Let’s run a short exercise:
- If I tell you about someone, always dapper with their trilby and their swede shoes, who do you picture?
- If I talk about another person, happily chatting away about their bright blue manicure, who do you imagine?
- If I mention someone who has been suffering from paranoid schizophrenia all their life, what do they look like in your mind’s eye?
- What about the devout Christian who loves singing contemporary worship songs and is definitely in the joyful noise category? Can you visualise them?
- And can you conjure up an image of another individual, still mostly closeted and still suffering in silence for their homosexuality?
You now have 5 persons in your mind. Without thinking about it, you gave them an age, a gender, a skin colour.
Notice it all; write it down if possible.
Next, imagine these people as a group. Do they fit in together? Do they have anything in common? Do you think they would get on?
Write that down too.
And now let me tell you this: these are all descriptions of a single individual.
How does this disrupt your mental images? Can you reconcile the 5 statements into one person? What jars or feels dissonant?
What age, gender and skin colour are you giving them now?
That’s how unconscious bias starts. Nothing major, nothing intentional. Just the autopilot assumptions we make about someone, based on a handful of disparate information.
This individual is real, by the way: a wonderful, vibrant, multifaceted, complex human being.
A very dear friend of mine, and someone who taught me more about diversity and inclusion than any course ever could.
With their permission, I have used their example in training sessions often.
But today, I share it at the most poignant moment: farewell, my friend, may you rest in peace.
#EDI #DEI #diversity #inclusion #bias #unconsciousbias #mentalhealth #schizophrenia #LGBT #faith
