Equity? More like a hit wicket for cricket’s racial harmony

Some days, it feels like there are forces at work that will not rest until everything we love about this country, every tradition, every harmless pastime, every innocent aside, every sweet courtesy, every thrilling sport, every beloved book, every patriotic song, every “You gotta laugh, aincha?”, are forced to prostrate themselves before our mirthless enemies and beg forgiveness.

Yesterday, which saw the publication of a “landmark” review by the Independent Commission for Equity in Cricket, was such a day. The word “equity” in the commission’s title is an immediate giveaway. Equity is not to be confused with its more mature and likeable elder sibling, equality. Equity means imposing a quota on any given situation regardless of merit or competence. In the US, equity has seen high-scoring Asian students barred from college admissions to make room for black students who didn’t make the grade. Equity automatically lowers standards, but it’s considered racist to point this out. Even when one ethnic minority is being disadvantaged in favour of another. Equity means being deeply concerned about the make-up of the NHL (National Hockey League) while lacking all curiosity about the composition of the NBA (basketball). Just for reference, in 2021 the NBA featured 73.2 per cent black players, 16.8 per cent white players, 3.1 per cent Latino players and 0.4 per cent Asian players. Most of us wouldn’t see that as a problem. Black players are clearly far better at basketball than, say, the Chinese who tend to be of more restricted stature. The same applies in athletics where no one complains about the “disproportionately black” sprinters.

It only becomes a problem when lots of white people do well at a sport, which can’t have anything to do with ability, obviously. It must be owing to unfairness, privilege or institutional racism.

Naturally, the new report from the ICEC accuses English cricket of being racist, sexist and elitist. It’s English, how could it not be? The invaluable role that cricket has played in bringing together Britons of different ethnicities who might otherwise exist in silos, their paths never crossing, goes unmentioned. Cricket is one of the great solvents of racial tension, I think, a blessedly innocent shared passion, but then I am not a professional DEI (Diversity, Equity, Inclusion) official whose income depends on finding discrimination wherever I seek it.

The England and Wales Cricket Board said it accepts the report’s findings will “shock and disappoint many”. They certainly disappoint me. To a dismaying extent, our institutions have been taken over by self-hating white people, politically correct bores who prefer to believe Azeem Rafiq instead of the patently decent Michael Vaughan who served with such distinction as England captain. Vaughan narrowly avoided being cancelled for making what most Britons would surely still regard as a lighthearted aside during his time as a player at Yorkshire. Vaughan was cleared of making the “racist’ remark, but his unsuccessful crucifixion will discourage white players from making anything but the most innocuous remark to non-white team-mates in the future. What an own-goal for racial harmony that is.

Among the report’s more fatuous findings are that female cricketers playing at domestic professional level are “disproportionately white”. And white, privately educated males are over-represented in the game. Is that cricket’s fault? Might considerations such as personal choice, culture, family preference and access to sport at school be the key drivers here, not racism?

I remember seeing a documentary in which it emerged that promising young Asian kids were going great guns at a junior level until their ambitious parents decided they were wasting their time wielding bat and ball and should apply themselves to something more secure like law or medicine. Might it be parental attitudes to cricket that need to change, not cricket?

According to Dr Rakib Ehsan, author of Beyond Grievance: What the Left Gets Wrong about Ethnic Minorities, the ICEC report is ill-judged and counter-productive. “The report provides an overly doom-and-gloom picture of English cricket – a much-loved national sport that brings a diversity of communities closer together in our modern democracy,” says Dr Ehsan, “The England men’s squad that won the ICC World Cup in 2019 was diverse in terms of race, ethnicity, faith, class and country of birth. This would not be possible unless cricket was a fairly inclusive sport, so the accusation that it suffers from widespread discrimination rings somewhat hollow. The timing of the report is most unfortunate considering that Rehan Ahmed – a Nottingham-born teenager of Pakistani-Muslim heritage – was called up by England last week for the second Ashes test match at Lords.”

Quite so. The diversity, equality and inclusion brigade may be cloaked in the garb of liberal reasonableness but, make no mistake, their goals are Marxist. Like woodworms, they gnaw away at the foundations of our society, hoping the whole damn thing will one day come tumbling down. And the brainwashed powers-that-be conspire to help them.

Here’s a funny thing. In their Early Years’ coaching pack, the ECB does nothing but promote cricket to youngsters from ethnic minority backgrounds and those with disabilities. Yet, instead of actively sticking up for what they are already promoting, they cravenly capitulate to the new report. And, all the while, interest in cricket dwindles and dwindles. The sport may perish, but at least it will die a virtuous, disproportionately non-white death.

The men I love best love cricket and they are the best of men. (And some of the women I love, too.) Nothing will persuade me otherwise.

If you disagree, as I do passionately, with the ECB’s response to this wretched report, then please use feedback@ecb.co.uk to let them know.

Our institutions have been taken over by self-hating, politically correct bores