No need for a clever headline to attract attention for this
post, methinks.
Unless you’ve been hibernating on Venus, you’ll have heard that Dr David Starkey CBE, Cambridge historian, writer and media presenter, said some apparently racist things and was promptly ostracised from society.
I have two questions:
1) Specifically: Were his utterances so dreadful that he deserved such condemnation?
2)
Generally: Is this
perpetual shutting up, putting down, pulling down, score-settling and compensation-seeking
the best way to solve the problem of racism in the UK?
My answer to 1) is, that’s not the point. Here’s why.
Dr Starkey said, “Slavery was not genocide otherwise there wouldn't be so many damn blacks in Africa or Britain would there?”
Unpicking that:
·
Slavery is: The state of being a slave, a person
kept as property, who is submissive under domination.
·
Genocide is: The deliberate extermination of a
racial, national, religious, or ethnic group.
While one might lead to or be part of the other, that
doesn’t automatically mean that they are the same, therefore Dr Starkey has a
point at least.
On the other hand, the phrase “damn blacks” made my toes curl. An educated, articulate person should know that it is wrong and indeed unnecessary to use such language. But before rushing to a final judgement, let’s play Devil’s advocate. I’ve been called a “Bloody Northerner” many times but I’ve never expected the perpetrators to be punished. Is this name-calling as bad as Dr Starkey’s?
Take a step back. Do we have the right in this country to be insulting? We do (as long as we don’t explicitly incite violence). It’s called free speech. And here’s where I get a bit esoteric – in the paraphrased words of the philosopher Karl Popper, being wrong sometimes leads us to the right answer (falsificationism), so we need to keep doors open, especially the free-speech door, to end up right.
Put another way, zero-tolerance and no-platforming have no place in a free, democratic, tolerant and peaceful society.
As to question 2) my answer is, no – this constant free-speech denial, finger-pointing, guilt-tripping, retribution-seeking will not solve the UK’s racism problem. Too much negative energy. Very distracting. So unchristian.
So what’s my solution? Positivity. Constructiveness. Kindness. Examples herewith:
· There are a lot – but there should be more – very successful people of colour in this country. In no particular order: Dame Sharon White, Sir Ken Olisa, Ben Afolami MP, Trevor Phillips, Trevor McDonald, Baroness Scotland, Priti Patel, and I could go on. Let’s tap into the secrets of their success. Let’s have can-do, won’t-whine role models for the younger generation.
· What most if not all of the above have in common is a good education. Many universities are attracting a more diverse student body. Let’s have an even greater effort and more investment in this solution.
· There have been calls for the teaching of history and other subjects to be reassessed. If this means teaching all of the facts – accurately – not just some of them, then great. If it means replacing one skewed view with another, then we will gain nothing.
· Focus criticism and seek change where racist actions lead directly to tangible harm, e.g. some (not all) policing, and where non-racist actions lead unintentionally to racial discrimination, e.g. the Windrush scandal.
· It is a matter of shame that slavery has been and still is a constant throughout recorded history. The most meaningful apology we can make for the part Britain has played, and the most positive action we can take, is to maximise resources towards freeing today’s slavery victims (e.g. the estimated 13,000 enslaved-labourers and sex workers in the UK), dealing with their physical and mental rehabilitation (e.g. thousands of Yazidi sex-slaves in the Middle East), punishing the perpetrators, and limiting the opportunities for slavery’s continuance and resurgence.
The alternative is to topple statues, spray graffiti, and virtue-signal.
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