The front man of The Strokes Julian Casablancas clarifies his comments on Zionism during the Oxford Union Speech “The key words we use to talk politics are essentially meaningless and keep out discussions going in these endless ragebait circles”. Stereogum reports that this all stared with Casablancas sharing his most controversial take on SubwayTakes in April. “American Zionists get the benefits of white privileged people but talk like they are Black people during slavery”. He went on to say “Indoctrination is such a strong thing. We just want to be part of the tribe. So I get it, but it is a sad fact the brainwashing of just people in general. You can’t be mad just because something was rammed down their throat, necessarily” (Stereogum).

A month later, the Oxford Debate Society announced that the singer would be one of the speakers on May 28th. On July 3rd the Oxford released coverage of Casablancas speech that expands on his opinion on Zionism. His speech begins with reminding the audience that “the key words we use to talk politics are essentially meaningless and keep out discussions going in these endless ragebait circles” and pointed out “freedom” as an example.

He argued that democracy has truly never been tried and the larger a group is the more potential for deception and exploitation rises. He said that “democracy” is on of the words that that’s thrown around but losses its meaning and he proposed that “democracy plus” requires five pillars to stop corruption. “1. A vow of poverty by leadership. 2. An objective way to label media reports to point out lies and remind consumers who owns the media outlet. 3. Thorough multi-day debates that allow time for factchecking. 4. An end to anonymity by putting direct lobbying in the public record. 5. The chance to choose how up to half of your tax money is used” (Stereogum).

He said that capitalism, communism socialism and libertarianism have been stretched to the point of losing meaning. Then brings up Zionism and breaks down the word to help avoid future problems. The singer also draws a conclusion with “green liners”, who agree to the boundaries of Israel as world leaders have agreed upon many times, and expansionists, “the good old settler types just shooting at Palestinians and taking homes daily.” He aligns himself with the green liners and says his moderate Jewish friends agree the expansionists are “kind of crazy”(Stereogum).

Casablancas speech can be watch here: