I'm about to share some microaggressive experiences that have hurt me, manipulated me and misguided me in the past.
@daznglobal
#blmleedsblackexperience
#dontsufferinsilence

Working at DAZN nearly destroyed me. Like, I've never been so depressed in my life and it was definitely because of this place. Not only am I black but I'm also Queer, so stepping into an environment like that was one of the biggest challenges I've ever had to face.

An extremely heteronormative, mysoginistic machine was there devouring my energy and my identity.. I've struggled with my identity as a black man thoughout all of my adolescent years and abit beyond, because I was assimilated behind the white picket fence for soo long...

that black culture was intimidating to me. And it took me until being fully 200% comfortable with my queer identity before I started realising that I had been grossly neglecting my beautiful black heritage for far too long..

From day 1 at DAZN I felt like an outsider. With the exception of a couple of people who were on the same wavelength as me, I didn't really talk to anyone to start with because I didn't really know how to (my introverted personality at the time did not help in the slightest.)

I like sports but I didn't love sports like how many other people at the company did. And I'm black (the only black person in the team at the time), I'm queer but I'm also a proud eccentric (proud now, I just thought I was a freak back then)

so it was set from birth that this was going to be extremely difficult terrain to navigate. But I'm an ambitious individual who won't steer away from my ambitions for any reason.

So I started at DAZN and then came the influx of microaggressions, attempts to "help" make me fit in. "Oh, I'll speak to him about this black related thing because he's black and must know what I'm talking about."

(usually I did, but that's beside the point. That's not all I'm about) I was brainwashed into a position of insidiously crippling otherness, made to believe that my otherness is cool and cool is the only ticket I got to success.

I began acting a different way in order to fit in and stay afloat, to be the "cool black guy" so that I can make friends in this extremely terrifying foreign land... It worked obviously. For them, but not for me.

Because I was turning an eye away from the microaggressions that were contributing to the decline of my mental health and the deconstruction of my identity.. I eventually used my rising confidence as a Queer person to keep me afloat and challenge the heteronormative.

But I was still neglecting who I am as a black man

@daznglobal is one of the least diverse places of employment I have ever worked at. And these microaggressions, these crimes against humanity, both to POC and women, are so embedded in its work culture. I now realise that I wasn't breathing properly for the 3 years I worked there

Here's some examples of microaggressions I've experienced at @daznglobal

-When a group of people(me being the only black person in the group) go out for lunch to catch up with an old colleague and it comes to the farewells. When he gives every single person a handshake and downgrades me to a insultingly stereotyped fist bump, that is a microaggression

- When someone thinks that me stabbing them with a knife is how I'm going to react. And then when I do react by raising my voice so more people can hear what is going on, I'm dragged into a quiet room and begged not to esculate the situation out of fear of losing their job.

That is a microaggression

- When someone says you look like Milli Vanilli even though I look nothing like them, that is a microaggression.

- When someone just decides to start calling you Dremundo after weeks of not knowing me, that is a microagression.

I certainly am not the young scared lad who seized any opportunity, ignored any environment and wrongdoings in order make gains in my career anymore. Because my silence is just as collateral as a nuclear bomb.

For those that read this and might feel like I'm talking about you. Educate yoself and check yo'privilege on a daily basis.
I have unlearned my wrongs. Because I will admit I have contributed to microaggressions towards other groups, and that saddens me.

But I recognised it, I've changed me and got rid of that poisonous mindset. I implore you, it's time for you to do it too.

#blmcallout #dontsufferinsilence #BLACKLIVESMATTER
#blmldsblackexperience