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Around 3% of people are estimated to be autistic and it is a lifelong disability. Most autistic people experience the sensory world differently, such as places being too loud or too bright. We also typically communicate in a more direct way than is usual.
In the UK, the Equality Act 2010 means that autistic people should receive reasonable adjustments – meaning organisations must make changes to how they provide their services to remove environmental and social barriers. Despite this, autistic people often experience society as highly disabling. We die between 16 and 30 years younger than non-autistic people, and have a suicide rate nine times higher.
Autistic people are often misunderstood by non-autistic people who fail to recognise how autistic people show empathy. This misunderstanding is embedded in many government bodies, which can result in dehumanising policies and services that do not meet autistic people’s needs.
We reviewed the evidence from a range of government and non-government research and reviews to understand how well autistic people fair in relation to government services. We looked at the areas described by William Beveridge, founder of the UK welfare state, as “the five giants”: health, education, employment, poverty and housing. Our findings, which focused on England and Wales due to differences relating to devolution, were bleak.
1. Health
Many government services designed to support autistic people are not available without diagnosis. However, in the UK, most autistic people aren’t yet diagnosed.
We found diagnosis waiting lists were long – for example, more then 20 months for people served by the Cardiff & Vale health board in south Wales. Across England, between June 2021 and 2022, the waiting list for an autism assessment rose from 88,000 people to more than 122,000.
Even with a diagnosis, autistic people often don’t receive healthcare that meets their needs. Some people don’t even tell doctors they are autistic, because they expect to be treated badly. Of those who have told their GP, more than 75% said their GP didn’t make any reasonable adjustments, such as allowing extra processing time during appointments.
Being expected to phone to book appointments is also difficult for nearly two-thirds of autistic people, yet many GP surgeries insist on phone calls to book appointments. Autistic people also report that clinical spaces are painfully bright, busy and loud, which can make it harder for us to explain what is wrong to the doctor.
2. Education
Autistic people often struggle in educational institutions because they rarely meet our needs. This can mean, for example, that autistic children are labelled as “troublemakers” by teachers, rather than disabled.
Despite autistic people accounting for only 3% of the population, around 80% of those sent to pupil referral units are autistic. This has lifelong effects, as only 8% of students with a “statement of special educational needs” or an education, health & care plan progress to university, compared with 50% of non-disabled people.
For autistic people who do make it to university, the disabled students allowance (DSA) should pay for extra costs – but less than one-third of eligible students get DSA. In addition, the support provided by universities is often poor quality or absent, leaving autistic students disadvantaged.
3. Employment
The UK’s Autism Act 2009 says that autistic people should be supported to be able to work. However, autistic people are less likely to be in work than non-autistic people.
Access to work is a UK government scheme to pay disabled people for the extra costs of working, but the application and claiming processes are complicated. Of the 42% of autistic adults who say they need help to access work, only 12% are getting it.
4. Poverty
Autistic people are more likely to live in poverty than non-autistic people. A 2009 report found one-third of autistic people in the UK were not in paid work or getting benefits. One reason for this is that the benefits designed to stop disabled people living in poverty, such as the personal independence payment (PIP), can be hard to apply for, especially for autistic people.
And for people who manage to apply for PIP, autism falls within the “psychiatric disorders” category, which means they are least likely to receive the award and most likely to lose their PIP upon renewal.
5. Housing
Around 12% of autistic people are homeless. As rent typically costs far more than the amount of money awarded in housing benefit, and autistic people are less likely to be in work or have access to benefits, they are more likely to struggle to pay for housing.
This can be made worse by the “bedroom tax”, which is when tenants in social housing have their benefit reduced if they have spare bedrooms. This affects single people under 35 especially, as they are only eligible for the shared accommodation rate. Autistic people can find it hard to live with other people due to their sensory needs, and there are few one-bedroom properties.
Autistic people who do not have somewhere to live are more likely to be placed in secure residential care, where they are subjected to similar confines to people in prison, by staff who may have limited understanding of autism. They can also be subjected to clinical “treatment” that has the same questionable origin as gay conversion therapy, and which guidance states should not be used.
The research supporting this approach, known as applied behaviour analysis (ABA), is often riddled with undeclared conflicts of interest. Those who experience ABA have been found to be more likely to experience symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
Worse, some autistic people in residential care have experienced abuse by staff. In the most severe cases, autistic people have died due to abusive and/or negligent treatment while in residential care.
In every area of government services, we found policies that failed to account for known autistic needs. These failures have a cumulative impact throughout life. A lack of accommodations in education leads to less likelihood of securing accessible employment and greater reliance on benefits and social housing.
To improve this, the policy-making process needs to be made accessible to disabled people so that services meet our needs. This could include ensuring that consultation processes reach out to a broader range of autistic people, and then meet their needs to submit evidence.
It is also important that policy-makers put evidence from the autistic community ahead of evidence provided by non-autistic “experts” who fundamentally misunderstand autism, can have conflicts of interest, and thus can not speak on our behalf.
Autistic lives depend on it.
Aimee Grant receives funding from UKRI, the Wellcome Trust and the Research Wales Innovation Fund. We wish to thank Dr Gemma Williams and Richard Woods, co-authors of the chapter this article is based on.
