Diversity Vs. Difference

When I am not working in television or blogging there is a fair chance I will be running. Anyone that knows me will be able to vouch that I am a little bit of a running junkie  - I completed 4 marathons last year and I’ve got my eye on two more this year. So when the Boston Marathon bombing happened I remember exactly where I was when I first heard about it. From every comment on twitter to the Runner's World magazine special edition I have followed every twist and turn of the story. My obsession with the story has not only surprised me but has taught me an important lesson when it comes to how we cover diversity in the media.

Although the marathon bombing was terrible it is far from the worst terrorist attack in recent history. More deadly bombings occur in Afghanistan and Iraq regularly. 

So why the obsession with the Boston Marathon?

The answer to that question highlights the lesson the Boston Marathon has taught me.

Similarity breeds sympathy.

The Boston Marathon bombing targeted runners and I am a runner. I feel an affinity to runners. When running in the park I often greet (or at least nod at) fellow runners - I don't greet all the dog walkers I pass. I look at the Boston bombing and I see the victims and wonder if that could have been me. I read the articles about the injured runners and my heart bleeds.

What my interest in the Boston marathon demonstrate is that the more points of similarity one can see with other people the more sympathy one feels. 

But what does this mean for people trying to increase diversity in the media? If similarity breeds sympathy does that mean difference literally begets indifference?

And in TV language “indifference” translates as smaller audiences! 

Luckily I am not the first person who has worried if people care less about people who are different from themselves:

In 2005 Prof. Mark Levine devised an experiment where a jogger pretends to fall and needs help. He conducted the experiments in Manchester. Half the time he put the runner in a Manchester United football shirt and the other half of the time he put the runner in a Liverpool football top. The results were striking. When the runner was wearing the "local" shirt he was helped 80% of the time, while pretending to be a Liverpool supporter he was helped only 40% per cent of the time.

Now I could be depressed about this and think this is a strong argument against championing on screen diversity. But there is a very large silver-lining from the grey cloud that we feel more sympathy for people who we think are more similar to ourselves.

The silver-lining is it doesn't seem to take a lot to feel a sense of similarity with someone. And once we feel that connection all the differences don't seem to matter. 

The other part of Prof. Levine's experiment was to see if the runner was helped if they were wearing just a plain white "neutral" shirt. In the experiments they were helped marginally more than when he was wearing the rival Liverpool shirt. So the Manchester United shirt was all it took for bystanders to feel a connection. Just a shirt! 

I feel a real connection to other people if they are fellow runners but the great thing is I then feel connected to them regardless of any other differences we might have. I have sympathy with the victims of the Boston bombings regardless of their race, nationality or any other characteristic that we sometimes categorise people by.

The challenge for those of us producing television programmes who want more diversity on-screen is to actually find the similarities that our viewers’ can connect with. In other words the viewer wont care less about a person if they are of a different race, gender, disability etc if we can find that metaphorical “Manchester United Shirt”  

The paradox is that often when promoting diversity we concentrate on the differences, what Prof. Levine’s experiment might teach us is maybe the less we look at the differences the more on-screen diversity we can achieve.

(The original version of this blog appears on my running blog http://thesoundofrunning.blogspot.co.uk . I told you at the start that I am a running junkie)