Latest / Thinking Class / #013 - Tomiwa Owolade: Why America's Culture War Should Not Be Britain's

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#013 - Tomiwa Owolade: Why America's Culture War Should Not Be Britain's · Thinking Class

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_01: Hello everybody, welcome to Thinking Class.
• 0:03
  SPEAKER_01: My guest today is Tomiwa Ovaladi.
• 0:06
  SPEAKER_01: Tom is a writer and critic and is the author of the book This Is Not America.
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_01: Tom has also written for The Times, The Sunday Times, The Spectator, The Financial Times, The Evening Standard, and The Literary Review.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_01: He is also a contributing writer at The New Statesman.
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_01: Tom has made appearances on GB News and BBC Radio 4.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_01: In this episode we talk about why Britain should not import America's racial politics, the complexities of identity, why social class is a bigger determinant of life outcomes in Britain than race is, and the impact of secularization and religion on British national life.
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_01: I had a lot of fun with Tom in this episode, and I know you'll find him to be a positive voice.
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_01: Enjoy the show, classmates.
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_00: My pleasure, John.
• 1:11
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I am really delighted you can join me because um Santa Claus was very kind to me at Christmas, and I got your book, This Is Not America, which I enjoyed very much.
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_01: Um I had actually seen you emerging into the public consciousness at the beginning of um the pandemic and the lockdowns.
• 1:29
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I'm a reader of Unheard, and you were one of the few heterodox voices, I suppose, who were um raising um questions about um Britain's imbibing of American um culture wars, but also uh current uh events um at the time, for instance, the death of George Floyd, the ramifications that had in American society, um, which then very quickly um came across the pond, as it were.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and and in the book, I think it's fair to say you're critical of white liberals who sacrilize ethnic minorities uh as well as activists more broadly, uh, of almost any ethnic strike who broadly seek to define people by racial categories.
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_01: So your book's ultimately about Britain importing America's culture walls to Britain.
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_01: Why is that a problem and why are we not the same?
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_00: That is a problem for various reasons.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_00: I think one of the most significant reasons why that's a problem is that looking at race through that rigidly uh abstract or Americanized way doesn't allow us to actually identify the various inequalities in British society.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_00: So for example, if we look at the education system, the experiences of black British people are not all the same.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_00: Black Caribbean pupils, black Caribbean boys in particular, tend to struggle more in the education system than black African pupils.
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_00: And if we care genuinely about the inequalities that uh affect society, we need to be more specific in our focus rather than simply uh looking at inequalities uh only through race.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_00: So in my book and in various other articles that I write, I emphasize the importance of class to explaining the various inequalities that affect British society.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_00: And all too often class is not incorporated enough into discussions about diversity, equity, and inclusion.
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_00: Um and without any recognition of the importance of class, the importance of other factors such as culture, family formation, hydrophy, and various other factors, we can't actually address the inequalities in our society.
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_00: And the focus of my book is to give us a more grounded approach, a more granular approach, an approach that emphasizes the importance of nuance and specificity in identifying inequality.
• 4:27
  SPEAKER_00: I think another problem that I have with the um current discourse around race, the current orthodoxies around race, is I find it very condescending um to ethnic minority people um to just view them simply as victims of uh racism and almost nothing else.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_00: I find that kind of attitude extremely uh condescending, extremely patronizing.
• 4:55
  SPEAKER_00: And I think if we genuinely want to show respect to any individual, irrespective of their particular racial, ethnic, or religious background, we need to treat them with a greater level of dignity rather than this condescending tone that I see um often amongst the people that claim to be anti-racist.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_01: That's a good point, and one I know you you make well throughout the book and and you um you use uh or you bolster your argument using um uh lines of reasoning by uh famous African American uh uh commentators um across the political spectrum, one of them being Thomas Sowell.
• 5:43
  SPEAKER_01: Um I know he's quite famous for um popularizing a couple of uh notions.
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_01: The first being that there's a tendency for policymakers um to uh view any disparity as being a sign of discrimination, yes, being number one.
• 6:01
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and and uh obviously, as you just pointed out, there is a whole multi uh variable analysis that could be made as to why outcomes turn out to be differently.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_01: But he he also talks a lot about um policymakers having mascots, and those mascots um are about feel-good politics in the end, and it is to make a statement about where you stand, but whether it actually goes on to create an outcome that would address the situation that was supposedly being addressed is another question entirely.
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_01: Um what what what do you make of that?
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_00: Of of the of the first point or the second point?
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_01: Ah, the second point, yes, I did just hit you with a blizzard of points.
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, I I think I think I think Thomas Sol is is a very um profoundly perceptive thinker.
• 6:58
  SPEAKER_00: And I think what one of the problems with many um policymakers, especially when it comes to uh addressing issues relating to race and ethnicity and so forth, is is is this sort of simplistic attitude that they bring into it.
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_00: Um the lack of actually uh understanding the various components that uh go into um not only a person's identity um but also a person's uh um condition.
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_00: Um so to to go back to the example that I mentioned earlier about the differences between um black Caribbean um pupils and black African pupils, um any kind of policy that says, oh, we need to um improve the lives of black British um pupils, teenagers, children, uh without actually acknowledging the fact that um certain um black pupils tend to do much better, black West African pupils in particular, than others in terms of education.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_00: Um those policies will not actually address um what they claim to address because they're not taking into account the fact that um the kinds of uh social condition and the kinds of inequality that they try to um uh reform are not uniform um across um the ethnic minority groups that they claim to speak on behalf of.
• 8:36
  SPEAKER_00: To use another to use an American example um and the example of affirmative action, um it's quite interesting because in America um one of the um groups, um ethnic groups that do best in certain uh getting into the Ivy League colleges and um gaining um extremely prestigious professional jobs uh are West African communities as well.
• 9:06
  SPEAKER_00: Um Nigerian Americans are amongst the most affluent um ethnic minority American groups.
