“The reason you feel bad is because you live in a shitty society, that’s not really discussed anymore…” It’s certainly something that should be, a lot of us who think we are depressed, anxious or just in bad mental health probably aren’t, we just live in a shit world where we are told that the problem is us. I’m taking that thinking into my daily life; I’m not sick, the world is just shit.

@richsan4923

Жыл бұрын

David Smail wrote a series of books about this as a phycologist well worth looking up!

@robertsolem9234

Жыл бұрын

It's very convenient for concentrations of power to have everyone taking "personal responsibility" for "their issues"; everyone is kept occupied with the demons in their head, rather than going out into the world and addressing the things that created these demons in the first place.

@monkeydotbizness

Жыл бұрын

If you’re depressed and anxious and feeling alienated it’s likely you’re perceiving the world for the pile of shit that it generally is.

@chingadapistolero

Жыл бұрын

I think that's probably a very healthy approach!

@GuinessOriginal

Жыл бұрын

Apparently it’s not so bad in Holland and Denmark, amongst other places

We don't understand what the Russians went through 30 years ago but we still don't understand what the Russians went through in WW2. In Britain, it's like, oh we had the Blitz, weren't those doodlebugs terrible, weren't the king and queen marvellous and Churchill won the war. In Russia 28 million people died.

@PauliusTautvydas

Жыл бұрын

Russians have started the war and got a bit of their own medicine.

@GuinessOriginal

Жыл бұрын

The British who lived and fought through the war did to a certain extent, Russians had the sympathy of that generation. The real problem is the Americans who don’t understand and don’t care. Russia’s feels threatened and the longer this goes on the more likely it is to end in nuclear war

@PauliusTautvydas

Жыл бұрын

​@@GuinessOriginal you fail to understand Russia so much, that your yapping about "Americans who don't understand" something seems like just some kind of bad satire. But then again, apologism of corrupt, falling empire is what some middle aged, ultraconservative Brits like you can do best. Can't go back to crying about your own misunderstood empire, eh?

@GuinessOriginal

Жыл бұрын

@@PauliusTautvydas I’m a 24 year old Irish Republican, so you’re way off the mark. Typical American, not a clue about anything or anyone outside their state.

@PauliusTautvydas

Жыл бұрын

@@GuinessOriginal yeah well, then you're one hell of a lost 24 year old British (I don't really care whether it's Ireland or Wales) Republican. Don't drink so much beer and maybe you won't buy that deep into imperialist propaganda. That'll be good both for your physical and psychological health.

I could listen to Adam Curtis all day. He affirms our fears and confusion, gives us reasons for why we feel this way instead of telling us to feel different, and re-focuses and clarifies the whole situation. Great interview Joe!

@benfennell6842

Жыл бұрын

Listen to voices that challenge and reinforce your ideas: not just one. People who tell you exactly what you want to hear arent automatically better to be listening to: even if they are right.

@casteretpollux

9 ай бұрын

Listen to Jeffrey Sachs too

It's a parallel I noticed while reading about the final decades of the USSR. In the USSR older generations who prospered after WW2 where more pro communism than those born in the late 1960s and onwards who knew nothing but stagnation. In the UK people 31 or younger have only known working in an economy thats going nowhere.

@olivercuenca4109

Жыл бұрын

Yeah, it's the distinction between upper case 'Conservatism' - i.e. the ideology, and lower case c 'conservatism', where even if the government claims to be left wing, it can still fall into the trap of becoming the Establishment if it hangs around long enough. In the USSR I suppose that stuff probably goes back to Stalin.

@ascendedbro1828

Жыл бұрын

There was no stagnation lol. Stagnation is what happened after the collapse of USSR

@themsmloveswar3985

Жыл бұрын

Well....that is the objective.....relentless wage repression.

@ineshvaladolenc6559

Жыл бұрын

As odd as this sounds, people were more pro-communism under Lenin and Stalin, as vilified as they are in the contemporary Western media. It was the Khrushchevites and other revisionists, with their "de-Stalinisation" which took a working union and slowly ran it into the ground. Eventually as result of continuous renouncement of Stalin, an ideological vacuum occurred. People began to reject communism altogether. Coupled with economic stagnation, a cynicism gripped over the Soviet society. Eventually that culminated in the breakdown of the system, and replacement with a new, Western inspired capitalism and democracy... And it failed miserably, giving rise to the oligarchs, mostly older party functionaries who looted state assets and profited over the suffering of others. Both the fanatical Marxism and Bolshevism of the early 20th century, as well as starry eyed liberal idealism of the late 20th century failed Russia. This is why the current iteration of Russia is non-ideological. It is socially conservative as per old Russian tradition, and economically close to European style social democracy, except with more oligarchs but who are not allowed to interfere in politics as per the arrangement with Putin.

@Muzikman127

9 ай бұрын

@@ascendedbro1828 no, after the collapse of the USSR there wasn't stagnation, there was rapid, brutal, massive decline, and destruction. That's much much worse than stagnation

Adam Curtis is an archive wizard, and arguably the most important filmmaker alive.

@johndavies5985

Жыл бұрын

He's good but hold on, he's not that good. Oliver Stone and Ken Loach are better.

@richardallan2767

Жыл бұрын

Certainly the best documentary maker,

@adsyoffinch

Жыл бұрын

@@johndavies5985 they’re a different kind aren’t they? They tell stories that represent society, Curtis disembowels society and presents you with all the bloody, gory horror that boils away beneath the surface of the real world. Loach shows you a powerful representation, Curtis shows you the reality.

@Elcore

Жыл бұрын

@@richardallan2767 Slow down - no one's managed to lethally shoot Werner Herzog yet, despite numerous attempts.

@annakissed3226

Жыл бұрын

Adam your question as to the way forward has been answered many, many times before. Its the answer to the paradox of the need for both individualality & belonging. It is antithesis of autocracy. Autocracy comes not just from the extreme right and the extreme left but also from the extreme middle Autocracy comes from desire for certainty, a need to know that their is an underlying structure, a science of understanding, a need to find the purest essence that explains everything, of testing people for their purity. To seeking the one, typically a man, who can like God (another human meme) lead us all What is the inverse of that? What is its antithesis? It starts with diversity but builds on that diversity by teaching everybody how to lead. Its in leadership that we gather people and resources around us and strike out to achieve a goal. But the point is that its not leaders & followers. Its only leaders, So take this now, what your doing right now, right here! Your taking leadership in this & I am lending you some resources & insight & it might be helping, but its up to you to decide if needs to be included or not - because YOU ARE THE LEADER and I'm too busy doing my own projects to have the time or tuits/spoons to put into this your project. The idea of everyone as leaders is as old as the hills. It stands at the core of consious raising movements. At the start of the black & base civil rights movements and the LGBTQIA+ movements and Of Age & disability rights movements. Its not new and there multiple courses in how to make these things happen over decades A really useful set of tools can be found in the re-evaluation co- counseling community But their are others all over the place and lots of people have been trained in them So a lot of the work has been done it just needs to be written large in our schools, along with how to do critical thinking. And changing our schools so that you do your classroom teaching from well produced videos dispatched to anyone via the Web but the homework & discussion of the ideas & the writing of papers in class with everybody else. You can even have the classes filled with pupils learning with each other but on different things at their own rates coming together in virtual classrooms where the students are people from across the country working together to solve that module. The point is this provides a sense of collectivness of us all coming together to sacrifice & learn together Whilst providing maximum diversity in what you choose to learn for your benefit.

