Compare and contrast: a pseudonymous grime/rap/punk group and a politics teacher at a prestigious school in a well-off area of southern England.
The musicians, known as Bob Vylan, were filmed leading the crowd in a chant of ‘Free, free Palestine’ and then ‘Death, death to the IDF’ at the Glastonbury music festival in England in June 2025. The BBC, which was livestreaming their performance, did not stop the broadcast. Thus the group’s calls for the deaths of soldiers in the Israeli Defence Force, most of whom are Jewish but also include Arab Christians, Muslims and Druze, were seen by millions of people around the world. Vylan’s lead vocalist, whose real name is Pascal Robinson Foster, declared: ‘Sometimes we have to get our message across with violence because that’s the only language that some people speak, unfortunately.’
Six months earlier, in January 2025, a teacher at Henley College, a sixth-form school where 16 to 18-year-olds take their A-levels for university entrance, showed some pro-Donald Trump videos to his politics students. They included one entitled ‘Daddy’s home’ by Roseanne Barr and a Canadian performer known as the ‘Maga rapper’. The video has been viewed 7.4 million times. The teacher showed the film as part of a module on politics and propaganda and had also shown his pupils Kamala Harris videos.
The contrast in the consequences of both events could not be sharper. Two students complained to Henley college about the pro-Trump videos. Instead of brushing the allegations aside and reminding the complainants that they had, after all, signed up to study A-level politics, a good part of which is about the American political system, the college opened an investigation. The teacher was accused of causing the students ’emotional harm’ and making one feel ‘quite uncomfortable’. The college, reported The Telegraph, wrote to him that he was accused of showing his students ‘videos of Donald Trump, his campaign, propaganda and other videos which are unrelated to what is being taught’.
At this point one might expect an adult to enter the room and close the matter. But that is to misunderstand the wholesale transformation of British officialdom and many elite opinion-leaders over the last few years. From the upper reaches of the civil service, through education and the public sector, the BBC and the legions of NGOs that control cultural and intellectual life, the process of wokeification is near universal. An entire generation, if not sections of British whole society has, for want of a better word, been ‘fragilized’. Feelings, even when evidently absurd and likely just attention-seeking, must always triumph over facts. Nobody must be made to feel ‘uncomfortable’, let alone have their assumptions challenged. A-levels, the examinations taken by 17 and 18-year-olds to enter university are supposedly designed to encourage critical thinking. But not, it seems, at Henley College.
‘They likened me to a terrorist. It was completely jarring. It’s dystopian, like something from a George Orwell novel’
And here the teacher’s story takes an even more absurd, but also sinister turn. The college referred him to the Local Authority Designated Officer in charge of safeguarding issues. The LADO’s report, issued in May 2025, claimed the teacher’s views ‘could be perceived as radical’. It recommended that the college refer him to Prevent, the government counter-terrorism authority in charge of tackling radicalization and preventing the spread of extremist ideologies. The teacher told the The Telegraph newspaper: ‘They likened me to a terrorist. It was completely jarring. It’s dystopian, like something from a George Orwell novel.’
Now desperate, the teacher turned to the Free Speech Union for legal and moral support against the disciplinary investigation. The FSU’s director, Lord Young, said that showing Donald Trump videos to a class of politics students ‘does not make you a risk to children’. Safeguarding protocols were being weaponized to ‘silence someone for political reasons’. Eventually the teacher began a grievance procedure and received a £2,000 pay-off after resigning from his post. He is now working on temporary assignments at different schools as a stand-in teacher. Henley College told The Telegraph that it did not comment on ‘individual allegations or ongoing investigations’, but was committed to ‘safeguarding the well-being of all our students and staff’ in line with legislation.
So what then of Bob Vylan and the group’s call for death to Israeli soldiers, which was broadcast on the BBC? The group’s chants caused widespread anger and not only among the Jewish community. The Glastonbury festival organizers strongly condemned Bob Vylan’s hate-speech, saying they were ‘appalled’ by the statements which ‘very much crossed a line’. US authorities revoked the group’s visas for a planned tour. Other venues and festivals cancelled planned appearances. The stage seemed set for potentially serious legal consequences. But not in today’s Britain.
Avon and Somerset police, the force responsible for the investigation, said on 23 December 2025 that no further action would be taken. The force said in a statement: ‘We sought specific consideration around the words stated, in terms of the intent behind them, the wider context of how people heard what was said, case law and anything else potentially relevant, including freedom of speech. Every case must be treated on its own merits.’ Citing ‘evidential difficulties that cannot be ignored,’ the force said the case did not ‘meet the criminal threshold outlined by the CPS [Crown Prosecution Service] for any person to be prosecuted.’
‘The selective removal away of Britons’ centuries-old freedoms has been ongoing for many years’
The decision was met with anger and bewilderment, both by Jewish groups and everyday citizens that wanted to see firm government action against the explosion of antisemitism in Britain since the 7 October attacks. The Community Security Trust, which provides protection to Britain’s Jewish community, said: ‘It is incredibly disappointing that the police and CPS have decided not to charge in this case, particularly when police forces in London and Manchester are adopting a stronger approach to tackling hateful rhetoric. It sends completely the wrong message at the worst possible time.’
Back in the 1990s, when I first moved to Budapest, I would occasionally meet Hungarians with near-perfect English, delivered in a BBC accent. For decades they had been taught that Britain, the home of Magna Carta and ancient liberties, was a land that cherished its freedoms. Sadly, that country has long vanished. The selective removal away of Britons’ centuries-old freedoms has been ongoing for many years, including under Conservative governments. It has rapidly accelerated in less than two years of a Labour administration. Nowadays calling for the death of Israeli soldiers on a programme shown by the national broadcaster brings no penalty. But merely showing a pro-Trump video can turn someone’s life inside out.
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