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alanjjohnstone wrote:

Quote:

Alan, if you dont like the Standard and/or don't read it or don't rate it, absolutley fine, but don't try and block others doing what they choose to do to propagate Socialist ideas.

Tim, are you trying to prohibit me from expressing my opinion on a motion that is to be put to the forth-coming annual conference of the Party and are you trying to silence me on this thread because you disagree with my contrary view to your own by creating a strawman argument, by accusing me of something i have not done? …………….. In no way am i trying to block what people do and you know only too well that i have defended some in the Party who have chosen their own way to propagate socialist ideas, from the provision of promotional items that others called trashy to uploading video to e-publishing party material as an individual………………….Once again a search of this list will show that i have been fairly consistent in my views for the party. Not only do i wish a webzine…………………..

I have no wish to prohibit you from expressing an opinion, as you well know. the point I made, which I suspect you fully understand, is that by voting to end the Standard you will be effectively "blocking others doing what they choose to propagate Socialist ideas". I am therefore putting forward the argument that you should not vote for this motion. As I understand it that is how debate works, you put forward one idea, I counter it, etc. etc. I do think the idea that I am trying to silence you on this thread (an impossible task anyway) is also dare I say it, absurd.You say that there is "No way am I trying to block what people want to do" but actually the effect of the resolution you support is precisely that.Ask yourself these questions:Do the people currently volunteering to produce the Standard "want to do" this work?Well the answer to that question must be yes, otherwise they wouldn't be doing it.Will voting to end production of the Standard stop them from doing that work?Yes, obviously if the Standard isn't produced, then they can't do the thing they currently want to do, can they?Therfore taking thing together, is voting for this resolution voting to stop people propagating in the way they want to? Yes, obviously it is and that is why I want you and others not to vote in favour of this resolution. It is devisive, badly timed and (in my opinion) absurd.Surely the way forward is to follow the "thousand flower" path. You say you want to produce a webzine, my view is that's fine, get enough volunteers from the Party to help you (if there's anything I can do by the way, just ask and i'll do what I can) and off you go. I don't see why you doing that should stop other members producing the Standard, if that's what they want to do and resoources aren't an issue.

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Young Master Smeet wrote:

Commercial journal publishers are increasingly becoming E-only, as are libraries, so there is a chance that libraries will begin to refuse to stock the print standard (especially as it is available free online), so at the least, looking at cutting the free subs to libraries could save a few quid.

It seems to me that every time I go into WH Smug there is an increasing array of magazines aimed at increasingly specialised areas with titles such asa "Racoon Weekly" and "Enjoy Your Ear Wax Collection".I also don't understand this obsession with saving a few quid here or there, I don't think we should go out spending money willy, nilly, but come on we have got more than a few Bob in the coffers. The party is in danger of behaving like an elderly miser, living off half a tin of soup every day, whilst having bundles of cash stuffed down the back of the mouldy, old, worn out sofa!

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alanjjohnstone wrote:

Who would take us back to the days where we put our soap-box on a street corner and ignore the internet? But adapt we do…Instead, we do lit stalls and what are the best sellers…the Standard or something from our selection of pamphlets?

I think this kind of point is an attempt to turn the debate into an either/or debate.Having a printed Standard does not detract from our growing on line presence.If there are enough volunteers who want to put the Standard out and the cost of this activity is not prohibitive, then why should we block this activity? It is not a case of either having the Standard and not having an online presence. We can have both and not only that, there is absolutely no evidence to support the idea that the time, effort and monies put into the production of the Standard would be used elsewhere.Is there a queue of volunteers lined up waiting to undertake on line work, which is hampered by all of the work required to publish the Standard? No.Is there a shortage of funds currently used to produce the Standard which other members are desperately trying to access so that they can undertake different forms of propagada? No.Is there are current shortage of volunteers willing to take on the roles required to produce the Standard? No.I find this idea that there is only one way to spread Socialist ideas really irritating, if members want to produce the Standard and there are the funds available to do it, then why should other members want to stop them from doing it?If members some want to hire a plane and fly over central london with a banner reading "abolish the wages system" give them the money and let them get on with it, if members want to produce a daily blog, give them the money and let them get on with it. Surely we should be in the business of creating as many outlets for our ideas as we can, not trying to block them so that the party can pursue an individual preference.Alan, if you dont like the Standard and/or don't read it or don't rate it, absolutley fine, but don't try and block others doing what they choose to do to propagate Socialist ideas.