Kathryn Williams receives funding for her PhD studentship from the Economic and Social Research Council. She is affiliated with Autistic UK CIC, where she is a voluntary non-executive director.
The US president, Joe Biden, is expected in Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland next week to mark the 25th anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement. His visit will be one of historic symbolism and of personal significance, as an Irish Catholic president who has spoken proudly of his ties to the country.
A few weeks ago, the UK prime minister, Rishi Sunak, formally invited Biden to come to Northern Ireland to mark the anniversary of the peace deal, which the US helped broker. The UK has much work to do to repair relations with the US following the Trump-Johnson years, especially if they are to pursue a much desired trade deal that has been stymied partly due to US concerns about the safety of the Good Friday Agreement post-Brexit.
The four-day visit comes at a fragile time for the agreement, threatened by post-Brexit trade arrangements and political tensions in Northern Ireland. Power-sharing in the Northern Ireland assembly – a key feature of the Good Friday Agreement – has been in limbo for over a year, due to a boycott by the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP). In a recent poll, a majority of Northern Irish unionists said they would vote against the agreement if a referendum were held today.
Read more: Rishi Sunak's Brexit deal: how the Stormont brake could block new EU laws from Northern Ireland
The visit has other historical symbolism and personal relevance for the US president. Biden will spend three days in the Republic of Ireland. For that part of the island, the visit will be less about Northern Ireland issues, and more around the historically resonant imagery of an Irish Catholic president returning to his roots.
There is a long history of US presidents visiting Ireland. It is thought that 23 of the 46 presidents have been of Irish heritage. Until the early 1960s, most visits were by former presidents whose families originated in Northern Ireland.
In 1963, John F. Kennedy became the first sitting – and first Irish Catholic – president to visit. His sojourn was widely viewed as a symbolic homecoming. Both Irish and American media at the time described it as a “sentimental journey”. Biden, the second Irish Catholic US president, will stir memories of Kennedy.
Biden will spend time visiting his ancestral home and meeting family in County Louth and County Mayo. He is clearly proud of his Irish roots, often referencing how his family history has shaped his political career and worldview. As he wrote in 2016: “Northeast Pennsylvania will be written on my heart. But Ireland will be written on my soul.”
Biden has knowingly taken on the Kennedy mantle as a politician. Over the years he has come to personify a liberal politics of empathy, in which his Irish ancestry and Catholicism function as moral touchstones. However, this can shroud an underlying reality, that Ireland and the US are increasingly adrift, out of sync on matters political and cultural.
At the same time, Irish America is ageing and growing more conservative, with very few new emigrants refuelling it. Biden represents a disappearing figure, the last of a once powerful tribe of liberal Irish American politicians.
Biden’s visit should not be understood as purely a sentimental journey. Indeed, looking back we can see that Kennedy’s visit was much more of a diplomatic mission than many viewed it in 1963.
Kennedy visited Ireland on his return from Berlin, after giving one of the most important speeches of the Cold War. His engagement with Ireland at that time aligned the controversially neutral state with the forces of “freedom”. And behind the scenes, a good deal of diplomatic and economic business was carried out that would benefit Ireland’s relations with the US for years to come.
As with Kennedy’s visit, economic diplomacy will be important, most obviously in the promise of US investment in Northern Ireland to reward and secure the new EU-UK deal on Brexit.
It is also a chance for Biden to repair the US’s global reputation for leadership in liberal internationalism, which has been on the back foot since the Trump administration.
Biden views the Good Friday Agreement as a significant achievement of US foreign policy, and one that enjoys bipartisan support in the US. To celebrate it today is to assert the US’s support for the rule of law in foreign policy, and promote the agreement as a model of peace for other post-conflict states. He’ll receive a warm welcome, but like Kennedy, the visit is something more than just sentimental.
Liam Kennedy does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
In its new illegal migration bill, the UK government has introduced some surprisingly radical proposals designed to discourage people from crossing the Channel in small boats to claim asylum.
Chiefly, it targets people who arrive in Britain through irregular routes, barring them from seeking asylum. And the UK does not offer many legal routes, with exceptions such as the schemes for Ukrainian and Afghan refugees.
Immigration lawyers are still picking over the details of the bill – initial debate is focused on whether it violates the UK’s legal obligations under international human rights or refugee law. While these questions are important, the practical and operational constraints are arguably the biggest obstacle to implementing it.
On paper, the bill effectively opts the UK out of the global asylum system as we know it, by preventing people from claiming asylum if they have arrived through irregular routes. That global system is, after all, based on the principle that people must usually reach a country’s territory in order to claim asylum. And this often involves irregular entry, because people fleeing threatening or otherwise dire circumstances may not have proper documents.
Read more: Illegal immigration bill does more than 'push the boundaries' of international law
The UN has said the new UK bill represents a “clear breach” of the refugee convention, “which explicitly recognises that refugees may be compelled to enter a country of asylum irregularly”.
Instead of hearing asylum claims, the bill stipulates that people entering through irregular routes should be “detained and removed” from the UK. This applies regardless of nationality, including people from countries such as Afghanistan and Eritrea who would be very likely to be granted asylum in the UK under the current system.
