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

[equationgirl]

Wonder what mark he got for that? And why journal papers are something he ignored except for one forthcoming reference?

 

[DotCommunist]

So a highly educated m/c geezer thinks that classrooms are a prison.

 

[Firky]

I'm still getting over this cunt being against the Chicago teachers' labour rights because he thinks that schools are a prison. I kind of want him to die.

Malcolm Harris is the worst one out of all of them I reckon. Worse than Laurie, Molly, Owen, Sunni and Elly Mae all rolled into one.

He must be stopped. I don't care how it's done but the man is an affront to decency.

I dont think any reasonable person could disagree that he needs bayonetting.

We need to make sure his death is as slow as possible though - which means that at least as much effort must be put into keeping him alive as is put into making him suffer. Some of them Chicago teachers must have doctors as partners - maybe they'd volunteer to help us in our noble quest?

 

[SpineyNorman]

So a highly educated m/c geezer thinks that classrooms are a prison.

One can only conclude that he's got plenty of experience of the former and none of the latter. Come the glorious day we will rectify that.

And presumably he also thinks that his mum making him eat his greens and tidy his room is a violation of his human rights.

 

[Firky]

Who's Helena Fitzgerald, I notice he's (Malcolm Harris) often photographed with her, drops her name etc. ?

Body language suggests they know each other very well.

(stripy toff blazer FTW)

 

[SpineyNorman]

Who's Helena Fitzgerald, I notice he's (Malcolm Harris) often photographed with her, drops her name etc. ?

Body language suggests they know each other very well.

(stripy toff blazer FTW)

Look at him. Just look at him. The smug cunt. If that's not a face that's begging to be slapped I don't know what is

 

[Firky]

Digerati lol

The Radiohead thing stinks IMO

I am going to have to come back that when I get more time as I am a huge RH fan

 

[equationgirl]

Look at him. Just look at him. The smug cunt. If that's not a face that's begging to be slapped I don't know what is

My first thought too

 

[J Ed]

Who's Helena Fitzgerald, I notice he's (Malcolm Harris) often photographed with her, drops her name etc. ?

Body language suggests they know each other very well.

(stripy toff blazer FTW)

They look very similar, I'm not going to google them and just assume they have some weird incestuous relationship like I imagine all privately educated people do

 

[sihhi]

a re-education camp would show him the subtle difference between school and prison

Don't joke in that way with him he will physically threaten you

"I remember at one of The New Inquiry‘s posh, super-exclusive literary salons on the Upper East Side (shortlist and all) that Pam managed to finagle us into, I made some throwaway, offhand remark that so enraged Malcolm that he physically threatened me. Which becomes much funnier once you consider the height and size differential between us. I had criticized the idea of purely local agricultural production as a viable alternative to global networks of food distribution, to which he raised some ill-informed objection about what was to be done with the “kulaks” (rather pronouncedly mispronouncing the word), assuming with smug condescension that Soviet history would be something I was utterly ignorant about.
He was wrong. In what was admittedly a pretty childish move, I calmly corrected his pronunciation of the word and jokingly assured him that there was no kulak problem at all: Obviously (obviously!), they’d be sent East and we’d just let the GULag sort them out. This bit of pedantry and black humor on my part — which, it’s true, was probably in poor taste — pissed him off to the point that he advised me to “insurrect” my “ivy league education.” Not that I hold it against him, but coming from Malcolm, who graduated from an expensive private school*, this all seemed a bit “rich.” For some reason it was just really funny to me, and I burst out laughing at his suggestion.
This didn’t improve his mood. He then told me that if I did not voluntarily leave the party, he would “make me.” I was unimpressed, and so we ended up staying another half-hour or so while he fumed and paced back and forth in the corner. Needless to say, my name was removed from the VIP list of approved invitees, so this was the last of the two literary salons they held that I was able to attend."

Harris didn't attend private school, as here:

"Malcolm Harris is from Palo Alto (median property value - $1.3m), and went to Palo Alto High School, which is something of a rarity in the United States, being a public school with an 11:1 pupil-teacher ratio."

