Speaker Series: David Baddiel

We were thrilled to reopen our doors to welcome the author and comedian David Baddiel to discuss his new book exploring antisemitism.

For our first ‘real life’ Speaker Series event since January 2020, a limited audience took to their seats in Waterlow Hall, while hundreds of households joined via Zoom for a live-streamed evening of football, family, comedy and, most importantly, a conversation about racism.

Mrs Bingham interviewed David Baddiel about his New York/North London upbringing (his mother was a Jewish refugee from Nazi Germany); his prodigious intellect (he graduated from Cambridge with a double first and began a PhD at UCL); his love of football (his ‘Three Lions’ anthem was the first song in history to top the UK charts four times); and his cake-making prowess – complete with photographic evidence of his recent Celebrity Bake Off Stand Up2Cancer ‘Chairman Meow’ showstopper.

The central focus of the evening was the author’s latest book, the ironically entitled Jews Don’t Count – a bold exploration of how and why antisemitism has been overlooked. Citing numerous examples from politics and the media, as well as powerful personal experiences, Baddiel illustrated how Jews don’t fit into the ‘sacred circle’ that some left-wing progressives have drawn. He argued that although all racisms should be equally bad, antisemitism is a “second class racism” which fails to elicit the reaction it warrants.

The thought-provoking evening ended with probing questions, and even a few jokes, before Charlotte in Year 11 thanked him, on behalf of the whole school community, for tackling such an important and complex topic with candour, clarity and wit.

We are grateful to the AKO Foundation and our South Hampstead Speakers’ Fund for supporting the Speaker Series. Recent high-profile guests have included former pupil and BBC Europe correspondent, Katya Adler; former South Hampstead parent and ex-Governor of the Bank of England, Mark Carney; the Today programme presenter, Mishal Husain; and anthropologist, Professor Alice Roberts.