My Speech

Saturday 18 April 2009. By Rick Falkvinge.

Get It Try It

Friends, citizens, pirates:

My name is Rick Falkvinge and I'm the leader of the Pirate Party.

The establishment has declared war on our generation.

The establishment has declared war on the industries of the next generation. The citizens of the next generation. The social participation of the next generation.

The politicians behave like incompetent drunken elephants with blinkers on their eyes trumpeting around in an egg carton factory. They're digitally analphabetic and they're destroying our society. There are no excuses.

All this because they let themselves be bullied by foreign powers. By yesterday's dinosaurs.

They tell us there is no corruption in Sweden. Why then did they carry out an illegal raid in 2006 on the direct orders of a foreign power? Why were our heroes Anakata, Tiamo, and Brokep convicted on the orders of Hollywood? Why was the investigating office Jim Keyser bribed with a top level job in the same Hollywood?

The police were bribed because the establishment discovered there's a new tool. A tool that makes it possible to discuss social issues without their approval. For us to think for ourselves. So we can no longer be controlled.

To you politicians who feel threatened by the Internet I have only one thing to say: get out of our parliament!

Because now it's time to rebuild it all. Build it anew. Build our society for a new generation. A new generation of citizens, a new generation of industries, and a new generation of participants.

We need politicians who believe in the future and who don't let themselves be bullied by yesterday's dinosaurs. Today's politicians have been tested and have failed. They're not building, they're ripping down and destroying instead. Therefore we have to replace them.

Fortunately we can do it. The European elections are right around the corner. The polls open in only 32 days, the 20th May. Talk to your friends, colleagues, classmates. It's only together we can effect this change - for we don't have Hollywood's advertising and lobbying budget. But what we have beats Hollywood hands down and it's our ballots and general elections. So we have to talk about the Pirate Party with our friends, get them to go and vote, and use the EU election to send a very strong message:

'Shape up or you're leaving the parliament too!'

We're called pirates. We're called pirates because we're for civil rights, because we believe in the future, because we want to rebuild our society for a new generation.

My name is Rick Falkvinge and I'm proud to be a pirate.

Now go and vote!

When I grew up they tried to outlaw cassettes. But you can't stop piracy. It's the future. The record companies are too spoiled with lobster and champagne. If they reduce their already enormous profits they complain. It's shameless.
 - Peter Stormare

Membership in the Pirate Party has been skyrocketing since yesterday. The Swedish Pirate Party is suddenly the third biggest political party in Sweden. This certainly gives the seated junta something to think about. It's time to reclaim Sweden.