The gormless looks of the panel including Dimbleby, when the counterargument makes complete sense. Priceless.

Everyone rolls their eyes at first; then they listen a bit, understand, and agree.

I am increasingly impressed by David Starkey. He is blatently opinionated, awkward and rude. And for that I trust him far more than the rest of people on that panel.

God how I wish David Starkey had been my history teacher, a rare visionary

I love Starkey, a lot of uncomfortable truths and doesn't give a toss.

I could watch Starkey's response to the Russia/China pressure question over and over forever, hilarious. Love him.

David Starkey was great on this. Telling it as it really is. A great man.

'What an absurd remark, THINK MAN!' -David Starkey, Legend.

It's very simple, people don't want their heroes to not be one of them.

It scars national pride when the people can't liberate themselves and have to rely upon foreign countries to do so. It's viewed as a failure of national sovereignty so Starkey raises a very valid point, he's not a 'pillock'

Starkey is always right. He doesn't do this political correctness crap. Just logic.

Starkey's knowledge of history is so valuable. Too often, historical events are cherry picked to try to win arguments, won't work against Starkey!

Bangladesh credits it’s liberation from Pakistan to a home grown organisation called ‘Mukti Bahani’ whereas it was the Indian army who went all the way to Dhaka and forced Gen Niazi of Pakistan to surrender to Gen Maneckahaw of India. David Starkey is absolutely right!

starkey is always soo damn right! i love him!

Starkey is absolutely 100% right. People DO NO LIKE BEING FREED BY OTHERS. Being liberated by others gives people a sense of shame. A sense of failure for having to depend on others, for having failed to free themselves. It is a failure which is deeply shaming. Hence, it is difficult to accept and feel gratitude towards the liberators. As Starkey says after the initial euphoria they see them as conquerors.

David Starkey absolutely spot on as per usual! As for the person who posted this video. What a pillock!

Yes Starkey is absolutely right . Just one country -Norway - feels that it owes anything to Britain for it's war effort . They give us a Christmas tree every year which is erected in Trafalgar Square. I was in discussion with a Korean on You Tube who did not understand that Britain had helped to liberate his country from north Korea. he just went on about the evils of imperialist Britain. Such is life.

Love him; he's so right

David is right.

Look at the OTT reaction by Rachel Reeves at 0:58 (typical labour party) even before David Starkey has finished his sentence. How cynical. Unless Clark Carlisle is doing something else under the desk.

If you want to be a rebel in this day and age you just need to speak the truth.

Would it be possible to arrange David Starkey's presence on the Question Time panel every week? WHAT A BRILLIANT MAN!!!!!

Starkey was epic... On a different level to nearly everyone in that room. I would trust him in power over Cameron ANY day

Dimbleby seemed a bit dim here. Starkey's point just went straight over his head.

He is so much smarter than everyone else in that room

The faux liberal outrage on that dozy Rachel Reeves face when starkey said 'people don't like to be freed' was preposterous

How is he a pillock? Starkey's right!

David Starkey is so far above these people he is but a speck in the sky.

Starkey is fantastic! What a star.

Perfectly legitimate insight that anyone who has studied history would not find surprising.

Damn starkey nails it here

David Starkey is SO right as always! Dimbleby is, as usual, his lefty self.

I like that at 1:00 Clark Carlisle tries to dismiss Starkey's point, 'like what is he going on about', but Starkey ends up actually making a very valid point which Clark Carlisle probably couldn't even comprehend.

I couldn't agree MORE with David Starkey! Legend.