But making something law does not mean it can be implemented. One of the biggest questions the bill raises is where people would be removed to.
If people do not come from countries deemed “safe” by the UK, they cannot be sent back to their country of origin without a decision on their asylum claim. If this is the case, the bill says they should be sent to “safe third countries”. There is currently just one third country, Rwanda, that is willing to take asylum seekers from the UK.
But even if the Rwanda scheme gets up and running, it is only expected to have capacity for around 200 people at first, though more could perhaps be processed per year. Without other safe third countries to remove people to, it is not obvious that many people could be removed in practice.
Past data illustrates this. Since January 1 2021, the UK government has already had a policy in place to remove asylum seekers it believes could have applied for asylum in another country. This would presumably include most people arriving by small boat from France. As of September 30 2022, the government had assessed around 18,000 people for removal – but had removed just 21.
Oddly, one strange quirk of the new bill is that it appears to make it harder, not easier, for the government to remove people who are not considered refugees. By preventing the government from considering asylum claims at all, it means that claims cannot be refused. People from “unsafe” countries who would have been refused cannot, under the new bill, be sent back to their countries of origin – instead, the UK will have to detain them (a costly endeavour) until a third country is willing to take them.
In 2022, the UK’s detention facilities were estimated to have a total capacity of no more than 2,500, while in the month of August last year, small boat arrivals exceeded 8,000. To accommodate more people, there would need to be a major increase in the use of detention. This is a reversal of previous government policy, which over the last ten years has aimed to minimise the use of immigration detention.
If people continue to arrive in the UK in substantial numbers, not being able to process and resolve their asylum claims could create considerable operational difficulties and financial costs – aside from the obvious human cost.
At the heart of the proposal is a gamble: that the UK will not actually need to impose this penalty on many people, because the deterrent effect will be so strong.
While this may seem like a sort of policy catch-22 – “introduce a policy to deter arrivals so that you don’t need to implement the policy to deter arrivals” – it is the argument made by some government ministers.
It’s hard to predict how much of a deterrent effect the provisions in the bill will have. They are more extreme than polices adopted in most other high-income countries, which is where most of the evidence on policy deterrence comes from.
With that said, to date there is surprisingly little evidence that asylum deterrence policies put people off in large numbers, for the simple reason that asylum seekers often have little understanding of what policies they will face when they arrive. Indeed, this has been the finding of the Home Office’s own internal research, which was released to an NGO working on migration after a Freedom of Information request and shared with our team.
There’s certainly a risk, therefore, that the UK would end up detaining (or otherwise housing and supporting) quite large numbers of people for indefinite periods if this bill is enacted.
Peter William Walsh receives funding from Trust for London and Oak Foundation. He is Senior Researcher at The Migration Observatory, University of Oxford.
At this year’s Brit Awards, British artist Harry Styles took home the most coveted award of the night, album of the year, for Harry’s House. He beat the likes of grime artist Stormzy, indie group The 1975 and the other big winners of the night, indie band Wet Leg. Styles also took home the awards for British artist of the year, song of the year (for As It Was) and best pop/R&B act.
Styles swept all categories in which he was nominated. He also found great success at this year’s Grammys, winning three of the six awards he was nominated for, one of which was the ceremony’s most sought-after award, Album of the Year – beating Beyoncé.
Styles has found worldwide success with Harry’s House. It is a well crafted pop record that inspires joy and comfort through its breezy nature. This sort of happy, easy listening is exemplified in the album’s three singles – As It Was, Late Night Talking and Music for a Sushi Restaurant.
It’s difficult to pinpoint what makes a good pop song. The features that come together to make a hit are often elusive to most song writers. The sociologist Antoine Hennion (1983) suggested that it was a combination of musical style and technique, the producer, the media, and the public. All combine to create a successful song.
However, I think this approach makes music clinical, as if it is a formula to be followed. Sometimes what makes a song or an album popular is simply the way it makes us feel.
The album’s first single As It Was leans toward a more pop-focused sound paired with a catchy chorus and euphoric instrumentation, featuring church bells. The lyrics discuss a romantic relationship and mental health issues, while also hinting towards the end of the pandemic.
The song represents people’s need for escape and is purely enjoyable, danceable pop music. Variety called the song an “effortlessly joyful lead single” which “bursts through like the sun after a summer downpour”.
Styles’ second offering, Late Night Talking, also falls into this pop-focused sound. The song discusses the experience of talking about absolutely nothing with someone you have a crush on, something we can all relate to.
The lyrics sometimes don’t make sense but the punchy chorus is perfect for singing at the top of your lungs with friends. The instrumentation is simple but draws on 80s synth-pop and leaves you with a feeling of nostalgia.
These songs make you want to dance and sing with your friends and I think that is where the magic of this album comes from and why it was received so well by the public. One reviewer commented that the album was full of “songs that blast to the heart of old-school funk, disco and soul, but never strays into pastiche, homage or cheap retro knock-off territory”.
Harry’s House is simply just fun pop music at the perfect time. We are coming out of a pandemic and are in a cost of living crisis – we need some easy and joyful listening.