Adam Curtis is one of the few Westerners who actually understand how the Soviet bloc disintegrated. I'm saying this as a person who was on the wrong side of the Iron Curtain at that time.

@jonnysupreme

Жыл бұрын

Debating which side is worse tbh 😆

@earthman6700

Жыл бұрын

@@jonnysupreme We have the resources to provide a relatively modern lifestyle for almost everyone. A 'Community' Political system might be it. Rather than appealing to certain elements of society. Sounds a bit like communism...

@aluisious

Жыл бұрын

@@jonnysupreme The Western side is the one that is doing the heavy lifting when it comes to destroying the world for future generations.

@kisfekete

Жыл бұрын

​@@jonnysupreme Such relativism is the luxury of Western populations who either lived a rather sheltered existence in the past 40-50 years or were not even alive at the time. For the people there, at that place and at that time, there was no debate. Eastern Europe was the side worse off. Period. That's why the whole system collapsed completely, like a wet turd castle, and that is why it it could not be saved neither by the usual political reform-and-consolidate measures (like it happened in Hungary, or with Gorbachev) nor by military force (like in Romania, or the 1991 coup in the Soviet Union).

@M20RUM

Жыл бұрын

& I agree - as someone who has travelled and witnessed the fallout from that.

I’ve been watching the Traumazone (all 7 episodes) all Sunday night long. I live in Russia all my life, I am 33, but I am still in such shock that I can’t sleep normally the second night. Can’t stop thinking about everything. Learning the history and listen to the elders opinions is one thing… but now I’ve got a feeling that I experienced all this horror and I'm just sad and endlessly hurt.

@manucnbiaelmaturana2754

Жыл бұрын

Do you still live in Russia now?

@rogink

Жыл бұрын

I'd be interested to learn what younger Russians like you learnt about the Soviet system. It seems that a lot of older Russians think back with nostalgia of those days, even if at the time, they enviously looked to the West for all its wonderful consumer goods. They crave the stability of a strong leader. Even if life was very dull, it was predictable. Were you told about the food shortages and queues for bread in the 80s? Or the political prisoners and the Gulag system? Of even Soviet foreign policy and its proxy wars in Africa?

@ThickRedPaste

Жыл бұрын

@@rogink The Gulags were a Stalinist idea, not communism

@rogink

Жыл бұрын

@@ThickRedPaste Who cares whose idea they were? They happened in the Soviet Union. Are you saying Russians shouldn't learn about their history under the Soviet system?

@ThickRedPaste

Жыл бұрын

@@rogink No, I was saying that you can’t put the responsibility of millions of deaths on an ideology (unless we were talking about Nazi’s) it’s the people that execute and have biases that are to blame. Edit: And when you say “learning history” you probably don’t know what to point out. You can’t say that a biased and one sided report is history.

Many thanks to Adam Curtis for putting this series together. I'd been getting increasingly annoyed with the way the BBC (and other UK media) report every belch and hiccup that happens in US politics as if it's of worldwide importance, but doesn't give even a hundredth of that coverage to other major nations. Watching "TraumaZone," it was fascinating to compare what was unfolding on-screen with my own understanding, gleaned from the UK media, of the history of what happened in Russia during that period, and the motivations of the key players - and discovering how utterly deficient it was. Gorbachev, for example, I recall being portrayed as a great reformer, the man who took Russia out of Communism; a guy the West could do business with, and therefore a "good guy." And then there's "TraumaZone" telling me Gorbachev was in fact attempting to save Communism - the opposite of the image I'd been given. Yeltsin, I realised, was portrayed in Western media as nothing more than a drunkard. But watching "TraumaZone" I realised what a Trump/BoJo-like character he was, and that Russia had "gone there" with its own Trump long before the US had theirs, and the UK had their Britain-Trump. In fact, the whole series actually left me wondering whether Russia had been some experimental test-bed for all sorts of social experiments that have since been applied to the West, e.g. what happens if we let Capitalism run riot, completely unfettered? What happens if we make the people wary of democracy by showing them that democracy, as a system, can produce these crazy wildcard leaders? Anyway, a fascinating series and many thanks for the education it provided :)

The most important filmmaker Britain has had for many years

@nodisalsi

Жыл бұрын

…who wasn't censored like Pater Watkins was. (RIP)

@petrichor649

Жыл бұрын

And maybe the most interesting.

@MrVas78

Жыл бұрын

He is but no one watches his stuff...that’s the problem. Too busy staring at immigration policies

@david-spliso1928

Жыл бұрын

@@MrVas78 Illegal immigration by economic migrants. Seriously unfair on legal immigrants and refugees.

@MrVas78

Жыл бұрын

@@david-spliso1928 home office problem, tax funded so it’s on them to sort out not for grifters to politicise based on bigotry

Adam “and then something strange happened” Curtis. Love his films especially Hypernormalisation.

@notgarybrown

Жыл бұрын

I even read it in his voice 🤣

@benday1218

Жыл бұрын

'but that was a fantasy, instead.....'

@ennesshay5040

Жыл бұрын

From 2016 ~ the 1min 43sec ''The Coming War on China - a film by John Pilger - Official Trailer.'' Pause it at the 1.18 mark !!! Plus ( from Dec 2021 ) ''Shocking LBC Debate Shows New Cold War with China,'' the 14.37 video by Novara Media.

@Elcore

Жыл бұрын

But they were all wrong.

@bigeddiespaghetti5618

Жыл бұрын

“A new wave of intellectuals with optimistic outlooks arose”

Honestly some of the most optimistic analysis I've heard in a long time. The fact that nobody actually really has a clue about what is going on, means we can still do something about it, if we actually start thinking and working together.

@malloc7108

Жыл бұрын

The bit 20 minutes in about collective responsibility and looking out for one another is surprisingly optimistic.

@Bhodisatvas

Жыл бұрын

From the birth of human consciousness and the unfathomable amount of minds that have existed on this planet not one of them have been able to say for certain or have any clue as to what the hell is going on and what existence is. We are born ignorant and die ignorant and spend our short time here in bewilderment...just enjoy the scenery.

@adamnouiguer3430

Жыл бұрын

@@Bhodisatvas London Calling to the faraway towns Now war is declared and battle comes down London Calling to the underworld Come out of the cupboard, you boys and girls Etc Etc, I can't be bothered to write it all down.

@HominisLupis

Жыл бұрын

Lol

@Alison-LoveAndUnity

Жыл бұрын

The Green Party does and Corbyn did but hey our so called democracies ensure neither of those will ever be allowed near power.

Curtis is the Picasso of our troubled times. His work should be obligatory watching in schools but if they were it could very well cause a revolution. I have been watching Curtis documentaries for decades now, some of them I have seen several times and each time I watch them I still discover something new. That's how deep his work goes.

