Brand v Paxman
- Thread starter newbiejim
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Rubbish. He made his points and made them well.
Further he skillfully answered or dealt with Paxman's daft answers and pointless questions.
He has the entire country talking about it now, and your saying he has no capability to affect the issues?
Well that entirely shows you didn't really listen to what he said.....no one person can do anything but the entire nation can......a revolution is indeed needed to the current POINTLESS system.
What's your opinion on politics BTW?
Well we'll have to agree to disagree on it being a debate and how he dealt with the issues. Shouting loudly at a camera using pointless multi-syllable words in a faux sense of being erudite about a subject adds nothing to the argument for me I'm afraid. However, everyone is different, unlike others in this thread, I shan't call people morons or idiots for agreeing with him or enjoying his diatribe - I'm sure I like stupid and pointless things that other people don't. Again it's a skew on opinion.
I did pay attention (as much as it pained me) - we've discussed the revolution idea, and the problem is, the people who will join in this revolution will not no what or why they're doing it, because (un)fortunately the people that will pay attention to the Brands of this world tend to be the people he was talking about... however, as you say perhaps that's what is needed - I personally don't feel a change is necessary at the moment, sure there are some things that need sorting, but you know what? Britain is slowly digging itself out of recession, crime isn't getting worse. However, yes, house pricing, gas/electricity/fuel is still a major issue that needs to be addressed.
The bread line? Hmmm well I'm not convinced on that, I'm all for offering people help if they've put into the system, and just need a boost to get out of the hole they're in, but at the same time I do not want to admonish those that are brave enough to step into the breach and work that little bit harder and take those risks to make themselves/their businesses/and ultimately the country that little bit better.
My view on politics is one of ambivalence. I guess the reason being is that I hold some left wing opinions but also have some conservative values. I guess I could be called a socialist conservative?
I guess that's what I was hoping from the LD a nice balance between the two... I'm definitely not a fan of extreme politics though I am definitely more down the middle, I like balance.Oh dear...
He was interviewed and answered questions.
This only shows that you have never really paid any attention to him before. He hasn't changed in his views whatsoever. You think he needs to do an interview with Paxman for publicity?? /palm
It also shows that you didn't actually listen to what he said.
There are an awful lot of males that don't like him and they are usually males that like to think they are 'alpha' in some way and react the same when another 'alpha' is present. (Sorry to say but yeah, it's jealousy) The others are usually people of the 'right wing' persuasion
He's said all this before.
I don't think he needs to do a Paxman interview for publicity, you can have your palm back, just careful where you place it. I know who he is, I've endured him on television many times, I find him absolutely vulgar, his humour distasteful and not particularly funny. He's off on a crusade like many celebs do I have no issue with that, good luck to him, what I do find curious is how people think he's some Messiah all of a sudden.
I'm not particularly alpha or have a need to exert my dominance over anybody, there are just some people I like and get on with, and others that I find abrasive. He is one of the latter. Now I'm sure off camera and in private he's probably a lot less extreme and "shouty" and probably tolerable to be around, I just find his persona absolutely grating.
Read my reply above.
And jealous? Why would I be jealous of him? Why are you making this personal? It's got nothing to do with him and I, I just don't agree with what he has to say. How does that make me jealous or insecure about myself? Just because I may be going against the grain of some of the opinions on him here, I think it's unfair for you to cast aspersions about me based on that. Besides I don't have the time to be jealous of people, I'm quite happy in my life.
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I like to have a motto on politics:
Why be left wing or right, when one can move forward?
Why be left wing or right, when one can move forward?
This was a highly satisfying takedown of that over-rated tabloid hack Paxman.
Brand demolished him in minutes. The rest was just dancing on his grave.
We were clearly watching different videos. There was no demolition of either side, Paxman tried to get more specific answers out of Brand and the rest was dancing around the questions.
Paxman was writhing like a constipated trout. Some of his questions were embarrassingly stupid:
'Is it true that you don't vote? Well, how do you get the authority to talk about politics, then?'
