TRIGGERnometry - Cancelled for Criticising BLM - Nick Buckley MBE

00:00:00.000 Hello, and welcome to Trigonometry. I'm Francis Foster.

00:00:08.260 I'm Constantin Kissin.

00:00:09.520 And this is a show for you if you want honest conversations with fascinating people.

00:00:15.040 A terrific guest today is the CEO of an award-winning charity and a social campaigner, Nick Buckley, MBE.

00:00:21.620 Welcome to Trigonometry.

00:00:22.760 Thank you very much.

00:00:23.760 It is great to have you here, Nick.

00:00:25.160 Before we get into your story, which a lot of our audience are going to find very interesting, I think,

00:00:28.760 just tell everybody who are you, how are you, where you are,

00:00:32.900 what is the journey that leads you to be sitting here talking to us?

00:00:36.880 That's a 50-year journey.

00:00:38.620 So, kid off a council estate in Manchester, in South Manchester, 1.00

00:00:43.740 went to a failing school and didn't do really well with me exams,

00:00:49.420 didn't go to university, did a lot of travelling around the world.

00:00:53.000 I think that really changed me, who I am.

00:00:54.980 Then I got a job with Manchester Council, started looking in different roles in there,

00:01:01.200 started working with young people, trying to stop them getting involved in crime and antisocial behaviour.

00:01:05.560 And then when the cuts came in 2011, austerity hit.

00:01:08.820 I took redundancy and used that money to invest in a charity.

00:01:12.880 And I set up my own charity to carry on working with young people on the streets

00:01:16.980 and stop them getting involved and making poor decisions.

00:01:19.160 And then June this year, I did some blogging and I did a blog on Black Lives Matter

00:01:27.900 because they'd just come to the fore.

00:01:30.480 Nobody knew who they were.

00:01:32.140 So, I went on the website, had a bit of a read and was quite shocked about what it said on their website.

00:01:37.160 So, not rumours, not gossip, what they put themselves on their website.

00:01:41.020 And I thought, I don't know anybody who knows any of this.

00:01:45.420 So, I wrote a 600-700 word blog, really talked about their website and what was on their website.

00:01:53.020 And that hit the fan.

00:01:55.460 People thought I was a racist, a Nazi.

00:01:58.140 And when you think I've spent 20 years working in the most challenging neighbourhoods across Greater Manchester,

00:02:03.340 working with thousands, tens of thousands of young people and helping, supporting them.

00:02:07.360 And everything just turned sour overnight.

00:02:12.300 There was an online petition to have me fired from the charity I set up and founded.

00:02:16.800 That got 450 signatures.

00:02:19.000 There were some other email complaints went into the board who I appointed.

00:02:23.140 So, a lot of them I were friends with and I appointed for their skills.

00:02:28.080 I was then summarily sacked via email.

00:02:32.680 And then I mounted a fight back.

00:02:34.540 I thought, I'm not having this.

00:02:35.740 You know, if you knew me, you would think to yourself, you wouldn't take Nick on if you weren't completely sure that what you're doing was right.

00:02:45.540 So, I mounted a comeback.

00:02:46.760 The online petition got 18,000 signatures compared to the form of...

00:02:50.740 To get you reinstated.

00:02:51.760 To get reinstated.

00:02:53.260 Got some press attention with the mail on Sunday.

00:02:56.520 And then I had a solicitor's firm involved, free of charge, called Keystone Law.

00:03:02.320 Excellent.

00:03:03.760 We're going to need that.

00:03:04.600 I highly recommend Jeffrey Davis.

00:03:09.260 Fantastic.

00:03:09.820 They looked at my case.

00:03:11.220 I'm within a few hours when they've made so many mistakes here.

00:03:14.880 A week later, reinstated back at the charity I founded.

00:03:18.660 And the Free Speech Union, very helpful, I believe.

00:03:20.880 The Free Speech Union were fantastic.

00:03:22.880 It's the only organisation I've ever joined.

00:03:25.320 So, I've never been a member of a political party, any other union.

00:03:28.660 I think the only thing I've ever joined is a local library and blockbusters for your younger viewers.

00:03:32.660 Your older viewers will know what blockbusters is.

00:03:35.120 But then I joined the Free Speech Union in June and they were amazing.

00:03:40.180 I'd recommend anybody, if you like talking, join the Free Speech Union because you don't know when you need them.

00:03:47.400 And you're contributing to their coffers and they're going to help people like me.

00:03:52.880 I never thought I was going to need any help.

00:03:55.300 It was my charity.

00:03:56.340 I set it up.

00:03:58.240 I appointed the board.

00:04:01.500 I got an MBE for it.

00:04:03.940 I'm not going to get cancelled.

00:04:05.900 How little did I know.

00:04:07.900 Well, that's the great thing about nowadays is that anyone can be a Nazi.

00:04:10.960 Yes.

00:04:12.040 You know, there's everything. 0.99

00:04:13.460 Black, white Nazis, white Nazis, Jewish Nazis. 0.83

00:04:16.100 It's incredible. 0.99

00:04:17.260 Anybody you don't like is a Nazi.

00:04:19.900 Yeah.

00:04:20.360 I got poor service in the shop one day.

00:04:22.080 I'm convinced they were not.

00:04:23.100 Well, listen, let's get into it a little bit.

00:04:27.840 So, first of all, it just boggles the mind because as comedians, we can understand we make a bad joke.

00:04:35.100 We say something wrong.

00:04:36.100 We haven't really done anything with our lives. 0.97

00:04:37.720 We're sort of useless. 0.85

00:04:38.540 We just talk.

00:04:39.500 So, if we get cancelled, it's sort of par for the course.

00:04:42.560 You expect it, blah, blah, blah.

00:04:43.900 But you're someone, 20 years, you've spent working with disadvantaged kids, helping them make a better lot for themselves, right?

00:04:54.720 Having yourself come from a very difficult background yourself, right?

00:04:59.140 So, you work your way up.

00:05:01.340 You start a charity with your own redundancy money.

00:05:03.860 You get an MBE.

00:05:06.740 It's your own charity.

00:05:08.760 And you say something in public, which is factually based about the BLM organization.

00:05:15.000 And then you're just, you're sacked from your own charity.

00:05:19.520 That's got to, it's unimaginable, isn't it?

00:05:23.700 Up to the email arriving in my inbox, it was unimaginable.

00:05:28.200 It's, I'm still in shock now.

00:05:31.240 You know, the last couple of months, I'm still in shock.

00:05:34.460 And it's deeply affected me as well.

00:05:36.740 You know, it's affected my relationships.

00:05:38.880 It's affected how I view the people on the board who I class as my friends.

00:05:43.560 You know, I've known one of them 15 years.

00:05:46.260 And I don't particularly blame those individuals.

00:05:49.380 I don't blame individuals.

00:05:51.140 You know, I put, you know, I put them in a very difficult situation with that blog.

00:05:57.120 Even though that wasn't my intention, that's what I did.

00:06:00.360 Because I take personal responsibility for this.

00:06:02.020 No one else did this.

00:06:03.380 I wrote the blog.

00:06:04.300 I posted it.

00:06:05.020 So I need to take responsibility for it.

00:06:07.620 And I still look at those individuals.

00:06:09.920 And they were still wonderful individuals the day before they sent that email.

00:06:14.320 So therefore, they're still wonderful individuals now.

00:06:17.080 They just weren't up for a fight.

00:06:19.140 And that's the only difference.

00:06:20.860 So I don't want to fall into the trap that other people do.

00:06:24.120 You know, they're nasty. 0.97

00:06:25.580 They're evil. 1.00

00:06:26.760 They're left-wing commies. 0.96

00:06:28.680 They were just nice people.

00:06:30.640 Just weren't up for a fight.

00:06:32.300 Yeah.

00:06:32.380 And Nick, the question I'm really interested in asking is this.

00:06:36.240 What were your criticisms of BLM, of the BLM organisation?

00:06:39.980 I'll make that avert.

00:06:40.980 What in particular did you disagree with?

00:06:43.260 So I think first thing I need to tell you why I wrote it.

00:06:45.480 Because I didn't write this because I had spare 10 minutes and I'm always sticking my nose into a people's business.

00:06:51.060 I've never commented anything around Extinction Rebellion, who I don't support.

00:06:56.020 But Extinction Rebellion doesn't fall under the remit of my charity of what we're trying to do, what we're trying to achieve.

00:07:00.980 So I wouldn't comment on that because I'm not an expert.

00:07:05.120 But when I read Black Lives Matter and what they were talking about, which I'll get into in a minute,

00:07:09.800 I thought to myself, this philosophy and ideology is going to damage the lives of the young people I've spent 20 years trying to help.

00:07:21.080 It's hard enough being brought up in the inner city.

00:07:24.200 It's hard enough being brought up in poverty.

00:07:26.040 Without having a national movement, an international movement, telling you that you're a victim.

00:07:33.100 That the police are out hunting you down every night. 0.96

00:07:36.100 That the reason why you fail is because you're black, you're brown, because you're Muslim, because you're this, because you're a woman. 1.00

00:07:42.180 And I know a lot of young people, and it's quite tempting. 0.92

00:07:44.760 And I was one of those, that's why I've only been doing this for 20 years and I'm 52.

00:07:49.240 So what do I do for another 30 years?

00:07:50.860 I wasted my life.

00:07:51.840 That's what I did.

00:07:52.560 So I know how easy it is to get distracted.

00:07:56.760 So if we're giving young people a solid gold reason not to try in life, because what's the point? 0.73

00:08:04.500 I'm black.

00:08:05.000 What's the point?

00:08:05.700 I've been told by all these politicians that I'm a victim.

00:08:09.540 Then I'm there going, no, you're bloody not.

00:08:12.920 And don't listen to them because that's a self-fulfilling prophecy.

00:08:15.620 If you think you're going to fail in life, I guarantee you're going to fail in life.

00:08:20.240 And success is what you make it.

00:08:22.560 Success isn't you're going to be an international footballer.

00:08:25.940 The odds are you're not going to get that.

00:08:27.860 But you can judge what success is.

00:08:29.800 And success might be stacking shelves at Asda and having a legal job that pays the rent and you can have a wife and kids.

00:08:38.260 That's success.

00:08:39.220 But also, if you want to be a doctor or a nurse, it doesn't matter.

00:08:44.980 Sort out yourself what success is and then aim for that.

