In 2025, Ideas Matter partnered with the Battle of Ideas festival to programme and present a range of discussion forums and events, particularly involving young thinkers. Living Freedom, Debating Matters and The Academy featured widely in the UK’s premier free-speech festival, enabling more young people than ever to discuss and debate issues important to their lives.
Ideas Matter stall at the festival’s ‘Ideas Market’
From the panel discussions, sponsored by Living Freedom and showcasing a Debating Matters competition, to volunteering and hosting promotional stalls at the ‘Ideas Market’, over 500 young people took part in the planning and participation of the festival. With over 3,000 people in attendance, this was a great opportunity for participants to debate and discuss cutting edge, contemporary issues, longer-term political trends and a range of debates relating to freedom, democracy and culture wars, as well as a huge opportunity to network with some of the UK’s most interesting political and social thinkers.
Young participants from Living Freedom, Debating Matters and The Academy were integral to the development and delivery of debates on:
Debating Matters: ‘Trial by jury should be removed in certain cases’
The Debating Matters showcase competiton at the Battle of Ideas festival, challenged sixth-form students to think about complex moral issues at the heart of a key topical motion .
Trial by jury has long been regarded as central to the idea of ‘the right to a fair trial’ – a fundamental legal principle that dates back to the Magna Carta. But the increasing pressures on the criminal justice system, there have been pushes to reform the system and scrap trial by jury. Leading to the Labour government focusing on the Courts and Tribunals Bill in attempt remove the right to a jury trial for many criminal offenses to fix the backlog. But, can we justify reducing the right to trial by jury, in order to solve what is essentially a practical problem?
Living Freedom sponsored sessions:
Online dating: the end of romance?
Should we be worried about online dating? For a generation who have grown up on the internet, dating apps almost felt inevitable. But recently they have not proving to be as successful as many had hoped, so is there something missing? Have dating apps changed our approach to commitment and partnership, when we always have the option of finding someone else – just a click away – will young people ever settle down?
From Harvard to Sussex: should the state punish universities?
Universities are seen as the centre of progressive ideology – most notably in the mistreatment of gender critical academics and the encampment protests for Palestine. Free Speech advocates, including Trump, have waged war on universities, pushing governments to intervene to protect Free Speech on campus. But do punitive measures signal government overreach? Are there better ways to push back against the climate of cancel culture on campuses?
Right-wing boys and progressive girls: war of the sexes?
While there is often much focus on right-wing boys, more recent polling on political attitudes has shown there has been a more dramatic shift of girls moving to the left. Men and women are increasingly polarised, not only in political alignment but also in social attitudes: An Ipsos survey showed that 60 per cent of Gen Z men believe that they are expected to do too much to support gender equality, compared to 38 per cent of women – the largest gender gap between all generations surveyed. What is the impact of political polarisation on the relationships between men and women? Can they come back together or are they destined to push each other further away?
The rise of snitch culture
Breaching someone’s privacy used to be seen as an immoral act – but now it is heralded as integral for accountability and justified if what is said is latter deemed as abhorent or wrong. WhatsApp chats and emails are no longer private, with politicians and university students increasingly being disciplined for tasteless jokes. Snitch culture suggests a wider breakdown of our social fabric; as we no longer trust others to conduct themselves well in public, we have become increasingly suspicious of what they say in private. Where should we draw the line between what’s said in private and what matters for public attention? How can we rebuild trust if snitching is normalised?
Should we ‘DOGE’ university research?
What has happened to university research? With research increasingly titled ‘The Politics of Smell’, the humanities is getting a bad reputation. It has become focused on politicised, fashionable jargon to argue for nonsensical conclusions rather than fufilling rigorous academic standards and asking difficult moral questions. Academic research is on it’s way to loosing public trust by prioritising ideological conformity over intellectual rigour. Begging the question, should we use public money to fund such research projects? How can we regain integrity and make university research fit for purpose?
Era of the downwardly mobile graduate?
With nearly five million graduates now working in non-graduate roles, and one million now unemployed, many feel that they were sold a lie of university education. They were promised careers and security, but instead they came out with £50,000 of debt. Young people are increasingly disillusioned, both with education and the workplace. As wages are stagnating while asset prices increase, they are losing hope that they can achieve the life markers of their parents. How do we fix the graduate job crisis? Can the system be reformed to serve both students and staff – or should universities cut places and reinstate selectivity? In a world of falling wages and rising automation, does doing a degree still make sense?
Ideas Matter at the Battle of Ideas Festival 2024:
Debating Matters showcase: Smartphones should be banned in the classroom
Is anti-extremism a threat to liberty?
Equality law: freedom’s friend or foe?
Is Western civilisation under siege?
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We are grateful to The Snider Foundation
for their support in developing this programme.
