Hello. Welcome back to Conversations with
Stephen Kamugasa. This is the fifth episode
in our 2025 Leadership Series. Today's guest
is Alex Renton, a British journalist, broadcaster,
and a visiting fellow at Newcastle University.
Alex is the author of several historical
and investigative books, including Stiff
Upper Lip, Secrets, Crimes, and the Schooling
of a Ruling Class, and Blood Legacy, Reckoning
with a Family Story of Slavery. In 2023,
he co-founded the advocacy and educational
group Heirs of Slavery. In this episode,
we discuss the topic, reimagining the media
in a liberal democracy in the digital and
AI age. Alex Renton, welcome.
Thank you very much, Stephen. A great pleasure
to be here.
Your book, Blood Legacy, Reckoning with a
Family Story of Slavery, is a deeply personal
and unflinching exploration of your family's
involvement in British Caribbean slavery.
Your meticulous research into your family's
papers uncovers the history of your ancestors
as slave owners, slave and plantation owners
in Tobago and Jamaica during the 18th and
19th centuries. The book details the brutal
realities of slavery on your family's estates
and the financial benefits they derived from
this exploitation. You highlight the disturbing
fact that when slavery was abolished, in
most of the British Empire in 1833, it was
the enslavers who received substantial compensation
from the government, not the enslaved people.
This historical injustice, you argue, has
contributed to the lasting economic and social
inequalities seen in Britain today. with
the descendants of slave owners, often among
the wealthiest and most powerful. But first,
Alex, can you please tell us something about
your childhood? And how did your childhood
prepare you for the brutal realities you
so powerfully catalog in your compelling
book?
Thank you very much, Stephen, for that introduction.
And what an interesting question. I, so I,
yes, and I'm kind of you're making me think
about about the relevance of my childhood
to the work I've subsequently done. The I
so I had a very traditional, upper class,
British childhood, really, along exactly
the same lines as my ancestors going back,
you know, for several generations, in that
I was brought up in a large house with some
domestic servants, and at the age of eight,
dispatched to a private boarding school to
prepare me for entry to Eton. and so I'm
very much the sort of orthodox template education
for a male child of the ruling class for
them to go out and then rule what remained
of the British Empire. I mean this of course
is the 1970s so the British Empire was fast
crumbling before our eyes and none too soon
but I think in terms of how it affected me,
you know, I was at the same school as Boris
Johnson, the British Prime Minister, and
others. And, of course, Eton, but it went
very badly wrong for me, as it did for quite
a number of people. I mean, I was, I didn't
flourish at all at the prep school. And I
partly because of abuse by the traditional
types of abuse, criminal and, and legal by
those who ran the school. And, and I, I really
emerged what like quite a few other people,
very anti establishment in a sort of unformed
way as a young teenager. I think I decided
quite strongly that I didn't trust adults.
And, and this is not a I've written about
this phenomenon interview of any others who
went through this system is not uncommon.
I, and I emerged, you know, in my early 20s,
becoming a journalist as someone whose core
belief was that authority and the establishments
should not be trusted and should be challenged
at all times, which is not a bad, a bad basis
for a, an investor journalist, but it can
also be destructive. personally for me, you
know, troubles emerged from that period that
I, you know, probably deal with all my life.
But, but in a way that bad experience inside
the sort of engine of British of the British
elite was good for me in that it gave me
a life of challenging the elite and its its
history and its and its beliefs.
Your book, Blood Legacy, goes beyond a simple
historical account. You grapple with the
moral and spiritual inheritance passed down
to the descendants of both the enslavers
and the enslaved. In your searches for the
book, you interviewed people living in the
Caribbean today, thus giving voice to the
enduring legacy of colonialism and slavery.
Alex, talk to us about the significant burden
of history that weighs heavily upon your
shoulders as a descendant of slave owners.
What is it like to recognize that the privileges
you have taken for granted are largely a
result of slavery?
