robbo203
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Oh dear , this doesn’t sound too good: ER a capitalist scam?
Marcos, a lot of things have happened recently in the WSPUS which you might not be aware. A new application for membership was I believe accepted just yesterday and there are several more in the pipeline. Plans are being made to recommence publishing literature , embark on extensive publicity and advertising and to revamp with website with fresh material and a forum facility. Jordan is going to be producing videos for the Party as well which I really looking forward to seeing. There are lots things going on and we need to support them
You need to get involved in the WSPUS again as the link with Spanish speaking workers just as the Canadian Party does with French speaking workers
Would it be possible to include on the election leaflet details of the 3 month free trial offer of the Socialist Standard? Might as well get some publicity in.
Hi James
Yes I can along with what you say. My thoughts on this subject of how we ought to approach the Brexit debate are influenced by something that Alan and others have said – that many workers voted Leave not just as some racist cum nationalistic reflex but also as a protest against the austerity measures enacted by recent governments in this era of neoliberalism. There is a kind of naïve simplistic association between the EU as a formation operating in the interests of Big Business and these austerity measures enacted by governments at the behest of Big Business. As if these austerity measures would not be enacted were the UK not in the EU!
Big Business and neoliberal austerity measures would continue to apply whether or not the UK remained in the EU or left and most certainly in the case of the much touted trade deals with the US and US based corporations which the Brexiteers are hoping will materialise. These corporations will demand their pound of flesh in the form of pushing back workers rights and cutting wages. Of that we can be certain
This is perhaps an approach worth pursuing because there are a lot of gullible leftists who fallen for the lie that some how for the UK to leave Europe would represent some sort of step forward for democracy – “reclaiming our country” – and further the interests of “British workers”.
Such talk is delusional
Would be good to discuss ways of propagating this message, as I think the conditions are ripe for its uptake
Do you have any thoughts on this yourself, James, to kick off the discussion?
“Make ‘Leaving Europe’ irrelevant – Let’s Leave Capitalism!”
“Stuff Europe, Stuff Britain – there’s nothing for the Workers to gain”
“Capital-exit, not Brexit’
“Brexit or Bremain – Capitalism is still the same”
Another stiff whiskey to get the creative juices flowing and I will try and come up with a few more …LOL
My investigation of the state of the WSPUS has been completed and comprehensive report has been drawn up. The conclusion in a nutshell is that the Party is definitely back in business, small though it may be
There are a number of recommendations made at the end of the Report which I hope will be discussed – and supported – at Conference. The include providing financial support for both the WSPUS and the SPC and scrapping the existing unworkable arrangement regarding membership by permitting dual membership
I have also suggested a project concerned with how to make more effective use of the social media which the membership of the WSM across the world could get involved with. So far the response has been pretty positive.
Saying that if we vote to Leave capitalism we can devote more resources to the health service (and everything else)?
Not a bad idea actually, This has the potential to become quite a clever slogan to catch people’s attention. How might it be worded?
What about the idea (on one of our FB sites) of hiring a big red bus during the election period fully equipped with a loud speaker, tons of leaflets to give out and of course, bedecked in placards?
How fitting that George Galloway should join hands with Farage’s little Englander Brexit Party. It confirms everything I ever thought about him
Who are the familiar names you saw on twitter feed by the way Alan?
It’s clear that for Marx, and thus for anyone claiming to be influenced by Marx, that the overwhelming majority of humanity is what is meant by ‘a majority’
Yes socialism requires a significant majority in order to be established but I think we ought to be clear, that in the process of obtaining that a majority the type of opposition that socialists are likely to encounter en route to that objective will itself begin to change and mutate and in the direction in which social opinion itself is moving and adapting.
That is to say, if you have 50 % of the population, say, who are committed or “full” socialists this would imply , in my view that a further , say, 30% are what I would term “semi-socialists”. Semi-socialists are not quite convinced about the need for socialism but wouldn’t stand in the way of its establishment, leaving only 20% who definitely oppose socialism.
