Michael, 38, London
Occupation Data engineer
Voting record Usually Conservative, but didn’t vote in the last two elections – “The parties seem broadly the same. Nobody really stands by the manifesto”
Amuse bouche This isn’t Michael’s first career – he started his working life as a history teacher
Sophia, 19, London and Portsmouth
Occupation Mainly a student, but works on social media and campaigns for the Workers party
Voting record The Workers party; has also voted Green
Amuse bouche Sophia can recite the full lyrics to Billy Joel’s We Didn’t Start the Fire. Can also sing it, but only when she’s been drinking
For starters
Michael She was covered in a bunch of communist pins; it came off as a little bit of an intentional caricature. My first impression was: younger than I thought and wearing her politics on her sleeve, literally.
Sophia I was expecting someone more rightwing, more Reform-like, but I found him pretty interesting, in regard to his abstinence from voting and his lack of interest in any of the key parties.
Michael I ate some salt and pepper squid and a cod loin.
Sophia I had the sourdough margherita pizza and a couple of glasses of rather nice Romanian red wine.
The big beef
Michael Governments’ first duty of care is to their own citizens, which means migration needs to serve the interests of the people already here. Relatively unchecked mass migration doesn’t seem to do that. Being someone who went through all the legal hoops – moving to the UK from Canada – the idea that I could have simply lost my passport, shown up and not had to wait in line for anything, that’s not ideal. Not being able to do anything about foreign people who take advantage of the UK’s astonishing generosity isn’t great.
Sophia He was essentially saying, “We need growth but how are migrants going to generate that?” He felt that it would be detrimental to the migrants’ own countries, in that they’d be losing their own assets. But they’re leaving because they aren’t seen as assets. They’re leaving because of corruption, poverty, different human rights. It’s not as simple as he thinks: migrants don’t necessarily have a choice.
Michael The situation we’re in serves large corporations and keeps everyone addicted to low-wage labour. It makes our GDP look good, but it’s reducing our standard of living, and that includes the people we’re importing. If we want to help the whole world thrive, are we doing anyone else any favours by saying to other countries, “Yes, we’ll have all your doctors and nurses, thanks”?
Sophia He looked at everything from his individual perspective as an economic agent. I think he lacked empathy, and I said that to him. He responded that I was being overly idealistic – but he was being idealistic as well, in terms of his own capital interests and what served them. If I had a penny for every time he called me idealistic, I could repair the economic conditions he’s so worried about.
Sharing plate
Michael She was very keen to talk about Gaza. I don’t think either side is very nice in this case. I don’t have a strong opinion, except that it is atrocious.
Sophia I don’t see it as a war. I see it as unjustifiable violence for nationalist aims. Having a two-state solution is completely wrong, because it’s only rewarding Israel for what it’s done. It should be one democratically run state.
For afters
Michael Everybody should have the right to be left alone. When we start having laws around misgendering, I think: look, I prefer people to be polite, but people are allowed to be impolite, and making special rules based on someone’s whim is weird.
Sophia I’m a gender abolitionist. He doesn’t like jargon, whereas I quite like that people use labels, because that makes it feel more real, as opposed to people thinking they’re abnormal.
Takeaways
Michael I tried to be polite and stay for the duration, while she was eating. Looking back, I berate myself for not walking away sooner. It was the most communist interrogation a guy can have without ending up with bamboo shoots under his nails.
Sophia It wasn’t that the conversation dried up or that we hated each other; we just said goodbye. I think it was on good terms. I was probably not the sort of person he’d choose to interact with.
Additional reporting: Kitty Drake
Michael and Sophia ate at Riding House, London WC1
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