@grahamberrie2462

Жыл бұрын

Great comment, totally agree

@miyojewoltsnasonth2159

Жыл бұрын

*From Wikipedia:* "In a departure from his usual style, Curtis opted not to use voiceovers or non-diegetic music. Curtis, in a piece in The Guardian, explained this choice was because the footage was 'so strong that I didn’t want to intrude pointlessly, but rather let viewers simply experience what was happening'." I was bored to tears. Am I the only one who *absolutely loves* Adam Curtis but *didn't give a rat's ass* about _TraumaZone?_ *What exactly does everybody actually like about **_TraumaZone?_*

@artconsciousness

Жыл бұрын

@@miyojewoltsnasonth2159 If someone doest get "TraumaZone" then they don't get it. May be later they will. Anyone who grew up in those turbulent time though will have not trouble getting it. This is history shown in a way it should be shown. From the perspective of the eyes of the people rather than through the eyes of the news media or professors of history.

@CatnamedMittens

Жыл бұрын

That implies that people know of an alternative, which they don't.

@jimbob-robob

Жыл бұрын

Picasso? Don't you mean Henri Cartier-Bresson or Don McCullin?

How on earth have I just discovered via this video that Adam Curtis has a new documentary out. This should be promoted EVERYWHERE! This may be the best thing the BBC releases this year...

@Espacemtl

Жыл бұрын

My thought exactly!

@miyojewoltsnasonth2159

Жыл бұрын

*From Wikipedia:* "In a departure from his usual style, Curtis opted not to use voiceovers or non-diegetic music. Curtis, in a piece in The Guardian, explained this choice was because the footage was 'so strong that I didn’t want to intrude pointlessly, but rather let viewers simply experience what was happening'." I was bored to tears. Am I the only one who *absolutely loves* Adam Curtis but *didn't give a rat's ass* about _TraumaZone?_ *What exactly does everybody actually like about **_TraumaZone?_*

from the power of nightmares to Bitter lake (notseen his last few yet) this man has single handedily taught me more than ANY person i have ever known

@miyojewoltsnasonth2159

Жыл бұрын

Agreed. And interesting you stopped at _Bitter Lake._

@miyojewoltsnasonth2159

Жыл бұрын

*From Wikipedia:* "In a departure from his usual style, Curtis opted not to use voiceovers or non-diegetic music. Curtis, in a piece in The Guardian, explained this choice was because the footage was 'so strong that I didn’t want to intrude pointlessly, but rather let viewers simply experience what was happening'." I was bored to tears. Am I the only one who *absolutely loves* Adam Curtis but *didn't give a rat's ass* about _TraumaZone?_ *What exactly does everybody actually like about **_TraumaZone?_*

@lolcatjunior

Жыл бұрын

You should really watch his other series they are just as good or even better.

@gfarrell80

Жыл бұрын

Century of Self, Hypernormalization, and Can't Get You Out of My Head are IMHO his best.

@voltydequa845

Жыл бұрын

As you can see from some comments, the admirers are limited to just admiring. Have a talk, on concrete topics, and you'll see that cognitive quality does not correspond to the quality of admiration.

I worked as a CBT in IAPTS for ten years and I can completely concur with what they are saying about well being and mental heath. It’s spot on. We were just papering over the cracks. One of the best summations of the current state of the world/country I’ve heard. Excellent

Corbyn offered an alternative but he scared those who own most of the assets so much, they had to destroy him

@Ballardian

Жыл бұрын

Yep, Corbyn was the UK's last chance of having something resembling a humane government. It won't happen again.

I'm paraphrasing, but 'We don't realise what it was like for millions of Russians thirty years ago.' is a fantastic start to this video!

@octavianpopescu4776

Жыл бұрын

As an Eastern European, I would also add "And both the West and the Russians don't realise what it was like for us." What I mean by that is that our Eastern European experience is closer to countries like those in Africa and Russia was a version of what the Western empires were for Africans and Indians and other people. I'll never forget the Kenyan ambassador to the UN talk about his country and telling Russia what's what... He understood what was happening, because his country lived through what we lived in the East.

@KW-hk2jd

Жыл бұрын

Exactly. Boo hoo Russia - a lot of other countries have gone through Much worse so suck it.

@djd8305

Жыл бұрын

@@octavianpopescu4776 I agree. Russian Communism was a destructive force. On top of Russia being ruled with an iron fist before Lenin and his gang took over, I read a comment somewhere that Russia was the worst country in which to try Communism as it was a rural/agrarian society not urban/industrial. So from the start the Communist Party had it wrong.

@djd8305

Жыл бұрын

@@KW-hk2jd No. I meant that it was a bad thing. I've travelled a lot - including traveling through Iran in 2019, and one sure thing is sure. That People aren't the problem, it's Governments that cause the trouble. Yep people make up governments, but they don't decide to be oppressed.

@KW-hk2jd

Жыл бұрын

@@djd8305 I was agreeing with Octavian Popescu, not you. The reason oppressive governments stand for so long is that they maintain a core of true believers, along with a corrupt elite. That's the sad truth.

I've just finished watching Traumazone and have been champing at the bit to hear from Adam Curtis about it. This is a brilliant interview, and like he said, makes me feel strangely optimistic in a way. I hope we can work out a better way forward.

@GuinessOriginal

Жыл бұрын

We’re going to need far better leaders than we’ve had for the past decade or so, and there’s no sign of them on the horizon. Things are going to get a lot worse before they get better

Trauma zone is an amazing and insightful series. Also I’ve listened to this interview multiple times. Curtis makes some amazing comparisons I have never thought about.

Incredible insight from Adam Curtis as usual. His observation about society's current obsession with individual trauma is absolutely spot on.

@utubeape

Жыл бұрын

it really works well in cultures who have been traumatised by Christianity

@colmkeegan5733

Жыл бұрын

@@utubeape that you lucifer?

@adams8847

10 ай бұрын

great observer, a true observer mind as john le carre would have said!!! good shit

@al1sa920

10 ай бұрын

I live in Russia and I started realizing the existence of such problem when State Duma proposed requirement for students who get budget-funded education to work in remote places for 3-5 years. Also government is highly encouraging doctors to work in small villages (and the name of this program is a reverence to a book named "A Young Doctor's Notebook" by Bulgakov). My parents were working like this because such practice was wildly used in the Soviet Union (it was also very encouraging since such jobs paid very well) and I fully understand the importance of such practice. However I was raised in the society where radical individualism is the main thing and while I'm aware that society is more important than single individual, I can't imagine myself doing this. I decided for myself to enjoy freedom and then eventually get to the point when I will work towards society and not only for my own benefit

Adam Curtis has almost the clarity of Orwell. So important, and remarkably uplifting, despite our apalling state of affairs.

@dh1380

Жыл бұрын

That is high praise indeed 🙌

@Lunar_Pendragon

Жыл бұрын

Only Orwell was a liar and a moron and Curtis is neither of those things.

@the1andonlytitch

Жыл бұрын

To be fair things weren't great during Orwell's time

@MrSimeonk

Жыл бұрын

Orwell also became disillusioned with Marxist Communism while recognising Western capitalism was equally flawed.

@richsan4923

Жыл бұрын

@@MrSimeonk he also worked in the security services!