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imposs1904 wrote:

". . .   it is a bit haphazard since it is based on his whimsical choice of what to scan and upload."Cheeky bleeder.

Pejorative as well!!!!!

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alanjjohnstone wrote:

"Even the proposers of this absurd motion"Tim, as i posted, we should not be using such perjorative words. It isn't absurd but a reasonable viewpoint that others may well disagree with. Claims and counter-claims are being made about the influence of both mediums and what is needed is what i have asked for – those in the respective committees, the SS and the Internet, begin to tell us the facts. Just what is the coverage of our circulation for the print standard and what could our audience be for a possible e-zine with all the bells?It is being argued by you that the print Standard is reaching "many people who do not have access to or the ability to use the internet" and by "restricting ourselves to the internet"  but who has actually proposed such a policy that we all become armchair activists in front of a key-board – (even those are redundant – it's all touch screen now) As world socialists many, many, many more fellow-workers and potential members are not receiving or having the Standard available to them and, imho, we should be reaching out to them the best we can at the least cost. As i mentioned to Robbo, there appears to a silence on the other item for conference – moving on from a branch based party to a nationally centred organisation with all the ramifications of restricting our contacts with other workers and being seen as throwing in the towel as you suggest your concerns are with an e-zine/webzine being made our priority. This well-known Private Frazer is trying his utmost to reverse the pessimistic prognosis i hold of the Party's future and becoming much more effective on the web is one such strategy which is well suited to incorporate our new ventures such as whiteboard animations. 

With all due respect Alan, I'll use whatever terms I choose to describe the motion. I think it is an absurd and badly timed motion, as that is my view I will express it. Hope all is well in the funeral parlour.Kind regardsTim

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gnome wrote:

alanjjohnstone wrote:

Quote:

The net cost of printing the Standard in 2014 (the most recent figures I can lay my hands on readily) was about £1500

Could you expand on this information.I note this it is net sum – so what are the sales figures that produce this.

Printing = £9615;  Sales, including subscriptions = £8388.  No separate figures available for Standard postage.

Quote:

And is the sales figures Paul paying Peter ie the branches and members under-writing the cost than the actual "many workers who don't read the Standard online because they don't have online access and quite possibly choose not to have it." going out to buy each month's issue.

Who knows?  But neither is there any guarantee that workers will read the Standard online.  That's why it's patently obvious we should keep any and every option open and not place all our eggs in one basket…

Even the proposers of this absurd motion estimate that the standard runs at a loss of only about £1,000 per month, (which from my working of the figures is an over estimate.) Looking at party funds and balances, this means that one of the recent legacies to the party gives enough funds to run the Standard at present costs for the next 25 years! Surely the issue here is not cost, none of our propaganda activities have ever been set up to make a profit!The Standard reaches many people who do not have access to or the ability to use the internet (my mother is a long time member who is now pushing 91 and the Standard is her only monthly contact with the party), there are many others in a similar position. The difficulty with the net is that there is such a lot of stuff out there in cyber land that we can get lost in, unless your looking very specifically for our material your not likely to happen across it. The Standard, in public libraries, left lying on trains, etc. meets that particular area.If we restrict our propaganda activities to the internet, we are restriciting our contact with potential socialists, why would we chose to do such a thing?We also need to think long and hard about the message that this gives out. Our opponents would view it as us throwing in the towel and the message to companion parties across the world would be very, very disheartening.it seems to me that there has been a change of momentum in the Party, new and potentially successful ways of putting the party case have been initiated (Whiteboard, magazine inserts,etc.), Ithink morale about activitiy is picking this motion gives the Private Frazers of the gloom merchant wing of the party another chance to tell us that we're all doomed!

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Having picked "tetties" in my youth, you get paid to fill the bags, therefore you tend to leave the little uns behind and concentrate on the big uns.

