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14th November Movement for Left Unity

Coolfonz said:
Yeah amazingly not everyone could be at that conference on that specific day with no other means of voting. What was it 300 out of 2000 members? Even on the now-abandoned forum some folks with disabilities said they could not attend. What about people with no jobs/low pay are they supposed to travel? Online voting systems I don't think are that hard to set up. Anyway...
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The idea that online forums are more democratic is a joke. Pay £2, sit on your arse, don't listen to or partake in any debate (still less action) and have your say! If that were implemented then the fucking CPGB motions would probBly have been passed. And then you'd be whining even more.

When (if) LU gets bigger, it will need a better, elected, and delegate subsidised conference. But for now, actual people actually turning up, talking and voting is more than reasonable.
 
In Spain the Podemos party includes online voting in their internal elections and they are polling as a very comfortable (for them, not the centre left) third force in Spanish politics. Might be worth taking some lessons from them...

They are also very successfully using the website reddit to debate policy, win over followers and disseminate information.

Of course, Podemos is run by people with a successful history of getting a progressive message across in both traditional and new forms of media whereas Left Unity is full of people who, err, don't have that history...
 
Spanky Longhorn said:
And shift workers and retail workers, healthcare workers, firefighters, and others who have to work weekends - none of them could be arsed? yet more evidence that Left Unity is a typical UK trot get together
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Hang on-LU is shit, yeah, but are you saying they're shit cos they had a conference when people might be at work? How does that make them Trotskyist?
 
belboid said:
The idea that online forums are more democratic is a joke. Pay £2, sit on your arse, don't listen to or partake in any debate (still less action) and have your say! If that were implemented then the fucking CPGB motions would probBly have been passed. And then you'd be whining even more.

When (if) LU gets bigger, it will need a better, elected, and delegate subsidised conference. But for now, actual people actually turning up, talking and voting is more than reasonable.
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How is participating in an online debate/vote not participation? Doing something like that is about trying to include the majority of Left Unity members, rather than a minority. Considering the name of the party that's also a bit dismissive of the party's non-attending members..."sit on your arse, don't listen to or partake in any debate..."
And what has £2 got to do with it? That was the figure set by Left Unity.
I think you are confusing whining with frustration.
 
Coolfonz said:
How is participating in an online debate/vote not participation? Doing something like that is about trying to include the majority of Left Unity members, rather than a minority.
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There is a qualitative difference between the kind of participation you can do sat at home in your pants and the kind of participation you can do when you're actually in the same physical space as other people.
 
Yes, sure it isn't exactly the same thing, but it's better than nothing at all if one is interested in including more people in the process etc. See Podemos etc...
After all you use it to debate with people you don't know about politics, why can't LU members?
 
Coolfonz said:
Yes, sure it isn't exactly the same thing, but it's better than nothing at all if one is interested in including more people in the process etc. See Podemos etc...
After all you use it to debate with people you don't know about politics, why can't LU members?
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I quite like urban because you get a variety of different politics with often a high level of debate. I don't want to build a political organisation with people on urban I fundamentally disagree with. That doesnt mean I dont want to be in a political org with a lot of urban types; I just dont wish to build one based on these discussions.
 
The problem with LU and it's conferences means their policies are decided by the sort of lefty bubble oddballs that can be bothered, or have the time and money to attend political conferences on their Saturdays in cities many miles away from where they live. That excludes by its very nature a huge % of people, particularly low income, disabled people and women.

But the bigger problem with that approach is that it leads to discussion and debate focused around the hobby horses of some of the least successful political tendencies in British history.

2000 hobbyists coming up with a detailed range of policies and a massive steering group based purely on very internally focused conversations, rather than carrying out serious qualitative and quantitative research on what the people they want to support the organisation want (research that could be carried out face to face and possibly online) means it is bound to repeat the sins of the long list of broken initiatives those 2000 or so people have previously been involved in.

I agree that online forums would not solve the problems with LU - in fact they would magnify them at the moment, but facing outwards and talking to the great unwashed before developing a range of policies and procedures may have helped.

Too late now though.
 
Spanky Longhorn said:
The problem with LU and it's conferences means their policies are decided by the sort of lefty bubble oddballs that can be bothered, or have the time and money to attend political conferences on their Saturdays in cities many miles away from where they live. That excludes by its very nature a huge % of people, particularly low income, disabled people and women.

But the bigger problem with that approach is that it leads to discussion and debate focused around the hobby horses of some of the least successful political tendencies in British history.

2000 hobbyists coming up with a detailed range of policies and a massive steering group based purely on very internally focused conversations, rather than carrying out serious qualitative and quantitative research on what the people they want to support the organisation want (research that could be carried out face to face and possibly online) means it is bound to repeat the sins of the long list of broken initiatives those 2000 or so people have previously been involved in.

I agree that online forums would not solve the problems with LU - in fact they would magnify them at the moment, but facing outwards and talking to the great unwashed before developing a range of policies and procedures may have helped.

Too late now though.
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Thats fair enough-IMO the way that LU is trying to build a program before beginning any campaigning is back to front.
 
I think casting the net wider - including via any form of popular participation - is exactly what a left party needs. Including online. We need the people who have not been active because the ones that have been, are failures. They have failed.
Podemos isn't an exact replica. But it was formed after Left Unity. It has a much more open style, primaries, online debate etc. It stood its most famous folk - roughly - at the Euro elections and ended up with 5 MEPs. Left Unity could have stood Ken Loach in the Euros, and even if he did not get elected gained some momentum.
Instead we get endless debates that start with people saying `comrade...` and the perverse sight of people on Left Unity's site deriding Podemos' methods and saying they are a flash in the pan.
I have loads of mates who are generally left wing - i showed them Left Unity and they just laughed. And its not my mates who are out of step with the mainstream.
 
