Andrew Doyle | I'm Not Exaggerating The Problem | Modern Wisdom Podcast 232

1. 0:00 – 1:40

   Intro

   1. ADAndrew Doyle0:00

      They can say that all white people are complicit in whiteness by virtue of the color of their skin, and they can also say that people who are non-white are also complicit in the system if they are not actively anti-racist. Remember, for these people, it isn't the dichotomy of racist or not racist. Because if you're not racist, that's another form of racism. The dichotomy is actually racist or anti-racist, which means you are proactively conceding your own complicity in these systems and, and attempting to decolonize these systems, right? So it's not good enough just not to be a racist person, to be a good person who doesn't ever say or do or support anything racist. That's not enough. You've got to be an anti-racist. (wind blowing)

   2. CWChris Williamson0:35

      Andrew, welcome to the show.

   3. ADAndrew Doyle0:37

      Lovely to be back. It's been a while. How long has it been? More than a year, I think.

   4. CWChris Williamson0:40

      Just over a year. You were-

   5. ADAndrew Doyle0:41

      Just over a year.

   6. CWChris Williamson0:41

      ... en route from London to the Fringe, dropped in for a quick coffee, and then-

   7. ADAndrew Doyle0:45

      That's right. That's right, yeah. And it was fun. It was good.

   8. CWChris Williamson0:48

      It was.

   9. ADAndrew Doyle0:48

      But none of that, none of that anymore. That's not how the world works now.

   10. CWChris Williamson0:51

       No.

   11. ADAndrew Doyle0:51

       It's all remote.

   12. CWChris Williamson0:53

       It is. You're, you're on, uh, on holiday at the moment, somewhere nice.

   13. ADAndrew Doyle0:56

       Well, I'm, I'm not really. I'm working. I'm on the Amalfi Coast. Uh, I'm staying in a small town, uh, halfway between Positano and Amalfi, and I'm... I spent the day in Capri the other day. So it's... And, and I've been to Pompeii, so it sounds like I'm having a good time. But I am here to work, and so for the rest of the week, I'm, I'm not gonna leave the flat. I'm just gonna sit here and write, 'cause I can't work at home. Too many distractions.

   14. CWChris Williamson1:18

       You're reading some-

   15. ADAndrew Doyle1:18

       But I norm-

   16. CWChris Williamson1:19

       ... future classics, I'm sure.

   17. ADAndrew Doyle1:20

       I normally go away to, um... No, I'm not. I'm, I'm working on a new book, and because the last two books I wrote, I wrote in Sark, the Isle of Sark, but I can't get there because of the quarantine rules, so I had to come to Italy. So, uh, you know, it's fine. Uh, yeah, it's a real tour.

   18. CWChris Williamson1:33

       It's a tough life, isn't it? Yeah. (laughs)

   19. ADAndrew Doyle1:36

       Yeah. No, but it's good. It's good. I mean, I've got the space I need just to focus on stuff.

2. 1:40 – 8:03

   Updates in the Woke World

   1. ADAndrew Doyle1:40

   2. CWChris Williamson1:40

      I like it. So what have been the major developments in the woke world this year?

   3. ADAndrew Doyle1:45

      I mean, where do you begin? Uh, it, it, it has exploded. When, when I last spoke to you, uh, I was often accused of, uh, exaggerating the problem and people would say, "Well, you know, you're just complaining about the behavior of a few rogue students here and there on university campuses, or a few nutcases on the internet." Um, and, well, I've, I've been proven right, haven't I? Because now it's not that. It's demonstrably not that. The evidence of everything I've been writing about and talking about for the past five years is absolutely everywhere. It's incontrovertible. And if that sounds arrogant, so be it, but there you go. I told you so.

   4. CWChris Williamson2:17

      The prophet, the prophet has arrived. (laughs)

   5. ADAndrew Doyle2:19

      I, I fucking told you so and you did nothing. And you attacked me. You just attacked me. I am Cassandra. You didn't believe my warnings, and here we are. You know, had you heeded my prophecies, perhaps this could have been evaded.

   6. CWChris Williamson2:33

      So other than you being-

   7. ADAndrew Doyle2:34

      But, but apparently not.

   8. CWChris Williamson2:34

      ... one of the, one of the four horsemen, where, where is-

   9. ADAndrew Doyle2:37

      Yeah.

   10. CWChris Williamson2:37

       ... the world of... If, if there's trends, if there was like a trending in the world of woke, sort of, where has it gone this year?

   11. ADAndrew Doyle2:43

       Yeah, so it's been a kind of, uh, just a concatenation of unfortunate circumstances. You know, we had the, uh, obviously the pandemic and the lockdown, and this created this kind of tension and this kind of, um, this sense of frustration. It meant a lot of people were spending more time on the internet, uh, uh, rather than the real world, which means that they have a skewed perspective of how things are going. And, and then all of a sudden it explodes, uh, because of the death of George Floyd. So there's this, you know, what, what starts out as very important, uh, legitimate protests against police brutality, I'm personally very, uh, nervous about any kind of overreach of the state, as you know, because you know, you know about my work. So I, I do believe instances like that do require rigorous response and rigorous protest. Um, but very quickly it became quite clear that this wasn't about George Floyd anymore. It was about this whole host of other issues, and it was actually more a kind of catalyst for the culture war to explode into the mainstream, which is exactly what happened. And then you have all major corporations, all major businesses, civic institutions, uh, schools, universities, absolutely everyone in lockstep over, uh, basically issues they don't fully understand. You know, I mean, when the BBC, for instance, um, and Sainsbury's as of this week-

   12. CWChris Williamson3:54

       (laughs)

