Aporia Smears

1,394 words

In its recent article titled “Harvard author Steven Pinker appears on podcast linked to scientific racism”, The Guardian offers a textbook example of what passes for journalism in our era of moralised media. Behind the headline lies not a careful analysis of Steven Pinker’s ideas or an engagement with the content of the podcast in question, but rather an attack piece constructed entirely around guilt by association, intended to discredit a platform—Aporia—that the newspaper finds ideologically threatening. In this piece, The Guardian targets a space for heterodox ideas not by offering counterarguments or supplying evidence of intellectual failure, but by applying labels designed to stigmatise and intimidate. It is a method as intellectually lazy as it is politically cynical.

That The Guardian has no interest in understanding, let alone fairly representing, the views expressed on Aporia is made abundantly clear by its complete lack of substantive engagement. Nowhere in its article does it quote any research, cite any scholars, or offer any serious rebuttal of the scientific discussions it denounces. Instead, it invokes phrases like “discredited race science” and “linked to scientific racism” without defining what is meant by these terms, much less explaining how they apply to any particular claim or study. The reader is not invited to think critically but rather trained to react emotionally. The aim is not intellectual examination but social ostracisation.

However, this is not an isolated instance of journalistic malpractice but part of a broader pattern that characterises The Guardian’s approach to contentious subjects. When faced with claims or data that complicate its preferred ideological narrative—particularly on issues of race, gender, policing, or climate—it invariably chooses dismissal over discussion. The newspaper does not see itself as a facilitator of open inquiry or a broker of competing viewpoints. Rather, it operates as a guardian (aptly named, perhaps) of a progressive moral consensus, one that must be defended not with argument but with an increasingly brittle form of orthodoxy.

Consider the paper’s response to the Black Lives Matter movement and the wider debate surrounding police violence in the United States. In the wake of George Floyd’s death in 2020, The Guardian offered largely uncritical coverage of the BLM narrative—that black Americans are disproportionately killed by police as a result of systemic racism. While this interpretation is now widespread, its popularity does not equate to factual accuracy, and there exists rigorous empirical research that complicates, if not outright contradicts, its central premise. Among the most prominent contributions is the work of Harvard economist Roland Fryer, who, after conducting one of the most comprehensive studies on police use of force, concluded that there is no racial bias in police shootings. His findings, published in a leading peer-reviewed journal, were both surprising and significant. Yet The Guardian, rather than presenting this work with intellectual seriousness, responded with a skeptical article that questioned his conclusions without fully grappling with the methodology or evidentiary basis. Crucially, the paper also failed to mention that Fryer addressed criticisms of his study directly in The New York Times, offering detailed responses to concerns raised by readers. Such omissions reveal more than mere editorial oversight; they point to a deliberate reluctance to engage with data that challenges the prevailing narrative

The same can be said for the extensive writings of Heather Mac Donald, who has repeatedly pointed out that racial disparities in policing outcomes can often be explained by disparities in crime rates rather than racial animus. Her arguments are supported by publicly available data and are presented in a rigorously empirical manner. Nevertheless, they have been met with silence or derision in The Guardian, which prefers to reinforce a narrative of systemic injustice even when the facts suggest a more complex picture. The possibility that the justice system may not be shot through with racial bias, or that disparities may have causes other than discrimination, simply cannot be entertained.

In the United Kingdom, this ideological rigidity is just as evident. The Guardian has for years advanced the view that the British legal system is structurally prejudiced against ethnic minorities, despite considerable research indicating the opposite. Recent studies have shown that juries in the UK do not exhibit racial bias against defendants, and in some cases, minority jurors are even more likely to acquit defendants from their own ethnic group. Yet The Guardian continues to publish stories that treat systemic racism in the courts as an unquestionable reality, ignoring the growing body of evidence to the contrary.

Moreover, the paper demonstrates a striking asymmetry in its treatment of racial discrimination depending on who is being discriminated against. When institutions like the BBC or the Royal Air Force adopt policies that explicitly disadvantage white applicants—as both organisations have done in recent years—The Guardian either ignores the story or frames it in a way that suggests such measures are a necessary corrective to historical injustice. This is a deeply troubling stance for any newspaper to take. If racial discrimination is wrong in principle, then it must be wrong regardless of who the target is. But for The Guardian, discrimination seems to be objectionable only when it fits a particular moral script.

The newspaper’s superficiality is not limited to race and policing. In its climate coverage, The Guardian regularly presents itself as a champion of science, yet often promotes voices that have little scientific training or expertise. One of its most frequently cited figures is Greta Thunberg, a teenage activist with no background in climatology, economics, or energy systems. Thunberg may be sincere and passionate, but she is not a scientific authority. Nonetheless, The Guardian not only amplifies her views on climate science but also on international relations and foreign policy, areas where her lack of expertise is glaring. At the same time, it ignores the fact—established by several surveys—that a significant portion of climate scientists do not endorse the extreme alarmism that Thunberg promotes. Once again, dissent is not examined. It is simply erased.

Nowhere is this intellectual hollowness more evident than in The Guardian’s treatment of discussions surrounding human intelligence and its potential biological correlates. In its recent article, it accused a podcast of promoting “discredited race science” but failed to name a single study, quote a single passage, or identify a single expert critical of the genetic component of intelligence. The field of intelligence research is, of course, contentious, but it includes many serious scholars with divergent views. Thomas Sowell and Richard Nisbett have written influential critiques of hereditarian theories, though their work is now decades old. In the intervening years, a growing number of studies in behavioral genetics and psychometrics have explored the heritability of intelligence and the potential role of genetics in group differences. Some of these studies—summarised in works like Russell Warne’s In the Know—raise important questions. But The Guardian is not interested in addressing those questions. Instead, it deploys moral condemnation in place of reasoned analysis.

Even its effort to smear Mankind Quarterly, a journal it describes as racist, rests on insinuation rather than evidence. Many of the journal’s contributors are not white, and much of its content does not deal with race at all. To reduce it to a platform for racism is to ignore its broader intellectual scope and to mislead readers who might otherwise be curious about what is actually being discussed. But that, perhaps, is the point: the goal is not to inform but to foreclose inquiry.

What emerges from all of this is a portrait of a newspaper that has abandoned its traditional role in the democratic process. Rather than exposing its readers to the full range of viewpoints on contentious issues, The Guardian now acts as an ideological filter, shielding its audience from uncomfortable facts and dissenting arguments. Its reporting has become a form of soft censorship, aimed not at advancing understanding but at maintaining conformity.

In attacking Aporia through guilt by association and unsupported accusations, The Guardian has once again revealed its disdain for intellectual diversity and its unwillingness to engage in serious debate. It does not wish to understand the world, only to reframe it in terms that flatter the prejudices of its readers. In doing so, it has ceased to be a newspaper in any meaningful sense. It is now little more than a sermon—preaching to the converted, hostile to heresy, and indifferent to truth.