The Elitist Irony of Banksy

by Karl Radl

WHEN THE LATEST artwork of the so-called ‘rebel’ artist Banksy was revealed on a garage in the Welsh town of Port Talbot near the city of Swansea, it predictably became quite the distraction from the latest depressing grind of the Brexit ‘negotiations’ and the ongoing destruction of the social, cultural, political and racial fabric of the United Kingdom. (1)

The ‘art’ — I use the term loosely — was immediately ‘protected’ by the local authorities. (2) Despite this, it was immediately attacked by a local loud-mouthed liberal muppet, Gary Owen; described as ‘some drunk halfwit’ who ‘tried to pull the fencing down and the protection glazing at the Banksy artwork’. (3)

Owen added that, ‘This art is for Port Talbot, Neath and surrounding areas. We do not want it wrecked.’ (4)

The irony of this is that Banksy is a multi-millionaire ‘artist’ who ‘creates art’ that causes problems and expense for others. With Port Talbot having an unemployment rate 2.5 percent higher than the UK average and 1.5 percent higher than the Welsh average, (5) Port Talbot also has the second highest rate of drug-related deaths in the United Kingdom, and has the highest in Wales. (6)

By creating his ‘art’ on some random garages in Port Talbot, Banksy has forced the local community to spend money it simply does not have in providing barriers and 24 hour security guards for the site. (7)

Even the ‘2,000 visitors’ who have turned up to see the ‘art’ within the first two days (8) will not bring much to the community, as at best some of them will buy a coffee in Port Talbot and then immediately get back in their BMWs and drive back to their plush apartments in London, Cardiff, Birmingham, Bristol and Liverpool, nattering about the ‘challenging social commentary’ of Banksy’s latest ‘artistic masterpiece’.

This is symptomatic of the snobbish foppery of the liberal elite in the world today; they don’t care about communities like Port Talbot enough to do something about the crippling unemployment and poverty that has resulted from the hollowing out of manufacturing in the West — 22 percent of jobs in Port Talbot are still in manufacturing but it used to be a lot higher — (9) by exporting those jobs to slave labour economies such as that of China, Taiwan and Vietnam, which then — to add insult to injury — sell these often inferior quality items to the very places that used to create them, like Port Talbot.

It is all very well for multi-millionaire champagne socialists like Banksy, and his admiring horde of chinless wonders, to turn up and stare at the latest ‘work of art’ created by a man with a vivid imagination and a couple of cans of spray paint and pre-cut stencils. Braying incessantly about the rights of so-called ‘refugees’ and self-appointed shemales, they yet refuse to care a jot — neither about the ‘canvas’ their artistic god has decided to grace with his presence, nor the consequences of that for the local people of Port Talbot.

This is the elitist irony of people like Banksy and his followers spending their time being ‘brave’ and making ‘bold statements’ about the ‘problems’ that afflict Western society, but they don’t bother to feed or shelter the homeless — this is usually done by poor people donating their free time to shelters — let alone assist with such projects as debt forgiveness and the like.

Banksy and his ilk are not ‘class warriors’ fighting for the ‘oppressed’ as they like to imagine; rather, they are a parasitic elite class who like to LARP as ‘class warriors’ in their spare time just like the anarchist, Peter Kropotkin, who would don workman’s clothes over his silk undergarments, sneak out of his opulent palace in St. Petersburg, and give fiery revolutionary speeches to the Russian workers fulminating against his own exploitative and parasitic class, only to then sneak back to the warmth of his silken sheets for a meal and an undisturbed sleep while his every need was attended to by an army of devoted servants.

Ironic: isn’t it?

References

(1) Banksy confirms Port Talbot ‘Season’s greetings’ piece is his – BBC News
(2) Ibid.
(3) Banksy’s Port Talbot snow mural attacked by ‘drunk halfwit’ – BBC News 1
(4) Ibid.
(5) Labour Market Profile – Nomis – Official Labour Market Statistics
(6) The Welsh towns and cities with the highest rate of drugs deaths in the UK – Wales Online
(7) Banksy’s Port Talbot snow mural attacked by ‘drunk halfwit’ – BBC News 1
(8) Ibid.
(9) Swansea Council – Information, Research & GIS, ‘Swansea Economic Profile’, October 2018

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Source: The Purity Spiral