Music for a Sushi Restaurant best fits into this category of fun, frivolous pop music. The song draws from pop significantly but is accented by jazz-like scatting and horn blasts throughout, again adding to the joyous nature of the song.
The music video echoes the strange lyrics, portraying Styles as a merman who becomes famous for doing performances in this sushi restaurant. But just as his fame is wavering, the restaurant owners become annoyed with his diva-ish behaviour and Styles ends up meeting the sharp end of a cleaver.
The joy of Styles’ music and visual accompaniments solidifies his place as a purveyor of excellent pop music, one of which the British music industry can be proud.
Jack Williams does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
In the wake of Nicola Sturgeon’s surprise resignation, it cannot be overlooked that she became leader of the Scottish National Party (SNP) after it had suffered a double blow. The party had failed to achieve its cherished goal of independence in 2014, and lost its (then) best asset, Alex Salmond.
Salmond led the SNP from the fringes to power and was often credited with its success, much as Sturgeon is now. Sturgeon, the deputy leader, had the difficulty of becoming the leader of a party whose primary purpose was independence just after it lost a referendum on the subject. It was not until after the UK voted for Brexit in 2016 (with a majority in England and Wales but not Scotland) that the SNP was able to reengage with its primary purpose.
However, with a surge of new members after 2014 and her high profile during the referendum campaign, Sturgeon had very high approval ratings after she became SNP leader. Her political rallies sold out large venues and she led her party to win 56 out of 59 seats in the Westminster election of 2015.
She also led the SNP in the cross party discussion which resulted in the Scotland Act of 2016. This granted Scotland more devolved powers over taxation and health, and was a win for the SNP, arguably taking Scotland a step closer to independence. Indeed, under Sturgeon, independence became a more popular governance option than devolution.
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Sturgeon’s daily briefings and communication skills during the pandemic allowed her to continue as an asset to her party. And it showed in the 2021 Scottish elections, when the SNP won nearly half of the seats.
After nearly nine years, Sturgeon leaves her post with a still high approval rating, though it has taken a bit of a blow in the wake of the row over policy for transgender prisoners in Scotland. Her personal popularity and her signficant role in her party’s recent success raises the question of whether her successor will be able to deliver the same growing enthusiasm for independence.
But we should be careful of attributing too much importance to individuals in Scotland’s political landscape. When Ruth Davidson was Scottish Conservative leader, she did very well in the 2016 elections. Commentators thought the Conservatives would do worse without her in 2021, but they won the exact same number of seats.
Certainly Sturgeon was an asset in past elections for the SNP, but public opinion in Scotland has been divided along constitutional issues since the 2014 independence referendum. Her departure alone is unlikely to change this.
The SNP is not just a party of government, it is also the largest party of the pro-independence movement. The fate of both are linked. When the SNP government performs well, support for independence can increase. The high levels of support for Sturgeon and the SNP during the pandemic coincided with record levels of support for independence, up to 58%.
In choosing a successor to Sturgeon, the SNP needs to consider how to balance its quest for independence with effectively delivering policy. The next leader has to both lead the Scottish government and be able to convince “soft nationalists” (voters who are generally sympathetic to independence but are unsure about its potential impact on them) that they should support independence.
Sturgeon leaves behind an SNP that is still by far the most popular party in Scotland. It has the most seats in the Scottish parliament and local councils, the majority of Scottish Westminster seats and a large party membership.
The litmus test for the new party leader will be how convincing their strategy for achieving independence is. If they are able to deliver successful policy that helps (or at least does not undermine) their aim to build support for independence, they could reinvigorate not just the party but also the wider independence movement. Among other issues, this will involve avoiding damaging public sector strikes and honing a new approach to the gender recognition bill.
Sturgeon’s “plan C” for independence (which was looking more likely after the UK supreme court’s November ruling) was to treat the next general election as a de facto referendum. But this plan was not supported by all in the SNP, so will need to be revisited with a new leader.
The wider question, though, for any new SNP leader and first minister, is about how to both win support for independence and unite a country that is evenly split. Under Sturgeon there has been too much focus on processes of how and when a referendum should be held, and less on convincing voters.
If a new leader can galvanise a consistent and clear push for independence over a sustained period, a future UK government could agree to a referendum to recognise a new settled will in Scotland. The impact of the 2014 and 2016 referendums has been to create, for the first time, a potential pro-independence majority. The challenge for a new SNP leader is to harness support and make that majority consistent.
William McDougall is affiliated with the EIS trade union.
Tax deadlines, such as the annual January 31 deadline for filing UK self-assessment tax returns, typically cause an uptick in tax scams. This year, for example, an ad for a costly connection service disguised as the British tax authority’s phone number is appearing at the top of search engine results for the agency’s contact details.
But it’s much more common for tax fraudsters to rely on unsolicited phone calls to extract information and money from victims. Each year the UK’s HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) and the US Inland Revenue Service (IRS) post warnings and updated lists of such bogus calls and phishing schemes. At any one time there are many different types of tax scammers attempting to trick unsuspecting people into handing over money to pay fake penalties and charges.
HMRC responded to more than 180,000 reports of suspicious contact made by people in the 12 months to August 2022, and almost 81,000 of them were scams offering fake tax rebates to access victims’ bank details. In the US, similar reports of such suspicious activity grew from around 2 million to 8 million between 2021 and 2022, according to figures from the IRS.
