00:04:41.820It was like, you're a brave guy, it's an important book.
00:04:43.600And which I thought it was, as far as I know at the time, or knew, it was the only book on far left extremism in the States.
00:04:51.720And I'd been living in the States before.
00:04:53.320So I was, even though it seems like a niche topic for a guy living in London, like it was, it was a topic that wasn't, didn't seem that niche from the life I was living in in America.
00:05:03.400And also, I suppose, when the mainstream media was so ignoring the far left extremism, covering far right extremism, rightly, but didn't cover far left extremism in the same breath.
00:05:17.440So I guess maybe that's why I was curious about it.
00:05:20.640And that's why perhaps I came to the book.
00:05:29.200And before long, I sort of apologized for the offense it caused.
00:05:35.740And then over the few months after that, my conscience just sort of, I just, it felt, it was wrong that I had apologized because I don't think there was actually anything wrong with the book.
00:05:48.460I mean, there's no book that's above criticism, obviously, even Shakespeare, but.
00:06:12.300And there's lots of criticism, there's a lot of fucking nonsense and lies written about the author.
00:06:20.860And, and I was, I guess, aware of that as well, because a lot of those lies then came at me, you know, for example, like, they change your Wikipedia, all these sort of far left extremists, they're very effective online.
00:06:33.880So within hours, my Wikipedia was changed to, is a fascist.
00:06:38.980And you're like, what the fuck is going on?
00:06:41.520And, and for, and for like a lot of friends in their life who don't understand the culture wars or don't understand, they'd never heard of the book, maybe never heard of Antifa, never understood the topic.
00:06:53.640They see all this and they're like, what the fuck?
00:06:55.760What's, you know, what's going on here?
00:06:57.100And so, and so, and they want to sort of protect you at the same time, they don't really understand what's going on.
00:07:03.040So it just, it was like a total, it's a very hellish period, privately and publicly, I guess.
00:07:12.920But, so as I kind of got to, into this more, I realized like, I, it was, it was wrong of me to apologize.
00:07:24.040I don't think it was wrong of me to apologize for bringing that, kicking that hornet's nest and bringing the, those, you know, that, that, that storm onto, onto my colleagues, onto my bandmates.
00:07:38.200I think it was right for me to apologize for that and I stand by that apology.
00:07:41.500But, but I, but I, the kind of conundrum I had was like, well, it's not true for me to, you know, there's nothing wrong with this book.
00:07:49.760Um, or, or, or, or certainly, sort of, I certainly stood by, at least, let's put it this way, I stood by my original tweet.
00:07:57.520He is a brave guy and it is an important book.
00:08:39.400And, and I remember being like, it was just like another, like, you, you know, you, you're on, you're assisting these evildoers, these violent hooligans in, in apologizing because you're accepting that they're right, they're, they're right, but they're not right.
00:08:53.520But the problem I had was that if I say or said, no, actually I stand by what I said, then my bandmates were, were going to get in loads of shit.
00:09:05.020Like little examples that radio stations said they were not going to play the band.
00:09:10.080And, um, for me personally, I was supposed to DJ at one festival that I got, uh, you know, cut from the bill, um, because the headliner, they wanted to condemn me online.
00:09:22.760A lot of musicians and artists, even ones we'd worked with, not all, but obviously, but a lot had, you know, come after me in a nasty way online or like in an at home and any way.
00:09:34.280Um, not just criticism, criticism is fine, but like gone a bit further than that.
00:09:39.880Um, and so my conundrum was, do I live a lie to protect or stand by a lie to protect the band or protect the band and leave, which is where I, the conclusion I came to, uh, which meant that I didn't have to, um, lie or, and they wouldn't suffer for, for the truth that I thought I was telling.
00:10:04.280Um, and that might seem like, uh, like, uh, like, uh, like not such a big, uh, um, thing, but for me, it was like quite, it was a hellish few months as well.
00:11:29.060So, but, but anyway, when you kindly invited us to your house, uh, it's not the tidiest house and that's because, sorry, Winston, I didn't mean to offend you.