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_00: And if affirmative action um is something that's simply focused on race without taking into account things like class and national background um or any other kind of factor, um and if affirmative action benefits Nigerian Americans um disproportionately um rather than um black Americans who are the descendants of enslaved Africans, then then that just strikes me as completely unfair.
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_00: And that's that that just strikes me as completely um anathema to any kind of uh reasonable social justice.
• 9:59
  SPEAKER_00: So any policy implementation, therefore, needs to be rounded in um acknowledging the multiple ways in which um inequality manifests itself rather than simply being shaped by a totalizing um racial approach.
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_01: Affirmative action seems to be something that uh comes back into the public consciousness every now and then and ends up under the spotlight.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_01: And I think we're probably there again now, um, and uh it's receiving criticism.
• 10:39
  SPEAKER_01: Uh in this case, I I think it's been generated by um uh events over in the States, you know, our our imperial overlords, as it were, the ones who set the tone for the culture.
• 10:51
  SPEAKER_01: But post-October 7th, uh something which people have uh been uh very uh uh cognizant of what was the congressional hearings um about uh a rise in anti-Semitism and um anti-Israel uh demonstrations on campuses at MIT, Penn, and Harvard.
• 11:12
  SPEAKER_01: And without running through the whole gamut of what went on there, is ultimately their responses, um, which seems um totally contradictory to how they had dealt with um smaller scale uh aggressions on uh campus, microaggressions, they'd call them, yeah um, uh ended up costing them their jobs.
• 11:30
  SPEAKER_01: They they all resigned.
• 11:31
  SPEAKER_01: But one of them in particular, Claudine Gay, was someone who um was the the president of Harvard, had um published 11 academic papers throughout the course of her career.
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not an academic, but academics who found this out thought that's outrageous because most people have to publish many more than those just to get tenure.
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_01: And she was also the sphere heading um DEI initiatives at at Harvard.
• 11:55
  SPEAKER_01: And so there were um there were suggestions that she made it as far as she did due to affirmative action, but she's also from a background um a very wealthy family, and um and uh and so it it links to the point you were making about Nigerian Americans, uh although she's not Nigerian American in America.
• 12:17
  SPEAKER_00: Her family's from Haiti, um, so she's Caribbean, um, in terms of background.
• 12:22
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 12:24
  SPEAKER_01: Um and which is also surprising because Haiti is such a uh a poor country.
• 12:30
  SPEAKER_01: Um so when I heard that that was surprising, but I I suppose my question is is you're talking a little bit about policy and how the blunt instruments are too blunt to make a difference and potentially cause harm.
• 12:43
  SPEAKER_01: Uh what are your views on affirmative action?
• 12:47
  SPEAKER_00: Um I I think it should be taken on a case-by-case basis.
• 12:52
  SPEAKER_00: Um I I I think if if as I said earlier, if if affirmative action is simply um predicated on race without taking into account um any other factor that might shape inequality, then I would be um totally opposed to it.
• 13:11
  SPEAKER_00: Um because as I'm sure you know, um there's been um over the past few years um lawsuits against um Ivy League colleges in America, which um have been organized by Asian American um students and their families as well.
• 13:32
  SPEAKER_00: Um and and these Asian American people feel that affirmative action is actually discriminating against them.
• 13:40
  SPEAKER_00: Um at the um um is it's it's putting their um sort of access to these elite colleges um under threat, essentially.
• 13:52
  SPEAKER_00: Um so so I I I I I I think it should be um any kind of policy that seeks to address inequality needs to be more uh multivaried um in power considers um sort of addressing these inequalities.
• 14:14
  SPEAKER_00: Um but there's also another um issue, which is that if um we focus simply on merit, um if we apply the principle of meritocracy, um then that would um lead to um a situation where uh certain colleges um are are sort of disproportionately filled by um Asian students, um and particular African um students as well.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_00: Um and if if we sort of had that colourblind, um completely meritocratic approach, um I think that that would um undermine one of the key tenets of the um current um vogue understandings of racism.
• 15:11
  SPEAKER_00: Um because as you as you said, um the first thing you mentioned about Thomas Sowell was his argument about the disparity fallacy.
• 15:21
  SPEAKER_00: And the disparity fallacy is the fallacy that any kind of disparity uh in society is necessarily um evidence of racism.
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_00: Um but if that was the case, then how could you explain, for example, um the disproportionate numbers of Asian students um excelling in American colleges and schools, or to use a British example, the um the fact that ethnic minor the fact that British um uh Indians and British um Chinese pupils are the most uh academically successful ethnic minority groups um even even much so much more so than white British students.
• 16:12
  SPEAKER_00: How could you explain um all of this if we stick to the idea that racism um means that disparities uh racial disparities are caused by um racial oppression rather than the disparities um being caused by other factors, uh some of which are quite benign.
• 16:39
  SPEAKER_00: Um so I I do think the the affirmative action uh issue is interesting simply because it illustrates um a lot of the tensions and contradictions of this current vulgish conception of racism.
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, the the point you're making about the um the lower performance or lower uh life outcomes within the white British population in comparison to certain ethnic groups is really interesting and one that is is frequently untouched, but it I think it harks straight back to the point you're making about social class as well, which is I think on an absolute numbers basis, um white working class boys are um that they're the biggest problem when it comes to life outcomes in the country, they lag behind pretty much every every group.
• 17:31
  SPEAKER_01: And um I and I think that's something that's quite interesting insofar as I remember back to the early 2000s when you couldn't get moved for tabloid newspapers referring to people as chabs, which is ultimately a um uh a uh it's definitely a judgment on culture.
• 17:51
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, if there's if there's anything going on in their lives, it's it's their fault.
• 17:55
  SPEAKER_01: People were very quick to be able to point that finger.
• 17:58
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but um everyone seems very afraid to touch the the culture um question, the family question with any other group.