00:08:48.180 Because we're not all going to be brain surgeons or footballers.

00:08:51.160 So you deem what success is.

00:08:53.000 And when I read what they wrote on their website about dismantling the nuclear family, that's the biggest problem we've got in these cities.

00:09:04.560 No bloody fathers.

00:09:05.500 And they want to dismantle the nuclear family and break it down.

00:09:10.220 And then you read they want to defund the police, which means abolish the police.

00:09:14.500 I don't know anybody who wants to abolish the police.

00:09:18.700 You tend to have police where we have crime.

00:09:22.040 And the poorest people in the poorest neighbourhoods are the biggest victims of crime.

00:09:27.360 Not the leafy suburbs.

00:09:28.580 It's the people living in the inner cities.

00:09:32.380 And all of them, and someone who speaks to a lot of them, they all want more police, not less police.

00:09:38.520 We've seen what happened in America when all of a sudden the police disappear.

00:09:42.400 You know, gun crime goes through the roof.

00:09:44.240 Violence goes through the roof.

00:09:45.560 Look at New York City at the moment.

00:09:47.220 I think homicides have increased 200-300%, something like that, over the last few months.

00:09:51.060 And we're telling the poorest people and the people who need the most and the most protection that we're going to abolish the police for you, mate.

00:09:59.340 And I'm reading all this on their website, and I'm thinking, they're either nutcases, but I've had some more and thought, they're not nutcases, they're Marxists.

00:10:07.980 This is the way to tear down our society and our culture and our country, especially when they say we want to overthrow capitalism.

00:10:16.220 But what does that mean?

00:10:17.280 Well, there's only one option from capitalism, and it's socialism, which means communism.

00:10:23.720 And we tried communism maybe a dozen times last century.

00:10:28.300 We gave it a really good go, mate.

00:10:29.940 We gave it a really good go.

00:10:30.900 Yeah.

00:10:31.240 Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:10:32.280 Your ancestors gave it a really good go.

00:10:34.260 Yeah.

00:10:34.880 And did it work anywhere?

00:10:37.200 No.

00:10:37.880 All it left was tens of millions of bodies.

00:10:42.420 And capitalism isn't perfect.

00:10:43.800 You know, capitalism is, you know, what the church will say, it's the worst, best system

00:10:53.020 we've ever come across at the moment, that we've developed at the moment.

00:10:56.020 It's not perfect.

00:10:57.320 You know, and capitalism, that's a tendency of leave, you know, the poor and the vulnerable

00:11:01.660 stacking up at the bottom.

00:11:03.760 And that's the people we need to help.

00:11:06.020 So we need a compassionate capitalism.

00:11:07.980 We don't need to tear all this down and try again, a failing system that has never worked

00:11:13.580 anywhere else.

00:11:14.440 So I read this, and I thought, this is going to destroy everything I've spent two decades

00:11:21.300 trying to change across Greater Manchester.

00:11:24.160 And that's why I wrote the blog.

00:11:25.300 I thought, people need to know about this.

00:11:26.980 Not because of me and my big mouth, because it's going directly against what the charity

00:11:31.340 was set up to do, to help the exact people this is going to damage.

00:11:36.200 And that's why I wrote the blog.

00:11:37.220 So let's talk about that.

00:11:38.940 You talk about, I can't remember the exact phrase, and I don't think it's about dismantling 0.96

00:11:44.920 the nuclear family, but something about disrupting the nuclear family requirement or some shit.

00:11:49.800 But basically, they want to live in massive communes or whatever it is.

00:11:54.400 You talk about the inner city.

00:11:56.100 Let's start with the rise of the single parent household.

00:12:00.120 What sort of impact on the young people that you work with would having more single parenthood 1.00

00:12:07.820 have for those people?

00:12:10.080 So if we go to my experience, my personal experience, single parent household, mum did a fantastic

00:12:17.580 job.

00:12:18.680 We had no money, but I knew I was loved.

00:12:20.560 How do we know?

00:12:21.120 A nice, happy family growing up.

00:12:24.500 And all my friends had dads.

00:12:26.200 So we're looking at 30, 40 years ago.

00:12:29.880 And if you'd have asked me then, do I miss having a father?

00:12:33.200 I had no memory of my father.

00:12:34.400 I think we left when I was two.

00:12:35.580 And the answer would be, no, I've not missed it at all.

00:12:39.360 You know, there's nothing I could have got extra out of it.

00:12:43.100 But then the first time I realised I had missed out, I was 23 years old, sat with my friends

00:12:48.580 in a beer garden in Manchester one summer's day, having a drink, and everyone's talking

00:12:52.340 about shaving.

00:12:53.840 And someone just bought the new Gillette shaver or bought this or bought that.

00:12:57.440 And we're all talking about shaving.

00:12:59.000 And they all said they shaved the way their dad taught them to shave.

00:13:03.120 And when it came to me, they said, how do you shave?

00:13:06.180 I went, oh, I've got an electric razor.

00:13:07.720 Oh, why do you use an electric razor?

00:13:10.140 And I said, well, I looked in some drawers once in the house when I was 14.

00:13:14.040 I found an old electric razor and I started shaving with that.

00:13:16.240 And I've shaved with it ever since.

00:13:18.240 And it was at that conversation I realised, oh, I have missed having a father in my life.

00:13:24.120 Not dramatically.

00:13:25.140 It wasn't, you know, a life-changing thing.

00:13:26.860 And then I started thinking, if I missed out on that, what else have I missed out on to

00:13:34.260 help me, mould me into being a man, to having, you know, inspiration, to trying to achieve

00:13:40.820 something?

00:13:41.280 And the answer is I don't know, because you don't know what you've missed when you don't

00:13:44.580 know it was there.

00:13:45.240 So taking that forward now to young people in the inner cities, when I meet young people,

00:13:52.840 I've got two ways of knowing if they're vulnerable to making really poor choices in life.

00:13:58.380 The first one is the failing education.

00:14:01.560 So if I'm talking to young people and they're saying they hate school, they're never in school,

00:14:06.340 they've been kicked out of school, it's a huge warning sign to me because I know they're

00:14:11.480 vulnerable now to being pulled into criminality, making negative choices.

00:14:15.980 And the other warning sign is I've no father at home.

00:14:19.920 And if you've got both of them, then, you know, you're extremely vulnerable to making poor

00:14:24.360 choices.

00:14:25.380 We really underestimate as a society.

00:14:29.320 And we don't even, we don't, we're not allowed to talk about this because if you talk

00:14:32.760 about this, it's as if we're attacking single mums.

00:14:36.420 And I'm not attacking single mums.

00:14:38.300 Do an amazing job under so much pressure and stress.

00:14:42.320 What I'm saying is they'd be under less pressure and stress and have an easier life if we had

00:14:48.160 the father there.

00:14:49.980 And who I'm blaming are the fathers.

00:14:53.120 I'm not blaming the single mums.

00:14:54.340 I'm saying to men and boys, how dare you knock somebody up and it's your child and you take

00:15:01.880 no responsibility ever for your child.

00:15:05.240 Then how dare you do that?

00:15:07.000 That this is your flesh and blood growing inside, you know, this woman who's then going 0.99

00:15:12.420 to give birth.

00:15:13.000 It's going to be your child who's then going to have other children.

00:15:16.200 And you don't want to be part of their life and you don't want to provide for that child

00:15:20.120 and be a man and take responsibility.

00:15:23.960 How dare you not want to do that?

00:15:26.060 And you're going to leave it to the state to bring up your child.

00:15:30.020 I'll tell you what, the state will do a bloody poor job of bringing up your child.

00:15:34.180 A poor job.

00:15:35.940 You need to get some responsibility and you need to raise your own children.

00:15:41.060 That's what you need to do.

00:15:42.260 And that's aimed at the men, not at single mums, who do a good job under hard circumstances. 0.98

00:15:48.340 I want them to have more help and support.

00:15:51.060 And it's the men, as a society, we need to be going after and saying, just like we used 0.95

00:15:56.100 to do with drink driving.

00:15:57.740 When I was a kid in the 70s, I always went to my uncle's car, he was drunk and we'd drive

00:16:01.920 us home.

00:16:02.740 And we all knew he was drunk and it was acceptable.

00:16:05.280 Now, you'd phone the police if you knew someone was driving someone's kid's home.

00:16:09.380 You'd phone the police.

00:16:10.980 And that's what we need to do with men who are not taking responsibility for their children.

00:16:16.000 Children need a father and a mother.

00:16:18.600 In less exceptional circumstances.

00:16:20.200 Of course. 0.96

00:16:20.360 If your dad's a violent, murdering paedophile, do you know what, you'll do better than life 0.99

00:16:23.840 without having a relationship with him. 0.98

00:16:25.740 So that's a caveat.

00:16:27.940 But on the whole, children need both bands.

00:16:31.080 I love shopping for new jackets and boots this season.

00:16:34.000 And when I do, I always make sure I get cash back with Rakuten.

00:16:37.920 And it's not just fashion.

00:16:38.960 You can earn cash back on electronics, beauty, travel and more at stores like Sephora, Old

00:16:44.220 Navy and Expedia.

00:16:45.680 It's so easy to save that I always shop through Rakuten.

00:16:48.240 Join for free at Rakuten.ca and get your cash back by Interacte transfer, PayPal or check.

00:16:54.300 Download the Rakuten app or sign up at Rakuten.ca.

00:16:57.740 That's R-A-K-U-T-E-N.ca. 1.00

00:17:01.060 So that BLM recommendation, not constructive, not helpful.

00:17:06.320 Disastrous.

00:17:07.020 Disastrous.

00:17:07.680 Okay.

00:17:08.100 So let's go to the next one, which is abolish the police, defund the police.

00:17:13.280 Now they say defund means something else. 0.99

00:17:15.400 There's a lot of bullshit, but then there's a New York Times article comes out where they 0.99

00:17:19.000 go, no, no, we mean abolish the police. 1.00

00:17:21.260 So let's take them at the word, abolish the police.

00:17:24.500 What would be the impact in the inner city like Manchester of removing the police officers

00:17:31.720 who are there?

00:17:33.100 Yeah.

00:17:33.920 And replacing them with quote unquote social workers.

00:17:36.540 What would be the impact of that?

00:17:37.640 Well, first of all, I spent nearly a decade as a community safety manager for Manchester

00:17:42.720 Council.

