other people without social and economic connections could gain the kinds of opportunities I had secured, advocacy became central to my practice.

Advocacy is tricky: I get passionate about the people for whom I am advocating- especially when they're being underserved because of procedural BS or willful ignorance. I have to curb my passion to present to polite, well-eaning, (usually) middle class (usually) white people (usually women) who react badly to open commitment. Some of my most painfully frustrating experiences have been when I've worked for Boards of Trustees/Directors who were either disconnected from the people the organisation served or who couldn't actually care what was happening so long as they could include their Board membership in their media profiles. I remember thinking how strange it was to work for the Regional Development Agency in an open plan office with about 100 other people yet the atmosphere was almost sepulchral. I commented that were the agency in a Caribbean or African context, the ambient volume level was very likely to have been MUCH more whilst delivering comparable (at least) outputs.

My latest issue is with fostering services- I will be interviewed (eventually!) by a bevvie of well-meaning, White, middle class, middle aged, straight women who are already freaking out because I am (to them), an indiscrete homosexual. What they see as indiscretion and sexualisation, I experience as freedoms for which I have been instrumental in developing for Black Gay men in this country. I remember when any hint of same sex appreciation- it didn't have to be in ANY way sexual, could land you in a world of hurt. The fact that today I can appreciate male physical beauty is liberating and- in my opinion, as it should be. The thrice-delayed interview will happen online next week- unless they find something else over which to rearrange their knicker elastics. I was chatting to someone online about it who noted my picture over my shoulder of Idris Elba and another actor in a shirtless embrace. I had a fierce debate with myself about taking down the picture or moving it out of shot etc, but it seemed wrong. -It would be lying to them in a way and in any case, if they need to be challenged on their preconceptions, I am prepared to do that even if it renders me ineligible to join their carers.