I think Yes, I mean, I wonder about largely
the result. I mean, it's kind of hard to
dissect that. I, you know, I'm certainly
privileged because of my ancestry, in many
ways, I think. And I think, you know, I think
most people in Britain, who do come to a
realisation about the fact that what, particularly
if you have an elite education, that you
will not be taught the truth about how your
privilege came about, or indeed about how
the British Empire behaved. We were all taught
a sort of, I'd like to put it as a sort of
North Korean propaganda, about the benevolence
of the Empire, indeed, the benevolence of
the British in abolishing slavery, which
is kind of hideously comic when you look
back at the 250 years in which enslavement
of Africans enriched us and made the rise
of the empire possible. I think when I really
stumbled, as I say in this book, across this
history, it should have been hidden from
me in my generation. by my parents and my
grandparents. I mean, it just wasn't talked
about, we weren't going to admit it. The
first thing that it was, it opened my eyes
to an awful lot, I mean, and made it immediately
apparent to me, in 2016, that this needed
to be addressed, because the ongoing consequences,
as you've said, we're still affecting not
just British society, but society in West
Africa and the Caribbean, the ongoing consequences
of transatlantic slavery. But also, that
It was a deeply unhealthy strain in British
thinking, which was based on this notion
of benevolence. And essentially, we'd acted
for the good rather than being as you know,
increasingly people waking up to people who
systematically looted and murdered their
way across the world in order to enrich themselves.
And so I think I saw it more in those lines,
rather than me personally. And that's what
drove me to write the book. And But then
I went to, and this seemed really important
because no one had done this, not just in
my family, but it seemed to me in Britain,
to go as a descendant of these people to
the plantations in Jamaica and Tobago and
say, what does this mean to you? And what
should I do about it? It seems, you know,
a very obvious journalistic thing to do.
And the conversations I had that can really
completely turns my head in terms of my attitudes
to this history, and realizing that, you
know, the generosity of people descended
from the people we enslaved. and their pleasure
at the fact that someone like me had come
and was going to acknowledge. And their kindness
in suggesting ways forward towards peace
and reconciliation was so enriching. that
you realized that this was now the duty was
to try and introduce this notion to as many
people as possible. So really what came out
of the book is, you've spoken to Charlie
Gladstone on your podcast, really interesting,
just listen to him. He and I and others formed
a group to try and help encourage others
to come forward, less to sort of, I mean,
to acknowledge what had happened and acknowledge
our shame at the denial of it and its significance.
I think that's it, rather than guilt, because
guilt is a more direct thing. But also that,
you know, we could encourage people, privileged
people in Britain to reach out and try and
offer support to people fighting racism and
indeed for acts of repair and justice. So
that's really how it played out. It was it.
But I mean, I want to stress how emotional
it was, you know, this discovery about my
my origins, and, you know, and really, I
think, one of the key conversations I had
early on, when I'd first started reading
my ancestors letters, and wondering what
to do with them, I spoke to a friend who
racializes as black, a writer and comedian,
a woman in London, you know, a good friend,
but someone we never really, we clearly never
talked about these things. And she said to
me, I really don't want, I don't want to
read the history of how your ancestors brutalized
my ancestors. I've read enough of that. She
used the word slavery porn. But what I do
want to know is how you white people are
going to heal yourselves. And that stuck
with me really through the whole writing
of the book and until now. Acknowledging,
some people have given terms to describe
it, this white psychopathy, if you like,
that we are still a problem and our attitudes
derived from centuries of dominating the
world are the thing that needs to be addressed
if we're to arrive at a better world in which
we can live in peace.
Your book crucially asks how those who have
benefited from this history can begin to
make reparations for the past. You examined
the political, economic, and moral dimensions
of reparations, arguing for a wider societal
reckoning with this dark chapter of history.
Now, in 2023, You co-founded an advocacy
collective called Heirs of Slavery, aimed
at exploring the issue of reparations in
practical ways. Can you please identify the
factors that could help overcome the resistance
in public discourse regarding reparations?
What would you advise ordinary members of
the public to do to advance this cause?
