Those wacky Brits are at it again, this time with a local Arts Council sponsoring a teenage band contest, provided that the teens sing protest songs:
I’m here to watch 13 aspiring rock gods audition for Build a Band, a competition run by the Arts Council charity Youth Music offering teenagers the chance to play on stage at Glastonbury. The group – some nervous, some so self-assured as to beggar belief – have already been sifted from roughly 300 applicants who submitted songs for consideration, but today they will be reduced to five.
Chosen for their musical aptitude and “ability to articulate a clear interest in protest”, the winners will perform as a group for the first time on the first day of the festival, after spending two hours a day writing and practising their own modern-day protest song. They will be mentored and coached by Billy Bragg, young troubadour Get Cape Wear Cape Fly, and Jerry Dammers, the founder of the Specials, before eventually playing on the Left Field stage on Sunday evening, in between Get Cape and Bragg’s sets.
You might at this point be wondering about the wisdom of putting adolescent rhetoric on stage. But Kevin the Teenager it ain’t. Leafing through the entries, I am struck by their eloquence and lucidity. “It can be hard to tell whether pharmaceutical companies really care about our welfare or just about the money they are making… It’s frankly staggering how many people die because someone is afraid to say ‘I was wrong’… planetary destruction is mankind’s selfish pursuit of superficial satisfaction… War is such a tragic waste of life. Less fighting, more talking.”
Autism, dyslexia, the failing education system, the separation of church and state in American politics, binge drinking, the nanny state, Somme heroes – the list of subjects goes on.
It’s good to see a government program that’s gone beyond teaching kids just to hate their country and is instead encouraging them to whine and be angry about everything.
Filed under: Britain
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Autism, dyslexia, the failing education system, the separation of church and state in American politics
if this is Britain, why do they have a subject on American politics?
Todays pimpled face whiner tomorrows wrinkled face blogger.
Is it me, or does anyone else notice that the most vicious, bellicose, hateful people on the planet are anti-war protesters and those involved with the human rights industry?
I wonder if one of the topics for the Perpetually Outraged, Oppressed People is this one: “The helplessness of the average Brit in defending himself against the criminals and British thought police?”
What do you expect from a country that doesn’t want to offend muslims by teaching actual history. Anne Frank is rolling in her grave right now.
If they get their way, the imperialist Arabizers will erase her from history. Thanks to the obsequious preemptive appeasers in Britain, they are well on their way to doing just that, Greg.