• 18:08
  SPEAKER_01: And um and when it comes to policy instruments to try and lift out someone who is part of the white British uh group, um, they're overlooked because it would be seen as anathema to this idea of you're white, thus you have privilege.
• 18:23
  SPEAKER_01: So there's just so much stuff going on in there, and I don't really know our way out of it.
• 18:28
  SPEAKER_01: And um and when when you see uh uh an election year coming, a Labour government coming, where you've got the leader of the opposition saying if we're to form a government, which they probably will, then we're going to um bring in a race equality act, which is going to be uh fundamentally um um underpinned by the idea of structural racism.
• 18:52
  SPEAKER_01: And that flies in the face of everything we just spoken about.
• 18:55
  SPEAKER_01: So it seems to me like the problem crystallizes uh that we've just been talking about.
• 19:00
  SPEAKER_01: Uh uh what I think about.
• 19:03
  SPEAKER_00: The idea of a rape equality act is also absurd because um we already have an Equality Act, the 2010 Equality Act, um, and race and racism is already um covered by that act.
• 19:18
  SPEAKER_00: So it just seems um amongst um everything else, it just seems completely pointless to me um to introduce such a legislation.
• 19:28
  SPEAKER_00: Um to to go back to what you said about the importance of social class, um so I I went to a state secondary school um in South East London, and my school was um very diverse in terms of uh race um and ethnicity and religion, but also diverse in terms of socioeconomic background as well.
• 19:56
  SPEAKER_00: Um there were a lot of uh middle class kids in my school and also a lot of working class kids as well.
• 20:03
  SPEAKER_00: Um one striking thing, which I only um realized in retrospect was that the white working class kids in my school were friends or friendly with ethnic minority kids of whatever class background and the white middle class kids in my school were also friends or friendly with ethnic minority kids of whatever socioeconomic background.
• 20:31
  SPEAKER_00: But the striking thing is that the white working class kids and the white middle class kids were not friends or friendly with each other, and I think that illustrates uh the extent to which class is still um the main social dividing line in British society.
• 20:52
  SPEAKER_01: You're absolutely right there.
• 20:53
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I I mean I grew up in Northeast England, um, it's not in one of the post-industrial towns, but Northeast England is hardly renowned for its uh economic opportunities, as it were.
• 21:04
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and uh my school, as you can imagine, being a small Northumbrian market town was um you know 99% white, but there was a clear class divide, as you mentioned, with regards to friendship groups.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_01: Uh there was snobbery, there was reverse snobbery.
• 21:20
  SPEAKER_01: But when I moved to Manchester uh for seven years after I left school earlier, I was in retail and sales and uh worked, uh rubbed shoulders with people from every ethnic minority or religious background, and exactly what you just mentioned was playing out is we all broke bread together, we all went out together.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_01: Um there was none of those things.
• 21:43
  SPEAKER_01: And actually, what was quite interesting is the things that did differentiate us, like our religion or ethnic backgrounds.
• 21:50
  SPEAKER_01: We actually spoke about it and we had uh this is also pre smartphone era, and I remember sitting in the tea room in the Armandales.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_01: Sunder in Manchester talking openly about these things.
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_01: No one was really um no one was uh um distracted by what was going on on their phone, you know, if they wanted to talk about uh religion and its impact and whatever that they would um and th nothing was nothing was to taboo almost.
• 22:21
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and it's quite striking to see how how th things have changed in you know 15, 16 years.
• 22:29
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, it is.
• 22:30
  SPEAKER_00: And um, because I think um, and I think this is one of the key differences between the UK and America, is that in America schools tend to be uh segregated more by race, whereas in the UK they tend to be segregated more by class.
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_00: And um and when people think about the relationship between uh the education system in the UK and class, they often pit it as the difference between um prepaying schools and um state schools.
• 23:06
  SPEAKER_00: But I think even within um state schools you still see um class divides playing out.
• 23:15
  SPEAKER_00: Um and I think one of the and I think one one of the reasons um, for example, why um America is is very different um to the UK when it when it comes to what I just said is that in America um the share of the American population that's black is about 12-13 percent.
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_00: Whereas in the UK, the share of the UK population that's black is about four percent.
• 23:44
  SPEAKER_00: Um but in America, um there are so many towns and cities um in America, especially across um many southern states where the majority of the population is black.
• 24:00
  SPEAKER_00: Um so if you're a black American, um it's much more easier to have an exclusively black social circle than it is um in the UK, um, because the share of the black British population is just uh much more smaller uh than the share of the black American population.
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_00: And the area in the UK of the largest number of black people is of course London.
• 24:25
  SPEAKER_00: But even in London, the share of the population of London that's black is only about 14%, I believe.
• 24:33
  SPEAKER_00: Um still a very small minority of the overall population.
• 24:39
  SPEAKER_00: Um so yeah, I I think one of the key differences definitely is that in America um in terms of schools, there is there is much more segregation predicated on race, whereas in the UK, it's much more um segregation predicated on class.
• 24:58
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and I know you write in your book about uh the the um the interracial uh relationships that are so prevalent in in Britain and uh just just how massive our our mixed race population between white, British, and uh any of the black um ethnic minority backgrounds uh have become.
• 25:19
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, if you look at the English national football team, whether it's Calvin Phillips or Kyle Walker, you know, we've got we've got some of the most prominent um people in the public eye, yeah.
• 25:29
  SPEAKER_01: Are I suppose the um they are the uh product of that success story which is so often overlooked?
• 25:37
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 25:38
  SPEAKER_00: That that's that's a very good point.
• 25:39
  SPEAKER_00: So the um the largest um growing ethnic minority group in the UK uh is is the mixed-race population.
• 25:50
  SPEAKER_00: Um and in fact, the UK is one of the um very few societies um in the world that uh has um a sizable mixed-race population that came about as a consequence of romantic love rather than rape.
• 26:11
  SPEAKER_00: Um so of course, the America has got a very large mixed-race population, and um Brazil also has a very large mixed-race population.
