ALB
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The total number of households in the 10 constituencies we have chosen is just under half a million. So that will be the number of election addresses we'll have delivered by Royal Mail
While we are speculating on hypothetical scenarios, Ken Macleod in his SF work The Stone Canal (p.175) envisages a government falling because a couple of "World Socialist" MPs abstained:
Quote:The next day the government lost a no-confidence motion (due to the abstention of only five MPs, the three Workers' Power and two World Socialists) and fell, to be replaced by a more radical coalition drawing in support from smaller parties.I haven't worked out why abstaining would lead to a government losing a no confidence vote. He can't have expected Socialist MPs to vote in favour of the government in such vote (or in any circumstance). Unless he's assuming that to defeat a vote of no-confidence a minimum number of MPs must take part (vote one way or the other).Also unrealistic is his assumption that Workers Power would more MPs than us. After all, in Vauxhall in 2010 we outpolled them.
If there's a prospect of a socialist election victory in Mole Valley Council in the stockbroker belt of Surrey then we'd be well on the way to worldwide victory. In fact, it could be the last council to fall so the problem you posit won't arise. Today even the Labour Party doesn't contest most seats there:http://www.molevalley.gov.uk/media/pdf/j/6/District_Results_2014.pdfHaving said that, I've just noticed that the "John David Hayball" standing in Leatherhead South ward is a former member and candidate of the Scargill Labour Party. He got 91 votes (6.2%). A sort of start, I suppose.
Quote:and the fact that the defendants “used emails with extreme security measures, such as the RISE UP server.Riseup is one way of trying to avoid State snooping (as well as avoiding unwelcome advertisements). What's wrong with that? Some members use it. More about it here:https://securityinabox.org/riseup_main
Does Chomsky really think we'll have to pay for drinks in socialism. I've a horrible feeling that he might.
The only extant species capable of abstract thinking, i.e of thinking about something in the absence of the thing thought about, is homo sapiens. Humans do this by means of symbols (words). Thinking with abstract symbols is what was once called "reason". To claim that this does not make us "special" is a silly example of "speciousism".The fact remains that this means that we are the only animal species capable of establishment socialism (George Orwell's Animal Farm is good, very good, but should not be taken literally) and so of improving the lot of other animals. Like it or not, they do depend on us for this.What I've been trying to do, incidentally, is to find a theory for not being cruel to other animals that does not involve "anti-speciesism", vegetarianism or utilitarianism. In practice, though, I think most people accept this without the need to theorise about it.
John Oswald wrote:ALB, how does one isolate a quote here from a longer piece to reply to?This is really one for Admin but what you do is you open the passage you want to isolate with quote in square brackets [quo..] and close it with /quote in square brackets [/quo…]. You can also check whether you've done it right by clicking "Preview".Thanks for the book. It's going into the Party's lending library at Clapham High Street.I'm replying separately about whether or not other animals than humans have "reason" (I don't think they do, at least not in the same sense as humans do).
That's a different point. Not sure I agree with what you propose. Might be better to let the central government do its own dirty work. And don't forget that in Britain local councillors are essentially elected civil servants of the central government. Anyway, under our rulebook, a socialist councillor and so council would be under the instructions of their local branch. I know which way I'd vote if this matter came up.
I think 1875 and Robbo are right: that if the socialist movement has majority support in one state and is in a position to win control of political power there they should, if only for the reason 1875 gives of taking control of the armed forces out of the hands of the capitalist class. Also to use the TV and radio possibilities this would give. The danger of being isolated for any length of time in that one state won't be very high as it is likely (given the way that ideas spread) that the socialist movement will be in a strong position in many other states. In fact, the decision as to what to do would probably be up to the socialist "international".Our objection is to socialists (if they are socialists) taking power in one country where they don't have majority support for socialism but only for reforms or for something else less than socialism, i.e have no "mandate" for socialism, as was the case of the Bolsheviks in Russia in 1917 and as will be the case of Syriza if they win the Greek elections next Sunday (I'm assuming that some of them and of the Bolsheviks did want socialism in our sense).
Yes, we were beginning to forget his megalomaniac claim to be his god's high representative on Earth.
You could be right, Steve, but all the other sources, including what we reported in the Socialist Standard at the time, say 503. It's possible that all are just repeating an original mistake, but what is your source? The only definite one will be that declared and signed by the Returning Officer but I can't find a copy of this on the internet. Have you got one?
Socialism and Ecology wrote:As the only consciously-acting life-form within the biosphere, humans ought to act as the biosphere's "brain", consciously regulating its functioning in the interest of present and future generations.You've misunderstood the meaning of the word "consciousness" in this context. But to be fair you'd have to go back to an earlier passage where "consciously-acting" is defined:
Quote:Other animals too can be said to engage in production in some sense. Birds change nature to satisfy their need for shelter when they build nests, and beavers change nature when they construct dams, as do bees with their hives and ants with their ant-hills. But nevertheless production remains an overwhelmingly human activity. It is not, as it is for other animals, an inherited instinctive behaviour pattern but results from conscious, premeditated decisions. This in fact is the only way that humans can react to their environment. All their actions (except for certain basic bodily functions and reflexes) pass first through the mind and thus are both conscious and deliberate. Humans are "consciously-acting animals" and this includes when they intervene in the rest of nature to provide for their needs.Maybe a better term to avoid the sort of misunderstanding you've made (since lots of other animals are conscious) would be "purposefully-acting". Humans can delay their reaction to outside stimuli and "consciously" decide how to react. Humans are capable of abstract thought. No other animals are.I don't see why it is arrogant to claim that humans are like the "brain" of the biosphere. Anyway, it's only a claim about life on Earth. Of course we're only specks as far as the whole universe is concerned. And of course the human species will die out at some stage along with the Earth and all the animals on it.The idea actually comes from Murray Bookchin in one of his long, rambling (because nobody dared edit them) books about ecology and ethics. His point was that the only species capable of doing anything about the pollution and the environment of the Earth's biosphere are humans (even if much of it is due to their actions). Only they can intervene, purposefully, to put things right. No other animal can. In fact the only species that can save some other animals from extinction is the human species. This doesn't give the human species the "right" to dominate and be cruel to other animals. On the contrary, and this is the point I was trying to make, it means that they have the "duty" not to.
Depends how you define "speciesism". If it's the view that humans are "the lords of creation" and can do what they like to other animals, then it's something to be criticised. If "anti-speciesism" means that members of the human species are not entitled to eat other animals and that people who say that we can are "speciesists" then it's a load of nonsense, more properly called as you suggest "speciousism" if only because it doesn't challenge the "right" of other species of animal to eat other animals. The worse thing about Peter Singer is not so much his specious philosophising on this point but the fact that he claims to be a Marxist. Marx must be choking on his frankfurters.
But nobody here is in favour of bull fighting or animal cruelty (the member who defended bull-fighting on the WSM Forum is now an ex-member and has joined Left Unity though he does appear here from time to time).You are right "Animal rights" and "anti-speciesism" have nothing to do with vegetarianism. You don't have to be a vegetarian to espouse these, though that animals have "rights" is a dubious concept. It's more that humans have a "duty" not to be cruel to them. As we say in the concluding paragraph of our Ecology and Socialism pamphlet:
Quote:As the only consciously-acting life-form within the biosphere, humans ought to act as the biosphere's "brain", consciously regulating its functioning in the interest of present and future generations. But before humans can hope to play this role we must first integrate our own activities into a sustainable natural cycle on a planetary scale. This we can only do within the framework of a world socialist society in which the Earth and its natural and industrial resources have become the common heritage of all humanity.
