If you watch anything on Youtube today, please watch this Owen Jones video. It draws our attention to quite a disgusting story about a pub in Essex whose landlords think they have the right to decorate it with racist iconography. The landlord decided to hang a load of golliwog dolls behind the bar, and when people started to object, the right-wing tabloid press and then Suella Braverman stepped to the scumbag’s defence. Having only just watched the video myself I don’t feel I can say much about the story, but as Jones points out this is part of an extremely concerning cultural trend in the UK where bigots are becoming bolder and bolder in expressing their abhorrent views, and whenever anyone calls them up on it, they are dismissed as ‘woke’ or ‘snowflakes’. It was probably started in 2016 by Brexit, but is now getting really repugnant. I fear that if something isn’t done to counteract it soon, the open, inclusive, tolerant society those of us capable of rational thought have striven so hard to build will be torn to shreds. The alternative is to watch public discourse descend into hatred and bigotry.

Perhaps the first step would be giving the White Heart Inn, Greys, Essex to a decent landlord who deserves to own a pub.