• 26:22
  SPEAKER_00: But the reason um for those mixed-race populations uh are far more sinister um than um the UK's um mixed-race population.
• 26:33
  SPEAKER_01: Dear classmate, John here.
• 26:35
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• 26:38
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• 26:46
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• 27:04
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• 27:08
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks for listening, thanks for sharing your support, and enjoy the rest of the show, classmate.
• 27:13
  SPEAKER_01: The the mixed race uh identity question is very interesting as well, and something that you um you write about so so well bringing up stories of um people who were um part British, part Colombian, and um uh then they'd go for on a channel they're in the Colombian, then they go to Colombia thinking this is a place for me, I feel out of place in Britain, and then get there and go, God, I'm so British.
• 27:37
  SPEAKER_01: And and and a friend and colleague of mine, he's um actually uh Tom, a very um similar story to you.
• 27:43
  SPEAKER_01: I used to work with him when I lived in London, and he was uh born in Nigeria.
• 27:47
  SPEAKER_01: He came over a little bit later in life um with his uh mum, and he was uh 12 years old, and it took him a little while to to um to get up to speed, I suppose, with the way things are done around here.
• 28:01
  SPEAKER_01: But uh the more and more he went back to visit Nigeria, the more and more uh whilst he still had an affinity for the country, yeah, he found himself uh feeling really out of place.
• 28:11
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and not even just within himself, it was because people just knew he wasn't from around there.
• 28:18
  SPEAKER_01: And so he he talks quite a lot about this hard line to tread where you know he he's uh he he feels an affinity to Nigeria, but no longer feels Nigerian.
• 28:30
  SPEAKER_01: He is British, but then there's also you know there can sometimes be some woolliness there as well.
• 28:36
  SPEAKER_01: Uh do you experience anything like that within yourself?
• 28:40
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, definitely, definitely.
• 28:41
  SPEAKER_00: Um the last time I was in Nigeria was nearly two years ago, and I did definitely feel more um I definitely did feel more British while I was in Nigeria.
• 28:54
  SPEAKER_00: And in fact, the reason why I was in Nigeria was because uh one of my brothers, one of my older brothers, was getting married, and this brother in question um lives in America and was getting married in Nigeria to a black American woman.
• 29:11
  SPEAKER_00: And um, by black American I mean a woman whose ancestors were enslaved Africans, and um my brother's bride invited many many of her family members and friends to the wedding, and for many of these um relatives and friends, it was their very first time visiting an African country, um and I think many of them expected a sort of homecoming, a sort of return of the prodigal son or the prodigal daughter, to use a biblical analogy.
• 29:46
  SPEAKER_00: But what was most striking from the perspective of the native Nigerians was not the fact that these black American people were black, but the most striking thing from the perspective of the native Nigerians was the fact that these black American people were American.
• 30:05
  SPEAKER_00: And of course that makes sense because Nigeria is a country where over 99% of the population is black.
• 30:15
  SPEAKER_00: So of course, race is not at the forefront of the average Nigerian person's mind.
• 30:22
  SPEAKER_00: Race is not one of the factors that divide Nigerian society, other things such as um religion, region, class, and all these other factors profoundly shape Nigerian society rather than race.
• 30:40
  SPEAKER_00: And in fact, um there is a very famous Nigerian novelist called Chemimanda Ngozi Adiciye, and she once said that the first time she realized she was a black person was when she went to America for the first time.
• 31:01
  SPEAKER_00: Um so that that that sort of way that many Africans see themselves is not the same as the way that black Americans see themselves.
• 31:12
  SPEAKER_00: Um when black Americans often look into the mirror, they see their racial identity.
• 31:18
  SPEAKER_00: Um whereas when many Africans look into the mirror, they see their tribal identity, their religious identity, their national identity.
• 31:27
  SPEAKER_00: So when black Americans come to Africa, the response of many Africans is not to see their race, it's to see their nationality, it's to see what distinguishes them from the native Nigerian flock rather than what sort of connects them to it.
• 31:45
  SPEAKER_00: Um and I think this is something that um also reminds me of an episode of the TV show The Sopranos.
• 31:54
  SPEAKER_00: Um have you watched The Sopranos?
• 31:56
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's uh it's an excellent episode without a reference.
• 32:00
  SPEAKER_01: Go go on with much pleasure.
• 32:02
  SPEAKER_01: I'll listen to this.
• 32:04
  SPEAKER_00: So, in in so for for for any any of your um listeners that don't know, The Sopranos is a show about um Italian American mobsters um from New Jersey.
• 32:17
  SPEAKER_00: And um in the first season of the show, there's one episode where the Italian-American mobsters go to Italy, um, and one of the one of the characters, one of the Italian American mobsters, a character called um Holly Walnuts, um traces around Italy uh as a source of with with a desire to reconnect with his Italian roots.
• 32:44
  SPEAKER_00: Um but the only awkward fact is that he can't speak Italian.
• 32:52
  SPEAKER_00: Um and and the these Italian-American characters, even though they sometimes sprinkle Italian words into their conversations and so forth, they can't actually speak Italian.
• 33:03
  SPEAKER_00: Um and so from the perspective of the native Italians, these Italian-American people are Americans first and foremost, rather than Italians.
• 33:15
  SPEAKER_00: Um I think when we talk about identity, um that's why it's important to always uh emphasize context rather than assuming that identity, especially your racial identity or ethnic identity, um is just this abstract thing which can be divorced from any kind of context.
• 33:39
  SPEAKER_00: I think that's completely misguided.
• 33:43
  SPEAKER_01: Tom, what do you think the long-term practical consequences might be if we don't get to uh a common understanding that you just outlined where we see the contextual identity rather than let's put people in racial categories?
• 34:00
  SPEAKER_00: I think one of the um long-term consequences is um it leads many black British people or black people in the um in Western countries to feel alienation.