When tax agencies warn people of such scams, they generally detail “phishing” attempts. This is when people are contacted and asked for private or sensitive information by someone pretending to be an official agency. This could happen because your contact information was stored in a database that has been hacked by criminals, exposing this private information to scammers.
During the tax filing period in particular, fraudsters have been known to impersonate government employees in an attempt to persuade or even threaten victims into handing over money or personal details. If you receive such a call, it might look like a legitimate number and could even include background noise that resembles a call centre to make the scam seem more authentic.
The fraudsters might pressure you to wire money through services such as Western Union or MoneyGram or to send a bank transfer. There have even been reports of scammers asking for payment of back taxes using gift cards.
The scammers might say you’ve miscalculated your tax payment in a previous year and must now pay to avoid a penalty, for example. They may provide a reference number, again to make the call seem more realistic, or a fake identification number for the officer that calls you. The amounts requested could vary from hundreds to thousands.
And although anyone can fall victim, the elderly and immigrants are among those that tend to be at greater risk of being successfully targeted by these scammers. Aside from the obvious financial cost, such loses can devastate victims, with some people even attempting suicide due to misplaced embarrassment or shame at being tricked and losing money.
There is little research into this type of scam, which can make it difficult to identify common features. Plus, the operators often work internationally or are based in other countries, particularly those in which western authorities find it hard to prosecute the groups involved.
Our research looked at recordings of calls with scammers to determine some common features. Unsurprisingly, we found that tax scammers use fake names and often adopt accents and language that matches with the country of the targeted taxpayer.
The specific language used to persuade potential victims can include common or phrases that sound official such as “tax miscalculation”, but also informal or even emotive words. The idea is to draw you in and encourage you to believe the scam and become worried about the consequences of not paying out.
So, if victims are confrontational or don’t comply, the caller might raise their voice and use insults. It is very unlikely that this would happen on a call with a real HMRC or IRS employee.
Scam callers often speak from a “scam script” designed to make them sound more official and authentic, increasing the victim’s trust that the call is really from HMRC or the IRS. As part of our research we compiled examples of steps often included in these scripts. The scripts might be adapted based on the victim, conversation or the level experience of the scammer, but the below chart shows an example of how such a phone scam might play out.
Tax scam call script
So, how can you protect yourself from tax scammers?
Both the IRS and HMRC issue warnings and information about how to distinguish between a scam phone call and one from an actual government department. This information is updated regularly, particularly during and right after tax filing season when scams can increase.
So, be aware and be vigilant; don’t engage with random callers. The IRS and HMRC will never contact you to demand money or threaten you with a penalty. Even if you have made a mistake with your taxes, tax authorities such as HMRC only call about payments you already know about – either from an official letter or because you have reported the debt yourself, through your self-assessment tax return, for example.
If you receive a suspicious call, never call back, dial any number they provide, or respond to a voicemail. Search for the official number of your country’s tax office online (in the UK this will end with “gov.uk” and in the US “.gov”) to speak to someone about your concerns and check if you really do owe money.
And, if you do receive a call like this, inform your country’s tax agency so they can update their records and make sure people remain aware of the latest tax scams.
The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
When Prince Rogers Nelson died at the age of 57 on April 21, 2016, it sent shockwaves around the world. Tributes from fans flooded social media, vigils sprang up across the US, and key landmarks, including the Lowry Bridge in Prince’s hometown of Minneapolis, turned purple to mark his passing. Yet the end of Prince’s earthly existence by no means marks the end of his enduring musical and artistic impact.
The legacies of beloved artists have long transcended their lifetimes. Socially, politically, sexually, and ideologically speaking, Prince is no exception. A remarkably productive and always cryptic figure, he continues to incite fascination from beyond the grave. However, his most incendiary and relevant album has yet to be released.
Pop has long been a rich space for subverting gendered stereotypes and Prince consistently challenged the rigidity of binary gender roles. At once hyper-masculine and delicately feminine, he cuts a distinctive and enigmatic figure within queer pop history.
Now, a cancelled 1987 album that explores all these elements is finally about to see the light of day and is expected to be released later in 2023.
The tracklist and songs that make up this lost release have been available in various guises for several decades, some existing on compilations, albums, and unofficial leaks. We have analysed all the available evidence and musical fragments ahead of their much anticipated reunion to present the most accurate picture possible of this elusive work.
Dearly beloved, we are gathered here to introduce Camille.
By 1986 Prince was already cemented as a potent force in popular music. After the success of the Purple Rain movie 18 months earlier and a slew of successful mould-breaking singles under his belt, including When Doves Cry, Let’s Go Crazy, Raspberry Beret, and Kiss, Prince returned to the recording studio with his sound engineer Susan Rogers to embark on a new project.
It revolved around one core concept that Prince wanted to explore: his voice. Through processing his vocals in the studio, Prince and Rogers were able to increase the pitch of his voice so it no longer sounded what we might call “male”. The process was actually the same as on the “Chipmunk” records of the late 1950s, but done to a much more subtle degree. This more “feminine” or “female” voice was christened Camille by Prince and became the centre of his new project.
