The identitarian Left’s obsession with promoting grievance and victimhood overshadows the patriotism and positive feelings ethnic minorities have towards Britain, argues Rakib Ehsan in Spiked. While challenges persist, many ethnic minorities appreciate the opportunities and shared values of living in the U.K. It is time to foster unity and celebrate our multicultural democracy, says Ehsan.
In the U.K., the worldview of the woke Left now holds sway in the spheres of politics, education, media and entertainment. Countless politicians, academics and pundits are gripped by a warped, pessimistic view about the state of race relations. On a near daily basis, they promote caricatured portrayals of the supposedly miserable lives of ethnic minorities living in Britain today.
Deploying largely American concepts such as ‘white privilege’ and ‘white supremacy’, identitarian Leftists present Britain as a racist dystopia. They claim that our economic and social systems are deliberately rigged against ethnic minorities – that British institutions are ‘institutionally racist’. And they have embraced the American Black Lives Matter movement – even though BLM has very little to tell us about British society and history, and its aims are rejected by most Brits. Labour leader Keir Starmer may be haunted for some time by that image of him, alongside deputy leader Angela Rayner, ‘taking the knee’ during the BLM protests of 2020.
The Britain these activists envisage is a thoroughly hateful place. In the words of one U.K.-based academic, “Systemic racism permeates British [society].” In this regard, Labour’s response to Tony Sewell’s 2021 Government-commissioned report into race and ethnic disparities was all too telling. Sewell, while recognising that racism still exists in Britain, highlighted the relative success of ethnic minorities educationally and professionally. Labour politicians were outraged. They accused Sewell of ‘denying’ institutional racism. In other words, his vision of Britain was simply not miserable enough.
The identitarian Left’s nightmarish image of Britain is utterly divorced from reality. It also flies in the face of ethnic minorities’ own view of the U.K., wilfully misrepresenting their experiences. Many groups are very content with life in Britain and are optimistic about the future. Yes, they believe that more needs to be done to strengthen equality of opportunity. They no doubt still experience challenges. But ethnic minorities generally view Britain as a place in which people have a chance to thrive.
The identitarian Left’s vision of Britain denies this reality. It promotes pessimism instead of optimism, division instead of cohesion and grievance instead of opportunity.
By constantly bashing Britain, the identitarian Left overlooks something very important. Namely, that many in Britain’s ethnic-minority communities love this country. Many have strong patriotic feelings. Indeed, study after study has shown that ethnic minorities tend to have a stronger sense of their British identity than the white-British mainstream.
This comes as no surprise to me. One of the greatest patriots I know is my mother. Born and raised in Bangladesh and resident in the U.K. since her early twenties, she views herself principally as a British citizen. She is deeply involved in the life and community of our hometown, Luton. Through her dedication and expertise, she has helped to establish grassroots community organisations. Many are now thriving civic associations which provide social assistance as well as sources of cultural belonging.
Of course, ethnic minorities’ strong affection for Britain as a nation doesn’t mean that there aren’t any problems. Everyone knows there is still some prejudice and discrimination. Work needs to be done, for example, to overcome discrimination in the privately rented housing sector. And our healthcare system needs to become more efficient and responsive to the needs of an increasingly diverse population.
But the identitarian Left doesn’t simply challenge actual discrimination, it treats individual instances of prejudice as emblematic of a racist society. It peddles a doom-mongering narrative about life in Britain.
This constant attempt to denigrate Britain comes at a cost. It risks undermining the patriotic feelings towards Britain held by supposedly ‘oppressed’ and ‘marginalised’ groups. Most black Brits attach great importance to their British national identity and three in four British Muslims believe that Britain is a good place to live. But, if the Left continues to promote division and grievance, for how much longer will this be the case?
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If you are not willing to reconcile differences through dialogue then that’s an implicit acceptance that some views have to be repressed, with the risk of differences being resolved through other means. Absolute free speech is the answer. (Yes, including death threats; the answer to this is better policing of physical space, and for people to develop tougher hides).