Whie his method of engaging with people and the way in which he speaks to people about some things, can be tactless and rude, Starkey made a brilliant point, that some people just don't seem to understand, and therefore dismiss out of hand. He is right to say that liberty can not be given, it must be taken or won by the very people being oppressed. Partly becuase it is in the act of achieving and asserting ones freedom that gives it weight, it's cost, whether in lives or time or effort, instills a need to protect that freedom and an appreciation of it's true value. Also in that very act of overcoming such adversity, leads to true growth that doesn't exist if someone else does the hard work for you. Just as, if some challenge i face in my life, was dealt with by someone else, they have gained the beneift of overcoming it, whereas I have gained nothing but removal of the obstacle that challenge represented. In such a way, we infact deprive other people of the journey and lessons it has to teach by doing it for them and they can't appreciate the success in the same way as they would had it been by the own hands wrought. He is also right to point out that invariably, when we in the west intervene, it is, more often than not, with the unspoken and ulterior motive, of putting in place of an old regime, one that mirrors and is designed to facilitate values that reflect our own, without regard for the cultural and social mores of the people we are supposedly liberating. When will the west wake up and realise we are not all the same, and the rest of the world need not be just like us. But if we really want them to be, maybe we should let them win their liberties, the same way we did, for ourselves.

David Starkey is awesome.

He is so right. You can only liberate yourself.

David starkey is awesome. I wish i could voote for him.

It's like the rest of the panel were desperate to maintain the pantomime whilst Starkey was the only one who wanted to say something as real as possible.

david starkey cracks me up. love him 🤣🤣🙃

He's spot on as usual

Starkey, as usual, is spot on.

lol I love Starkey's views "pfft what pressure could we bring to bear on China" =D rofl he has a damn well good point there!

Im glad Starkey knows his history. We never cared about the French in World War 2 ( Sadly) we focused on protecting our colonies and destroying Germany for economic gain which backfired.

Starkey bang on point as per usual

The disaster in Kabul and Afghanistan today once again proved this man right. The Afghani people welcomed the Taliban back with open arms because they finally saw liberators who shared the same skin-color as them.

Starkey was bang on as usual, he's so much more intelligent than Dimbleby & the rest of the panel, it's a bit embarrassing really.

Starkey is excellent. Erudite, well-spoken and confident. He knows what he is talking about. He knows the history. And intelligent people all know fully well that the past begets the present and the future and so on and so forth.

spot on

He's a historian and he knows what he's saying. I find the party politicians who shriek at any conservative view that makes them feel unconfortable with something that sounds logical so frustrating

The Stark is absolutely right ! Old fashioned common sense

I think he's absolutely right. In fact I saw this live and this particular bit shocked me into a higher awareness. I don't think Starkey understands people as individuals very well, but he's incredibly aware of how people act as groups. He is a very very clever man who pisses people off because he's dangerous, he makes people think.

A few years ago I probably, whilst not dismissing him, would have rolled my eyes and shook my head at this (I remember it well)I love to listen to Starkey. Then, just last year, I was working in a care home for the elderly in Jersey. I love talking to the clients and I asked one lady, who was still sharp as a button, "what was it like under German occupation?" The lady replied; "the German's were lovely, it was the British who were horrible and the Americans were just ghastly". Maybe Starkey is right.

Noticed some serious triggering when Starkey explained THE TRUTH. Well Done, David.

1:32 The gormless look of someone who can't comprehend what the PhD is saying

He's not a pillock. His opinionated. And generally correct.

The panel members all trying to outdo one another's look of outrage

Must be so frustrating for Starkey to be on a panel of absolute lightweights

He is brave enough to say what is correct. We need more like him.

What a legend

How does someone like Rachel Reeves find the intelligence to even breathe?

David Starkey is spot on yet again!

He's worded it badly, but Starkey's sentiment is bang on correct

David Starkey you are brilliant, you are such a breath of fresh air. You speak free from political correctness and the truth, keep it up!

David is one of the most logical minds.

Statement of the obvious from Starkey, especially in Arab cultures which are and have been irate at the west for "occupying" Saudi Arabia for decades now. Any intervention in Syria will be taken the exact same way, more western troops occupying more Arab lands requiring more terrorist attacks on the west to liberate them. People should know this, we've had ten years of Al Qaeda repeating over and over "We will attack you until you remove your troops from our land". We've got to stop thinking of Arabs, and other cultures more generally, as if there is a westerner inside them that needs our help to get out, and start recognising that these are different cultures with different values and different world views than us.

A Christopher Hitchens/David Starkey debate would have been very interesting.