00:11:40.380You've got books everywhere and they are books from people like Andy, no, they're books from people who would be the very opposite.
00:11:50.360You're clearly someone who likes to take in different perspectives, think about things you read about history, you read about philosophy, you read, I, and it's, it's, it's clear to me that you're someone who thinks carefully in a nuanced way and is very interested.
00:12:04.820Um, and I, I think the, the reality of your situation partly is that we no longer live in a world that, that is understands that that's possible, that you can read a book and think someone's brave without necessarily being right wing or read a book and think it's interesting without necessarily being left wing.
00:12:22.820Or, and I think that's kind of, and I think that's kind of partly what you came up against, that you're sort of measured by each tweet as an, independently of your entire track record as a human being.
00:12:33.600Yeah. And if you went through the other books I was reading, that I was reading about, I was like, fucking Mao, you know what I mean? And, and, you know, that's actual evil.
00:12:43.220Um, yeah, I mean, perhaps on, you know, reflection, I perhaps, well, I definitely didn't understand Twitter for the, the thing that it was.
00:12:55.280And, and if you, the whole point is each tweet does have its life of its own as soon as it's out there and, and it's almost like a statement.
00:13:03.120If you're, for some people tweeting is just like train of thought, but for other people or like artists, I guess, or institutions, each tweet is a, is a statement.
00:13:13.220And I guess I got that wrong, which I'm now, ironically, now I get that.
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00:14:38.840Obviously, it shocked you by what happened with the tweet, but did it shock you, the behaviour of your fellow artists?
00:14:47.080Because one would think that, particularly in the music industry, you know, rock and roll, freedom, fuck the man, I'm going to say what I think, what I want.
00:14:57.660Did that surprise you that there was that backlash?
00:15:00.400I was surprised by a couple of the artists who said stuff who I'd worked with because they could have done it privately instead of adding fuel to that fire.
00:15:17.980Again, I don't think anything's above criticism, so fair enough, you know, if they felt like they needed to.
00:15:25.320But then, yeah, the idea, and absolutely, as I said, I only had a few thousand followers, so it was insane to me.
00:15:33.280Within like a day or two, it was on The View and Tucker Carlson, it's like, what?
00:15:38.720Like, how is this, you know, just seemed like an act of God, which, you know.
00:15:44.420And so, with the other artists, it doesn't really surprise me that, I do think all, you know, all, I've written about this in a piece for Barry Weiss last week, her Common Sense Substack.
00:16:00.980All communities, all groups are prone to a certain amount of homogeneity of thought, and that's absolutely normal.
00:16:11.660It's forgivable, it's definitely not good, but what can you expect, and particularly in the music industry, when it's a community of people who will have similar personality traits and being open.
00:16:25.980And the only, it's not that strange that there's a kind of, a kind of agreed upon, or a popular opinion within a group, even if it's not popular.
00:16:41.040No, actually, Barry Weiss sent me a, because I did an interview with her, and I didn't do very many interviews, but I did one with her.
00:16:48.260Because I just wanted to get my story out, and I didn't, I wasn't, like, trying to, I just wanted to get, set the record straight, so I just did her.
00:16:56.300Yeah, such high regard for us, that you didn't do it with us, by the way.
00:17:01.040Yeah, and, but Barry sent me a, one poll, which I should dig out, but the Antifa in the States had a five to six percent approval rating, which is the, that is the fringe.
00:17:19.640That's like, now, in America, five to six percent of people is a lot of people, right?
00:17:24.020But nevertheless, as a, as a society, that's the fringe of society, and, and that's the extremist.
00:17:31.460I mean, that's probably what the far right is, five to six percent.
00:17:38.600So, it was an extreme thing, and, and they're very effective.
00:17:43.060They know what they're doing online, they know what they're doing, or they, it looks like they, do they know what they're doing in real life?
00:17:50.720Well, I don't know, but they're causing all sort of, all sort of, all sorts of havoc and, and damage, and it's, it's appalling.