Free Speech –YES. Death Threats –NO. You can speak freely about everything except what is against the law.
Disagree. Any exceptions WILL be disingenuously interpreted. Witness all the instances of obvious jokes on Twitter leading to arrests.
“Against the law” – something the socialists in parliament decided should be illegal. Give me a break.
Absolutely.
There is a distinction between talking about breaking the law and the act of breaking the law.
The act is what should be persecuted.
It depends. Something I witnessed in the past was a clash of football fans of opposing teams happening at Mainz station. This started by a small guy full of nervous aggression holding a rousing speech on the steps of the large staircase inside the building until he had whipped up the fans of the non-local team to a sufficient degree that they rushed towards the others and a big street fight started. If the police had stopped the speech, they (and bystanders accidentally caught in it) wouldn’t have had to deal with the street fight.
True, but imagine the rousing speech was about “trans rights” or was “gender critical” and the two sides looked like they might kick off. It’s easy to see how such a law could be used selectively to stop people saying certain things and allowing others to say others.
My remedy – deal with the street fight, punish people who use violence. Happy to pay for more police to do this, or indeed to pay police to deal with stuff like this rather than whatever it is they seem to spend a lot of time doing (I have little idea as I go weeks without seeing police where I live).
True, but imagine the rousing speech was about “trans rights” or was “gender critical” and the two sides looked like they might kick off. It’s easy to see how such a law could be used selectively to stop people saying certain things and allowing others to say others.
There’s a difference between people chanting nonsensical slogans during a gathering (eg, Lock her up!) or making idle threats on the internet and someone acting as leader of a tactical unit/ mob about to get into action. The former shouldn’t be actionable, the latter should. A less legally heavy-handed approach would also work: Disperse both crowds before something happens. That’s keeping public order which is certainly a job of the police.
Who defines what is “nonsensical”, and how is it defined in law?
Disperse crowds – who decides what a “crowd” is and which “crowds” are threatening and need to be dispersed.
Prevention is great, but often the presence of police will deter people stepping over the line.
This obviously involves making a judgement call and might lead to a wrong judgement. That’s something for the courts to sort out. Personally, I really prefer the Prussian solution: Send troops and order them to attack whoever doesn’t voluntarily move on.
Well, I trust neither the courts nor the Prussian troops.
I can’t claim (first-hand) experience with Prussian troops but some experience with courts and I’m certainly not inclined to trust them. But nevertheless. Coming back to a distinction I already made a couple of times: Speech can be informational or functional. The former is supposed to have an effect on the minds and hearts of the listeners only and that’s the one which ought to be free. And the latter is meant to accomplish a tangible real-world effect and should be limited accordingly. To use a contrived example other than the tired theatre – fire one, let’s assume I have an absolutely dedicated lackey who believes I’m Christ reincarnated and my orders are to be absolutely obeyed. If I now tell him “Kill the bearded guy over there, he’s a secret agent of the devil!” and he obeys, walks over and kills him, I certainly shouldn’t be able to claim that I’m innocent of this, despite I only spoke and didn’t do anything myself.
I agree there’s a line to be drawn somewhere, but these days my inclination is to err on the side of everything being allowed, speech-wise.
Nope . I won’t give you a break. ——You want to live in a world where we should all threaten to kill each other.—- I would watch those cornflakes your munching on this morning if I were you. I think they may be a bit tainted. ——-But then again, it’s all down to personal taste what?
The problem lies with the law. Remove restrictions on speech, and the hypocrisy and double standards are gone.
To be honest I don’t need Douglas Murray to explain this.
I’ve fought for Israel (against BBC bias) for 30 years. I’ve visited Israel twice, been to the Gaza border and Ashkelon. A friend runs ”Camera’, the world’s premier website against media bias against Israel.
The people Toby describes are, simply, evil.
No journalist can understand or explain this evil in political terms. It’s not sociological, nor intellectual.
This is a spiritual battle. It concerns a Chosen People and a Promised Land.
One translation of the Hebrew for ‘Israel’ is ‘God wins’.
