We must save the middle-class from "oppression."

This blog intends to ask critical questions of the contemporary and practical use of the term "oppressed" in UK Universities that I find incredibly fascinating. "Oppressed" is defined in the Oxford Dictionary as "subject to harsh and authoritarian treatment." It is worth holding onto that definition as we undertake a class analysis of the practical use of the term by different groups in the UK. 

In this blog, I will draw attention to how "oppression" as a term is used more by the middle-class than by those on the margins of society such as prisoners, for example. I do not make a claim to provide any certain answers about the disparity between how the educated middle-class and those who reside in our overcrowded, understaffed and poorly regulated prisons talk about the world and their experience of it. However, as anyone who has ever read any of my blogs prior to this one will know, it is also intentionally aimed at providing a provocation. I currently work in a University teaching criminology to under graduate students, so it is incumbent upon us as educators to encourage people to step outside of their comfortable thinking box and engage with unorthodox ideas and uncomfortable questions. I am nothing if not heterodox, a term defined as "different from or opposing what is generally accepted, such as beliefs, standards or traditional forms."

Again, most who have read my previous reflections will know, I spent most of my childhood and young adult life in care, on drugs and in and out of prison. I would describe growing up in a single-parent household like mine as poverty stricken, chaotic and traumatic. However, I've done alright for myself beyond all of that, and although most of my family members have found themselves stuck in the intergenerational cycle of poverty, social care interventions, prison, drugs and a constant life of crises, I'm blessed to have a stable, middle-class lifestyle and work in the middle-class environment in a UK University. I'm even doing a PhD. I know, right. I still eat pot noodles as I often did in prison. When you have to live on £5.50 for a 30 hour working week, pot noodles are like caviar. Yep, some traits die hard. You can take the lad out of poverty and prison, but you can't deny a good Bombai Bad Boy. Anyway, I do digress. 

What this blog is really about is what I see as a gap or disparity in the world view between individuals in prison - including children - and individuals who work, and at times those who study in UK Universities. I have this fascinating current situation whereby I'm currently working in both environments, and observe some significant differences in how both of these contrasting groups talk about the world they live in. You see, on campus, I often hear that staff and students are "oppressed" due to their sex, sexuality, gender identity, race, ethnicity or religion. Furthermore, they are often "oppressed" by white culture, through the mechanism of "whiteness." An abstract structure which formulates a culture that alienates anyone or anything not viewed through the prism of normative as it is not "whiteness." Of course, most well articulated folk would say its not white people, but "whiteness" that creates and maintains the oppressive social system. Most folk grounded in common sense and people who don't talk about humans in such an abstract way know that it's all enshrined in ideas of coloniality and colonisation, which is because this world view believes that the UK is and has always been "oppressive" towards any groups who don't fit the white, male, heterosexual, elitist and white supremacist profile of what is socially acceptable. There is inevitably some truth to this within history, which is why this philosophy is so attractive to use for those who aim to explain inequality or disparity of outcomes between differing groups. I personally don't buy into this world view in contemporary Britain, drawn from post modern literature of viewing the world through a simplistic lens of "oppressed" and "oppressors." If you have any knowledge of the influential but controversial scholar Karl Marx's work in the mid-1800s, it is also not really original analysis. 

However, debating about whether these epistemological perspectives are accurate or not is not the reason I wanted to write this piece. I spend my Wednesday evenings volunteering with children or young people between the ages of 16 and 18 - of all races and backgrounds - in a Young Offenders Institution. I ask them in the beginning of my 11 week programme why they think they ended up in prison and what services could do to prevent other children following their footsteps. The idea and objective is to give the children space to believe that their ideas can help other children with the hope of instilling self belief in them, that they are really "good kids" and more than just prisoners who made poor choices. I find it absolutely fascinating that these children and young people - literally living in prison - never use words like "oppressed." They do not say I'm here because of some historic event that happened hundreds of years ago. They do not say, "I grew up in a system of 'whiteness' and that if we could abolish whiteness I may have had more opportunities and not ended up here." They are always quite clear, that they got involved with the wrong crowd, that their parents let them down, or that their behaviour was just too much for their parents, school or social care to manage. Interesting, eh? When poor and socially excluded kids end up in prison, from their perspective, it's often them or those closest to them who are mainly responsible. However, a privileged student at University doesn't get the grades they believe they should, or grades that are not commensurate to another kid in another group, or an Associate Professor doesn't get that Professorship they believe they are 'entitled' to, its system "oppression" grounded in coloniality - make that make sense?

I absolutely know that many will believe this dichotomy is because the kids in prison are just "uneducated" and do not see the bigger picture of the "oppressive" system of patriarchy, coloniality or whiteness. That if they stayed in school, read more, then they'd understand that colonisation resulted in capitalism and hierarchies that alienates them, and that poor white people as well as minorities can and are victims of "whiteness" and the "white supremacist system." Something I've been told is a causal factor for my own care experience and incarceration since I arrived on campus. Whether I agree or not doesn't seem to matter, apparently. This is probably because this middle-class, educated and elitest philosophy is so solid and unquestionable, that if you disagree that you are indeed oppressed, you're probably not educated enough to understand. The irony, right. No, nothing to do with all the perplexed and dysfunctional adults who raised me, abused me and introduced me to crime and drugs. It was always Margaret Thatcher & co after all. Thanks for the heads up! 

The issue with this world view from my perspective is that most working class people, both white and black that I know personally don't agree with these abstract concepts that are rolled out regularly by the educated on any campus and have become somewhat mainstream, at least in the Higher Education sector. Indeed, there is a complete disconnect that is developing in the world view of the educated managerial-class in the UK and the working class. This is just a micro example, albeit an extreme one. Rob Henderson in his memoir from poverty to an Ivy League University in the US and book titled  'Troubled' defined these elitist ideas as "Luxury Beliefs." He defines them as "ideas or opinions that confer status on the upper class at very little cost, while often inflicting costs on the lower classes." 

Having grown up poor and in diverse areas in Leeds, spent years behind bars and addicted to heroin, I find this world view disparity just as alarming for inequality than any disparity of outcomes between different groups, whether social, economic or educational. If we have a social system whereby the educated, managerial elite claim to be "oppressed" by the "system" while the incarcerated and socially excluded make no such claims, surely we have to consider what the implications of this disparity is likely to be for those on the margins and who's benefitting. Indeed, if we care about these groups on the margins as much as we care about virtue signalling and cosplaying at victimhood, maybe we should at least reflect on whether we are speaking about them, to them or with them. 

From my observation, if we want to help those on the extreme margins of society, we need to stop talking and do more listening. Otherwise, we will find that we are contributing to their social exclusion, claiming that they need the system to change or to read a bit more literature for their circumstances to change, while we benefit from social mobility as a result of the choices we make. I'm personally not on board with that philosophy, simply because it is not grounded in my own lived experience and doesn't help those navigating the hard edges of society to take ownership of their life circumstances. In fact, it is likely to disempower them. There are 101 reasons that many of us have barriers and hurdles to overcome, but "oppressed" in the UK? Especially when we work or study in middle-class institutions like Universities. Maybe the middle-class can learn a little from the incarcerated children who seemingly just 'get on' with it without claiming victimhood. I listen to them talk and compare it to what I often hear on campus and understand that this exactly what Henderson conceptualised as "Luxury Beliefs."

I did say I aim to provoke thought : )