   13. ADAndrew Doyle3:54

       ... uh, telling their employees to read White Fragility by Robin DiAngelo, which is a book which is, uh, I suppose the most popular example of, of, of critical race theory that we have at the moment. But it is a very, um, a very shoddy, uh, piece of work, um, which has been widely discredited and, and, and doesn't have the kind of academic respectability. Once you move beyond that sort of niche of, of the, the kind of postmodern offshoots such as, uh, you know, uh, critical race theory, disability studies, fat studies, gender studies, intersectional feminism. Once you go beyond all that, people don't take Robin DiAngelo very seriously. Uh, businesses do, corporations do. They pay her thousands of dollars to go in and shout at their white employees and tell them how racist they all are. But it's such a dangerous, divisive, backward philosophy of life. It's the, it's the idea that you divide us into oppressed and oppressor, irrespective of our personal circumstances, and you, you, you, you know, it's, it's racist in every way it is possible to be racist. You, you know, it degrades people of color by telling them that they're always gonna be victims, that they never, they will never, uh, achieve anything that they deserve to achieve. And it's racist against white people because it tells them that they all, uh, oppressive and racist. And in particular Robin DiAngelo, who will claim that if you deny your complicity in white supremacy, that just proves you're a white supremacist, right? So this, it's, it's absolutely appalling and abysmal. And of course, because she used the phrase, and, and, uh, well... People of that ilk use the phrase "anti-racism" to describe what they're doing. If you complain about anti-racism or make the case that anti-racism is a bad thing, it sounds like you're saying that you are for racism.

   14. CWChris Williamson5:24

       (laughs)

   15. ADAndrew Doyle5:24

       And of course the reason for opposing anti-racism is if you are concerned about actual racism. That's the problem. So this gets very complicated. There's this whole lexicon you sort of have to, you have to master before you can get anywhere. It also makes people rightly nervous. They understand that, you know. Most people are, are concerned about, uh, the anti-racism in terms of unconscious bias training, implicit bias training, dividing people up. I mean, Sainsbury's literally created an online safe space for their Black employees. I mean, how patronizing is that?

   16. CWChris Williamson5:55

       (laughs)

   17. ADAndrew Doyle5:55

       Um, so people are nervous about this, but they don't want to be seen to be opposed to anti-racism. It's a very clever phrase that they use. But what people have to understand is that anti-racism is a rehabilitated form of racialized thinking. In other words, it is a form of racism. And if you really care...... about combating racism as I do, then you will oppose anti-racism. And you'll go back to the liberal approach, uh, the liberal approach to combating racism. And the reason why that's a good thing is we've got the past six decades of progress which prove that it works. And sure, it hasn't achieved a complete utopia where racism doesn't exist. That will never happen because we live in a society of human beings, and there's always gonna be some nasty pieces of work amongst us, right? But the best, the absolute best way, as has been proven by recent history, is the liberal approach, is that you would tackle racism rigorously whenever it occurs. What you don't do is create this faith-based philosophy where there are nebulous power structures that only people like Robin DiAngelo are qualified to detect. And therefore, you implement policy on that basis in the government, in the arts, in education, in the media, absolutely everywhere. And then you're solving problems that may or may not exist on the basis of this, this data that you've created. That's not the way to go about this, and we know this is the case. So people who do believe in those liberal values, those decent values of equality and fairness and, and looking out for people and ensuring that people aren't, uh, mistreated in society and discriminated against, those are the people who need to advance the liberal, uh, agenda. The social liberalism that has served us so well for so long, uh, that is now being utterly demolished before our eyes.

   18. CWChris Williamson7:26

       It seems or it feels a little bit like, you know, the God of the gaps theory?

   19. ADAndrew Doyle7:31

       Yeah. Yeah.

   20. CWChris Williamson7:31

       This is kind of like the racism of the gaps theory.

   21. ADAndrew Doyle7:35

       Yes. That's right.

   22. CWChris Williamson7:36

       The ra- ra- racism is the set point and that is the elephant in the room with regards to the anti-racism movement, that it inherently further entrenches and splits us up into groups based on race, as opposed to the Sam Harris proposal, which is a world where the color of someone's skin would be as important as the 色 of someone's hair. And we don't care that there's-

   23. ADAndrew Doyle7:55

       Yeah.

   24. CWChris Williamson7:55

       ... there's not enough gingers that are CEOs-

   25. ADAndrew Doyle7:58

       (laughs)

   26. CWChris Williamson7:58

       ... or bru- brunettes that are working on the, the machine line or whatever it might be.

3. 8:03 – 15:50

   Where Are the Gay Activists?

   1. CWChris Williamson8:03

      Um, one thing I've noticed this year, race really has sort of come to the forefront. What's happened with the gays this year? Is gay activism still alive and well?

   2. ADAndrew Doyle8:14

      The gays are, are the new white man, aren't they? I, I think that (laughs) people are quite down on the gays at the moment. And there's all sorts of things that you've just kind of touched on, which are quite difficult to unpack. I mean, you, you were alluding to the, the, the ideal of colorblindness, which is of course the ideal, the liberal ideal, which is that, as you say, the ginger hair analogy works well. Because we, it doesn't mean that you don't see race, it means that you don't, uh-

   3. CWChris Williamson8:37

      Care.

   4. ADAndrew Doyle8:38

      ... care. You don't care. You don't, you don't treat people differently on, on, on, on the base of skin color, which is actually a beautiful, uh, ideal that we should all be str-... That's how, that's what we use to teach children. And all of a sudden, over the past six months, suddenly all of that needs to be unpicked and unpacked and re- and revised based on this very reactionary agenda. I think that's absolutely, uh, heartbreaking and genuinely, uh, tragic and yes, reactionary and regressive. Regressive.

   5. CWChris Williamson9:03

      (laughs)

   6. ADAndrew Doyle9:03

      It's taking us right back. Um, and that's the thing, you don't need, you know, we've s-... Can anyone seriously, hand on heart, say that what has happened this year has not inflamed racial tension and made it worse and, and basically made our society more racist as opposed to less racist? I mean, can anyone seriously say that with a straight face? Uh, I don't believe they can. Um, so that's why we do need to do something about it. Uh, in terms of gays-

   7. CWChris Williamson9:27

      Where are the gays, Andrew? Where have all of the gays gone?

