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Wednesday, November 19, 2014

Russell Brand Nonsense

The following was posted by me on a negative review of Russell Brand's book, "Revolution." Someone posted a list of questions designed to identify someone as conservative if they voted yes to any of them.  Brand is proud of the fact he's never voted because he figures it's been useless...

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I answered No to all of your questions but I still think Russell Brand is a useless goof.  If he can't convince the people who DO vote to vote differently, he's pissing in the wind.  And at least in the US, if voting was as irrelevant as he says, corporations wouldn't be spending $5B on campaign propaganda and the GOP wouldn't be working so hard trying to make it harder for low income and minorities to vote.  The problem is not that voting doesn't work, the problem is the voters keep voting for greedy corporate shills rather than for third parties or anti-incumbent protest votes.  The problem is the $5B propaganda mill is working well, and frankly, the fewer people who vote the better they like it, especially when the non-voters are anti-corporate liberals.  So Brand is serving them well at this point.  There's no way there'll be a violent "revolution," that's a pipe dream.  You have to do the hard work of exposing the fact that the MSM no longer cover protest movements, or just as importantly, the systemic clamp-down on them. 

 In the 1970s strip malls were converted to shopping malls all over the US.  But few people realize an important reason why.  You can't picket inside on private property, so picketers would have to stand outside at the common entrance to the entire complex where they have much less impact, since they're not directly in front of the store in question-- they're not confronting just shoppers for the store in particular but for all the stores.  Safety in numbers, and the hunkering down happened while no one was paying attention.  The result is, public protests lost much efficacy and visibility in the process, to the point that protests are going on all over the world, but most of the voters who can in fact, make a difference, are oblivious of them.

Voters, at least in the US have been hyped into being sports fans looking for a team to cheer.  Everyone has learned to cheer their own team no matter what.  Right or wrong.  You're behind the blue team or the red team, period.  The entire socialization process in the US with its rah-rah sports metaphors has trained everyone.  You don't need to think, just cheer for your team, and voters like that just fine.  Suggesting those people who DO think, should just not vote in protest, is the worst suggestion one could imagine-- virtually certain to guarantee the corporate status quo.   And the people are arguing about socialism vs capitalism, the totalitarians in charge have got them all right where they want them.  As long as we're arguing about whether to spend money on wars, surveillance, free trade partnerships or liberal programs, we're not colluding on ways to get the money out of politics.

We've seen this story before.  Read Abbie Hoffman and Jerry Rubin.  Revolution is at hand, yeah, right.  And they targeted the vote too, but trying to get the "rock and rollers" TO vote.  That didn't work either-- the problem is, the people who vote their team and have always voted their team and will keep voting their team are in the majority, and crazy talk isn't going to change that.  You have to get down and do the hard work of getting petitions signed, social media campaigns, not just to get out the vote but to educate in the process, and yes, pounding the pavement and talking to people.  We need to build up the social pressure that just voting for team red or blue is being a puppet and that the MSM, be it Fox or MSNBC, are feeding us useless propaganda instead of useful information.  It's a hard slog though, because a big chunk of people don't like to have to think and the team approach relieves them of that.  Unfortunately, they all vote and as long as that is the case that is what you are up against.

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