[DJP]

SocialistPunk wrote:

Just noticed that post #171, where I point out the possibility that the flagging function has been misused, has been….wait for it…. flagged.Pure comedy gold.

Rule 14. Rule enforcement is the responsibility of the moderators, not of the contributors. If you believe a post or private message violates a rule, report it to the moderators. Do not take it upon yourself to chastise others for perceived violations of the rules.

[DJP]

Vin Maratty wrote:

How are branch minutes 'freely available' if they are not published online?

So nothing was freely available before the advent of the internet? Good job I'm too young not to remember those times

[DJP]

steve colborn wrote:

The use of the full name of the Party, contravenes the wishes and instructions of the Party,

Despite the above recently being voted for by a majority, curious (or perhaps, spurious). Couldn't find what the figures for the vote where, don't know if anyone knows of hand..

[DJP]

steve colborn wrote:

Ergo, the use of the full Party name on the top of this site, is unconstutional. The use of the full Party name on the Head Office frontage, is unconstitutional. Using the full Party name on the proposed Logo is unconstitutional. Using the full Party name, indeed, on the Standard, is unconstitutional.

Er, well no…Here's the 2008 resolution (as voted on by a one member, one vote poll)

Quote:

This Conference resolves that the Party's full name, 'The Socialist Party of Great Britain', be used in the following cases: A. legal documents; B. Party forms; C. Party membership cards; D. All Party bank accounts.E publication credits, including the masthead of the Socialist Standard; F. listings of World Socialist Movement parties and publications; and G. the title of the Party's website. It is encouraged to use the abbreviated form 'The Socialist Party' in any other context where confusion with other similarly named organisations is unlikely. This resolution supersedes the 1986 and 1988 Conference resolutions respecting the use of the Party's names.".

[DJP]

LBird wrote:

If you're happy telling workers that the 'material' determines their thoughts

I don't tell "workers" that and neither does the party.

[DJP]

SocialistPunk wrote:

Steve has a point.If it says in the rules Conference is a Party poll, then thats fair enough. Party polls are obselete and the rules need updating.

I think you're right. There's a few things like that in them. Not sure if the latest version is better…

[DJP]

steve colborn wrote:

DJP would you point out the "exact" passage in the rulebook which states that a conference vote is the same thing as a party poll?Cheers.

Just did

[DJP]

SocialistPunk wrote:

Hi DJPI found this and it seems to confirm what I previously thought. I've highlighted the relevant part and unless this is out of date (and if it is why) then….PARTY POLLS26. A poll of the Party shall be taken at any time by the Executive Committee; it shall also be taken at the request of a Delegate Meeting, or Conference, or by four or more Branches sending in a requisition stating the matter upon which the poll is desired. The Executive Committee shall call a specially summoned Party Meeting before the issue of Ballot Papers. At such meetings only motions concerned with procedures shall be tabled. Branches shall hold at least one specially summoned meeting to discuss each Party Poll. The returning date of voting papers to be twenty-eight days from the date of issue. A Party Poll shall be interpreted to mean that every Party member shall receive a separate ballot paper and vote individually, i.e., as in the method adopted for the election of Party Officers. The result of a Party Poll shall overrule all other decisions (i.e., EC, Conference or previous Party Poll decisions). (N.B. For Party Poll on Executive Committee and Party Officers' vacancies, see Rule 12.) Addendum: Branch polls may be called by the EC or any Branch, suggesting a wording for a resolution. If an absolute majority of Branches pass the resolution, the EC shall consider it as if it were a floor resolution

But notice the preceding sentence "A Party Poll shall be interpreted to mean that every Party member shall receive a separate ballot paper and vote individually, i.e., as in the method adopted for the election of Party Officers. " That's how voting for conference is carried out now. Conference votes ARE party polls even if they are not called that.

[DJP]

SocialistPunk wrote:

Technically it means that the 2008 Conference decision is invalid. That could have been avoided if a Party poll had been called to overturn the poll of 1991. Logic dictates that any wish for a return to the multiple name usage, the 1991 poll tried to remedy, would require removing the technical barrier of the 1991 Party poll. A constitutional requirement, surely? 

Not really because voting for conference now takes the form of one member one vote, whereas previously voting was done by delegates. I'm not sure when the change came in. But now a conference vote is in effect the same thing as a party poll.Read the rulebook…

[DJP]

LBird wrote:

The term 'materialism' is tainted by association with Lenin

Well more so the words "communism" and "socialism". Perhaps we should not use these to?

[DJP]

LBird wrote:

We've been here before, DJP. We know we can't solve our problem by simple appeal to scriptural authority. We can both find evidence from Marx to support our claims. I've said this many times previously.

You made a claim that Marx saw himself as belonging to the Idealist tradition. I showed that he did not. There is no where in Marx, after the German Ideology if not before, where he says "I am an idealist" whether you like it or not…."Monism" is fine for our purposes, but if the argument is "what Marx said" he never used that term – though he would have obviously know what it means.

[DJP]

LBird wrote:

…you have to accept that Marx did see himself as belonging to the idealist tradition…

I don't because he didn't

Marx wrote:

my method of development is not Hegelian, since I am a materialist and Hegel is an idealist.https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1868/letters/68_03_06-abs.htm

[DJP]

Young Master Smeet wrote:

I'm fine with you calling it idealism-materialism, so long as you and the rest of us realise you're just using that to desribe Marxian Materialism.

Or the word "materialism" could be avoided and it could just be called "Marxian Monism", but you have to accept that Marx did see himself as belonging to the materialist tradition… 

[DJP]

Vin Maratty wrote:

It is obvious that 'materialism' has a multitude of meanings on this thread.

That's unavoidable because it does…

[DJP]

LBird wrote:

DJP wrote:

But we know that Marx's "materialism" is not the same kind of "materialism" as those he critised in The Theses of Feurbach.

No, it isn't.

I'm presuming you missed the "not" above?

LBird wrote:

So, why did Engels, on the next page, mention a third group?

The next page of what? I'm not getting this from Engels… 

LBird wrote:

While the only choices available to us are 'idealism' or 'materialism', we're lost.

They're not. But as they're many kinds of 'idealism' and 'materialism' this is not a choice of two options.

LBird wrote:

'Physical things' do not do 'theory and practice', only humans.

So human beings are not physical things, intersting.

LBird wrote:

'Dialectics' can only exist as an interplay between humans and their external environment. The notion of a 'Dialectics of Nature' is simply nonsense, because 'dialectic' means 'to talk through' or 'discuss', and 'material' without consciousness does not discuss.Reality does not tell us what it is. We inescapably require social theory and practice. In a nutshell, alongside material, also IDEAS.

I agree..But ideas are just a part of nature, not something seperate or above it…

[Author]

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