More generally his plans around twitter involve using it to combat racism by having a 'dog' account not say anything but simply 'bark' at colour-blind instances of racism ie when when ordinary white Americans say something that's not racist but simply the result of cultures not having fully merged or shared together.

http://overland.org.au/previous-issues/issue-208/feature-malcolm-harris/

The account served a second purpose: as a sort of anti-racist hunting dog. @Anti_Racism_Dog quickly attracted a lot of like-minded followers who understood the dynamics at play. Whenever it would start barking at another user, this was a cue to the dog’s followers to troll the offender as well. There’s only so much one dog can do alone. Colour-blind racism is particularly dangerous because it isn’t immediately visible as such. It provokes good-faith discussion from liberals about what counts as racism, muddying the water. But @Anti_Racism_Dog’s strategy draws new lines about what constitutes acceptable discourse on race, placing colour-blind racists on the other side by speaking to them like an animal. What would be taken as totally insane in flesh space can be infuriatingly clever online.

Apparently, this means stopping the situation where

Structural injustices thrive when the micro-interactions that constitute them are hidden from view.

One other option for twitter was creating rumour storms and weirdness that will disrupt the system.
Here is a post from his blog from 2010

http://destructural.wordpress.com/2010/12/05/please-stand-up

“In Russia, that Narodnik-Anarchists would sometimes forge a ukase or manifesto in the name of the Czar; in it the Autocrat would complain that greedy lords & unfeeling officials had sealed him in his palace & cut him off from his beloved people. He would proclaim the end of serfdom & call on peasants & workers to rise in His Name against the government.

Several times this ploy actually succeeded in sparking revolts.” - Hakim Bey, The Temporary Autonomous Zone

 

[SpineyNorman]

Don't joke in that way with him he will physically threaten you

"I remember at one of The New Inquiry‘s posh, super-exclusive literary salons on the Upper East Side (shortlist and all) that Pam managed to finagle us into, I made some throwaway, offhand remark that so enraged Malcolm that he physically threatened me. Which becomes much funnier once you consider the height and size differential between us. I had criticized the idea of purely local agricultural production as a viable alternative to global networks of food distribution, to which he raised some ill-informed objection about what was to be done with the “kulaks” (rather pronouncedly mispronouncing the word), assuming with smug condescension that Soviet history would be something I was utterly ignorant about.
He was wrong. In what was admittedly a pretty childish move, I calmly corrected his pronunciation of the word and jokingly assured him that there was no kulak problem at all: Obviously (obviously!), they’d be sent East and we’d just let the GULag sort them out. This bit of pedantry and black humor on my part — which, it’s true, was probably in poor taste — pissed him off to the point that he advised me to “insurrect” my “ivy league education.” Not that I hold it against him, but coming from Malcolm, who graduated from an expensive private school*, this all seemed a bit “rich.” For some reason it was just really funny to me, and I burst out laughing at his suggestion.
This didn’t improve his mood. He then told me that if I did not voluntarily leave the party, he would “make me.” I was unimpressed, and so we ended up staying another half-hour or so while he fumed and paced back and forth in the corner. Needless to say, my name was removed from the VIP list of approved invitees, so this was the last of the two literary salons they held that I was able to attend."

Harris didn't attend private school, as here:



More generally his plans around twitter involve using it to combat racism by having a 'dog' account not say anything but simply 'bark' at colour-blind instances of racism ie when when ordinary white Americans say something that's not racist but simply the result of cultures not having fully merged or shared together.

http://overland.org.au/previous-issues/issue-208/feature-malcolm-harris/



Apparently, this means stopping the situation where



One other option for twitter was creating rumour storms and weirdness that will disrupt the system.
Here is a post from his blog from 2010

http://destructural.wordpress.com/2010/12/05/please-stand-up

“In Russia, that Narodnik-Anarchists would sometimes forge a ukase or manifesto in the name of the Czar; in it the Autocrat would complain that greedy lords & unfeeling officials had sealed him in his palace & cut him off from his beloved people. He would proclaim the end of serfdom & call on peasants & workers to rise in His Name against the government.

Several times this ploy actually succeeded in sparking revolts.” - Hakim Bey, The Temporary Autonomous Zone

Sounds like the yes men or whatever they call themselves.

 

[Firky]

Look at him. Just look at him. The smug cunt. If that's not a face that's begging to be slapped I don't know what is

He's got his fingers in the pie of Tumblr, it's another thing (aside porn, sex, nudity, and Fitzgerald) he drops as often has he can. But it is porn he likes best, he keeps coming back to it again and again.

"The cover-shoot for Sasha’s movie is too much for Vince to handle. All those faceless male bodies and sculpted muscles constitute a giant fucking machine; their hairless, sterile flesh is as efficient as it is hollow. When Vince tells Sasha that what she does makes him sick, she tells him that “guys like you, that wanna fuck all sorts of girls just for the fun of it."​

And what the fuck does this even mean?