That's, again, a very significant and interesting
question. I think when I advise, because
considerable numbers of people come forward
with my own experience saying, I've realised
I have this history, what should I do about
it? And we as heirs of slavery, I think our
chief role is in helping them come forward
to acknowledge and to look at ways of addressing
repair, if that's what they want. And I think
the first thing that we would say is start
learning and listening. It's not for us as
the descendants of the enslavers, the people
who are enriched, to tell the descendants
of the enslaved how to campaign or what they
should be asking for, what they should want.
It is our role to listen and to support if
wanted. And some, I've talked to lots of
reparations activists, in the recent years
and some don't want our support at all for
very credible reasons and one has to accept
that. But so I think you know it starts with
that but I'm one of the the initial you know
the reason for hours of slavery is a lot
of people said after I published my book
and and you know other similar books were
coming out at the same time it was you know
acknowledgement is all very well And making
a direct debit to Black Youth Opportunities
NGO in London or in Kingston, Jamaica is
all very well too. But this is just a pleasure
for you. You're salving your conscience.
That's what charitable giving is often about.
It's about a dopamine hit. But this is, you
have, you are entitled, you are connected
to power possibly because, so you have it.
have it within you to influence this wider
debate. So we we that's what we set about.
But I have to say I'm at a bit of a loss
at the moment because when we set up in the
shortly after the 2020 Black Lives Matter
movement resurfaced in Britain, after the
murder of George Floyd, things look much
more hopeful. We had a Labour Party then
in opposition who, with a man, David Lammy,
who was to become foreign minister saying
he actively wanted to pursue the international
reparations as set out by the CARICOM group
of nations. And that has changed totally.
if anything, because of partly because what's
happened in the States, you know, there's
been a road back from the notion that there
is a solution to this, to this international
justice that is through law and through through
transfer of finances. And that, you know,
what we're seeing now is corporations rowing
back on equality, diversity and inclusion
initiatives, which is something that, you
know, a lot of thought was in the bag that
corporations work better if they include
other people. So we're really fighting a
battle to hold on to the gains that have
been got. What, I mean, to your question,
sorry, more precisely, I mean, what do we
do to further the international reparations
debate? I mean, I think all we can do or
people from my side of this history can do
is ensure it still remains on the table,
despite the Commonwealth, you know, the throwback
from the Labour Party in no power to the
Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting,
you know, asking that talks should begin.
we just have to say it's still there, it's
still to be talked about. And that's something
that we try to do. But my, and I think, you
know, the other thing that we we talk about
as a group to people coming forward is reparations
takes many forms. I mean, the CARICOM plan
isn't just about give us trillions of dollars,
and that the right wing of have have have
weaponized that ask. But it's about about
issues around sharing technology, about forgiveness
of debt, about allowing young people visas
to come and study. So there are many other
ways of repair, of seeking healing and repair
that we have to continue to pursue and up
our efforts. And that is essentially about
combating racism in our societies now. In
2023,
I had the pleasure of interviewing a Ugandan-American
journalist and publisher of the Black Star
newspaper, Mr. Milton Allimadi, for a powerful
podcast, How to Decolonize Africa's Toxic
Image. I highly recommend the podcast. Now,
Milton published a powerful book, Manufacturing
Hate, How Africa was Demonized in Western
Media. The book argues that early European
travelers, acting as agents of imperialism,
intentionally demonized Africans in their
writings, especially in journals, to justify
the subsequent conquest, colonization, and
exploitation of the continent and its resources
under the guise of civilizing mission. This
narrative the book contends. was perpetrated
by later Western media, including prominent
publications like the New York Times and
the National Geographic, which inherited
and reinforced these racist depictions. Alex,
considering the enduring legacy of slavery,
how critical is it for contemporary journalism
and education to actively dismantle its lingering
effects on societal understanding and perceptions
in the 21st century.
Well Stephen, it's clearly critically important
if you are one of those This used to be a
universal belief, but it's now challenged.
He believes that ending racism or abuse and
intolerance based on skin color is the key
to us arriving at a world which is more equitable
and more just and better. So I think one
of the key things, learning experiences,
you certainly, when I do talks about my book
to book festivals, you know, reason fairly,
fairly ordinary middle class British people.