00:18:05.500We were talking about, were you shocked by the reaction of your fellow artists?
00:18:09.520Yeah, so, um, I was, I was shocked, but, again, I, I, I sort of understand now, with hindsight, over Twitter's kind of, that's the world I was engaging in.
00:18:23.060And, also, I do think that artists generally, I do think there's a problem, a problem of homogeneity of thought in the, in the creative industries.
00:18:31.240Like, you see this, and this is what I, I wrote for Barry last week, is, whatever the topic is, unorthodoxy, um, is established pretty quickly, and even if, um, this doesn't mean everyone disagrees.
00:18:47.640Like, for example, on Antifa, I think the only other musician that's publicly outspoken on Antifa is Nick Cave, who, um, on his blog, has written about it, criticizing them.
00:18:58.560And, um, I, I know he got pushback from, from doing that.
00:19:03.060Um, but otherwise, I don't think there's many who have, um, and because I do think there's probably a decent amount of, of consensus within the industry, even if society at large doesn't, there isn't evidence of that consensus on Antifa.
00:19:14.760But, you see, you've been very diplomatic, Winston, and I, and I understand why, because I think you're a far more conciliatory person than I am.
00:19:27.340It enrages me, because the whole point of art, to me, whatever type of art it is, is that it should be welcoming and celebrating of a diverse, of diverse viewpoints.
00:19:40.260It shouldn't be just one particular viewpoint is celebrated and everybody else should be silenced.
00:19:46.660That, to me, is, is an ethema to art, surely.
00:19:50.100Well, that's what has been particularly shocking this year with, with, uh, what's happened to Rogan.
00:19:56.520Um, it's, it's artists forming their own, leading the mobs, against freedom of expression.
00:20:05.960It's, and again, I'm not saying that Rogan's First Amendment rights are in question here, although the White House did follow up by saying, yeah, more needs to be done to combat misinformation.
00:20:16.880But it's artists like Neil Young, Crosby, Stills, and Nash, uh, here, it was Stuart Lee, here, it was...
00:20:54.620So, so, the last, touring the last record, well, let's put it this way, like, we did a record in 2015, and then we did another record in 2018.
00:21:06.860And so, and we're doing promotion for that in 2019.
00:21:10.140In 2015, none of the questions were about politics.
00:21:13.800In 2018, none of the questions were about music.
00:21:17.260And that's, and that, and that's a bit pithy, and it's not totally true, but that's kind of how it felt, like, a little bit.
00:21:24.100But, um, and something about, uh, essentially Brexit and Trump meant that all the interviews were, like, trying to get in that.
00:21:33.560Even though the music wasn't remotely political.
00:21:35.880It's not, it's not remotely relevant to the, to the music, um, and to the product, and to the album, and to the band, or not in my opinion.
00:21:43.880Um, and, and then there was, there are certain topics that, yeah, there was group consensus on in the industry.
00:21:54.240So, doing interviews, I, I got to a point where I was, you know, very nervous going interviews because it was, I'm gonna, I don't want to say the wrong thing.
00:22:03.580I'm gonna get my bandmates in trouble, um, because they're probably gonna ask about the, you know, politics, um, whatever topic it might be.
00:22:13.400Um, and even though I don't think there are opinions that are publicly particularly controversial at all, um, that's just, you know, an exact, I think there's a lot, I was sensitive to it.
00:22:25.580Because, um, the photograph, uh, come out with Jordan Peterson, who I was, was, and am a great admirer of, and it kind of blew up to be this thing.
00:22:40.000It's like, what, like, and he's, this is a guy who sold millions of books.
00:22:45.300Um, he's, um, uh, changed so many lives for the better.
00:22:49.960And, and, um, obviously he's divisive and there's some people, uh, who, who dislike him, um, or, or at least dislike the person they think he is.
00:23:00.780Um, but, and then after that, it's like, wow, well, like, if what I consider, I don't think he's remotely controversial.
