Prince Harry and Jane Goodall Talk About Unconscious Racism in New Interview
Meghan Markle gave her husband an important assignment for her guest-edited issue of British Vogue: to interview Dr. Jane Goodall, the legendary scientist and environmentalist. And Prince Harry did not let her down.
In a section of the interview, published in the Telegraph, Prince Harry and Jane Goodall engage in a thoughtful discussion of unconscious racism. The Duke of Sussex broached the topic by first talking about Goodall's achievements. "What I love about your work is that you focus on the younger generation," Harry told Goodall. "When you start to peel away all the layers, all the taught behavior, the learned behavior, the experienced behavior, you start to peel all that away and at the end of the day, we’re all humans."
Goodall agreed, noting that children "don’t notice, 'my skin's white, mine's black' until somebody tells them."
Harry then reiterated his point. "But again, stigma is handed down from generation to generation, your perspective on the world and on life and on people is something that is taught to you," he said. "It’s learned from your family, learned from the older generation, or from advertising, from your environment. And, therefore, you have to be able to have a wider perspective."
Later, the pair were discussing animals' aggressive tendencies, with Goodall noting that "we mostly control them" with our brain. Harry then pointed out that, in order to control racist tendencies, one has to be aware of them in the first place.
"It’s the same as unconscious bias—something which so many people don’t understand, why they feel the way they do," the royal said. "Despite the fact that if you go up to someone and say 'what you’ve just said, or the way you’ve behaved, is racist'—they’ll turn around and say, 'I'm not a racist.'"
He went on, "'I'm not saying you’re a racist, I’m just saying that your unconscious bias is proving that because of the way that you’ve been brought up, the environment you’ve been brought up in, suggests that you have this point of view—unconscious point of view—where naturally you will look at someone in a different way. And that is the point at which people start to have to understand."
Since bringing Meghan Markle into the royal family, Prince Harry has watched his wife bear the brunt of racist commentary, both online and in the media. Before the couple split from Kate Middleton and Prince William's Kensington Palace account on Instagram, the palace was forced to heavily police its comments section, to combat hateful and bigoted messages.
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