One of the questions that comes up again
and again is people going, you know, slavery
is part of the human condition, it's always
been with us. Why should we see transatlantic
enslavement of Africans as any more significant,
you know, or important to today's debate
than the enslavement of British people by
the Romans back then. I mean, it's a standard
rebuttal. And to which you say, I mean, I'm
not the only one who says it, that British
or European transatlantic enslavement is
sui generis. for various reasons, not least
that it was totally industrialized, that
it was legalized, but that it was entirely
racist and there is no other form of enslavement.
And I can see this very specifically in my
ancestors' letters about managing the plantations.
As Christians, as readers of Thomas Paine
and believers of the rights of man, as liberal
members of parliament, they believed in forms
of equality, which we would now see as quite
modern, but not for a subhuman race. And
that enabled them, you know, to brand human
beings as you would have to treat human to
breed more young breed baby slaves, if you
like, I mean, you can't put it too nastily,
because you have to get through to people.
And eventually people do say, Okay, I guess
it, it was racist. And then you go, and that
racism, that belief that people of that skin
color were subhuman, uncivilizable, uneducable
roots, if you like, all those words persist
today. And they're at the root of the systemic
racism that we see in Britain, which, you
know, the statistical outcomes we all know
about in health and criminal justice and
education and so on. So nailing that home,
and saying this isn't history, this is today,
I think that that what I can do, and people
like me going forward. I mean, Milton Allimadi,
who sounds fascinating, and I haven't listened
to the Manufacturing Hate podcast, but I
will, is, I mean, I think you know, we, it's
clear that Western journalists continue to
demonize Africa that continues to be, you
know, I hear this daily in our work, you
know, a sort of what's the point in giving
reparations money to ex Caribbean country
because they've never run themselves competently,
they're all corrupt. I think you need to
show that these attitudes come from that
legalised racism that enabled enslavement.
Because until you counter that, you don't
counter anything. I don't want to be hopeless,
but we're not living in a society where the
most developed countries are becoming less
racist. I mean, if anything, what's going
on in nationalist politics at the moment
is revitalising racist attitudes. And that's
a new phenomenon we're going to have to address
in new ways, because the old ways of addressing
it are deeply in decline.
In researching this podcast, I asked a political
columnist at The Guardian and author of Politics,
a Survivor's Guide, Mr. Rafael Behr, whether
he had anything to say about my upcoming
interview with you. In his email to me, he
wrote this, and I quote, from my perspective,
the hardest question is how journalists are
expected to separate straight news reporting
from opinion in an environment where political
leaders, Trump, for example, lie all the
time and refuse to engage with any of the
norms of democracy. The conventional model
of balance and impartiality breaks down when
one side of the argument is dealing with
facts and the other side just makes up its
own version of the truth. So much of our
political media culture rests on the assumption
that everyone is kind of operating within
parameters of decency and protocols that
are intrinsically democratic. We don't have
a vocabulary for reporting on politicians
who don't recognize those rules. Rafael's
questions are as follows. If we think a politician
represents a threat to democracy by the essential
character of their politics, how do we communicate
that in the reporting? Does it necessarily
blur the boundary between opinion and reporting?
Is there a duty to be partisan if we think
democracy itself is under threat?
It's a very thorny one. I know Raphael's
writing and I really respect him very much.
I mean, he really puts his finger right on
the crisis in our society, in our democracies
at the moment, to which I think a lot of
people are scratching their heads and failing
to find an answer. I mean, those rules that
he refers to were very fragile. And I don't
think we understood how fragile they were,
that facts were facts and opinion was not,
and that the great discovery of partly using
the new technologies of President Trump and
his like, and many of his like in Britain
as well, it was that that you could break
those rules very easily. No one would no
one, no, the great majority wouldn't notice
or care because they'd never actually understood
them. The gap, as Raphael puts it between
opinion and reporting. And that you can simply
if you're loud enough, and you flood the
space, as they've put it with with bad information,
you can drown out the good, the decent information,
which was, you know, which was always a difficult,
difficult concept anyway, because you know,
who's ever going to agree on what is his
absolute truth? I mean, that's one for philosophers,
but I, it's very, very frightening what's
going on in the media at the moment. And,
and that you know, I worked as a news journalist
on daily newspapers for 20 years earlier,
earlier in my life, and that gap between
expressing opinion and and impartially reporting
was, was under threat even then, I mean,
not least because you, you chose a story
to do on a good newspaper, you know, it was
because you were moved and had an opinion
on it. And then you'd set up but the rules
were there. And the rules, are gone. I continually
complain when I see loudmouthed columnists
on European or American newspapers calling
themselves journalists. They're not. I'm
a journalist. I went to journalism school.