By the time full socialists achieve a figure of say 60% , socialism’s overt opponents will have shrunk to pretty much negligible proportions.
What I am trying to say is that you have to visualise the (as yet hypothetical) growth of the socialist movement in historical terms. It cannot but have a profound (and ever expanding) impact on the broader social climate. As the latter changes this will help accelerate the growth of the movement in a positive feedback loop.
This is why I find the typical Leftist scenarios about the capitalist class clamping down on the socialist movement (once it starts growing) by withdrawing elementary democratic rights and installing a fascist dictatorship, quite unconvincing and ahistorical. Capitalist governments operate within, and adapt to, a given social context if only to shore up their legitimacy. They dont have a free hand to mould developments as they might want. If they did , if they could shape society in whichever way they chose, the workers would never revolt or have obtained the vote. We would still be living in the pre-Chartist era or Rotten boroughs lorded over by rotten capitalists.
Change is essentially a bottom-up process. The capitalists and their representatives have power only because we give it to them. When the writing is on the wall and their time is clearly up, there will precious little they could do about it. For the most part even they will fall in line with the will of majority, grudgingly or otherwise
What a commotion. A member was not aware that Corbyn had expressed the view that the class struggle as defined by the SPGB was more important to workers than Brexit.
That is all!
Can we leave it at that?No we can’t. We ALSO have to discuss what side of the class struggle Corbyn and the Labour Party are going to support. It is certainly not going to be the side of the workers. Corbyn does not want to get rid of capitalism (only to humanise it). But capitalism can only really be run in the interests of capital and therefore against the interests of labour
I thought I would just mention that just in case Vin thinks socialists should leave off attacking the ideas of a politician (like Corbyn) who upholds capitalism
the ridiculous statement that “The SPGB is small because it is hostile to workers and their attempts to feed and house themselves”…”
Robbo, I actually don’t think VM’s criticism is as ridiculous as you say and it is our approach to reforms that has to a large extent, but not wholly, determined our size and connection to the broader workers’ movement. Can that really be denied?Sorry I dont agree, Alan. If Vin had rephrased his sentence to say something along the lines that “The SPGB is small because it is hostile to workers attempts to win reforms” I might have just let the matter rest even if I wouldn’t myself use the word “hostile”. It is better just to say we oppose reformism
But he didn’t say that did he? He wasn’t referring to reforms. He was referring to our attitude to workers as workers . He was saying we are “hostile” to them.
That is a pretty outrageous claim to make in my opinion and when challenged on that Vin gets into a fit of pique and calls me a schoolboy bully for daring to criticise him
Very strange behaviour is all I can say….
I view robbo as a schoolboy bully with minions around him and thus treat him with the same contempt.
Oh pleeeez. Vin, get a grip.
I simply criticised you for coming out with the ridiculous statement that “The SPGB is small because it is hostile to workers and their attempts to feed and house themselves”
Now, apparently, because I have criticised you, I’ve suddenly become a “schoolboy bully”. All I can say is you have got to be “super sensitive” if you dont like the idea of others criticising you.. There is another word for that but I won’t mention it. Try to grow a thicker skin if you can’t handle criticism.
You talk about strawman arguments but your whole contribution has been one long strawman argument. So Corbyn recognises there is a class divide in society. Great! And your point is – what? Socialists are quite happy to acknowledge that at least Corbyn is saying something that you wouldn’t see a Tory politician saying. But at the end Corbyn’s Labour Party is as fully committed to capitalism as the Tories. THAT is why we oppose him and his Party or do you prefer that we did not?
You also talk about the SPGB’s “sectarianism” but frankly you have shown nothing but sectarianism in your bitter attacks on the SPGB. Please stop it. You are alienating a lot of people who once had a lot of sympathy for you when you were in SPGB. You chose to leave even when you were urged to remain. That in itself make your hostility all the more baffling and uncalled for.