• 34:17
  SPEAKER_00: Um and in fact, despite the title of my book, um as as you mentioned earlier, many of the thinkers that have most influenced my ideas about race are themselves black American writers and thinkers.
• 34:32
  SPEAKER_00: Um you mentioned Thomas Sowell earlier, um, I I would also mention James Baldwin, um Ralph Ellison as well.
• 34:41
  SPEAKER_00: Um and what many of these writers and thinkers emphasized is that when it comes to being a black American person, we shouldn't simply focus on the black aspect of that identity, we should also emphasize the American aspect as well.
• 35:01
  SPEAKER_00: And um I apply that insight to what it means to be a black British person, um, because as you as you mentioned earlier about your Nigerian friend, um he felt more British being a Nigeria, and and that's something that equally applies to me as well.
• 35:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um so I I think the long-term consequences of not contextualizing um racial identity and racial categories is that we leave people feeling completely alienated, completely um beracinated, um, completely rootless and lacking any sense of uh attachment.
• 35:43
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that would only lead to uh sour resentment because as humans we all crave belonging, we all crave a sense of being a part of a wider group or a wider community, and I think simply assuming that race is the only thing that can satisfy that craving is just so profoundly misguided.
• 36:11
  SPEAKER_00: Because I would argue that I feel a greater sense of affinity and kinship to any person, irrespective of their racial, ethnic, religious, or national background, that grew up in the same patch of Southeast London that I grew up in, that I would feel um to a black person that lived in America, or a black person that leaved lived in Senegal, or a black person that lived in the Caribbean.
• 36:42
  SPEAKER_00: Um and I think that that approach of sort of emphasizing um the local ties and the national ties of black British people is much more constructive than simply emphasizing their racial identity above anything else.
• 37:08
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, this concept of uh a civic identity uh under something that that draws you together, coheres you around a symbol.
• 37:17
  SPEAKER_01: I know um Dr.
• 37:18
  SPEAKER_01: Rakhi Bessan, the the author of Beyond Grievance, uh the left gets wrong about ethnic minorities, he was on the podcast and uh and and he writes about how there are many things that can bind all of us, regardless of our ethnic uh minority status or otherwise uh as British people.
• 37:38
  SPEAKER_01: And uh I think elites have a big part to play in this.
• 37:43
  SPEAKER_01: So a lot of our cultural elites are arguably sowing the seeds of division, perhaps without realizing it, as we've spoken about.
• 37:50
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but if I look at the monarchy, for example, uh two of the most touching moments I think uh in my life on the monarchy, uh with regards to the monarchy happened in the last uh year and a half.
• 38:03
  SPEAKER_01: There was the passing of Queen Elizabeth II, and when she was uh when she she was taken in state toward uh Westminster Abbey, and there were um under under the British flag, you had um Scots and Irish Pipers, um, you then had uh various different guards and troops, and then people of uh different colours all all walking under the same flag as this is what binds us here, all of these different peoples and backgrounds, and yes, there's been conflict, but look, we've actually worked live learned to live together and cooperate, and this is part this is who we are.
• 38:38
  SPEAKER_01: And then King Charles III's coronation.
• 38:41
  SPEAKER_01: Um clearly, this was the first coronation since 1952, and the the um demographics of the country have changed so much, and he did a uh a pretty good job, I'd say, of um representing um the United Kingdom in all of its various different um creeds, colours, and um, and that's that that was a a uniting moment, or it could be, and and I think they're the kind of things that we need more of, which is look, actually, there are different ways that we live, but look at the things that do hold us together, and it's more important that we're British rather than um let's box ourselves off into whatever it is, as our religious background or our ethnic background.
• 39:25
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, yeah, and I think that that sense of civic unity is sort of altered.
• 39:30
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and yeah, the monarchies is one example um through which that kind of civic identity can be expressed.
• 39:38
  SPEAKER_00: I think another one is through um sports.
• 39:42
  SPEAKER_00: Um so you mentioned um football earlier, um, and and um the various mixed-race footballers um sort of symbolizing the um one of the positive changes um in in British society.
• 39:58
  SPEAKER_00: And and I feel I'm I'm a big football fan.
• 40:01
  SPEAKER_00: Um and I know that football is slightly different because football is based on um um England and Scotland and Wales rather than sort of a British identity, but I do feel that um football is or sports in general, whether that that be cricket or rugby or any other kind of sport, um there's another way in which that kind of civic um identity uh can be expressed.
• 40:27
  SPEAKER_00: Um and in fact you can plausibly make the case um that religion is another example of that as well, because even though the UK is one of the most um secular societies in the world, um at a constitutional level, um Britain is still a Christian country.
• 40:47
  SPEAKER_00: Um and um one of the striking things um about London, for example, is that um London is actually um the most religious uh city in the UK.
• 41:02
  SPEAKER_00: And and um one of the one of the main reasons for that is that London is the most ethnically um and racially diverse cities um and the um extent to which Christianity plays an important role in the way in which um black British people identify themselves um should never be underestimated.
• 41:32
  SPEAKER_00: Um it's so integral to the way in which many black British people see themselves.
• 41:38
  SPEAKER_00: Um and there is a sort of um interesting irony in the fact that um without um many of these um black African communities in London, um the process by which um Britain becomes a less religious society would be even more stark.
• 42:01
  SPEAKER_00: Um and the reason why it's funny is because um for many of these um black African communities, it was the UK, it was it was um missionary societies from the UK that introduced Christianity to them in the 19th century.
• 42:18
  SPEAKER_00: Um so it's almost a sort of weird kind of return.
• 42:22
  SPEAKER_00: Um I I I'm I'm I'm almost tempted to say it's almost like a sort of reverse colonialism, but that's that's I I don't want to sound like a sort of far-right um agitator.
• 42:35
  SPEAKER_01: No don't don't worry, you're among you're you're amongst friends here.
• 42:39
  SPEAKER_01: I can I see I see the humour in that.