00:17:43.840 And every residence meeting I went to, every victim of crime I spoke to, in the inner cities,

00:17:50.760 lots of them being me, would all say, I want more police on my street.

00:17:55.800 Where are the police?

00:17:56.900 I want more police.

00:17:57.680 Not one person ever said to me, do you know what, Nick?

00:18:03.460 I'm sick of seeing, I'm sick of seeing police around here.

00:18:06.200 Not one person's ever said to me, in the decade I worked in the crime field at Manchester Council,

00:18:11.680 everybody wants more police.

00:18:12.680 It makes you feel safer.

00:18:14.780 If we reduce the amount of police, and we have done across Great Manchester, I think we've

00:18:19.180 lost over 2,000 police officers in the last decade because of austerity.

00:18:23.200 The Met has lost a hell of a lot more than that.

00:18:28.520 If you take police out of those neighbourhoods, you're basically handing it over to organised

00:18:33.300 crime, and you're handing it over to dysfunctional young people who commit low-level crime and

00:18:39.300 anti-social behaviour, and we'll run amok.

00:18:42.380 I remember growing up on a council estate 50 years ago, where anti-social behaviour and low-level 1.00

00:18:47.920 crime was not only every day, it was culturally acceptable.

00:18:53.640 I remember some kid running across my street with half a leg of lamb, half a lamb, because

00:18:59.940 someone was delivering meat to local butchers, and as he popped in, this lad jumped to the

00:19:05.060 back and picked up half a sheep and ran on with it, and everybody knew who'd done it.

00:19:10.080 No one said anything.

00:19:11.040 It was all acceptable.

00:19:12.120 We've got away from that now, because it looks like a victimless crime, but there is

00:19:15.760 no victimless crimes in society, and if we remove police from these areas, or just reduce

00:19:21.740 them, anti-social behaviour will go through the roof.

00:19:25.180 Low-level crime will go through the roof, and then we'll have organised crime taking over,

00:19:31.000 and what we'll have then is then we'll have vigilantes.

00:19:33.780 We'll have organised crime walking around going, I'll sort that burglar out for you, and they

00:19:38.920 might not even be the person who burgled your house, but they'll get a good idea.

00:19:41.540 They were stabbing because we thought it was him, and that's not how we want to run

00:19:45.740 our society with lawlessness, and vigilantes, and gangs running our neighbourhoods.

00:19:52.520 We need more police, not less police.

00:19:54.720 There's an argument for better policing, absolutely.

00:19:58.160 I've trained police officers in community engagement.

00:20:01.720 I did that for several years, every now and again, working with Great Manchester Police.

00:20:06.820 Police need to improve their training.

00:20:09.700 I'm sick of police.

00:20:10.700 You see it on TV.

00:20:11.480 Those TV shows drive me mental.

00:20:13.780 If I hear one more police officer speaking to a member of public and calling him mate,

00:20:17.740 all right, mate, what are you doing tonight?

00:20:19.400 All right, love, you know, calm down.

00:20:21.300 Don't be drinking.

00:20:22.640 Excuse me.

00:20:23.440 You call him sir, and you call her madam.

00:20:26.420 You don't call him mate and love.

00:20:28.640 If someone from British Gas turns up my house, I want them to call me sir.

00:20:32.020 I'm paying for a service here.

00:20:33.760 I'm not your mate.

00:20:35.180 Be professional.

00:20:37.120 And so we can improve the police, and we need to raise their game.

00:20:40.940 On the whole, they're fantastic.

00:20:42.180 I'm a big supporter of the police, but they can be improved.

00:20:45.300 So we can improve and help train the police better.

00:20:48.200 But reducing them and getting rid of them is absolutely crazy.

00:20:54.280 I can only say it's a craziest idea I think I've ever heard.

00:20:57.240 I like that, because halfway through, it sounded like you were giving him a bollocking.

00:20:59.860 Which I deserve, to be fair.

00:21:03.380 Yeah, which you do deserve, which I very much enjoy.

00:21:05.380 Now, I think pretty much everybody who looks at these ideas knows that they're crazy,

00:21:11.080 knows that they are fundamentally unworkable.

00:21:14.180 So why have we got into this position where they have become impossible to criticise?

00:21:20.580 Do you remember the documentary the BBC did on Black Lives Matter

00:21:23.540 when they went into the background of who they are and how they set up?

00:21:27.200 We didn't see it.

00:21:28.120 No, I don't.

00:21:28.580 Did you see it?

00:21:29.040 I don't think I had no one.

00:21:30.060 It doesn't exist.

00:21:31.840 That's why no one knows what Black Lives Matter stands for. 1.00

00:21:34.560 Because not one reputable mainstream media organisation

00:21:38.340 has done a half-hour documentary into Black Lives Matter.

00:21:43.200 That's why nobody knows about it.

00:21:45.540 As simple as that.

00:21:46.500 I speak to my friends.

00:21:47.840 All my friends, up to me educating them,

00:21:50.020 think Black Lives Matter is just a movement that came out of racism in the UK.

00:21:54.100 And I say, it's an organisation, they have a website, they've collected millions of pounds.

00:21:59.900 Have they?

00:22:00.780 I didn't know that.

00:22:02.640 Well, these are some of their views.

00:22:04.900 I never knew that.

00:22:06.980 Well, how would they?

00:22:07.960 Unless they've got the time and the inclination to do some research, which most people haven't,

00:22:13.920 then the mainstream media have completely let us down.

00:22:18.420 Where is the documentary about who Black Lives Matter are?

00:22:21.480 I'm not saying attack them, but a factual BBC, Panorama, Horizon, Newsnight type of documentary.

00:22:32.100 This is Black Lives Matter.

00:22:33.340 Started six years ago in America of a shooting of some black young person who said he had his hands up.

00:22:40.740 It turns out he didn't have his hands up.

00:22:42.300 All the way through now.

00:22:43.740 And let's have a proper factual documentary.

00:22:45.560 But no one's made it.

00:22:46.880 And the mainstream media don't want to make it.

00:22:48.640 So we're kept in ignorance.

00:22:50.440 They're scared.

00:22:50.940 I mean, this is why you say people aren't educated.

00:22:53.640 But there are also people, and I can tell you this from personal experience, in the media,

00:22:58.100 higher up in different echelons of different organizations.

00:23:01.820 You talk to them, you sit them down, and you go, you know, here's the fact about this.

00:23:07.060 This is what they propose.

00:23:08.560 And they go, hmm.

00:23:10.400 And then they don't say anything.

00:23:11.760 Yes.

00:23:12.220 Because they know the punishment, as you now know the punishment.

00:23:15.020 Yes.

00:23:15.400 Which is if you make these perfectly legitimate observations.

00:23:18.300 I mean, they say so themselves.

00:23:20.560 One of the co-founders of BLM said in 2015 that they're trained Marxists.

00:23:25.520 Yeah.

00:23:25.740 I saw the video of her talking about it.

00:23:27.700 So it's not a secret.

00:23:28.780 No.

00:23:29.220 It's not a secret.

00:23:29.960 There's no secret about it.

00:23:30.880 But a lot of people simply don't want to say that that's what's happening.

00:23:35.600 And therefore, they'll pretend they don't know.

00:23:37.420 It's a bit like Fire at Christmas and the Easter Bunny.

00:23:41.680 We know it's made up.

00:23:43.280 We know it's crazy.

00:23:44.960 But we're not going to go around saying it's all made up and crazy because it might upset

00:23:48.580 the people who still believe in it.

00:23:51.400 We call them children.

00:23:52.380 So we don't want to upset them.

00:23:55.300 And if you've got the big directors at those big organizations, you know the truth. 0.99

00:23:58.720 They're not stupid. 0.85

00:23:59.500 They've already looked into this. 0.98

00:24:01.380 But you're right.

00:24:02.740 They're seeing what's happened to people like me and other people.

00:24:05.760 And they're thinking, I don't want to lose my quarter million pound year job and my amazing

00:24:12.800 pension for saying something that I know people don't want to hear.

00:24:17.760 This is my job.

00:24:19.780 And Nick, did you have any idea of the hot water you were going to get into by writing

00:24:25.760 this blog?

00:24:26.400 Or did you think it was a legitimate criticism and you were just going to go about your day?

00:24:30.300 I thought there would be some criticism because social media, you know, I could, I could,

00:24:40.940 I could put on social media, my date of birth, somebody would be criticizing.

00:24:44.620 So there would be some criticism.

00:24:46.380 Yeah.

00:24:47.460 Did I think it'd be anything like what happened?

00:24:51.020 No.

00:24:51.920 Because, you know, would I have posted it if I had, if I'd have known?

00:24:57.700 I really don't know.

00:24:58.980 I'd like to think I would.

00:25:00.340 I'd like to think, yes, I would.

00:25:02.340 But I'd be, that's far too easy an answer.

00:25:05.080 Would I have posted it knowing that the turmoil and, you know, the, the hurt and, you know,

00:25:13.200 just what I've been through, what I have done it.

00:25:16.000 I really couldn't answer that.

00:25:17.660 But no, I didn't expect it to go batshit crazy like it did.

00:25:22.600 But do you regret posting?

00:25:23.640 No.

00:25:24.680 Why not?

00:25:25.280 Um, because I believe I was right and I believe I've been proven right.

00:25:30.380 And I believe if I'd have posted that blog today, it'd have made no waves.

00:25:36.120 I agree.

00:25:36.880 I was ahead of the curve.

00:25:38.600 Yeah.

00:25:38.740 And if you're trying to be a leader in any field you're in, and if you're trying to improve the lives of people you care about, then you need to do what's right, not what's convenient.

00:25:52.260 And it was right at that moment in time for me to try to educate whoever was following me on social media about what I discovered.

00:26:01.260 I didn't know.

00:26:01.760 I discovered it and went, people need to know about this.

00:26:05.340 So I then tried to educate and inform other people.

00:26:09.340 So I don't regret doing it at all.

00:26:12.400 And so you say that you don't regret doing it.

00:26:16.020 And you look at the government's handling of BLM.

00:26:18.360 I personally think it was weak.

00:26:20.020 What handling?

00:26:21.220 Exactly.

00:26:22.340 So what, what are your criticisms of the government?

00:26:24.420 Do you think they handle?

00:26:25.140 Well, that's the biggest, that's the biggest problem we've got.

