Social class prejudice is alive and well in the UK PR and creative industries - and how it can be overcome

My efforts as a child to start a fashion of one collar in, one collar out, never did quite catch on.

But one thing that has lasted is a deep sense of facing social class bias, matched with a determination to tackle social injustice on a wider scale – which has led to a special free event, ‘We ain’t victims: Social Class bias in Britain today: the Cockneys’ stories’ at 5.30pm, Tuesday March 28th at The Hickman Building, Four Communications, Whitechapel.

It’s part of the Modern Cockney Festival (March 3rd to April 4th) exploring how we can reclaim, recalibrate, and reboot a Cockney self-identity based on positive, inclusive values fitter for purpose in the 21st century to help people and communities overcome adversity and come together better.

Social class bias is double-edged sword with the negatives of fewer life choices, barriers to aspiration and ambitions, and the constant reinforcement of ‘you don’t belong here’.

Yet, at the same time, it can equip those who experience discrimination with greater resilience, drive, and backbone to stand up for themselves.

Looking forward to joining a panel of inspiring speakers, along with a Festival poet, who will be sharing their experiences and wisdom including Jessie Brooks Tom Armstrong Danny Heath , Cornelius Alexander FCIPR, Founding Chart.PR Kerry Sheehan Stuart Baird CIPR Fellow and Festival poet in residence Tim Wells.

Free tickets for the event can be booked here: https://socialbias.eventbrite.com?

What’s your experience of social class bias in the PR industry?

Here’s the story of the little boy in the picture.

I was just nine years old. The teacher hit me around the head. All I did was call out the number assigned to me for my East End primary school class registration.

I had recently changed schools and was given the last number in the class.

“Green! It’s th-h-irty th-h- re-e!” my teacher yelled in my ear. I hadn’t realised but I spoke with a Cockney accent, and I was being scolded for not speaking proper, not pronouncing ‘thirty three’ properly.

Fifty plus years-on. The incident still resonates with me. Not for any physical pain I experienced. Rather it was the first alert that my life ahead was going to be marked out by people defining me by a label that would inspire certain judgment calls, prejudices, and biases.

Although I like to think I’ve done well for myself in life, I can reflect on certain negative challenges from how others , like my primary school teacher, chose to define me.

As far as I am concerned, social class bias does exist in Britain. The certain job interviews that were skewered by my postcode, rather than my potential. The times, working in a public relations consultancy where I never got a look in with certain clients, particularly the ones who wore pinstripe.

Even in the seemingly liberal world of academia, where I worked as a part-time university lecturer, the impact of social class is there. Student feedback was characterised as my ‘being Marmite’ - some students really liked you, but others the opposite, often, I would suspect, from unconscious social class bias.

Yet, paradoxically, how others perceived me, provided the rocket fuel that has made me achieve much more than had I been just the safe, conventional, or conforming person.

I do reflect how this has also made me the person that I am. Giving me a gift, of pertinacity, resilience, and sheer bloody determination to make the best of things, regardless of whatever cards I get dealt with in life. If they GCSE’s for fighting instinct, not to take things as they are but to challenge, subvert, and change them, I would get an A* grade.

I did become a recognised international expert on creativity, written books translated into eight languages, ran an award-winning PR consultancy and Media Centre, and live in a nice house on Barry Island.

Others, however, face a lesser future because of their social class. I for one, am not putting up with that.

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