The system is adept at turning our aggression on to one another. We condemn the rioters. The EDL condemns immigrants. My new rule for when I fancy doing a bit of the ol’ condemnation is: “Do the people I’m condemning have any actual power?” The immigrant capacity to cause social negativity is pretty slender. Especially if you live in luxury in Hollywood and the only immigrants you meet are Gabby, my Mexican second mother, and Polo who looks after the garden. It probably seems more serious if you’re in a council flat in Tower Hamlets. Still the fact remains that an immigrant is just someone who used to be somewhere else. Free movement of global capital will necessitate the free movement of an affordable labour force to meet the demands that the free-moving capital has created. The wrath is directed to the symptom, not the problem.
Monday, 28 October 2013
Russell Brand on Scapegoats
Very quick one tonight. No time for a proper post. This from his New Statesman essay.
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3 comments:
Yes. And it is good to note that he also registers the differing impact of immigration, ie - the bourgeois that have promoted it see only the benefits (and anyone who disagrees is a "bigot").
Well, no, it's not a matter of bigotry. But it does require a sophisticated response from the left beyond a few glib soundbites.
Problem, ala turning on each other, is that the rioters did just that. Burning people's homes down, emptying little shops, attacking firefighters who were saving children from the flames (it happened) isn't going to make the world a better place.
And neither are the cheers of a bunch of opportunist 'revolutionaries' and anarchos, especially from the safety of their keyboards. (Like they'd ever get involved).
Politics is some what more complicated than a pose, be it by a millionaire pretending to be a radical or a social worker trying to look tough / clever.
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