00:23:06.660So, if, if that, if a topic like that can blow out like that, like, anything can go like that.
00:23:12.860So, you'd go into these interviews and you'd, you'd be very hesitant about saying anything at all.
00:23:18.800Even though you were being asked about it, you were being asked political questions as a musician who's not political.
00:23:23.840And you'd just sit there going, I really don't want to say the wrong thing.
00:23:27.180And, and the interviewers generally, or not generally, but would often either have an agenda or you could almost be certain that the way they would present it would be not fair.
00:23:40.100It would be, they would be pushing their own agenda, um, because they would care about the topic.
00:23:46.400Or, uh, you can see this with some of the, um, legacy music, um, magazines like NME.
00:24:10.240Um, so, you know, all these music magazines where it's not, it's not politics, we're, we're putting, we're turning into political magazines with an agenda.
00:24:20.540And so you couldn't, I was just like, well, they're not, they're obviously not going to present this fairly.
00:24:26.180So I don't want to engage in this conversation like that.
00:24:29.980Did you feel, did you ever have conversations with other artists talking about how they felt that the Overton window was narrowing and how things were becoming more fraught?
00:24:40.480Because, uh, now, having gone through this experience, I've had amazing artists, very high profile, not just in music, but across, um, the board.
00:25:08.000Um, uh, so there's definitely a lot of artists that, that, that see this as, as, um, the ridiculous situation that it is.
00:25:22.680And, and, and hopefully that will, I think, I sense it will like deescalate.
00:25:28.200Like last week, for example, there's a photograph of Skrillex came out with Jordan and Michaela.
00:25:34.760And, and it's like, um, and he's a big artist and I imagine he's probably getting a bit of flack behind the scenes, but I don't know if, I hope he's surrounded by good people anyway.
00:25:47.580Um, and it's since like, and more and more people do that.
00:25:52.000And it's just like, it will expose the lunacy of the, of the state of those industries by just more and more people having the courage, realizing that there aren't, like Skrillex is untouchable.
00:26:05.120Do you think it's going to help the fact that the music industry, because of the internet, because of social media, because of Spotify, it's losing its power.
00:26:13.120It can't really shut people down like it used to.
00:26:17.700Like if you were dropped by your record label in the nineties, I mean, that was potentially career ending and it, for many, many people.
00:26:24.180But now if your record label drops you, you can still release your own stuff.
00:27:11.140In other words, to making sure that that doesn't happen for you.
00:27:15.980Um, and Winston, one of the things that you talked about your apology and, and I wanted to explore this because you and I have talked about this in the past, because you apologized really because you wanted to protect your band.
00:27:43.700Um, and the reason I'm delving into it is that I think one of the things that happened with you is when you did apologize, there was also a lot of people from the other side who then decided to come after you.
00:27:58.160I was like, oh yeah, you guys behave exactly like the people you, you were taught to be, uh, against the anti, the anti, the anti-woke mob.
00:28:07.700They're, they're just as quick to cancel people as, as the, the, you know, the progressives on the other side.
00:28:14.060And, and, um, you know, now I hope you get canceled and this kind of stuff.
00:28:19.400And it was really quite helpful for me to see that.
00:28:22.800And, um, I would be very reluctant to kind of take that, go flip onto that, that side of things for sure.
00:28:31.620There's another sort of inspiration for me in that sense, um, was, I mean, someone I've spoke about so much so that it's probably boring at this point.
00:28:40.320But, um, uh, in, uh, in Solzhenitsyn's warning to the West and he, he came over and he gave a bunch of lectures across the, um, uh, the UK and, and, and the States, I suppose it would have been the seventies or eighties.
00:28:55.940Um, I'm not sure exactly, uh, when, but, um, he, he comes over and he could, and he still loved Russia.
00:29:04.420It was his country, uh, but he, he could very much have, you know, it's cold war.
00:29:09.560He could have come and been like, fuck Russia, like America and America, you know, America would have loved him, but he came over and he criticized America.
