Funny this should come up today.
My YouTube algorithm has been going through a bit of a “you should be watching more people shouting about politics” phase. As part of all this it recommended me a video of Russell Brand talking about an interview he had on Fox with Tucker Carlson. 
, I thought. What is Russell “progressive lefty shoutface” Brand doing talking to Tucker Carlson? Turns out he was finding out that he has a lot in common with old Carlson and was very enthusiastic about teaming up with lots of very right wing Americans to take on those awful bastards at Big Pharma and those terrible Centralised Power Structures (Newscorp anyone?).
I thought to myself, “what a naive prick”. It just shows yet again how easily the “progressive” mindset can turn into a conspiratorial one, and that that usually only ends one way. I was reminded of the time I watched the first couple of Zeitgeist films. I remember how they started off with this narrative of how corruption has permeated our society and Capitalism is bad and all that stuff that most of us kind of agree with. Then they started with the 9/11 shit and I was out. Because there’s far more obvious and real examples of corruption and conspiracy to get angry about. Using 9/11 was an immediate red flag to me that the people behind Zeitgeist aren’t to be taken seriously.
Karl Marx told us what was wrong with Capitalism 150 years ago. His disciples also showed us how many people you’ll have to kill to get rid of it. And it’s this uncomfortable reality that the left has never been able to reconcile, as how can you be the good guys and do what needs to be done. It’s this part that the people behind Zeitgeist are pretending they can fix, that people like Tucker Carlson pretend they care about (along with telling women what they can and can’t do with their own bodies).
Brand got a lot of stick during his very public political awakening a few years ago, because he started telling people not to vote, but was unable to offer any sort of coherent alternative beyond constantly pointing out the problems we all already know about. He kind of became a personification of the left in the 21st century, lots of finger waving, lots of moralising, but not much in the way of solutions. It is this search for some sort of a solution that has led Brand into the arms of the American right wing and it is that same search in all of us who might think ourselves progressives that can lead us down the conspiratorial, somewhat alternative reality being offered by the people behind Zeitgeist.
Anyone who tells you we can destroy capitalism without the blood of millions on our hands is lying to you. What Zeitgeist is offering us is more of the same, but with a different set of hands on the tiller.