I did exams in ethics and legal reporting
and libel law and so on. That makes me a
journalist. But one of the problems, particularly
in Britain, is it was always deprofessionalised
and mocked, even in its peak. I mean, I'm
you know, even when I was a young man, and
we, you know, journalists were down there
with bookmakers and, and pimps, in terms
of, because you ask the member of the public,
do you trust a journalist? They go, No, of
course I don't. Because they look stupid
if they say they trust a journalist, but
but we were trustworthy. And that's gone.
And I really don't know. But I don't think
I mean, specifically, Mr. Behr's question
is, can, can you can you, should you be partisan
to fight for the greater good? And I really
don't know. I mean, I mean, I, you know,
your instinct is to go don't fight the evil
by adopting evil. That's a decent principle.
But on the other hand, what we try to do
isn't working. not least because, as I read
the other day, 30% of people in the UK and
America don't have any news sources at all
that we would call traditional. They don't
watch TV news, they don't watch newspaper
news. And we all know that TV news isn't
so impartial or great, depending on what
you look at. So no, we're in in very deep
trouble. I'm, you know, I'm not a news journalist
anymore. I mean, I made some programs for
the BBC earlier this year, where it's kind
of interesting, because BBC, you know, much,
much mocked and derided on and criticised
on all sides. But it does try to apply standards,
it's really hard making vestive news for
the BBC, because you you come up against
controls that you find really onerous and
kind of unnecessary, but they are trying
to do the old fashioned job. And I noticed
the other day that on the BBC website for
this investigative series I did, In Dark
Corners, it's called, it's on BBC sounds,
if you're interested. has my title has been
changed. It says that it said that investor
journalist Alex Renton looks at this. And
now it says, campaigner and activists and
journalists. And they're trying to do the
right thing. You can see there, and I kind
of a bit cross because I'm going well, you
know, I know I did the job properly, but
campaigner and activists, you know, you know,
there is an element of those programs to
that, you know, campaigning for children's
safety and in boarding schools. But um, so
what do we do practically, I think we have,
you know, I mean, certainly, I spent a lot
of time telling people in my country tell
you that the BBC should be in destroyed or
taken down or not receive public subsidy
any longer that actually they should do it.
However much they hate it, it's the last
bastion. It's independent media, whose independence
is enshrined in law and is funded impartially
of corporations that can influence it. I'm
sorry, I went on for a very long time there,
Stephen.
On April 26, 2025, the former British Prime
Minister, Gordon Brown, published a piece
in The Guardian to inform the world about
his formal complaint to the police. This
is what he said, and I quote, for some time,
the public have known that over three decades
and across every continent, NGN, marching
under the banner of free press, invaded the
private lives of thousands of innocent citizens.
He continues, Sir William Lewis, the former
group general manager of NGN and the current
publisher of the Washington Post, attempted
to incriminate Tom Watson and me, accusing
us in statements made to the police in 2011
of theft and bribery. He falsely claimed
a conspiracy by the two of us to suborn an
unnamed employee who was supposedly handing
us private documents. This was their pretext
for shredding reams of evidence. As one of
the investigating officers has said, they
falsely implicated Gordon Brown. If I had
known this, I would have made arrests for
obstruction of justice. Alex, what are the
key societal ramifications when a significant
portion of the public cannot reliably distinguish
between trustworthy news outlets and those
disseminating manipulated information? Considering
the nature and the severity of these ramifications,
can any potential positive outcome justify
fundamentally dishonest practices in media.
So when we talk about NGN, we're talking
about, you know, more familiarly, the Murdoch
Press. So for those of your listeners who
don't know that, that ranges across the English
speaking world. Sorry, it doesn't actually.