00:29:19.600People went off him very quickly when he did that.
00:29:23.880He could have, and, and, and it would have turned him to, into another, he didn't buy into any of that.
00:29:29.720And he saw, he saw it for, or, or, or he, I mean, that's real, I mean, that's integrity to another level.
00:29:36.860Um, and, uh, that's the, that's the, that's sort of the archetype really, I think, dealing with that sort of, the mobs and crowds and, um, it's the opposite to like politicians.
00:29:50.900Politicians have to play to the mob to further their careers.
00:29:53.280And that's the great thing about an artist is he doesn't, well, actually an artist does in a weird way, but Solzhenitsyn didn't let that affect him.
00:30:01.280The reason I bring it up is, is something that Francis and I've been thinking about a lot and dealing with, because there's no question that we are not woke and against wokeness.
00:30:15.340But the problem is if you are anti-cancel culture and you then engage in cancelling people because they said something you didn't like, or, you know, I see this quite often, you know, on YouTube, you'll get somebody on who's more left-leaning or who may be woke even.
00:30:32.620And you want to have a conversation with them and people are like, I'm not watching this, you know, and it's like, well, you're not anti-cancel culture then.
00:30:40.500You're just anti that cancel culture and you actually quite like to engage in your own thing.
00:30:45.960And so, and that's the evolution of all of us.
00:30:49.040I think initially for us as artists, as comedians, that was the feeling of like this, this industry has become very homogenous and everyone's supposed to have the right opinion.
00:30:57.640And I'm against that, but then also as you, as you move away from that, you're starting to see the flaws in some other arguments.
00:31:04.400And, and, you know, we're generally trying to build our own picture of issue by issue, topic by topic, subject by subject, as you do with the books that you read.
00:31:12.780And the, I think it's, it's big tech, it's social media is just designed to, to just push you into an echo chamber.
00:31:22.780It's just pushing you, you're either woke or you're anti-woke.
00:31:25.820Like, you know, you can't just be human being with different opinions.
00:31:29.060Like it, it's going to feed you this, it's going to feed you that.
00:31:33.420And it's great that you've identified that.
00:31:35.280And, and as you, you know, take trigonometry forward, and this is how I say it, for example, for me, another, it's not exactly speaking to that,
00:31:45.900but I got invited to every news thing on, under the sun.
00:31:50.860And I've been very careful to like, not go on to certain shows because I, I, you know, I don't need to like, so I can play to now the anti-woke crowd very easily.
00:32:00.520But I don't, because I don't want to play that game at all.
00:32:05.340I want to, I know what it's like to lose my integrity, and I want to fucking keep hold of it, keep hold of my bloody soul.
00:32:10.620And, and just kind of see above it and see, and not play quick, you know, games, which you're in a tricky position because you're building a business.
00:32:19.300So you kind of need to play quick games, but at the same time, people will see through you in the long run.
00:32:26.280We never, we never looked at it like that, man.
00:32:28.240We never, ever looked at it like that.
00:32:29.940Yes, of course, now we have staff and people helping us make the show.
00:32:34.080We've got to make sure that we've got a salary to pay them.
00:32:37.060But we think of it as the integrity that we try to maintain.
00:32:42.780And look, we're human beings and we're fallible, but it's the integrity that attracts people.
00:32:48.280So when we say this is our opinion, and now we've changed it, for example, because we've changed our opinion, that to me is what people recognize as human beings.
00:32:59.060And you hope that there's an audience out there for that.
00:33:01.120But it's like when I started comedy, people would always ask me, you know, comedians are desperate to succeed and whatever.
00:33:06.300And I always said, if I can't do the comedy that I want to do, I don't want to be a comedian.
00:33:11.460It's part of the reasons I don't do comedy now anymore.
00:33:13.860I feel like I've got more interesting things to do, you know.
00:33:18.280I don't want to play to any crowd, you know.
00:33:22.860Who do you not find that crowd, though?