Coolfonz said:
I think casting the net wider - including via any form of popular participation - is exactly what a left party needs. Including online. We need the people who have not been active because the ones that have been, are failures. They have failed.
Podemos isn't an exact replica. But it was formed after Left Unity. It has a much more open style, primaries, online debate etc. It stood its most famous folk - roughly - at the Euro elections and ended up with 5 MEPs. Left Unity could have stood Ken Loach in the Euros, and even if he did not get elected gained some momentum.
Instead we get endless debates that start with people saying `comrade...` and the perverse sight of people on Left Unity's site deriding Podemos' methods and saying they are a flash in the pan.
I have loads of mates who are generally left wing - i showed them Left Unity and they just laughed. And its not my mates who are out of step with the mainstream.
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If you think internet discussion forums are what LU needs you are mad.
 
Coolfonz said:
I think casting the net wider - including via any form of popular participation - is exactly what a left party needs. Including online. We need the people who have not been active because the ones that have been, are failures. They have failed.
Podemos isn't an exact replica. But it was formed after Left Unity. It has a much more open style, primaries, online debate etc. It stood its most famous folk - roughly - at the Euro elections and ended up with 5 MEPs. Left Unity could have stood Ken Loach in the Euros, and even if he did not get elected gained some momentum.
Instead we get endless debates that start with people saying `comrade...` and the perverse sight of people on Left Unity's site deriding Podemos' methods and saying they are a flash in the pan.
I have loads of mates who are generally left wing - i showed them Left Unity and they just laughed. And its not my mates who are out of step with the mainstream.
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Online forums are definitely part of what needs to be provided by any effective progressive movement, certainly they would be more useful than selling papers and doing petitions on Gaza on a Saturday morning high street like a nutjob.

But the question of who participates and why is key - you can't put the cart before the horse, and for LU to put much faith in online discussion before it's engaged with normal people in a meaningful way, would be as pointless as having a conference of the self funded.

If LU had a forum and you showed it to your mates they would still laugh at it. It would be full of threads by Steve Freeman demanding English support for a Scottish socialist republic and AWLers winding ISNers up about Israel.

Podemos have used tools like Loomio very effectively and that's a really positive thing, we can also learn a lot from M5S in Italy - however they were engaging with an already extent base who believed they had something to gain from supporting them - LU does not have that, and will not get it. There was possibly a five minute window when they could have used their initial momentum to speak with people but they blew it, which was probably an inevitable outcome given who they were...
 
I was actually originally talking about LU members having the ability to vote on motions and also to propose them. Not just a forum for members to spout off.
It appears as if LU thinks 300 members out of 2000 voting on motions - and proposing them - is preferable to all 2000 voting. The conference etc etc.
 
Coolfonz said:
I was actually originally talking about LU members having the ability to vote on motions and also to propose them. Not just a forum for members to spout off.
It appears as if LU thinks 300 members out of 2000 voting on motions - and proposing them - is preferable to all 2000 voting. The conference etc etc.
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Correct me if I'm wrong but haven't at least half of those 2000 members never attended a single LU event, even locally, and in fact have never demonstrated any commitment to LU beyond signing some call for a new party?
 
Spanky Longhorn said:
How should LU engage with them?
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I don't think they should, I think most of the leadership of LU should lock themselves in padded cells for everybody's safety.

Why do you think people who are happy to put their name to something on the internet but who aren't actively engaged in any campaigning at all, not even in their own workplaces, are the key constituency LU should be looking to engage with?
 
SpackleFrog said:
I don't think they should, I think most of the leadership of LU should lock themselves in padded cells for everybody's safety.

Why do you think people who are happy to put their name to something on the internet but who aren't actively engaged in any campaigning at all, not even in their own workplaces, are the key constituency LU should be looking to engage with?
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The key constituency LU should be engaging with (or should have when they had the chance) didn't even sign up to it let alone attend any events or actions
 
Some posters may not be aware Burgin (after a discussion with Bone) let a thousand flowers bloom when L/U first started, anyone could be a local contact, etc, its not his fault that it was the usual suspects who then took over at the Conferences.
 
treelover said:
Some posters may not be aware Burgin (after a discussion with Bone) let a thousand flowers bloom when L/U first started, anyone could be a local contact, etc, its not his fault that it was the usual suspects who then took over at the Conferences.
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It doesn't matter now.

They had the briefest of brief moments to step outside.

They didn't, they couldn't.

Nobody's "fault". But until people let go of their "role" of left-wing activist and all the rituals and catechisms that flow on from that then this will always, always, always happen.
 
SpackleFrog said:
They'd need to let go of their shit politics as well.
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Yeah.

But the politics flows from the role they are playing. Activists need to be "active". Left-winger activists need to be active on "Left-wing" issues. Hence standing on high streets waving petitions about Palestine.

Not that there's necessarily anything "wrong" with doing that but it's at best a bit of volunteering, at worst a hobby.

Either way, it's not the way to transform society.
 
SpackleFrog said:
Correct me if I'm wrong but haven't at least half of those 2000 members never attended a single LU event, even locally, and in fact have never demonstrated any commitment to LU beyond signing some call for a new party?
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So even if you are actually a paid up member of any organisation you should be stopped from voting on motions - or proposing any - because you can't physically attend meetings? Even corporations' AGMs have more inclusivity, even UK elections allow postal votes...
`Left Unity wants to transform society, but you cant use the internet as it's a bit weird and the members might vote for something` is a good campaigning slogan...
 
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