Skewering the popular view of anti-war individuals as ‘radicals’, M.I.A.’s amazing new video looks at how commonplace and natural the idea of 3D printed guns, uzis, and drones floating in our skies have become. Who is the real radical in that world where being against the killing and surveillance of others is a weakness or  some sin that you don’t support your President? “Double Bubble Trouble’ would say the people who support these inhumane ‘needs of war’ and a ‘right’ to own a handheld killing machine (let alone a military strength one) are the ones who need to check their morality.

M.I.A’s video would be beautifully dystopian if  it wasn’t already our reality.  M.I.A.’s quintessential DIY style is played to great effect here, amplifying images of the sobering reality of gun culture played out internationally.  It connects the ways that people are victimized by this culture and the ways those victims are often silenced–via graphic imagery, which honestly may be the only way that gets across. But perhaps it’s greatest achievement is the way it horrifyingly makes clear the soporific attitude which we are taking to the increasing presence of drones in our skies by showing people dancing nonchalantly to a plaza filled with neon lit ones like the  lights in a rave

It’s no wonder UMG initially tried to block this video on ‘Copyright Grounds’ after M.I.A. uploaded it to youtube. Plutocracy doesn’t like a bit of truth making its way out. M.I.A.’s twitter rampage to get the video unblocked, which I watched unfold live, was a sight to behold and places her square in the history of pop music’s protest folk heroes.

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