Knowledge is a power structure, maintained by manipulation of language. So, we learned from Michel Foucault, who inspired the postmodern turn in universities and emancipatory activism. Fact has been replaced by narrative, and objective reality by relativism. The framework of identity politics accepts neither individual nor universal truths. Your group status (gender, race, etc) determines how you are seen, and … [Read on]

The Remainers weep: “Oh, how we miss the French with their charm, their style, their sartorial elegance and delectable dishes!” Where are they now? Alas! All these have been wafted away, borne on a cloud of bafflement and indignation; for sadly, when faced with a genuine crisis, French governments yield to two familiar temptresses, arrogance and inefficiency. During this recent … [Read on]

Author Tom Bradwell On January 12th Spotify was granted a patent that described “methods, systems and computer program products for processing audio signals to determine taste attributes.” It continues: “Environmental metadata is retrieved… based on the background noise which might correspond to any noises in the audio signal that are not the primary speaker’s voice. This may include ambient environmental … [Read on]

The University of Leicester’s proposal to replace the medieval literature component of its BA English courses by ‘excitingly innovative’ modules on race, ethnicity, sexuality, and diversity, and thereby further the aim of ‘decolonising the curriculum’, has attracted anger among academics in the English department. But if the public letter of resignation penned by its prospective external examiner for the MA … [Read on]

I’ve just been to a funeral in the South of France, wonderful to see so many of my old friends again and I didn’t have to leave my front room. Unlike obsequies of the past, the smooth running of this one didn’t depend on people arriving on time by train, or funeral cars avoiding traffic jams; everything rested on the … [Read on]

Following Trump’s demise, the question is this: Can some semblance of a shared political space be recreated in which civilized debate can be carried on, and appeal made to sources of evidence judged by common consent to be impartial? Or does the rise of the worldwide web and social media, and the accompanying fall from grace of the mainstream media, … [Read on]

There is no difference between the arrest of Alexei Navalny at Moscow Airport tonight and the impeachment last week of Donald Trump. Navalny and Trump are seen by their respective political establishments as enemies who must be silenced at all costs. Silencing opponents is the work of dictators. Both establishments have dug their own graves: Putin in trying to murder … [Read on]

According to critical race theory, whites are historic oppressors, and ‘people of colour’ are historic victims. British imperial history – white history – must therefore be thoroughly deconstructed. Yet when we look back through world history, we see people of colour engaged in positive orgies of oppression, brutality, colonial exploitation, enslavement, violence, and barbarity. ‘People of colour’, given the chance, … [Read on]