> The pain of not having enough is a fundamental human experience, and to see someone who had more than most will ever see in their lifetime literally burn it away hurts. I thought it was deeply selfish stunt then, and still do now.
If they had spent it on a yacht would that be better? It represents an exchange of money for an object, and I suspect you don't regularly get hurt by the fact that people buy largely pointless status symbols. But in some ways it amounts to the same thing.
(Actually I'd argue that the resources and fossil-fuels involved in manufacturing a largely pointless object such as a yacht is less than the burning of the money. And yet, which hurts more?)
I heard a story that a young Tony Blair and some of his friends burned a 50 pound note in front of a destitute homeless person. Are the KLF worse for burning their larger sum of money as an act of rebellion against a corrupt self-serving industry? Or is it Tony Blair who is worse for sadistically showing a little hope to a desperate person and then snatching it away?
The story in the press about this insinuates David Cameron might have done this as it is apparently a Bullingdon Club (which Boris Johnson was also a member of) “thing”.
It would be quite surprising for someone who went into Labour politics to do this:
https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/bullingdon-club-initia...
If they had spent it on a yacht would that be better? It represents an exchange of money for an object, and I suspect you don't regularly get hurt by the fact that people buy largely pointless status symbols. But in some ways it amounts to the same thing.
(Actually I'd argue that the resources and fossil-fuels involved in manufacturing a largely pointless object such as a yacht is less than the burning of the money. And yet, which hurts more?)
I heard a story that a young Tony Blair and some of his friends burned a 50 pound note in front of a destitute homeless person. Are the KLF worse for burning their larger sum of money as an act of rebellion against a corrupt self-serving industry? Or is it Tony Blair who is worse for sadistically showing a little hope to a desperate person and then snatching it away?