Reith Lectures 2025
I listened to the first one of these yesterday.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m002mmrv?partner=uk.co.bbc&origin=share-mobile
I wondered if anyone else had listened and what they thought?
There was also some controversy over the cutting of a sentence about Trump - presumably Auntie Beeb doesn't want to upset You Know Who.
https://www.theguardian.com/media/2025/nov/25/rutger-bregman-accuses-bbc-of-censoring-his-reith-lecture-on-trump?CMP=share_btn_url
Turning to the speech itself, I was particularly interested in the bit about how the Left can be paralysed by an unfortunate side-effect of intersectionality - whereby it can fall into requiring agreement on a very wide range of issues. There is, I think, a Charybdis to that Scylla whereby regressive and harmful positions can gain currency by association with people who otherwise hold progressive and enlightened positions.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m002mmrv?partner=uk.co.bbc&origin=share-mobile
I wondered if anyone else had listened and what they thought?
There was also some controversy over the cutting of a sentence about Trump - presumably Auntie Beeb doesn't want to upset You Know Who.
https://www.theguardian.com/media/2025/nov/25/rutger-bregman-accuses-bbc-of-censoring-his-reith-lecture-on-trump?CMP=share_btn_url
Turning to the speech itself, I was particularly interested in the bit about how the Left can be paralysed by an unfortunate side-effect of intersectionality - whereby it can fall into requiring agreement on a very wide range of issues. There is, I think, a Charybdis to that Scylla whereby regressive and harmful positions can gain currency by association with people who otherwise hold progressive and enlightened positions.
Comments
Perhaps two thing the lecturer omitted were, first, the way in which social media algorithms insidiously lead people on, reinforcing their opinions rather than allowing them to be challenged. I also think he omitted the way in which the populist Right get peoples' sympathy by using simplistic, unrealistic but attractive soundbites, while those on the Left engage in more complex intellectual offerings. This was clearly the case during the Brexit campaign, and is something which IMHO bedevils attempts by the LibDems to break into popular discourse. Without wanting to stray into a different thread or necessarily endorsing his position, I think that this is something which Zack Polanski has succeeded in doing.
A very depressing lecture; some would say that it represents the withdrawal of (some) Christian values from the public sphere.
[A PS: a youngish lady I once knew became a high-flying lawyer in the world of corporate wealth. She left her job in order to set up an organisation with the aim of encoraging the use of private capital in the service of a just economy].
There are of course three more lectures to come; it is understandable if the first sets out the problems; development of the argument and of solutions may follow.
What you say about social media algorithms is both true and terrifying. Allegedly the big supermarkets have colluded with The Muslims to erase Christmas, based on the absence of the word on a Christmas Tree box in Tesco, and apparently despite the fact you otherwise can't move in a Tesco store for adverts, hoardings and displays with the word Christmas all over them. Express and Mail are particularly pushing this one, and frankly it's clearly intended to stir up community unrest and inflame racial hatred. At the most charitable, these rags don't care that that will result and they're just interested in clicks.
I recall an item some years ago about how effective simplistic slogans are - MAGA, Leave Means Leave, Stop The Boats, Mass Deportation Now, you get the picture. Never explain how it can be achieved or what it would really mean, just inflame passions. It parallels the Gish Gallop - how a pseudo-scientist can make dozens of assertions in the time it takes to address just one of them properly.
Massive problem. There is a saying along the lines of every question having an answer that is easy, quick, simple and wrong.
I think we're also losing nuance. It's very polarised and binary now. It's surprising in a way that we live in a time where the two main party system is breaking down.
But yes, a (rough) transcript is available, and does contain the sentence removed from the broadcast version.
Which centre are they ignoring (apart from a largely synthetic one) ?
My impression is that they were more present in the past when they actually had fundamental critiques of policy, as opposed to the current era where they seem to be mostly trying to live down their horrendous period in coalition government (which bears a huge responsibility for why the UK is in the state it is).