I mean, Australia, the United States and
Britain. And so of course, it includes grand
trustworthy, you might think titles like
the London Times and the Wall Street Journal,
but it also includes Fox News and the Sun
newspaper. And Fox News' role as a purportedly
impartial traditional TV news service in
spreading lies and hate in America, I think
is well attested. And indeed, and in the
instance that Gordon Brown was talking about,
again, well known, I mean, goodness knows
the Murdoch papers weren't the only ones
invading privacy in that form and illegally
as well. I mean, the mirror group ones were
as well. I, in I think, I mean, the bar that
tabloid or what we used to call tabloid journalists
set themselves is always very low. If it's
in the public interest, it's okay. And asked
once to define the public interest, Kelvin
McKenzie went, he's interesting. meaning
a TV, a pop star or TV star, I'm interested
in him, which is, of course, not not what
the public interest means, but but it's how
it's always been defined. And there's always
been a notion. And you can kind of understand
it when you look at authoritarian regimes
that committing a crime in order to get the
truth out is something a journalist should
be able to do just as they should be able
to protect their sources and so on. However,
if you use those, if you use those standards,
or those notions, in order just to produce
entertainment, or indeed, lies that harm
people, then that whole notion of giving
a sort of laissez passer to to, to journalists
to break the law for the public good falls
apart. And I'm afraid that fell apart a very
long time ago, at least in my country. The
I mean, So, in a way, I think this sort of
Gordon Brown and Tom Watson complaint from
some years ago now is shutting the stable
door after the horse is bolted. I mean, I
mean, the media that you would hope to regulate
is already in in terminal decline. So regulation
of it now seems I don't think regulation,
better regulation of it now is going to put
it right. There's a new press standards organization
that came out of these scandals in Britain,
which has proved to be completely useless.
And the Murdoch media and people like them
haven't changed their way of doing business
at all. I mean, there are certain specific
parts of the law they know that they may
be fined for breaking and they have been
fined for breaking. But I don't see even
back then that Our systems are very good
at dealing with dishonesty in the media.
And now I don't think the media in its new
formats is controllable at all. We can't
even properly tax the owners of the most
significant media in the world, which is
TikTok and Facebook and Instagram, let alone
introduce some controls on them, even for
the safety of children. That's failed in
Britain. I'd hate to sound so, so depressive.
I do have some positive thoughts about the
future of the media, but we will get to that
perhaps.
The title of our podcast is Reimagining the
Media in a Liberal Democracy in the Digital
and AI Age. Thomas Carlyle's 1841 pronouncement
of the press as the fourth estate surpassing
even Parliament in importance, a concept
he introduced earlier in the French Revolution,
highlighted his belief in its pivotal role
in fostering democracy through the spread
of facts and opinions, even inspiring revolutions
against oppression. Yet, the contemporary
media landscape dominated by corporate journalism
and a perceived lack of meaningful diversity
due to the over-representation of journalists
from elite institutions seems a stark departure
from this vision, potentially rendering diversification
efforts as mere public relations rather than
genuine change. Alex, given our podcast's
focus on the fourth estate, Let's explore
a critical historical question. Did a lack
of diverse voices in traditional media create
a blind spot hindering its ability to understand
the nuances of identity politics? Now, in
the digital and AI age, social media has
become the dominant platform How does this
new reality, where algorithms, not editors,
often determine what we see, fundamentally
reshape the function and relevance of the
fourth estate?
Two questions, really. I mean, looking back
at the history and then where we go now.
I'd be the last person to underplay the failures
of traditional media. to properly represent
all voices. In London, with some boroughs
which are more than 40-50% non-white, when
I was a writer and an executive on the Evening
Standard, the London newspaper, back in the
90s, we thought of ourselves as a liberal
newspaper that represented the whole city.
There was one black reporter in the whole
newsroom. Stephen Hugh Muir. He's a friend
of mine. He's now number three on the Guardian
comment editor. He absolutely insane. And
you know, I remember, you know, we as young
writers would talk about it, how mad this
was. But we none of us got up on our chairs
and shouted about it. And Steve, you know,
Stephen and other people, you know, of colour,
as we would have put it then, who worked
there had a really difficult time, you know,
it's, oh, this is a black story, you better
go and do it, you know, because you're black.
