Tragedy At The BAFTAs: A Tale Of Victims And Villains?

Our CEO Dr Nancy Doyle has written for Forbes about the event at the BAFTA’s this week. She writes:

The film “I, Swear”, featuring the life story of John Davidson, a man with Tourette Syndrome from Galashiels in Scotland, won three BAFTAs on Sunday night. Two Black men, Delroy Lindo and Michael B Jordan represented the multiple award-winning film “Sinners” and presented at the ceremony. This should be a story of hard-won acceptance for Tourettes and the Black Community, but has sadly become a case in point of how far we still have to go.

In a quiet moment during the ceremony, Davidson ticced a racial slur while Delroy Lindo and Michael B Jordan were on stage. Despite the BAFTAs being recorded hours before broadcasting, the tic was not picked up the editors and so the offensive phrase was made public. The fallout for both the Black community and the Tourettes community has been swift and devastating and forces us to confront some uncomfortable truths about racism and ableism in society. There are lessons in here for all of us and learning them might be the only way to salvage some good from this tragic situation. Let’s start with the basics.

To explain, Davidson has “coprolalia” a particularly disabling form of Tourettes, where people speak or shout offensive words and phrases. These are tics. They cannot be suppressed, in the same way that you cannot suppress a sneeze. Coprolalic phrases are typically a mirror to the society we live in. I’ve known Touretters who tic “I’ve got a bomb” when travelling through train stations, who don’t go out at all at Christmas because they can’t stop ticcing “Santa is not real.” I’ve known ticcers who have had their spinal cords severed because they have kicking tics so bad that they injure themselves and others. This is not something that an individual can control, it is isolating and dehumanising.

The charity Tourettes Action released a statement with these poignant words. “People with Tourette’s manage their physical and social environments and symptoms on a constant basis. The price of being misunderstood is increased isolation, risk of anxiety and depression and death by suicide.”

If Davidson is ticcing racist slurs, it is because racism exists in our society and he observes it, not because he means to participate in it. Davidson is a victim of an afflicting condition, not a villain who must be chastised. Calls to blame him and disbelieving his sincerity are an example of the discrimination the film sought to address. This is so important, and it is the main point of the film. I urge you to watch it to truly understand this.

We do not have to diminish the impact even when we acknowledge there was no malicious intent. Delroy Lindo, star of “Sinners”, said that he wished someone from the BAFTAs had come to speak to him afterwards. The BBC have apologized for failing to edit out the tic, which now not only affects those in the room but also those watching the awards ceremony, and the countless social media posting and re-posting. Yet Black and Brown people have been confronted with a message of hatred, amplified and reported on without care. There is a sustained impact on safety, a sudden jolt and reverberation of systemic racism ricocheting across people simply trying to go about their daily life. Trying to watch an awards ceremony. Appreciate art and culture. It is relentless. Calls to simply ‘get over it’ on social media simply because there was no intent are unhelpful, and they rob us of the opportunity for deep reflection.

Humans seem to struggle with the idea of two things being true at the same time. We seek a villain because it is easier than sitting with discomfort and nuance. It is devastating that this happened to Davidson, Lindo and Jordan – all three – we don’t need to pick a villain or a victim. Life is not as simple as that and to seek that level of simplicity shows a lack of maturity in our narratives.

Bilal Harry Khan, an experienced facilitator working with companies around issues of race and inclusion, provided this comment: “It is important that in talking about one inequity we don’t negate the unique complexities and struggles of another. In a world where Racism and Ableism both co-exist, the safety of those impacted by both and either needs to be prioritised. We need to be able to have the uncomfortable conversations and ask ourselves who truly benefits from minimizing harm to minoritized communities.”

From the Neurodivergent Community, Director of the organization “Autism Inclusive Meets”, Emma Dalmayne pointed out that the online discussion is perpetuating the tension. “Right now, we have White people telling Black people what’s racist and what is not, which is wrong. The n word, when said by anyone not Black, will always be discriminatory, hurtful and objectify Black people. A proud moment for the Black community was fractured. We then have the fact that the tic came from John, a White man with Tourettes. I can only imagine that John was mortally embarrassed and devastated by it. We now have to deal with the harm of the tic and that blame will be inevitably cast upon him for a characteristic of his disability.”

