Sophie Heawood: yes, they’re having it both ways – but are Salmond and Brand really hypocrites?

http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2014/dec/13/sophie-heawood-hypocrite-russell-brand

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It’s a strong word, hypocrite, and it’s nearly aways used to try to make someone feel bad about doing something good. This month it has been plastered across the front page of the Sun, over a picture of Russell Brand, who was campaigning on behalf of residents of a London council estate at risk of losing their homes to a property developer. The logic apparently being that if you’re rich enough to pay high London rents, as he is, then you shouldn’t be sticking up for people who aren’t.

Next up to be painted with the hypocrite stick was the former SNP leader, Alex Salmond, who announced that he was now going to stand as an MP for a Scottish constituency in the British parliament. So, still representing the SNP, but working half the time in London. Within minutes, he had been accused of hypocrisy for joining the Westminster elite he had previously criticised. As if, having tried for an independent Scotland and failed, the last thing he should do is try to get some of the power back from the place where it has got stuck. As if you can no longer be a Scotsman of the people if you go to make some noise in a land of lords. “Hypocrite!” people shouted, jumping out of their chairs for a second, before fluffing the cushions and sitting back down to watch their next boxset.

Salmond might be a hypocrite if he announced he was standing for election in a nice constituency in Buckinghamshire, as a Tory, and that he was “just glad to get away from all that freezing cold Irn-Bru bollocks, get this itchy kilt off and make a start on the expenses forms for my new floating duck house”. And Brand might be a hypocrite if he had bought an entire council estate of his own down the road, in some dodgy local government deal, and was on the verge of moving in the demolition trucks and turning it into a condo with a Miss World pageant on the roof.

This could all happen next week, of course. But presumably the Sun also believes that you shouldn’t point out there’s a fire down the road if your own house isn’t burning down, and you should never chase after a thief who robbed the woman next to you if your own wallet is still safely secured in your pocket. Gah.

Clearly, neither of these men is unfailingly consistent or selfless in his actions, and there is much hypocrisy in public life. When it actually occurs, it is important to point it out. But at the moment, it’s so easy to shoot at anyone who dares stick their head over the parapet and makes an effort, that the people with real power are left to carry on their war against the poor with the greatest of ease. As Brand himself said, he used to complain about inequality when he was poor, too – only then he got told he was bitter. Now he says it when he’s rich, he’s a hypocrite.

It isn’t just the famous who get this. There are always people in life who will make you feel silly if you admit that your brain can contain a thought such as, “My God, how cruel and shocking that many people are now dependent on food banks”, as well as another such as, “Ooh, that’s a nice sofa in that advert, I could buy that for my living room.”

Except the truth is that those two thoughts live inside many, many people’s heads – and why wouldn’t they? It should be possible for some people to have nicer sofas than others while absolutely everybody has enough food to eat and a roof over their heads. “Bill Clinton is not a hypocrite,” PJ O’Rourke once said. “If a man believes that it is just and moral to redistribute wealth, there is nothing hypocritical in his attempts to redistribute some of that wealth to himself.” It’s a good gag – but I don’t remember Clinton ever claiming to be a communist.

In these hyper-critical times, if you have anything at all in your life that differentiates you from a humble peasant, it is safer to just keep stumm about it. Of course, if you actually are a humble peasant, nobody will listen to a word you say anyway, but hey ho. At least you won’t be a hypocrite.

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