Margaret Thatcher 1925-2013
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TheOldGreyWhistle wrote:Join in the partyhttp://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/margaret-thatcher-dead-durham-miners-1820941
Will you be going? It would be interesting to have a report on the festivities.
Thatcher top of the charts when she is dead! http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/margaret-thatcher-dead-ding-dong-1821740
A reminder of our meeting in West London taking place on the eve of her funeral…http://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/event/thatcher-and-capitalism-chiswick-800pm
Preparing the introduction to the discussion on "Who was to blame: Thatcher or Capitalism?" at West London branch on Tuesday, I re-read the May 1989 Socialist Standard on the 10th anniversary of her becoming PM. This passage, appropriately entitled for today "Thatcheritis", says it all:
Quote:It would, however, be a mistake to attribute the sufferings workers have had to endure over the past ten years to the actions of one particular capitalist politician, however ill-intentioned, class-prejudiced and domineering she might be. There is no such thing as Thatcherism as something different and worse than ordinary capitalism. What Thatcher has done is to have presided over the operation of capitalism during the worst part of the slump phase of its economic cycle. During such a period redundancies and unemployment reach a maximum and governments are forced to slash social benefits as a way of lowering the tax burden on the reduced profits of capitalist enterprises.When Thatcher endlessly repeated "There Is No Alternative" she was in fact displaying a clearer understanding of how capitalism works than did the Labour and other opposition politicians. There really was no alternative (apart from socialism, of course). Any government of capitalism during the worst part of a slump would have had to behave in essentially the same way. In short, it was capitalism not Thatcher that has been responsible.UK Uncut are organising some sort of event in Brixton on Saturday which will likely become an anti-Thatcher celebration. Some of us are thinking of going along to hand out leaflets and maybe this back issue (as opposed to going to Trafalgar Square later and getting kettled, tempting as it is to witness what might turnout to be a significant event).
ALB wrote:Preparing the introduction to the discussion on "Who was to blame: Thatcher or Capitalism?" at West London branch on Tuesday, I re-read the May 1989 Socialist Standard on the 10th anniversary of her becoming PM. This passage, appropriately entitled for today "Thatcheritis", says it all:Quote:It would, however, be a mistake to attribute the sufferings workers have had to endure over the past ten years to the actions of one particular capitalist politician, however ill-intentioned, class-prejudiced and domineering she might be. There is no such thing as Thatcherism as something different and worse than ordinary capitalism. What Thatcher has done is to have presided over the operation of capitalism during the worst part of the slump phase of its economic cycle. During such a period redundancies and unemployment reach a maximum and governments are forced to slash social benefits as a way of lowering the tax burden on the reduced profits of capitalist enterprises.When Thatcher endlessly repeated "There Is No Alternative" she was in fact displaying a clearer understanding of how capitalism works than did the Labour and other opposition politicians. There really was no alternative (apart from socialism, of course). Any government of capitalism during the worst part of a slump would have had to behave in essentially the same way. In short, it was capitalism not Thatcher that has been responsible.UK Uncut are organising some sort of event in Brixton on Saturday which will likely become an anti-Thatcher celebration. Some of us are thinking of going along to hand out leaflets and maybe this back issue (as opposed to going to Trafalgar Square later and getting kettled, tempting as it is to witness what might turnout to be a significant event).
I am not sure I agree with the statement:It is tantamount to arguing that Thatcher and her government were blameless and acting in accordance with some predermined guidence. It turns historical materialism into a nonsenceI still think Marx was right when he wrote""Men make their own history, but they do not make it as they please; they do not make it under self-selected circumstances, but under circumstances existing already"AndHistory does nothing, it ‘possesses no immense wealth’, it ‘wages no battles’. It is man, real, living man who does all that, who possesses and fights; ‘history’ is not, as it were, a person apart, using man as a means to achieve its own aims; history is nothing but the activity of man pursuing his aims.. Thatcher and her government consciously acted in the interests of the ruling class. How they did that was not decided by the invisible hand of history.
Actually, that was one of the points I was going to raise in the introduction to the discussion: how much leeway do politicians have to influence the course if not the direction of events?For instance, in her case, was it really necessary from a military point of view to order the sinking of the Belgrano or was this done to punish Argentina? Again, with the miners strike, was it necessdary to close down all pits that were not making the going rate of profit (rather than just those that weren't making any profit at all) or was this just done on to break the power of the NUM as the leading trade union? The same sort of question could be asked about Blair's decision to back the US invasion of Iraq: France and Germany didn't, so it wasn't strictly necessary for Britain to.I'm not sure how this affects the attitude we should take to steps to try to stop things being worse than they need be.