Gee, a non sequitur right off the bat! Utterly moronic. The man can't even open his mouth without committing a logical fallacy.
'Is it true that you don't vote? Well, how do you get the authority to talk about politics, then?'
Gee, a non sequitur right off the bat! Utterly moronic. The man can't even open his mouth without committing a logical fallacy.
![[FnG]magnolia](/styles/overclockers/avatars/9.png){kind=avatar}
Caporegime
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I like Brand but that was peer-between-the-fingers-and-feel-awkward viewing.
He's not a stupid man but he is often funny and he can string a sentence together well enough (the same one several times, if you watch that video closely).
His answers were as empty as most of the questions put to him.
He's not a stupid man but he is often funny and he can string a sentence together well enough (the same one several times, if you watch that video closely).
His answers were as empty as most of the questions put to him.
Um, what? If you're not going to vote, at least spoil your ballot. To not even be arsed to go to a polling station means he has absolutely no authority to talk about politics because he has excluded himself deliberately from the democratic process.
You are so off base and vocally so, it's really quite bizarre. :/
What did Brand actually say that was so amazing?
He basically just said life is unfair, the political system isnt that great and when asked how we could make it better he just shrugs his shoulders.
Brilliant : /
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His look-to-camera shot at the end of the interview is either terribly telling or not (it is terribly telling).
e : wakey wakey magnolia. Evangelion, hope you and yours are ok with the fires going on. Take care
e : wakey wakey magnolia. Evangelion, hope you and yours are ok with the fires going on. Take care
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You missed (and apparently everyone else in this thread) his freaky neck tango at the start....still he is the Messiah so is allowex such eccentricities.
I think he has much depth as a puddle...and is trolling everyone his rant had zero substance..ill admit he has got everyone hoodwinked..thinking he is some avante-garde hip political visionary with his cookie cutter wisdom...
Is he Bono? Does he follow through with his convictions my arse he does hes lording it up with champagne desecrating nature habitats with his loutish behaviour...
I think he has much depth as a puddle...and is trolling everyone his rant had zero substance..ill admit he has got everyone hoodwinked..thinking he is some avante-garde hip political visionary with his cookie cutter wisdom...
Is he Bono? Does he follow through with his convictions my arse he does hes lording it up with champagne desecrating nature habitats with his loutish behaviour...
I did wonder why Paxman had such a pained expression at times...
What did he say...? Paraphrase his ideologies for me please?
As far as I'm concerned he didn't say much.
I think perhaps the best way to describe the actor, comedian and writer Russell Brand is as "a Halloween-haired, Sachsgate-enacting, estuary-whining, glitter-lacquered, priapic berk... a tree-hugging, Hindu-tattooed, veggie meditator."
It's the best way, because it happens to be his own description of himself - in a 4,750-word revolutionary rant in this week's issue of the New Statesman, guest-edited by, you guessed, Russell Brand.
The Brand manifesto has caused quite a stir in some circles, not just because of his celebrity and skill in making waves, but because of a probably well-founded suspicion that his anger and contempt directed at the entire political class is widely shared among young people who care about the country they live in but see no way to do anything about it.
I imagine there are a lot of people who can identify with the Brand view of politics: "Like most people I regard politicians as frauds and liars and the current political system as nothing more than a bureaucratic means for furthering the augmentation and advantages of economic elites."
So I propose to take what he says seriously - which may be a mistake, but what the hell. A lot of it will be curiously familiar to anyone who remembers, as I do, the hippies of the 1960s: "Make love, not war... down with the man... Power to the people." Beguiling, attractive slogans, with their wonderful certainty that there are simple answers to complex questions.
What Brand says is not only daft but dangerous. It's dangerous because he is a clever man with influence, and when he says: "Apathy is a rational reaction to a system that no longer represents, hears or addresses the vast majority of people", there is a real risk that some people - especially young people - will take him seriously.
The core of his message is: "I will never vote and I don't think you should, either." He presents it as a message of hope, when in fact it is precisely the opposite. It is a message of despair.
