Anyone see Paxman interviewing Russell Brand?

[clv101]

I think Mr. Brand is more mouth than deed.

You do seem rather hard to please these days! Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good. It should be clear to all these days just how powerful 'mouth' can be in our superficial, media dominated culture.

[woodburner]

I think Mr. Brand is more mouth than deed.

You do seem rather hard to please these days!

Because I am not agreeing with several posters here? Maybe I am suspicious of someone who has benefitted from the system, and now professess to want a revolution to demolish the system.

Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.

What do you mean?

It should be clear to all these days just how powerful 'mouth' can be in our superficial, media dominated culture.

Or how opportunistic a mouth can be.

[clv101]

Maybe I am suspicious of someone who has benefitted from the system, and now professess to want a revolution to demolish the system.

Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.

What do you mean?

Exactly that. Brand may be wealthy and have benefited from the system (he's not perfect), but we shouldn't let that be the enemy of the good things he's now saying.

[woodburner]

So should you have said "don't let the imperfect be the enemy of the good"?

As for "good things he's saying", they are just "populist" things reminiscent of many an opportunist politician

[clv101]

More explanation of the expression:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perfect_is ... my_of_good

[woodburner]

I think you should watch Mr Brand carefully, and establish his level of sincerity.

[UndercoverElephant]

I think you should watch Mr Brand carefully, and establish his level of sincerity.

I've watched carefully, and think it is very high.

Why on earth do you think he would be saying what he is saying for unsincere reasons????

[biffvernon]

Actually, it doesn't matter whether or not he is sincere. It's the message that counts, stimulating thought, discussion and action.
Brand should be considered as taking the role of the medieval Jester.

Hope you've read Naomi Klein's call for revolution too; it's all of a piece.

http://www.newstatesman.com/2013/10/science-says-revolt

[raspberry-blower]

Naomi Klein is not the only one calling for a revolution:

Chris Hedges: Our Invisible Revolution

[vtsnowedin]

The best revolutions are fought for at the ballot box.

[nexus]

More interesting stuff on revolutions from the New Statesman:

http://www.newstatesman.com/2013/10/wha ... n-mean-you

There are quite a few worth reading especially the one from comedian and activist Francesca Martinez and the one below from Oliver Stone and Peter Kuznick:

Oliver Stone and Peter Kuznick
Film-makers

F--k Stalin, Mao, the Kims and all the other “revolutionaries” who defiled the noble concept of revolution in the interest of power, self-aggrandisement, repression and ironfisted control. The damage they have done to utopian thinking and the prospects for future humanistic change has been incalculable. F--k Churchill for trying to “strangle Bolshevism in its cradle” and Woodrow Wilson for sending in 15,000 troops to join the Brits and others in undermining the Russian Revolution from its inception – not because it was repressive but because it threatened the rapacious capitalist world order and because its leaders exposed secret treaties revealing imperialist deals to carve up the world and wisely pulled Russian troops out of the mindless slaughter of the First World War.

And F--k western advertising and journalism for so trivialising the very idea of revolution that we now have regular fashion “revolutions” and other equally banal revolutions in manners and lifestyle.

But don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater. The brutality of Mao and Stalin no more discredits the humanistic and egalitarian ideals of democratic socialism and revolution than 2,000 years of Crusades, child abuse, warfare and oppression perpetrated in the name of Christianity discredits the social teachings of Jesus Christ – or that Islamic fanaticism, which the US did so much to cultivate and incite during the Reagan years, discredits the teachings of Muhammad.

And don’t forget that many revolutionary societies have improved people’s lives, despite the efforts of the US and other global powers to upend or undermine them. Still the history of failed revolution is the albatross we bear as we search for a way to assert control over our lives and restore harmony and justice to this wounded planet.

By revolution we mean fundamental transformation of the social order as opposed to evolutionary change or reform. Such transformations turn violent when the beneficiaries of the old order deploy all the rep - ressive force at their disposal to maintain their privilege. It was Thomas Jefferson who wrote that the “tree of liberty” must be watered by the “blood of patriots and tyrants”. But despite Frantz Fanon’s contention that violence may have a positive and liberating effect on those who stand up to their oppressors, we have too often seen the use of violence unleash emotions and forces that beget more violence and new forms of tyranny and oppression. Still resistance is necessary. As “La Pasionaria” Dolores Ibárruri, the antifascist leader in the Spanish civil war, understood, “It’s better to die on your feet than live on your knees.”

In 1942 Vice-President Henry Wallace rejected the Time and Life publisher Henry Luce’s call for an “American Century”, offering instead his stirring vision of “the century of the common man”. Wallace called for a worldwide “people’s revolution” in the tradition of the American, French, Latin American and Russian Revolutions. Wallace’s revolution would end militarism, imperialism and economic exploitation, redistribute wealth on a global scale, and spread the fruits of science and industry – a vision just as relevant today. A world in which the richest 300 people have more wealth than the poorest three billion, in which the US maintains perhaps 700 overseas military bases and spends almost as much on military and intelligence as the rest of the world combined, and in which greed and the lust for power are privileged over creativity, kindness and generosity, is a world gone astray – one that demands revolutionary transformation of the deepest and most profound sort.

[nexus]

Comedian Lee Camp knows where its at and is well worth watching:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eb4w6cKja4c

[woodburner]

If Lee Camp is a comedian, he'd better not give up his day job. He comes across as angry and agressive, promoting revolution in a way which indicates some hint of violence. No one is safe in that situation.

[emordnilap]

The best revolutions are fought for at the ballot box.

Should be, but they're not. Many regimes - such as the UK's and the USA's - do not pursue the majority's preferences.

[vtsnowedin]

The best revolutions are fought for at the ballot box.

Should be, but they're not. Many regimes - such as the UK's and the USA's - do not pursue the majority's preferences.

How so? In the USA 6% of the population works for the government, Fed. State or local, then 16% are drawing Social security and Medicare. Another 15% are drawing food stamps, 26% are getting their medical bills paid by medicade and on and on. Clear majorities are at the government hog trough and vote to keep the food coming. And the politicians are jumping through hoops to keep it going even though it is clear that it will end soon and badly.
http://cnsnews.com/news/article/terence ... s-medicaid
What would your revolution do that would actually make things better?