Róisín Murphy’s recent speech has struck a nerve, exposing a growing unease within the arts that many have long been reluctant to voice. Once celebrated as a space of boundless creativity and free expression, the cultural landscape now feels increasingly constrained, shaped by ideological pressure and the fear of stepping out of line. As artists face mounting backlash for expressing unfashionable views, how did an industry built on freedom become one so quick to silence? asks Rachael Tearney.
Róisín Murphy recently gave a heartfelt, excellent speech about her experiences as a victim of cancel culture. As a member of Moloko, she is known to many of us for its “absolute banger” of a hit, Sing It Back.
People of a certain age remember dancing and partying in clubs and bars in our free and brilliant nation. Today, pubs and clubs are closing, and artists are being silenced for daring to voice opinions that do not fit the prevailing narrative.
I listened to Róisín and heard the emotion and pain in her voice. As someone who has spent their entire professional life in the arts, I know what she is talking about. Many of our respected artists are being subjected to political persecution, and for most, the shock and horror of these virulent campaigns will have been far greater than anything I have experienced. Not because the militants have been more aggressive with them than with me, but because, unlike me, many artists believed the Left, which has dominated the arts for decades, stood for freedom.
None of the recent behaviour of the industry has come as a shock to me, terrifying, yes, but not a shock, because I never believed in the Left. I learned very early on, back in the hazy days of Moloko’s massive hit, that my conservative views had no place in the arts. If I wanted to work, I needed to keep my opinions to myself. The vitriol from the Left about the Tories, Margaret Thatcher, and anything remotely conservative was intense.
There were dozens and dozens of people I met, musicians, writers, actors and actresses, and those who considered themselves “alternative comedians”, and they were almost all left-wing. Television shows ran with an endless stream of left-wing humour. The constant derogatory talk about Mrs Thatcher, for years after her premiership ended, and which naturally transferred to Brexit and then Boris Johnson, was relentless.
Yet never once did these enlightened alternative artists appear to realise that, during Mrs Thatcher’s government, which they considered to be “fascist”, they were entirely free to say whatever they wanted about her. She never censored their humour. Under her tenure, comedy exploded with acts like Not the Nine O’Clock News, Blackadder, The Young Ones, and French and Saunders. Pop music was vibrant, expressive, and exciting. Theatre was fostering works by the likes of Caryl Churchill, David Hare, and Edward Bond. With a right-wing government, the arts were on fire.
So why, when the Right was creating an environment in which freedom in the arts flourished, was everyone in the arts left-wing? It is a bizarre paradox. In my view, it is because the arts became increasingly dependent on state funding.
Bertolt Brecht became the darling of GCSE drama. You could not set foot in a drama class without encountering his plays. A passionate Marxist, he left Germany because he was being silenced by fascists, which is true. However, the misunderstanding lay in the definition of fascism and where it comes from. It does not come from the Right. You cannot follow Mrs Thatcher’s beliefs in individual freedom, property ownership, small government, and low taxes, and arrive at a fascist state. Fascism is characterised by state control, censorship, and collectivism.
This core issue is what many artists failed to grasp. They were always on guard against censorship, and rightly so, but they did not understand from which direction the threat might come. Needless to say, the Marxist Brecht fled to the capitalist United States to continue his life of free expression before eventually settling in his idea of a utopia, the GDR. Incidentally, I do not believe the plays of the passionately anti-Marxist Tom Stoppard have often featured on drama set text lists.
The introduction of the National Theatre, developed through policies originating after World War II and established fully in the 1960s, set this trajectory in motion. From then on, Marxist ideas gained a stronger institutional foothold. By promoting the idea that fascism was inherently “far right”, it became possible, through public funding of creativity, to present leftist ideology as the moral alternative. In my view, this was one of the greatest sleights of hand in modern history.
The passionate nature of artists made them particularly susceptible to this influence. Over time, this contributed to a culture in which state-funded artistic expression increasingly aligned with one ideological perspective. It did not happen overnight, but developed gradually. Ironically, the eleven years of Mrs Thatcher’s government provided ample time for these ideas to be promoted through the arts. Any attempt to challenge or restrict them would have risked validating the very accusations being made against her.
It may have been hoped that living in a free and expressive society would lead more artists to recognise where that freedom came from. However, many did not. As a result, certain ideological perspectives became dominant across theatre, television, music, comedy, and literature.
Moving forward through the Tony Blair years, further cultural and political shifts took place. Over time, many of the informal safeguards that once protected open expression appeared to weaken. This has contributed to a climate in which dissenting voices can face significant social and professional consequences.
Like lambs to the slaughter, free-thinking artists are now being sacrificed on the altar of cancel culture.
I have watched a number of artists go through this awakening in recent years, realising that the Left may not be what they once believed it to be. Others feel that it has been distorted, leaving them uncertain after years, or even decades, of support for the Labour Party.
In my view, if we want to rediscover artistic integrity and freedom of expression, we must reconsider the role of state funding. This may seem like a drastic step, but until artists are free to create independently, supported directly by audiences rather than institutions, the creative landscape will struggle to recover. The principle of appealing to audiences, sometimes expressed colloquially as “bums on seats”, remains fundamental.
The rise and fall of the Left in the arts may be one of the clearest examples of dramatic irony in modern cultural history. Those on the Right have long believed something that many within the arts did not. They failed to recognise that their greatest opponent, the frequent subject of their criticism, Margaret Thatcher, may also have been one of the strongest defenders of their freedom to create and express themselves.
Follow Rachael at @WritesRachael