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The tragic loss of life apart, I do think it would improve the area somewhat

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jondwhite wrote:

For clarity, the masthead you are talking about is not the SPGB one, but the one athttp://www.socialiststudies.org.uk/It may be a bad replacement logo (reminiscent of 'One World, One People') but anthropogenic global warming is real, its what environmentalists do about it is where Marxists might disagree.

I hear he's thinking of changing his name to Bob "wrong again" Andrews

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Prakash RP wrote:

' Did some girl hurt you? ' [ comment by Kilgallon on April 07, 2017 ]Would like to know what led you to the thought that I may have been hurt by some girl before I had posted this message.  

Don't know, let's just call it intuition.

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The War of the Spanish succession which arguably ended Spain's role as a hegemonic power in the world began in 1702, ending with France as the leading world powerThe Napoleonic wars which arguably ended France's role as a hegemonic power in the world began in 1803, ending with Britain as the leading world powerThe First World War which arguably ended Britain's role as a hegemonic power int he world began in 1914, ending with the USA as the leading world powerDon't mean to be pessimistic guys, but none of the previous leading world powers has given up their title peacefully, and the USA's 100 odd years or so is now just about up.

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robbo203 wrote:

John Pozzi wrote:

.Rear money, i.e., GRB ecos, signify the universal value of the product of nature, i.e., the generation of biomass in an ecosystem, usually expressed in units of mass per unit surface (or volume) per unit time, for instance, grams per square metre per day (g m−2 d−1). The mass unit may relate to dry matter or to the mass of carbon generated. Productivity of autotrophs such as plants is called primary natural productivity, while that of heterotrophs such as animals is called secondary productivity.Secondary production is the generation of biomass of heterotrophic (consumer) organisms in a system. This is driven by the transfer of organic material between trophic levels, and represents the quantity of new tissue created through the use of assimilated food that everyone consumes. 

 Oh dear. What on earth are you on about? This has got nothing to do with money. Money is a social institution grounded in an exchange or private property-based economy,  The transfer of organic materials between trophic levels is not some kind of quid pro quo property transaction.  I know there is a tendency to resort to metaphors when talking about nature or natural processes but the lion is not really the "king of the animal world".  You do know that dont you?

I think this silly bugger still believes in Santa Claus

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alanjjohnstone wrote:

What we face – Ryanair's boss on climate change“This kind of nonsense that we all need to cut back on beef production or that we all need to eat vegetables or go vegan and all start cycling bicycles is not the way forward. I think it’s complete and utter rubbish," he said. "You had these people standing round the market square 2,000 years ago saying the end of the world is nigh. In the 19th century in London, they thought they were all going to die from smog. There is always some lunatic out there who points to a load of rubbish science; science changes.” O'Leary expressed his desire to see nuclear fuel being considered as a viable future energy source. "If you're concerned about these issues, the obvious one is more nuclear fuel, but you ask the likes of Mary Robinson, the climate change justice mob, and they recoil in horror because it's not trendy or liberal." O'Leary, who owns 1,000 acres of farmland in Gigginstown, Co Westmeath, said he doesn't believe that beef consumption and carbon emissions are the primary driving forces of climate change. The Ryanair boss said he believes "human ingenuity will find ways of improving the way we breed beef and the way we consume fuel".When asked if accepted that climate change is happening,  O'Leary said that the cooling and warming had been "going on for years" and he didn't accept it was linked to carbon usage."I don't accept that climate change is real. I don't accept the link between carbon consumption and climate change. http://www.independent.ie/irish-news/news/michael-oleary-slams-climate-change-as-complete-and-utter-rubbish-35606512.html