00:26:30.340 Um, I can only say I've never been so disappointed in the government than the one we've got at the moment.

00:26:36.780 I voted for this government.

00:26:38.620 And not because of policies, not because of COVID, because let's be honest, we're all making COVID up as we go along because no one knows what they're doing.

00:26:45.480 Just everyone, every country is doing the best, what they think is right.

00:26:49.080 Because when they've had this before, so I'm not even blaming them for that.

00:26:52.320 All of us, you know, we have, even now, where's the leadership?

00:26:56.860 When they're pulling down statues and graffitiing, you know, the Churchill statue and attacking the police.

00:27:03.680 And I can't, I can't, I can't, I can't name one politician who stood up and went, no, no, no, no, not in this country.

00:27:15.880 Not today and not while I've got my seat in parliament.

00:27:20.260 If you don't like what I'm saying, vote me out.

00:27:23.700 Because I'm going to say what I believe, vote me out if you disagree with me.

00:27:27.360 But I'm having none of this.

00:27:28.920 The whole country was begging for someone to, to stand.

00:27:33.340 Boris Johnson was on death's door.

00:27:34.820 So, he still could have done more, regardless.

00:27:40.040 You know, we had a World War II pilot with no legs, flying Spitfires.

00:27:43.680 So just because, you know, you're ill or you've lost, it doesn't mean you still can't do anything.

00:27:47.480 He still should have done more.

00:27:48.800 I'm extremely angry and disappointed with our government, about how they did nothing.

00:27:53.940 How they made everybody else feel.

00:27:56.560 I better say nothing.

00:27:57.960 Because even the government's afraid of the mob.

00:28:00.500 And if they're afraid of the mob, I work in Tesco's.

00:28:04.880 I work in a factory.

00:28:06.540 I don't say anything.

00:28:08.440 And I better put that BLM postman window. 0.80

00:28:11.240 I better start making those fist salutes. 0.92

00:28:13.780 I better start putting a black square on Instagram. 0.93

00:28:16.440 Because if the government's afraid, then I need to be terrified.

00:28:20.560 And they really dropped the ball.

00:28:23.320 Absolutely dropped the ball.

00:28:24.540 I know an actor who was forced by her agent to put a black square on their Instagram. 0.75

00:28:33.940 Because if you don't, you're going to lose work.

00:28:37.500 Yes.

00:28:38.180 So, that terror you're talking about, and you're right, I think it rose all the way to the top.

00:28:43.120 All the way to the top.

00:28:44.680 But coming back to you and your situation, it sounds to me like the people who sacked you from

00:28:51.100 your own charity, they didn't do it because they were sort of ardent BLM marchers who'd been

00:28:57.920 out there protesting.

00:28:59.740 They did it for likely the same reasons that people were doing everything else, which is,

00:29:05.560 this is scary.

00:29:06.760 We're going to get punished.

00:29:07.900 This looks bad.

00:29:09.600 And they just didn't want to make the stand that you did.

00:29:13.380 Yes.

00:29:14.460 It was a sort of soft cowardice, you might say.

00:29:18.200 Possibly.

00:29:18.700 I mean, I'm putting it quite in strong terms.

00:29:20.360 I'm not attacking the people.

00:29:22.040 I'm just saying they were unwilling to make a stand, let's say.

00:29:25.820 Was that it?

00:29:27.200 Was that the extent you think of it?

00:29:29.120 Yeah.

00:29:29.600 They just didn't want to deal with the trouble.

00:29:31.420 Yeah.

00:29:31.760 But why fire you then?

00:29:33.280 Why not just like say they don't support you?

00:29:35.620 Why would they sack you from your own charity?

00:29:38.480 Again, a lot of this comes down to COVID.

00:29:41.880 Months and months being locked away.

00:29:44.440 All of us hypersensitive.

00:29:46.460 All of us spending far too much time on social media, haven't got nothing else to do.

00:29:51.140 If there's been normal times, I think the email would have been, Nick, we all need a face-to-face here.

00:29:56.800 It's COVID.

00:29:58.260 So there was no face-to-face.

00:30:01.900 They were probably looking at a charity and thinking, we've got lots of corporate supporters.

00:30:06.360 And they're probably looking, some of these corporate supporters are actively supporting BLM.

00:30:10.960 They're not happy.

00:30:13.320 And my answer would have been, I don't care.

00:30:16.240 I set this charity up.

00:30:18.060 They can pull their money.

00:30:19.120 It's not a lot of money anyway.

00:30:20.780 But I'm not sacrificing the futures of the young people on the streets just so we can get a couple of extra grand off this corporate.

00:30:29.800 Because I'll take a pay cut.

00:30:32.440 We can save the money somewhere else.

00:30:34.720 I'm not selling my soul and what I believe just for the next couple of grand because we're damaging young people that the charity was set up to help.

00:30:44.240 And that's what I always came back to.

00:30:46.560 And that's all the decisions I've made for the charity was, is this decision the right thing for those kids on the streets?

00:30:52.820 Because if it is, well, we make that decision.

00:30:56.520 Is this the best decision for me to get a pay rise?

00:30:59.980 Well, I shouldn't be answering that question.

00:31:02.960 The question always should be about young people trying to help.

00:31:06.180 And they probably looked at many things.

00:31:08.760 I'm guessing I wasn't in their mind.

00:31:10.680 I didn't even sit down and have a conversation with them.

00:31:13.160 They panicked.

00:31:14.900 They saw some complaints come in.

00:31:16.820 They saw the 450 signatures, which at the time seemed a lot of people.

00:31:21.380 The 450 people all want Nick sacked.

00:31:24.920 These people are saying he's a Nazi. 0.99

00:31:27.020 He's a racist. 0.99

00:31:28.100 Some of these people are obviously black. 1.00

00:31:29.800 Look at the faces on Twitter. 0.97

00:31:31.360 They must know what they're talking about.

00:31:33.900 So we've got to let Nick go.

00:31:35.680 And how did it work?

00:31:36.980 Did you have any inkling that you were going to get fired or did you simply walk into an office and then it get delivered to you there?

00:31:42.580 Emails.

00:31:43.260 It was all over email.

00:31:44.480 So you got sacked from your own charity by email?

00:31:46.760 Yes.

00:31:48.060 Immediate.

00:31:49.520 Immediate.

00:31:49.920 I mean, the effect on, and did you have any idea that this was going to happen?

00:31:54.200 No.

00:31:55.060 So effectively you got an email out of the blue firing you from your own charity that you set up.

00:32:00.260 The effect on you must have been devastating.

00:32:02.960 The first week, it's hard to admit I was a beaten man the first week. 1.00

00:32:06.880 Because I walked out and went, you idiot. 1.00

00:32:13.760 You and your big mouth. 1.00

00:32:16.360 When will you ever learn to keep your mouth shut? 0.99

00:32:20.260 That's all I was saying to myself.

00:32:22.000 People are laughing at you now.

00:32:23.900 Those 450 people are definitely laughing at you.

00:32:26.320 People you've worked with, other agencies, other charities, they're all laughing at you.

00:32:31.120 Who does he think he is?

00:32:32.800 He was always spouting off in meetings.

00:32:34.460 He was always saying we could do better.

00:32:36.200 He was always saying our plans were wrong.

00:32:39.060 And look at him now.

00:32:40.220 Hmm.

00:32:40.640 Yeah.

00:32:41.520 So I'm well glad that I am.

00:32:43.020 That's what I was thinking.

00:32:44.620 The first week, I was a beaten man.

00:32:46.340 Absolutely.

00:32:47.060 I look back now and I think, oh, I couldn't have got any lower.

00:32:50.600 And then the second week, I got a phone call off a friend who said,

00:32:54.660 what are you doing, Nick?

00:32:57.400 I said, what do you mean to him?

00:32:58.820 You've not replied to anybody.

00:33:01.120 Not one email, not one, anything on social media.

00:33:04.600 You've not challenged anybody.

00:33:06.640 You know, they're calling you Nazi here.

00:33:08.400 You've not even come back, even with an insult to them.

00:33:11.540 You've just accepted it all.

00:33:13.680 And as if you're guilty.

00:33:15.700 And we all know you're not guilty.

00:33:17.200 Why are you lying down?

00:33:20.580 Because I was beaten.

00:33:21.960 So I went to bed that night and that was, I didn't sleep.

00:33:25.840 That's all that was going on in my head was that conversation.

00:33:29.900 And I woke up next morning and I thought, right,

00:33:32.020 the least I can do now is fight back and clear my name.

00:33:35.860 Probably won't get my job back.

00:33:36.860 But unless I clear my name, my next step in my life is going to be a lot harder

00:33:42.280 because it'll be, do you remember Nick?

00:33:44.000 The Nazi. 0.59

00:33:45.600 And I thought, well, that can't be around the rest of my life.

00:33:48.440 So I thought, at least I need to fight back.

00:33:51.360 And then coincidence happened in life.

00:33:54.220 You know, I've always had a lot of good luck.

00:33:56.080 I always argue, is it good luck?

00:33:58.040 Or was it the fact that I was willing to take an opportunity that arose?

00:34:00.820 I don't think it was luck.

00:34:01.740 Anyway, that morning, knock on the door, opened my front door.

00:34:05.740 Hi, I'm a reporter for the meal on Sunday.

00:34:08.260 Can I have a chat?

00:34:09.020 And I went, just a man.

00:34:12.400 Can you get a kettle on?

00:34:13.160 Can you get a kettle on?

00:34:14.480 So it wasn't that flippant.

00:34:16.480 I went, come in.

00:34:17.380 I need to properly think about this before I do an interview.

00:34:20.360 And I wasn't that flippant.

00:34:22.220 So we had a good chat, gave an interview.

00:34:24.000 And I thought, well, that's the beginning of the fight back.

00:34:26.180 Let's get some national press on this.

00:34:28.920 And then one of the former trustees of the charity phoned up and said,

00:34:32.180 I can't believe what's happened.

00:34:34.120 He said, do you mind if I set up an alternative petition to get you reinstated?

00:34:39.160 Because I don't want to do it without asking you in case it makes things worse.

00:34:41.640 I went, no, do it.

00:34:42.840 So he set that up.

00:34:45.360 And then I went on the offensive.

00:34:47.920 As much press as I could do.

00:34:49.460 I went on talk radio quite a bit.