   8. ADAndrew Doyle9:30

      Where are the gays? So the, the, the... That's a different issue. The problem with the gay issue now is that we have, uh, there is a kind of fission within the LGBTQIA+ community, right? So wha-... (laughs) Even using the phrase makes me laugh. I think we need to totally just abolish it and move on, because the truth is, uh, the w-... Let's take Stonewall. Stonewall, which is the, the sort of major charity for gay people in the UK, which has done some incredible work over the years and has now changed its entire philosophy about sexuality. And it, and it, and it believes, for instance, that gay men are... It's redefined it, not that... Homosexuality is no longer same sex attraction, it is same gender attraction. But of course, gay men are not attracted to, uh, uh, people who identify as men. They are attracted to people who have the bodies of men, right? And that's actually quite a fundamental distinction. A lesbian is not going to, uh, be attracted to someone with a penis simply because that person with a penis identifies as female and because that person says that, "Well, it's a female penis." That's not... Because we're dealing with people's biological, uh, in- inclinations, sexual inclinations. It's quite deeply rooted, shall we say. Um, so when Stonewall effectively adopt a homophobic policy, right? And I use that word, uh, with caution, insofar as I don't think the people at Stonewall are homophobic, but I think their new philosophy is underpinned by homophobia, in much the same way that I don't think fourth wave feminists are misogynists, but their philosophy is underpinned by a misogynistic idea that women are weak, inherently weak, and always victims and need protection, right? So it's perfectly possible, uh, to, to, for this to happen, as we have seen. So Stonewall now, uh, are obsessed with the, the trans issue. I mean, they're right to be, uh, concerned whenever a trans person is discriminated against, right? That is something, again, we go back to the liberal standard, which is that, uh, everyone should have equal rights irrespective of who they are or how they identify. The liberal perspective is that you should be able to call yourself whatever you want, you should be able to do whatever you want to your body, uh, you should, you should have the... And, and of course, um, trans people have every right to, to be treated exactly the same as everyone else. What they don't have the right to do is to force other people to use the language that they want them to use. And that's really the sticking point. Um, and there is this, of course, uh, conflict of rights now between feminists, who for the most part, particularly second wave feminists and thereafter, believed in the idea of gender being a social construct, um, and of course, the trans movement, particularly the militant trans activists believe that, uh, gender is a, a bi-... They have a biological essentialist view, which is why you get this idea of being born in the wrong body. So you get this fundamental contradiction. You also have feminists who are concerned about single sex spaces, uh, such as domestic violence refuge centers, for instance, or prisons, uh, which is a legitimate concern to have. Uh, and they, they do not believe, um, that biological sex is, is, is a fantasy. Um, they, you know... And, and, and as Blaire White, uh, a trans rights lawyer in America has pointed out, if there's no such thing as biological sex, there's no such thing as trans people. So all of this is-... going on. Uh, so you've got, uh, lesbians and gay men, uh, who are being pitted against trans activists. And it's not really fair because the majority of trans people, uh, don't have these views. This is j- this is a minority of activists who, for some reason, are able to sway Stonewall's entire policy and thinking on this. And, and Stonewall, in fact, has, has completely stopped listening to gay people, and has completely, uh, uh, unfeminists and completely overruled their viewpoint. I'm not suggesting that any particular person, uh, should just be deemed to be correct in this. I think we need to have a debate, right? I'm perfectly willing to be challenged on anything that I've said. And for people to say I'm wrong, I, I almost certainly am wrong about a number of things, that, that it's got to be the case, right? So having, having the discussion is important. But when you have someone just charging in and saying, "Trans women are women," well, there's a lot to unpack there. You know, what do you mean by woman? What does woman mean by your definition? What if I don't share your definition of, of woman? Uh, what if I think that, um, uh, uh, sex is, uh, biologically ingrained, and that you are fundamentally incapable of changing that? However, you can, uh, identify, and you're free to identify however you want, which is, by the way, is what an awful lot of trans people believe, right? According to this new rubric, a lot of trans people are, are very transphobic, and that's gonna be very complicated.

   9. CWChris Williamson13:46

      (laughs)

   10. ADAndrew Doyle13:47

       So what, what do you do? Gay men are not... Gay men, gay women, uh, they're-

   11. CWChris Williamson13:51

       It's so-

   12. ADAndrew Doyle13:52

       ... they're lower down on the hierarchy, yeah.

   13. CWChris Williamson13:54

       The pecking order, yeah.

   14. ADAndrew Doyle13:55

       So, so because of intersectionality, which effectively, I know the original intention wasn't this, but what it has morphed into is a kind of exactly that, yeah, a kind of, uh, a hierarchy of grievance, and gay people are dropping down the charts all the time

   15. CWChris Williamson14:08

       Is there any further for them to go?

   16. ADAndrew Doyle14:11

       Oh, relegated to the Vauxhall Conference, mate, you know.

   17. CWChris Williamson14:14

       (laughs)

   18. ADAndrew Doyle14:14

       Uh, by the way, I don't know what that means, really.

   19. CWChris Williamson14:17

       (laughs) Yeah. I just heard a man in a pub say it once.

   20. ADAndrew Doyle14:19

       Uh, no, the reason I, I... (laughs) The reason I use that is because when I was at school, uh, it was sort of... Because I'm, I was never a gender-conforming kid, and so I didn't like the stuff that the boys liked, and I wasn't into football, and everyone was so into football. I had to pretend that I supported a team, and I chose, uh, Yeovil Town, um, so that I had something to say. Um, and apparently, they got relegated to the Vauxhall Conference, and I've always remembered that phrase. I don't even know if the Vauxhall Conference is still a thing.

   21. CWChris Williamson14:47

       I don't think it is, but you've managed-

   22. ADAndrew Doyle14:48

       Right.

   23. CWChris Williamson14:48

       ... to pull out a, like, couple-of-decade-old reference that's still in there.

   24. ADAndrew Doyle14:54

       (laughs)

   25. CWChris Williamson14:54

       It's still in there.

   26. ADAndrew Doyle14:55

       Oh, yeah. Well, it's very traumatic and scary. You know, if you're a boy at school, at your primary school, and you're secretly doing ballet in the evenings, and you're, you're having nightmares about them seeing you in your tights, uh, and, and, and, and y- and you're getting bullied at school, and, and you're not considered very masculine and traditionally masculine. Uh, yeah, those things stick, I think. I think that's the thing.

   27. CWChris Williamson15:15

       Mate, I've, I've, I played cricket in a state school in Stockton, subs- sub-area of, uh, Teesside, Middlesbrough-

   28. ADAndrew Doyle15:25

       Yeah.