00:33:26.480And the crowd I'm interested in playing, and I suppose if there is one, is the crowd of people who are interested in exploring ideas and making up their mind on an issue by issue.
00:33:35.120And still retain that genuinely liberal feeling of, I'm interested in hearing people that I don't agree with.
00:34:08.920I'd much rather be a part and actually have my own thoughts and my own views and my own sense of integrity than to be part of a group where I have to become disingenuous.
00:34:19.400And lie not only to other people, but more fundamentally to myself.
00:34:24.400But I am going to ask this question because I think, sorry, go for it.
00:34:28.220Well, I found that with now launching my new podcast and the people I've got on, it's a range of people.
00:34:35.340I think probably all my guests are liberal if not progressive.
00:34:41.440I don't think I have any conservatives yet.
00:34:43.760But I certainly don't agree with them on everything to different degrees.
00:34:52.280But I want to make them look good because they're humans.
00:34:56.500And because there's no reason, even if I disagree with someone, that they aren't an interesting and nice person that should be given the time.
00:35:08.560And I think that that's that vilification that happens when you get into the tribal stuff.
00:36:19.740I think this idea that we should judge artists and say that, you know, if they have done reprehensible things, which many of them have done, suddenly we can't have access to all the beautiful things that they've created.
00:37:20.520Is there any artist that's committed a crime too much for you to enjoy their work or sponsor their work?
00:37:31.280Because that's another line is if you know that by listening to them or watching them that they're getting paid and that money is then fueling insidious behavior or inappropriate, immoral shit.
00:37:42.440Then that's, is there a line there for you?
00:37:47.060Because, you know, you can talk about people who are dead.
00:37:56.800I also think it depends on what you're talking about.
00:37:59.100For example, if you look at someone, the music may be different somewhat, but comedy, how you experience a comedian's material depends very, very much on what your perception of their character is.
00:38:10.540It's one of the reasons someone like Jimmy Carr gets into a lot more trouble than someone else doing the same jokes, because Jimmy Carr presents a kind of fairly normal person on stage.
00:38:28.600And so people look at the joke on its own.
00:38:32.020And he's not necessarily the most likable persona on stage either.
00:38:35.760Whereas if you took someone like Jerry Sadowitz, who says things that are way worse than what Jimmy Carr says, but his persona on stage is someone who's completely mental, right?
00:38:46.600And very vulnerable and very sort of unhinged.
00:38:50.080And that means he can get away with stuff that someone else can't.
00:38:53.120So the knowledge, for example, that someone is a sex pest or whatever, changes how you experience a joke they might do about that issue, right?
00:39:03.620So I don't think it's as simple as just going, well, you know, the art and the artist are separate.
00:39:10.840Well, on some issues, some situations they are, and then some of them are not.
00:39:20.460I probably, there's, I can't really think of an artist that I wouldn't listen to.
00:39:33.980I would still listen to R. Kelly, but R. Kelly's, R. Kelly's the only one, because as far as I understand it, and this is, I'm not sure if this is actually right,
00:39:43.300but he's an interesting example because he's someone who's still alive, who still profits when you listen to his music.
00:39:50.240However, I don't think he's still engaging in that behavior.
00:39:55.060So you're not funding, you're not fueling that necessarily.
00:39:59.000But the idea that artists are infallible and morally sort of untouchable is insanity.
00:40:10.500And so you can't, there's no art you can listen or engage with or enjoy at all if they have to be a good guy, because no one's a good guy.
00:40:20.660But even more, to me, art comes from flawed people.
00:40:24.980If you think about some of the greatest songs, the greatest art, literature, a lot of it stems from pain.
00:40:34.660And when someone's in pain, quite often they inflict it on other people, whether they intend to or whether they don't.
00:40:44.560An artist is never a well put together person when they're at their creative peak.
00:40:49.780So to then expect them to be this flawed, perfect person who's then producing incredible works of art, to me, the entire thing doesn't make any sense.
00:41:03.580I just see the way that we're putting artists on a pedestal now and expecting them to be perfect, both from what they create and in their private lives and in their political opinions and in who they are.
