Brian Eno has shared an extensive New Year message, urging the public to push for equality.

Taking to his Facebook page on January 1, Eno addressed the “pretty rough year” of 2016 and questioned whether it is “the end – not the beginning – of a long decline”.

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“This decline includes the transition from secure employment to precarious employment, the destruction of unions and the shrinkage of workers’ rights, zero hour contracts, the dismantling of local government, a health service falling apart, an underfunded education system ruled by meaningless exam results and league tables, the increasingly acceptable stigmatisation of immigrants, knee-jerk nationalism, and the concentration of prejudice enabled by social media and the internet,” he wrote.

He blamed the “huge wealth inequalities” for the decline of democracy and urged readers to “start something big”.

“It will involve engagement: not just tweets and likes and swipes, but thoughtful and creative social and political action too,” he continued. “If we want social generosity, then we must pay our taxes and get rid of our tax havens. And if we want thoughtful politicians, we should stop supporting merely charismatic ones.”

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He concluded that “inequality eats away at the heart of a society, breeding disdain, resentment, envy, suspicion, bullying, arrogance and callousness,” before adding that “if we want any decent kind of future we have to push away from that, and I think we’re starting to.”

2016/2017The consensus among most of my friends seems to be that 2016 was a terrible year, and the beginning of a long…

Posted by Brian Eno on Sunday, January 1, 2017

Eno released his new album, Reflections, on January 1.

The February 2017 issue of Uncut is now on sale in the UK – featuring our cover story on Leonard Cohen. Elsewhere in the issue, we look at the 50 Great Modern Protest Songs and our free CD collects 15 of the very best, featuring Ry Cooder, Jarvis Cocker, Roy Harper, Father John Misty, Hurray For The Riff Raff and Richard Thompson. The issue also features our essential preview of the key albums for 2017, including Roger Waters, Fleet Foxes, Paul Weller, The Jesus And Mary Chain, the Waterboys and more. Plus Leon Russell, Mike Oldfield, Ty Segall, Tift Merritt, David Bowie, Japandroids, The Doors, Flaming Lips, Wilco, The XX, Grateful Dead, Mark Eitzel and more plus 139 reviews