   29. CWChris Williamson15:25

       ... whose claim to fame, up until recently, was only that it had the highest teen pregnancy rate in the UK. Uh, and I wa- I was playing cricket, which, which was like just the, the bourgeois arrow over the top of your head for, uh, th- this guy needs a kicking. Uh-

   30. ADAndrew Doyle15:40

       Oh, cricket, cricket is basically P. G. Wodehouse and that kind of-
4. 15:50 – 26:14

   Decolonising Mars

   1. ADAndrew Doyle15:50

   2. CWChris Williamson15:50

      Uh, did you see the campaign to decolonize Mars?

   3. ADAndrew Doyle15:56

      Uh, I didn't. What, to... Well, it hasn't been colonized yet, has it? I didn't s-

   4. CWChris Williamson15:59

      Let me, let me lay, let me lay this one out for you, okay?

   5. ADAndrew Doyle16:03

      Okay, yeah, I haven't come across this one.

   6. CWChris Williamson16:04

      Decolonizemars.org, an UnConference on Mars. Decolonizing Mars: An UnConference on Inclusion and Equity in Space Exploration will bring together a diverse group of individuals working at the intersection of astrobiology, anthropology, social justice, and space, space exploration. The format of the event will feature a discussion as its primary objective. While there will be time for brief presentations, a significant fraction of the program will be devoted to group discussion around pressing themes which will be determined by the symposium participants themselves. The term decolonizing, uh, de- decolonization refers to the undoing of the legacy of colonialism. Many people are used to hearing about colonizing Mars to talk about humanity living in space. Here, we examine how using a colonialist framework in space reproduces past harm from humanity's history on Earth. This event is about envisioning fresh pathways for thinking about space exploration by stepping away from the ways we usually talk about space, which is, by definition, decolonizing the topic, hence Decolonizing Mars. And as you've quite rightly identified and James Lindsay brought up, there is an entire conference dedicated to decolonizing a planet that hasn't been colonized yet.

   7. ADAndrew Doyle17:17

      Are you sure this isn't a joke? I'm just, I'm just putting that out there. I, I-

   8. CWChris Williamson17:22

      It seems... Well, I mean, that, is that not the subtitle to almost everything that's happened this year?

   9. ADAndrew Doyle17:29

      Th- this is the problem now is that I, whenever I see an article like this or something, I have to verify it. It's very, very-

   10. CWChris Williamson17:34

       Do you wonder sometimes if you wrote it?

   11. ADAndrew Doyle17:36

       Yeah, exactly. Maybe I

   12. CWChris Williamson17:37

       Did you troll yourself?

   13. ADAndrew Doyle17:39

       Yeah. (laughs)

   14. CWChris Williamson17:40

       (laughs)

   15. ADAndrew Doyle17:40

       It's by... It's, I mean, it's so, on the face of it, just insane. And it's... You want to be... I mean, I, I, I've, I've always been banging on about, you know, how I want to give people the benefit of the doubt, I wanna be respectful to all opinions, and I wanna be able to discuss them. But some... The problem with this social justice ideology is, is, i- it is, at heart, so infantile. That it's, it's, it's, it's very difficult not to start sounding like you're throwing out homonyms, you know, on- once, once you start. But it, it just is... This isn't how adults who are educated well should behave.

   16. CWChris Williamson18:12

       Well, let, let's not forget as well, we're not talking about... You, you, if you want to have the, those conferences that happen in Portland where everyone calls each other comrade and, uh-

   17. ADAndrew Doyle18:22

       Mine, yeah.

   18. CWChris Williamson18:22

       ... has a point of personal privilege, that's fine. No, no, no. This is fucking space. Right?

   19. ADAndrew Doyle18:27

       Yeah, yeah.

   20. CWChris Williamson18:27

       There's no... That we, we... There's... You know, it's a vacuum out there. It's really, really scary and dangerous. And Mars is far away. I don't wa-... the, uh, the astronauts that are going over there, there should not be an inclusivity officer on board-

   21. ADAndrew Doyle18:42

       No.

   22. CWChris Williamson18:42

       ... the first-

   23. ADAndrew Doyle18:43

       Well, uh, yeah, I know that-

   24. CWChris Williamson18:43

       ... shuttle to Mars.

   25. ADAndrew Doyle18:44

       Once they've decolonized maths and science and, and engineering, and then they can build the rocket that goes to Mars, I'm not gonna be on, on that rocket, I tell you, because it's not gonna get very far.

   26. CWChris Williamson18:53

       (laughs)

   27. ADAndrew Doyle18:53

       And, you know, if they're obsessed with this stuff... I mean, I hope, I hope we do meet an alien race, because, because, because these people, their first concern is gonna be about whether the alien race is sufficiently inclusive and diverse.

   28. CWChris Williamson19:03

       (laughs)

   29. ADAndrew Doyle19:04

       And, uh, and they'll just shoot them, won't they, with their laser guns, and that'll be the end of that, and that'll be fine.

   30. CWChris Williamson19:08

       And we'll get-
5. 26:14 – 35:37

   Defining ‘Whiteness’

   1. CWChris Williamson26:14

      in, yeah. Um, can you take us through what whiteness means?

   2. ADAndrew Doyle26:19

      Okay. So the, the, the notion of whiteness, I suppose the best way to, to think about it is a system of power, right? So it's, um... And this is coming from critical race theory. This is the phrase that they always use, whiteness. It's been analogized with the concept, with the Augustinian idea of original sin. Uh, it doesn't actually specifically pertain to... Well, it, there's an ambiguity. It doesn't specifically pertain to th- the color of your skin, the whiteness. It, it more pertains to a complicity in a system of whiteness, a system of oppression on the basis of race, right? So for, this is why, for instance, very confusingly, when there was that story in America when the, uh, the, the, uh, the Asian boys, I think one of them urinated on a Black schoolgirl or, and, and, and attacked them. It was a kind of a, a, a sort of, mm, it was a horrible attack.

   3. CWChris Williamson27:08

      Okay.

