Prince Harry says his upbringing left him unaware of unconscious racial bias — ‘I had no idea’

Prince Harry has admitted his upbringing made him unaware of unconscious racial bias, but that changed thanks to his relationship with Meghan, Duchess of Sussex.

In an interview with GQ magazine, Harry spoke to Patrick Hutchinson, who shot to fame after being pictured carrying an injured White man to safety during a Black Lives Matter protest in June.

The Duke of Sussex told Hutchinson that you can’t criticize people for showing their unconscious bias, but once you realize it exists you have to educate yourself because ignorance is no longer an excuse.

“Unconscious bias, from my understanding, having the upbringing and the education that I had, I had no idea what it was. I had no idea it existed,” said Harry.

“And then, sad as it is to say, it took me many, many years to realize it, especially then living a day or a week in my wife’s shoes.”

Harry emphasized that everyone needs to examine their unconscious attitude towards race.

“And I think one of the most dangerous things is people within positions of power, whether it’s politics or whether it’s the media, where if you’re not aware of your own bias and you’re not aware of the culture within your system, then how are we ever going to progress?” he said.

Hutchinson spoke of his frustration at the lack of understanding in some quarters about Black Lives Matter and the fight against racism.

“There are a lot of people who either don’t think that it exists or they don’t want change and they’re fighting against it,” Hutchinson said. “And I don’t know what these people are scared of, or afraid of.”

Harry, who was speaking from his home in California, said it’s been a “very interesting” time to live in the US, but underlined that change needs to happen everywhere.

“It’s going to take every single one of us to really change things and anyone that’s pushing against it really needs to take a long, hard look at themselves in the mirror,” he said.

“This is a global movement. The train has left the station. If you’re not on it now, then get on it because there’s so much that we can do. And being a dad myself, the whole point in life, I guess, for me, is to try to leave the world in a better place than when you found it.”

Earlier this month, Harry described his “awakening” to the existence of systemic racism, saying “the world that we know has been created by White people for White people.”

Harry said he has only recently recognized the full extent of racism in everyday life, telling the UK’s Evening Standard newspaper: “I’ve had an awakening as such of my own, because I wasn’t aware of so many of the issues and so many of the problems within the UK, but also globally as well. I thought I did but I didn’t.”

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex were talking to the paper at the start of Black History Month, which is marked every October in Britain.

Correction: A previous version of this story used a photo of Patrick Hutchinson carrying an injured White man to safety, but not the image that went viral. The story has been updated to include the correct image.