Viva Hate

The lovely and talented Beaucoup Kevin has posted an enlightening interview with Neil Tennant of the Pet Shop Boys from 1992, discussing the intrinsic value of hate:

Of course, these days it’s more fashionable to be positive. I hate positivity. The problem with positivity is that it’s an attitude that’s decidedly about lying back, getting screwed, and accepting it. Happily. It’s totally apolitical. It’s very, very personal and one-on-one. It’s not about changing society, it’s about caring about yourself. In fact, it’s totally about ignoring one’s economic role in society, and so it works in favor of the system. Just look at work years of personal consciousness theories have given us: those icons of the status quo, George Bush and John Major.

Positivity is fundamentally middle-class. It’s about having the time, the space and the money to sort out where your head is at. Therapy is just another side of positivity. It’s a leisure activity, a luxury for people who don’t have any real cares. It’s new age selfishness, the new way of saying that charity begins at home.

And positivity makes the world stay the same. Hatred is the force that moves society along, for better or for worse. People aren’t driven by saying, “Oh wow, I’m at peace with myself.” They’re driven by their hatred of injustice, hatred of unfairness, of how power is used.

Absolutely lovely. By the way, it came out during my nearly-two month silence, but the latest Pet Shop Boys album, "Fundamental", is quite brilliant. What other pop group would record a song using a pair of mismatched lovers as a metaphor for the relationship between Tony Blair and Geroge W. Bush, and the call it "I'm With Stupid"? Take that for political relevence, Bono!