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The independence of lawyers is under attack from the regulator itself

What’s the big deal? Everyone believes in equality, don’t they? As a colleague put it, there are few organizations more egalitarian than large law firms. Even green lizards from Proxima make partner if they bill enormous hours and bring in new clients. Failure to do so will usher you out the door no matter who you are. The culture may not be caring and sharing but it is equal, diverse and inclusive: everyone is subject to the same ruthless criteria.

The problem is that the Law Society means something quite different. “Equality does not mean treating all people the same,” it states on its website. It demands that its licensees state their commitment not to equality of treatment but to equality of outcome based on identity politics.

Racism used to mean treating people differently because of their race (hence “race-ism”) rather than approaching them as individuals. It meant judging them on the colour of their skin rather than on the content of their character, to paraphrase Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. Today, social justice activists have flipped the meaning of racism on its head. To them, racial identity is fundamental instead of irrelevant. Race indicates whether you are victim or oppressor and therefore deserving of compensation or contempt. The new racism means not favouring the right races. As American economist Thomas Sowell has put it, “If you have always believed that everyone should play by the same rules and be judged by the same standards, that would have gotten you labelled a radical 60 years ago, a liberal 30 years ago and a racist today.”