Interlude 2 - Loski, Akala

Let’s remember we’ve got a couple of centuries

Of this type of violent youth crime

In predominantly white communities in Britain

The overwhelming majority of murders

Have not been committed by teenage black boys

In 2017 there were 117 or 16 murders, 21 of which were of teenage black boys

In 2018 there were 134, 24 of teenagers in general

When you think that blackness is the most important thing to emphasise

About these young men

Almost half of the young people in prison in Britain

Regardless of ethnicity were in care as children

Almost half of young people in prison in Britain

Were expelled from school as children

When we offer blackness as an explanatory factor

As if we don’t need to know anything else

Because let’s look at it in the other sense

Where young black boys overachieve

Is race offered as an explanatory factor?

For example, British Ghanaian and Nigerian boys on free school meals

So, the poorest sector academically outperform

And are more likely to go to university

Than similarly poor white mix-race and black English kids

Whose grandparents came from the Caribbean

The four youngest children in Britain to ever take GCSEs are all black

Ramarni Wilfred, a young black boy from east London

Has a higher IQ than Einstein

Young black men are more disproportionally represented

In professional football than any other area of British life

With all of the consequences and implications that has

For their contributions to the tax base et cetera

So it’s almost as if a black person does something negative

The entire so-called black community is to blame

A black person does something positive

And they suddenly regain their humanity

And their right to be viewed as an individual

I started carrying a knife when I was maybe 15

I don’t say that my own personality is in no way responsible

Most of the young black boys I grew up with didn’t carry knives

I made bad decisions, but those bad decisions were made in a context

And unlike a lot of the rest of my friends, because I had good GCSEs

Because I had self-confidence, because I had this pan-African support

When I decided to stop making bad decisions

I had the equipment to progress