Here's another case of a well known comedian asking to be taken seriously. This time it's Russell Brand, who's been doing that an awful lot in recent years. (Actually, he seems much more interested in becoming a public intellectual and activist more than an entertainer!)
His latest cause is to try and save Bali Nine drug smugglers Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran from execution in Indonesia. It's hardly surprising that he would take this position. He's a leftie, after all, and a reformed drug addict himself.
And he certainly keeps trading off the image of the drug using hedonist, dressing flamboyantly -- more like a rock star than a comedian. A lot of his fans are hipsters and stoners and others with a generally permissive attitude to drug use.
His latest cause is to try and save Bali Nine drug smugglers Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran from execution in Indonesia. It's hardly surprising that he would take this position. He's a leftie, after all, and a reformed drug addict himself.
And he certainly keeps trading off the image of the drug using hedonist, dressing flamboyantly -- more like a rock star than a comedian. A lot of his fans are hipsters and stoners and others with a generally permissive attitude to drug use.
These Aussie blokes are going to be killed soon for a bit of daft drug smuggling (they've done 10 yrs already) HELP! http://t.co/LRxs6JBteR
— Russell Brand (@rustyrockets) April 11, 2015
But the irony is that Brand himself has beaten his addictions to drugs and alcohol (and good on him for that). So his take on it seems kind of dishonest to me. If you want to call smuggling drugs daft, as if it's harmless, then why stop taking those drugs yourself, particularly when you trade off the coolness they evoke?
This is the politically correct double standard you see everywhere in entertainment industry. A lethal scourge is trivialized, while severe punishment for spreading it is condemned. (By the way I agree that execution is too harsh a punishment for what they did. But I still think it was vile, and the drugs they smuggled would have killed more than two people in the end.)
And that's the ugly truth that gets ignored by Brand and so many other entertainer/activists. Drugs surely kill more people than capital punishment does. And these victims are innocent. Guilty of drug use, sure. But not guilty of selling, surely a more serious crime.
Brand himself believes we should treat addicts not as bad people but as sick people. Then the drug trade kills only sick people. Surely that makes it worse than those who are killing the bad people who exploit the sick?
This is the politically correct double standard you see everywhere in entertainment industry. A lethal scourge is trivialized, while severe punishment for spreading it is condemned. (By the way I agree that execution is too harsh a punishment for what they did. But I still think it was vile, and the drugs they smuggled would have killed more than two people in the end.)
And that's the ugly truth that gets ignored by Brand and so many other entertainer/activists. Drugs surely kill more people than capital punishment does. And these victims are innocent. Guilty of drug use, sure. But not guilty of selling, surely a more serious crime.
Brand himself believes we should treat addicts not as bad people but as sick people. Then the drug trade kills only sick people. Surely that makes it worse than those who are killing the bad people who exploit the sick?
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