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May 18, 2019 - Sargon of Akkad - Carl Benjamin
08:49
The Utopianist #Plymouth
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Right.
So, the people chanting, can we talk to you?
We'd like to know why you think we're racist.
Yeah, exactly.
It's because you, because you, hi.
How's it going?
Would you like a right?
So you have to hold it fairly close to your mouth.
Alright, thank you.
Right, what's your name, please?
My name's Claire.
Claire, can I show you how?
Thank you very much.
I have almost a British accent after being here for 13 years.
And are you from South Africa?
I should be applauded.
I'm from South Africa, yes.
Yes, I can tell by the accent.
Great.
Okay, would you like to talk to us about hate speech?
Hate speech?
Well, where I come from in our country, we have freedom of speech, but we respect that you can't harm or bully anybody by what you're saying.
It's quite shocking to come here and realise that you've used freedom of speech as a way to put other people down.
I don't.
Well, would you rather me put them down in a different way?
Well.
Do you think that some people don't deserve to be held to account for the way they act?
It's not about being held to account.
It's about being judged for where you come from or your contribution to the country that you're currently in.
Why is that unfair?
Because we're all just people.
Why are we trying to make sure that we're protecting ourselves from these people coming in?
Aren't you erasing their cultural distinctions when you say that?
There shouldn't be cultural distinctions.
That's what you're trying to do.
Why?
Because it doesn't work.
It doesn't work.
You will get people coming up against each other.
You're creating hatred.
No.
You're creating division.
No.
And nothing good comes out of that.
I think that people have a right to exist as they are.
I don't think that you've got any right to try and raise their cultures.
Why are you saying you're trying to raise my culture as a South African?
No, I think that you are trying to erase our culture.
When you say raise, are you saying I'm trying to destroy it?
E-raise.
I mean, you came here and said that there's no difference between people and we shouldn't have any cultural boundaries.
I think that's awful.
I think that's tyrannical and imperialist.
Well, my grandfather dropped me off in South Africa.
That's why I'm here.
My grandfather was British.
So I've managed after 13 years to get the visas, to get the passport.
I don't call myself British.
I'm just a person of this world.
I ended up in South Africa.
I ended up far away.
I happen to have come to this country, but I don't think we should be hull-bent on trying to keep our borders and trying to keep ourselves insular.
Oh, no, I don't agree we should be insular.
I don't think we need to be, but if I went to another country, if I went to South America or something, I turned up there and I said, right, you've got to erase your borders.
This culture is not allowed to be any different to any other culture.
You wouldn't be able to get there if they didn't want you there in the first place.
And that's what you're trying to say, is you're trying to stop people from freedom of movement.
Freedom of choice and where they want to be.
You have a door on the front of your house, right?
Yes.
So why can't I just go and live in your house?
Because people own property.
People own things.
This is not even a, that is a really silly analogy.
No, it's not at all.
Not at all.
How embarrassing are you to bring up your own family?
If we didn't have social services, if we didn't have the NHS, then maybe I'd be inclined to agree with you.
But unfortunately, we are a society in this country.
We have to, and I contribute as an immigrant.
And no one's here.
I am currently working in the NHS for six months on a placement for free.
I get no money.
And I'm not saying that I'm doing that because I'm part of British society.
I'm saying I'm doing that because I'm a human being.
What's wrong with being a human being as part of British society?
Sorry?
What's wrong with being a human being?
Nothing, I love Britain.
I love Britain and I love what we're doing.
Why are you trying to erase society?
I feel like by delaying to betray all these negative things that you're trying to put out there, why would you want to change this?
Look at it.
Look at what we've got.
I would like it to exist as it is, but the European Union will not allow that to happen because it has all this time till now.
This existed before the European Union.
Fine.
And while it's absolutely.
The European Union is the threat to Britain at the moment.
Do you understand that they actually have freedom of movement as part of the European Union's mandate?
Yes, I'd love to work in France or something.
Fantastic.
Why do you?
Because that will soon be taken away from me.
We won't have the right to work in European countries.
Well, maybe you can ask them and they'll say yes.
Not after we've left, not after we've left.
Why?
Because we're not allowing them to come here.
Why would someone give that up?