It's so annoying that the other panelists are so reluctant to engage their minds that they are groaning and facepalming at Starkey's logic and facts.

Actually David starkey talks a lot of sense if you think about it

David Starkeys correct on being Liberated .. I'll feelings towards the Alies of Repelling forces are noted in History ◇◇

He's not being a 'pillock', TopTellyFan. He's quite correct. You go in, you become the enemy. To take just one example much closer to home: remember the Catholics in Northern Ireland in 1969? The British army went in to help them. And I think it's fair to say they became the enemy...

5 ½ years later, this tragically hilarious

starkey's prompt sheet remark is incredible

Iv'e always wondered why the French dislike the English so much, now I know why, thank you David, you now have a new fan.

How dare Starkey make an insightful and accurate assessment of human nature and history! XD

He is spot on we need to free ourselves not be freed by someone else, you end up living under their idea of freedom

Starkey is right. History supports that. Every country we have gone into in the past 20 yrs is fucked up.

He is absolutely right!

He's not saying people don't like being free, but that they don't want someone coming in to free them when they didn't ask. He's right: being freed by someone else is more humiliating than an IMF or European Central Bank bailout. It shows you can't do it yourself and have no control of your situation. Starkey's right on the ball as usual.

I just had a massive epiphany about human frailty and weakness and the relationship between that and the ideals that bind a country/culture together. Trippy shit.

I am looking at this post being seven years old. Here we are in 2021 having voted Brexit, and having trouble with the eu, but especially France, fully demonstrating, David is bang on the money!

This man is an inspiration and so fiercely intelligent. He wipes the floor with everyone else here. Loved the prompt sheet jibe at 1:52 but the best was 5:55 - greatest sound of disdain I have ever heard! I would want the ground to open up and swallow me after his dismissive remarks.

Well said Dr David. A little puff at the establishment goes a long way. Brilliant analysis.

He's right. The French would have loved us if we'd tried and been beat.

People like to be "freed" only when the liberator quickly departs and does not leave a power vacuum in their wake. Prime example: Kuwait. The US lead coalition went in, pushed out the Iraqi army out, and then largely exited leaving the existing Kuwaiti regime in power.

Maybe I missed it, but the video title 'David Starkey says: "People don't like being freed"' suggests that there is a quote from Starkey within this video that says that exact same quote?

He speaks the truth and would be on my foreign policy team any day of the week

Even though he is absolutly right here

Absolutely, agree, with, Starkey. This lot are so far up their own, backsides, so, blinkered, they're, not listening, to the point, he's, making. This, man, is, honest, & is not part of the, "herd", mentality. Bravo, David Starkey!

Clark Carlisle - out of your depth on here and in the Premier League

Starkey makes the programme worth watching.

"Make a difference" means turn them into a consumer society just like us.

Starkey is so much more intelligent than Dimbleby & the rest of the panel its embarrassing. Hope to see him back on Question Time soon.

The point he is making is that there's a price or debt to be paid to the liberator for the deed of liberation. 'We've made this considerable and expensive effort to defend and liberate you so now you owe us' That is what fuels the inevitable resentment. His comment that the allies didn't necessarily do it to liberate France is probably right. The reason was to stop Nazi Germany as it was dangerously close to invading Britain who happened to be the US closest ally. Had France been on the other side of the world it wouldn't have been so strategically important.

It's not that people don't like being freed, it's that outside groups feel they have a chance in situations like this and so events like this occur.

Starkey 'wipes the floor' with them, ...lol

These sorts of discussions are best left to nations that still have navies.

Well said,Starkey!

David Starkey was absolutely right about Syria. The situation isn't as simple as a dictator vs his people. What we are in fact seeing is the Shia Alawite minority of which the country is 12% composed, fighting a Sunni majority uprising for their very existence. Even if we DID intervene on behalf of the Sunni faction in order to offer 'humanitarian' assistance we would be covertly aiding the Sunni majority - effectively encouraging attempts to destroy the other 12% Shia of the country. Madness.

Starkey. King of the uncomfortable truth.