The UK’s common-sense voice on race
Our beliefs
- We should treat everyone as an individual worthy of respect regardless of race, religion or the colour of their skin
- We call this colourblind anti-racism – it is based on freedom and tolerance – and we believe it is the best way to counter prejudice where it does exist
- Today’s so-called anti-racism sees group identity before it sees a person and risks reinforcing prejudice by dividing us into a world of victims and oppressors
- Britain is a successful multi-cultural society with a positive story to tell about race relations
- We won’t benefit from importing divisive political ideas from the US that don’t reflect our history and which undermine our shared values today
“We believe that our common humanity is indivisible.”
DDU Director Alka Sehgal Cuthbert Introduces Don’t Divide Us to Andrew Doyle
DDU statement on anti-Semitism in the UK
14 October 2023
DDU has supporters from across the political divide. We recognise that people will draw different political conclusions following the events of recent days. Nevertheless, we feel compelled to make an ethical statement. We believe that, if it ever was such, Hamas has now abandoned any claim of being legitimate advocates for Palestinian interests. Its actions seem also to have given the green light to some within Britain to explicitly voice what has, largely, remained implicit. That is to say; identity politics, or more specifically, its race-based variant epitomised by the Black Lives Matter group and other so-called anti-racist groups, is in perfect alignment with the oldest racism in town – anti-Semitism.
While some openly celebrated the massacre of Jews as being decolonisation in practice (in the process grossly insulting previous generations of people fighting for national sovereignty), some Jewish schools in London have closed to ensure their pupils’ safety on this Hamas-inspired ‘day of rage’. If reports are accurate this has already claimed a teacher in France, murdered by a supporter of the Gazan terror group. This is not the crybully calls of the seven people who said they felt psychologically unsafe in the presence of someone voicing DDU’s beliefs, this is evidence that in today’s Britain and on the continent, some people still feel they face a real threat of violence because of their religion. In a secular liberal democracy like Britain, this is unacceptable. DDU aims to expose and challenge all forms of racist ideas in Britain, whatever faux-progressive guise in which they appear.
Update: 23 October 2023
We are glad others are showing solidarity with Jewish people facing anti-Semitism here and elsewhere in the world: see British Friends of Israel.
PUBLIC EVENT IN LONDON
CONTEMPORARY ANTI-SEMITISM IN THE UK
DDU hosted this event on 11 December 2023 in association with The Equiano Project. The speakers were Stephen Pollard, Professor Frank Furedi, Khadija Khan and Daniel Ben Ami.
Video
Not the Easy Way: free speech for children
Child psychologists Peter D’Lima and Claire McGuiggan discuss the psychological benefits of free speech for youth development.
Report
WHO ARE THE EXPERTS?
An investigation into anti-racist third-party organisations in schools
News and opinion
DDU open letter in response to ‘Black Out’ performances at Noel Coward Theatre
Alka Sehgal Cuthbert writes to theatre owners Delfont Mackintosh to denounce the idea of blacks-only performances.
Educational achievement: individual aspiration and effort counts!
Frederick R. Prete argues that claims that American school exams are biased against minorities don’t stand up to close examination. What really matters is aspiration and rigorous course work.
Thank you
DDU petition against indoctrination in schools
Our petition, signed by Lionel Shriver, Toby Young, Claire Fox, Matthew Goodwin, Inaya Folarin Iman, William Clouston, Allison Pearson, Jonathan Sumption, Tim Luckhurst, Tony Sewell, Ben Cobley, Joanna Williams, Eric Kaufmann, Stuart Waiton, James Esses and around 5,000 people has now closed.
Find out how we’ve used the petition.
Partners
Scottish Union for Education