There’s no right “to not feel shitty”

The Guardian’s acting women’s editor and G2’s features editor, Nosheen Iqbal, has caused an unnecessary stir from her article about Daniel Kitson’s latest stand-up show where she denounces his use of the word ‘Paki’ which he uses several times during a segment in his show.

The segment which makes up the focus of her article is actually a very small part of a masterful and profound stand-up show which must have taken Kitson an incredible amount of thought and effort. But the attention that Iqbal has given to that small part of the show in her article is, sadly and unfairly, leading to people thinking it plays a much more prominent part of his act. It’s even leading some writers, comedians and folk commenting online, including the writer and stand-up comedian, Peyvand Khorsandi (who almost certainly hasn’t even seen Kitson’s show), to explicitly refer to Kitson as racist.

Iqbal’s accounts of racial abuse and her feelings about the word ‘Paki’ and its connotations are harrowing and well written. That doesn’t mean there is automatic validity to her argument that she has a “right to not feel shitty” because his use of the word caused her offence or upsets her. She doesn’t. That’s one of the basic rules of free speech.

Free speech, though most of us technically accept some limitations to it, most certainly includes the right to offend. It is, therefore, incompatible to also include the right not to be offended. And that’s very important, because otherwise, as John Stuart Mill writes in On Liberty, it will lead to:

“The peculiar evil of silencing the expression of an opinion”

and that this will

“[rob] the human race; posterity as well as the existing generation; those who dissent from the opinion, still more than those who hold it. If the opinion is right, they are deprived of the opportunity of exchanging error for truth: if wrong, they lose, what is almost as great a benefit, the clearer perception and livelier impression of truth, produced by its collision with error.”

Having seen Kitson’s show, I think it’s important and much fairer to provide more context to Kitson’s use of ‘Paki’ than Iqbal provides so that a reader can make a much clearer assessment. This is important because Iqbal’s article is fairly accusatory and presents a one-sided case which likely makes many readers unduly feel that Kitson’s use of the word was racist and gratuitous, when, quite frankly, that is miles from the truth.

Kitson uses the word ‘paki’ several times in context, talking about his real-lived experience of the ignorance and casual racism of people in his community when he was younger, when they would regularly and unthinkingly refer to the local shop as a ‘paki shop’. The use was to help mock such thinking but also to further mock himself and his own family at what he had previously though of as sophisticated non-racist thinking; and he used the word to show an epiphany of progress and refinement in his views whilst, in my view, making clear that we shouldn’t be so confident that what we do now isn’t unduly offensive or unnecessary.

I don’t think the segment would have carried sufficient resonance had he not used the actual word. And Kitson’s repeated use was to highlight how freely and regularly people used the term ‘Paki shop’, how that happened in our recent history, and how quickly we’ve come to accept that it was not acceptable. I don’t think that he would have been able to achieve what he intended without using the word how he did and in the context he did.

It’s also important to note that there is no evidence that Kitson intended to offend. There is no evidence that it was used because he has a prejudice against South Asians and Pakistani people/heritage/ethnicity. There was, throughout the show, explicit reference and admission of his own privileges of being white and male.

I’m also fairly certain that, in the show, Kitson only uses the word ‘Paki’ when accompanied with ‘shop’ which isn’t how it’s acknowledged or presented in Iqbal’s article.

I have had the experience of being called Paki. I can’t say it was frequent, but, when it happened, it hurt. However, I can’t see any evidence that Kitson’s use denigrates or belittles the experiences of those that have been racially abused with such a slur. It certainly didn’t belittle mine.

Iqbal attempts to dismiss the comedic and artistic defence of context in her article, but it’s hugely important as to whether Kitson’s use of the word ‘Paki’ should be considered racist. When context is considered and especially in more detail, it demonstrates that there is nothing unfair, immoral or unethical about his use of the word.

There’s also another refutation I feel necessary to make, and that is to Iqbal’s claim that Kitson was trying to reclaim the word ‘Paki’. That’s straight up nonsense. There’s no evidence of that whatsoever. There is nothing in Kitson’s show to say he’s now planning on using the word ‘Paki’ with a significantly changed meaning.

Iqbal’s article is dishonest and unfair. And no one, including Iqbal, gets an automatic defence on the logic of “Well, that’s just my opinions man”, as if there’s no difference between opinions which hold weight and opinions which are rubbish.

Iqbal suggests on Twitter to a response to her article that she hopes Kitson’s show will ‘evolve’.

To me, this is a thinly veiled way of saying she hopes he self-censors to remove the word ‘Paki’ so as to make it more palatable to her. But before Kitson should even entertain such an idea it is up to Iqbal to sufficiently prove why the work is so offensive that it need ‘evolve’ in the first place. Her article fails to do that and is written with an extremely misleading opener that she attempts to justify on the grounds of being a ‘writing technique’ (yes, we know that – but it’s a writing technique which makes the article more misleading and disingenuous as a result of using it).

Iqbal’s article also steers very closely into the dangerous territory of arguing offence to subject matter should preclude that subject matter from being shown or talked about. How does this help us as a society? A movie features a racist character who uses a racist slur. Are we expected that because the word or character or actions intended to be shown cause offence to or may trigger memories of negative experiences for some of the audience so that we must use a non-racist character, using a none racist slur, changing the entire meaning of the film? Do we beep over words or simply cut the scene all together? And, really, what fucking good will that do?

Should we, on Iqbal’s logic, remove the storyline around Mark from Eastenders having HIV and suffering stigma in the series because some people might be upset by the content and/or it may have related directly to their negative experience? Again, what good what that do?

We need to talk about real things (even in fiction) using real language reflecting real experience. If we don’t do this or we set daft rules to stop that, then the resonance and power of what we say and the ability to perhaps change the world for the better is significantly weakened.

Freedom of speech means others get to hold opinions. That’s fine. But it doesn’t mean their opinions are right simply because they hold them, and it doesn’t guarantee anyone the right to not be offended.