‘BLM was a form of mass neurosis’

For Heather Mac Donald, author of When Race Trumps Merit, this is a deeply troubling development. Not only does it undermine our institutions – it is also anathema to genuine racial equality. Heather joined Brendan O’Neill for the latest episode of his podcast, The Brendan O’Neill Show.

What follows is an edited extract from their conversation. Listen to the full episode here. Brendan O’Neill: Black Lives Matter is usually described as a grassroots movement. But is that right? Were the George Floyd protests really about ordinary people rising up against racism? Or was this an elite crusade?

Heather Mac Donald: You had two kinds of riots going on in 2020. You had the traditional, opportunistic looting riots, because law enforcement had been cowed. You also had real provocateurs there, too. Some of them were white Antifa anarchists. That was not necessarily grassroots.