Journalist Matthew Syed has opened up on the deluge of racism he experienced while growing up in the UK.
In a shocking interview with John Cleese on Dinosaur Hour, the 53-year-old recalled being told to “pick on someone your own colour” upon asking a girl out on a date while in senior school.
He said on GB News that he “dreamt” of being white in a heartbreaking admission.
“The school I went to, you leave the school and there was a little parade of shops”, he said.
Matthew Syed spoke to John Cleese
GB NEWS
“On one of the doors, it said, kick f****ng p***s out of this country. Vote NF [National Front].”
Cleese asked whether he dismissed the sentiments that were prevalent at the time, but Syed said it was something he “struggled” with.
Matthew Syed spoke to John Cleese
GB NEWS
“The first girl I asked to date me, Yvonne, this would have been the second year of secondary school”, he said.
“She said, ‘pick on somebody your own colour’, I was heartbroken, I really liked her.
“I remember waking up having dreamt of being white and thinking, ‘damn, I’m still brown’.
“I was conscious of it all the time. I went to a football game at reading and the P-word was shouted.
“The first national team match I went to was England against Czechoslovakia and the first black player to play in the England men’s national team played. Viv Anderson.
“My mum took me and my brother. We got in and the N-word was liberally used, along with monkey chants.”
Syed has recently spoke out on the issue of race in Britain, saying in October the country has “come so far”.
Despite this, he told the Times “not everything is perfect” as he called on Britons not to be “complacent” in the quest to rid society of racism.
“I agree with Suella Braverman that we need to deal with a flawed asylum system”, he said.
“But where I depart from Braverman is in her dog-whistle attempts to position Britain as dysfunctional.
“We need to reject this, just as we reject woke extremists on the other side who insinuate that Britain is endemically racist.”