A Free Left Blog

In my book I wrote quite a bit on how efforts to keep the United Kingdom in the European Union have mobilised what I call 'the system of diversity', by aligning to a view of the world in which certain identity groups like women, gay and non-white-skinned people appear as victims of unfavoured groups like men, white-skinned people and the ethnic English. Seemingly every day brings more remarkable evidence of this. Via Twitter, James Mendelsohn has kindly sent one of the best, most concise examples I have seen so far - a video by a campaign group called Our People, Our Choice which calls itself, 'A group of young people campaigning for a #PeoplesVote on the Brexit deal!' We say no to Brexit And social mobility, grinding to a halt. We say no To the rich doing fine but the poor getting poorer Whilst parliament “negotiate”, dividing regions and communities. WATCH, SHARE & RT this powerful poem by @antoniacundy . #PeoplesVote #WednesdayWisdom pic.twitt...

The novelist Doris Lessing has been called a ‘feminist icon’ but had some withering words for modern-day feminists before she died last year. At the Edinburgh Book Festival in 2001, she said: “ What I really can't stand about the feminist revolution is that it produced some of the smuggest, most unselfcritical people the world has ever seen. They are horrible ." She added: " It is time we began to ask who are these women who continually rubbish men. The most stupid, ill-educated and nasty woman can rubbish the nicest, kindest and most intelligent man and no one protests . " Men seem to be so cowed that they can't fight back, and it is time they did ." I have had my fair share of shouty abuse from feminist mobs online and can certainly sympathise with what Lessing says, even though I would pull away from calling all of these people ‘awful’; indeed they are often perfectly pleasant when separated from this side of their politics. It is ofte...