We think about the idea of
carpe diem or seizing the day
on the individual level.
It's about me seizing
opportunities in my life.
And historically that term has
also been about spontaneous
action and about living in
the present moment.
And it's also been partly about
hedonism about partying about
sex and drugs and rock and
roll. Now I believe there is a
fifth form of seizing the day
which is what I call carpe diem
politics and what it's
about it's about taking these
other four forms of seizing the
day opportunity,
presence, spontaneity and
hedonism and ratcheting them up
to the collective level to
bring about change.
Look through history some of
the world's most powerful
social movements have had
carpe diem politics at their
heart. Think of the protests
that helped bring down the
Berlin Wall in 1989.
There were people seizing
opportunity on a mass scale.
It was spontaneous.
People born in this present
moment and they're also almost
like in a state of hedonistic
carnival real partying
alongside very serious
political intent.
And David Hasselhoff ended up
on a wall in a leather jacket.
That's the ultimate in
hedonistic revelry in a way.
And I think that political
movements find it very
difficult to sustain themselves
unless they have all these
different elements in them.
You actually need a bit of
having a good time having a bit
of almost medieval carnival
spirit in order to keep people
engaged and this is why I worry
a bit about shifting people
into politics straight from
digital media just into voting.
I think.
You want a party in between.
I want a party in between.
You're up for that.
Definitely, that really fits
into what we've been doing as
well.
I mean with Rise Up
we are engaging young people
with music artists,
we've released music videos
and we have put on parties.
We put on a mass event on the
build up to the election
some of the artists that young
people want to see.
You've got to take your fun
seriously.
You've got to take your
partying very seriously just
before the Berlin Wall came
down there were mass rock
concerts for tens of thousands
of people in Berlin,
in Leipzig, in other cities.
Think back to June the 18th
1999 one of the first great
anticapitalist protests in this
country. We were all given
carnival masks of different
colours and had to follow our
own colour as we weaved around
the streets trying to avoid the
police. But there was also
music. There were the first
great samba bands which are all
now part of a classic political
protest.
But they really got us going.
