57. One of Them, Musa Okwonga
Short but fascinating memoir by a British boy of Ugandan heritage who grew up in a ropey Thames Valley town and went to Eton in the 1990s (he notes that fees have tripled since then, putting the top independent schools out of reach of "normal" families such as his own other than in exceptional circumstances).
I expected this to be a misery memoir of racism and bullying but it's much more interesting than that. Okwonga liked Eton, he found it both nurturing and challenging, he was happy there and he made good friends. It's later in life, and with the benefit of mature hindsight, that he starts to ask questions. What do privileged institutions like Eton say about our society? What role have they played in our history? And why are some of the people that Okwonga knew, liked and admired at school now behaving like monsters on the national stage?
There are so many bits that I highlighted while reading this. Thoughtful, nuanced thoughts about class, race, privilege, and the way that things these things perpetuate.
This is why so many people who grow up in environments of such comfort can be so unsympathetic to those who don't. They simply have no concept of a society where, even if people work their very hardest, everything can still fall apart for the majority of them. They have been raised in a realm where every personal downfall is self-inflected.....The idea that you can simply be overwhelmed by your circumstances is utterly alien to them.
...the fate of a nation should not come down to whether the nice guy or the nasty guy in your class ends up as Prime Minister. Power should simply not be held so tightly by one group, being passed around the same circle of individuals as if it were a joint on a night out.
I look at the school's motto, "May Eton Flourish", and I think, It is not right that you flourish, and will continue to flourish, at the expense of so many others.