Author Archives: Kenan Malik

PLUCKED FROM THE WEB #23

August 20, 2017 by Kenan Malik

The latest (somewhat random) collection of recent essays and stories from around the web that have caught my eye and are worth plucking out to be re-read. . Goodbye Pepe Angela Nagle, The Baffler, 15 August 2017 At a tragic moment like this, few will want to take a step back and ask the genuinely difficult questions. What is it about the alt-right that has captured the imagination of so many young people and at least intrigued a great many […]

Categories: Pandaemonium

LIVING ETHICALLY

August 16, 2017 by Kenan Malik

Here is a recording of a discussion between myself, Rebecca Huntley and Emrys Westacott at the Byron Writers Festival on ‘Living Ethically’. It was broadcast on ABC’s ‘Big Ideas’ programme on Monday 14 August. . The image is Leonardo Da Vinci’s ‘Vitruvian Man’.

Categories: Philosophy & Ethics • Tags: embryos westacott, ethics, rebecca huntley, talks

FIRST LIGHT

August 13, 2017 by Kenan Malik

Off Byron Bay, where I was speaking last week at the Writers Festival, lies a headland which forms the most easterly point of Australia. The point over which dawn first breaks. There is inevitably something clichéd about images of sunrise. But there was also something dramatic about first light over Byron Bay, a light very painterly in its composition and palette. So, a few images from the break of day over Australia.

Categories: Photos • Tags: australia, byron bay, photography, sunrise

ON MORALITY AND ITS HISTORY

August 10, 2017 by Kenan Malik

This is a transcript of a talk I gave at the State Library of New South Wales, Sydney. What can the history of morality tell us about the nature of morality? And about ourselves as human beings? These are the questions at the heart of The Quest for a Moral Compass. And these are the questions I want to explore tonight. For some, the questions themselves might seem absurd. It is striking that there are thousands of books about the […]

Categories: History, History of moral thought, Philosophy & Ethics • Tags: anti-imperialism, christianity, enlightenment, europe, french revolution, greek philosophy, haitian revolution, history of moral thought, human agency, human nature, imperialism, modernity, monotheism, morality, nietzsche, plato, radical enlightenment, thrasymachus, viktor frankl

DEATH AND MORAL CONFUSION

August 6, 2017 by Kenan Malik

This is the full version of the article I wrote last month for the New York Times on the contrasting court cases of Charlie Gard and Noel Conway and the moral confusions they reveal about our attitudes to death. (I cannot publish my NYT articles on Pandaemonium until the month after they are published in the newspaper.) Charlie Gard died last week. It was a tragic case in which, as I suggest, there was no single right answer; there were valid […]

Categories: Britain, Philosophy & Ethics • Tags: assisted dying, charlie gard, death, julian savulescu, morality, noel conway, peter singer

TALKING OZ

August 2, 2017 by Kenan Malik

This is an update on the talks I am giving in Australia over the next couple of weeks: . 4-6 August Byron Writers Festival Byron Bay New South Wales I am speaking in three sessions: Friday 4 August, 11am-12pm In conversation with Laura Kroetsch about the themes of my books From Fatwa to Jihad and The Quest for a Moral Compass. Friday, 4 August, 3-4pm ‘Living Ethically’ a discussion with Rebeccca Huntley, Emrys Westacott and Anthony Funnell Saturday 5 August, 2.45 […]

Categories: Kenan Malik • Tags: australia, talks

THE BEAUTY IN THE BLEAKNESS

July 30, 2017 by Kenan Malik

In his book Feral, the environmentalist George Monbiot describes the Cambrian mountains in mid-Wales as a ‘desert’ devoid of life. It is, he says, a ‘dismal, dismaying’ landscape, venturing into which makes him ‘almost lose the will to live’. Feral is a polemic for ‘rewilding’ Britain, which means for Monbiot covering moorlands with trees and forests. John Bimson (who helps run a wonderful little b’n’b, Bron y Llys, in the heart of the Cambrian desert) wrote last year about the disingenuity […]

Categories: Britain, Photos • Tags: cambrian mountains, george monbiot, isle of lewis, moorland, orford ness, photos, rewilding, scotland, wales, yorkshire

PLUCKED FROM THE WEB #22

July 27, 2017 by Kenan Malik

The latest (somewhat random) collection of recent essays and stories from around the web that have caught my eye and are worth plucking out to be re-read. . Why I left immigration law Jawziya F Zaman, Dissent, 12 July 2017 Our narratives about the rest of the world consist of interchangeable anecdotes of suffering, scarcity, and repression. There’s no room for complexity here, and nuance only muddles the case. We tell ourselves that what we describe on paper is just […]