00:34:53.060 Lots of stuff on Twitter and Facebook.

00:34:55.560 That was generating lots of complaints then to the charity board to say,

00:34:59.860 why did you sack this man?

00:35:01.240 So all of a sudden, I flipped the pressure.

00:35:03.820 Pressure wasn't on me anymore now.

00:35:05.920 Pressure went back onto the board of the charity.

00:35:08.260 Why have you done this?

00:35:09.960 What was the formal reason for sacking you?

00:35:12.260 Formal reason was bringing the, I think it was three points.

00:35:15.840 Never mentioned the blog.

00:35:16.960 So the three points were something like bringing the charity in disrepute,

00:35:21.920 spouting political ideology, and breaching charity commission guidance.

00:35:28.820 It's interesting.

00:35:29.420 Do you think that if you'd made a statement in support of Black Lives Matter,

00:35:34.280 do you think that would have been regarded as spouting political opinions?

00:35:37.280 No, because almost every charity before that was all supporting Black Lives Matter.

00:35:44.180 That's interesting, because I would imagine that's sort of a political position as well, isn't it?

00:35:47.700 If it's a political position to criticize, then it's a political position to endorse.

00:35:51.580 It turns out, when you read the charity commission guidance,

00:35:55.560 none of that comes under their definition of political.

00:35:58.660 It's about supporting British political parties around laws or getting them elected.

00:36:06.900 And this was the American organization, so it didn't even come under that.

00:36:11.120 And so this happened, so you started your fight back.

00:36:15.440 At this point, did you want to return to the charity,

00:36:18.120 or did you just want to highlight what actually happened to you and the injustice behind it?

00:36:23.160 To begin with, I was trying to clear my name.

00:36:26.280 That's how I thought this is, you know, like you do in life, when you've got plans,

00:36:29.920 you have a series of goals.

00:36:33.020 My first goal was, I need to clear my name.

00:36:35.180 I can't be known as Nick.

00:36:36.780 Remember the charity guy, the Nazi? 0.94

00:36:38.240 So I wanted to clear my name on that.

00:36:40.500 The best thing that someone called me was a compassionate Nazi.

00:36:43.420 I got a tweet saying, I'll take on board your two decades of working in these tough day,

00:36:47.940 but supporting kids, and you're obviously very compassionate, 0.71

00:36:50.460 but you're still a Nazi. 0.96

00:36:52.260 You are a compassionate Nazi. 0.98

00:36:54.440 And I thought about changing my Twitter handle, and I thought,

00:36:57.300 no, I don't want to go for the rest of my life with the word Nazi in my Twitter handle,

00:37:01.980 and stuff like that.

00:37:02.620 But I thought it was quite funny.

00:37:03.800 So I wanted to clear my name first of all, and when I could see that was happening,

00:37:07.920 and I was getting, I mean, I literally got maybe a thousand personal messages

00:37:12.440 on Facebook, on Twitter, from all over the UK, from France, from Australia, from America,

00:37:18.660 saying we've seen it in the press.

00:37:20.380 We've got our full support, anything we can do.

00:37:23.560 I had the one English businessman offer to pay my wages in case I was really struggling.

00:37:31.280 I was getting so much support.

00:37:35.320 That changed my perspective then.

00:37:38.120 I thought, if I had any doubts that what I'd done was right, and I did have doubts of what I'd done was right,

00:37:42.400 because when all of a sudden you face that, it's like, and I am a reflective person,

00:37:47.220 so I was thinking, maybe I am one.

00:37:49.600 Maybe I did cross the line here.

00:37:52.280 Why would all these people be against me?

00:37:55.100 And no one for me.

00:37:56.400 That was another strange thing.

00:37:57.960 No one, in that first couple of weeks, no one came to my defence.

00:38:01.700 No one.

00:38:02.980 I had a couple of emails and phone calls saying I'd like to,

00:38:06.380 but after I see what's happened to you, Nick, I don't do anything public,

00:38:10.160 but just let me know that I am on your side, just not publicly.

00:38:13.560 And then when all that happened, I thought, oh, I might be able to get the charity back here.

00:38:19.520 So it was a secondary thought.

00:38:20.760 It wasn't my initial thought.

00:38:22.200 And then when I got a solicitor, Keystone Law involved, and they looked at everything,

00:38:26.140 they went, this looks like an open and shut case to us, mate.

00:38:29.300 They said, we really think you'll be back in the seat this time next week.

00:38:33.400 Oh, really?

00:38:34.120 And they were spot on.

00:38:35.640 Wow.

00:38:35.980 And what would you say to people who invariably say, cancel culture, it's a myth.

00:38:40.420 It doesn't exist.

00:38:41.740 You know, you're free to say whatever you want.

00:38:45.940 We need to define what cancel culture is because it's become this term for everything now.

00:38:51.600 So if I am sick of your posts on Twitter and I block you, that's not cancel culture.

00:38:57.840 That's me just sick of your tweets.

00:39:00.440 But people are going, oh, he's blocked me.

00:39:02.620 You're talking about cancel culture, but yet you block me.

00:39:04.900 That's not cancel culture.

00:39:06.100 And it's not cancel culture if it's, you know, you're an actor and also I don't like your political views.

00:39:15.160 And it's not cancel culture to say, do you know what?

00:39:18.180 I used to be a fan of yours, but I'm not now.

00:39:20.600 That's not cancel culture.

00:39:21.960 Cancel culture is when you say, I don't like what you're saying or what you think.

00:39:26.040 And I'm going to try to destroy your life.

00:39:29.480 I'm going to go after. 0.99

00:39:31.440 If you work for someone, I'm going after them so they know.

00:39:35.000 I'm going to go after.

00:39:36.800 You put on Twitter that your sister works for Virgin Trains. 0.99

00:39:40.280 Well, I'm going to go after your sister on Virgin Trains now because I'm going to, I'll destroy you. 0.90

00:39:45.580 If you're an actor, you know, I want to set a petition up that we all boycott the film.

00:39:50.220 You had a four second role in.

00:39:52.400 And I'm going to make sure that all the other directs, producers know if you're in anything that a load of trouble comes with that.

00:39:59.940 That's cancel culture where you try to destroy someone's life. 0.96

00:40:02.460 Not when you say, I don't, I don't want to hear you, mate.

00:40:06.520 So therefore I'm going to do something so I don't hear you.

00:40:09.740 That's perfectly acceptable.

00:40:11.840 That's not cancel culture.

00:40:13.140 It's when you want to destroy someone.

00:40:15.260 And having experienced it yourself, do you think it's more prevalent than we actually like to think in the UK?

00:40:24.460 I'm bound to say yes, because I'm more attuned to it now and I see it more.

00:40:28.360 I probably didn't see it as much before.

00:40:30.360 But you two gents who do this podcast and speak to lots of people, you're probably in a better position to know.

00:40:36.640 It looks like it's happening more, especially since Black Lives Matter, because we've suddenly got this new justice warrior type now who weren't involved a few months ago.

00:40:47.240 And it's easier to do it now.

00:40:49.480 And it's easier to do it because every one of those individuals completely believes that they're 100% right.

00:40:57.880 And that they're on God's side, that they're on Martin Luther King's side, that if Gandhi and Mandela were here today, they're on their side and they 100% believe that.

00:41:09.340 And what we believe, people like us, is, I think I'm right.

00:41:17.500 I'm not saying I'm 100% right.

00:41:18.920 I think I'm right based on what I've read and what I've seen and what I've felt.

00:41:22.460 And I'm quite happy listening to somebody else in case they can change my mind or in case they know something I don't know.

00:41:28.080 So it's hard to have a fair fight when we think we're right and they know, they know they're right.

00:41:37.440 And it's an unfair fight.

00:41:39.280 I think a lot of it is what we talked about earlier. 0.58

00:41:42.040 And you sort of cringed a little bit when I suggested the people who sacked you are cowards.

00:41:47.180 But I think, not speaking about them personally, but more broadly, I think that's a big part of it.

00:41:53.480 Because in your case, 450 people signing a petition, you could get 450 people to sign a petition about the color of trains, right?

00:42:02.960 That, anything.

00:42:04.520 But it seems like a lot.

00:42:06.240 And then, at that point, people have to have some backbone to say, actually, we don't care that 450 people who we don't know, who have no identity verification, we don't even know if there's one person who created 450 accounts.

00:42:19.600 Could be, right?

00:42:20.920 It takes some backbone to stand up against it.

00:42:25.020 And I think part of the reason that there is cancellation happening is that people are just afraid.

00:42:31.660 Good people.

00:42:32.460 Good people are just afraid.

00:42:33.580 So, let's talk about the process further down the line, which is, you get the lawyers involved, they tell you it's an open and shut case.

00:42:41.820 What happens from there?

00:42:44.140 So, the board of trustees, the solicitor of Olsen, outlining their mistakes and where they were wrong.

00:42:52.180 And that I was going to sue them for unfair dismissal.

00:42:58.500 So, I breached a contract.

00:42:59.620 And upon hearing that and seeing the evidence, and obviously then getting legal advice themselves, which they probably should have done before, they realised the mistake and decided to resign.

00:43:15.960 So, they appointed another board who I approved.

00:43:19.360 A new board was appointed and then they reinstated me.

00:43:22.220 Wow.

00:43:23.500 Wow.

00:43:24.260 And so, you're back where you should rightfully be, at the helm of your charity?

00:43:28.960 Yep.

00:43:29.360 And what advice would you give to people about speaking out?

00:43:33.420 About criticising?

00:43:34.600 We all need to speak out.

00:43:36.280 And when you were just saying then about cowardice, we're all guilty of that.

00:43:44.500 We're all guilty.

00:43:45.580 None of us do enough.

00:43:47.320 Even now, I see things.

00:43:49.320 I think, should I comment or shouldn't I comment?

00:43:51.620 And I don't comment on anything, even though part of me wants to comment on that because I believe in something.

00:43:55.980 And I like to think at the moment, I'm probably still a little bit, not vulnerable, I'm probably still a little bit, probably a bit damaged.

00:44:06.380 And it's, could I mentally cope with the love of outbreak?

00:44:11.520 And it's like, do you know what?

00:44:12.560 I don't want to give that a go.

00:44:14.000 So, maybe in a couple of months' time, when I'm a bit stronger, a bit more solid than I do, and hence why I'm on your show.