London is the second largest French city.
They will still be able to come here.
If they have a certain level of education and a certain criteria of employment.
It really depends.
I mean, we can set whatever rules for people coming in we like.
Absolutely, and so can they.
But right now we belong to a system where everybody sets the rules together.
Surely.
That's because we're betraying ourselves by not leaving.
I just find your word betrayal, even the word sounds negative, doesn't it?
Well, it is negative, that's why.
Life isn't all sunshine and roses.
It is.
No, it's not.
You can choose that, or you can choose to be.
There are thousands of young girls being raped in the north.
Don't bring gangs.
No, you don't want to talk about it because it's happening.
It's real.
It's happening.
Life is not all sunshine and roses.
You have to understand that.
This kind of idealistic nonsense won't last.
And trust me, what comes after me will be way worse.
Okay, so what people do when they want to make sure that they can get a shock factor is they come up with something so horrible and nasty.
Something that's happening.
That's potentially happening.
And they use that as a problem.
40 people have been arrested in the last two months.
And they use fine, fine.
But they use that as propaganda to make sure that they are following.
What's happening is propaganda.
Yeah, but that has got, why?
How has that got anything to do with Brexit?
Do you believe that those people from India are part of Europe?
I don't think they're from India.
Or Pakistan.
What do you mean?
Do I think they're a part of it?
They live in Britain.
Okay, so who are the rapists that you're talking of?
Are you saying they're British?
Pakistani Muslims.
Pakistani descent.
Are these people part of Europe?
Well, unfortunately, at the moment, yes.
So how are you, by leaving Europe, what is that even, how can you make that association?
I didn't say that they were the same thing.
You're arguing against the idea of borders anyway.
So why wouldn't we want to be able to control?
You can control borders being part of Europe if you want to make borders between us and India a little bit tighter.
Who do I vote for to do that?
Well, quite frankly, this should be beyond politics because when you start bringing rape into it, that's not a political, that's not a political weapon that you should be using.
Well, I'm sorry, it's something that's happening, and I'm not going to deny it.
Well, it's you should join victim support or something.
That's a totally different agenda.
Or I could address people who would literally like to ignore them and sweep it under the rope because it's inconvenient for their vision of a perfect world.
We're never going to achieve a perfect world, but we might give a good world.
I just still think you've completely fallen on your face with that link between Europe and rape.
I'm sorry.
I didn't say Europe was responsible for it.
Whatever it is that you're trying to link up with it, I just think that's what I'm saying.
I'm trying to address your utopian worldview.
You have a utopian worldview that will never work.
You admit you have a utopian worldview.
Yes.
Okay, but that's silly.
You know what?
If in reality we can all be happier and live a life where we just do the right thing, that's all it is.
It's a bit of a danger.
That's what I'm advocating for.
You think the right thing is to create hatred.
I don't agree that I'm creating hatred.
It's everywhere.
It's in signage.
It's in the way you're talking.
It's in the way you're talking about them and us.
You're basically trying to divide and conquer between the conquer.
Yes.
Like you said, Britain was part of this for thousands of years.
You know, that conquering attitude.
How is that a conqueror that's not afraid of the people who are not?
I don't believe British people are like that.
I know lots of British people that don't want to remain in that insular political world that you're not going to be able to do that.
But they lost.
Well, yes, they did.
So they deal with it.
Based on the information that they had at that time.
So they can deal with it if we respect democracy at all.
Yes, but it's democracy is quite a beautiful word.
You don't want to turn that into hatred and start talking about race.
I don't agree that what you think is hatred is hatred.
Right.
You just hate it.
I think it's dealing with reality.
And I think that your utopian worldview prevents you from dealing with reality.
I'm sorry.
It's the reality that you're creating that people don't even.
Your reality in the future is going to be worse, though, than what it is now.
Unless we take action now.
No, we continue like we have been.
Britain's a beautiful place.
What you're trying to do is you're trying to cut off ties with imports, etc., which might in the end cost us more.
That's not true.
The living conditions of people here are going to suffer.
That's okay.
They accept the price.
They accept the price.
You are happy to pay more for your supermarket shop.
There are more important things than money.
There are more important things than money.
But thank you very much.
Thank you very much.
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