He will. Your prayers help.
There is no such thing as simply evil people.
Yes there is they are called the Global elite aka WEF, open your eyes
Douglas Murray has a wonderful talent for “hitting the nail squarely on the head” with very simple statements.
Yep. Obviously.
Nobody that reads the DS regularly will be under the illusion that the censorship that now exists in our society is anything more than a political weapon.
This sort of approach is good to wake up the dozing majorities. But is this article directed at them? How many will read it?
I have sympathy for both the people of Israel and Gaza. It is BOTH correct that the Palestinians are oppressed by Israel AND that Hamas are terrorists.
In theory a two state solution where both sides agree to cement the status quo is ideal. Unfortunately the outside world gives aid to the Palestinians the continued giving of which is contingent on the Palestinians continuing in their role as professional victims.
Things being as they are, maybe the best thing Israel can do is re-locate the entire population of Gaza to a newly built suburb of Cairo and give the West Bank back to Jordan (one reason we tend to hear less about the West Bank is that it is heavily infiltrated by the Jordanian intelligence service.)
I’ve read that the majority of Israelis and Palestinians don’t want the two-state solution; Palestinian preference is to reclaim all the land. Relocation would make no difference; they’d still want to wipe Israel off the map.
In the same vein the Israeli Government are terrorists as they have been using their army to opress and murder Palestinians, just because the MSM aren’t showing it, doesn’t mean that it isn’t happening, I am tired of people banding round the word terrorist, if your family were constantly being hurt by someone and the only way to stop them is to hit back would you do it? Oh yes add to it it has been happening for 70 years?
While I agree with the gist of this article I don’t think it’s entirely truthful to say that in relation to Israel, that things are entirely different..because they aren’t.
I think we can all agree that there is massive inconsistency in who gets away with what, on all sorts of issues, and I don’t think this is very different…however unpalatable the comments might be in this instance.
Other than a lot of ‘the usual suspects’, both the vast majority of people and MSM, have quite rightly condemned Hamas, and what happened over the weekend….…
I’m not sure that I fully appreciate the right/left argument here..nor the ‘as yet unconfirmed’ mention of beheaded babies…
….I don’t know if it is true or not..but I think it only makes things more difficult ..especially if it turns out not to be true….
….it means you have given ‘ammunition’ to your ‘enemy’ ….and a great deal of natural support and trust is lost…
The ‘binary’ nature of everything now….particularly in geopolitics (you are with us or against us) was always going to come back and bite the West…because it was always a false choice…and while I have no time for anyone praising and glorifying atrocities
it is quite possible to oppose both terrorists, and the indiscriminate bombing and killing of civilians..now being denied essential supplies, including water…
Agree however, how would you counter-offence an attack like Saturday’s?
The best way to kill enemies is to make them friends.
A magnanimous gesture by the wealthier to the poorer would benefit both in the long term.
War and fighting wastes lives and resources.
Those who sponsor and perpetuate conflict – avaricious bankers, career politicians, scurrilous media – only benefit in the short term. They will pass away like the rest of us, but go with some seriously heavy baggage.
There are just under 10 million people in Israel of which about 7.5 million are Jewish. It might be cheaper, both in cost and in human lives, for The West to relocate the 7.5 million in Western countries than to watch the Jewish people stay in Israel and be massacred over the coming years, something that is definitely on the cards at this time. Perhaps we could politely deny entry to the 500 million or so “religion of peace” “refugees” who want to move to the West. We would also be able to ship the pro-“Palestine” protestors who are making so much noise in Western countries back to THEIR promised land, after all, it would be vacant.
Maybe, but good luck convincing them to come. They tried that once before and are possibly reluctant to try it again.
It seems obvious to me that separate countries is the only solution. It’s probably obvious to many people, just tricky drawing the borders in the right place.
Unfortunately the two state solution is unacceptable to the Islamic extremists. They want Israel annihilated. As the great Chris Plante likes to say, if the “Palestinians” were to lay down their arms there would be peace. If Israel laid down its arms there would be genocide.
