A word that has been used historically to shame and denigrate people who do not fit neatly into the systems, structures and standards upheld by the powerful. A label intended to marginalise and to exclude people who look, act and sound different to the majority. Women, people of colour and LGBTQ people have all been deemed “improper” at moments in history and still are today, whether explicitly or implicitly.

To be improper means not acting in accordance with accepted standards. But who decides the standards? Often people are asked to conform to societal norms that were not created by them, for them or with them in mind.

The greatest challenges of our time, whether it’s the refugee crisis or the climate crisis, all fundamentally stem from structural inequality. Society’s answer to inequality is to try to fix the people it marginalises, to make them fit within existing structures. To silence the activist calling for change. But it’s not the people who need fixing, it’s the system that is broken.

Perhaps, then, we need to interrogate standards. Push them a little. Take them apart and rebuild them. If improper means changing the standard, then we think improper is a good thing.

People should be more improper.