LimeWire Music Blog

Henry Rollins: Hello, I am Henry Rollins and today I am interviewing Mr. Tom Morello – activist, singer, songwriter, guitar legend, and tremendous provocateur. Tom, what was your introduction to Amnesty International?

Tom Morello: I’d heard of Amnesty International when I was in high school, but really, I thought about Amnesty International for the first time during the Human Rights Now Tour. There was an HBO special, and I think it featured Sting, Peter Gabriel and Bruce Springsteen, and at the time I was a fledgling guitar player, and I was really kind of overwhelmed by the power of the concert and how it reached into every home that had cable with a message of human rights. And to me, I was like, wow, because at the time I was already a fledgling activist in high school, and I was, you know, a beginning guitar player, and I thought, Wow, you can do this on a big scale, where you can have impact. And they were touting some of the successes of Amnesty and getting specific political prisoners out of jail, and the campaigns were going on, and they were asking me and everybody in their homes to enjoy the concert, but to call this number (I forget what the action was they asked us to take), and to me it felt like, this is real grassroots activism on a huge international scale.

Rollins: And how was that different, because you said you started your activism then. How was Amnesty International different from other agencies that you had seen and had dealt with at that time?

Morello: Well, prior to the concert and learning more of the specifics of what Amnesty does, they weren’t radical enough for me. You know, I was the one anarcho-syndicalist in my high school. But then when I heard the real life stories of the people who were being aided, and the international web of concern…and taking these teenagers and sometimes pre-teens to just write this letter, and this mass action, which was easy to do and had tremendous results – that was very impactful, and I started thinking about music and activism and the synergy between the two in a different way, just from that concert.

Henry Rollins: “One of the things I’ve always liked about Amnesty International is that they don’t come on heavy or self-righteously, which is a real turn-off for me. You want my money and you want me to be concerned, but you’re kind of bragging to me about how great you are… where Amnesty International just seems to be begging the world for mercy. Like, let’s take care of each other. If you can donate something great, if you can’t, that’s cool too, but keep us in mind.”

Rollins: One of the things I’ve always liked about Amnesty International is that they don’t come on heavy or self-righteously, which is a real turn-off for me. You want my money and you want me to be concerned, but you’re kind of bragging to me about how great you are… where Amnesty International just seems to be begging the world for mercy. Like, let’s take care of each other. If you can donate something great, if you can’t, that’s cool too, but keep us in mind. That’s why Amnesty International has always had a great appeal to me – because it’s wanting the world to help the world, and it’s about time. In this country, quite often we talk about human rights, and we always think about it [like] “In Africa they’re having problems, in Eastern Europe, South America…” but we have problems with food and water and basic kindness in this country, and I think Amnesty International is going to be doing a lot of work on behalf of Americans, the last group of people you would really think would be in need. Have you been thinking about that?

Morello: One thing I think that Amnesty International has always been able to do very successfully is maintain a moral high ground. Even during the conflict with the Soviet Union they would call out the Soviet Union for their human rights abuses, and at the same time call out the United States for their human rights abuses in Central America, and their collusion with apartheid in South Africa. It’s really a very clear moral voice that [says] jailing someone for ideas is wrong, and that does not have a left or right stamp to it. It is always wrong, and this is what we need to address. As far as the year 2009, a basic human right should be shelter. A basic human right should be food. Tonight in Los Angeles, where we’re doing this interview, there are 75,000 homeless people. Fifteen percent of those are kids. I can’t do the math, but that’s 12,000 or so homeless children on the streets tonight. To me, that’s more than an injustice, that’s a crime. One of my hopes is that the economic injustice, rather than just political injustice, is something that Amnesty takes head-on in the years to come.

Rollins: What do you think it’s going to take for in America for Americans to really get up and start addressing and assessing these issues? Because as it is now, I think this country suffers from [the feeling], “Well it can’t happen here because we’re America, we do everything, we can do everything better than everyone. “Okay great, but this guy’s hungry, and that guy is foreclosed upon, and that whole family is at the bus station tonight and dinner’s gonna be some Snickers bars. Do you think we’re gonna have to hit the ground harder for everyone to drop the ego trip and start seeing that we really have to help each other? What’s it going to take?

