The political Left has officially kicked actor Russell Brand out of their trenches and into no man’s land.
“I once admired Russell Brand. But his grim trajectory shows us where politics is heading,” declared Guardian columnist George Monbiot.
“We have lost Russel Brand,” echoed The New Statesman, bemoaning his descent into “right-wing signaling.” And The Spectator published a piece called: “The unmaking of Russell Brand: How the left’s hero fell out of favour.”
All of this about the man who was once called “the best thing that has happened to the left in years.”
Brand is now part of a growing number who ran afoul of the progressive dogma over one tiny little thing and discovered quickly how censorious the modern Left is.
He joins Piers Morgan, J. K. Rowling, Bill Maher, Joe Rogan, Bari Weiss, Naomi Wolfe, Elon Musk, and other far-from-conservative-but-nevertheless-disowned-by-the-Left celebrities that have found themselves in the same place.
The reality is, the comedian, like the others, would still define himself as a liberal. But the classic liberal of the ’90s who “spoke truth to power,” fought against crony capitalism and big business, and was at the forefront of protecting freedom of speech no longer has a home in the new political Left in America.
Elon Musk described this phenomenon perfectly in a viral meme depicting his own political “evolution.”
The cartoon showed a stick figure, presumably representative of Musk, who “moved” from left of center to right of center over a 10 year period. What brought about this comparative change, however, was simply how far to the Left his “fellow liberal” had swung. Musk himself had not budged; his values had not changed. But in comparison to the new Left “progressive,” he ended up much closer to the Right.
This is now creating a union of strange bedfellows – traditional liberals and conservatives find that they suddenly agree on more than they disagree.
Key among the common ground these classic liberals share with conservatives is that the new Left’s swing towards a heavily centralized government – and its law enforcement and intelligence agencies – working hand-in-glove with big tech and corporations to censor and punish freedom of speech and expression is dangerous to a healthy American society.
When 2020 Democratic presidential candidate Tulsi Gabbard left the Democratic Party last year, she specifically worried about “government that is of, by, and for the powerful elite.”
At the end of the day, these traditional liberals are sounding the alarm – the new Left’s puritanical penchant for canceling and punishing dissenters has merged with the all-powerful, unchecked, Orwellian power of government and corporate industries.
Brand spent years saying things conservatives disagreed with, but no one on the Right called for him to be de-platformed. However, the moment he questioned government policy regarding COVID, he was censored.
As Brand put it on his show, “What I learned from my conversations with figures from the conservative Right … is that there is a new willingness to form new alliances in order to … attack centralized, establishment, authoritarian power. I.E., explicitly, people that are conservative and Right-wing are willing to have a truce with and alliances with people that are really ‘progressive.’”
Similarly, Joe Rogan and conservatives are diametrically opposed on many issues. But when Spotify tried dropping him over “misinformation,” only the Right came to his defense.
The reality is, both conservatives on the Right and traditional liberals believe in free speech … especially the right to criticize corrupt political establishments. But the new progressive Left does not tolerate such behavior.
As Bari Weiss averred upon resigning from The New York Times, “forays into Wrongthink” — anything that differs from “truth” as determined by “an enlightened few” — will result in bullying and being blacklisted.
More and more Americans are realizing that the overbearing, centralized power being driven by the progressive Left must be stopped if we are to protect the freedoms of the individual citizen. Like Russel Brand, they see the threat of “centralized power” and are uniting to stop it.
This is seen in the polling showing the majority of American voters now favor a convention of states to meet and propose amendments to the Constitution that would rein in the power of the federal government. A convention of states – once an idea that lived on the Right wing of American politics – now enjoys the support of not only a majority of Republicans and independents, but also half of Democrats.
This reaction is not just limited to the U.S. either.
Canada has seen large-scale protests against the authoritarian power grabs of the Trudeau government, and farmers in central Europe have repeatedly blockaded major roads in response to the plans to bring agriculture under a centralized government plan.
Western Civilization has been defined by its continued advancement towards individual freedom and autonomy. Now the governments that were borne from those advancements are seeking to reverse course and consolidate power back into the hands of a select few.
Celebrities like Brand, Rowling, and Musk are not voices crying in the wilderness that have become radicalized. Rather, they are sounding the alarm on the threats that authoritarians pose to Western societies, and they are giving voice to the millions of people around the globe that want to see the arc of history continue towards freedom and liberty.
Mark Meckler is president of Convention of States.
The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.