I’m pretty ignorant on the subject and of course who can predict the future but I expect this is true. I’d love to understand why they hate Israel so much, which some of them seem to. Jealous of their success?
Two branches of the same monotheistic religion which are forever at loggerheads how to worship properly.
I am fairly ignorant on this subject, but from what I know there are many similarities between the two religions. What does vary wildly is the way they are interpreted, especially with regard to separation between church and state. Israel seems a much more secular country than most majority-Muslim countries, and seems more concerned with race than with religion – in that sense it’s the most/only “racist” state on Earth (an observation not a criticism). I guess it’s due to history and numbers. Jews have not had their own country much in recent centuries and were never in a position to impose theocracy, and the current state of Israel certainly doesn’t look like going in that direction. Jews apparently don’t try and “convert” people – Muslims do.
I tend to be vaguely pro-Israel in this whole business, simply on the basis that it’s hard to see how Israel represents a threat to the Muslim/Arab world in the same way that world represents a threat to Israel. Of course that doesn’t give them a free pass to do bad stuff, but my gut usually has me coming out more in sympathy with them than with the other lot. And as Mogwai pointed out elsewhere, I would prefer to live in a Jewish neighbourhood than a Muslim one, based on my London experiences.
As you rightly pointed out the other day, there’s not much you or I can do about it.
https://off-guardian.org/2023/10/11/israel-hamas-war-another-excuse-to-shut-down-free-speech/
Kit Knightly at Off-G with a typically insightful take on the Israel / Hamas mess.
Basically, more censorship.
The first casualty of war is the truth.
Perhaps the second casualty is free speech.
Toby is wrong, there were no beheaded babies.
“Source of dubious ‘beheaded babies’ claim is Israeli settler leader who incited riots to ‘wipe out’ Palestinian village”
https://thegrayzone.com/2023/10/11/beheaded-israeli-babies-settler-wipe-out-palestinian/
What sort of callous people hold a “rave” on a Jewish holiday just 3.1 miles of open scrub from the biggest concentration camp in the world housing 2 million fenced in and subjugated Muslims?
Reports have stated that IDF soldiers and security guards fired on the advancing Hamas fighters who returned fire. There is video footage of armed and uniformed Israeli security forces within the crowd.
https://t.me/VanessaBeeley/18226
Unfortunately, many civilians were killed.
The festivals own website stated ……
“This time too, on the upcoming Sukkot holiday, we are going to host for the first time ever in the Jewish state, one of the largest, oldest and most influential festivals in Israel!!! https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/14.0.0/svg/1f30d.svg”
https://www.eventer.co.il/event/novaparalellotranslate/wCqCL
“Despite what you might think, no, Palestinians are not celebrating death. We do not look at the news and rejoice over the number of Israelis killed. We do not salivate at the sight of blood drenched bodies. Despite what you might think we are not evil. We do not look at death and feel happiness.
The “joy” you might be seeing is the idea that for the first time in history we might have a chance to reclaim our land. We might have a chance to end the occupation, we might have a chance to open Gaza’s borders, to visit our family without reprisal and to escape from torturous prisons.”
https://hebhjamal.substack.com/p/despite-what-you-think-palestinians?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=363132&post_id=137772419&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=6x3tl&utm_medium=email
It’s more than a rethorical smokescreen. It’s a seriously retarded world view held by people who’ve been externally socialised by Hollywood movies and TV series produced in similar spirit. The basic axiom of this word-view is that there are always to neatly separated groups of people, the good guys and the bad guys. Whatever the good guys do is in the name of the universal good and thus, deserves general sympathy and support. And whatever the bad guys do happens in the name of universal evil and is thus reprehensible and must be squashed. Can’t bring in more nuances because otherwise, the plot gets so difficult that the resulting movie may still end up being shown on art festivals (to the bewilderment of an audience which doesn’t dare to expess that because It’s art!) but it certainly won’t become a highly profitable popular success¹.
