Sometimes the cynicism of Britain’s right-wing press takes our breath away.
The Daily Telegraph is so incensed by so-called cancel culture that it has its own section on the paper’s website, in which its writers fulminate daily about figures in the public eye being shot down for holding unfashionable views.
In the last few days, Telegraph columnists have worked themselves into a froth over the singer MIA being “kicked off [a] US tour after saying she would vote Republican”, over a choir being dropped from the London Marathon “over founder’s gender-critical views” and even over Kanye West losing a London gig for his effusive praise of Hitler. “Does he deserve forgiveness?” mused columnist James Hall (no).
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That campaign against cancel culture doesn’t, however, extend to those whose views the Telegraph disagrees with. Hence, the paper is now campaigning for the removal of the chair of London’s Southbank Centre, Misan Harriman, for sharing a view on social media that the Golders Green attack was Islamophobic as well as anti-semitic, since a third victim on the same day was Muslim. Objectively true.
Harriman, a Nigerian-born British photographer and Oscar-nomiated filmmaker, became chair of the Centre – which includes the Royal Festival Hall, Queen Elizabeth Hall and Hayward Gallery – in 2021.
This week, he shared a message on X by Ayoub Khan, independent MP for Birmingham Perry Barr, and added the comment: “Wait, so there was a third victim on the same day who was Muslim?! And our press isn’t reporting it? Even the Met Police didn’t mention the Muslim victim in its X post?”
That was enough for the Telegraph to run a report by Craig Simpson, its arts correspondent, attacking Harriman under the headline “Arts Council-funded venue chief shares Golders Green ‘conspiracy’”. Simpson roped in Labour MP David Taylor – a man so low-profile his entire Wikipedia entry runs to 92 words – to say that “the Southbank Centre should consider removing Mr Harriman from the board”.
“The Southbank Centre recently received £10m from Arts Council England, which was accused this week by Sir Keir Starmer of funding organisations that promote the work of artists accused of anti-semitism,” wrote Simpson, leading Taylor to helpfully suggest that “in the spirit of the prime minister’s words this week, Arts Council England should reconsider their funding arrangement with the Southbank Centre”.
What the Telegraph failed to mention in its lengthy report, however, is Harriman’s first response to the Golders Green attack. He co-posted on Instagram, unambiguously: “Our thoughts are with all those affected by the appalling stabbings in Golders Green. Antisemitism has no place in our society and we send our solidarity to the Jewish community. We must unite to stop all racist attacks.”
Not that that will stop the Telegraph’s cynical attack on Harriman nor its naked attempt to pile pressure on Starmer’s position on antisemitism. As one headline on the paper’s online cancel culture – also written by Simpson – puts it: “Censorship is suffocating British culture, warns singer Roisin Murphy”.
Incidentally, Harriman is also guilty of another one of the greatest crimes the Telegraph can accuse someone of. It mentions as early as the second paragraph – and then a further couple of times in the article – that Harriman “has a well-documented friendship with the Duke and Duchess of Sussex”. To the Tower with him!
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