00:44:21.860 This is the real reason why I'm here.

00:44:23.600 Because I want to speak out.

00:44:26.360 I want to be a voice for everybody else.

00:44:31.040 I want to show people and tell people, this can be beaten.

00:44:35.500 And it can be beaten fairly easy.

00:44:37.880 Nobody puts up, when I fought back, no one fought back against me.

00:44:43.080 They didn't rise back up.

00:44:44.560 Just like skilled bullies.

00:44:47.000 When it's 10 of us, we're going to pick on you something awful.

00:44:50.660 All of a sudden, you're fighting back.

00:44:53.260 Someone easy around the corner to bully. 0.94

00:44:55.180 Let's go have a go at them because you're just causing too many problems for me now as a bully.

00:44:59.720 I'm going to pick someone else.

00:45:02.720 Nobody, when I sat in the fight back, there was no negative comments on social media.

00:45:07.940 No one's emailed me to complain that I'm back in post.

00:45:11.220 No one's emailed the board saying, why did you take that Nazi back? 0.95

00:45:15.560 They shut up.

00:45:16.800 Once that Mail on Sunday article hit, every single one of them shut up.

00:45:21.160 Because all of a sudden, there's thousands of people online in support of me.

00:45:25.600 And they all went, we're not taking on a crowd.

00:45:28.620 It's too dangerous.

00:45:29.960 We know what it's like when you're a crowd and what you can do to people.

00:45:33.520 That's a bigger crowd.

00:45:34.480 We're not taking them on.

00:45:35.760 So we all need to stand up.

00:45:37.740 What we don't need is martyrs.

00:45:38.800 I don't want people losing their jobs, standing up over something that was trivial or something you couldn't change.

00:45:46.240 We don't need more martyrs out there who are self-sacrificing themselves.

00:45:49.740 But everyone can do a bit.

00:45:50.740 And if everyone just doesn't, we're the silent majority.

00:45:55.140 The vast 90-odd percent of the country agree with us.

00:45:58.540 If everyone in just did a tiny bit and you add all that up, that's like a tidal wave of support.

00:46:04.640 And we can crush the dissent that we get. 0.98

00:46:07.800 And these lunatics, we can crush them in a nice way. 0.99

00:46:11.880 And that's what we need to do. 1.00

00:46:13.820 Everybody needs to do their bit.

00:46:14.880 So if you read something on Twitter and you think, yeah, I can retweet that, retweet it or like it.

00:46:20.400 If you want to comment on something, comment on something.

00:46:23.240 But be sensible.

00:46:24.040 What we don't need is our version of those nutcases out there. 0.99

00:46:28.080 Because all you do then is you give them another reason to double down and say, look at that. 0.93

00:46:35.200 Some of them are racist.

00:46:36.840 We don't need to play their game the way they go. 1.00

00:46:40.360 We need to beat them.

00:46:41.840 First of all, with emotion, not facts.

00:46:44.880 They don't want to hear facts.

00:46:46.420 You can give them all the facts you want.

00:46:48.300 They're running on emotion.

00:46:50.080 So we need to tackle them with emotion.

00:46:52.900 And we need to say, this is what we're trying to achieve.

00:46:56.180 We want to achieve the same things as you.

00:46:58.560 A fairer society.

00:47:00.200 No racism.

00:47:01.860 Lots of opportunity for everybody.

00:47:03.600 No homeless people.

00:47:04.760 We want the same things as you.

00:47:07.160 Of course we do.

00:47:09.000 But these are our ways of getting there.

00:47:11.460 With some of your ideas and some of our ideas,

00:47:13.420 we can get there as opposed to saying we're just going to attack them for attacking them safe.

00:47:18.380 We need to have a better strategy of how we're going to do this.

00:47:21.500 And I'm sort of formulating one at the moment.

00:47:23.380 So I'm either going to write some articles or maybe a book or something about how we do it.

00:47:27.720 And it's not about attacking them.

00:47:30.960 Yeah.

00:47:31.180 Because the vast majority of them are decent people.

00:47:33.440 We need to pull them onto our side.

00:47:37.560 What we don't need to do is to be knocking them off one at a time and beating them.

00:47:41.900 Let's pull them all on our side. 0.98

00:47:43.360 And then you've got a couple of cent of Marxist lunatics that we can all turn around and then just mock. 0.98

00:47:49.040 So it's about being a compassionate Nazi. 0.97

00:47:53.000 Exactly.

00:47:53.760 When you run for office, that can be a slogan, mate.

00:47:56.760 No, I agree with you.

00:47:57.880 And I think the point you're making is very important, which is...

00:48:01.300 And I've been thinking about this for the last few months, which is...

00:48:05.680 If this is a war, which has kind of been set up...

00:48:09.120 It can't be a war.

00:48:10.160 That's my point.

00:48:10.880 It can't be.

00:48:11.560 Because all we're doing is...

00:48:12.500 It's a civil war.

00:48:13.660 Yeah.

00:48:14.020 That's my point.

00:48:14.660 We all lose in a civil war.

00:48:16.220 This can't...

00:48:16.720 This has to be...

00:48:18.260 I hate the word war.

00:48:19.340 I hate the term culture war.

00:48:22.320 Yeah.

00:48:22.880 Because what we're doing is...

00:48:24.720 So constantly we're setting each other up in camps.

00:48:26.960 Yeah.

00:48:27.660 And, you know, America now is getting close to a civil...

00:48:30.120 A physical civil war.

00:48:31.360 We've got people killing each other now.

00:48:33.360 This needs to be a war of ideas.

00:48:35.960 It needs...

00:48:36.840 It needs to be a war of emotion.

00:48:38.760 What it really needs to be is a conversation, mate.

00:48:41.800 And that's what you're saying is you have to be sensible.

00:48:43.880 Yeah.

00:48:44.380 So that other people don't get put off.

00:48:46.380 Yeah.

00:48:46.480 So you can actually have a conversation.

00:48:47.900 I don't think we're there yet for conversation.

00:48:49.300 No, we're not.

00:48:49.740 That's why I'm saying to people, we need to tackle them with positive emotion.

00:48:55.320 Because they're running on emotion.

00:48:57.460 Yeah.

00:48:58.080 They're not willing to listen to facts or have a conversation.

00:49:01.340 Or to give you the benefit of doubt that you're used to and not racist.

00:49:05.480 So if they can't give you the...

00:49:06.940 I give everyone a benefit of doubt that they're not a racist.

00:49:10.460 Unless they prove me wrong.

00:49:11.860 I give everyone a benefit of doubt that they're a decent person.

00:49:15.980 Unless they prove me wrong.

00:49:18.120 And that's how we should treat everybody inside.

00:49:19.800 But they're running on emotion.

00:49:21.100 So we need...

00:49:22.020 I'm not sure how we do it yet.

00:49:23.720 But having conversations and telling facts.

00:49:29.020 We can do that.

00:49:29.880 It's like how it's come on.

00:49:30.520 And would you change anything about your experience or what you went through?

00:49:34.780 Broadway's smash hit, The Neil Diamond Musical, A Beautiful Noise, is coming to Toronto.

00:49:41.340 The true story of a kid from Brooklyn destined for something more.

00:49:44.720 Featuring all the songs you love, including America, Forever in Blue Jeans, and Sweet Caroline.

00:49:50.620 Like Jersey Boys and Beautiful, the next musical mega hit is here.

00:49:54.700 The Neil Diamond Musical, A Beautiful Noise.

00:49:57.480 April 28th through June 7th, 2026.

00:50:00.520 The Princess of Wales Theatre.

00:50:01.940 Get tickets at Mervish.com.

00:50:08.800 I would have...

00:50:10.660 The blog would have been vote better.

00:50:14.420 I didn't realize how much scrutiny it was going to get.

00:50:16.900 So even there's nothing in there that I regret writing, as you know, you can word things slightly differently.

00:50:23.460 I could have made points slightly better.

00:50:25.480 So I don't regret writing it, nothing there I'm ashamed of either.

00:50:29.640 But I could have wrote it a little bit more academically, a little bit more as if I was an English lit major or something.

00:50:37.320 I could have made it a bit better.

00:50:38.580 But I didn't because I'm just a kid off a council estate and I'd spare half an hour, read a website, but all right, on this and did.

00:50:46.660 So that could have been better.

00:50:47.680 I'd have changed that.

00:50:50.720 No, I'm not one for regrets.

00:50:53.040 I'm not one to, you know, could or would or should or.

00:50:56.820 No, done's done.

00:50:58.520 I need to learn from what I did. 0.99

00:51:00.960 Because you're a fool if you don't learn from things that go wrong in your life. 0.99

00:51:04.160 So I need to learn from that. 1.00

00:51:05.880 I don't regret any of it.

00:51:07.480 It's taken me to a place where I am now.

00:51:11.800 It's given me a new challenge in life.

00:51:15.120 So I'm still going to work for the charity, but I'm looking at going part time because I want to start dedicating some of my time, do a lot more writing on social issues.

00:51:23.500 I want to get involved in policy.

00:51:24.980 I want to drive some of the agendas and be an influencer as opposed to helping a few thousand kids a year, which is great and amazing.

00:51:33.660 But if I can influence policy and I can help bring down something like Black Lives Matter, the organization, not the phrase, then I can have a bigger impact and do more good.

00:51:45.900 Well, let's talk about that, because I think if we put a bow on your story, there's a happy ending.

00:51:51.520 And that's a good thing.

00:51:53.280 And congratulations to you on that and to all the people who supported you.

00:51:58.000 Yeah, big thanks to the people who supported me.

00:51:59.760 And, you know, Keystone Law, the Students' Union then, but the Free Speech Union were amazing.

00:52:06.760 And everybody, everyone who messaged me really helped me get through this because I was at a really low place.

00:52:12.900 And having, having reading weeks of being called an answer to then get messages saying, you know, look at the great things you've done and look at this and look at that.

00:52:21.460 And look at this old article that I heard about four years ago where you saved a girl from being sexually abused.

00:52:28.540 And, you know, they sent me the article.

00:52:29.920 I thought, I have done some good work.

00:52:32.560 And, you know, you start doubting yourself.

00:52:34.300 So they really helped me.

00:52:36.080 So let's talk about the future then, because I think one of the most important conversations that we started sort of at the beginning was,

00:52:43.060 it was about what made you criticize the organization of BLM, which is you thought their prescriptions for what should happen in inner cities were fundamentally mistaken.