Voting doesn't change anything? Tell that to the millions of Americans with no health insurance who, once the Obama administration have sorted out their IT problems, will, for the first time, have access to decent health care. They wouldn't have it if no one had bothered to vote.
Tell all those tens of thousands of British workers on the minimum wage (yes, I know, it's disgracefully inadequate, but it's still better than no minimum wage at all), introduced in the face of fierce opposition by a Labour government after the Blair victory of 1997. And it wouldn't have happened if no one had bothered to vote.
Tell the millions of black South Africans who voted for the ANC in 1994 and elected Nelson Mandela as their president. It wouldn't have happened if they hadn't bothered to vote.
Apathy is cowardice. It's a way of saying "I take no responsibility for what happens in my country." I can understand people being reluctant to vote because they feel a sense of disgust, but the rational reaction to that is not apathy, but to find candidates -- or become a candidate -- in whom one is more prepared to have faith.
Brand brands himself a revolutionary. "Revolt in whatever way we want, with the spontaneity of the London rioters, with the certainty and willingness to die of religious fundamentalists or with the twinkling mischief of the trickster... Take to the streets, together, with the understanding that the feeling that you aren't being heard or seen or represented isn't psychosis; it's government policy."
I wonder if he's noticed what's happening in Egypt, or Tunisia, or Libya, where hundreds of thousands of excited revolutionaries took to the streets to topple hated dictatorships. They achieved their goal - and then what? So far, it's not easy to argue that what has followed is any better than what went before. I would have thought that the lure of the barricades might have taken a bit of a knock - but perhaps careful consideration of other peoples' experiences is not Brand's style.
In a hilarious, but also deeply depressing, interview with Jeremy Paxman on Newsnight on Wednesday night, he demonstrated his utter inability to offer any concrete example of what he believes we should do instead of vote. He wants fundamental change but has no idea how to achieve it.
The closest he comes in his New Statesman manifesto is: "To genuinely make a difference, we must become different; make the tiny, longitudinal shift. Meditate, direct our love indiscriminately and our condemnation exclusively at those with power." At which point, I can merely offer another quote from the same piece: "First and foremost I want to have a ******* laugh."
Indeed. And here's what worries me most. If Russell Brand was content to be a highly successful comedian, a jester with a pig's bladder and bells on his multi-coloured hat, I'd leave him alone with his mashed-up mind and pantechnicon of platitudes. (Oh yes, I too can write as if I've swallowed a thesaurus - it's neither as difficult, nor as impressive, as Brand seems to think.)
But by writing thousands of words of political junk in a respected weekly magazine, he sets himself up as someone with something to contribute to an important debate. The truth is that he has nothing to contribute, other than the self-satisfied smirk of a man who knows he'll never go hungry or be without a home.
If he really wanted to encourage the development of a genuinely revolutionary movement, he would start organising one. He would knuckle down to do really, really boring things, like handing out leaflets on street corners, lanching petitions, holding meetings, just like the early trades unionists and labour activists he professes to admire so much.
But of course that's not what he's about. "First and foremost I want to have a ******* laugh." Which is fine, as long as no one is tempted, even for a moment, to take him seriously.
http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/rob...ngerous_b_4155341.html?utm_hp_ref=mostpopular
It's the best way, because it happens to be his own description of himself - in a 4,750-word revolutionary rant in this week's issue of the New Statesman, guest-edited by, you guessed, Russell Brand.
The Brand manifesto has caused quite a stir in some circles, not just because of his celebrity and skill in making waves, but because of a probably well-founded suspicion that his anger and contempt directed at the entire political class is widely shared among young people who care about the country they live in but see no way to do anything about it.
I imagine there are a lot of people who can identify with the Brand view of politics: "Like most people I regard politicians as frauds and liars and the current political system as nothing more than a bureaucratic means for furthering the augmentation and advantages of economic elites."
So I propose to take what he says seriously - which may be a mistake, but what the hell. A lot of it will be curiously familiar to anyone who remembers, as I do, the hippies of the 1960s: "Make love, not war... down with the man... Power to the people." Beguiling, attractive slogans, with their wonderful certainty that there are simple answers to complex questions.
