Resistance

Jamie Renton: No Angel


Jamie was born in 1962 in London. He attended a local special school until the age of eleven when he moved to a mainstream Jewish private boarding school in Oxfordshire. From age sixteen he attended a local college, continuing on to university.

Here Jamie describes making a decision not to be seen as a ‘little angel’.

https://howwasschool.allfie.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/no-angel.mp3

Transcript

I remember there was one teacher in particular who was incredibly patronising to me. And I remember, if you want an example of what, you know, the right attitude towards disability from a non-disabled person is, this sums it up to me. There was a boy in my class and he said to me – you’ll have to excuse the language here, he said to me, 'he thinks you’re a little angel'. He said, 'he doesn’t realise you’re as big a bastard as the rest of us'. And I thought, that’s exactly it. And I vowed to make him realise that I was as big a bastard as the rest of them, and I decided – I remember I make a conscious decision I would rather be seen as a trouble maker than as – than as this poor little patronised, you know, person that you patted on the head.

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