"Packaged rebellion" refers to rebellion as spectacle - people who wear rebellious clothes, listen to rebellious music, wear circle-A's, hang out in countercultures, call themselves anarchists or rebels, and maybe do token symbolic protests, but don't actually fight the system because they're too commercialised and superficial, or too afraid. It's about what "The Coming Insurrection" refers to as the milieu.
I think it's addressed to the band's fans, who almost by definition are into rebellious music, but a lot of whom will never take it beyond consumerist gestures. It's saying, "don't just do these gestures, get up and do something".
There's three main claims about rebellion here:
a real rebel acts as an expression of who they are, of their desire and will, not to impress others or create an image
a real rebel acts in decisive ways, not "flaccid" and "friendly" ways, and not through images
a real rebel will rebel at any opportunity.
The idea of the "act" emerging solely from will reminds me a lot of Stirner, Bakunin, insurrectionism and post-left anarchy, as well as the existentialist tradition and (more recently) Zizek. Also Bookchin's "Lifestyle Anarchism" though it strangely echoes what Bookchin is criticising. Cross-read it with "One Man Stands", "Keep It In the Family" and "Protest and Survive".
"Packaged rebellion" refers to rebellion as spectacle - people who wear rebellious clothes, listen to rebellious music, wear circle-A's, hang out in countercultures, call themselves anarchists or rebels, and maybe do token symbolic protests, but don't actually fight the system because they're too commercialised and superficial, or too afraid. It's about what "The Coming Insurrection" refers to as the milieu.
I think it's addressed to the band's fans, who almost by definition are into rebellious music, but a lot of whom will never take it beyond consumerist gestures. It's saying, "don't just do these gestures, get up and do something".
There's three main claims about rebellion here:
a real rebel acts as an expression of who they are, of their desire and will, not to impress others or create an image
a real rebel acts in decisive ways, not "flaccid" and "friendly" ways, and not through images
a real rebel will rebel at any opportunity.
The idea of the "act" emerging solely from will reminds me a lot of Stirner, Bakunin, insurrectionism and post-left anarchy, as well as the existentialist tradition and (more recently) Zizek. Also Bookchin's "Lifestyle Anarchism" though it strangely echoes what Bookchin is criticising. Cross-read it with "One Man Stands", "Keep It In the Family" and "Protest and Survive".