Alex Callinicos/SWP vs Laurie Penny/New Statesman Facebook handbags

[emanymton]

Hang on, isn't J Ed one of them too? Are we about to see a university ISN group torn to shreds over this?!?

Pretty sure he has posted on their forum, not sure if that makes him a member or not though, I have posted on their forum and don't consider myself a member, more of an interested observer.

I know a few ISNers and they seem like pretty sound people, did work on anti-benefit cuts and UKUncut campaigns in Manchester. The two I know the most seem pretty working-class and down to earth, probably hence why they aren't in the SWP anymore (in fact one of them is one of the expellees for "secret factionalism").

PT? thought he was at uni in Leeds now?
Anyway the ISN seems pretty open an lose. IT seems to me to be a collection of all those who had problems withe the SWP (beyond the mess over the rape allegations) but they did not spilt over the same issue so are not really unified by anything beyond opersition to the SWP CC.

 

[Nigel Irritable]

That guy pre-ISN obviously:

To be fair, you have to use your CPGB to English translator to get that part. The SWP student wasn't defending scabs, as far as I can make out, but objecting to the CPGB calling people who voted for a deal they don't like scabs.

 

[Tom A]

PT? thought he was at uni on Leeds now?
Anyway the ISN seems pretty open an lose. IT seems to me to be a collection of all those who had problems withe the SWP (beyond the mess over the rape allegations) but they did not spilt over the same issue so are not really unified by anything beyond opersition to the SWP CC.

Yeah him, I knew him when he was still in Manchester. One of the people who temporarily helped me get over my irrational dislike of the SWP, before events proved to me that dislike may not have been so irrational after all.

 

[J Ed]

In my limited experience (outside of student politics, thank fuck), it is usually done in an 'ironic' and mocking way. Appropriation as a way to mark middle class superiority over the dumb, common proles or 'chavs' (never recognised that as a legitimate working class subculture, though).

Yep, check this out from the 'far left fashion' blog:

 

[Delroy Booth]

The presence of this stuff on Libcom is particularly funny for those of us who can remember the rabid, and sometimes offensive, hostility to identity politics that prevailed over there at one point.

Why it's almost as bad as when Militant changed their opinions on the class composition of the Labour party

So how long before class-struggle anarchism ceases to exist in this country and is subsumed within a crude cargo-cult imitation of the hyper-liberals on the American "left" I wonder?

 

[Tom A]

Yeah I know but this probesity reminds me of the pro-ana sites, "nothing tastes as good as skinny feels" and all that shit.

Filp side of the same coin, huh?

 

[J Ed]

I wonder if "alawite privilige" translates into Syrian for when Al-Nusrah massacre people, invite children to cut their heads off in the street with machete's etc? I wonder if there ever will be massacres over this tuff. Will the decline of the left in the UK lead to the sort of sectarian bloodbath we've seen in Russia and the Middle-East since their class-based left died out?

The rhetoric used even by the likes of Laurie Penny with her call for 'gender war' certainly suggests that but somehow I think this would be the example of Suppose They Gave a War and Nobody Came

 

[DotCommunist]

Yep, check this out from the 'far left fashion' blog:

gnnnngh

 

[Nigel Irritable]

Why it's almost as bad as when Militant changed their opinions on the class composition of the Labour party

Well, if you ignore the fact that the change was slow, was based on actual changes to Labour, and was explained in frankly tedious detail every step of the way, yes certainly.

 

[J Ed]

Hang on, isn't J Ed one of them too? Are we about to see a university ISN group torn to shreds over this?!?

No.

 

[Tom A]

Yep, check this out from the 'far left fashion' blog:

Where the hell do the Village People fit into this "cultural appropriation" malarkey? They have the dreaded "white man in a Native American headdress" and the stereotypical blue-collar worker in a hard hat, but then those calling them out could be deemed an unwitting part of a homophobic attack.

 

[sihhi]

The presence of this stuff on Libcom is particularly funny for those of us who can remember the rabid, and sometimes offensive, hostility to identity politics that prevailed over there at one point.

What was offensive? iirc Class War burnt the Mohammed and Jesus effigies on Bonfire night, Libcom allowed open discussion, Libcom wasn't offensive unless you count hosting such discussion in and of itself offensive.

 

[toggle]

However, there does reach a point where obesity is medically unhealthy doesn't there? obviously people have the right to eat whatever they want but there does reach a point where it's clinically dangerous, for example because of the strain on your bones/organs and difficulty in walking for example. There are also binge-eating disorders where people think they're too thin and eat all the time. And telling somebody who wants to lose weight that they don't need to and the idea of promoting being obese being a "privilege" etc, because it's affecting their health could actually be really dangerous.

ask spangles, or go read some of her rants in some of the threads on diet that dismiss her diet choices.or mine.

yes obesity is dangerous. one of the reasons i went on a crash diet was that other diets didn't work. the pressure to achieve was overwhelming.

obesity is often a symptom of another issue, in my case, it was a safety blanket during a period of abuse, but we don't tell people with other psych problems that we fix it by telling them they are fat and lazy and should pull their socks up. we also ignore the growing body of evidence that being fat produces hormones that stop appetite regulation working. being fat promotes getting more fat.

sometimes there is a point whereby removing the psych pressure to diet needs to happen before someone can safely impose their own pressures to loose weight and succeed.

 

[Nigel Irritable]

So how long before class-struggle anarchism ceases to exist in this country and is subsumed within a crude cargo-cult imitation of the hyper-liberals on the American "left" I wonder?

It is actually interesting that sections of "class struggle Anarchism" have taken to it so enthusiastically, and that other, more sceptical sections are so loathe to challenge it head on. I'd have expected the broader anarchoid milieu to take to it like ducks to water, as its essentially a politics of personal purity, but the class struggle lot are a bit of a surprise.

 

[Nigel Irritable]

What was offensive? iirc Class War burnt the Mohammed and Jesus effigies on Bonfire night, Libcom allowed open discussion, Libcom wasn't offensive unless you count hosting such discussion in and of itself offensive.

I wasn't actually talking about that at all, but about the extreme hostility that feminism etc used to get on the boards there.

 

[J Ed]

gnnnngh

Model and activist Ella Raff is fastly becoming one of FLF’s faves, positively smoldering in solidarity with coal miners. Ella recently became a hit dressing like a toff as part of a ‘posh protest’ in order to dismiss the inaccuracy that ‘lefty = badly dressed’. We wish her well in her modelling and campaigning, especially in her work championing free education.

 

[sihhi]

The rhetoric used even by the likes of Laurie Penny with her call for 'gender war' certainly suggests that but somehow I think this would be the example of Suppose They Gave a War and Nobody Came

LP has never called for gender war unlike Malcolm Harris advocating some kind of generational war using shock troops in the prisons of schools and actual prisons alongside those who have taken out a college loan.

 

[sihhi]

I wasn't actually talking about that at all, but about the extreme hostility that feminism etc used to get on the boards there.

Was that offensive? Were offensive things encouraged/done in those discussions. I don't particularly remember it.

 

[frogwoman]

ask spangles, or go read some of her rants in some of the threads on diet that dismiss her diet choices.or mine.

yes obesity is dangerous. one of the reasons i went on a crash diet was that other diets didn't work. the pressure to achieve was overwhelming.

obesity is often a symptom of another issue, in my case, it was a safety blanket during a period of abuse, but we don't tell people with other psych problems that we fix it by telling them they are fat and lazy and should pull their socks up. we also ignore the growing body of evidence that being fat produces hormones that stop appetite regulation working. being fat promotes getting more fat.

sometimes there is a point whereby removing the psych pressure to diet needs to happen before someone can safely impose their own pressures to loose weight and succeed.

completely agree.

btw is there not also sometimes a bit of sneering that goes on about people who go on diets, like the idea they're thick and only concerned with looks? or is it just me

 

[J Ed]

LP has never called for gender war unlike Malcolm Harris advocating some kind of generational war using shock troops in the prisons of schools and actual prisons alongside those who have taken out a college loan.

