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  • in reply to: Anti-Zionism is not anti-semitic #132468
    ALB
    Keymaster
    Quote:
    In other words Zionism could be construed as a form of racism

    You can't say that or you'll be done for anti-semitism. Here's the official government definition of anti-semitism:https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/a-definition-of-antisemitism

    Quote:
    However, for those seeking a definition of antisemitism, the UK’s College of Policing does include a working definition of antisemitism in their guidance to police forces in the UK. The full guidance is available from their website here and the definition is reproduced in full here:(…)Denying the Jewish people their right to self-determination, e.g., by claiming that the existence of a State of Israel is a racist endeavor.

    Safer to say that Israel is a sectarian endeavour.

    in reply to: Anti-Zionism is not anti-semitic #132464
    ALB
    Keymaster

    More here:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marriage_in_IsraelApparently, the same applies to Israeli subjects who are Muslims and Christians. They can't marry outside their religion either. Israel is continuing to apply the situation that existed under the Ottoman Empire except that it is Jews not Muslims who are the top dogs. So Israel is a backward country in this respect, though not as bad a Apartheid South Africa as sexual relations between people of different religions don't seem to be illegal. It's a sectarian State.

    in reply to: Anti-Zionism is not anti-semitic #132462
    ALB
    Keymaster
    alanjjohnstone wrote:
    https://mailstrom.blogspot.com/2012/10/jewish-history.htmlA useful read from my personal blog Mailstrom  of an article by Schlomo Sand, professor of history at Tel Aviv university.

    Is this true:

    Sand wrote:
    Israel is a state which forbids marriage between a ‘Jew’ and a ‘non-Jew’,

    It can't be, can it? Is Israel really that bad?

    in reply to: Anti-Zionism is not anti-semitic #132461
    ALB
    Keymaster
    bbc wrote:
    Mr Gabbay says the policies of Israel's opposition party and the ruling coalition government were "aligned" when it came to the "security of our citizens and the actions of our soldiers" and Mr Corbyn had shown "hatred" of the government's policies in these areas.

    Here is a prime example of someone using the new, invalid extension of the meaning of anti-semitism to mean not just "hatred of Jews" but "hatred of policies of the government of Israel". The Israeli Labour Party is of course a Zionist outfit.

    in reply to: Anti-Zionism is not anti-semitic #132455
    ALB
    Keymaster

    The word Semitic in relation to "race" (or "ethnicity" as you have to say now) is just as unscientific as Aryan in the same context. Both in fact orginated at the same time, when the the facts about "race" were not yet known and prejudices about it widespread, even mainstream.The only scientific use of the two terms is in relation to language and, here, the irony is that the European Jews who went to Palestine as colonists under the Zionist project spoke a dialect of German, a non-Semitic languague (Aryan, in fact). And the Jews that came to Palestine after the state of Israel was set up spoke Arabic (which is a Semitic languague). They were in fact Arabs whose religion was Judaism just as most of the Christians of the area are Arabs whose religion is Christianity.

    in reply to: Syria: will the West attack? #96231
    ALB
    Keymaster

    For the record, here's how the various States on the UN Security Council voted:www.scoop.co.nz/stories/WO1804/S00063/security-council-fails-to-adopt-three-resolutions-on-syria.htmThe OPCW investigation is going ahead anyway but so might the NATO bombing campaign and retaliatory action by Russia (probably on bases of US-trained rebels in Syria).

    in reply to: Syria: will the West attack? #96229
    ALB
    Keymaster

    I don't know if this is true but it seems reasonable:https://www.stripes.com/news/middle-east/chemical-weapons-watchdog-to-send-inspectors-to-syria-1.521295https://sputniknews.com/middleeast/201804101063408765-opcw-douma/What's going to be interesting is how the War Party is going to react. Will they give the OPCW team the run-around that they gave poor old Hans Blix over Iraq's non-existent "weapons of mass destruction", ignoring any unfavourable conclusions?Bomber Blair is naturally in favour of bombing first and investigating afterwards.

    in reply to: Jeremy Corbyn the person #114213
    ALB
    Keymaster

    To give the man his due, he is not joining in the "Bomb Syria" campaign in which many of his own MPs are participating.:http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5594765/Corbyn-refuses-blame-Assad-chemical-attack-Syria.htmlTo go to war, capitalist states need a pretext and this time it's "gas attack" even merely "alleged" or "suspected" (last time it was "weapons of mass destruction"). But since the place where the attack is alleged to have taken place is no longer in rebel hands it should be easy to verify whether or not one took place. The place and the people in the video should be able to be identified. I can't see how any reasonable person, as someone who wants to avoid further deaths, injuries and destruction, could refuse to such an immediate on-the-spot investigation.One of the reasons that the Oxford Communist Corresponding Society gave for voting Labour in 2016 — in fact the only reason as they accepted that a Labour government even under Corbyn would not be able to make capitalism work in the interest of the working class — was that Corbyn as PM would not authorise military action overseas. I think he might try not to, as he's doing now, but would be toppled if the vital interest of UK capitalism was threatened.

