There are many conversations around the subject of inequality. So many days championing the cause. Huge marketing campaigns, high profile presentations and celebrations too.
The biggest noise, however, does not represent the life limiting inequalities we face in society. They are very much centred on and led by the privileged.
Privilege is powerful and used effectively can change the world for the better. But, when the conversation is purely focused on enhancing that privilege without acknowledging the existence of said privilege, it makes the problem worse, widening the gap in equality, creating further harm to society.
Over the course of history, the significantly underprivileged and most vulnerable have put their lives at risk to fight for equality. From the Underground Railroad to the Suffrage Movement to Pride to The Matchstick Strikes. Many of us are benefitting from their vulnerability and their fight. However, these truly life-limiting issues are still prevalent today. But the conversation feels like it has been hijacked, by the few for the few. Peers of privilege, aloft on their platforms calling for equality that isn’t for the many or for those most in need. In the UK we still have significant social disparity. Inequality of opportunity across all sectors of education, health, work and lifestyle, and it is growing rather than getting better.
Is this because the conversations are not answering the genuine call of need?
Presently, our most needed workers in society, health workers, care workers, education providers, frontline essential workers are striking for fair and safe working conditions. In the UK, sweat shops still exist. Slavery is a modern-day problem. Communities of people are excluded from educational and employment opportunities. Individuals are unable to access quality health or living standards. We have people we depend on, living in hardship, with no choice and no voice.
People really suffering from inequality.
How authentic are the conversations we see and hear centre stage?
Can a person/company stand on the stage and demand equality in the boardroom stood in an outfit made by a child in a sweatshop?
Can a person/company advocating for a four-day week, associate with people/companies that pay their workforce less than living wage, on gruelling shift patterns?
Can a person/companies/marketing agendas demand equal rights for privileged reasons whilst ignoring or abusing the most vulnerable?
I had to stop and think.
A care worker in UK care home earns, on average, £8.50 an hour. They work long physical days, night shifts and day shifts, on 12-hour shifts, sometimes turning into 20-hour shifts. Most care home workers are women, most did not benefit from a privileged upbringing, did not receive equality in education, or health, but had experience of caring from others due to needs in their own family. Without complaint, but with sacrifice, they look after those most in need; feed them, clean them, talk with them, hold their hand and are there for them in their last moment. Let’s not forget, they received very little PPE in the pandemic and get no support or remuneration from the multi-millionaires that own the care homes they work in. The same business owners that will use the equality platform for their own agenda.
Can we call for equality for the few at the top whilst the bottom are suffering from such injustice?
Today, the time we live, can we deliver true equality that protects many lives and not just the few at the top?
What will be our equality legacy?
Kind Currency was created because the world is messed up. We believe true equality is about focusing on those in need, and starts with gratitude. It is certainly not about greed.