Adam is excellent at explaining in simple terms the complexities of the systems that govern us. The systems that we don't learn about in school

@miyojewoltsnasonth2159

Жыл бұрын

*From Wikipedia:* "In a departure from his usual style, Curtis opted not to use voiceovers or non-diegetic music. Curtis, in a piece in The Guardian, explained this choice was because the footage was 'so strong that I didn’t want to intrude pointlessly, but rather let viewers simply experience what was happening'." I was bored to tears. Am I the only one who *absolutely loves* Adam Curtis but *didn't give a rat's ass* about _TraumaZone?_ *What exactly does everybody actually like about **_TraumaZone?_*

@DV-dt9sq

Жыл бұрын

I haven't seen this documentary yet, but you are right about learning about the system in schools. And, of course there is a reason for that...people on power do't want citizens to know it, because they might want to change it. It reminds me of the catholic church who forbid people from reading a bible. It was forbidden...the church was the only one who would tell them what was written in it...the church (priests) were the the only ones who could tell you what god wants. Total control of information.

@JelloTypeR

Жыл бұрын

⁠@@DV-dt9sqexactly. That why there was such slow progress and the church controlled the information. Until Gutenberg when books became more widely available to the people. The progress graph resembles a hockey stick.

Adam is so apocalyptic in his films and in contrast so reassuring in this interview it makes this something to admire. Hope he's back to tell us what is wrong with the BBC and preferably being more specific than he is here. Thank you Joe!

Fantastic interview. Adam has some great insights into the malaise plaguing Britain. I was born in 1991 and the first 25 years of my life it really felt like nothing existed. Nothing to believe in. Nothing to fight for. It was great just pursuing what you want as an individual, as Adam says, until our system began breaking down with inequality accelerating. Whereas, now every day feels like living through history. Such a strange but unnerving feeling.

@Domdeone1

7 ай бұрын

Each of us is out in the words alone

@Destro7000

7 ай бұрын

"inequality accelerating" fucking lol. Equality is communism. Inequality is the natural state of humans that elevates them out of poverty.

I reckon Adam Curtis's analysis of our current situation is the most honest and thoughtful I have yet heard. He seems a very open minded guy. One of those people who is able to look at the world and attempt to see what is really going on as opposed to trying to impose his own self serving dogma. A very harsh judgement on the Dartford marshes though 🤣. One of my favourite places in the UK and I don't see it as full of knuckle dragging racists, not least because there are very few people living there. Lots of people in Dartford itself and the surrounding urban areas but in my experience they are a pretty good natured bunch and half of them are immigrants anyway.

@ZealothPL

Жыл бұрын

I don't think he meant that they are knuckle draggers, but that the people living there have been suffering destitution and austerity for decades, so it's no wonder they threw in a wrench into gears of a system that is crushing them

@dogmatictales

Жыл бұрын

The dartford marshes thing was a joke

@thelostboy9884

Жыл бұрын

*wooosh*

@mral4381

Жыл бұрын

Facebook created an algorithm to detect "racism". It discovered that immigrants in the UK very vastly more prone to it than any of the indigenous inhabitants. Hard times ahead for all, guaranteed.

You used the perfect interview format for Adam Curtis

We need as many people as possible to resonate with this! Thank you, Adam Curtis.

8:35 Curtis completely summarises the current state of British politics. Incredible

@ChrisKeziahHyde

Жыл бұрын

I'd say 5:31 is pretty accurate

@SOMEHANDSOME

Жыл бұрын

it is basically a russian folk saying I grew up with - `make things much worse rapidly, and then return everything to how things were before`. /paraphrasing/ bang - you`re a hero, not the tyrant you were yesterday. amazingly enough, formula worked, until /relatively/recently, when magic trick was exposed.

@drdavid1963

Жыл бұрын

@@ChrisKeziahHyde No one knows the alternative and everyone is completely beaten down by 12 years of austerity, the failed experiment of democracy in Brexit, 2 years of Covid and now inflation and the cost-of-living crisis. What's surreal is many of those same people will simply vote the Tories in again. It's what has been accepted as the new normality but, I think things haven't been normal for about 15 years and everyone's forgotten. I know he touched on individualism but for me, it's the lack of engagement in collective life which is really damaging long term. Covid hasn't helped. But I think Curtis is right in identifying the need for an alternative. Otherwise, things will get worse and we'll end up like Russia before too long.

@drdavid1963

Жыл бұрын

@@ChrisKeziahHyde Watch this about new book called How Economists Invented Austerity and Paved the Way To Fascism - kzread.info/dash/bejne/oZp6tJOmdJW7f7A.html

@drdavid1963

Жыл бұрын

@Paul Fournet It's not so much what I experienced but the ideological policy of austerity itself

That very cogent bit about seven minutes in about Britain coming to the end of something really stuck with me, his depth of knowledge about that time period is incredible

Curtis seems behind the scenes and, when he tries to explain it, it feels like he has pulled aside the mirror and revealed all the broken gears that make the world work. He clarifies things while linking them together, which makes everything seem bigger and more complicated.

Great interview. You nailed the skill of giving thoughtful interjections here and there while not interrupting Curtis’ flow.

Liz Truss is an ex-Shell executive. Shell have recently become one of the largest energy suppliers in the UK. They have a shocking contract created with them and the government where they can increase bills by 400% even though the costs of getting British gas and British oil out of the ground has NOT increased. It's our gas and oil, from our land. They are just extracting it for us. Why aren't we ONLY paying them an extraction fee? Why aren't the Tories going after the executives from these exploitative businesses as hard as they go after the working people of Britain? Oh look, the Tory government are also executives of these same rip-off companies with exploitative contracts! They are stealing from us in so many ways.

@acolli777

Жыл бұрын

They keep blaming the energy crisis on the war in Ukraine but don't even consider passing a "wartime act" to do as u have suggested: make the energy companies sell OUR gas to us at a fair profit not at exorbitant rip off prices

@richsan4923

Жыл бұрын

You answer your own question. The Tories are representatives of a faction of the British capitalist class.

The difference is that Britain does have the potatoes. But the people who sowed and harvested them are being told they can’t have any potatoes because the people at the top want more potatoes than they could ever eat and the government are helping them to keep them.

The way is open... Adam Curtis documentaries over the decades are an essential archive of alternate and contrasting perspectives that demonstrate why we are where we are today. After listening to this intriguing discussion I propose however, that some people do have alternative ideas to the dying system we see before us. One new, very small, contributor of which is within this new novel, The Future Now, many themes and issues chime with the topics raised here, and in other films by Adam Curtis. It is available on PreOrder now and in paperback from 5th dec and the backdrop is indeed the UK of 2050 during its next incarnation, after a drastic systematic shift brought on by social upheaval, Adam and anyone watching may find the system design interesting perhaps even the plot and personal journey of the main character.... thanks Politics Joe and Adam Curtis 👍✊

Adam Curtis is an amazing journalist and filmmaker. I didn't realize he also produced The Century of the Self series. Thank you Adam! And thank you PoliticsJoe for this video.

I don't think it's right to say nobody has any idea of an alternative. Plenty of people do. We're just not allowed to implement any of it. Curtis's idea that it just needs one person to offer something different and run with it and the world will change is nonsense; there's a whole massive system out there designed to stop that.

@danger.snakes

Жыл бұрын

Ironically he falls prey to the same radical individualism he (rightfully) despises. He, on the one side of things, extols the virtue of mass movements, but then suggests all it takes is one man with the right idea. Well, maybe if that man was Karl Marx, but short of that, who's to say? And how many of those are left?

