Steve McHugh

I’m dealing with a family emergency, so I won’t be doing broadcast interviews on the John Davidson Tourette’s tic at the BAFTAs story. Hearing the N word shouted at two of the most successful black actors in the world, on stage at the BAFTAs and broadcast on the BBC, was horrible. It made people uncomfortable. It should have. But it was an involuntary tic from someone who lives with Tourette’s syndrome. It was not chosen. It was not intentional. It was not an expression of belief. What’s astonishing is watching people who constantly lecture the public about inclusion suddenly abandon it the moment it becomes complicated. The same voices that demand respect for lived experience are now acting as if a neurodivergent man consciously decided to shout a slur for sport. Tourette’s is a neurological condition. It is not a political statement. It is not a moral failing. You cannot preach DEI and then punish someone for symptoms of their neurodivergence. Even the Royal Household has previously understood Davidson’s condition. Not even the late Queen was immune to his tics he said “F*ck the Queen” TO HER FACE. If that reality can be accepted there, it should not be beyond the rest of us. Two things can be true at once. The word is abhorrent. The tic was involuntary. If your commitment to inclusion collapses when it involves neurodivergence, then it was never inclusion in the first place.