By November 1986, the whole album (also called Camille) was finalised and a few vinyl demos were pressed in preparation for release the following year. Controversially, Prince decided to attribute the whole album to Camille rather than himself, and his name would not appear on the packaging. But, for reasons that are not known, the release was cancelled – most likely because the record label baulked at the idea of a Prince-less Prince album. Camille lived on for a short time beyond the cancelled release, with three tracks repurposed for the legendary Sign ‘O’ The Times, specifically If I Was Your Girlfriend, Housequake, and Strange Relationship. After this, Camille was never heard from again.
This story is part of Conversation Insights
The Insights team generates long-form journalism and is working with academics from different backgrounds who have been engaged in projects to tackle societal and scientific challenges.
In the intervening years, rumours, fan theories, album sleeve notes, tour programmes, and biographies have all hinted at the possible Camille album. But it was not until Prince’s former production manager Karen Krattinger offered one of the demo copies of the album at an auction in 2016 that the record was confirmed as actually “real”. Now, seven years later, Jack White’s Third Man Records has reached an agreement with Prince’s estate to release the full album.
The story of Camille fits into the wider narrative and rediscovery of the hidden histories of queer and trans people, mapping the blank spaces where they were erased from history. Many examples spring to mind, but perhaps soul singer Jackie Shane’s slow rediscovery over the past decade is a perfect example of the treasure trove of music and figures that have been obscured from music history. When shared, these histories can empower marginalised groups within broader society. Imagine the potential impact had Camille been released and received as a queer persona in 1987. What would have happened if “His Royal Badness” had been “Her” four decades ago?
In many ways it is futile to speculate around lost impact. Yet it is worth reflecting on what it would have meant to have an artist of colour – who was also a bastion of male sexuality – playing with gender, femininity and sexuality. Would it have pushed further aspects of queerness into popular culture? After all, Prince was a mainstream megastar, selling millions upon millions of records throughout the 1980s.
Conversely, imagine pop without the gender-bending and provocatively queer moments that we now hold up as legendary. What would our history be if we lost David Bowie and Mick Ronson’s shocking “oral guitar solo”, the winking audacity of the I Want to Break Free video, Frankie telling us to “relax”, or Lil Nas X offering the devil a lapdance? Camille should have been among this list of cultural touchstone moments that make up our collective conception of popular music.
Several highly-acclaimed recent television series’ have also focused on queer history at a time contemporaneous with Camille’s original planned release date. Russell T Davies’ mini-drama It’s A Sin focused on the lives of young queer Brits during the AIDS epidemic that decimated the community. Equally lauded was FX’s Pose, which explored the lives of LGBTQ+ people of colour in the New York ballroom scene of the 1980s. The resurgence and reinsertion of the ballroom scene documentary Paris Is Burning (filmed again in the mid-late 1980s) into public consciousness points to a wide and continued fascination with this period of queer history.
Among today’s so-called “culture wars”, the denigration of the trans community, and the recent rise in homophobic and queerphobic hate, a celebration of the diversity of gender performances is surely as welcome as ever. In recent years the unique perspectives of queer, trans and non-binary artists have been praised by popular music fans and pundits alike. Sophie, Mikki Blanco, Kim Petras, Julianna Huxtable, Anohni, Honey Dijon, Arca, and many more have greatly increased the audibility of queer voices for the broader pop music fan base.
So with Camille finally about to “come out” (in every sense of the phrase), it seems like the right time to ask what impact she might have had in 1987, how she was created, and why now is the perfect moment for her debut.
Prince was sexy. Not necessarily just as an object of desire, but his persona, music, lyrics, dance moves, album covers, and public image oozed sex, ambiguous sexuality, and overt sensuality. He was a cheeky champion of all things kinky. The lyrics to Darling Nikki, Get Off, Soft and Wet, Head, and Dirty Mind, among others, should be enough to convince you of his sexual credentials.
Prince’s particular form of musical sexuality was unique and often hard to define. His approach to sex, in general public consciousness, was masculine, straight, tough, and naughty. But it could also be feminine, queer, tender and spiritually chaste. Wesley Morris sums up this sexual ambiguity perfectly in his New York Times piece, saying that the focus of Prince’s sexual orientation was always oriented towards “you” – that is, the listener.
Here we are of course conflating aspects of gender, sexuality, and sex. But with Prince, it’s hard to untangle those elements. Prince was at his most interesting and successful when he wrapped himself in ambiguity and androgyny. The opening lines to I Would Die 4 U specifically tell us this:
I’m not a woman. I’m not a man. I am something that you’ll never understand.
He left us other clues about the way he viewed race, sex and sexuality in tracks like Controversy, where he played with the media’s portrayal of celebrity.
Am I Black or white? Am I straight or gay?
Of course, he wasn’t the first to play with these ideas. Western popular music has a rich history of genderplay. Cast your mind back to the decadence of glam rock, the unabashed sweaty sexiness of disco, or the glittery flamboyance of the New Romantics. A degree of dandyism has long allowed the male rock star to challenge the codes of reserved, stoic, western masculinity. The term “dandy” in this case refers to those lavishly dressed, ostentatiously extravagant male artists of the latter half of the 20th century. Rock stars like Marc Almond, David Bowie and Mick Jagger used elaborate fashion and exaggerated movements to free themselves of conservative expectations around how men “should” behave.