¹ A “blockbuster” (or “cookie”) is a 4000lb air mine supposed to blow off the roof and smash the windows of a rectangular arrangement of multi-story houses working class people used to dwell in in Germany cities (called ein Block in German to this day), so that the following hail of 4lb incendiaries would end up inside the buildings and thus, reach flammable material and to enable enough airflow for a large fire to develop quickly. It’s quite telling that this became a synonym for immensely popular performance.
https://www.conservativewoman.co.uk/the-hounding-of-an-inspirational-headmaster-who-spoke-out-on-covid/
Another sad story concerning an inspirational teacher who was hounded from his job for guess what?
Speaking freely.
Speaking freely is a bit too general. He was openly critical of Covaxxes-for children and other COVID-cruelties inflicted on pupils. And because of this, the local council reported him to the counter-extremism unit of the government as someone who’s seeking to turn children into terrorists. And the counter-extremism unit obviously picked that up as they anti-disinformation unit of the government had already been monitoring him. And of the government is really to neutral. It’s almost certainly other card-carrying (New) Labour members in suitable branches of the civil services.
Civil servants abusing their offices for party politics are a pest which must be eliminated (from the civil service, mind you, there’s nothing to say against them preaching at street corners or standing for elections).
@Toby, the General Secretary of the Free Speech Union
In recent days, the Daily Sceptic has published six posts on events in Israel-Palestine, four of them by Will Jones, and all of them in one way or another charging the Left with applying left wing principles inconsistently. Is Will Jones actually Melanie Phillips writing under a pseudonym? I see no substantial point which she and her kind have not made during one Israel-Palestine crisis after another. Perhaps it is time to restate the right wing case against Israel.
The charge is this. Insincerity. The insincerity of those who have not the faintest idea that you are supposed to be right. The insincerity of those who regard facts, even when they are true, as a means to an end. The insincerity of those who will say anything, whatever suits the purpose. The insincerity of the party line.
The Zionist movement, having been offered a Jewish national home (not state) in (not the whole of) Palestine, gained independence by campaigning for the partition of Mandate Palestine (not the biblical Land of Israel) into two nation states of equal size. They claimed that partition was what they positively, absolutely wanted. Within days, their private armies initiated a campaign which resulted in the acquisition of three quarters of Mandate Palestine, subjecting most of it to ethnic cleansing. In the decades since then they have helped themselves to the rest of it (and rather more) never ceding one inch of it, nor readmitting a single Palestinian.
This process has been accompanied by decades of fraudulent pseudo-intellectual propaganda and pseudo-history, decades of misrepresentation of the real issues, decades of agreements made in bad faith. Who manufactures the propaganda? They.. Who believes, or affects to believe it? They. Who are They? If the cap fits, wear it.
And now for the suspicion. Let me observe in passing that during the Second World War the German state deliberately killed between five and six million Jews (and not a few others), almost certainly on the secret personal orders of the then head of state Chancellor Shicklgruber, a half-baked crank and conspiracy theorist. Germany has since mended its ways.
The suspicion? It is that the current crisis will end with the ethnic cleansing of Gaza. According to a report in the Daily Telegraph (oops, I mean the MSM) the armed forces of Israel have ordered the civilian population of Gaza to flee. Flee? To where? Flee? How? Through the crossing (before the crisis began, under Israeli control) to Egypt. Then, presumably, the propaganda machine will cease its operations and they will be allowed to return to the remaining sliver of Mandate Palestine not yet occupied by Israel.
And if you believe that you believe anything. You believe that the great scientist Sigmund Freud discovered the Oedipus complex, the great musicologist Theodor Adorno enriched Western music with tonerows, that the great intellectual Wilhelm Reich synthesised Marx and Freud and discovered orgone energy and that the great planetary astronomer and ancient historian Immanuel Velikovsky revolutionised our perception of life, the universe and everything.
I am extremely disappointed that a web site I have followed and admired for two years or more because of its commitment to freedom of expression and sceptical challenges to mainstream narratives has now become, in a matter of days, rabidly pro-censorship and pro-cancel culture when it comes to anyone challenging the pro-Israel/anti-Hamas line. CNN and Fox News look positively restrained compared to The Daily Sceptic.
