As children go back to school, my friends in the US have been complaining about Black Lives Matter flags flying outside their classrooms, says Ayaan Hirsi Ali in UnHerd. I share their concern. It’s not just because BLM is corrupt – its leader is under investigation for siphoning off $10m for personal use – but because its ideals are “at best, misguided, and at worst, actively destructive”. Take the group’s self-proclaimed mission to destroy the “Western-prescribed nuclear family”. It’s hard to think of a worse idea to teach black kids. Research shows that the “most robust predictor of economic mobility” is a higher percentage of two-parent families. Put simply: “black boys do much better when their fathers are around”.
Even more dangerous are BLM’s ideas about defunding the police. Cities that experimented with slashing officer numbers after George Floyd’s murder found “their streets filled with blood”. In Floyd’s hometown of Minneapolis, three quarters of black residents are against reducing officer numbers: they know the devastating impact it would have on “predominantly black areas where violent crime is rife”. Besides, is BLM’s “catastrophism” really healthy for youngsters? If black children are taught their country is “irredeemably racist”, they’re likely to think there’s no point in even trying at school and fall into “nihilism and despondency”. It beggars belief that schools support this “enemy of black prosperity and education”.