• 42:42
  SPEAKER_01: Um uh yeah yeah, the the re-evangelisation of the uh evangelists who lost their faith, as it were.
• 42:50
  SPEAKER_01: That is a that is a remarkable thing.
• 42:52
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I know when I visited churches in in London, that's what strikes you is that the white British population are it's not that they they're non-existent, but they uh they're not they're not really the most common people that you'll see uh in the churches.
• 43:08
  SPEAKER_01: And you write in your book that uh secularization is is predominantly a white British um phenomenon.
• 43:14
  SPEAKER_01: And and I think you could probably go even further than that and say that um uh it certainly has been led by our cultural elites, and uh and I think those who um you know I think people would refer to them as white liberals.
• 43:28
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know how how liberal they are, but I would say because they've typically had uh their hands on the tiller with regards to the um uh new ways of governing society and ideological uh currents, is that the the post second world war is that Christianity was certainly shelved um with that and um and and diminished, I think, probably in the eyes of um the public.
• 43:54
  SPEAKER_01: And so um that is quite an interesting irony if there's anything in that that um Um whilst it's kind of been diminished in the eyes of uh the white British population, is that those that they champion, actually from ethnic minority backgrounds, are bringing religion back in through the back door, as it were.
• 44:14
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 44:14
  SPEAKER_00: Well, but then there's there's also like um the the the extent to which um this this is a positive thing is also complicated as well because um many religious communities, not only um um like Christians, but also Muslims as well, espouse certain um social con socially conservative views and even some um progressive social views as well, which um um complicate the kind of liberal, open, tolerant um kind of society that many of us um also want to see.
• 44:56
  SPEAKER_00: So it is also complicated by that as well.
• 45:00
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it absolutely is, and I think um I think we've touched on um how this moment in time in particular feels like there's a bit of a reckoning with the various ideas, ideologies, and uh and and and value conflicts that exist within our society.
• 45:19
  SPEAKER_01: And uh I I get the impression we're probably only just at the beginning of sorting those things out.
• 45:25
  SPEAKER_01: Um now they're coming into focus.
• 45:28
  SPEAKER_01: On the American influence point, so I don't think we can avoid it given that it is the English-speaking cultural hegemon.
• 45:36
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, and also, as you write, the the long arm of the American digital influence, all of the things that we use, probably the software we're using now, but certainly all the social media platforms, our search engines, they all sit in California, basically.
• 45:51
  SPEAKER_01: Um, this californication uh is is then um spread through the world algorithmically, and so um uh it seems that we can't avoid the influence.
• 46:01
  SPEAKER_01: So, what brought these um ideas over that we've talked a little bit about, for instance, the certainly the popular notions of diversity, equity, inclusion, and how they're set on things like intersectionality and um and trying to sort people into more deserving um uh groups uh based on their ethnic status and who they think are um more um uh what's the right term, uh more deprived than others, um, and what are more privilege, and let's resort them.
• 46:30
  SPEAKER_01: Is it it that also feels like the Overton window is has shifted because of the conversation in America post-October 7th.
• 46:37
  SPEAKER_01: So we've talked a bit about the the Harvard pens, the MIT things.
• 46:42
  SPEAKER_01: In response to that, you've had influential people like um Bill Ackman, who is a donor for the Harvard, to start calling into question the tenets of DEI publicly.
• 46:51
  SPEAKER_01: Elon Musk obviously owns X and Twitter, and you know, he's someone who can just smash an overton window just with one sentence and seems to have done that.
• 46:58
  SPEAKER_01: And then Vivek Ramaswamy, who is was running for the Republican presidential um pick, he um spoke in no uncertain terms about what he thought about DEI, uh, effectively saying if the goal is to abolish systemic racism, let's not replace it with more systemic racism.
• 47:17
  SPEAKER_01: So uh whilst whilst you're arguing we need to see ourselves as not American, I think that's important and we need to stop importing things from America.
• 47:25
  SPEAKER_01: Do you also uh think that current American public discourse is ultimately going to be the key to any change here in Britain, whether we like it or not?
• 47:36
  SPEAKER_00: Um I I do I do think that the influence of America is inevitable for many of the reasons that you've mentioned, um, especially those pertaining to the use of social media.
• 47:47
  SPEAKER_00: So anyone that uses um social media, especially anyone that uses social media um and lives in an Anglophone country will inevitably encounter um American culture, American society, American talking points, American debates.
• 48:05
  SPEAKER_00: So I think it is uh inevitable and unavoidable.
• 48:09
  SPEAKER_00: Um the key question and the and the key issue is the extent to which we can uh not allow it to influence our own understanding of the issues that pertain specifically to us.
• 48:28
  SPEAKER_00: Um so I think another example would be um the debates around abortion um in America and and and the fact that I I noticed many people um after um the news about Roe v.
• 48:45
  SPEAKER_00: Wade uh a couple of years ago, um I I I noticed many people feeling um frightened about that in in the UK.
• 48:55
  SPEAKER_00: Um but I think one one important and one key difference between the UK and America is the extent to which um religion doesn't really influence British politics um to the extent that it influences American politics, um and the kind of divisions and polarizations around an issue like abortion simply doesn't apply in the UK um as it does in America.
• 49:24
  SPEAKER_00: Um so the UK and I think what one one important thing that we can do is to gain um a better understanding about um European countries that are closer to us.
• 49:38
  SPEAKER_00: Um so I know next to nothing, for example, about the political culture of the Netherlands or Belgium, even though those countries are just across the English Channel.
• 49:50
  SPEAKER_00: Um I I know a bit about about France, but I feel that I it would be much more better if I knew more.
• 49:58
  SPEAKER_00: Um and of course the language area is one of the factors that influences this.
• 50:02
  SPEAKER_00: But um another example would be I I know um not that much about the politics and culture and society of Northern Ireland, for example.
• 50:16
  SPEAKER_00: Um even though it is that that it is part of the UK, I know very little about it.