Morello: Well, I think a deep corporate propaganda vein in the United States since even before the Reagan era is that everyone should be in it for themselves, and if you have the right jeans and the right six-pack of beer, you’re gonna be okay, and that [kind of] advertising is crammed down your throat. It’s different in other industrial nations where there’s more of a feeling of we rather than me. I just did a justice tour on the west coast where we visited homeless advocacy organizations, and more and more people, more and more young people are being pushed out of the middle class into poverty, and more people in poverty are being pushed into homelessness. What is it going to take? I think there has to be a definite paradigm shift. And I don’t think you can sit around and wait for the powers that be to come to their senses. The way that things change in this country, the way that things have changed in a progressive way has always been from the bottom up, and from people organizing and struggling for what they think is right. And if poverty isn’t right, then that’s something we’ve got to struggle against.

Rollins: Let’s talk about the Axis of Justice that you have along with the Serj Tankian. When did it start, and more importantly why did it start?

Morello: Axis of Justice began almost ten years ago now. In 2000, Serj’s band System of a Down and my band at the time Audioslave were going to perform at Ozzfest. The year before, I’d been to the San Bernadino Ozzfest, and was appalled by the number of white power tattoos and Nazi tattoos I saw people flying very comfortably at the show, when on the main stage there wasn’t one act all day long that didn’t have at least one non-white member in it. And I just thought, This is my music too, what the fuck? Are you kidding me? That’s just not okay. So Serge and I talked about it, and the next year, System and Audioslave were set to play a show, and I said that we need to have a presence on the concourse amidst the skull bracelets and whatnot; an anti-racist presence. So we put together an organization called Axis of Justice, and we attended each one of those shows, and it gained momentum from there – it grew from this one tent on one tour promoting human rights and anti-racism to a radio show on KPFK to a website, axisofjustice.org. The premise was to take progressive-minded musicians, fans of music, and local grassroots organizations and bring them all together. Since the first Rage Against the Machine show, people have been asking me, “How can I get involved? What can I do to help?” and I have a lot of sympathy for that because I grew up in a tiny suburb of Chicago where I had ideas and feelings [like] if this wasn’t right, what do I do about it. So by going to axisofjustice.org, there’s like a watering hole: if you’re interested in this issue, and you live in Pittsburgh, you’re two clicks away from finding a local organization that we endorse.

Rollins: Great. Is activism for young people different now than it was when you were a young person wanting to get involved?

Morello: That’s a good question. I can’t really look at it from the same perspective at 44 now, [compared to] what high school kids are thinking, but the issues at my time were Cold War issues in a way. It was the U.S. support for brutal dictatorships in Central America and for support of apartheid, and the I.R.A. hunger strikers – that was sort of my moment when I made a personal commitment to social justice. It was during when Bobby Sands was dying of a hunger strike….

Rollins: I was about to say, Bobby Sands.

Morello: Yeah, ‘cause there were kids in my high school who were starving themselves to make the wrestling team, and here was someone who was literally starving [himself] because of an idea. I see at every one of my shows young people who seem very, very committed to ideas of social justice and to making the world better, and I think that that sort of energy always comes from youth, and that’s why at Axis of Justice we really try to foment that, and to stir up unrest among the children.

Tom Morello: “I really do have faith in these young people, that they are seeing it, they are getting involved, they’re going to your website, they’re going to something like Amnesty International and saying dammit, I’m ready. And the fact that they can be a click away I think is really encouraging.”

Rollins: I would see one of the main differences between when you were young and wanting to get involved and now is the Internet, where you just said a moment ago, two clicks away. You’re in Eerie, Pennsylvania, you want to help out, you can go right there. And hopefully that kid steams down there the next afternoon and says “I’m ready to do whatever it takes.” But back in those old days of the last century when a fax machine was a newfangled thing, it’s amazing how technology has helped. And even in the last several years, just investigative journalism online – people who can now go Oh no you don’t, aha! – and all kinds of great pages which I go to all the time and you go to. I think now more than ever young people who can access Axis of Justice or go to whatever website, they can become more involved. And it’s my hope that it is these young people. At the end of every year, I’m angrier than I was the year before about what’s going on. I’m also more optimistic. I really do have faith in these young people, that they are seeing it, they are getting involved, they’re going to your website, they’re going to something like Amnesty International and saying dammit, I’m ready. And the fact that they can be a click away I think is really encouraging.

