O’Neill: The language has changed, but the instinct is the same, which is to shut down the questioning of certain ideas. Phrases like ‘transwomen are women’ are often repeated almost as a religious mantra, but they’re never explained. Our role is to repeat them, rather than to say what we really believe. Do you see a common thread between the hardline Islamists and the new woke religionists?
Hume: Islamist extremists want to kill you for excercising your free speech, whereas woke culture warriors just want to cancel you. One group wants you to lose your life, the other wants you to lose your livelihood, your career, your future prospects and your voice in public. So there are differences and striking similarities, too.
It was surely no coincidence that JK Rowling, who is hated by the woke, also received death threats in the wake of the Rushdie attack. Apparently, this was from someone with Islamist leanings, in response to her support for Rushdie. Why would Islamists go after JK Rowling? What do they really care about her views on trans? It’s as if there’s now an unholy alliance between Islamists and identitarians.
It is also clearly the case that the anti-free-speech culture in the West gives a green light to those who want to take things further than cancellation and attack somebody. When Western ‘liberals’ say ‘your speech is the equivalent of violence’, then why shouldn’t someone conclude that it is legitimate to use violence to stop someone speaking?
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