Cultural Historian. Academic, author & political commentator. Senior Fellow: @newcultureforum Post-war British culture on TV and film, and in literature.
Jan 3, 2023 • 12 tweets • 2 min read
1/12 The start of a new year is no big deal to me these days. I thankful I’m still here, healthy and solvent, but my gratitude doesn’t stretch further than that. It certainly doesn’t go much beyond these four walls. I love home, family, friends, books, furniture, clothes, etc.🧵
2/12 But I gave up on what passes for culture and society a while ago. I didn’t even realise at first. Then I picked up on the signs: not bothering with big events like the World Cup, Wimbledon, and so on; passing on new film, television & music output.
Dec 8, 2022 • 8 tweets • 2 min read
Thursday 🧵 1/8 Imagine what would happen if we reached peak ‘equality, diversity and inclusion’.
(Not in the meaningful sense of a broadly tolerant society BTW - we already have that. No. I mean in terms of the ideological drivel that has become synonymous with the concept.)
2/8 There’d be a Chatterati meltdown. Panic! It’d be like a Millennium Bug reboot. Radio 4 would become redundant. So would Channel 4 News. BBC News 24 would become News 15 (minutes).
Nov 24, 2022 • 9 tweets • 2 min read
Today's thread: 1/9 There’s a reason why many anti-racists are racist. It’s why some LGBTQI+ activists are homophobic misogynists. And why (not to labour the point) swathes of socialists ‘hate Tory scum’.
These drivers of ‘social justice’ are fuelled by a desire to punish.
2/9 To an overwhelming degree.
The current wave of activism is a new form of Old Testament retribution. Nowhere is this more pronounced than in the eco-vandalism that is hell-bent on Tango-ing everything from priceless works of art to pricey Mercs.
Nov 23, 2022 • 8 tweets • 2 min read
Today’s thread: 1/8 Much of British cultural history is disappearing. This is particularly true of the socially conservative mainstream. Why? Because when filmmakers, writers and scholars look to the past, they see only a drama of emancipation – LGBTQI+, BAME, etc.
2/8 While rights claims tell an interesting tale, it’s by no means the whole story. Here’s the problem: no one in the MSM is interested in the everyday experience of the majority population – the real substance of our history. To put it bluntly, the centre is being hollowed out.
Nov 22, 2022 • 12 tweets • 2 min read
1/12 My dad escaped from Hungary in 1956. When he came to Britain, in 1959, it was at a time of transition. It feels like we, too, are at the end of things. But unlike him, poised on the threshold of the ‘60s, I don’t relish the prospect of what’s to come.
2/12 He died back in 2006, the old man. Lung cancer. His useless GP kept sending him home with paracetamol, even with a tumour like a tennis ball on his neck. Imagine that.
Nov 20, 2022 • 12 tweets • 2 min read
1/12 That lovely moment when Orwell is debating a Stalinist radical. And the Stalinist says: Yes, there were purges; yes, there were deaths; yes, there was the Gulag. But you have to break a few eggs to make an omelette.
And Orwell says: Where's your omelette?
2/12 The middle-class Stop Oil protesters are revelling in their moment of chaos. Are they genuinely motivated by environmental concern? I'm sure some are. But much of it is a cack-handed attempt at payback for something they don’t understand: History.
Nov 19, 2022 • 14 tweets • 3 min read
1/13 My fixed-term mortgage comes up for renewal at the end of January. No doubt I’ll be royally clobbered by the eye-watering interest rate. I’ll have to tighten my belt of course, but it’s not the end of the world. One thing occurs to me, though:
2/13 If I’m fatalistic about the prospect of shelling out, it’s because day-to day politics has conditioned me to chaos. I mean, I knew cost was on the cards, so it’s not a surprise; but neither is it really an upset.
