Derek Turner writes that “the bravest man in the universe,” Trevor Phillips, doesn’t go far enough:
Yet the majority arguably has more to complain about than even the most put-upon minority, because it is their culture which has been most compromised, and their country which has been altered utterly. And Phillips must know this, because more even than Islamists, he fears the nativist parties now springing up across Europe.
These “far Right” parties are “frauds”, he opines unjustly, haters masquerading as heretics, getting away with it because the mainstream is too prissy.
Cleverer than many of his white compeers, and not suffering from their racial angst, he sees that the veneer of politesse is very thin, and below is a deep angriness belatedly starting to find practical political expression.
A soft answer, he clearly hopes, may turn away long-deferred wrath — and so he apologizes and contextualizes, and publicly feels the host country’s pain. It is the only card he can play, although he plays it well.