What Brand says is not only daft but dangerous. It's dangerous because he is a clever man with influence, and when he says: "Apathy is a rational reaction to a system that no longer represents, hears or addresses the vast majority of people", there is a real risk that some people - especially young people - will take him seriously.
The core of his message is: "I will never vote and I don't think you should, either." He presents it as a message of hope, when in fact it is precisely the opposite. It is a message of despair.
Voting doesn't change anything? Tell that to the millions of Americans with no health insurance who, once the Obama administration have sorted out their IT problems, will, for the first time, have access to decent health care. They wouldn't have it if no one had bothered to vote.
Tell all those tens of thousands of British workers on the minimum wage (yes, I know, it's disgracefully inadequate, but it's still better than no minimum wage at all), introduced in the face of fierce opposition by a Labour government after the Blair victory of 1997. And it wouldn't have happened if no one had bothered to vote.
Tell the millions of black South Africans who voted for the ANC in 1994 and elected Nelson Mandela as their president. It wouldn't have happened if they hadn't bothered to vote.
Apathy is cowardice. It's a way of saying "I take no responsibility for what happens in my country." I can understand people being reluctant to vote because they feel a sense of disgust, but the rational reaction to that is not apathy, but to find candidates -- or become a candidate -- in whom one is more prepared to have faith.
Brand brands himself a revolutionary. "Revolt in whatever way we want, with the spontaneity of the London rioters, with the certainty and willingness to die of religious fundamentalists or with the twinkling mischief of the trickster... Take to the streets, together, with the understanding that the feeling that you aren't being heard or seen or represented isn't psychosis; it's government policy."
I wonder if he's noticed what's happening in Egypt, or Tunisia, or Libya, where hundreds of thousands of excited revolutionaries took to the streets to topple hated dictatorships. They achieved their goal - and then what? So far, it's not easy to argue that what has followed is any better than what went before. I would have thought that the lure of the barricades might have taken a bit of a knock - but perhaps careful consideration of other peoples' experiences is not Brand's style.
In a hilarious, but also deeply depressing, interview with Jeremy Paxman on Newsnight on Wednesday night, he demonstrated his utter inability to offer any concrete example of what he believes we should do instead of vote. He wants fundamental change but has no idea how to achieve it.
The closest he comes in his New Statesman manifesto is: "To genuinely make a difference, we must become different; make the tiny, longitudinal shift. Meditate, direct our love indiscriminately and our condemnation exclusively at those with power." At which point, I can merely offer another quote from the same piece: "First and foremost I want to have a ******* laugh."
Indeed. And here's what worries me most. If Russell Brand was content to be a highly successful comedian, a jester with a pig's bladder and bells on his multi-coloured hat, I'd leave him alone with his mashed-up mind and pantechnicon of platitudes. (Oh yes, I too can write as if I've swallowed a thesaurus - it's neither as difficult, nor as impressive, as Brand seems to think.)
But by writing thousands of words of political junk in a respected weekly magazine, he sets himself up as someone with something to contribute to an important debate. The truth is that he has nothing to contribute, other than the self-satisfied smirk of a man who knows he'll never go hungry or be without a home.
If he really wanted to encourage the development of a genuinely revolutionary movement, he would start organising one. He would knuckle down to do really, really boring things, like handing out leaflets on street corners, lanching petitions, holding meetings, just like the early trades unionists and labour activists he professes to admire so much.
But of course that's not what he's about. "First and foremost I want to have a ******* laugh." Which is fine, as long as no one is tempted, even for a moment, to take him seriously.
http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/rob...ngerous_b_4155341.html?utm_hp_ref=mostpopular
Soldato
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You have no idea do you? lol, Yes it would cause a massive uproar and would take years to sort out, BUT ITS NEEDED.
Simply the current system is flawed, is it right 1% have it all and the rest dont ? course not, but it will stay that way unless 'devastation' is done, the 1% cannot fight back if 99 decide they have had enough.
