The Productive Pessimist

This morning, LinkedIn was being very Monday, very LinkedIn, not very demure, not very mindful. A woman, whose profile suggested she works in recruitment, responded, quite aggressively, to a disabled man asking why companies were still  engaging in discrimination against disabled individuals with: "Because disability is a liability, it costs money, and businesses can't expect to run up their costs to an infinite degree whilst tiptoeing around every single need people could ever possibly have." This isn't an isolated thought.  It's not often said out loud in the UK - but it always has been elsewhere in the world, and it very much is being shouted from the rooftops of the USA. And it's not just recruiters and executive leadership; it's ordinary people, meaning that, even with the most inclusive, welcoming, accommodating leadership, disabled people will still be encountering hostile environments courtesy of the able-bodied people they have to work with  on th...

  The recent riots and racially-motivated intimidation across the North of the UK, and in Northern Ireland, has shown one thing very clearly; that inclusion training and 'awareness' in the UK is failing. For those who have to live in a marginalised experience, especially where their marginalisation is very visible, this isn't news. It isn't a surprise. Even for white British people who face marginalisation because of disability, economic status, sexuality, or gender identity, the fact that "inclusion and diversity awareness and training" typically only makes discriminative attitudes worse . As an organisation working in inclusive practice, we at The Productive Pessimist are obviously very concerned both about genuine  inclusion, and the welcome and safety of all people who are able to behave with courtesy and open-mindedness to others, and about why traditional inclusion training isn't working. The primary issue we've observed is that traditional inclu...