I mean, all the microaggressions and the
micro racism and so on that, you know, we're
now more aware of. But, you know, what I
would say is, you know, that that that fervent
media world in which in whatever it was,
30% of all Londoners bought the Evening Standard
and it was 120 pages, most editions, it's
not disappeared. It's not even even in it's
a handout once a week or something, but contained
a huge variety of opinions, and, and, and
are all under one banner. And we were proud
of that. We said we're multicultural, a multi
multi ethnic multicultural city, it needs
all those voices in there. And we did try
to all that's gone. And the problem with
this kind of media that my children who are
both politically interested in aware, consume,
and my journalism students when I've taught
journalism is it doesn't offer you two opinions.
It offers you the opinion it thinks that
you want to hear you don't get that old opinion
pages on the one hand and on the other hand.
Similarly, with the reporting they read,
you The good thing about old school newspapers
is we were talking before we started about
about failures of reporting in Africa. back
then, you would open the newspapers to read
a story about your football team, but on
an adjacent page, you'll be a story about
famine in South Sudan, or, or, you know,
democratic moves in South Africa, or, and
you know, that's your entertain you read
it, because it was sitting there, that's
just gone. So Pete, so the new systems act
to make us less, more ignorant, more opinionated,
less aware of the others. other thoughts.
So, but I mean, in terms of Well, I mean,
I, you know, this is hugely in flux, isn't
it? I mean, I mean, you know, we none of
us heard of Tik Tok 10 years ago, or even
less, the fact that politicians and I realize
it's the most important way of getting the
message out is kind of passed people my age
by because we don't even understand how it
works. But this is moving on. You know, there
are, I do think, you know, it's always said
that we journalists used to reject criticism
going, going, you know, we only give you
what you want, because we're commercial.
And, and, and I think there is some truth
in saying that the public get the media that
they deserve and want. Possibly that's less
true now. But, but I do see sparks of light
where where media is really necessary. Things
do happen this I mean, in Scotland, where
I live, There are new online crowdfunded
investigative newspapers, The Ferret is the
great one in Scotland, coming up that do
challenge in traditional ways, and they're
mainly run by traditional journalists, but
they've taken on the new ideas. So there's
still affirm and to desire for desire for
news and real, real information, that and
there's more ability to satisfy that now.
I mean, just as you can put out a podcast,
it's, it's easier to leap than having to
have a printing press and rolls of paper
or a TV station. So there is hope there.
I think what is worrying is, you know, this
notion that you can get good news for free.
And that so I had a kind of depressing year
teaching a master's in journalism at one
of Scotland's universities a few years ago.
And I remember on day one, I mean, my 30
master's students all intending to become
journalists. And we went around the room
and I said, who paid for their news this
morning before you arrived? This is 10 years
ago. And even then, one of them said, Well,
I pay the license fee for the BBC in my flat.
So I suppose nobody had paid for their news.
You go, Well, how do you expect people to
pay your salary? And that's deteriorated.
So I think the new reality, to go back to
your question, the algorithms, not editors,
it has already fundamentally reshaped the
fourth estate, the mainstream media, the
traditional news media, it is it is kind
of gone. We're seeing the death throes, I
would say. But humans need good information.
Democracy needs good information. yeah i
i buy newspapers across the i mean i have
subscriptions to newspapers across the world
that i would never that i don't read because
it's that seems to be part of a good way
to give in order to support democracy and
and keep the notion that the fourth estate
is crucial as carlisle put it crucial to
a healthy happy happy society alive it is
my understanding that all proceeds
from your book, Blood Legacy, Reckoning with
a Family Story of Slavery, are entirely dedicated
to various organizations that seek to address
the modern legacies of the transatlantic
enslavement period. This includes support
for educational needs and anti-racism initiatives.
Could you speak more about the specific types
of organizations you've chosen to support?
For instance, what drew you to focus on educational
needs and anti-racism initiatives as key
areas for your book's proceeds?
