"Capitalism is killing music"

Some time ago, at my quarterly "Fellas Weekend" (where me and my three best buddies get together for a getaway weekend) I noticed a CD one pal brought with him: "Worker's Playtime" by Billy Bragg. What caught my attention was the little blurb at the bottom of the CD case: "Capitalism is Killing Music." (You can view the CD here, but the blurb is a little fuzzy.) And, here's an example of Bragg's politics as noted in the song "The Price of Oil":

Saddam killed his own people
just like general Pinochet
and once upon a time both these evil men
were supported by the U.S.A.
and whisper it, even Bin Laden
once drank from America’s cup
just like that election down in Florida
this shit doesn’t all add up
it’s all about the price of oil
‘cause it’s all about the price of oil
don’t give me no shit
about blood, sweat, tears and toil
it’s all about the price of oil

I'll address Bragg's [mis]interpretations of the song here in a sec. But first, an examination of the "Capitalism is Killing Music" inanity. How exactly does capitalism "kill" music? Or, to rephrase this, how would Bragg's beloved socialism make music flourish? The answer is, it wouldn't. The very system that Bragg detests makes music flourish! Capitalism allows the market for various types of music -- Bragg's included -- to exist. Private enterprise allows bands to form, recording studios to record, and record companies to produce music -- of all types. What would Bragg's system allow? Centralized production of music? How would that work, exactly? Centralized production of music ultimately means music allowed by the state. If Bragg's music was deemed "inappropriate" by the state, isn't his music "killed?" Contrariwise, isn't there a niche for his (or anyone's) music in the capitalist free market?

"I think firstly, we're in a post-ideological period. They may come back again, different ideologies, but we're definitely in a post-Marxist period and the language of Marxism doesn't offer us a language in which for us to talk to people anymore," says Bragg.

It always cracks me up that people who gain success via the capitalist free market doing what they love to do, then gain some kind of "superior knowledge" that enables them to "see" the "benefits" of Marxism and socialism. But this is why: Their newfound notoriety and popularity gives them a sense of superiority over you and me. They somehow know better than us. Guys like Bragg who legitimately recognize various inequities in life somehow then ridiculously advocate a system which will only make such inequities worse. Real life history apparently doesn't mean a thing to these newfound geniuses.

As seen in the song lyrics above, General Augusto Pinochet is the darling of the Gucci left crowd. Yes, Pinochet illegally took power with the assistance of the United States after Salvador Allende, a socialist, won election in Chile in the early 1970s. Americans should never have supported this move by the US, especially since Allende won in a free election -- which the US professes to encourage worldwide. Amazingly, however, the Left -- which always purports to be the vanguard on issues of human rights and "social justice" -- says hardly a word about the communist/socialist dictators which came to power via armed insurrection and hold such power via armed force. Y'know, people like Lenin. Stalin. Castro. Mao. Pot. Mugabe. Comparing Pinochet to these killers is like comparing a firecracker to an A-bomb.

In addition, I am continually flummoxed at how these suddenly knowledgeable folk seem to forget that the world was quite a different place when the U.S. supported Saddam and bin Laden. It was called the "Cold War." Geopolitics change, after all.

Without casting the blame on consumerism and the threat of global capitalism, Billy Bragg argues that the demise of ideology lies in the inability to clearly communicate with everyday folk.

Why doesn't Marxism offer us a language anymore, Bragg? Because it was bankrupt in the first place. The so-called "inability to communicate clearly with folk" is a cop-out. It's probably that folks think your message is bullshit.

"If you say to someone, ‘What kind of society do you want to live in?' and you say to them ‘I want to live in a compassionate society,' people understand that; everyday people understand that," says Bragg. "If you say ‘I want to live in a socialist society,' what does that mean? You have to have another five paragraphs or footnotes. And if you need that, then your language is fucked. If you can't speak in the language of compassion, or what we refer to at the gig as socialism of the heart, then you need to be out looking at new ways of articulating it."

"Socialism of the heart"? Capitalism relies on exactly this -- the generosity of average people for their fellow man. If Bragg wants to demand of everyone generosity, then he has achieved true socialism -- forced "generosity" in the guise of confiscatory taxes to "care" for everyone, and cradle-to-grave state care in every aspect of life. This isn't compassion. This is state-imposed mediocrity. It is Big Brother watching you and "caring" for you. Want to get ahead in life? Sorry -- that's "unfair" to your fellow man. Work harder than your colleague? Sorry -- extra rewards for hard work and motivation are "unfair" to others who do not do such/possess such.

(Selected quotes are from here.)

UPDATE (12/29 at 9:40am): As noted in the comments here, David Gertsman offers up an article that Bragg really ought to read!

Posted by Hube at December 27, 2005 03:36 PM | TrackBack