Society

Thursday

Lionel Shriver Lionel Shriver

A minority opinion on Covid deaths

When the media have gone large on the conclusions of an overpoweringly tedious report, one of the biggest favours a columnist can do for a readership is to read the source. Friends, you owe me. I will expect flowers and chocolate. For I have located Public Health England’s ‘Beyond the Data: Understanding the impact of Covid-19 on BAME communities’ and ploughed through the whole bloody thing. This is the report that produced headlines like the Guardian’s ‘Historical racism may be behind England’s higher BAME Covid-19 rate’. Channel 4 News hit the same black-and-brown-patients-are-dying-of-racism note, which conveniently chimes with the current hair-shirtery of Black Lives Matter. A bit too conveniently, I

Alicia Munckton

The private school advantage has never been greater than in lockdown

When Boris Johnson announced the easing of lockdown this week, there was nothing for schools. Pubs, yes. Theme parks, even. But the education of children? There is no great rush for that, it seems. First things first. I have a 14-year-old daughter at a state grammar and like so many parents, I am in despair. The two-metre rule, which had presented such problems for schools, is finally being relaxed. But far from cheering the move as a crucial step towards getting children into the classroom, the teaching unions are still cavilling — advising headteachers to ensure they have contingency plans for bringing only half of pupils back, on a rotating

Rory Sutherland Rory Sutherland

What if Oxford PPE graduates on TV were made to wear pink conical hats?

You can’t discuss racial inequality without using the N-word. And you can’t debate social justice without adding the C-word and the F-word as well. In this case the N-word is Nepotism, the C-word is Credentialism and the F-word is Favouritism. What is often overlooked in the debate about social justice is that inequality of opportunity need not arise from the exercise of negative preferences but from a mildly positive, unintended bias operating in reverse. Inequality of opportunity need not arise from the exercise of negative preferences Q. What is, at birth, the best predictor that you will become a doctor? A. Having a parent who is a doctor. Hence there

Bruce Anderson

Two bottles to help eradicate cabin fever

The virus is in retreat, the lock-down is crumbling, the sherbet dispensaries will shortly reopen and there is a second spike of summer. Every prospect pleases, and only demonstrating man is vile. In London, we have been subjected to the most ridiculous public protests since the Gordon riots or the agitation in favour of Queen Caroline. During the latter follies, Wellington, riding back to Stratfield Saye, found his way blocked by a crowd of yokels who declared that they would not let him pass until he had toasted the Queen. ‘Very well, sirs, if you will have it so, God bless Queen Caroline and may all your wives be like

Matthew Parris Matthew Parris

Will the shock of Covid change anything?

Earlier this month, a curious report caught my attention. Apparently there exists no rigorously established evidence that electric shock therapy, or ECT (electroconvulsive therapy), works. At all. In Electroconvulsive Therapy for Depression: A Review of the Quality of ECT versus Sham ECT Trials and Meta-Analyses, Dr John Read, Professor Irving Kirsch and Dr Laura McGrath have shown that the therapy, commonly administered for severe depression, has not (despite claims) been shown to have any significant positive effect, ever. It can be dangerous, carrying a small risk of death and a higher risk of serious memory loss, yet (the authors say) more than a million people worldwide are undergoing this therapy

Mark Mason

Where’s the fun in football without the fans?

Football is back — but the fans aren’t. Covid means that clubs have to play their games behind closed doors. Which is a pity, as at dull games (far more common than pundits admit), the fans are the best thing. Their chants are works of genius. When Rio Ferdinand was banned for eight months, opposition supporters adapted Duran Duran: ‘His name is Rio, and he watches from the stand…’ After Andy Goram was diagnosed with mild schizophrenia, Kilmarnock fans sang: ‘Two Andy Gorams, there’s only two Andy Gorams…’ And when successful teams inspired renditions of ‘It’s just like watching Brazil’, fans of lesser clubs serenaded match-day police with ‘It’s just