@GuinessOriginal

Жыл бұрын

Agree with both of you. I think things will have to get a lot worse before things change, and at the moment it looks like they are going to get a lot worse. Unfortunately I expect we will be dragged into a war to stop things having to change too much, and all the young people who would drive any change will be killed instead.

@sichambers9011

Жыл бұрын

Agreed. The institutions of the UK prevent real democratic participation. It's elite that have no idea beyond filling their own pockets and protecting their privilege

@GuinessOriginal

Жыл бұрын

@@sichambers9011 and to the end they’ve decided to shadow ban your comment

@OrwellsHousecat

Жыл бұрын

👍🏽

Most brilliant discourse I’ve listened to for quite some time, thank you for uploading 😊

Yes! I love Adam Curtis and his thoroughness. Makes life worth living. Thank you

Excellent conversation; wish it was longer.

Adam Curtis is one the of these people who I wish was wrong. Through his films (that I've got a lot out of over the years) he paints a picture of humans (by their increasingly convoluted methods) being generally pretty sh**ty to eachother. But he's not wrong, the almost unchecked concentration of power and wealth is the the result of our current reward systems. It's these systems that need to change. And while you'd be a brave person to claim you have a solution ready to go, what increasingly encourages me is that sentiment is changing. I now feel I have more and more in common with more and more of my fellow humans from everywhere on the planet than ever, from the guy in the office I'd previously clash with on everything, to the protesters I've never met in Iran. And even in spite of the censorship and control from those who benefit from the current system, I see more compatriots wherever I look. And that's the start of something better, I'm optimistic.

@rossleeson8626

Жыл бұрын

I can’t help but be cynical about Iran. The stuff on the news has always been happening. I feel like we’re being conditioned for some good old democratic altruism.

@geroffmilan3328

Жыл бұрын

@@rossleeson8626 things definitely look different in Iran this time. The last couple of times there has been major strife, they have been able to pit people against each other: those with water against those without, for example. And they went for brutal crackdowns after only 2 weeks. This time there appear to be no sides to divide & conquer, and it seems they realise that shooting or beating schoolgirls isn't a particularly viable reaction to the death of a very young woman in custody. Certainty is for the ignorant, but change is possible...

@joby19881

Жыл бұрын

Very well put!

@richardc861

Жыл бұрын

I agree but feel algorithms are growing stronger by the day and to the detriment of society. Reality is being distorted at such a level now that I find it hard to know what truth is.

@kevinjohnbetts

Жыл бұрын

@@richardc861 I think what you mean is that discerning facts from within the welter of opinion that we are bombarded with is increasingly difficult. Thirty years ago there were only a few perspectives on anything and it wasn't hard to work out what was actually happening. Now we have social media, KZread channels, blogs, and the 'old' media all chasing smaller demographics. Each outlet spins the facts in order to appeal to its target audience meaning that everything you read, see, or hear, is subjective. Going in search of 'The Truth' involves being prepared to get uncomfortable. In my experience most people don't want to do that. They want to keep their beliefs simple and easy to convey. Even Curtis falls into that trap when he talks about 'The Climate Change Movement' because there isn't one. He's inadvertently following the narrative of the small groups who deny anthropogenic global warming and frame it as 'us against them'. Sorry that got away from me slightly. Brevity was never my strong suit. 😎

I was captivated by "Century of the Self" and everything else Adam Curtis has done. He's so eloquent in inviting you to put your foot down on the break and take a look at what's actually going on, from an outside perspective.

@paid14

Жыл бұрын

And them soundtracks tho

@miyojewoltsnasonth2159

Жыл бұрын

*From Wikipedia:* "In a departure from his usual style, Curtis opted not to use voiceovers or non-diegetic music. Curtis, in a piece in The Guardian, explained this choice was because the footage was 'so strong that I didn’t want to intrude pointlessly, but rather let viewers simply experience what was happening'." I was bored to tears. Am I the only one who *absolutely loves* Adam Curtis but *didn't give a rat's ass* about _TraumaZone?_ *What exactly does everybody actually like about **_TraumaZone?_*

@smon4164

Жыл бұрын

@@paid14 The soundtracks are haunting, they fit the mood perfectly.

@smon4164

Жыл бұрын

@@miyojewoltsnasonth2159 I have not see TraumaZone, but century of the self and his stuff he did with Charlie Brooker on screen-wipe are next level, they quite frankly put him in a higher level than any 'mainstream' documentary filmmaker. It's too bad that the ones who are indoctrinated into the manufacturing of consent are the ones who are most likely to never find the time to self educate themselves about it by watching such documentaries.

@peterrenn6341

Жыл бұрын

@@miyojewoltsnasonth2159 I agree Traumazone is a bit of a shock after the usual Curtis formula of eye-candy visuals and calm, compelling voice over but I love his work so I stuck with it - and after a while I 'got' what he was doing. As he says he was trying to replicate the experience, so yes, it's bleak, and horrific, and tedious and frightening and yes, it's hard to watch, but that's exactly the point. He's big on the idea that individualism (and by extension what he calls "oh dearism")means that if people aren't entertained or appealed to directly then they don't give a rat's ass. I came away from the full 7 hours humbled and with more sympathy for the people who went through (and are still going through) this horror. I don't feel better about myself but that's not what I watched it for. Not trying to change your mind, just trying to answer your question :-)

Adam Curtis is one of the most insightful filmmakers I've ever hear

Fantastic interview. Much love for Adam Curtis

He's a breath of fresh air is Adam Curtis. Great to hear from him again on an up to date issue.

This honestly left me scratching my head. Adam points out that in Russia, the oligarchs at least just _happened upon_ a way to make chaos work for them. They didn't choose the chaos, communism made the choice for them. But in the UK and the US, as Adam says, we keep seeing the same thing. A series of choices that benefit the most wealthy, and harm the poorest. Am I the only one seeing this? If you hold wealth and power, and you keep making the same "mistake" again, and again, and again; and that "mistake" gives you more wealth and power whilst always stripping it from others ... Is it really a David Icke fever dream to suggest the hypothesis that this just might be by design? Is this meant as an exercise for the listener to complete the sentence? I can understand when the markets do it. That's what they are designed to do. But when it constantly ends up enshrined as public policy, deliberate action certainly does not seem a far fetched conclusion.

@thedualtransition6070

Жыл бұрын

Before the collapse of communism, through the 1960s and 1970s increasingly kleptocratic, corrupt elements took shape within the communist party. Once Gorbachev set the collapse train in progress these elements grabbed the opportunity. Gaidar, a member of the communist nomenklatura, explicitly stated that he did shock therapy to make a return to communism impossible. In 1993, they destroyed democracy in Russia to stop the parliament from putting a stop to the chaos that facilitated the looting. At the same time the Western financiers both facilitated and took part in the looting. The chaos did not just "happen", Adam sees the images on the wall but doesn't investigate who produced the images and why. All surface analysis and no real political economy. He seems to be very insightful, but in reality his analysis is very superficial in many ways.

