jdportes.bsky.social
Professor of Economics and Public Policy, King's College London; Senior Fellow, UK in a Changing Europe. Immigration, economics, public policy. Personal views only; usual disclaimers apply.
Books: Immigration (Sage), Capitalism (Quercus)
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You say here that Kisin (who, whatever he is, presumably isn't an idiot) deliberately wants to "maintain the freedom to replay racist arguments, helping normalise them."
I agree.
In what sense does someone fitting that description merit your bald claim "Kisin is not a racist."
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It's my decision (as with your daughter and with Rishi Sunak)whether we, born in England, are English.
Kisin telling us we aren't/can't be *because we are Hindu/brown/black/Jewish* is explicitky, openly, racist. This isn't complicated.
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I'm Jewish, parents born in the US.
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I'm not angry. I'm just pointing out that denying either me or your daughter an English identity is not remotely complexed or nuanced. It's explicitly racist.
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FFS. Kisin was born in Russia. He's free to define himself as Russian. I was born here and this racist fuckwit is telling me I'm not English. This is not complicated.
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It really does not explain Kisin's view that I am not English. There is a *very* simple explanation for that.
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See also.
bsky.app/profile/thea...
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Happy to discuss. But I hope you would agree that someone who says I'm not/can't be English is a racist.
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I actually managed to avoid knowing much about him until now, but you're obviously correct.
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In 2023 I attended a finance event in London. Kisin was one of the entertainers. He made a sort of funny joke which featured a character saying “pa*i”. Tho funny I like many others didn’t laugh. He then followed up by just saying “pa*i” 3 more times. By this point only a small minority laughed. 1/2
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He was born in Moscow and is obviously free to describe himself as Russian Jewish if he chooses. What he's not free to do - without being accurately described as a racist - is to suggest that I cannot describe myself as an English Jew.
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Quite
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I admire Kenan and his writing hugely and as usual most of the column is clear, eloquent and well-argued. Which is why the assertion - which his own evidence directly contradicts - that Kisin isn't a racist is so odd.
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@kenanmalik.bsky.social asserts that Kisin doesn't share Powell's "racial politics" -and then in the next sentence explains that Kisin's racial politics are indeed essentially indistinguishable from Powell's..
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I mean, either Kisin thinks I'm not English, in which case he's a racist, or he thinks I am but Sunak isn't, in which case...he's a racist. This is *really* not complicated....
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"Kisin is no racist?". FFS Kenan.
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In the real world boosting productivity growth by 1-2% a year would be "a lot".
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Exactly.
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Probably, somewhat. By anything remotely close to that implied above? No, of course not, and neither does anyone else who thinks about it for more than 30 seconds. This isn't complicated.
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[It's also just comically disjointed from any conception of reality. The world economy is going to expand 100 or 1000-fold - whatever that even means - and that might help with the Spending Review? Like saying an alien invasion would complicate planning for next week's awayday.]
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Did Fraser really not notice when he published Lionel Shriver complaining London was being overrun by non-white people?
archive.ph/UcNbT
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I genuinely don't know whether Fraser's pathetic attempt to deflect blame for the rise of *homegrown in SW1* white ethnonationalism in the UK to Trump/Musk etc is guilty, hypocrisy, self-delusion or purely cynical. But the damage is done.
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This seems to be a response to my article in The New European.. There was more about Fraser in it, my editor cut it down, sadly!
www.theneweuropean.co.uk/samantha-asu...
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Did Fraser really not notice when Murray described Yousaf as "First Minister for Gaza"? FFS.
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that's the ethnic group category, which is slightly odd/ambiguous I agree. But there's a separate national identity question, and nothing to stop Asians (or anybody else) identifying as English (with or without another identity like British).
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What @samfr.bsky.social says. And, like Sam, I had private exchange with Fraser a long time ago about exactly this.