In light of recent racist events, I believe it is important to educate the children that reside in the UK how the British Empire came to be.

The UK is such a widely diverse and cultural place to live in I have always found it crazy that we don't educate our children on how that came to be.

I believe that one of the reasons racism is so prominent is due to the fact that people are uneducated on how racism is a socially constructed concept influenced by the rise of the British empire and a way to categorise and segregate people of different skin colours and therefore create a system of importance.

The British began to establish overseas colonies in the 16th century and by 1783 had colonies in America and the West indies and although this came to an end after the American revolution, Britain built a second empire in the 19th century, made up predominantly of conquests in India and Africa.

Britain viewed these colonies as 'barbaric'and uncivilized and implemented western norms, religion and opened up 'trade markets at the benefit of themselves and not their colonies. Britain ruled their colonies and removed a lot of tribal leaders in India and Africa in order to rule cotton farms and tobacco farms using the local people to work these farms in the form of slavery. The transportation of people between the empire for personal profit was rife in the form of human trafficking. 

But how has this implicated today's society? Wide spread poverty and conflict is still prominent within historical colonies despite independence being achieved. Mass amount of lives have been lost along with cultural heritage to these areas. 

So why is it important to teach this to our children? 'White privilege' is very apparent even in our day and age. It is linked to both inheritance of not only economic gain made from the colonies in the form of tobacco farming, cotton farming, oil drilling, diamond mining and human trafficking and slavery but also in the form of the legacy of segregation that the British Empire has left behind.

What I mean by this is, the view that we as whites are the 'superior' and 'civilised' race. It is important to teach our children to be aware of white privilege to offer an equal attitude and opportunity to all the diverse cultures that have come to find Britain as their home.

Nelson Mandela said "No one is born hating another person because of the color of his skin, or his background, or his religion. People must learn to hate, and if they can learn to hate, they can be taught to love, for love comes more naturally to the human heart than its opposite". 

We need to actively teach our children of our historical mistakes and why segregation is wrong and unnatural. So please, stand with me and stand with all our brothers and sisters and sign this petition as a step towards educating our future generations in hope of change.