Excuses, Excuses...

As I push through the doors, the smell of chlorine hits me. Instantly, I feel sick, and I remember why I don't go swimming. I'm getting ready for my first swimming lesson in over 10 years, trying to convince myself it won't be so bad. Before I know it, I'm in the water. I glance around the pool; I'm surrounded by other black women learning to swim, all at different levels. Some are confidently swimming lengths; others, like me, are learning how to feel at home in the water. I'm learning to breathe properly, dunk my head under and let the water carry me, rather than fight against it. There are so many things to remember. At the age of 27, I'm still unable to swim - and I'm far from alone.

Indeed you are, though that doesn't stop some people from trying, given the right encouragement. 

As a black woman, it's the figures for the black community that always jump out to me. Swim England's figures suggest that 67% of black women and 44% of black men in England cannot swim 25 metres unaided - far higher than the national average, and far higher than the numbers for white people (17% of white women and 12% of white men cannot swim 25 metres). Behind those figures, published in 2022, are very different stories.

All children in the UK are supposed to leave primary school able to swim. But just why are there so many black people, like me, who can't?

I don’t know, but I’m sure the answer will be something outside of black physiology or black culture (as if there were anything like all-encompassing ‘black culture’ and not mny different cultures) and something pointing to ‘racism’ most likely!

But racial exclusion from pools in some countries, like the United States, helped to create the idea that black people were poor swimmers.

BINGO! But why would the experiences of people in another country have an influence on people born here? 

The UK did not have the same system of formal segregation as the US in the 20th Century. But Alice Dearing, a former Olympic swimmer and co-founder of the BSA, thinks that the US's history might have reverberated in parts of British culture too.

Maybe instead of researching swimming prowess, someone should research the need for disadvantage-by-proxy! 

For most British children, swimming starts with their family. If parents swim, children grow up seeing the water as something familiar.

For those who never learnt as children, Cole says starting later can feel particularly exposing. "To be a beginner swimmer, you are humbled by the water," he says. "You have to be very vulnerable."

And that’s surely something that is experience by children of all other races equally? 

For Kevin Hylton, emeritus professor of equality and diversity in sport at Leeds Beckett University, that started with his childhood. "I grew up in a working-class Caribbean family where swimming wasn't a thing that was done," he says. "We had almost zero leisure as a family together. It was done through school."

If we're going to blame the parents for this, can we blame them for all the kids' other failures too?  

And there are other thorny cultural factors too. In a 2023 survey by the BSA of more than 1,400 people, 33% of black British respondents named issues around their hair as a barrier to getting in the pool. The BSA wrote that "traditional aquatic headwear", like swimming caps, "doesn't cater to children with longer, thicker afro hair, nor does it cater to traditionally Black hairstyles including braids, dreadlocks and twists with extensions".

Aha! Finally an excuse they can use, as long as they don't mind being sneered at as idiots whose priorities are so skewed that minor discomfort is preferable to learning a vital skill that may save their lives.

Seeing people like yourself in the water can make a difference. But at the highest levels of swimming, black representation remains low.

But pretty high in the 'drowning after entering the water anyway' statistic...