Joe Biden may have once bragged about his cooperative relations with segregationists, but he still arguably owes more to African-American leadership and voters than any politician in recent history. After all, it was black voters who bequeathed him the two …
The experts are lying to you
With most of the world’s information only a click away, one would have assumed that ours would be the most enlightened generation in human history. We may have lost the rote-learning skills and depth of knowledge of our grandparents, but …
Why Baltimore didn’t defund the police
In Baltimore the protests that followed the death of George Floyd felt less like an eruption and more like a mellow reprisal of events that had taken place five years earlier. The death of Freddie Gray in police custody had …
The truth about the Buffalo shooting
After the horrific racist mass shooting of 13 people — 11 of them black — in a Buffalo, New York supermarket, it is vital to ask what caused such violence. For some progressives, the answer is already clear: Republicans, notably …
The narcissism of America’s race politics
The Romans loved their Saturnalia. For one week, every year, social customs were overturned in the spirit of carnival: gambling was permitted and slaves were treated as kings. The literary critic Northrop Frye was fascinated by this festival, and saw …
Buffalo and the myth of racist America
What connects the tragedies of May 25, 2020, and May 14, 2022? The straightforward answer, at least according to many in the media and on the Left, is systemic racism.
On May 25, 2020, a black man was murdered in …
How to stop children being indoctrinated
During one of the morning assemblies at my convent school, our headmistress, a fearsome nun who beat me with a shoe for accidentally breaking a window, announced that there was to be an amnesty on “Garbage Pail Kids” trading stickers. …
The white privilege of BLM
For every major metropolis that painted BLACK LIVES MATTER on its streets two years ago, there were huge swathes of America where the whole movement felt like a distant diversion, similar to the current war in Ukraine. You knew it …
The cruel world of yoga
The bar for doing a yoga practice couldn’t be any lower: all you need is a mat and a body, although even the mat is optional. You don’t have to be flexible. You don’t have to be strong. You don’t …
Will Leeds atone for David Oluwale?
It was a moment that had been 15 years in the making. As Leeds unveiled its latest blue plaque, the mood at the ceremony was festive. The 200-strong crowd heard music and poetry in memory of David Oluwale. “A British …
Is Ukraine just a white man’s war?
Fourteen years ago, when Boris Johnson was a mere twinkle in the British electorate’s eye, I wound up shadowing the then MP for Henley-on-Thames as he campaigned to become Mayor of London. He won, of course, then bagged a second …
When libel laws are needed
“Andrew Doyle is an ultra-conservative anti-feminist homosexual who uses a drag persona on Twitter to attack trans and queer people… He wishes with all his heart that he was Julia Hartley-Brewer. Pathologically so.”
Only one assertion in this tweet is …
The myth of the black role model
It’s not easy being good. Living in a $42 million home, being worth $350 million, and stepping up to accept the greatest award of your career is no mean feat. Maybe, just maybe, we caught Will Smith at a bad …
Anti-racism betrays Asian students
After the tragic killing of George Floyd in 2020, much of the virtue-signalling that followed focused on an unexpected target: admissions processes. Activists claimed children “of colour” weren’t getting their fair share of places at good schools — or, to …
The problem with anti-woke liberals
In the summer of 2005, hundreds of recent college graduates gathered in a giant auditorium in Houston for a lesson in “diversity, community and leadership”. At 20 years old, I was the youngest of the bunch. The organisation Teach for …