Empowerment

By John Talbut

< contents

25th November 2017

Be empowered, not PC, to avoid discrimination

The -isms, racism, sexism, ableism etc., tend to be considered separately. Sometimes there is even competition between them, like we must stand by our black brothers even if they are being sexist. Often the way of dealing with these -isms is by having rules – you mustn't say or do this, you must say or do that. These rules are referred to as being PC, “Politically Correct”.

All these -isms are all part of the same thing, discriminating against people based on them being different. This discrimination happens when people are oppressed. Oppressed people tend to lack genuine self confidence. They feel the need to compare themselves and be somehow better than others.

Oppression is a whole lot of things that coerce or brainwash people into feeling (internalising) that they do not have rights and choices that, in reality, they do have. In the same way they are made to feel that have obligations that, in reality, they do not have. This internalised oppression is something that people feel within themselves often without being aware of it. It is something that affects most people to some extent.

The more oppressed people are, the more they tend to feel that it is all right to behave badly to people who are in some way down from them. At the same time they will put up with being treated badly by people who are up from them. For example, some men will behave badly towards women in their own community but behave helplessly when dealing with someone who is better educated.

Persistently behaving badly towards someone is different. I call this persecution. Persecution can be oppressive, for example when accompanied by psychologically undermining the victim. On the other hand outrageous acts that provoke anger and resistance may not be oppressive.

The hierarchies of who is up and who is down, who is better than who, are complex and varying, they change with social attitudes. Taking one characteristic after another, gender, race, ability, sexual orientation and so on, training people to be aware of the issues and making rules for each case misses the point. Bullying can go on between people who are in all the same categories.

Being PC can also be oppressive. It treats whole types of people as if they need to be protected. This reinforces their status of being somehow inferior. An example of this is the use of quotas in employment. It is important to try to make sure that people are not being discriminated against because they belong to a certain set of people, e.g. women or Muslims However, people need to be seen to be in a job on merit and not in order to fulfil a quota.

This, I believe, happens because the people making these rules are themselves oppressed. They do not feel able to, or the need to, respect others equally regardless of difference. Indeed it would seem that some of them find discrimination acceptable and the rules are a box ticking exercise. The media that are in favour of discrimination use these PC rules as opportunities for ridicule.

Being PC also can be what is called rescuing. In an example of the “rescue triangle” the rescuer, being PC, “saves” a victim from their persecutor. The rescuer takes over and becomes yet another persecutor controlling the victim.

We should aim to be able to respect all people and relate to them as equal human beings whoever and however they are. This does not mean treating everyone the same, it means honouring difference and relating to each person in appropriate ways.

The route to doing this is through empowerment. To be clear, this involves helping people to to be more in their own power and to:

It is the opposite of oppression.

If we relate to others in ways that support them to be more in their own power this is respecting them as equals, not as being equally in their own power but as equally deserving to be in their own power. To do this we also need to address our own self empowerment.

After many years of teaching assertiveness I have learned how effective it is as a basic approach to empowerment. It has to be taught holistically, in other words the teaching needs to involve feelings, emotions and imagination as well as ideas and techniques. It also needs to be taught experientially, people need to learn from their own experiences of trying to be assertive – or not.

Assertiveness does involve putting ourselves first. What I have discovered is that the more that people genuinely put themselves first and act in their own power, the better they relate to other people. It does make sense, relating well to other people is putting ourselves first.

Consider the example of dealing with bullying. The PC tick box approach means that there is a procedure that someone who is being bullied is supposed to adopt. The authorities take over and the victim then becomes a victim of the system as well.

In an empowering approach, the victim is helped to be aware of all the possibilities that are available to them, including calling in authority as just one set of options. They are helped to develop skills such as assertiveness and self defence. And, most importantly, the victim is supported to make their own choices about what to do. And the same approach is taken to the bully, since their behaviour is also compulsive and powerless.

When people who are being treated badly try to do something about it, they tend to act in one of two ways. Many people try to move up the hierarchy of persecution so that they have control over the people who have been ill treating them. This is what PC rules are often about, they can be used to punish people who don’t obey the rules. However, people can always be treated badly by someone further up the hierarchy.

The other approach is empowerment. As people become more self empowered they move out of the hierarchy of persecution. They become more able to deal effectively with attempts to persecute them. And they become less inclined to persecute anyone else.

This is the way to go.