00:52:53.440 Yes.

00:52:53.800 They're fundamentally damaging to people who live in those communities and particularly the vulnerable young people with whom you work.

00:53:00.620 Yeah.

00:53:00.740 So what are the things that people don't understand about inner city, young people, knife crime, gun crime, gangs, all of the sort of stuff that you would have experienced dealing with?

00:53:14.140 What do people need to know?

00:53:15.360 We have politicians who watch the show.

00:53:16.980 We have journalists who watch the show.

00:53:18.600 What do they need to understand that they do not understand at the moment?

00:53:23.240 That's a billion dollar question.

00:53:24.780 I think we could do a 10 episode series on that.

00:53:28.920 It's just really complicated.

00:53:32.680 So some of the simple things, one is education.

00:53:38.500 I've just wrote an article for the Critic Magazine on what I think we need to look at in our education system, because one size fits all doesn't work for everybody.

00:53:47.620 So according to government stats, 82% of young people in England who attend school achieve the five GCSEs, which is the government minimum standard.

00:53:56.720 That means 18% don't.

00:53:59.360 It's the 18% who are being failed at school.

00:54:03.880 And we need to look at how do we educate them.

00:54:07.140 And I give a couple of examples of a girl I knew who was a lovely girl.

00:54:12.060 Wasn't very bright, but was just a lovely person.

00:54:15.820 And, you know, could achieve in life because of her innate ability of making people go, I like her.

00:54:22.080 And we've all met those people.

00:54:24.540 And she left school with no qualifications, hardly attended any classes, because she just was academic.

00:54:32.440 And if we had a different school around the corner, that wasn't a dumping ground for academically challenged kids or behavioural challenged kids.

00:54:40.400 This isn't, you know, a pupil referral unit.

00:54:42.560 This is a school your parent chooses for you, as opposed to you get sent.

00:54:48.520 Because it's all about choice.

00:54:49.380 I want parents and kids to have choice.

00:54:51.540 We could have other schools where young people who are not academically gifted, or might be, but just don't, are sick of sitting in lessons.

00:54:58.600 And they have a choice.

00:54:59.620 They go to these schools where it's more practical.

00:55:02.380 So they'll still do English maths, things like that.

00:55:03.940 But then, you know, there could be, you know, there could be classes where, you know, people could do coding, if that's what they want to leave school and do.

00:55:12.340 And this girl, I'll give you an example, where she could have been trained as a chambermaid, was never going to do an academic job. 1.00

00:55:18.380 But she could have understood, you know, working, turning up on time, customer service, invoicing, simple hotel computer systems.

00:55:28.540 She left school.

00:55:29.440 And there's hundreds of hotels in my city centre.

00:55:33.460 She did a job like that. 0.98

00:55:35.300 But I bumped into her when she was 17.

00:55:37.980 Now morbidly obese.

00:55:39.840 Never had a job.

00:55:41.140 And he's now unemployable.

00:55:43.120 And we've taken her spark away.

00:55:44.480 She smiled all the time when I knew her.

00:55:46.160 When I met her when she was 17 in the city centre, just walking past, we stopped for the chat.

00:55:50.200 Didn't smile once.

00:55:52.420 Whatever was in her, our education system rips out of her. 0.98

00:55:57.020 And that's only a small percentage of young people.

00:55:58.640 But that doesn't mean we let them fail just because the vast majority are doing well at school.

00:56:04.260 And those young people are also the young people then who then get dragged into crime.

00:56:08.220 They get groomed.

00:56:09.180 They get kicked out of school because of their behaviour.

00:56:11.160 Or they stop attending school because you imagine you go to school for 11 years.

00:56:14.780 Imagine going to school every day and you're not academically gifted.

00:56:17.900 And every day you sit in a class. 1.00

00:56:19.360 And every day they make you feel more and more stupid. 0.99

00:56:22.980 And you see other people getting it. 1.00

00:56:25.940 And you can't get it.

00:56:27.940 And you start getting angry.

00:56:29.640 And you start thinking, I'm not coming anymore now.

00:56:32.660 And you start getting disenfranchised.

00:56:34.620 You start thinking society's against you.

00:56:36.260 And you wonder why, by the time you've left at 15, 16, you're an angry young man.

00:56:41.960 You wonder why we just talked to you for 11 years. 1.00

00:56:45.020 Made you feel stupid, inadequate, and nobody. 1.00

00:56:48.820 All those years. 1.00

00:56:50.460 With the best intentions.

00:56:52.020 They don't do it on purpose.

00:56:52.980 I get that.

00:56:53.620 And then you wonder why the hang on the street's hanging out.

00:56:57.880 And you wonder why a drug dealer's going, come here, mate.

00:57:00.660 Want to earn 10 quid?

00:57:01.660 Do you want to do this, this, this?

00:57:03.080 It's like, I'm finally being treated like an equal.

00:57:06.300 They're not.

00:57:06.920 But they think I'm being treated like an equal.

00:57:09.020 I could be him.

00:57:10.640 I could be the godfather.

00:57:12.380 I could have this big house.

00:57:14.340 And the odds are, no.

00:57:15.340 You're going to get stabbed in a couple of years' time and end up in jail.

00:57:17.620 But they buy into the dream because I've education, let them down.

00:57:21.500 That's something we can do.

00:57:22.480 You know, the way we're kicking kids out of school into the arms of criminal gangs

00:57:28.420 is tremendous in all the inner cities.

00:57:31.220 And then we've got an issue with our culture.

00:57:36.800 If you look at some of the biggest hits for TV shows over the last couple of years,

00:57:42.740 Peaky Blinders, what's that?

00:57:44.320 Organised crime.

00:57:45.820 Breaking Bad, what's that?

00:57:48.260 Organised crime, drug dealing.

00:57:49.520 We're selling young people the dream of it's a career.

00:57:56.460 Subconsciously, look at the music we listen to, rap music and stuff like that.

00:58:02.260 All negative messages all the time.

00:58:05.280 You know, gangs and drugs and killing and respect.

00:58:09.140 And then we've also got some in the city, culture and family, about not appreciating and looking at the value of education.

00:58:20.240 We've got lots of immigrant families who come in, big on education.

00:58:24.500 You speak to, you know, a British Chinese kid or Indian kid or Nigerian kid.

00:58:29.500 Their kids are going to do well at our state comprehensive in a poor area.

00:58:35.680 They're the kids who excel.

00:58:36.820 Their parents are saying, what we've done today, look at your report card.

00:58:40.940 Go get the belt. 0.85

00:58:42.500 Two B's, go get the belt. 1.00

00:58:45.140 And that's, they're doing really well.

00:58:47.060 To be clear, we're not advocating for that.

00:58:48.600 But I know what you mean.

00:58:51.060 They're strict on that and they value education.

00:58:53.500 And I remember once, 20 years ago, sat in a...

00:58:57.180 You're not that compassionate if you've got the belt, mate.

00:58:59.040 You've got to stick to your label, compassionate and naughty.

00:59:01.680 We all need discipline.

00:59:03.600 Sure.

00:59:04.080 And I don't condone, you know, but I know some families do that.

00:59:08.420 I remember sitting in a house talking to a mum once about her daughter who was causing problems in the local chippy.

00:59:15.420 A bit of racial abuse in the local chippy.

00:59:16.880 And I visited the house, sat down and said, you know, this can't go on.

00:59:20.760 These are the consequences for your daughter if this goes on.

00:59:24.720 And I'm sat in this house, nicely decorated.

00:59:27.200 The biggest TV I'd ever seen.

00:59:29.580 This was like 15, 20 years ago.

00:59:31.540 I didn't have a flat screen TV at the time.

00:59:33.200 And she had this size of a wall flat screen TV.

00:59:36.620 It was on benefits.

00:59:38.080 Didn't work.

00:59:38.940 And I'm trying to say, she needs to go to school.

00:59:40.760 That's the problem.

00:59:41.640 She goes, well, I never went to school and I did okay.

00:59:45.200 I'm looking at this nice house.

00:59:46.520 All of it's paid for.

00:59:47.820 Everything's paid for.

00:59:48.700 Nice big TV.

00:59:50.340 I'm thinking, you have done okay.

00:59:54.840 She's got a point.

00:59:56.080 How am I telling this girl that if you don't go to school and get an education, you're going to be there?

01:00:00.700 Where her mum's going, I did all right. 0.99

01:00:04.040 So part of it's cultural as well.

01:00:06.080 So if we're living in those cultures where we don't value education or we don't value aspiration or we're not saying to our kids, you can be a doctor, you know, or I want you to be a doctor.

01:00:17.280 Or we're saying, I want you to, you know, work here or do this or do that.

01:00:22.840 If we're just saying to young people, I don't care what you do, it makes no difference to me, mate.

01:00:28.700 So how do you help kids?

01:00:30.800 It's really about giving them a dream.

01:00:34.260 It's about building their aspiration.

01:00:35.740 It's about making them believe in themselves.

01:00:37.220 The thing I've heard the most and the thing that upsets me the most is when young people, when I say to young people, what do you want to be?

01:00:46.340 You know, what's your dream?

01:00:48.440 And they go, nothing, I've got a dream.

01:00:52.960 I prefer it when they say I want to be a football player.

01:00:55.820 And, you know, we know they're not, but at least I've got a dream.

01:01:00.100 But when you've got young people saying, nothing, I've got a dream.

01:01:04.000 And you dig down, you speak, you get to know them over weeks and you find out and you realise they meant it.

01:01:11.380 What happened to them was they had a dream, they tried stuff, and they either got no support, usually from home or parents or school, or they failed or stumbled and nobody helped them up.

01:01:25.540 And no one gave them the encouragement to start again.

01:01:28.380 And eventually they learnt themselves that if I don't try, I don't fail.

01:01:33.660 But doesn't this go back to fatherlessness, that they've got nobody there to go, come on, pick yourself up, look, we all fail.

01:01:40.780 And that's what fathers do.

01:01:42.100 So when you come out, you know, you run in the house crying, you've cut your knee, your dad goes, stop being a big baby, you're fine, get back out there.

01:01:50.400 Where your mum goes, oh, oh, go get the first day there.

01:01:54.400 And your dad goes, oh, your leg's not going to get out.

01:01:57.620 But that builds resilience in you.