Luke McShane

Clutch fun

‘May the best scoring system win!’ is hardly a sentiment to stoke the passions. In the 2011 referendum, the alternative vote (AV) system was mooted to replace first-past-the-post. The electorate didn’t care for AV, which lost by two votes to one. Indeed, people didn’t much care for the issue at all: the 42 per cent turnout was far feebler than 72 per cent for the Brexit referendum in 2016. The fact remains — how you keep score does matter. In elections, the ‘popular vote’ does get counted, but it isn’t usually what counts, much to the chagrin of, say, Hillary Clinton’s supporters in 2016. In sport, as in politics, much

Luke McShane

No. 610

White to play. Grischuk–Aronian, Clutch Chess 2020. Only one rook move draws here. Which one? Answers should be emailed to chess@spectator-.co.uk by Monday 29 June. There is a prize of £20 for the first correct answer out of a hat. Please include a postal address and allow six weeks for prize delivery. Last week’s solution 1 Na4! is a nasty surprise, trapping the queen. Last week’s winner Victor Strugo, Talloires, Haute Savoie, France

Lavatch

2463: Tongue twisters

The unclued lights are of a kind and are entered in the grid in a thematically appropriate manner. Across 11 Alpine mineral popular in pasta (7) 12 On the radio, transmit pitch at sea (5) 14 Mostly irrational, a section of holy book (4) 17 Yam in dough, recipe also from east (9) 20 Senorita paid to dance, taking breath away audibly (12) 22 Performed holding instrument that’s weakened (7) 24 Inactive state, with no middle? (4) 26 I don’t know ‘Fathers and Sons’ (4) 29 Holy Roman Emperor’s fate meeting with shock (7) 31 Disraeli maybe fires competitors (12) 33 Money secures a small Indian vessel (8) 34 Make

Taki

The mob mentality of the elite

Gstaad I thought of Nietzsche while the mayhem and destruction of monuments was going on. Decadent bourgeois society was in the great man’s sights, but then he went bananas. Later on, young Nietzscheans believed that what was needed to save the world was an insurrection of sons against their fathers. But things do change, and mostly for the worse. Imagine if Mr N. and his followers were around today — the past four weeks to be exact. They’d be exhorting fathers to kill their sons. And daughters. My higher thoughts were interrupted by a telephone call from a woman who spoke with what sounded like a parody of a female

Jeremy Clarke

What angry young French men want

Chatting on the café terrace with my new friends Didier and Emile made me aware that certain political ideas, which before the Covid-19 pandemic I had comfortably assumed belonged on the wilder shores of political discourse, are now mainstream among the under thirties. I felt a little envy, perhaps, for Didier’s undoubting conviction that questions of equality, gender, race and white supremacy were the ultimate verities for humankind. But a single word often betrays a great design, and his supplementary advocation of voluntary euthanasia for the chronically sick and elderly indicated all too clearly in which direction his ideal post-Covid society would be headed. Also, it seemed to me that

Melissa Kite

The abominable selfishness of the Surrey middle classes

‘Have you met the man who keeps his horses in this field?’ said one silver-haired lady to the other, as the pair stood by the gate of the builder boyfriend’s smallholding. ‘No, but I hear he’s not very nice.’ ‘He’s an oaf. He won’t even let us walk our dogs through his field.’ This vignette was captured on one of the game cameras we have dotted around the fields where we keep our horses. We’ve captured thieves in the act of loading up feed, fly-tippers in the process of dumping rubbish and we’ve now found out what the locals think of us. The BB was flicking through footage when he

Susanna Gross

Bridge | 27 June 2020

I’m not a great fan of online bridge but I must admit, lockdown has provided a real opportunity for players to improve their game. The endless choice of duplicates, and the ease with which they can be played, means many people are playing far more than they used to. That includes the international stars of the game, who can be seen battling it out daily in invitational tournaments. It’s never been easier to watch and learn; in fact, it’s downright addictive. I spend most evenings flitting between matches to compare how they bid and play the same hands. This seemingly dull hand cropped up during the recent ‘Alt Invitational open

Mary Killen

Dear Mary: How can I stop predatory kisses at social gatherings?

