“The Party is half the size
“The Party is half the size it was when I first joined and is still steadily declining by all accounts. Oblivion is theoretically quite on the cards and still we have members displaying advanced signs of the Titanic syndrome – lashing out at any signs of fresh thinking. Lets all gather around the piano, comrades, and sing the red flag rather than “god save the queen” as we slowly sink below the waves but, for gods sake, dont even think about organising the liferafts!!!. Don’t think outside the black box. Just carry on as usual. Just do what we have always done and got more oe less nowhere as a result.” Isn’t this the same for all political groups. Even mainstream bourgeois parties are losing members. And if we are brutally honest , the Occupy Movement although offering a degree of inspiration was a side show in regards to numbers. Zeitgeist also raised the imagination but led to no real impact on the vies of the working class. We thought the unions were about to escalate their resistance, and they still may do , but the political solutions they are offering have remained in a Keynesian cul-de-sac. In comparison to those beforementioned 2005 saw the churches mobilise hundreds of thousands in their ultimately futile end poverty campaign. What does that say of the potential of thinking outside the box? Should we all don dog-collars and cassocks to reach out to those in dire need of some socialist catechisms to achieve a reversal of numbers? No magic answer here right now. Just banging away with the same old arguments in the same old way. Because what is the alternative except to maintain principles. But i think a case can be made for re-prioritising and re-shaping our case for socialism in changing conditions. Yet we need to first reach a concensus upon what the foremost problems faced by workers are and which part of the socialist response would reach the most receptive audience. But even that poses its own problems. With all their focus groups and political analysists and social commentators, even the conventional capitalist parties continually raise themes and then drop them, they constantly switch and re-position their propaganda….with as much success as ourselves! If people have concrete suggestions and practical proposals and then lets hear them. Otherwise, it’s all no different from the post …a wishy-washy outpouring of emotion.