Yes, I should say, as a slavery isn't a charity
and it doesn't collect or distribute money,
but if you, so my book has a website, the
Blood Legacy has a website, bloodlegacybook.com
or .org, I can't remember. And that has a
list there of the charitable organizations
or quasi charitable organizations to which
my members of my family and I are giving,
including, as you say, the proceeds from
the book. I couldn't possibly have... I mean,
quite often in book festivals people go,
but aren't you just making more money out
of slavery with this book? And I go, no,
I'm not. I give the proceeds away. It was
kind of an obvious one from the beginning
of that. And so there's a page in that website
and on the Heirs of Slavery website called
Repair or Reparations, which lists organizations.
The choices I made were partly geographic.
The family and I wanted to support people
in Jamaica and Tobago where our family had
enslaved people. So we might in some way
feel we were directly affecting their descendants.
So that was one choice. So it's Tobago and
Jamaica focused. But then there's a lot of
organizations doing youth support work and
educational work, as you say, in Britain
and in London. There are 400,000 people in
Britain who are descendants of the enslaved.
Leaving that geographic thing aside, which
is choice, I ask people who are descendants
from the enslaved, where do you think the
money would be best spent? mean, what? I
mean, you know, in many ways, it's their
money. I mean, it's if I'm richer than they
are. I mean, I didn't directly. I don't live
in any of the houses my family built, you
know, and I didn't inherit anything, but
I did inherit privilege. So it seems absolutely
right to ask them how it should be spent.
And that's what we do. I do. And we do. But
in education, particularly in Britain, where
black children are systemically disadvantaged,
it seems key. There's a very good charity
called Kairi Foundation that lots of us heirs
of slavery people support, but specifically
offers scholarships for disadvantaged black
youth to get into the top universities, the
Russell Group, and then support them while
they're there, because the dropout rate can
be very challenging. for people particularly
from a poor ground to arrive in a grand elite
university, to support them while they're
there. Things like that. You say reparations,
I mean I increasingly try to be careful with
that word. It's very politicized. I say repair.
Reparations I think you need to leave, it's
not linguistically correct, but leave to
the national reparations ask of the CARICOM
nations. repair covers a whole, a much broader
set of possibilities to improve global love
and peace, I would say. And of course, repair
for colonial ills isn't just about West Africa
and the Caribbean. It's, I mean, India, the
Asian nations have an awful lot to ask of
Britain as well. Yeah, I mean, so the challenges
in facing this, I mean, there's not enough
money. I mean, you know, I suppose, but it's,
it's really encouraging how people come forward
and get this as a notion, people who know
that they, their ancestors were enriched
by enslavement. that it's doable. You know,
it's, and I think far more, I think in a
lot of the, in terms of the enslaved that
I speak to would say, the first thing is
the acknowledgement. That's the most important
thing you're going to after all these years,
nearly 200 years since slavery was abolished
to most of the British Empire, you're going
to stop denying its significance or its extent,
and you're going to start acknowledging and
apologizing. Apologies go much further than
people imagine.
And finally, Alex, please advise our listeners
where they may find your book, Blood Legacy.
Oh, well, that's very kind. So it is available
on all the usual websites as Amazon, obviously,
and bookshop.org. I encourage people to use
I'm not great, very keen on Amazon. And for
reasons that I'm sure you'll understand,
it's downloadable on the usual sites also
as a Kindle and so on as an audio book. I
do, I do quite a lot of people write to me
going, I can't afford it. And I'm a descendant
of this history. And so I, if you do that,
I will, if I've got some spare copies, I
will send you one. So any, any particularly,
and a lot of people in Jamaica and Tobago,
I've sent copies to until they run out. But
yeah, and do write to me. I mean, blood,
blood legacy book. I'm just checking blood
legacy book.org. I think it is. It's a misused
term that isn't it.org.org. I think it's
.com. It's bloodlegacybook.com. Do write
to me via that.
Alex Renton, thank you very much for being
a guest on this podcast.
Thank you, Stephen. It's a great pleasure.
And it was such a luxury to go into issues
in such detail. I've enjoyed myself.
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