You may feel the DS hasn’t been sceptical enough about the narratives emanating from this conflict; personally I’d like to see a bit more light and some investigation into the claims. However, I don’t think it’s correct to say they’ve become pro-censorship or cancel culture.
You might all (including Toby and the DS team) find Frank Wright’s The Death of Peace article helpful: https://frankwright.substack.com/?utm_campaign=email-home&r=16mzd7&utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email
You could all also check out MiriAF (easy search on Google) on all this. She, Frank Wright and UK Column are the most helpful, informed and balanced on the Israel/Gaza topic.
And, BTW, there has been no evidence for the beheading of babies; indeed, UK Column thinks this rumour is false. We should always try and check out things like that before letting them fly.
False equivalence is a trait seen in narcissists and psychopaths. Thank you for this outstanding article Toby!
The spirit of national socialism lives on in today’s left it seems. It looks like we could be just a nudge away from history repeating – incremental changes to dictatorial totalitarianism.
One must look beyond the attacks.
Who decided there should be attacks now? Why? What is sought to be achieved?
Who are the manipulators who made this happen? What do they have to gain from it?
Who are those being used?
How many different interests are there in play here?
How many different interests are met by what is happening?
Where does the money come from to make it happen?
Why does the legacy media never address these questions and find the answers to report?
That’s the kind of analysis I’d prefer the DS to focus on.
Yes lots of people taking about the aggression of the Palestinian people in Gazza, and you condemn that that but have any of you seen what the Israel Army has been been doing for years to people living in Gazza?. Doubt it,. before condemning a people find out the real reasoning behind it as I’m sure many of you don’t
That is the easy bit. We all can understand the anger and frustration of those confined in Gaza. And you are right that a balanced understanding of the problem is necessary.
But is this new conflict to achieve results which are nothing to do with ending injustices in Gaza?
What we never get to hear is who decided this new war should happen and why? Who is funding it and why? How many interests are there being served by this new war? How many players are there and what are all their different interests? Are the people of Gaza being used to serve other interests?
Is this, for example, yet again about oil – a new manifestation of ensuring oil for western interests? I am not saying it is but we must look beyond what we might think is the obvious.
What are the real reasons?
Cycle of violence; both Arabs and Jews have been at each others’ throats for millennia. Hamas and Iran don’t want a two-state solution either; they want Israel wiped off the map. What’s the solution?
I also er on supporting, total free speech as the US amendment. It helps give a clearer wider picture of mankind’s thoughts, intentions and direction of travel. That open uncensored dialogue, listening and interaction should be a no brainer!! As opposed to state policed, censorship, reduced dissemination of information and authority dictating a view; which unfortunately gen z seem to prefer, as they think speech is a hate crime and run to the false safe space of cancelling people and with palpable irony shoot their own future selves freedoms on the foot.
Transparency of speech helps all of us build tolerance to listen.
To stifle speech stops listening and in turn stops thought.
The online safety bill is authoritarian suppression of speech, listening, thought and action.
There has been a lot of tribalism & division over the past few years. Brexit, jabs, lockdown, Ukraine-Russia and now Israel-Palestine. Divide and rule works. While it’s outside my psychological remit to understand those who celebrate the death of another, I’d no doubt feel different if I was Palestinian or Israeli. It would be preferable of course if those who believe in free speech didn’t use it to offend whole races, whether that’s glorifying the death of Israelis or Palestinians or for that matter insulting the Prophet Muhammad. But you either have 100% free speech or you don’t, because as we know, any encroachment allowed by government will not end. Much as we may like, you cannot legislate against somebody being an a-hole.
Sara Sidner (on the alleged dead baby story) bold added.
@sarasidnerCNN
I would argue we were mislead. I am going to report on what heads of governments say. That is what new orgs do. It doesn’t mean it’s true but it’s news they said it & had to retract it. In that same report I noted Hamas denied the acts but no one on here is complaining about that.