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The Arcade Fire's Win Butler Gets Political In New Interview
Opinions. Everybody's got them. However, things tend to get a little risky when bands and musicians get political. The wrong couple of words could leave a large majority of your fan-base alienated or at odds with your positions. Apparently for Win Butler of Arcade Fire, this is a risk he's doesn’t mind taking.
In a recent interview, Win Butler of Arcade Fire gave a thumbs-up to the political "work" of U2's lead-singer stating, "As much as people slag Bono, I will forever give him credit for engaging with George W. Bush when he was president. Even though it was a deeply unpopular move, even in his own band [...] Bono was engaged in the work, even when the situation wasn't ideal." Butler then goes on to laud former U.S. President Bush and his HIV relief efforts in Africa calling the Bush Administration’s $5 billion dollars AIDS package, "a hell of a lot more than any other president before had done."
It's only fair to wonder just how much time Win Butler has spent in Africa and seen first-hand the positive and/or negative effects of the relief effort. And isn't this dude Canadian, anyway? Oh well, at least their new album rocks. [Spin]
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Anyone looking to get waaaay off the musical path, here's a short little article stating the issues of monetary-based relief efforts which Win himself should probably read:
http://www.globalissues.org/article/35/foreign-aid-development-assistance
Butler doesn't seem to understand also that most of the AIDS package was wasted on shenanigans, thanks to the neocon belief that promoting abstinence is the best way of preventing the spread of the virus. And we all know how well that worked so far...
"...Dybul is very close to the religious right, including Pastor Rick Warren, and supported the positions of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops and Catholic Relief Services in maintaining restrictions on funding for prevention in the recent reauthorization of PEPFAR. Lobbying by these groups resulted in the retention of restrictions on funding for prevention of sexual transmission, needle exchange, and sex worker organizations. It also resulted in an expanded "conscience clause" which unconscionably allows groups to discriminate as to who will receive prevention, treatment, and care under programs funded by the U.S. taxpayer. Under Dybul's tenure, tens of millions of dollars have been given to ideologically-driven faith-based organizations under the controversial New Partners Initiative.
And after passage of PEPFAR 2 in 2008, Dybul acted quickly to mollify religious conservatives by writing program guidance not required by law which forbids purchase of contraceptive commodities using PEPFAR funds. This step greatly undermines integration of HIV prevention with reproductive health programs, limiting efforts to slow the rapid spread of new infections among women in sub-Saharan Africa and denying HIV-positive women in prevention of maternal-to-child transmission programs support they need to space or limit births. " - Jodi Jacobson
whoa fellas. it's all going to be ok. and win butler is american-from texas originally. i like that he can remain neutral. it keeps him from being blinded by biases.
that's the thing, it's not neutral at all...