Morello: There’s a demystification as well. Before, you got what you were given on the nightly news, unless you maybe heard a Clash record.

Rollins: Joe Strummer was one of my early guys who made me question things.

Morello: Exactly, I could trust him much more than I could Dan Rather. But now, with everyone’s cell phone is a news reporter. It’s harder to hide the misdeeds than it once was, and that’s a positive thing.

Rollins: We’re gonna kind of shift gears now and get into that Obama-first-100-days thing, and the thing that you wrote on the closing of Guantanamo. So, I’m gonna ask you how you feel about the executive orders to close Guantanamo and the use of torture and your opinion on accountability for those responsible for torture and other abusive policies. Are you ready?

Morello: Yes.

Rollins: Okay. As you know, recently the International Red Cross report was leaked or somehow got to the New York Times Book Review. Now everyone gets to read it. Within the last week Barack Obama released some torture memos; a lot of it is redacted, but you can still read enough of it to know that we did torture, whether you want to call it that or not. He’s also wanting to close down Guantanamo. What do you think is the Obama administration’s responsibility to accountability? Should we be hauling people like Bivey and Addington down to the dock and having a word? Should we put this behind us? The world is watching us. The world is watching what we’re going to do very closely. When Barack Obama says we’re moving ahead, you’ll see both sides of that on the internet – people going, Well wait, it’s a war crime; a crime is a crime is a crime is a crime – come on now. I think the world is waiting to see what America’s going to do. What do you think about all of this?

Morello: Well, it’s interesting, because first of all in Obama’s first five days in office, with the idea to close Guantanamo and that we’re not going to torture anymore…I haven’t heard a president say two things in a row that I’ve agreed with in my lifetime. (Guantanamo is still not closed, to my understanding.) With regards to torture: torture is amoral and barbaric, period. It is also illegal. It is a crime. The people who commit torture, the people who order torture to be committed should be held accountable. I was reading some evil article in the New York Times yesterday where one of the arguments that was being put forward by the Obama administration was that it was proved that this torture was not effective. What does that have to do with it? Maybe they should have rammed a hot poker up someone’s ass? Torture is right or it’s wrong. Torture is absolutely wrong, and the people responsible for it should be held accountable if there’s going to be any credibility. We’ll see if this administration is interested in being morally credible and holding those sons-of-bitches responsible who have done the torturing. So when it gets to the point of mincing words, of how “effective” is torture – maybe it would have been more effective if we’d beheaded the mothers of the people –

Rollins: I think that’s how they got around the whole issue, because if you do any reading about Addington and John Yu, they’ll tell you that none of this was torture. “See? We didn’t torture, because we wrote it out and said we didn’t torture, that means we didn’t torture.” Taking a guy by a dog collar and slamming his head into a wall – Oh, but it’s a wooden wall! – no, no, no you’re giving the guy brain damage. You put him in a box with bugs – Oh, but they weren’t the stinging kind! – but you told him they were. You crazy people, what are you doing?

Morello: And if they claim that that wasn’t torture, they probably wouldn’t mind it being done to them or their family members.

Rollins: Or they don’t mind this stuff being declassified, but they are putting up quite a ruckus. And so what do you think America’s responsibility is to the rest of the world in accounting for what we’ve done to these people?

Morello: I think the first responsibility we have is to ourselves, like, who are we? We have been a nation of torturers, like medieval Tower of London shit going on, and if we’re to get beyond it, if we’re to have any sort of moral standing not just beyond our borders, but to be able to look at ourselves in the mirror, we have to hold up to it, and we have to hold those responsible. It’s not okay just because there’s some disagreement about it, or because it’s “impolitic” to send Rumsfeld to the gallows – that may not be politically expedient or maybe right to do. How would the world react to that? It would put the cheers of the World Cup to shame, I think, but it’s something that’s more difficult too. I hope that the Obama administration is able to press out the boundaries of what is doable, with regards to that, and they would gain the respect not only beyond the nation’s borders but of the people within the nation who’ve been so furious that we’ve been dragged through the mud like this over the last eight years.