00:41:20.620And I've never, I've never, so let's say political opinions, because that's maybe where it's most relevant to my life.
00:41:26.800I have no problem listening to like Marxist, communist musicians, like that, even though it's obviously an abhorrent and completely immoral political ideology that's killed hundreds of millions.
00:41:42.620It doesn't mean I can't enjoy the music, I have no problem separating those things, but I don't think that that's the case for everyone.
00:41:51.760I think that we're in a period where it's not the art that's judged, it's the person by whatever, kind of, whatever the faddy morals of the day are.
00:42:03.100Hey, Konstantin, do you believe every business needs cyber security to succeed?
00:42:10.660Yes, of course, because otherwise Uncle Vlad will hack the hell out of it.
00:42:14.500Wouldn't that be a gross violation of international law?
00:58:14.080But it's like a lot of everything that's happening in society now.
00:58:17.320Now, if you believe in utopias and you care more about virtue signaling than truth, and you care more about your idea of what's right instead of what actually works,
00:58:30.300yeah, that's what you're going to end up.
00:58:31.520You're going to end up believing in all this stuff.
00:59:25.660Well, look at something like our conversations around racism, for example.
00:59:31.320Does anyone who's actually thought about it for more than two seconds think that a society of human beings who evolved to be suspicious of foreigners and of others will ever get to a point where there is no racism in society?
00:59:46.100There's not a single racist person ever.
00:59:48.820Are we ever going to get to that place?
00:59:50.200No, but that doesn't mean it's not worth trying to deal with those issues.
01:00:08.100See, this is where we get into the problem, right?
01:00:11.440I never said it shouldn't be dealt with.
01:00:13.180I said, are we ever going to get to a point where there's not a single racist left in society, right?
01:00:19.540And the problem is, and actually Peterson, who talks about this a lot, is the first 95% of the problem is usually solvable with pretty simple and normal means.
01:00:32.080The last 5% takes an awful amount of social engineering to get to, right?
01:00:37.740And so we've now got to a point where I think most of the normal ways of dealing with the issue of racism have been exhausted.
01:00:44.620And you are now doing things that are actually counterproductive, not you personally, you, us, the society, right?
01:00:51.160Where we are, we've got to a point where we think that just chastising people for saying the wrong word is going to make them less racist.
01:01:14.440The more we bang on about institutional racism and the more we talk about all of this stuff, the more difficult this conversation becomes.
01:01:22.960There's another problem is that the solutions are wrong.
01:01:25.660This is an example I gave in my piece with Barry a couple of weeks ago, which was, there was a BBC, I was still with the band and we did a show with BBC Orchestra and the producer in preparation was insistent on doing, having a racially diverse orchestra, which of course is nothing at all wrong with having a racially diverse orchestra.
01:01:51.860Although her approach was that it should be, that the orchestra would be chosen by their immutable characteristics rather than their hard work and skill.
01:02:04.780And a lot of people would argue, yeah, that's how you deal with racial inequality.
01:02:10.980And I'm absolutely prepared to agree that there is racial inequality.
01:02:18.720But I wouldn't say that then picking people by the colour of their skin is the answer.
01:02:34.500Which is, if you start discriminating against some group in order to correct past mistakes, are you going to create less racism or more racism?
01:02:43.860If you keep discriminating against the majority of people in this country?
01:02:49.040I felt this so much because for a period I was going back and forth between England and America and that country is so racialized and they see everything through the prism of race.
01:03:00.520And obviously I'm generalizing about a hell of a lot of people.
01:03:03.080But compared to British society, in the last couple of years, we're taking that on, which is just horrible.
01:03:14.240Moving back to England, I was like, oh, thank God I've escaped that kind of racialized nightmare of seeing the world through that lens.
01:03:22.380When I think beforehand, I thought Britain was pretty good at not, you know.
01:03:40.960We were, we visited a friend of ours who watches trigonometry.
