Way of the World Michael Deacon
When I am finally appointed Secretary of State for Education, the first thing I will do is launch a radical overhaul of the way we teach history. Above all, I will ensure that the curriculum becomes far more varied – for one very simple reason.
We desperately need to provide the progressives of the future with some new insults.
For decades now, our history curriculum has been dominated by the Second World War. There are, of course, good reasons for that. It’s an extremely important period. But this constant focus on it has had one downside. Which is that, whenever progressives want to smear their political opponents by likening them to monsters from the past, the only ones they can ever think of are the Nazis.
They liken US Republicans to the Nazis. They liken gender-critical feminists to the Nazis. And right now they’re likening Rishi Sunak’s government to the Nazis. Practically everyone who dares disagree with them reminds them of the Nazis.
Or so they claim. Personally, though, I’m not convinced they believe it.
I think the reason they always call their opponents Nazis is that it’s the only historical reference point they have got. It’s all they can remember learning at school. Nazis, Nazis, Nazis.
Calling your opponents Nazis all the time, however, isn’t just crass.
It’s also stupendously lazy. So predictable. So boring.
Therefore, I urge the Government to start teaching our children about other great monsters from history. If only to ensure that, when they grow up, they can smear their political opponents in a more imaginative way.
Take the current target of the Left’s righteous ire, Suella Braverman. Wouldn’t it at least make a nice change if they likened the Home Secretary to, say, the brutal Tang dynasty empress Wu Zetian, or the murderous 16th-century Hungarian noblewoman Elizabeth Báthory? Alternatively, perhaps Isabella I of Castile, who established the Spanish Inquisition, or Irene of Athens, who declared herself empress of the Byzantine Empire after having the previous emperor – her own son – imprisoned and blinded. Obviously, Mrs Braverman has no more in common with any of these women than she has with the Nazis. But then, to her progressive foes, accuracy is beside the point. All they want is a good strong insult. And likening her to the tyrants above would be much more original. Denouncing Mrs Braverman’s approach to illegal immigration, Gary Lineker claimed that her language was “not dissimilar to that used by Germany in the 30s”. But imagine if, instead, he’d said that her language was “not dissimilar” to that used by the Mongol Empire in the 1220s, or the Neo-assyrians in the 8th century BC.
If he’d done that, we’d actually have been impressed. We’d have said: “The man may be an idiot. But at least he’s a well-educated idiot.”
The Booker Prize, said Roald Dahl, was designed to celebrate novels that are “beautifully boring”. The same is true of the Oscars. Whichever film wins the prize for Best Picture tomorrow night, you can guarantee it will be beautifully boring.
That’s just how it is these days. Best Picture hardly ever goes to a film that’s fun. A comedy. A crowd-pleaser. Instead it almost always goes to some aching yawnfest about disability, discrimination or deprivation.
The reason, I suspect, is that the judges all subscribe to what I call the “cod liver oil” school of art. In other words: they’re not interested in pleasure. Mere fun is beneath their dignity. Art, in their view, should be serious, high-minded, and in some way “improving”. So, like a 1950s nanny trying to force a spoonful of cod liver oil down a child’s gullet, they think you should stop moaning about how foul it tastes, because it’ll “do you good”.
Let’s hope this year will be different. May the least worthy film win.
No doubt about the week’s strangest story. Kemi Badenoch, the equalities minister, has rejected calls to expand the list of vulnerable groups protected under the Equality Act. And among the groups who campaigned to be added were single people, left-handed people, people with tattoos – and ugly people.
All these suggestions are bizarre, but especially the last. For one thing, who was campaigning on ugly people’s behalf? Is there a union of ugly people? A Royal Society for the Protection of Ugly People? And if so, how do you become a member? Do you have to send them a photo, so they can judge whether you’re sufficiently hideous? And if they reject your application, should you feel hurt, or flattered?
In any case, say Mrs Badenoch did accede to their wishes, and made ugliness a “protected characteristic”. You know what would happen next. Employers would introduce quotas for ugly people. FTSE 100 firms would promise to ensure that at least 40 per cent of their board members are physically grotesque. The Labour party would impose all-ugly shortlists. (An important move, to balance out the legions of dazzling dreamboats who traditionally dominate the Commons.)
The trouble is, though, no one wants to benefit from positive discrimination for ugly people. Because that would officially confirm that they’re ugly. Imagine going to a job interview.
“Just to let you know, sir, that at this organisation we believe in equality, diversity and inclusion. So please be assured that your beer gut, buck teeth and revolting nasal hair will not be held against you.”