@Voltan

Жыл бұрын

its almost like we live in a _kleptocracy..._

@thegreatdream8427

Жыл бұрын

This is the fundamental nature of capitalism. The current economic system is and has for hundreds of years been essentially a wealthy class, containing both the business owners and the politicians, working together to maintain their control and siphon wealth from everyone else. The market is rigged in their favor by the government. A truly free market wouldn't do that, but there actually has never been a truly free market - even back when propaganda claims the economy was laissez faire, it wasn't - it was just more *blatantly* rigged in favor of the rich. The problem here is the continued survival of states whose sole purpose is and has always been to protect the rich from the poor. A democratic revolution from the bottom up, where people reject the idea of "representatives" in some faraway capital and instead govern themselves locally by direct democracy in a series of federated levels via instantly recallable delegates who have no power to make decisions without ratification by referendum, may be what we need to revitalize the world. Consider the example of democratic confederalism in the autonomous cities of northeast Syria, which operate on similar lines - or more generally look into the history of anarchist thought, particularly the strain known as mutualism, which I think is the most reasonable direction to go from where we are, as it doesn't require a radical break from the market system but only a series of specific reforms that ultimately boil down to ending the wealthy class's centuries-old rigging in their favor, and gradually dismantling the state in favor of more and more local autonomy, returning control over people's lives to the people themselves. Kevin Carson's book "Studies in Mutualist Political Economy" is very eye opening, both in its explanation of how the economy really works, and could be reworked, and in its description of the history of the current system - the *extremely corrupt* history. It's mainly focused on America after it reaches the 20th century, but I expect similar things happened in Britain.

@nd15music73

Жыл бұрын

You're right except for you also miss that 'the oligarchs' were a part of the western system and the elites of the u.s were running russia in the 90s and 'the russian oligarchs' was coordinated with the u.s.a. a good video on this is on youtube titled 'Who Were The Oligarchs Who Plundered Russia?' by Keith Woods.

@nickthurn6449

Жыл бұрын

We are seeing a lot of populists harnessing the anger of ordinary people and turning it against the tried and tested solutions seen in much of northern Europe. Inequality isn't really the problem - no one cares when everyone has "enough" but a few are obscenely wealthy - it's when Mr & Mrs Average are suddenly having their livelihoods sucked dry by employers with the connivance of government that people lose hope. In a sane world there would be no billionaires - no one needs or can even spend that sort of money but it does but a lot of protection and influence.

For what it's worth, I offer this observation: During the 1980s, in Norfolk, there was a strong and healthy cadre of volunteers from all ages and walks of life for all sorts of useful organisations like St John's Ambulance as well as youth organisations like Scouting etc. By the 1990s, "working people" started to drop out at an alarming rate, to the extent that the volunteers that remained, were either retired or had sufficient money to devote the necessary spare time. And the reason those "working people" gave? Not enough money to pay the bills; we're working double shifts or second jobs; our partners have to work work as well; so we need to expensive child care (which frequently subsumed up 80+% of the extra wages earned). People because too busy working and/or too tired to volunteer. They most definitely had "no spare time". But, should they have thought that they did have some spare time then rather than volunteer, they would try a get a paying job to fill it. Until people can work for a truly living wage, one that allows people to rest and have some quality leisure time, Britain will continue to elect grandiloquent people like Boris to make "grand gestures" like Brexit "happen" to the further detriment of the people living in the UK. Good luck with sorting that out.

Three things are needed: 1. Proportional representation; 2. Land Value Taxation, replacing local business tax and personal income tax; 3. A revised Beveridge settlement to fight todays giant evils. These things I know, these things I desire for the UK.

Fantastic interview! Adam Curtis is incredibly insightful on societal wide problems. One quibble is that the city video footage is too interesting and I found myself repeatedly having to go back because I wasn't paying attention to the audio.

@robertsolem9234

Жыл бұрын

Lol, that's like me actually watching Curtis' films -- I'm either watching the footage or I'm listening to the narrative T_T.

Adam Curtis’ nod towards individualism now being the default mode of our experience is absolutely mind blowing. This goes some way to explaining the media propaganda against unionism, environmental protest and racial equality protests. We now live in a society where we have been embarrassed into individualism, collectivism has almost been promoted to a level of social suicide, if you engage in it. Analysing my own thoughts, I do feel a twinge of wanting to conform to the insular, ‘I’m alright Jack’ way of thinking when presented with collective action, but I don’t know why. It’s almost as if, over the past 20 years we have been moulded, as individuals, to be disgusted and fearful at the power of groups, from Brexit to Black Lives Matter.

@stleonards1066

Жыл бұрын

From my perspective BLM had full backing from both political institutions and main stream media so I'm not sure how that fits in

@beikdw5762

Жыл бұрын

@@stleonards1066 I found that some right wing press allowed their veiled racism to become a bit more transparent when the BLM protests came to the U.K. The kneeling footballers is a prime example of collective anti-racist action being criticised by the press.

@Fishstickification

Жыл бұрын

The reason why it is appealing is because it is also a simple ideology. Easy to just look after yourself, like Curtis’ nods to game theory if you play the right way in a game of ‘Fuck You Buddy’ you’ll be a more effective individual in getting what you want. Combine that with a bit of nihilism and baby you’ve got a hedonistic, individual ideology on a plate.

@lollmaowtf

Жыл бұрын

Poor BLM. So unfairly maligned by the media. What a hilarious inversion of reality. Without the media there would be no BLM, they selectively focus on black victims of police abuse, uncritically repeated BLM's messaging, and went to great lengths to pretend the "protests" were non-violent and about equality, not race riots trying to take revenge for the racial oppression paranoia the media itself created. BLM is a reactionary movement in the truest, most pejorative sense of the word. It's based on easily disprovable claims of black persecution, using them to build a hollow racial identity, which fomented mass unrest that ultimately achieved nothing. The actual issues particular to black people continue to go on unaddressed. The actual issue of police brutality continues to go on unaddressed. The true purpose of BLM was achieved though: racial division and anger that impedes people's ability to think clearly, which makes them more susceptible to propaganda.

@OrwellsHousecat

Жыл бұрын

Atomisation and Alienation

29:42 is the start of some brilliant points. Great interview. Thank you.

Adam Curtis is my favourite documentarian, and I feel he has the greatest grasp of understanding and articulating the complex world which we live in. I wish politics and political thinkers would utilise this fantastic talent, and help make a better world for us all.

One of the best reports I have heard for a long time. I also found a possible explanation for so many East Germans suddenly liking there old system!

@aluisious

Жыл бұрын

East Germans liking the old system is pretty simple. 1) No unemployment 2) No homelessness 3) Free education 4) Affordable health care Happiness is mostly about reducing misery, not this fairy tale of "you too could be rich and powerful and good looking!"

@themsmloveswar3985

Жыл бұрын

The East Germans told me that the police ran the DDR but the propaganda media ran the West. Being bullied produced a backlash. Pervasive lying is far more effective in preventing it, due to psychological damage.