I've seen her use it a few times as a hashtag https://twitter.com/PennyRed/status/319429708305530880 is she being ironic?

 

[toggle]

completely agree.

btw is there not also sometimes a bit of sneering that goes on about people who go on diets, like the idea they're thick and only concerned with looks? or is it just me

it's a no win situation.

if you want loads more info, i'm happy to discuss by pm rather than turn this thread into toggle's personal rant, but i'd suspect that would make more sence than half the things that are being dicsussed. that pro ally stuff made me feel a bit sick tbh

 

[sihhi]

Model and activist Ella Raff is fastly becoming one of FLF’s faves, positively smoldering in solidarity with coal miners. Ella recently became a hit dressing like a toff as part of a ‘posh protest’ in order to dismiss the inaccuracy that ‘lefty = badly dressed’. We wish her well in her modelling and campaigning, especially in her work championing free education.

Clare Solomon from Firebox Counterfire Lindsey German's crew actually tweeted them in a positive way

https://twitter.com/solomonsmfield/status/313207062085640194

.@FarLeftFashion Here's the @FireboxLdn crew in Emily Wilding Davison tshirts on IWD? From @philosophyfootball pic.twitter.com/bHwnm4oVO3

 

[frogwoman]

toggle I've noticed there's this whole idea that going on a diet is like something that only stupid/shallow people do.

 

[emanymton]

Yeah him, I knew him when he was still in Manchester. One of the people who temporarily helped me get over my irrational dislike of the SWP, before events proved to me that dislike may not have been so irrational after all.

Meet him a couple of times quite briefly, but yeah he seems a good bloke. I was amazed he stayed in the SWP as long as he did though.

 

[J Ed]

Has anyone else found the people who promote the idea that people who smoke tobacco are an oppressed identity politics group? There are some weird corners of the internet where right-wing libertarianism meets identity politics and tobacco denialism. UKIP's Gabi Coleman of recent 'don't ask don't tell policy towards Nazis' fame is a big proponent of this and is trying to set up a pub for smokers somewhere.

 

[toggle]

toggle I've noticed there's this whole idea that going on a diet is like something that only stupid/shallow people do.

cause you don't diet, you change lifestyle a little and it's fine, you don't need to diet unless you're unable to make changes. dieting is for idiots? but you must be an idiot to have got fat in the first place.

 

[sihhi]

Has anyone else found the people who promote the idea that people who smoke tobacco are an oppressed identity politics group?

Yes. One notable returning poster.

 

[Nigel Irritable]

Was that offensive? Were offensive things encouraged/done in those discussions. I don't particularly remember it.

We are both seemingly dealing in vague memory here, but I seem to recall the line being crossed on quite a few occasions. But either way, the point I was making was less about how offensive the place used to be and more about how they are now posting up privilege/intersectionality stuff of a sort that would not all that long ago have been met with howls of derision. It's quite a reversal.

 

[frogwoman]

its this whole orange tan/sunbeds/dieting/botox stereotype thing i think

might be imagining it though does anyone know what i mean or am i talking bollocks?

 

[J Ed]

This is the sort of thing I'm talking about.

People in the UK creating devilish caricatures of Aussie public health bods, advocating voting for MPs based on their approach to tobacco issues like plain packs.

They protest outside smoking cessation conferences, it's mad.

Someone on my facebook posts in one of their groups and the stuff they come out with is just wow. Sort of like how the mad identity politics people think it's okay to be rude to people who are less oppressed than them, they have similar approaches to non-smoker 'allies'.