Morrissey claims that “diversity means conformity”
Former frontman of The Smiths, Morrissey, has weighed in on the debate around diversity in the arts and culture. His comments came during his first recorded interview since 2015, which was given at The London Palladium, and was uploaded to YouTube.
The solo artist spoke of what he perceives as the “dumbing down” of UK culture, including “insufferable” adverts on TV, before he claimed that “not many people have faith in music anymore”.
He continued, turning his attention to “bloodless” record labels that now drop new acts that don’t have immediate success. Morrissey said things have changed, as, in the past, labels would at least let artists have numerous “flops” before dropping them.
“They [record label heads] talk all about, ‘Oh we must have diversity, diversity, diversity,’ which is diversity of people that you don’t know,” Morrissey expressed. “And it just means – it’s just another word for conformity. It’s the new way of saying conformity, diversity. You don’t see anything diverse anyway, it’s all conformity.”
The interviewer then noted that she thinks the term “diversity” is “having the opposite effect”, to which Morrissey agreed. He responded: “It is because when people talk about diversity, they don’t think about the great things that we don’t have in common. And those things are ignored. And they always made countries very interesting because you could travel to Germany, you could see the most incredible culture. You go to Italy, see the most incredible culture. Now, they just want everything to be the same.”
Morrissey persisted: “So diversity means conformity. It doesn’t mean let’s – it doesn’t mean avant-garde or, ‘Let’s make really interesting, strange art.’ It means box everybody [in]”.
Concluding this part of the conversation, Morrissey clarified his thoughts on the matter: “Diversity, I think, is a dreadful word. Pin it to anything and that situation is finished. It’s a terrible word – terrible.”
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