   4. ADAndrew Doyle27:08

      Um, they were described, because they weren't white perpetrators, they were described as enacting whiteness. In other words, whiteness is a way that you oppress people of color, a, a system of oppression, and that you don't necessarily, therefore, have to be white. You could be, you could be white-adjacent, which is the phrase that-

   5. CWChris Williamson27:27

      (laughs)

   6. ADAndrew Doyle27:27

      ... I, I started using last year as a joke through to Talia, and now people are using it, and I started thinking, "Did I invent this?" But I probably didn't. I, it probably was just there in the ether, you know? It, it's a, it's because fascist adjacent-

   7. CWChris Williamson27:39

      (laughs) Undiscovered knowledge.

   8. ADAndrew Doyle27:41

      Yeah. I mean, you can, because you can anticipate this stuff. You can't... That's the, that's the problem. And, and because fascist adjacent had become so popular, I just thought I'd start calling Black people who don't have, who were Conservatives, say, white adjacent, as a joke. And now I'm actually seeing it everywhere, and it's really bothering me, and I, I want to work out if I did invent that. I hope so. Um, but yeah, so that's what whiteness... So therefore, to give an ex- another example, um, and of course there's all sorts of books and tracts written about whiteness and, and, and trying to, uh, give it the illusion that this is something that is thought through and, and, and it's, it's-

   9. CWChris Williamson28:13

      Sophisticated.

   10. ADAndrew Doyle28:14

       ... sophisticated. That it's, it's too, it, it, you know, they load it with this jargon in order to give the impression that it's too complicated for you to understand, so you better just accept, accept it.

   11. CWChris Williamson28:22

       Hand it over to us.

   12. ADAndrew Doyle28:23

       Right. But it's-

   13. CWChris Williamson28:23

       You made, you made the analogy that, um, uh, uh, the same reason as to why the Church didn't want the Bible translated into common parlance back in the Middle Ages.

   14. ADAndrew Doyle28:34

       Right. It's why they burnt Tyndale at the stake, because you translate the Bible, it means that they, all of a sudden the power is, is, is devolved to the masses. It means they can interpret scripture for themselves, and that matters, you know? You don't have, you can't just say, "Well..." You can't have a priest just say, "Well, you've got to do what I say because I'm the only one who can read the sacred texts." You know? That is the equivalent of what's happening here. So the academics are saying, "Well..." And you see all the time, when people get into argu- when, when you, your average person gets in an argument with one of these crazy academics on Twitter, they'll say, "Well, actually, I'm an expert in this." And they'll throw all this jargon down, and they'll frighten people away. Uh, and if it, you know... Actually, don't worry about it, because they're talking bollocks.

   15. CWChris Williamson29:06

       (laughs)

   16. ADAndrew Doyle29:07

       They really are. All this comes from is, is these, these things are slogans that, that, that, that are used instead of serious thought processes. And they are, they're not to be taken seriously, so don't worry about it. Just get them... Also, you should remind them that if they're unable to express their point with any degree of clarity, they're not expressing their point well. That's, that's the other thing. But just to come back-

   17. CWChris Williamson29:28

       It's the mark of a, well, is it, it's a, it's the mark of a genius to explain a complex thing in a simple way. It is the mark of a charlatan to explain a complex, uh, a simple thing in a complex way.

   18. ADAndrew Doyle29:36

       Very nice. Did you just come up with that?

   19. CWChris Williamson29:38

       No, I found it on Twitter probably.

   20. ADAndrew Doyle29:39

       (laughs) Yeah.

   21. CWChris Williamson29:39

       But not, not in your world. So yeah, you were saying, another-

   22. ADAndrew Doyle29:41

       It's, it's exactly right. Well-

   23. CWChris Williamson29:42

       ... example of whiteness.

   24. ADAndrew Doyle29:42

       Well, just to give another example of the, of the way in which, uh, the social justice people and the critical race people play on these ambiguities is that, that they can say that all white people are complicit in whiteness by virtue of the color of their skin, and they can also say that people who are nonwhite are also complicit in the system if they, if they are not actively anti-racist. Remember, for these people, it isn't the dichotomy of racist or not racist. Because if you're not racist, that's another form of racism. The dichotomy is actually racist or anti-racist, which means you are proactively, uh, uh, conceding your own complicity in these systems and, and attempting to decolonize these systems, right? So it's not good enough just not to be a racist person. To be good, to be a good person who, who doesn't ever say or do or support anything racist, that's not enough. You've got to be an anti-racist, right? So you've got all that going on. And then, but then, they will play on it and make it racial. So then you've got like the Resisting Whiteness, uh, conference that was at Edinburgh University, where they said explicitly that in the Q&A section at the end...... white people were not allowed to put their hands up and ask questions. So, well, in that case, you are making whiteness explicitly about skin color. And in that circumstance, what do you do if you're mixed race? Can you speak in a low voice or whisper?

   25. CWChris Williamson30:49

       How much, how much whiteness are you allowed to have?

   26. ADAndrew Doyle30:52

       Yeah. Do you get like, do you get like half a question or, or, uh, you know, how do you, how do we ... And also, we're all mongrels of various races, so how much do you get to speak? Do I have to have a DNA test to decide how much I can speak? So on the one hand, they like the fact that it alludes specifically to race and skin color, and on the other hand, they will deny that it does and that race is a social construct and all the rest of it. So it plays on the ambiguity. It plays on it. It's in the same way that they, they, they, they play on the idea of, of social justice and liberalism and, and they play on people's good natures and good intentions i- in order to get what they want. I think it's absolutely, it's absolutely ghastly. So you can have, for instance, uh, academics who talk about how, uh, whiteness is evil and we must abolish whiteness, as we've seen from a number of people. I think it was a Cambridge academic who said exactly that. But of course what she's doing is she's, she's enjoying the fact that she can have a, a pop at white people, but then she can defend herself by saying, "Yes, but when I say whiteness, I'm talking about this oppressive system that I've sort of ... That I believe in, this magical system that, that we all us fellow academics talk about amongst ourselves." So you can have it both ways. Um, it's, it's really, it's really bad.