These sophisticated, nuanced statements represent countless that have been shared with me from the Black and Brown Neurodivergent community, as well as those in social media spaces representing Black people who have Tourettes. Those who experience the harm of racism and ableism daily are adept with the wisdom and grace needed to handle tension, and to express solidarity for each other. Businesses should take note, as variants of this incident are taking place in organizations every day. Many are more subtle, but they are still deeply felt. When we gloss over, bystand and avoid talking about hard things we leave our colleagues feeling more marginalized than ever.

Creating personal safety where there are no villains requires us to learn at the system level, not just the individual level. Khan pointed out that “the issue is a lack of care and safeguarding towards all parties.” Here’s three strategies that work, which employers can apply in workplaces, specifically to support people with Tourette Syndrome.

One: Provide private spaces for Touretters to tic. Many Touretters can feel a significant tic, or a ‘tic attack’ approaching, like a build-up of tension. . Undoubtedly, in a high stakes, highly emotional and sensory charged environment like an awards ceremony, Davidson’s tics would be severe. He needed a quiet space and an easy route in and out so that he could leave quickly without feeling like everyone was staring.

Two: Provide warnings. Hosting an inclusive space for Touretters means letting people know that this might happen, that it could be offensive, hurtful, embarrassing and that people do not mean what they tic. Forewarned is forearmed, and at the very least this should be protective for the people in the room. Whilst the BAFTAs did provide this warning, it is clear that it wasn’t enough when even the BBC weren’t looking out for tics that needed to be bleeped out. Touretters and Tourettes charities have educational videos, presenters and hosts needed additional training in order to handle the inevitable smoothly. People in charge needed to be prepared to step in and handle the situation with grace.

Three: Acknowledge the rupture. When white, non-disabled people clam up and say nothing after an incident, it leaves everyone on edge and the hard work to be done by those experiencing the harm. Davidson had to leave halfway through. Lindon, Johnson and other Black and Brown attendees were left stranded, all those in the room with high anxiety. Davidson also ticced slurs to Black women in the audience, which was not picked up by the recording. An apology was cobbled together: “we apologise if you have been offended” – an unfortunate phrase that diminishes the obviousness of the offence. The purpose of inclusion training is to primarily to prevent harm, but that is only level one. Level two training should provide those of us not affected by discrimination the skills to handle emotional labour when things go wrong. Harm is not always intentional, as we see clearly here, so understanding healing has to be part of of inclusion work. This is true allyship. It requires participation, not just a nod of the head or a tick in the box.

In my consulting work I regularly come across incredibly sensitive situations at work, where a two parties with protected characteristics are in need of seemingly competing actions. This situation has lessons for us all, it is not as distant as we might like to think. That no one was able to step in and offer support was a systemic fail and I suspect that at least some of organisers are wringing their hands right now and also having sleepless nights about how to repair the damage. No one is winning, the whole event is a tragedy and many individuals are now at substantial risk.

Failing is a guaranteed human experience. Failing is actually critical for learning. If we don’t acknowledge failure, we cannot make progress. Can this rupture provide the space needed for honest conversations about how the tsunami of online hate speech has permeated our social narratives so densely? Perhaps we can use this tragic moment to reflect on the critical thinking skill of accepting two truths as valid, and harm as systemic rather than a game of villains and victims. Perhaps – we dare to dream – that this sparks a re-engagement of inclusion work, as businesses realise that their skills do not pass muster.

We have spent a lot of money on “awareness”, in disability and race inclusion. But true inclusion requires deft relational skills, the ability to hold a safe space whilst people work through difficult experiences. This is not easy, but it is leadership. This training is not off-the-shelf subject specific but involves creating a safe space for hard conversations and behavioral change. Right now, the emotional labor falls to those with the least resources. If our leaders invested in developing the emotional and communication skills needed to hold safe spaces for all, how many more people would be thriving instead of surviving? Right now our only job is empathy for those involved.