What a fantastic video and incredible commentary from Adam Curtis on so many culturally relevant topics. His understanding for the modern world and the old world is exactly what's needed in politics to push this country forward

Excellent interview. Thanks. Human ennuis is incredibly difficult to pin down. Modern tech communication has given people just enough information for them to realise that established societal systems don't really work and never really have. Unfortunately it's also given them too many diverse channels to express their dissatisfaction, and some of those channels are corrupt and corrupting. Tricky to say the least. Atomised individuals within atomised groups within atomised societies. BTW That Russian computer researched "stacked heels" strategy reminds me of the old Monty Python bit where a mega-corporation programmes a computer to solve the meaning of life. It returns with "People aren't wearing enough hats". 😀

@miyojewoltsnasonth2159

Жыл бұрын

*From Wikipedia:* "In a departure from his usual style, Curtis opted not to use voiceovers or non-diegetic music. Curtis, in a piece in The Guardian, explained this choice was because the footage was 'so strong that I didn’t want to intrude pointlessly, but rather let viewers simply experience what was happening'." I was bored to tears. Am I the only one who *absolutely loves* Adam Curtis but *didn't give a rat's ass* about _TraumaZone?_ *What exactly does everybody actually like about **_TraumaZone?_*

@benclarke4470

Жыл бұрын

@@miyojewoltsnasonth2159 I think it speaks to some more than others. I allowed myself to be taken in by what I was seeing and actually, I think I learnt more from the video narration about the fall than I could have ever learnt from books. For me, the silent documentary made me realise a sense of commonality with others around the world that our societies are desperate to suppress. It didn't need narration, we spend our lives being told what to think, this was about just ingesting raw material and making our own interpretations.

“Not just the right , but the Liberals and the Left are celebrating a ‘return to calm’ which is mad’ Um……No? The left isn’t celebrating it at all, have I lost my mind? Can anyone else help me out here?

@funbarsolaris2822

Жыл бұрын

You're right, it's the liberals not the left, Curtis (as much as I like and respect him) often conflates the two. Is it just me or is the inspiring new model for society exactly what Corbyn was proposing? Hasn't he been proved right in the most extraordinary way?

@TheSeanj87

Жыл бұрын

@@funbarsolaris2822 I agree

@maxhaughton1964

Жыл бұрын

You have reached the entropic end-state of curtisism - Curtis usually exists like a sage old orangutan in the tree above the monkeys on the ground. He has genuine prescience fairly frequently but rarely in the specifics of people and real (day-to-day vote winning) movements.

@raymondanderson3624

Жыл бұрын

He talks as if the West had absolutely nothing to do with the collapse of the Soviet Union.

@brentoneccles

Жыл бұрын

@@funbarsolaris2822 Corbyn’s programme is certainly the only hope for saving Capitalism from itself.

Best interview I've listened to in a long while. Well done to all involved. Love AC's films, can't wait to watch the latest series.

@dorsetengineering

Жыл бұрын

It’s brilliant, isn’t it…. Have you watched Bitter Lake?

Adam Curtis is TOP WORLD REFERENCE. He deserves ALREADY the Nobel Prize related with so much he made in terms of literature. 🏆

@miyojewoltsnasonth2159

Жыл бұрын

*From Wikipedia:* "In a departure from his usual style, Curtis opted not to use voiceovers or non-diegetic music. Curtis, in a piece in The Guardian, explained this choice was because the footage was 'so strong that I didn’t want to intrude pointlessly, but rather let viewers simply experience what was happening'." I was bored to tears. Am I the only one who *absolutely loves* Adam Curtis but *didn't give a rat's ass* about _TraumaZone?_ *What exactly does everybody actually like about **_TraumaZone?_*

@blairhakamies4132

Жыл бұрын

@@miyojewoltsnasonth2159 each person understand it in different ways. Keep on being a source of inspiration for a better world. 🌹

Can't get enough of Adam Curtis. Nice video.

Amazing interview. Few people are as captivating as Adam Curtis.

Curtis is a marvellous journalist and this was a fascinating interview

What an absolute masterpiece. I enjoyed every second of that. I will share with video with all my friends and family. People just need to widen their views and understand the danger we are in right now

It's always a pleasure to listen to Adam Curtis 👍

Thank you for a superb interview. What a great man Adam Curtis is. I was fascinated by his understanding of our loss of belief in the way forward and our disassociation from the collective. I kept thinking of the word atomised. You do excellent commentaries. Thank you. David.

Some amazingly interesting topics raised; I have for a long time believed that change in the modern day needs not just a societal or cultural change, but a change to human nature and the way we have been raised in this society in whole.

I used to work with a Russian who told me that back in the 70s - 90s, everyone had a job, could see the doctor, have somewhere to live but just got by. By the year 2000 he said , either you have black money or no money. I see this happening in the UKs rentier economy given another innings of the Tories.

@earthman6700

Жыл бұрын

I've asked a number of older Eastern Europeans what is different from the old Soviet days to now. I've always had the response, 'Everyone had a job and a roof over their heads'. It was something of some importance to all of them. What I see in the US and the UK does not show us as particularly advanced, despite the wealth of the Countries.

@srpacific

Жыл бұрын

I don’t think this is a uniquely tory problem. You’ll find that the same system exists no matter what party is in power - this is exactly what Curtis is saying in this interview

@GuinessOriginal

Жыл бұрын

Loads of Brits have got black money. They wouldn’t be any to get by otherwise.

@daniles

Жыл бұрын

Yes, everybody in USSR had a place to live but you had to stand in line for an apartment for decades. Because you couldn't buy an apartment. It was forbidden. Yes, everybody had a job but it was really little paid. There was a phrase "You pretend to pay us, we pretend to work". You could see a doctor but the treatment prescribed was often awful and with no competence. Most of the people in USSR had black money or just stole something at work to sell it or to use it at home. And the most important thing that inherited from soviet times is that many people still want the state to give everything to them. And of course, no politics at all, like in soviet times. It's the state that is in politics. That's why Putin still has the power over them. He's their Big Brother. I lived both in USSR's 80s and Russia's 90s and 2000s.

@VisiblyJacked

Жыл бұрын

Wake up. It's not about the Tories or the other party. This is the end game of the financial system post-ww2 collapsing throughout the West. There is nothing left for the 1% to plunder.

Enjoyed this, insightful, more unique inputs, thanks.

Absolutely on spot!! Thank you!

Wonderfully pertinent and thought provoking.. and very accurate regarding what the UK looks like from abroad, to someone who used to feel at home in a way, there..

Russia got potentially inexhaustible oil, gas, mineral resources and is self-sufficient in agriculture produce and Britain has what? There's no comparison.

@chadimirputin2282

Жыл бұрын

Britain has an abundance of plebs.

@joshuacampbell1625

Жыл бұрын

And yet despite that, the living standards of Russians have been less then Britons throughout modern history. Also we're not in the middle ages anymore, and the world economy is based on alot more then just food and natural resources.

@person.X.

Жыл бұрын

A small island that has been rich and stable for generations vs a continental sized country with all its advantages that has as its main claim to fame the ability to relentlessly over centuries treat its own people like shit and ruin their lives. Never has a nation squandered its potential like Russia has.

@awordabout...3061

Жыл бұрын

Russia has the classic resource problem - she has relied on extraction for so long that the Russian industrial sector now can do almost nothing else. We've seen that as foreign firms have pulled out, they're unable even to produce railway bearings to keep their rail stock rolling, and they're burning huge amounts of gas because the complex tasks of managing and operating gas extraction simply isn't in their wheelhouse. Britain, putting aside the North Sea Oil, doesn't have much in the way of commercially viable natural resources since we've decided not to mine (which makes sense if mined metal from elsewhere is much cheaper) and yet is a very wealthy country, even if it is very unevenly distributed.