    in reply to: London Borough Elections 5 May #132220
    ALB
    Keymaster

    The list of candidates has now been publshed. In London the voting system is that there are 3 councillors per ward, with the first 3 past the post being elected. Electors can cast up to 3 votes (which must be for different candidates).In Islington Junction ward: it's a straight fight between us and 3 candidates each from the usual suspects (Tories, Labour, LibDems, Greens), making a total of 13 candidates.In Richmond Barnes ward: besides us there are 3 Tories, 3 Labourites, 2 LibDems and 1 Green (the Lib-Dems and Greens have formed an electoral pact), making 10 candidates in all.In Southwark Borough & Bankside ward: we're are up against 3 candidates each from the usual suspects plus 1 from the Women's Equality Party, a total of 14 candidatest

    in reply to: Additions to MIA Hardy archive #124006
    ALB
    Keymaster

    More added. Click on title to read:

    Quote:
    The Finance of War, September 1959 We are all Socialists now, April 1962 A Tale of Two Simpletons: Good man gone wrong, September 1962 The Common Market and the old Corn Laws, October 1962 Forerunner of Common Market, November 1962 Marx and the Sunday Times, November 1963 The Founding of the Trades Union Congress, June 1968 Capitalism's Dilemma, January 1974 The Strike Weapon, May 1976 The Future of Unemployment, August 1976 A useful introduction to Marx, June 1978
    ALB
    Keymaster
    Quote:
    How to abolish wage labor within 5 years in five simple steps:STEP ONE: In the first year, add one three day weekend. Each week activists would target one working day to disrupt all wage labor. The work week will now be reduced to four days and all wage labor beyond this point will be targeted.STEP TWO: In the second year, add one four day weekend. Each week activists would target two working days to disrupt all wage labor. The work week will now be reduced to three days and all wage labor beyond this point will be targeted.STEP THREE: In the third year, add one 5 day weekend. Each week activists would target three working days to disrupt all wage labor. The work week will now be reduced to two days and all wage labor beyond this point will be targeted.STEP FOUR: In the 4th year, add one six day weekend. Each week activists would target four working days to disrupt all wage labor. The work week will now be reduced to two days and all wage labor beyond this point will be targeted.STEP FIVE: In the 5th year, add one full week off. Each week activists would target all five working days to disrupt all wage labor. The work week will now be reduced to zero days and all wage labor will be targeted.

    If you can persuade workers to do that, you could persuade them also to go through the front door and vote the political representatives of capitalism, who currently uphold capitalist rule and private property, out of office too. Then they withdraw the state's support for the existence of private and corporate property rights, lop off its coercive and undemocratic parts, and use what's left to coordinate the change-over to the communist society described (what we also call socialism). In any event, not all of the admittedly large increase in state spending over the past 100 years is just on the coercive aspects of the state (armed forces, police, courts, prisons, etc). Much of it is on things that are at least in principle socially useful such as education and health; local councils also run lots of useful services; and there's also resources (very far from adequate of course) to maintain those who don't work for one reason of the other. To deprive the existing state of the resources to keep all this going would be suicidal and, anyway, would never get majority support. Back to the drawing board, I'm afraid.

    in reply to: Left and Right Unite! – For the UBI Fight! #104149
    ALB
    Keymaster

    And Thomas More didn't envisage a basic "income" in his "utopia" but a society that didn't use money. Not at all the same.

    in reply to: Originator of a THESIS on money’s incapacity #129927
    ALB
    Keymaster

    Well, at least he takes on board some of the points we make.

    in reply to: SPC Report April 2018 #132430
    ALB
    Keymaster

    They are all  terrible. They can't have a maple leaf on a socialist banner. That would be like us having a union jack on ours.

    in reply to: Jeremy Corbyn the person #114211
    ALB
    Keymaster

    Here's the link: https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2018/apr/08/labour-antisemitism-opinion-pollIncredible. I don't believe it. A relentless smear campaign conducted by the media has managed to persuade a third of the population that Corbyn himself is an anti-semite, i.e that he hates Jews, wants to discriminte against them and/or thinks that they control things from behind the scenes. Not even the journalists who participated in the campaign will believe that that's what he thinks. As you point out, the real reason why the Board of Deputies has been out to get him is his pro-Palestine stance in the Israel/Palestine conflict.  It could turn out to be a pyrrhic victory for them, though, as over a third of voters still support the Labour Party; which suggets that they don't think that anti-semitism in its illegitimately extended sense of anti-Zionism and anti-Israel is that reprehensible or that important or relevant.

Viewing 15 posts - 5,311 through 5,325 (of 10,475 total)