I Got Ahead by Playing the Race Card ; City Lives

Summary

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SMART people are often dumb when it comes to dealing with race. I realised this at university, when I wrote my only article for the student magazine: a review of a Bollywood film that didn't exist. Wanting to foil the desperately ambitious wannabe journalists who ran the magazine, I played the race card to devastating effect. I invented a blockbuster about gay lovers in a travelling circus, called Sheesh Mahal, which I translated as "Ring Master". The title was actually the name of a local takeaway, and means "Kebab Palace".

I wrote a straight review, in which the actors' names were double entendres: Mohammed Azzabiggun, Madonacant Singh, Rabesh Binh, and Kareem Mepanteez. The dopes at the magazine thought it was great and ran it without qualms. Like many white liberals, they wouldn't let common sense undermine their desire to look hip and multicultural. But it caused a furore when I got an Asian pal to complain about it. The magazine had to withdraw its entry from the national student journalism awards, and I'd done my bit to stymie the careers of a bunch of self-righteous, middleclass nerds.

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I Got Ahead by Playing the Race Card ; City Lives

Canny operators can manipulate the sensitivities around race to get ahead.

It's a phenomenon I've witnessed (and sometimes exploited) throughout my life. At high school, we called certain teachers (young white idealists) racists for disciplining us, and...

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