176. BURN IT DOWN - Why Elitist Institutions Can Never Be Inclusive

“those who cling on to the old ways things were need more than an appeal to their personally liking the old standards to maintain them. They need to explain why keeping the bias, and the inequality and lack of inclusion those biased standards cause, is more important to them than making things better.“

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151. INSTITUTIONALLY AFRAID - On The Importance Of Acknowledging Institutional Prejudice

“When we refuse, as Rowley has, to acknowledge the institutional nature - the structural nature - of the racism (and misogyny and homophobia) that permeates an organisation we are refusing to fully grasp the nature of the problem, or fully see what such prejudice looks and feels like for those who experience it.“

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147. NOT ALL GOBSTOPPERS ARE EVERLASTING - Why I'm OK With Changing The Words of Roald Dahl

“Don’t let the illusion of sole authorship fool you.  Published writing has always been edited by many and influenced by audiences.  If you want to read the unblemished, pure and unfiltered draft straight from the author’s mind and onto the page, read something self-published (like this blog…although I do tend to do a few drafts).  Anything else you read, assume there have been drafts, edits, alterations, corrections, and the input of many. The author, often, is a group of authors. Dahl is no different.“

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128. THE QUEEN IS DEAD - Long Live The King

“As Britain comes to terms with the loss of its longest reigning monarch, Queen Elizabeth II, who died on Thursday, I was struck by the immediacy of transition from Queen to King. In an instance the previous settled gender of certain phrases - our national anthem, ‘God save the Queen’, prayers within the Church of England asking to ‘replenish her with the grace of thy Holy Spirit, that she may always incline to thy will’, the pledges taken by members of parliament to ‘be faithful and bear true allegiance to Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth, her heirs and successors’ - had to update and adapt.“

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97. BLACK HISTORY MONTH - On Tackling My Continuing Blind Spots

“As it is Black History Month here in the UK I thought it would be worth remembering the most influential black philosopher in my own life so far - the young, black, A-level student of mine from about six years ago who asked me a simple question to which I had an embarrassingly limited answer: “are there any black philosophers?”“

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77. TIME TO EVOLVE ON GENDER - Why We Can't Ethically Support An Exclusionary Binary

“If you suggested that women should be barred from having the same rights as men because of their reproductive organs you would be laughed at or face a lawsuit for discrimination. We have overcome these old ways of thinking with technological, intellectual and emotional advances which have rendered the old narratives obsolete. Yet for some reason the myth of gender norms seems harder for people to shake despite the obvious failings of the binary male/female model.“

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68. ABUSIVE THEOLOGY - Why LGBTQ+ Students Deserve Better From RE

“As a teacher of RE, and head of RE at my school, that we RE teachers are supposed to give oxygen to such ignorant and discriminatory views in our classrooms – and treat their prejudice and hurt as something that is to be respected – is something I find an outrage.“

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