Being in love with more than one person at the same time is risky business. Yet these 5 couples have it all: they are able to love more than one person without causing the broken hearts and dishes that often accompany polyamorous relationships. What’s their trick? They love each other AND the planet, human rights, and civil rights, and they take action to make the world a better place together. Because these lovebirds bring so much love to each other and the world, because their heart-felt hard work has won my heart, I’d like to give them a Valiant Valentine Award (VVA).

Today’s Valiant Valentine, which kicks off my 5-part Valentine’s week-long series, goes to a couple who has already received a few awards here and there, though none as prestigious as the VVA. She’s a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador who scored Academy Awards, and awards from Amnesty International and The Center for Constitutional Rights. He’s no small potatoes either, having won his own Academy Award, a Golden Globe, and a Best actor “Prix” at Cannes.

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Oh, no! I just spent, like, the last forty years idolizing Neil Young, and now he says he doesn’t think music can really make a difference in the world. At the Berlin film festival today, where he presented the documentary “CSNY/Déjà Vu” , about his 2006 anti-war concert tour, he told the AFP:

“I know that the time when music could change the world is past. I really doubt that a single song can make a difference. It is a reality.”

He may”unlike Pete Seeger–be pessimistic about the power of song, but Young doesn’t really seem ready to give up on being an agent of change. He’s working on a new film called “Repowering The American Dream,” a documentary about the ‘59 Lincoln he’s converted to a plug-in hybrid, according to the Daily Green, which quotes a more optimistic-sounding Young:

“By drawing on entrepreneurial companies’ advanced technology and good old American ingenuity, we intend to transform one of the largest and heaviest gas guzzling vehicles of our generation into a highly energy efficient vehicle, and demonstrate to the American public that we can re-power the American dream by demanding environmentally-friendly vehicles now.”

Sounds like Young is just looking for new ways to electrify the electorate. Long may he run.

Young gives other musicians who want to express their opinion on the war and related topics a chance to be heard on his Living With War website; give them a listen here  if you’d like to hear from folks who still believe music can make a difference.  

One of the best and most inspiring documentaries I saw this year was Jim Brown’s Pete Seeger : The Power of Song. Pete Seeger is a folk singer, who starting in the late 40’s, wrote some amazing folks songs, while encouraging people to change the world, both with their voice and their actions.

He has also faced a lot of controversy in his lifetime, from interactions with the Communist party in the 50’s. He went on to testify before the House Un-American Activities Committee, but would admit no wrong-doing, as all he had done with fight for workers and African-Americans to have rights. He would be banned from appearing on television and for a long time he did not.

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