01:02:00.940 You go, oh, right.

01:02:02.240 And dads come across as cruel sometimes, but they're not cruel.

01:02:07.260 That's what dads do.

01:02:08.480 That's why we need a mum and a dad in less extraordinary circumstances.

01:02:12.600 Yeah.

01:02:12.660 And, you know, when you come home and you're being bullied, your dad doesn't go, oh, we're going to have to speak to school and we know we're going to have to get taxed to pick you up and we're going to have to do this and do that.

01:02:24.700 Your dad goes, all right, well, tomorrow when the first one comes up to you, you smack him as hard as you can in the face and the others will either run away or you're going to get battered.

01:02:34.260 But I'll tell you what, they won't mess with you the day after because they'll all know someone's getting a fist in the nose.

01:02:40.500 Or your dad will walk with you to school and your dad will threaten them.

01:02:43.900 And they all go, don't mess with him, his dad's mental.

01:02:47.060 And we've all got different roles.

01:02:49.080 And that's what we're missing out with fathers.

01:02:51.420 We're missing these young people seeing their dad go out to work every day in the wind, the snow, the hovercane, getting up at six, seven in the morning, not coming back till six, seven at night, knackered, sitting down.

01:03:05.180 What was, dad, you can't play football?

01:03:06.340 I can't play football with you, son.

01:03:07.820 I'm absolutely shattered.

01:03:10.220 Could have been working.

01:03:11.440 Oh, but dad, well, do you know why the lights are on?

01:03:15.400 Because I paid the rent and I paid the bills.

01:03:17.380 Do you know why you've just eaten?

01:03:19.340 Because I give you more money and she goes out and buys food for you. 1.00

01:03:22.740 Where does that money come from?

01:03:23.740 It's me working six, seven, eight, nine, 10 hours a day.

01:03:26.860 And young people go, right, someone's got to work for me to have stuff.

01:03:32.020 And these are all the lessons we used to teach our children.

01:03:37.380 And they weren't lessons as in we knew we were teaching them.

01:03:40.780 They were just in heaven.

01:03:41.940 But all that's gone.

01:03:44.240 And especially young boys are just drifting.

01:03:47.780 And they're looking for that father figure that's someone to look up to and someone to respect.

01:03:53.440 And they're finding it in negative male role models outside the house.

01:03:59.380 Do you know, I listened to you and you're so right.

01:04:03.960 And I listened to you with the Twitter brain on. 0.70

01:04:07.740 And I'm going, we're going to get cancelled so fucking hard for this. 0.52

01:04:10.760 Because these things have become unsayable. 0.85

01:04:13.000 I was a teacher in East London, a very deprived part of East London in Newham.

01:04:20.480 And I looked at the boys who were struggling in my class.

01:04:24.520 And I'd be like, no, dad, no, dad, no, dad, no, dad.

01:04:27.740 The vast majority of them.

01:04:29.440 And it's not their fault those kids.

01:04:31.300 It's because, as you said, they've been failed by their fathers.

01:04:35.340 Because, and people don't want to say this.

01:04:38.100 But if you have a kid, that is your responsibility.

01:04:41.300 Your responsibility.

01:04:43.400 We can't say it enough.

01:04:45.040 It's your responsibility.

01:04:47.360 And men who abandon their children should be publicly shamed.

01:04:51.180 You should be ashamed of sitting in the pub and saying,

01:04:54.340 oh, yeah, I've got two kids.

01:04:55.400 Oh, yeah, I've not seen them in years.

01:04:57.980 That should be like saying, well, yeah, I did four years in jail for paedophilia.

01:05:02.280 It should be almost the same as that.

01:05:05.140 Because you're damaging your own children.

01:05:07.700 You might not see it.

01:05:08.740 And it holds a long time.

01:05:10.420 And it's emotional.

01:05:11.460 But you're damaging your own flesh and blood.

01:05:14.960 And if you don't want to have your own flesh and blood, they're called condoms.

01:05:19.080 So we've got a choice.

01:05:21.520 And that's not to say that every young person who doesn't have a father in his home

01:05:25.360 is destined to be a criminal.

01:05:27.640 That's not the case.

01:05:28.440 Because I don't have a father in my home.

01:05:29.420 So it's not to say, you know, that happened.

01:05:33.640 But when you look at the overall stats and who's failing and the years I've spent working

01:05:38.740 with young people, it's like, oh, yeah, again, again, again.

01:05:44.640 And we see it.

01:05:45.540 And there's a wonderful book by, it was called The Boy Crisis by Warren Favill.

01:05:52.700 Have you read it?

01:05:53.400 Yes.

01:05:54.760 If you've not read it, you need to read it.

01:05:56.700 It's a wonderful book.

01:05:57.960 And it talks about all of this.

01:06:01.020 Before we go, just one question I want to ask, Nick, what advice would you give to someone

01:06:05.440 who's going through an experience similar to yours?

01:06:08.020 What should they do?

01:06:09.020 What should they not do?

01:06:11.960 First thing is join the Free Speech Union because they're great and they can help you.

01:06:17.180 Don't ever apologize for something you're not sorry for.

01:06:23.160 Because I wouldn't do it.

01:06:24.940 So if you've done something and you know it's wrong, then you need to apologize.

01:06:28.680 It's called being a decent human being.

01:06:30.140 But if you've done nothing wrong, don't apologize.

01:06:32.460 And then depending on your situation, you need to work out how you can fight back.

01:06:38.260 And try to use some of the tactics that they've used against you for you, such as social media,

01:06:48.380 such as online petitions.

01:06:50.240 Seek out people like me and other people who have got a presence online and let's get a petition

01:06:57.400 started for you.

01:06:59.060 It might not work, but make you feel better when 18,000 people have signed it.

01:07:02.160 And don't do what I did the first week, which was accept defeat.

01:07:08.120 The biggest mistake they made with me was they gave me nothing else to lose.

01:07:16.660 And when you put someone in the corner who's got nothing else to lose,

01:07:21.660 you either die or you fight your way out of that corner.

01:07:26.220 And if they've done the same to you, then that's your choice. 0.99

01:07:28.820 Either die in that corner or fight your way out.

01:07:31.600 Because you've got nothing else to lose.

01:07:33.680 One of our favorite quotes on this show is the Fight Club quote.

01:07:37.100 I don't know if you've seen that movie, which is,

01:07:38.520 it's only once you've lost everything that you're free to do anything.

01:07:42.220 And thank you for coming on the show, Nick.

01:07:43.960 Thank you for taking the stand.

01:07:45.720 I'm glad you landed on your feet.

01:07:48.500 And it sounds to me like there's some really great things ahead in the future for you.

01:07:52.400 And as a result for young people in this country,

01:07:54.600 because I really think you can make a huge contribution to improving their lives.

01:07:58.100 And I hope people who watch this and people who listen to this,

01:08:00.580 who have the ability to change things, take what you've said on board.

01:08:04.440 With that in mind, as always, we've got one more question for you.

01:08:07.640 Which is, what's the one thing we're not talking about as a society,

01:08:11.420 but we really should be?

01:08:13.620 We're talking about a little bit, but not anything like we should.

01:08:15.940 And it's the knife crime epidemic that we've got.

01:08:19.880 How have we got hundreds of young people stabbing each other to death every year?

01:08:25.720 And it seems as if we are lost for an answer.

01:08:31.820 It baffles me.

01:08:34.360 Part of it is we don't understand.

01:08:35.340 Well, people who are tackling it obviously understand it,

01:08:38.000 but the vast majority of people don't understand it.

01:08:40.500 You know, people think it's really drug turf wars.

01:08:45.180 And it tends not to be about drug turf wars.

01:08:47.260 It tends to be about respect.

01:08:49.200 It tends to be about, have you seen what he put on Twitter about you?

01:08:53.120 About your mum?

01:08:54.120 Are you going to have that?

01:08:55.600 I wouldn't have it. 0.97

01:08:56.760 If he said that to me about my mum, I'd knife him.

01:09:00.200 And all of a sudden, that young person then feels like

01:09:02.860 there's nothing else I can do now.

01:09:04.080 All my friends are saying, I wouldn't have that.

01:09:06.700 And then they're backed into a corner, and then we have violence.

01:09:10.740 And we're not looking at it seriously enough,

01:09:14.480 and we're not tackling it enough because of the racial element we have.

01:09:18.980 And everyone, again, is paranoid about looking at it 0.98

01:09:22.260 because it's predominantly young black men stabbing other young black men. 0.96

01:09:26.200 And I had a thought the other day, which I've not really looked into, 0.97

01:09:29.620 and it just popped in my head.

01:09:31.480 100, 150 years ago in the UK, we had a problem of duelling,

01:09:35.820 and that was over respect.

01:09:38.080 So we'd have, you know, sir, you said, what about my wife?

01:09:42.760 I will see you tomorrow at dawn.

01:09:45.260 And we had people stabbing and shooting each other to death,

01:09:47.840 over respect.

01:09:50.460 We need to look at why that happened and how we tackled it.

01:09:55.600 In other countries, how have we tackled young men taking offence,

01:09:59.620 which is easily done in every culture throughout history,

01:10:02.500 and resorting to violence, which is what young men do.

01:10:05.820 So this is a new problem.

01:10:07.840 But we don't, I can't see anywhere where we're looking at it

01:10:11.080 and coming up with solutions.

01:10:13.480 We just seem to be, all we seem to do is an outcry.

01:10:19.140 How can this happen?

01:10:22.040 And I think it's a shame.

01:10:23.620 Well, Nick, thank you so much for coming on the show.

01:10:25.860 If people want to find you on Twitter?

01:10:28.140 Twitter, Facebook, Arnold's Places, Nick Bookley, MBE.

01:10:32.280 Perfect stuff.

01:10:33.400 Thank you so much for watching the show, guys.

01:10:35.480 We hope you enjoy it.

01:10:37.020 Please follow us on Twitter and all the usual socials.

01:10:40.080 And if you want to see a show of ours,

01:10:41.920 Wednesday and Sunday are episodes.

01:10:43.940 Tuesday, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday are our live streams.

01:10:47.500 And we always go out 7 p.m. UK time.

01:10:49.900 It's Tuesday.

01:10:50.280 See you soon.

TRIGGERnometry - September 16, 2020

Cancelled for Criticising BLM - Nick Buckley MBE

Episode Stats

Summary

Transcript