Q. How can one politely stop predatory kissers? I am (or was) an affectionate and demonstrative person but I don’t wish to immediately go back to kissing and hugging — even close friends — at social events, let alone people I have just met. I accepted an invitation to my first (garden) lunch since lockdown because I was told we would be only six. I arrived to find we would be a much less manageable ten. One of the un-billed guests, a neighbour I’ve only met a few times, came immediately towards me saying: ‘Are you kissing?’ When I said ‘no’ he bore down on me anyway, saying ‘Well I’m

Tristram Hunt

As V&A director, I won’t save Clive of India

‘Pray for us St Sebastian that we may deserve to pass through this pestilence,’ reads the inscription on a 15th-century reliquary imploring the patron saint of plague victims to assist Augsburg as the city faced another disease outbreak. Today, this exquisite silver offering — set with rock crystal, pearls and sapphires — sits alone in the Medieval and Renaissance Galleries of the V&A, patiently awaiting the return of the British public after our own Covid plague. During lockdown, curators have been selecting objects charting the design response to coronavirus — most notably, the NHS rainbows — which might join our existing collection of 18th-century smallpox mourning rings or 1993 Keith

Peter Jones

What can Roman outbreaks of malaria teach us about Covid?

When Covid-19 first appeared, its similarity to Sars made some assume it could not mount a pandemic; others that it would be infectious, but mild. Assumptions with unhappy consequences are nothing new: some can last millennia. Take the West’s understanding of malaria. This deadly fever, widespread across the ancient world and mentioned in Homer, is caused by mosquitoes carrying the malaria parasite. But the ancient view was that ‘bad air’ (mal’aria, from the Italian) was the cause, reasonably enough, since the disease was clearly associated with swamps. Roman encyclopaedist Varro nearly solved it, arguing that ‘certain small animals breed there, invisible but causing troublesome diseases by entering through mouth or

The Spectator

Which former prime minister earns the most for corporate speeches?

Voyage into history How did the Labour government respond to the arrival of the Empire Windrush on 22 June 1948? While the ship was at sea, Prime Minister Clement Attlee tried but failed to have it diverted to East Africa so that its passengers could work on the groundnut scheme. He later wrote to concerned MPs that it was ‘a great mistake to regard these people as undesirable or unemployables. The majority of them are honest workers, who can make a genuine contribution to our labour difficulties at the present time. It is difficult to prophesy whether events will repeat themselves, but I think it will be shown that too

The Spectator

Letters: Churches have risen to the challenge of lockdown

Back to schools Sir: I share Lucy Kellaway’s enthusiasm for seeing school-life return and inequality gaps closed (‘A class apart’, 20 June). I was also glad that she debunked the myth that teachers have been on holiday during lockdown. It doesn’t feel like a holiday to me, as I sit contemplating a set of essays, the second set of predicted grades of the year and my annual Ucas references, not to mention daily work postings, live sessions on Microsoft Teams, Zoom staff meetings and a long list of emails. Where we depart is at Lucy’s call for a return to school at all costs, rather than the ‘blended learning’ approach

Robin Oakley

Royal Ascot was a triumph – even without the cheers and the hats

Royal Ascot it wasn’t: for the first time in her 68-year reign, thanks to Covid-19, the Queen was not there. Nor were the owners, the crowds, the hats or the morning suits. But just as the Cheltenham Festival gave us the last great sporting spectacle before lockdown, so Ascot celebrated the behind-closed-doors return of sport with five days of supreme skill and drama. As the no-nonsense Hayley Turner put it after a 33-1 victory: ‘It’s still an Ascot winner. Still the same race, the same grade of horses. It’s just as hard to ride winners whether anyone is here or not.’ The smooth Ascot operation provided a masked-up, biosecure environment

The Spectator

2460: Sleaze solution

The word is TACK. In the order of the headwords in Chambers, except for the fifth, their meanings are indicated by: COURSE OF ACTION (1A), BITS (12), COMESTIBLES (16), ACUTE NOISE (33/24), LEASED TENEMENT (42) and DISTINCTIVE FLAVOUR (10/5). TACK in the tenth row was to be shaded. The title indicates the fifth headword’s meaning. First prize Rhiannon Hales, Ilfracombe, Devon Runners-up Jim Knox, Beaconsfield, Bucks; Jeff Walker, Whittingslow, Shropshire