I'm not talking violence here im simply saying if we all halted our bank accounts and stopped paying the 1% ANYTHING, they would be well and truly stuck, the entire idea of '3 party politics' that brand spoke of needs to be totally stopped, and he's right, build a new central goverment in a modern clinical building that follows logic and science for the entire greater good and something useful would happen - turn the houses of parliament into a tourist attraction, put it in history where it belongs, otherwise NOTHING will change, humanity, the Earth and UK will forever be stuck arguing over things that don't really matter.
We are a species on a limited planet, A LOT of people seem to forget this, and just look at what they are used to.
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If people can't be arsed to Vote..Then they are certainly not going to revolt!
As said in that article:
"If he really wanted to encourage the development of a genuinely revolutionary movement, he would start organising one. He would knuckle down to do really, really boring things, like handing out leaflets on street corners, lanching petitions, holding meetings, just like the early trades unionists and labour activists he professes to admire so much."
FFS I mean people can't even be arsed to switch power providers as they can't be bothered saving themselves 20 quid a year...If everyone shifted then this would make a statement at least.
Same with banks...people can't be bothered to move if they don't like their banks.
Fact is...if you want to change something you change it. Not just pussy foot and rant about it.
I cancelled Sky TV on principle...but people still soak up that BS and pay for something they can ultimately get for free
I moved Banks
I move car insurance as I was getting stiffed.
Not doing anything is not revolution...its apathy.
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Soldato
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Well we'll have to agree to disagree on it being a debate and how he dealt with the issues. Shouting loudly at a camera using pointless multi-syllable words in a faux sense of being erudite about a subject adds nothing to the argument for me I'm afraid. However, everyone is different, unlike others in this thread, I shan't call people morons or idiots for agreeing with him or enjoying his diatribe - I'm sure I like stupid and pointless things that other people don't. Again it's a skew on opinion.
I did pay attention (as much as it pained me) - we've discussed the revolution idea, and the problem is, the people who will join in this revolution will not no what or why they're doing it, because (un)fortunately the people that will pay attention to the Brands of this world tend to be the people he was talking about... however, as you say perhaps that's what is needed - I personally don't feel a change is necessary at the moment, sure there are some things that need sorting, but you know what? Britain is slowly digging itself out of recession, crime isn't getting worse. However, yes, house pricing, gas/electricity/fuel is still a major issue that needs to be addressed.
The bread line? Hmmm well I'm not convinced on that, I'm all for offering people help if they've put into the system, and just need a boost to get out of the hole they're in, but at the same time I do not want to admonish those that are brave enough to step into the breach and work that little bit harder and take those risks to make themselves/their businesses/and ultimately the country that little bit better.
My view on politics is one of ambivalence. I guess the reason being is that I hold some left wing opinions but also have some conservative values. I guess I could be called a socialist conservative?
snip
I take your points, however, im assuming you have a life of plenty, a good job and a nice house - right ?
Well, most people have somewhere to live, to me it seems people get stuck in comparison.
However, maybe your part of the 1% possibly the 2%, and don't wanna change that and fear change.
I am all for more human equality (at the 'sacrifice' of anything I have), I lead a blessed life also.
However this MASSIVE government and corporate disparity over the nation is just disgusting, frankly. I agree with him 'profit' is a dirty word.
The companies should make a limited profit, sure enough for all the staff to have a great life, but to sit on billions ? NO, monitor that the staff a very fairly treated (hell give them a million each for the top few) then take the rest in tax and put it back RESPONSIBLY into the nation.
Do useful things with it like medical research, food research, space capability (Hawking is also correct - the planet is limited and were getting very close to that limit)
Do all this and humanity will move forward.
Soldato
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I'm ALMOST tempted to do this myself, but how far would an unknown person get? Id eventually get arrested for inciting 'terrorism' .........these laws are also another example of how the 1% control the 99%, if you can't see it, then I can't explain it to you, cuz it happens right in front of everyone's eyes. Just most say 'meh' or 'so' or 'just get on with life' because nearly no one can do anything about it, sucks huh, modern slavery,lol.
Humanity cannot move forward under this model.