Rollins: [Over] the next few years coming up, what do you have planned as far as making your voice heard, things you want to do on behalf of human rights?

Morello: My activism is always tied with my music. So via Axis of Justice, with my new group Street Sweeper Social Club, with The Nightwatchman, and with the upcoming Rage Against The Machine shows, the idea first of all is to rock you silly with our music, because I think the first thing has to be the vehicle. No one wants to go to a college lecture. No one wants to see just hollerin’ about injustice over something that doesn’t kick ass. So the idea is first to make the art compelling. That’s why I’m not in the carpenters’ union. I’m a guitar player. But secondly, to really tie that to grassroots issues. And the issues at the forefront for me, [the first issue] is poverty, and that poverty is a crime. And that’s something we need to address on two fronts. One is that we need to do all we can to help the people who continue to fall through that safety net. In order for it to be a just country, it’s got to be a country where there is greater economic equality. On the other hand, if poverty is a crime, who is the perpetrator of that crime? And what are the intrinsic things in the system that cause this crime to happen? [We need to] really take a look at those, and see what we can do to get our hands on the lever to make sure that we don’t have 75,000 people five years from now homeless on the streets of Los Angeles.

Tom Morello: History’s not done, you’re in it, and what you do or fail to do during your time is gonna make an enormous difference in what the planet looks like during your time and in the future.

Rollins: I just want to get your take, if you have one, on food delivery systems in the world. I think there’s enough food to go around when you see all the tons of food that gets wasted in New York every day because you can’t serve the bread twice. And so what do you think about everything that’s going on with NAFTA, which I know you were probably critical with Clinton about that, and that I think has probably screwed people out of a meal. Where do you think the future of food distribution is going and the importance of that?

Morello: Well, I think this speaks to the whole idea of a paradigm shift. We need to bail out people, not banks. All of the sudden, these countless hundreds of billions of dollars that are apparently sitting around in sacks in the Treasury are given to the automobile industry and are given to these corporations which have flushed the economy down the toilet. Now, what if we made as our priority looking at the three things that would end AIDS in Africa? The first one’s poverty. What can we do with those $700,000,000,000 tomorrow to address that problem? Those people aren’t on the radar, those people don’t matter. Those 75,000 people on the streets of Los Angeles, they’re not a voting bloc, they have no influence, they just don’t matter. [They don’t] factor into the equation. The automobile industry on the other hand, the jackasses who fly in their private jets to go pick up their checks from Congress – they’ve got the time, they’ve got the ear, and they’ve got the checks (your and my tax dollars), as some sort of bonus for their malfeasance. And that’s why I think it really takes some sort of paradigm shift. The structure is set. It’s changing the structure that will allow us to bail out people, not banks, and I am all in favor. I always have the website and the booth at the gigs, and those things I think are very important and can make a real difference in the lives in the people in the communities where we play. Shining a light on the picture of what it is, what the fuck are we doing when we’re giving hundreds of billions of dollars to millionaires when there are teenagers with AIDS and their little kids…a tiny percentage of that could dramatically change their lives and their communities forever.

Rollins: Last question: If you were to address a young person anywhere in the world, because human rights is a global thing, and Amnesty International is a global thing, their eyes are everywhere, what would you tell a young person, someone who would show up to your show? You as an individual, what is your responsibility to your fellow humans around the world? What’s your responsibility right now? What should you go do tomorrow, just as a matter of course?

Morello: First of all, I don’t know that I’d necessarily take that tone with them and tell them it’s their responsibility, because I think there are plenty of people in that audience who recognize that something’s not right, who recognize that they maybe feel powerless, they maybe feel atomized. Yes sure they can twitter and they’ve got a PS3, but how do I interact with them? The thing I would tell them is that the world only changed because people like you have changed it. [Because of] people like you, women got the right to vote, lunch counters were desegregated, the Berlin Wall fell, apartheid was overthrown because of people just like you. You are an agent of history. History’s not done, you’re in it, and what you do or fail to do during your time is gonna make an enormous difference in what the planet looks like during your time and in the future.

Rollins:: Fantastic. Thank you, sir.

Morello: Thank you very much, always a pleasure.

interview transcribed by Maddy Wyatt

images by Andrea Passarella