A teenager in Wales might want to play video games, hang out with their friends or even, dare I suggest it, read a book. The Welsh government, however, would prefer they put on a headset and confront their ‘unconscious bias’. It has created a £1.2 million metaverse, the ‘world’s first anti-racist virtual world’, to teach Welsh teens about their ‘white privilege’. But this is only one element of an official commitment to end racism by 2030. Not today, not yesterday, but a specific year in the future.
The idea for an Anti-racist Wales Action Plan – ArWAP – was born following fervour around the Black Lives Matter movement, and an official plan followed in 2022. Now it reaches into almost every element of Welsh public, and private, life – from libraries to nurseries and museums to landlords. Even Welsh cakes aren’t safe.
One line in the ‘Logic Model’ of the updated ArWAP in 2024, with a foreword by then Labour first minister Eluned Morgan (Plaid Cymru is also supportive of the plan), revealed the ambition to change ‘the beliefs and behaviour of the white majority’, the 93.8 per cent of Welsh people, with results measured by a Race Disparity Evidence Unit. Nothing sinister-sounding there.