Ding Dong The Witch is Dead which some now want banned was written by Yip Harburg.His real name was Isidore, but he was known as Yipsel (shortened to Yip), because that’s how people pronounced YPSL – the Young People’s Socialist League, of which he was a member. He was a victim of the Hollywood blacklist in the 1950s. The author of the Oz books was Frank Baum, and he too was of the Left. "There were no poor people in the Land of Oz, because there was no such things as money, and all the property of every sort belonged to the Ruler. The people were her children, and she cared for them. Each person was given freely by his neighbors whatever he required for his use, which is as much as anyone may reasonably desire. Some tilled the land and raised great crops of grain, which was divided equally among the entire population, so that all had enough. There were many tailors and dressmakers and shoemakers and the like, that made things that any who desired them might wear. Likewise there were jewellers who made ornaments for the person, which pleased and beautified the people, and these ornaments also were free to those who asked for them. Each man and woman, no matter what he or she produced for the good of the community, was supplied by the neighbors with food and clothing and a house and furniture and ornaments and games. If by chance the supply ever ran short, more was taken from the great storehouses of the Ruler, which were afterward filled up again when there was more of any article than the people needed. Every one worked half the time and played half the time, and the people enjoyed the work as much as they did the play, because it is good to be occupied and to have something to do. There were no cruel overseers set to watch them, and no one to rebuke them or to find fault with them. So each one was proud to do all he could for his friends and neighbors, and was glad when they would accept the things he produced." “It must have cost a lot of money,” remarked the shaggy man.“Money! Money in Oz!” cried the Tin Woodman. “What a queer idea! Did you suppose we are so vulgar as to use money here?”“Why not?” asked the shaggy man.“If we used money to buy things with, instead of love and kindness and the desire to please one another, then we should be no better than the rest of the world,” declared the Tin Woodman. “Fortunately money is not known in the Land of Oz at all. We have no rich, and no poor; for what one wishes the others all try to give him, in order to make him happy, and no one in all Oz cares to have more than he can use……[later]"Don't they work at all?" asked the shaggy man."To be sure they work," replied the Tin Woodman; "this fair city could not be built or cared for without labor, nor could the fruit and vegetables and other food be provided for the inhabitants to eat. But no one works more than half his time, and the people of Oz enjoy their labors as much as they do their play." ”
ALB wrote:I'm not sure how this affects the attitude we should take to steps to try to stop things being worse than they need be.It certainly doesn't change our case; socialism is still the only answer.
TheOldGreyWhistle wrote:Thatcher top of the charts when she is dead!I always suspected that the BBC wouldn't play this and they're not going to. Just listened to the bloke who started the campaign being interviewed and he turns out to be a wimp, defending his action as "British humour" rather than class hatred.
History repeating itself here with the BBC. They did the same sort of thing to the Sex Pistols song "God Save the Queen" at the time of the silver jubilee in 1977. It hit number one on the NME charts, but the BBC only acknowledged it at number two. So avoiding the accusation of censorship, in not allowing it air play.Comforting to see the BBC are still the guardians of the nations morals.
The Ritzy cinema in Brixton last Monday night:Good, but what was meant by "communism"? Actually, since many of those there would have been Leninists, they may have meant by "communism" what we mean by "socialism", i.e a classless, stateless, moneyless, wageless society. It would be nice to think that this is how those who saw it understood it rather than as something to do with the state capitalism that used to exist in Russia.
The head of Radio1 Ben Cooper, informs us that he has been caught between a rock and a hard place in his decision not to play the full record of, Ding dong The wicked witch is dead on the chart show. He also paronisingly informs us that it is the job of the BBC to inform and "educate" the audience as to why a group of people within society, would have done that, (getting this song into the charts). I think people in Capitalist Britain would be quite well aware of why this protest has been made! It does not need a buffoon like him to explain it!Moreover his use of the phrase, a rock and a hard place, is an insult to the millions under Thatcher who were, in reality, placed in this position during Thatchers rule and the countless millions placed in exactly the "same position" decades after Thatchers political demise, by her political Herrs, of the current coalition government.Workers dont need an appointee of the establishment intelligentsia pointing out the obvious. Why not Mr Cooper, use this oppurtunity to try and justify spending over 10 Million quid on a "credit card" that we are continually told has been maxed out? Heres a thought, have the body on display and let her sycophantic supporters pay money to view the corpse. When they raise sufficient funds then, and only then, bury the parasite. We'll see how much the wealthy revere her, in the only currency she, and they, understand or accept. Steve.
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