I was brought up hearing my father speak ill of Black people, homosexuals and denigrating women.

By the age of 5 discrimination by skin colour can be well underway. We are socialising our young children to think like us before they think for themselves. Their learning does not only come through formal lessons but through the social contexts in which we nurture our much loved offspring.

When Connor uttered the words ‘ I don’t like Black people’ I was stunned. It seems that the message ‘ there is only one race, the human race’ had not penetrated. He ‘did not like Black people’.

Teenagers can be grumpy, surly and silent. But inside that changing body is a a growing mind.