@themsmloveswar3985

Жыл бұрын

Britain has Peppa pig world according to Boris Johnson.

Brilliant. I will watch them all. Thankyou Sir!

Thank you. VERY helpful, Mi Curtis.

Adam Curtis is one of the most important post-Cold War interpreters of where we are and why we are here, I urge everyone to explore his works. The catalogue is substantial but even if you limit it to the last 20 years or so, the 21st Century, it will be rewarding beyond your expectations - if you keep an open mind. Curtis has had a similar effect on me as Zinoviev's Yawning Heights (1980) which was an absurdist critique of Soviet Communism. Curtis is unbound by ideologies of orthodox Left or Right. He observes, unmasks and interrogates. And points to our complicity in the bullshit.

This is one of my favourite channels on KZread. Thanks for sharing!

An incredibly illuminating interview and probably one of the most important I've ever heard. Thank you.

What a fantastic and interesting conversation. Nice one.

It's always great to hear Adam Curtis talk about collectivism and individualism. You did an amazing job expanding the conversation. Top marks.

The title kind of assumes that the Soviet Union "fell", and wasn't destroyed from the inside, by neoliberal forces, at great expense to the general population.

I had no idea that he had made a new documentary, amazing!

He walks right up to the subject then misses it entirely. That's Adam Curtis for you.

@geoffmilner

Жыл бұрын

​@@hamc9477He's got no solutions.

@geoffmilner

Жыл бұрын

@@hamc9477 Certainly not if you are making programmes about a subject. Russell Brand has the same pointless style, criticising while alluding to some kind of utopia that should be achievable, but never explaining what it is or how to get there. Curtis just rambles on about the public and elites being confused that there isn't an overarching plan, but there should be one. He said in Bitter Lake that Afghanistan was at the centre of the world and yet he never mentioned it. Clearly he's nowhere on domestic or international geo politics. All he's got is remaining in the EU and climate change as his guiding principles No different to David Attenborough.

@geoffmilner

Жыл бұрын

@@hamc9477 I agree, so many of these think tanks, institutions, NGOs, charities etc are appointed and operate in the background without oversight that we never even see their influence on decisions that are being made. They are parasitic in nature, all surviving on taxpayers money, or even worse, money from industry and other foundations, who want special favours. The regulatory capture of the MHRA is a prime example as it is 80% funded by the pharmaceutical industry by way of the Gates foundation. The govt then funds the dangerous poisons ad infinitum. Mainstream Curtis would never get into the root causes of a problem like that unless he upsets the BBC commissions he's been dining out on for decades. The BBC and media are an essential part of how the corruption is carried out by keeping the public controlled and onboard with all of the false narratives.

@2x94Z

Жыл бұрын

@@geoffmilner you know Marx, Kropotkin, Bakunin, Bookchin etc didn't have concrete plans either? It's not like do this, this and this, and tada, proletarian revolution. And it's not up to them or documentary directors to make them, it's the people involved.

That was really enjoyable. Never really heard of adam curtis, but seems to have a pretty decent analysis of the current situation we find ourselves in and a hopeful glimpse into the future

@garysantana7906

Жыл бұрын

if you dont know his work, you should 100% check out his past documentaries, i would start with 'century of the self'

@geroffmilan3328

Жыл бұрын

@@garysantana7906 century of the self is an amazing work imho - must-watch.

@the1andonlytitch

Жыл бұрын

I will also point you towards Hypernormalisation which goes through a lot of what he is saying today

@GuinessOriginal

Жыл бұрын

You’ve just opened up a rabbit hole for yourself, prepare to be amazed

I need to rewatch Can't Get You Out Of My Head too.. amazing filmmaking

Stumbled upon instant gratification Mr Curtis thank you

I am eternally grateful to Adam Curtis, for always being able to articulate in succinct, eloquent and straightforward commentaries, precisely what I - and so many of us - knew, and know. And thank YOU PoiticsJOE!

Great work guys. I watched the 1st episode of the new series, but really glad to hear Adam talking about the overall concept.

Man this channel is so good...!

I’m not sure I’d concur that “escaping into nature” is “nostalgic”.

Can I just point out that putting the interview to footage like this is pretty cool. I enjoyed the docuview format

It's not that they don't have an alternative it is that they don't want to impose something fairer as they fear they will lose out on power or wealth or both

Another brilliant interview by a brilliant filmmaker. I'm so glad he's spoken about his documentary because I missed hearing his own words in the actual film itself

@sprkraida

Жыл бұрын

Throughout TrauZone I coud hear his narration, born in my mind, but oh so real. His voice is very peculiar. I love it

@craigmorrow2939

Жыл бұрын

@@sprkraida "What Yeltsin failed to realise...."

I have been drawing the parallels between the late Soviet Union and Britain, for the last 30 years under the new Soviet junta, for several decades - TraumaZone is a truly exceptional set of films 😎🙏🏽❤️

Trauma Zone was outstanding. This was by far one of the best interviews I have seen on this channel. Adam Curtis is raising issues here that most commentators are far too entrenched in their positions on either the left or the right to even see. I do wish I could be as optimistic on China and Iran, but perhaps time will prove me wrong.

Extremely interesting. Thank you. ❤️🖤🚩🏴

Thank you it has answered a lot of questions I had.I see it has a opportunity to take society in the new direction it needs to go, sometimes a breakdown of society generates a breakthrough to something new. The systems we have currently don't work and expecting people to live within them may cause them to be prone to failure.For me it's about meeting the needs of all society and not being in this constant state of boom and bust world of the Banking systems.

This was amazing. Giving it a second listen

is there a version of this interview without background audio? After 23:00 it was hard to hear the conversation.

Primo “Content” - Thank you Joe 🙏

@GloriousSonOfYork

Жыл бұрын

why "content" in quotation marks?

Bloody wonderful, I watched his 7 part series Traumazone on Russia yesterday. So glad I listened to this, he just manages to tap into the zeitgeist and get to the marrow of what is happening and I'm so thankful for his optimism at the end, I feel it too, all is not lost. ❤

I absolutely LOVE the way Adam can talk and talk and talk about everything I'm also thinking about, but he has thought about them more deeply and for a lot longer - he is obviously less distracted with the shitty stuff than i am - and when I listen to him talking, I feel his conclusions of where I should have bothered to get to. None of it is too complex, or hard to understand. He will just come out with 'you can feel bad because you think there is something bad inside you, or you can feel bad because you live in a shitty society' and he is bang on the money. I can then have a ten minute conversation with my 13 year old about TikTok which might, just might help him understand why HE feels guilty and bad. Brilliant man.

*I LIVE IN BULGARIA NOW* we dont have individualism here - no one is told they are "special" or "unique" - your value is your worth to the society you live in... Its a MUCH nicer way to live. Your neighbour's health and wellbeing is YOUR responsibility, the neighbourhood kids are YOUR responsibility. And when you are too ill to walk your dog your neighbour will do it 4 times a day without a seconds thought

👏. Brilliant. Sums up exactly how people really feel. I want a full political reform. I want a flattening down, not a levelling up.