   27. CWChris Williamson31:56

       Isn't it like, it's like the, the old school, um, closet racist comedian that would make overtly racist jokes and then say, "Just a joke, mate, I'm only, I'm, I'm, I'm only-"

   28. ADAndrew Doyle32:06

       Right, exactly. It's-

   29. CWChris Williamson32:06

       "... I'm only joking." Or the same as the, the guy who is vehemently anti-gay, but if you watch ... Put, put some gay porn in front of him and stick him in front of an MRI, he's got much more of an arousal response than anybody else in the room.

   30. ADAndrew Doyle32:19

       Right. Exactly.
6. 35:37 – 50:22

   Semantic Overload & BLM

   1. ADAndrew Doyle35:37

      a human being at all.

   2. CWChris Williamson35:38

      I learned this year for the first time from Ben Shapiro, the term semantic overload. Are you familiar with this?

   3. ADAndrew Doyle35:45

      Well, I, I can work out what it means from the, the meaning of the term.

   4. CWChris Williamson35:47

      So it was, it was, yeah, and, um, he bas- he's been using it to describe the words Black Lives Matter and-

   5. ADAndrew Doyle35:55

      Right.

   6. CWChris Williamson35:55

      ... that semantically overloaded, it can be multiple things at once. It's this thing-

   7. ADAndrew Doyle36:00

      Yeah, okay. I see.

   8. CWChris Williamson36:01

      ... when we want it to be, "Are you against Black Lives Matter?" Well, it's very difficult to say that without sounding like you hate Black people.

   9. ADAndrew Doyle36:07

      So it's, it's a, it's back to the anti-racism idea. It's, it's something that can have more than one meaning. And certainly, uh, it's a very clever rhetorical trope because of course, as you say, you cannot disagree with the phrase Black Lives Matter. No one would. This is the weird thing about it, that, you know, people making ... Using that hashtag and that expression because they believe that unless they do use that expression, we're going to assume they don't believe that Black lives matter. It's, it's similar to ... I mean, this just goes to show how much things have escalated so quickly, right? There was a thing about five or six years ago where people started wearing safety pins as a gesture to show that they weren't racist. It was, it was a very short-lived thing, right? So you Google it, I'm not, I'm not making it up. And it got ridiculed by everyone, including people on the social justice side. Because like, because of course, the default assumption in a society like ours is that people aren't racist, right? So if you're wearing a, a safety pin and saying that anyone who isn't-... must be erased. It's absurd, right?

   10. CWChris Williamson36:59

       Yeah, yeah.

   11. ADAndrew Doyle36:59

       But we are- we are now in safety pin world, where basically, unless you're saying Black lives matter, you assume that Black lives do not matter, but that's not true. I still stand by the point that anyone who, any decent civilized person will obviously believe that Black lives matter. It- it's gonna... You know, you should never assume that someone doesn't believe that unless there is incontrovertible evidence that they don't. But that's the problem. It, it goes back to the critical race theory idea that racism is present in every possible human interaction. They don't ask, "Was this situation racist?" They ask, "How did racism manifest itself in that situation?" And that is the problem. So in other words, the entirety of society is underpinned by racism. It's such a bleak, nihilistic worldview. It's- it's so horrible. So yes, semantic overload, when, I suppose, something that can have multiple meanings. And- and certainly, are you talking... When you talk about Black lives matter, are you talking about the- the, uh, group? Are you talking about, uh, the concept? Well, I would suggest now, whenever I hear someone using that phrase, I'm always going to assume you're talking about the group because why would you make the statement? We all know that-

   12. CWChris Williamson38:05

       Have you noticed now that people are starting to use Black Lives Matter and BLM? Th- they've bifurcated...

   13. ADAndrew Doyle38:12

       That's the... Yes. Well, that's the way... That's... I think that started early on as a way to get around it because we- we need to be able to criticize BLM, because as a movement, it has all sorts of ludicrous aspects to it. For instance, it's belief that we should dismantle cisgender privilege or attack the Western nuclear family, or- or-

   14. CWChris Williamson38:31

       All of which perfectly push forward the benefit and the well-being of Black people.

   15. ADAndrew Doyle38:37

       Well, look at their- their intention to defund the police as well. I mean, loo- Which- which of course would affect areas that are working class and... You know, and there is a high proportion of- of Black and- and ethnic minority people in working class areas. It's not going to do them any favors. So this stuff... Yeah, exactly. I don't think dismantling cisgender privilege is something that's going to go down too well in certain Black communities, I- I would- I would suggest, okay? Um, well, I mean, if you know anything about the history of- of- of Black gay people, they have had it tough in- in this country, from, in their- in their communities because of cultural issues, religious issues, and all sorts of things. I don't think dismantling cisgender privilege is going to go down well. So you're- you're right. BLM... And of course by saying BLM, you're avoiding having to say, "I oppose Black Lives Matter." You can say, "I oppose BLM," right? And- and I think lots of people do. I think the idea of demolishing capitalism, right, I think a lot of people are uncomfortable with. I don't understand why schools across the country, schools like Eton, are putting out statements in support of Black Lives Matter. Private schools, right? When if you took the Black Lives Matter agenda and applied it to society, Eton would be razed to the ground.

   16. CWChris Williamson39:46

       (laughs)

   17. ADAndrew Doyle39:46

       It wouldn't exist because it charges extortionate rates. It is the hub and training ground and cradle of capitalism, right? So to have them support a- a movement that wants to see them abolished is utterly retarded, right?

   18. CWChris Williamson40:01

       (laughs)

   19. ADAndrew Doyle40:02

       And I know I'm not meant to use that word. I'm using that word in its literal meaning of to go backwards before you start complaining.

   20. CWChris Williamson40:07

       Yeah.

   21. ADAndrew Doyle40:08

       F- You see, even I'm doing it now. Even I'm worried about what I'm saying.

   22. CWChris Williamson40:10

       So this is the- this is the thing, that semantic overload and this... It's even tropey now to say, "Oh, it's so- it's so 1984, isn't it?" You know, Orwell prophesied all of this. I'm like, I'm so bored. So, so bored. And I can't imagine what it's like for you who's further entrenched, you know, really, really sort of swimming through the muck and the- the feces and the blood and the straw, and-

   23. ADAndrew Doyle40:33

       Yeah.

