For this week, we continue a conversation that has been re-emerging for the last month. Sparked by two cultural events – Ruben Östlund’s much-anticipated Triangle of Sadness as well as Greta Thunberg’s talk at the London Literature Festival – we try to wrap our heads around the nuances of calls for social change, or more specifically, their discourse, rhetoric, and intentions.

Have we reached a point where ‘raising awareness’ – or ‘climate populism’ – just is not enough? Does a socialist critique from a middle-class director necessarily have to be hypocritical? And if so, aren’t we – having paid 20 pounds for the ticket – hypocritical in saying so?

References: 

Watch the live stream for Greta's talk at the Southbank Centre. 

Greta Thunberg - The Climate Book as well as a review

A Rolling Stone review for Ruben Östlund's Triangle of Sadness that sums it up quite well: 

“Instead, Triangle of Sadness seems hemmed in by its tastefulness — which feels strange to say about a movie whose central scene is a literal shitstorm, but this is precisely what merits the red flag. If not for that scene, how far would the movie appear to go? It’d rest on a few great elbows to the ribs, a few great punchlines (the best involving a grenade; the second-best involving the divvying out of some octopus) and a lot of filler. The actors try their best, but Östlund’s insistent conceptual droning overtakes them. “