I personally have no objection to nuclear energy if it was developed in a socialist society where the profit motive and sectional interests were not a factor in development, it's interesting that some sections of the green movement have become quite enthusiastic about nuclear energy.With regard to meat production and its environmental impact, although I agree that in terms of deforestation, etc. the impact can be very significant, some of the other issues associated with meat production are, in my opinion, overplayed. About 10% of human activity related greenhouse gas emisions can be attributed to meat production, a significant amount I agree, however the bulk of this is in methane production, and at the moment methane is not thought to be a major issue in climate change, as the rate of degradation is pretty close to the rate of emmision. I would also argue that with the development of a socialist society the greenhouse emissions that would be cut from needless human activities (banking, stock exchanges, etc.) would be far more significant positive than cutting those emissions from meat production that have a significant impact on climate change.There are arguments in favour of meat production, apart obviously from the delicious pork pies, bacon, sausages and hamburgers we get from it. If we wish to reduce the use of artificial fertilisers in crop production, then reducing the availability of the most commonly used, most efficient and most natural fertiliser available (manure) would produce significant challenges, especially in under developed areas of the world where manure is often the only form of fertiliser used. Similarly meat production plays a significant part in the use of human food waste, it is estimated that 70% of the feedstock used in the Dutch feed industry originates from the food processing industry, interestingly there is a growth in the reuse of distillers grains and malted barley from the distilling and brewing industry as an environmentally friendly food for livestock. So when I'm sitting back, supping my beer and munching on pork pies and porky scratchings, I like to think I'm doing my little bit for the planet.

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Sorry for the delay in getting back to the "pork pie and cuppa" discussion.Alan you seem to contradict yourself, on one hand you describe potato picking as backbreaking work and question who would do such work in a socialist society, yet in another post you are postulating the replacement of hillside sheep farms with genetically modified turnips, etc. Are these turnips going to be genetically modified insuch a way as they pull themselves out of the ground and then leap into the automated tractors, which will carry them to the hordes of good folk waiting to feast on the delights of spit roasted turnips?You also describe tea pickign as dirty, dangerous and degrading, which I am in no doubt is a good description of the present conditions in many tea plantations (there was an excellent programme on radio 4 recently about the issue). However as we have already established, tea is being grown and being picked in the UK (Cornwall has a tea plantation as well). I don't doubt the tea pickers in this plantations are getting massively rewarded, but the conditions and pay must be in line with the regulations in the UK, which demonstrates that tea picking doesn't have to be dirty, dangerous and degrading.I also think we are falling for the idea that world food shartages are the cause of mass starvation and malnutrition, which of course they are not. The world even under capitalist production systems produces enough food for all to have a healthy, varied and interesting diet (including the occasional pork pie) Socialist food production would increase the options considerably.With regards to tea picking, you might want to consider this:http://www.ochiai-1.co.jp/english/product/05.htmland with regard to water shortages, it may be that the following is a real game changer:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-39482342

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Prakash RP wrote:

[  Would like to add the following text to my comment dated 06 April 2017 :  ' There's NO good reason to believe the born poor and underprivileged, the silly millions, that don't feel ashamed of … ' ] ' Besides, getting legally married is no more necessarily " approving matrimony " than using money is approving money. ' [ ALB's comment dated 27 march 2017 ] The observation quoted above appears a fine instance of sophistry meant, implicitly, to lessen the gravity of some professed communists' disgusting indulgence in the luxury of matrimony or sheer travesties in the name of matrimony which is essentially a propertied-class institution meant to serve exclusively the propertied-class interest, as I see it. The point missed is it is an undeniable fact that while money, the filthy lucre, is something indispensable in the capitalist world for not only staying alive but leading a life of ease and luxury as well, matrimony, either the true one or the travesty of it, happens to be just a luxury, something dispensable a hundred per cent, RIGHT ? You must earn some money through some licit means ( i.e. a lawful profession such as work in a factory or an office, running a business, etc ) in order to live with some dignity. You may steal money, rob banks or engage in an illicit trade to make easy money, be found out someday, and end up in a jail. Evidently, this is NOT living with dignity. Nevertheless, you don't need drugs, drinks or matrimony either to stay alive or live with dignity. Even if you want to lead a silly, meaningless existence, you should NOT need any stuff like drugs, drinks or matrimony, do you ? The truth is like drugs and drinks, matrimony performs NO meaningful role in an individual's life or in society or in the State. All advanced civilisations along with some backward ones, such as India, RECOGNISE and RESPECT relationships outside of matrimony and fruits of such relationships. The sensible oughtn't to fail to take cognisance of these points. And in order to be a true communist, you have to be sensible first. Another most important point the sensible canNOT allow to escape their notice happens to be the fact that the commenter is aware that ' getting legally married [is] " approving matrimony " '. He just wants to play down communists' indulgence, in this space age, in matrimony, as I see it.

Did some girl hurt you?

[Author]

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