Comfortably Numb: The Politics of Roger Waters

From the desk of Dimitri Cavalli on Fri, 2006-11-17 09:07

Recently, I attended the Roger Waters concert at Madison Square Garden in New York City. In 1965, Waters co-founded the great British rock band Pink Floyd, which produced several unforgettable concept albums. It was a joy seeing Waters, who is still in top form at age 63, masterfully perform many classic Pink Floyd tracks, including the album Dark Side of the Moon (1973) in its entirety. Unfortunately, the concerts politics failed to match the excellent quality of the music. When Waters performed The Fletcher Memorial Home from Pink Floyds album, The Final Cut (1983), the large screen behind him broadcast a video that compared Osama bin Laden, Saddam Hussein, Joseph Stalin, and Kim Jong-Il to President Ronald Reagan and President George W. Bush. A self-described socialist and militant pacifist, Waters has always taken an interest in politics. One track, Get Your Filthy Hands Off My Desert, from The Final Cut, equates British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher with General Leopoldo Galtieri, Argentinas military dictator who seized power in 1981 and invaded the Falkland Islands in 1982. In recent years, Waters has bitterly attacked Prime Minister Tony Blair for participating in the U.S.-led invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq. As a private citizen, Waters has the right to speak out on any issue. Disagreeing with him or any celebrity, left or right, is not censorship. I believe that the comparisons Waters is making during his current tour are not only offensive, but reveal substantial ignorance on his part. Reagan, Thatcher, Bush, and Blair all came to power by winning elections. Those who opposed their views had the opportunity to vote against them. By contrast, Stalin, Hussein, Kim Jong-Il, and Galtieri never allowed free elections in their countries or any opposition to their rule. Reagan and Thatcher gave up power voluntarily. Blair is expected to step down next year. Bush will leave office on January 20, 2009. How often do dictators give up power voluntarily and peacefully? Despite his advancing age and serious illness, Fidel Castro refuses to relax his grip on the Cuban people 47 years after seizing power. In Great Britain, the United States, and in any democratic country, Waters enjoys the freedom to criticize the government, including its leaders and policies. Additionally, Reagan, Thatcher, Bush, and Blair never made any effort to silence Waters. People who live in dictatorships dont have that freedom. If Waters were Cuban, Castro would have thrown him into prison, where thousands of political dissidents presently suffer. Both Saddam Hussein and Kim Jong-Il probably would have had Waters tortured and then executed for opposing their dictatorial rule. In 1990, Waters organized a concert in Berlin to celebrate the downfall of communism in Eastern Europe. Did it ever occur to Waters why the Berlin Wall finally fell? The combined leadership of Reagan, Thatcher, and Pope John Paul II made it happen. They helped extend freedom to hundreds of millions of people who were being repressed by communist dictatorships. Today, people in Eastern Europe and the old Soviet Union can choose their leaders, have a say in their governments policies, and even enjoy Pink Floyd without being harassed by the secret police. Apparently, Roger Waters is like many ideologues on the right and left. They think democracy works only when people who agree with them win elections. I myself voted against President Bill Clinton twice. Although I was disappointed that he won, I never thought there was something evil afoot in the republic. I often rolled my eyes when I heard conservative extremists accuse him of orchestrating several murders and peddle other conspiracy theories about him. Would it have been appropriate for the right to equate Clinton to Slobodan Milosevic, the late dictator of Yugoslavia and The Butcher of the Balkans? Was President Jimmy Carter no different than Irans Ayatollah Khomeini? Where does it end? How about Waters? If those who disagree with his views were to compare him with Dr. Joseph Goebbels, the Nazi Minister of Propaganda, or Al Qaeda propaganda that is often broadcast on the Al Jazeera network, I am sure that Waters would be morally outraged (and rightly so). Unfortunately, many ideologues arent satisfied with simple disagreement. By demonizing opponents and comparing them to monsters from history and the present, they hope to increase the stakes. Differences of opinion suddenly escalate into a battle between good and evil.

Many people on both sides are often turned off by such extreme and divisive tactics. In fact, after Waters finished, Leaving Beirut, an anti-war song he wrote in 2003, about half the concert audience booed. Many of them probably werent Bush supporters. For someone who wants to tear down walls that keep people divided and living in fear, Roger Waters helps to build them higher and higher when he makes these false and outrageous comparisons.
Dimitri Cavalli is a freelance writer in New York City.