Yet, Prince’s androgyny always felt different. As author Sasha Geffen wrote, it went beyond costume, it was “a part of who he was, reflected not only in his clothes but in his voice, mannerisms and presence”. He often played with a hypersexual mode of masculine musicality, as documented by songs like Erotic City, while his visual persona could easily be described as “soft” or “pretty”, as he appears on the cover of his eponymous album. So Prince’s ambiguity is entangled within his entire persona. Nowhere is this clearer than on this currently unreleased gem.
If Prince is hard to pigeonhole, then Camille proves even more elusive.
The Camille persona did not just arrive fully formed. Rogers was instrumental in bringing Camille to life. As Prince’s sound engineer for Purple Rain and Sign ‘O’ The Times, she facilitated his performances and helped craft his most seminal albums. She has described Camille as a figure “who might have been male, might have been female, it wasn’t really clear – might have been kind of ghostly, might have been kind of humanoid”.
However, the technology used to create Camille’s voice from that of Prince was rudimentary. In 1986, “realistic” male-to-female voice modification in a recording studio was not possible, and still poses challenges for technology companies today. But the limitations of the technology are one of the most revealing aspects of Camille.
A study from the Journal of Voice illustrates that voices that are manipulated in this way are perceived as “non-male”. The study also points to the “gender ambiguity” of a voice treated similarly to Camille. There are several studies that present similar findings. In essence, this research shows that altering the voice can have an impact on how we perceive someone’s gender. But more importantly, the processing of Prince/Camille’s voice is done to a degree that defies the gender binary.
It’s not just the pitch of Camille’s voice that sheds light on her possible persona. On the track Good Love we can hear Camille offering us a half-spoken/half-sung vocal mimicking the “valley girl” delivery made famous in the teen classic Clueless. By using elements of the stereotypical creaky-voiced “vocal fry”, Camille is telling us to what tribe she might belong. Plus, the squeals of girlish delight we hear throughout the song point to something other than the machismo one might expect from a 1980s male sex symbol.
If, as originally intended, we didn’t know that this album was produced by Prince, we might have a very different perspective on the singer. In essence, there is evidence to say that Camille might be best perceived female, or possibly as queer or trans – at least in terms of her voice. Yet, her voice and delivery aren’t our only clues to her identity. It can also be found in what she says.
If I Was Your Girlfriend is one of the songs which survived and made it on to Sign ‘O’ The Times, and in some early releases is even credited to Camille. The song is perhaps where the combination of lyrics and artificial vocal manipulation are most striking. Opening with six bars of falsetto sighs and screams, the song introduces us to a more vulnerable Camille. This vulnerability soon gives way to something more urgent.
The meaning of “girlfriend” is as ambiguous as we have come to expect from Prince. The opening verses describe our narrator and the addressee doing arguably platonic activities, like choosing outfits and swapping stories about those who have wronged them. It is not long, however, until Camille sings of the sexual gratification that might result from such closeness and promises of long baths and kisses “down there, where it counts” soon follow.
The shifting perspectives of the narrator make it difficult to work out who is being addressed and who does the addressing in this song. Camille makes reference early on to having been the former “man” of the person she sings to and suggestions of children occur in the spoken section. Yet her pleas to girlfriend status make up the majority of the song. All elements are sung in Camille’s distinctive timbre. Jumping between male and female signifiers throughout, Camille could be said to occupy an ambiguous space here, leaving us little in the way of explanation.
The track might be presenting Camille as a transgender persona. Alternatively, there is an argument to be made that Prince is simply asking the object of his affections for the kind of emotional intimacy common in close female friendships. Yet, the hypersexual male rock star making such a plea is striking, particularly in combination with the vocal manipulation. Perhaps Prince is challenging the tough, promiscuous persona that might be expected of the rock god?
On the track’s original B-side, Shockadelica, we find Camille in a less melancholic mood. As on If I Was Your Girlfriend, the identity of our narrator is not immediately apparent. Prince sings about Camille, but in her voice. Is Prince talking about this mysterious, bewitching woman, or is Camille singing in the third person, as befits a diva?
Either way, Shockadelica is an unapologetic celebration of Camille and her allure:
She must be a witch, she got your mind, body, and soul hitched!
Where If I Was Your Girlfriend challenged gendered stereotypes through its emotional openness, Shockadelica is a paean to female sexuality. This is a woman who is fully aware of her appeal and in total control of it, rendering her admirer completely helpless.
Feel U Up would also find its home as a B-side, in this case for 1989’s Partyman. Feel U Up is classic Prince hedonism. Camille urges the object of her affections to enjoy the moment – any subsequent relationship, however fleeting, is not of concern here. Camille prioritises the other person’s pleasure in this song, encapsulating Morris’ points about Prince’s focus on “you” with lyrics like: “I ain’t looking for a one night stand, I only wanna feel you up.”
In this collection of songs, Camille is a fully fleshed-out character. She contains multitudes in her desires and her insecurities, and her complexities are consistent with the complexities in all of us.
