I did briefly join the Oxford Union debating society all those years ago as it had a late bar which was kind of handy if you felt thirsty “after hours.” But recognising that the chancers, greasy pole climbers and bores who ran the place were chancers, greasy pole climbers and bores my association was a brief one. Natch they have all gone to great things in life while I aspire to a life of herding goats. This past week the Union has been in the news.
Its President elect is a Mr. George Abaraonye who, having debated the conservative commentator Charlie Kirk just a couple of months ago took to social media to celebrate Kirk’s murder. This was met with demands that George be stood down as the Union President or even booed out of the University.
Natch, the Union, which seems to have caught the woke virus, issued a statement in which, it inter alia, condemned many of those attacking master George for being racists. Of course, play the racism card.
For what it is worth I view George’s comments as appallingly tasteless. But if we believe in free speech as long as George was not encouraging others to kill conservative commentators which he was not then you have to accept his right to say what he did. But, as ever, market forces will apply.
Apparently the Oxford Union faces a few financial issues. If it wishes to elect turds like George as its President it is unlikely that it will attract many conservative speakers and as a tedious woke echo chamber it will attract fewer new members while many life members are already cancelling their memberships. Go woke go broke. Good riddance I say.
This is all about freedom. George can say what he wishes and I support his right to do so. But I would also support fully those now boycotting the place and if that sees it go bankrupt then all will learn a valuable lesson. I would suggest that if George wishes to make a sincere apology he should demonstrate his sincerity by standing down or the good of the Union and all can move on. Including George himself.
I greatly enjoyed a raft of folks lining up to condemn Oxford University for not discipling him since that would be a matter not for the University but for his college which, confusingly to folks who could only get into Durham like Tory girl Sophie Corcoran, is called University College. Its Master, Labour peer Baroness Amos, said, again rightly in my view, that George would not be disciplined by Univ. But the real question is not why George should or should not leave but why he got in, in the first place.
In the olden days when I was accepted by Oxford, it sorted the wheat from the chaff with an exam and interview and if you were deemed wheat you got an A level offer of 2Es. Folks like me promptly coasted along for the two terms that followed, concentrating on important things like trying, and largely failing, to get laid, smoking and drinking too much, knowing we could not fail to get in. And in the end, my laziness, meant that I only got ABB.
These days my three eldest kids needed all As and A*s to get into Oxbridge and all three achieved just that. I am confident that, with grade inflation my ABB ( plus an A in General Studies) is equivalent to 4A*s today but that is not the point: you need to get As and A*s to get in.
But George Abaraonye managed just ABB and was accepted. Warwick, to its credit, rejected him outright but Oxford allowed him in with wholly inferior grades. This is because he is black. Oxford and Cambridge are both desperate to attract as many non white students as possible just to show they are diverse, making up for slavery or Cecil Rodes and trying to create a more equal society.
My two youngest kids are mixed race and could plausibly benefit from this affirmative action. But I would prefer them to get in wherever they get in on merit and have faith in their ability to prosper on that basis. They do not need to be patronised by members of the liberal elite. And as it happens, the TES reports that of those accepted by Oxford for the 2023-24 academic year only 71.2% were white. According to the most recent census 80.7% of the working age population is white. I suspect the figure is lower among younger folks but still it is quite clear that there is not a massive issue with non-white folks getting into Oxford.
I should also flag up that until Oxford offers a degree course taught in Welsh, my nine year old son says he is not interested and would rather continue his studies among his fellow cottage burners here in Wales. He may change his mind.
For those who argue that non-whites should be over-represented to make up for historic white privilege etc, etc the obvious question is by how much? What target are you hoping to achieve by accepting less able students like George Abaraonye rather than a more able honkey?
Of course there is one group that is horribly underrepresented at Oxbridge, other than self-affirming heterosexuals, and that is working class kids. In 2024 just 13.6% of those accepted came from the bottom two quintiles (i.e the bottom 40%) of what are termed ACORN categories of poverty. That is actually down from 17% in 2021!
The number admitted from ACORN 4 & 5, was just 352 students. Now I know that most state schools are not that good, but I really cannot believe that it would be impossible for Oxford to aggressively seek out another 700 students from poor backgrounds who could get grades of better than ABB and get them to come to the City of Lost causes. But of course, most of those poor kids would be white and there would also be a lot of boys, Working class boys (of all colours) are the ultimate under-achievers in British education, shouldn’t Oxford be reaching out to them?
What I propose might be fair, it might be just, it would be better for society and almost certainly better for Oxford. But it goes against the simplistic narrative so beloved by our liberal elite which allows intellectual lightweights like George Abaraonye to go to Oxford instead of someone more deserving. That is the real scandal that his idiotic and unpleasant behaviour reveals but will anything change? What do you think?