Categories: Pandaemonium

NOT ALL POLITICS IS IDENTITY POLITICS

July 23, 2017 by Kenan Malik

I took part in a discussion on ‘Identity politics, communalism and multiculturalism’ at the Secularism Conference 2017. This is something of what I said. ‘All politics is identity politics.’ And ‘Without identity politics there can be no defence of women’s rights or the rights of minority groups.’ So run the two most common contemporary defences of identity politics. As criticism of the politics of identity has become more developed and fierce, so has the defence. So, I want here to […]

Categories: Justice & Liberties, Politics • Tags: freedom struggles, identity politics, racism, universalism

CHARLIE GARD AND OUR MORAL CONFUSIONS

July 20, 2017 by Kenan Malik

An excerpt from my latest column for the New York Times on the contrasting cases of Charlie Gard and Noel Conway: Usually, a decision about a child’s best interests involves two alternative futures. Is he better off with his mother or father after a divorce? Is it in his interests to stay with parents who may be having difficulties, or to be taken into care? . In Charlie Gard’s case, though, the choice is between a possible future and a […]

Categories: Philosophy & Ethics, Science & Technology • Tags: assisted dying, charlie gard, death, ethics, law

SARTRE ON GIACOMETTI

July 16, 2017 by Kenan Malik

I remember when I saw my first Giacometti statue. It was in the Foundation Maeght, near St Paul de Vence, in Provence. The gallery was founded by two local art dealers, Marguerite and Aimé Maeght, who were friends with many of great figures of modernism. The Foundation Maeght houses one of the great collection of twentieth century art – Chagall, Braque, Bonnard, Miro, Leger, Kandinsky, Hepworth, Hartung, Soulages, Takes, Kelly, Lam… And outside stands the Giacometti courtyard, a gloriously rich collection of […]

Categories: Culture & Books, Philosophy & Ethics • Tags: art, existentialism, giacometti, human nature, modernism, sartre, sculture

PLUCKED FROM THE WEB #21

July 13, 2017 by Kenan Malik

The latest (somewhat random) collection of recent essays and stories from around the web that have caught my eye and are worth plucking out to be re-read. . How climate scepticism turned into something more dangerous David Runciman, Guardian, 7 July 2017 Post-truth politics also poses a problem for scepticism. A healthy democracy needs to leave plenty of room for doubt. There are lots of good reasons to be doubtful about what the reality of climate change will entail: though […]

Categories: Pandaemonium

CULTURAL APPROPRIATION AND SECULAR BLASPHEMY

July 9, 2017 by Kenan Malik

This is the full version of the article I wrote last month for the New York Times on controversies over ‘cultural appropriation’ . (I cannot publish my NYT articles on Pandaemonium until the month after they are published in the newspaper.) It was originally published on 14 June under the headline ‘In defence of cultural appropriation’. The article has drawn much attention (and much hostility). I hope to write a proper response to the criticism soon. The images are all […]

Categories: Culture & Books, Justice & Liberties, Race & Immigration • Tags: anti-racism, blasphemy, chuck berry, cultural appropriation, cultural ownership, dana schutz, elvis presley, emmett till, identity politics, racism, rushdie affair, the satanic verses

GILROY AND REED ON RACE, CLASS & CULTURE

July 6, 2017 by Kenan Malik

I have written much recently on questions of race and culture, as reflected through issues ranging from adoption to cultural appropriation to patriotism to diversity to identity. The common theme has been the way that those who call themselves ‘progressive’ or ‘anti-racist’ often draw upon ideas that are deeply regressive and rooted in racial ways of thinking; and that the consequences of identity politics and of concepts such as cultural appropriation is to bring about not social justice but the empowerment […]

Categories: Justice & Liberties, Politics, Race & Immigration • Tags: adolph reed, anti-racism, black culture, black identity, class politics, cultural appropriation, hip hop, identity politics, paul gilroy, race, racism

HOW CULTURE CAME TO APPROPRIATE RACE

July 2, 2017 by Kenan Malik

A slightly shorter version of this essay was published in the Observer, 2 July 2017, under the headline ‘We need to rethink the way we imagine race and culture’. Last week, Sandeep and Reena Mander were denied the chance to adopt a child. It was not because their local council, Windsor and Maidenhead, thought that they would not have provided a loving family home. Nor because there were no children to adopt. It is rather that the Manders are of […]

Categories: Politics, Race & Immigration • Tags: adoption, cultural appropriation, culture, dana schutz, identity politics, immigration, katie perry, left, muslims, new right, paul gilroy, racism, rape, stolen generations, transracial adoption