01:03:45.120And she was telling us about a plumber that comes around to her house who also now, thanks to her telling him something, watches trigonometry.
01:03:54.400And she was saying, oh, she's like, oh, I love that interview.
01:03:57.380I love, yeah, you know, they explore such different topics.
01:04:00.120The only thing I'm not sure about is the Jews.
01:05:59.120Starting my own show with The Spectator.
01:06:01.860Interviewing comedians, actors, writers, everyone in the creative industries.
01:06:07.660To try and work out what the difficult totemic issues are.
01:06:11.940Which you've been doing, but I'm looking more specifically, I guess, at the arts.
01:06:16.320And so far, we had Ignat Solzhenitsyn, who is Alexander's son, speaking about his work as a composer and conductor in the classical music world.
01:06:30.320And also, he's an expert on his father's work.
01:06:33.740And we talked about Live Not By Lies, which is the essay Alexander published right before leaving.
01:06:41.780And got a little bit of a disagreement because, you know, this essay is like, if you don't stand up for what you believe, you're a cuck.
01:07:48.540And then anti-Semitism, I think, is certainly linked to that.
01:07:53.240But there's another issue that needs to be one of those sort of difficult topics.
01:07:59.680And even hearing that, I've heard from Jews privately who are very nervous, even if they're not pro, you know, they're sceptical about Israel.
01:08:11.840They feel like when that topic comes up, they have to keep quiet because it's one of those issues that really sort of angers and is very divisive.
01:08:45.980And, you know, you're working your way through it and it takes a little time sometimes, you know, to work out exactly what you want to do and how you want to be.
01:08:54.920And you're a very thoughtful man and you've got plenty of books to read, I think, as well.
01:09:00.160Thank you both for giving me the time and being so thoughtful in your questions and for letting me plug my thing and supporting me in my new...
01:09:08.260You've been very supportive, for your listeners should know, that you two have been very supportive friends behind the scenes as well as in front of them.
01:09:27.020We've got one more question for you before we ask a couple of questions from our audience only.
01:09:30.760But, Winston, the last question we always ask is the same, which is,
01:09:33.560what is the one thing that we're not talking about as a society that you think we really should be?
01:09:38.260The thing that pisses me off, or not pisses me off, perhaps, well, it certainly occasionally pisses me off,
01:09:44.600but I can't quite work out, is why the issue of the Uyghurs in China,
01:09:50.760where it's the largest internment of human beings on the planet at the moment.
01:09:56.480It's between two and three million, or one and three million Uyghurs in camps in Xinjiang.
01:10:03.720And we've got all sorts of heinous, horrific stories of rape and organ harvesting and just the worst possible things you can imagine.
01:10:17.700And it seems to me to be one of the great atrocities happening right now.
01:10:21.160And there's certainly a lot of, there's been a decent amount of coverage across the board.
01:10:26.440And it is one of those issues, a bit like Hong Kong, which seems to, in this country, be bipartisan,
01:10:34.860in that there's no one, it's not a divisive issue.
01:10:37.220It's, everyone's pretty much on the same page.
01:10:39.340I mean, there are extremes who are hesitant to criticise China, but I would say they're the extremes.
01:10:44.880But nevertheless, and even though, let's say, the Uyghur issues in Hong Kong gets a fair amount of press coverage,
01:10:52.560I don't think it captures the imagination of my contemporaries and peers.
01:10:59.860And perhaps this is because Uyghur culture is so alien.
01:11:05.560I mean, this is another thing with, maybe one of the reasons why we got so, the George Floyd captured the imagination all the way over here,
01:11:14.280and it's probably about the same, similar distance to how far away the Xinjiang is from here,
01:11:19.000is because we're so marinated in American culture growing up that it feels like our culture.
01:11:24.440Whereas, not only is Xinjiang a remote province of China, which is completely unimaginable, unfathomable to us,
01:11:34.600but China itself, even though it's the biggest country in the world, is, I don't think it's something we're educated on at all.
01:11:42.300Talk about being not educated on communism earlier.