   24. CWChris Williamson40:34

       ... just desperately trying to get out the other side, so yeah, it's, um...

   25. ADAndrew Doyle40:38

       It's... Yeah, it's- it's... What can you say? It's depressing. Do you not get depressed by this? I mean, I sometimes... I- I feel like-

   26. CWChris Williamson40:43

       Massively, man. This is why I brought it up with- with Douglas as well. I was like, "Mate, I want to know what you've got to say about how to lead a good life, about what it means-"

   27. ADAndrew Doyle40:54

       Yeah.

   28. CWChris Williamson40:54

       "... to have human flourishing and fulfillment. I want you to dip into your bottomless back catalog of literature and- and understanding of how, you know, the Renaissance and the- the Enlightenment and all this." That's what I want to learn from Douglas Murray.

   29. ADAndrew Doyle41:07

       Yeah.

   30. CWChris Williamson41:07

       I don't want him to write fucking Madness of Crowds. Like, you know, wonderful book and the- the Titania McGrath stuff that you do is fantastic. But as he brings up, like, when the barbarians are at the door, we'll be debating about what gender they are whilst we get Kalashnikov'd in the head.
7. 50:22 – 1:01:43

   The End State of Woke Activism

   1. ADAndrew Doyle50:22

      That's not good.

   2. CWChris Williamson50:22

      Yeah, for sure.

   3. ADAndrew Doyle50:23

      Yeah. Yeah.

   4. CWChris Williamson50:23

      What's, what's your prediction for the end state of all of this activism? Is it inherently self-contradictory and splintered into groups that don't agree to the point-

   5. ADAndrew Doyle50:33

      It-

   6. CWChris Williamson50:33

      ... where it's gonna eat its own tail?

   7. ADAndrew Doyle50:35

      It is self-contradictory, but it embraces the contradictions and that's why it's impossible to reason with it. And that goes right back to the postmodernists as well. And, you know, someone like Derrida who, who was very playful, uh, and self-contradictory, so often deliberately so. And that, that means that actually it's sort of built into their system. It doesn't matter that they have contradictory thoughts and they can hold those contradictory thoughts at the same time. Uh, it, it, it really doesn't. You know, it doesn't matter that they will say, uh, that, that, uh... Well, to give the example of the, to go back to the trans example, that they, they say gender is completely a social construct except for trans people who are born in the wrong body. It doesn't matter that that can't... That doesn't make any sense because they've just, they, they can do that. Whereas everyone else relies on the idea of rationality and rational thought. But the problem is that they would perceive that to be a sort of heterosexual, patriarchal construct. So, you know, you're back to square one. So ultimately-

   8. CWChris Williamson51:24

      So what's, what's gonna happen? We, we, we roll this forward.

   9. ADAndrew Doyle51:26

      Well-

   10. CWChris Williamson51:26

       What's the end state? What do you foresee?

   11. ADAndrew Doyle51:28

       Uh-

   12. CWChris Williamson51:28

       Look into the crystal ball, Andrew, and tell us what you see.

   13. ADAndrew Doyle51:31

       Yeah, you know, whenever I do this, I get it wrong though. I, uh, well, there's a lot at stake. So I think... (sighs) Well, ult- ultimately it's gonna go one, one of two ways, isn't it? Either... I, I can't envisage that this can just rumble on as it is anymore. I think there are a lot of people who were sort of saying before the explosion this year of, of, of the culture war, there are a lot of people who are just saying, "This will always be the way." There will always be the sort of extreme culture warriors pushing their agenda and most people will just gently push back and, and we'll, we'll constantly be having these, these spats and these disputes. I don't think we can say that anymore. I think one side is gonna have to win out. Uh, so if the, if the culture warriors win out, if the social justice left or the identitarian left or whatever the fuck you want to call them win out, we will be living in a, under a form of authoritarianism, right? Where people are not allowed to say certain things, will literally be arrested for saying the wrong thing, and, and it will be, uh, uh, very scary and dangerous. Education will be decolonized to the point where it won't mean anything anymore. Uh, artifacts from the past, monuments from the past, a recognition of history will be swept away. Um, and we're already seeing that happening, but not, as I say, not in a crisis point, you know. It, it, it's important not to inflate these things, you know. I don't agree with mobs deciding which statues stay up and which don't, right? But ultimately that statue of Edward, Edward Colston, you know, I don't think they should have been able to just arbitrarily decide and tear it down, but it doesn't, uh, amount to a crisis. It doesn't amount, you know, we're not talking about, as you said, the Orwellian principle of literally revising history, throwing things down the memory hole yet. And that's the qualifier, is that the problem is that these are the seeds of that, and you have to be vigilant against this stuff. And particularly when it comes to free speech, uh, you have to be incredibly vigilant. It's not something that, that is the default of any given society. It's something that has to be fought for with each successive generation and people need to be reminded of the validity of it and the importance of it. Um, so I think if, for instance, a government were to get in that was, uh, identity obsessed, as the current Labor Party is, um, but they had maybe a more zealous identitarian leader, uh, I mean, Keir Starmer wouldn't be that person, as it happens. I know he sort of toys with it a little bit, but he wouldn't be that sort of extreme zealot, uh, identitarian type. If you had a government like that, then you have a very dangerous situation and you have a society that is going to go backwards very, very quickly. Um, or the alternative is that we, we reach the point where... What I'm hoping is in about 15, 20 years' time, we will have restored the idea of liberal values and free speech and everyone will just go back to just accepting that, yes, that's, that's the default. That's what we should be having. And they'll almost look back at these years as like what happened there? There was a kind of hysteria. There was a kind of weird-

   14. CWChris Williamson54:19

       Hmm.

   15. ADAndrew Doyle54:19

       ... mania that happened. And, and they'll probably say, but it was, it wasn't really a big deal, was it? 'Cause it just sort of went away and it was fine.

   16. CWChris Williamson54:25

       So-

   17. ADAndrew Doyle54:25

       But of course, it only, it only went away because people like us are pushing back against it, but we will be considered the nutcases. Like, why are we even worried about it? It just went.

