Browne-noser? Taunted debater forgives ‘reckless’ Bloom over Richard III jibe

Earlier this week we carried Godfrey Bloom’s version of events from last Thursday’s debate.  Here, writing for The Tab, David Browne gives his response.

As I’m sure a lot of people are aware by now, on Thursday last week, I made a speech against the motion that post-war Britain has experienced too much immigration, during which Godfrey Bloom asked me if I was Richard III.

While I was certainly aware of the potential implications of the remark given Shakespeare’s portrayal of the King, I would have liked to think that Mr. Bloom was not referring to my disability nor indeed would I have thought many would be able to tell (although Douglas Murray has described my disability as obvious), but knew that this was certainly a plausible theory.

I felt that it wasn’t a nice thing to say and was somewhat insulted but I knew how to deal with it, laughing it off as far as possible and invoking Margaret Thatcher to shoot the remark down regardless of whether he was referring to my appearance or disability. It worked.

No likeness there

The remark’s potential connotations to my disability were widely picked up on by the speakers, audience and the media. Mr. Bloom has recently written that he was indeed only remarking about my appearance. Believe him or not (if you look at the Tab’s comparison of myself and Richard III it’s practically impossible not to see some physical similarity), he should still probably have seen this reaction coming; as Oliver Troen has pointed out, Mr. Bloom should surely have been aware of Richard III’s condition when making the comment.

Comparing a disabled student to Richard III is liable to be interpreted this way regardless of the student’s appearance, and certainly I think the widespread reading of the comment is perfectly reasonable, making Mr. Bloom’s choice of words tactless and reckless at best.

Richard III (left) and Richard III

I certainly wasn’t going to let any connotations of the remark ruin my first Prezzie’s in 7 debates, and despite (or perhaps because) of his controversial reputation, many guests were very keen to meet him properly after the debate, myself included. Although it may surprise many viewers of my speech given the current drive to classify pro-immigration stances as inherently not right-wing, I am an active member of the Oxford University Conservative Association and would describe my views as broadly right-libertarian.

As such I was keen to quiz Mr. Bloom, who describes himself as a classical liberal, on some of his less-reported views such as healthcare and the enforcement of equality. In the end I often found myself disagreeing with him, and I certainly think that Mr. Bloom deserves to be taken seriously and engaged with by supporter and opponent alike.

Most of this is probably familiar to anyone who has read a media report on the event, occupying as it does most of the page space on the story. What is probably less familiar is a lone comment piece on the Independent that has annoyed me more than anything else on the topic accusing the audience of being complicit in disability discrimination.

Clubbers of the week

This is a claim that should not be made lightly, although I can’t help but feel that this is exactly what James Moore has done. While it certainly sounds like a couple of members of the audience may have enjoyed the comment a bit too much, the same cannot be said for – it would appear – just about everyone there. Indeed, the laughter at all appears fairly isolated when I watch the video, which certainly seems to discredit the idea that a “sheer number” of people even laughed.

This apparent exaggeration is nothing, however, compared with how it is interpreted.

James Moore claims quite bluntly that “it seems that [the disabled] are fair game because it isn’t just acknowledged kooks like Bloom who delight in chucking bricks at us.” This is an extreme generalisation of the situation; indeed Mr. Moore does not attempt to back up or analyse the situation at all, merely attacking the audience for the reaction of what would appear a small minority. Even more crucially than this point is his failure to engage with why those members of the audience that laughed and applauded (far from enthusiastically, by the way) did so.

There are several reasons why they may have done so, and indeed the idea that they enjoyed the joke surely ranks as the least probable.

Perhaps the most obvious interpretation of the laughter, which should have come first before a generalisation of the audience as complicit in disability discrimination, is that they were in fact laughing at Mr. Bloom rather than with him, especially if the general mood in the chamber was one of shock and outrage; indeed, it has been reported several times that the chamber took more offence than I did.

No laughing matter

Secondly, this shock itself may indeed be the reason for the laughter. If one listens, the vast majority of laughs are very short and seem gasped, as if to ask whether Mr. Bloom had actually said what he did, hardly the conduct of people revelling in mocking the disabled.

Finally there is the entirely plausible idea that people would be laughing at the absurdity of it all; I would be surprised if the whole chamber got the reference (or indeed knew I was disabled prior to the reports), and may have seen the resemblance themselves, so the natural response in a situation of absurdity is surely to laugh at it.

Surely, in the light of these factors, the worst we can confidently say about the laughter, scattered though it may appear to be, is that it is ambiguous.

Instead, we are treated to a sweeping generalisation with absolutely no justification for taking that view of the laughter. Although I doubt very much that Mr. Moore had a major anti-Oxbridge motive in writing the article, it is also very difficult to escape the conclusion that the piece plays into what would appear the Independent’s new pastime of taking any negative story about a part of Oxford and superimposing it on the whole.

Certainly, there is no justification at all for Mr. Moore’s last assertion that if the Union hacks go on to shape our world, “it is going to become an ugly place indeed”. Perhaps Mr. Moore should come to Prezzie’s some time and actually meet the people to whom he refers, and he will see that his assertion is (somewhat obviously) as far from the truth as possible.

This piece was simultaneously sent to The Tab and posted by David on his Facebook page.  Disagree with him?  Get in touch at [email protected]