• 50:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um so I do think what we we we need to educate ourselves more um about um about us and also about our neighbor in European countries and um not allow um American culture and American talking points to influence our own culture and talking points.
• 50:41
  SPEAKER_00: Even though, as I say in the book, I am um um and my example of the sopranos illustrated.
• 50:49
  SPEAKER_00: I am a big fan of many aspects of American culture.
• 50:53
  SPEAKER_00: I I love American TV, I love American films, I love American music, I love American fiction, um I love so much of American culture, but I think um I I do recognize, and I think we should all recognize that America is a foreign country.
• 51:13
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, no, there's some words you don't you don't hear very often.
• 51:16
  SPEAKER_01: I think you're right, we almost meme ourselves into seeing ourselves as Americans or becoming more American or taking our cue from them, and as you mentioned, part of that's language.
• 51:28
  SPEAKER_01: The other one is I suppose you mentioned already, which is if we're just spending our lives networked into this uh amorphous blob of people who's uh who um are ultimately imbibing most of the same talking points and flashpoints, and um we're we're going to end up with a distorted view of ourselves.
• 51:47
  SPEAKER_01: And um, I suppose this is the danger of spending a lot of our times online, which is a little bit like spending a lot of time in your head, but without actually spending it in your body and uh interacting with those people who are actually around you.
• 51:59
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and uh this is something I think we need to fix.
• 52:03
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I don't know how that happens, how that uh a more national consciousness expands, but uh in some respects, the internet's been a sting in the tail.
• 52:12
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but it's it's always been there uh with regards to, you know, everyone talks about the north-south divide.
• 52:19
  SPEAKER_01: So I can having lived in both the north of England and the south of England, what I certainly know it's there, but it's really interesting that um during uh lockdown when people weren't able to travel abroad, the amount of people that were born and raised in this country, regardless of whether they're white, British, or from any other ethnic uh minority background, um had never really gone any further north um than the Cotswolds, maybe.
• 52:46
  SPEAKER_01: Um predominantly they think of I'm gonna get away on holiday.
• 52:52
  SPEAKER_00: Anywhere north of Watford is far too north.
• 52:57
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly.
• 52:59
  SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
• 52:59
  SPEAKER_01: It's true.
• 53:00
  SPEAKER_01: And it's uh and and you know, in in the northern English consciousness, you know, you kind of get past Yorkshire and you don't even really take Midlands into account.
• 53:09
  SPEAKER_01: It's just you just see a sea of cocknies, and that's that's about it.
• 53:13
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but there's just so many people who you know, you'll speak to people, you know, decades into their life and they've um they've not been to the north of England or Scotland or or whatever.
• 53:24
  SPEAKER_01: And um I think we do need to f to to somehow uh fix that.
• 53:28
  SPEAKER_01: But I guess maybe it's ever been thus.
• 53:31
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, if you're from the southeast of England, you know, we've been ultimately since the Norman invasion, we've been more hitched to the continent than we have been to anywhere else.
• 53:40
  SPEAKER_01: And um, you know, that that um uh channel tunnel is effectively just uh uh just a modern way of showing that.
• 53:47
  SPEAKER_00: Um but don't but don't you think but don't you think that that kind of those kinds of divides are becoming even less of an issue now because of like um technology, for example.
• 53:59
  SPEAKER_00: Um and I know that um one striking development um of over the past few decades is the decline of certain regional dialects and certain regional accents.
• 54:11
  SPEAKER_00: The fact that the sort of the act many of the accents and dialects in the UK are kind of sort of becoming flatter rather than more distinctive as as they were in the past.
• 54:21
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that must be due to the fact that through culture and technology and so forth, we are becoming a more integrated um nation.
• 54:32
  SPEAKER_01: Um yeah, I think you I do think you're right.
• 54:37
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I I've forever disappointed people for uh over 10 years with my very light, almost uh imperceptible Northumbrian accent.
• 54:45
  SPEAKER_01: Uh it used to be there until I started moving around the country and I realized people don't really understand the dialect.
• 54:51
  SPEAKER_01: Uh so I had to had to flatten it out.
• 54:53
  SPEAKER_01: But you are right, and um, you know, London's a great example, actually.
• 54:57
  SPEAKER_01: What's quite funny, I think, actually, besides the London point, is that we that that flattening uh is typically in the past, people would attribute that to like a BVC fication of the English tongue where everyone spoke in, received pronunciation.
• 55:11
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but what people are seeing the rise of now in London, not only have you seen the the um kind of the loss, I suppose, of the typical Cockney accent, but the rise of MLE, which I think is multicultural London English, but you've uh which was typically, I think, um, spoken by ethnic minorities, but now it's spreading even amongst white British, but nowhere near London.
• 55:33
  SPEAKER_01: You know, you see videos online of like these kids in East Anglia and the Switch, you know, chocolate.
• 55:38
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, uh honestly, it's really something to see.
• 55:43
  SPEAKER_01: But that's an ex it's it's very funny, very incongruous with the background uh in which they stand as well.
• 55:50
  SPEAKER_01: This you know, kind of like a uh chocolate box kind of background.
• 55:54
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and they're just speaking in this this tongue, which uh is so alien to where they're from.
• 56:00
  SPEAKER_01: Um but you are right, there does seem to be a bit of a flattening that network effect, I suppose.
• 56:05
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, it's the general homogenization of culture, and I guess we say homogenization, it's with an American uh tilt, right?
• 56:11
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, um and also Cockney as well.
• 56:15
  SPEAKER_00: Can be better because many of the um white working class people in the East End um have of course moved to um Essex and um Hertfordshire over the past few decades, and the sort of the Cockney accent is changed into something that's um often called estuary English, which which is a kind of softened version of the Cockney accents, and I think that's interesting as well.
• 56:46
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 56:47
  SPEAKER_01: I I mean it'll be very interesting to see where we're at in you know, 30 years hence, because ultimately it's been the last 30 years, I think we're just seeing such rapid changes in the way that we speak.