You may have noticed us refer to Camille as she/her and this is quite deliberate. In the lyrics there are scant references to pronouns, but when they are used she is consistently referred to as “she” or “that girl”, or directly by name. Although she is female on this album, she is referred to as the “boy named Camille” in the LoveSexy tourbook (and in French, the name is unisex). There is also evidence to suggest that aspects of Camille were inspired by Herculine Adélaïde Barbin, a 19th-century French intersex person who identified as female. Due to the imminent release of the album in which Camille seems to be tangibly female, we call her “she” in this context, with the caveat that she appears more fluid in other instances.
The deeper into this album we have gone, the more apparent Camille’s separation from Prince has become. We think it is fair to say that Prince never thought of Camille as some form of fleeting sonic drag. Rather, Camille is an entire alter ego, or a new frontier for Prince to explore.
With Camille, we can hear Prince parsing experiences of sex and the sexual between his own experience and that of his female alter ego. Prince is interested in all things erotic, and that extends as far as donning a female or queer persona to allow a full range of experiences. Camille tells us so on Feel U Up: “I don’t really want to be your man, I only want to feel you up.”
And Camille seems to spark a broader fascination for Prince, particularly concerning the idea of two opposites or binaries existing together. In 1986 it was Camille and the exploration of the male and female. A few years later, he’d don a superhero and supervillain costume simultaneously (divided down the middle, of course) and call himself Gemini for the soundtrack album for 1989’s Batman. You can even see Gemini in the Bat Dance video. Writer Lucas Cava offers a fascinating deep dive into the dual personalities and interwoven origin stories of Gemini and Camille, guiding us through their development in videos, songs, films and extracts from tour programmes.
It isn’t coincidental that Prince wanted to explore these binaries between man and woman, evil and good. An interest in dichotomies seems to have been a theme in Prince’s life and career. His patented Minneapolis sound is a blend of working-class white rock and queer Black disco. Life and death crops up regularly in Prince’s lyrics. Even his Dandyish fashion draws together elements of masculine and feminine together.
Whereas Prince and Camille played with the dichotomies of male and female, Prince’s contemporaries explored the spaces in-between and along the spectrum of gender. Bowie was at various points dandy-ish (look at the Hunky Dory and The Man Who Sold the World album covers), a glittery bisexual alien (the Aladdin Sane and Ziggy Stardust personas), and an emblem of sneering masculinity (The Thin White Duke). Boy George and Annie Lennox proudly danced in the middle, gazing out at you from the cover of Newsweek. Grace Jones’ statuesque coolness defied conventions of demure femininity, while Sylvester’s brand of queer joy flew in the face of stoic masculinity.
Taking a more aggressive tone, the heavy metal fraternity (see Twisted Sister and Mötley Crüe) of the 1980s applied makeup and Lycra in an attempt to shock crowds, parents and topple the status quo. The earlier Rolling Stones attempt at provoking audiences with similar drag appears (retrospectively at least) more Monty Python than scandalising, more churchgoing Sunday best than skintight spandex.
Prince and Camille sit apart from these artists. They don’t revel in the innumerable gradations along the spectrum of gender and they certainly do not mock any interpretation thereof. Rather, they represent the polar positions, singing back and forth to one another across the expanse.
In the process of listening to and revisiting the songs made for the album, we have found ourselves running in circles trying to define this mysterious and intriguing persona. Each time one of us thought we had found a definition we could pin down, it would slip from our grasp on a second listen. In light of this, we decided that it would be more valuable to celebrate her ambiguity and ask what the release of the album means now, rather than trying to pigeonhole or categorise her.
Freed from her four decades in the vault, Camille will finally be allowed to come out. The question now is how and where to situate Camille within a queer pop history. Will she be lauded as an important lost voice in music history, or cast aside as a novelty for Prince completists?
Camille’s long absence leaves us only able to speculate on the impact she might have had. Had the Camille album been released as planned, could she have contributed to the wider representation of queer artists earlier in our pop culture past? What kind of ruminations around gender could she have provoked in the public consciousness? What would a Camille tour have looked like? There are surely queer elements that might have become part of broader public discourse, at least among Prince’s established fanbase, as a consequence of Camille’s presence.
The history of androgyny and genderplay in pop is a rich one, but Camille embodies something that eludes neat compartmentalisation. While we can’t know for sure what kind of impact Camille would have had at her inception, she belongs to a vibrant hidden history of queer artists. Personally speaking, we like the fact that Camille is so challenging to define. She brings ambiguity, playfulness, and queerness to bear in a way that few artists ever explore. That androgyny and otherness is, to us, where her real power and contribution comes from.
It is fair to say that Camille would not have been a cure-all for queer rights and discrimination and we must be careful not to overestimate her impact. She would not have been the straw that broke the camel’s back, ushering in a new age of fraternal love, but she may have added another high-profile voice to the growing number of queer artists presenting important and publicly relevant work.
We can only hypothesise what she would have meant to listeners in 1987. However, that doesn’t negate or diminish her contribution and importance to audiences today, particularly audiences who may see themselves reflected in her enigmatic sensuality.
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The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
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