I was introduced to inequality at junior school with a novel technique that every child should experience.
It was my first day in the top class of junior school: year 6 as they’d call it now. The teacher had joined the school during the summer break so there was an even higher level of nervous anticipation - no one knew what to expect from the new teacher.
We filed into the classroom and took our seats. The headmaster introduced the new teacher who then entered the room. This was our first chance to look her over. She was smartly but plainly dressed, had mid-brown hair which sat more upright than free-flowing. I don’t recall making a mental comment on her age at the time. That’s because to a 10-year-old anyone over 21 is “old” by definition.
She introduced herself as Mrs Hughes and began the first lesson with a reminder of the importance of the final year of junior school and a summary of what we’d be learning.
Less than five minutes had passed when the first reprimand went out. It was one of the usual troublemakers and the rest of the class thought this was just the usual stamp of authority. But the scolding concluded with a strange comment about the boy’s jumper, “It’s always someone wearing red, isn’t it,” said the teacher.
As the lesson progressed the reprimands continued and started being handed out for minor and more minor offences: playing with the inkwell cover, fidgeting, opening the text book without being asked. The children now being told off were not normally recognised as badly-behaved. I was as shocked as they were to see them singled out.
At each ticking off Mrs Hughes pointed out something red in the child’s clothes: a red t-shirt for one boy, a red hair clip for one girl.
Then it was my turn. Mid-sentence the teacher stopped and turned her gaze directly at me. It was so swift my brain hadn’t engaged what was happening. I thought I was being asked a question but the tone of her voice made me realise otherwise.
The crime was touching my hair. Mindlessly running my finger past my ear as I was lost in thought. Mrs Hughes then pointed out there was red in my jumper, just a flash of red in the logo, but that’s all that was needed to brand me a hooligan.
In my mind I hadn’t done anything wrong. And as the teacher continued to scold more children the logic clarified: we were naughty because we were wearing red. It was ridiculous. I thought about wearing a different colour jumper the following day and acting-up just to prove someone not wearing red could be unruly. That’s if I bothered coming into school tomorrow!
Within the space of 30 minutes I had gone from loving school to hating it. From feeling like part of an establishment to wanting to bring it down. That’s how quickly being treated unfairly disrupts your mental state.
It was once stated that a society is only 3 meals from anarchy. I was 30 minutes from revolution.
The lesson ended with Mrs Hughes placing her cards on the table. The lesson had been an exercise in inequality. Using red to distinguish troublemakers was unfair discrimination. Her prejudice of people wearing red created a bias against them.
Inequality was the subject we studied for the next few weeks. We learnt the meaning of words like discrimination, prejudice, bias and stereotype. We also had an interesting performance from a local feminist group.
This was the 80s and whilst sexism was a word commonly used I had not heard the word feminism.
Mrs Hughes took us into the school hall to watch what she simply described as a “performance from a local group”. I was expecting a play but got a rude awakening when the performers burst into the hall making a huge racket.
Three women and a man shouting loudly and one woman was also banging a drum. It certainly caught everyone’s attention but I honestly couldn’t make out what they were shouting.
Two women unfolded a banner; two sheets stitched together and in large painted letters it read: “woman = man”. I was intrigued because I recognised the equals sign from maths lessons. I had never seen it used like punctuation in a sentence. It made me think about inequality in a mathematical way. Specifically thinking of a chant girls and boys used in the playground.
During break times girls and boys tended to fall into gender-defined groups to play gender-stereotypical games. When these groups met there was a front of animosity on both sides, each blaming the other for encroaching on their part of the playground. Arguments would conclude with the chant of “girls are better than boys” and “boys are better than girls” being hurled in either direction.
The banner gave me an answer to all this posturing. We were equal. Neither argument was fair.
I was instantly hooked on equality and feminism as a means to drive fairness in society and beat down those who had artificially bolstered their own status in life.
Today I am dismayed by how people use words like stereotype, prejudice, bias and discrimination interchangeably. They don’t seem to realise they mean different things. In this age of emotion, people concern themselves with the feelings words conjure ... a group of words that all reference “something bad” must all mean the same thing.
Getting angry about inequality and using words inaccurately achieves nothing. To tackle inequality we must understand the thoughts and actions of others, for that we must be able to describe those actions, and for that we need precise words.