• 56:58
  SPEAKER_01: Um, who knows what we'll be talking about then?
• 57:01
  SPEAKER_01: Um uh I I know we're probably approaching the end zone, so a couple of quick fire ones to you.
• 57:06
  SPEAKER_01: Um Cammy Badenuk, uh from the Conservative government, has spoken in the past quite forcefully about um uh Britain being the best place in the world to be black.
• 57:18
  SPEAKER_01: Uh what what's your take on that?
• 57:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um I I I I think amongst any other um I I think she's probably right.
• 57:32
  SPEAKER_00: Um if if we're talking about um living standards and if we're talking about um tolerance of people from a different um ethnic or racial background, I think she's probably right about that.
• 57:48
  SPEAKER_00: Um and um even though I'm not I'm not one of those people that like to sort of say, oh, this place is the best, um that's that's not that's not that's not my that's not my style.
• 57:59
  SPEAKER_00: And I think maybe maybe maybe paradoxically, maybe I'm very British in that kind of research, kind of sort of feeling a bit, I don't know, uncomfortable around being being boastful.
• 58:10
  SPEAKER_00: But I do think that um all too often there is this kind of fashionable um denigration of the UK um as a sort of fashionable tendency to always denigrate and to always demonize the UK.
• 58:31
  SPEAKER_00: Um and I think that kind of attitude um illustrates um a profound ignorance about the rest of the world, because of course the UK is not perfect by any means when it comes to racism, when it comes to bigotry, when it comes to prejudice.
• 58:52
  SPEAKER_00: Of course, uh racism, bigotry, prejudice still exists in the UK and it's still a problem that needs to be addressed.
• 59:01
  SPEAKER_00: But uh when you compare it to the rest of the world, when you compare it to other countries um across the world, then then the UK is is definitely amongst the most tolerant societies in the world, definitely.
• 59:18
  SPEAKER_01: It strikes me that actually the most commonly heard voices you'll you'll hear saying things like that, Tom, are people from immigrant backgrounds.
• 59:27
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I know you have been on the trigonometry podcast, and Constantin Kissin has become uh a real public figure um in the last year or so.
• 59:41
  SPEAKER_01: And uh on his most recent um uh appearance on Question Time, uh he was asked a question by a member of the crowd.
• 59:49
  SPEAKER_01: And uh to paraphrase him, he said, take it from me, as someone who is from the former Soviet Union, um, we need to stop talking Britain down.
• 59:57
  SPEAKER_01: Like that's not going to help us succeed, number one.
• 59:59
  SPEAKER_01: But two, most of the charges we level it, level it, could level at it, we could we could dismiss um that that we we make it out to be some uniquely evil place.
• 1:00:10
  SPEAKER_01: It's like believe me, things could be much worse elsewhere.
• 1:00:13
  SPEAKER_01: And look, you can't accuse me of being some kind of typical white British, pro-British um uh person because I'm I was born in Russia, and uh there was someone in the crowd that heckled him repeatedly, wouldn't let him finish and was shouting, shame on you, when he was trying to talk the country up, um, which is which is remarkable, really.
• 1:00:33
  SPEAKER_01: Um Kia Starmer, we talked a little bit about the the Race Equality Act and how you think that's a a junk idea.
• 1:00:41
  SPEAKER_01: So let's finish on you know, what would you advise political and business leaders to do to promote a healthy civic society rather than one that fractures along racial lines?
• 1:00:53
  SPEAKER_00: I think what I would advise businesses and politicians to do to promote um a more healthy civic society is to not generalize um about people based on their race, to take into account the fact that somebody's identity and somebody's position in the world is and can be influenced by other factors rather than their race.
• 1:01:24
  SPEAKER_00: And in fact, to genuinely show respect to somebody to genuinely treat somebody with a great level greater level of dignity is to accept that to reduce that person to their race is to denigrate them.
• 1:01:45
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, yeah, here and inherent human dignity.
• 1:01:49
  SPEAKER_01: Now there's something which I know is very deep within the Christian tradition, and um uh and uh uh perhaps there's no surprise that that's something that you're you're championing, Tom.
• 1:02:01
  SPEAKER_01: Uh not that I know your your religious persuasion, even if we have spoken about it, but but that that that gives a sense of what um the Western world ultimately is built upon.
• 1:02:11
  SPEAKER_01: And I think it's really important we don't lose sight of the fact that uh there is an inherent human dignity, and that is a universal truth.
• 1:02:18
  SPEAKER_02: Yes.
• 1:02:19
  SPEAKER_01: Um and and anything that goes against that is undermining it and much to all of our detriment.
• 1:02:25
  SPEAKER_01: Uh Tom, it's been an a pleasure to speak to you today.
• 1:02:27
  SPEAKER_01: I've had a lot of fun.
• 1:02:28
  SPEAKER_01: I was very glad to talk about Paulie Goltieri as well.
• 1:02:31
  SPEAKER_01: Uh uh amongst other things.
• 1:02:33
  SPEAKER_01: I wasn't expecting that, um, but it's been a wonderful conversation.
• 1:02:36
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you.
• 1:02:37
  SPEAKER_01: And I hope we can uh I hope we can stay in touch and and speak again in the future and keep fighting the good fight.
• 1:02:42
  SPEAKER_00: Definitely.
• 1:02:43
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you very much, John.
• 1:02:44
  SPEAKER_01: That was wonderful.
• 1:02:45
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks very much.
• 1:02:48
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you for joining me in Thinking Class today.
• 1:02:51
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• 1:03:01
  SPEAKER_01: Thinking Class seeks to understand the civilizational issues we face and why what our leaders do in response matters.
• 1:03:07
  SPEAKER_01: Here I seek to explore the ideas, values, and culture that made our civilization, those that are unmaking it, and how leaders at our public and private institutions should respond.
• 1:03:16
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• 1:03:25
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