   18. CWChris Williamson54:33

       Yeah. Yeah.

   19. ADAndrew Doyle54:34

       I think that's what's gonna ha- I think, I fear-

   20. CWChris Williamson54:36

       So-

   21. ADAndrew Doyle54:36

       ... that's what's gonna happen.

   22. CWChris Williamson54:37

       I think-

   23. ADAndrew Doyle54:38

       (laughs)

   24. CWChris Williamson54:38

       I think that, that really, um, dovetails quite nicely with something I've been thinking about this year, which is, been reading a lot of existential threats and existential risk work like Toby Ord's, which is what prompted my concern to do with the academics and the low-hanging fruit and the TikTok. And, um, this year we got a pandemic. It's been anyone who's looked at existential risk or anything coming out of the Future of Humanities Institute knew that this is one of the big ones. The control problem for artificial general intelligence is another one of them. But we got delivered, touch wood, we got delivered such a, like, piss-weak pathogen. The mortality rate on it-

   25. ADAndrew Doyle55:17

       Yeah.

   26. CWChris Williamson55:17

       ... is, it's just not h- The incubation period and the transmittability are all okay-ish. The R number could be, you know, if I was designing it, one, to end the human race, the R number might be a little bit higher and the incubation period-

   27. ADAndrew Doyle55:29

       Yeah.

   28. CWChris Williamson55:29

       ... where you're asymptomatic also might be a little bit longer. Um, but we got delivered-... here's a, here's the beta test. Here's the demo version-

   29. ADAndrew Doyle55:37

       Yeah, exactly. I, I know what you mean.

   30. CWChris Williamson55:38

       ... of what, what happens, and maybe this is the ideological conceptual equivalent where, where people are trying to hijack all of the institutions that mean the most, like, um, education, like, chi- chi- children education, higher education, the arts, popular culture, politics, all of that stuff. But they did it with the Marxists that some people speculate are the conspiratorial pushers of this that are in the background that are the Trojan horse that this particular-
8. 1:01:43 – 1:06:17

   Prediction for 2020 Election

   1. CWChris Williamson1:01:43

      Final, final question-

   2. ADAndrew Doyle1:01:45

      Yeah.

   3. CWChris Williamson1:01:45

      Who is going to win the 2020 election?

   4. ADAndrew Doyle1:01:48

      Either way, we are in trouble, uh, because either, either victor will cr- will make the culture war worse, not better, right? And the reason for that is Biden has completely bought into identity politics, 100%, and he's allowing himself to be guided in that way. And Donald Trump also has his vo- version of identity politics. Uh, and, uh, which is the sort of more, sort of nationalism style, uh, version. And he's not, let's face it, uh, particularly well, uh, equipped to, to deal with this kind of crisis, right? He tends to inflame things rather than make them better. You know, fundamentally, uh, Donald Trump likes people who like him and dislikes people who don't like him. So, uh, and, and everyone knows this. It, it comes back to this, this essential narcissism. Watching those two debate was the, one of the most depressing things I've-

   5. CWChris Williamson1:02:31

      Painful.

   6. ADAndrew Doyle1:02:31

      ... I've, I've ever seen. Neither of them are, are equipped to be president and, um, I just... I don't think either side is gonna quieten down because if Trump wins, then the social justice group will take that as further evidence that they live in a neo-fascist society. And if, if, if Biden wins, then I, I suppose they will be emboldened to, to, to persist with these kind of demands, such as the students at Radha make and to, to reshape society according to their, the principles of their faith. Uh, so either way, we are fucked.

   7. CWChris Williamson1:03:05

      Have you got a prediction? Do you think... Can you... I, I know that your, it's not your special, your special-

   8. ADAndrew Doyle1:03:10

      Think-

   9. CWChris Williamson1:03:10

      ... area, but what do you think?

   10. ADAndrew Doyle1:03:14

       I think Biden is gonna win. I think, um, I, I, I, I, for a long time, I thought Trump was go-... I'm, I'm sure that Trump would have won were it not for coronavirus. I'm, I'm, I'm pretty s-... Because the economy was doing so well, uh, and because the, it, it just didn't seem as though... I, I, I think though, his handling of the coronavirus, combined with this kind of general fatigue with his, uh, his behavior and the way that he tweets. He needs to get off Twitter, you know? If he wants to win, he has to go.

   11. CWChris Williamson1:03:43

       Very much so. Yeah, it's, um-

   12. ADAndrew Doyle1:03:45

       Um-

   13. CWChris Williamson1:03:45

       If, if the election was about Trump versus... If it was just a, a personality contest on Biden, if that was the competition on Biden-

   14. ADAndrew Doyle1:03:53

       Yeah.

   15. CWChris Williamson1:03:53

       ... Biden would lose. But sadly, Trump continues to make it about himself, which I think is-

   16. ADAndrew Doyle1:03:58

       Yeah.

   17. CWChris Williamson1:03:58

       ... inherently dangerous because his personality rubs people up. Even his own support is the wrong way.

   18. ADAndrew Doyle1:04:02

       Oh, it does. I mean, Biden has no charisma whatsoever, but then, but then Trump, uh, uh, is, uh, uh, you know, is not, let's put it delicately, is not statesm- statesmanlike.

   19. CWChris Williamson1:04:11

       Yeah.

   20. ADAndrew Doyle1:04:11

       Is he... You know, it, it and I just-

   21. CWChris Williamson1:04:12

       No one can, no one can have looked at the debate that they had-

   22. ADAndrew Doyle1:04:15

       Right.

   23. CWChris Williamson1:04:15

       ... the other week-

   24. ADAndrew Doyle1:04:16

       Yeah.

   25. CWChris Williamson1:04:16

       ... and say that that was a presidential way to conduct yourself.

   26. ADAndrew Doyle1:04:20

       Well, I wouldn't be able to vote for either of them. Uh, but luckily, I'm not in that position of having-

   27. CWChris Williamson1:04:24

       You don't.

   28. ADAndrew Doyle1:04:24

       ... to make a choice.

   29. CWChris Williamson1:04:25

       You don't have to. Yeah.

   30. ADAndrew Doyle1:04:26

       (laughs)

Episode duration: 1:06:18