​

“Like the reader of Milton’s Paradise Lost who sympathizes with Satan, only to be reminded of his own fallen nature, the viewer is implicated in Ari’s shaming. Up until this point, his bravado has seemed a mask for a family man trying to succeed in a cut-throat industry, but at the end of season seven, he is finally revealed as a bladder of bile kept animate through unadulterated aggression. His true face is the lie, and the viewers fell for it too.” ​

 

[Firky]

I bet he has some interesting files on his Apple Macbook and iPhone. The dirty cunt. He's like a ginger Woody Allen with twice the sleaze.

 

[frogwoman]

what's he doing quoting the anarcho-nonce hakim bey?

 

[equationgirl]

Helena Fitzgerald is a New Inquiry article contributor (amongst others) and was a contributing editor. Certainly of the same circles as Harris although a quick scan of her Twitter shows he's not making a lot of tweets to her other than about New Inquiry matters.

 

[Firky]

This caught my eye, just posting it here to remind myself to take a look at it later along with hte Radiohead thing.

Looks like a piss take out of him

https://www.nsfwcorp.com/dispatch/malcolm-harris/fd9b4ac47855d2cb11bac1da96702d5ccb9051df/

Malcolm Harris and the Occupy Swindle​

 

[Firky]

Helena Fitzgerald is a New Inquiry article contributor (amongst others) and was a contributing editor. Certainly of the same circles as Harris although a quick scan of her Twitter shows he's not making a lot of tweets to her other than about New Inquiry matters.

Aahh a bit of nepotism (they do look similar)

 

[sihhi]

what's he doing quoting the anarcho-nonce hakim bey?

He is promoting the idea that a fake twitter account for NUS head Aaron Porter with it promoting physical occupation of university space is a good thing to do.

Hence saying Radiohead will play at the Occupy Wall Street park is also a good thing to do.

Just like ultra-esers and narodniks in tsarist era issuing ukazi from the tsar encouraging rebellion against landlords.

None of these things ever promote boy who cried wolf syndrome or encourage detachment and fixation on powers from above.

 

[phildwyer]

They don't see anything wrong with commodification. They don't understand why they shouldn't be "entrepreneurs" who "market" themselves as a "brand."

 

[equationgirl]

sihhi Palo Alto is a very wealthy enclave though (thanks to incoporation of the city) it's a private town, with less than 70,000 highly educated, extremely wealthy residents.

I doubt Palo Alto High School is a true public school at all.

 

[J Ed]

re: discussion a few pages earlier about privately educated leftists who use things like flashmobs for activism - a privately educated 'anarchist' at my uni who's going to be a sabb next year is talking about how he's made a Foucault finger puppet who inspired him to write a dissertation about why "contemporary hip-hop isn't very good because neoliberalism". ffs

Big fan of Laurie Penny. Naturally.

 

[Firky]

Radiohead have a song called Palo Alto about it's MC utopia

equationgirl

In a city of the future​

It is difficult to concentrate​

Meet the boss, meet the wife​

Everybody's happy​

Everyone is made for life​

​

In a city of the future​

It is difficult to find a space​

I'm too busy to see you​

You're too busy to wait​

​

But I'm okay, how are you?​

Thanks for asking, thanks for asking​

But I'm okay, how are you?​

I hope you're okay too​

​

Everyone one of those days​

When the sky's California blue​

With a beautiful bombshell​

I throw myself into my work​

I'm too lazy, I've been kidding myself for so long​

​

I'm okay, how are you?​

Thanks for asking, thanks for asking​

But I'm okay, how are you?​

I hope you're okay too​

 

[equationgirl]

re: discussion a few pages earlier about privately educated leftists who use things like flashmobs for activism - a privately educated 'anarchist' at my uni who's going to be a sabb next year is talking about how he's made a Foucault finger puppet who inspired him to write a dissertation about why "contemporary hip-hop isn't very good because neoliberalism". ffs

Big fan of Laurie Penny. Naturally.

That sounds a bit like a breakdown, to be honest. Is he ok?

 

[Firky]

re: discussion a few pages earlier about privately educated leftists who use things like flashmobs for activism - a privately educated 'anarchist' at my uni who's going to be a sabb next year is talking about how he's made a Foucault finger puppet who inspired him to write a dissertation about why "contemporary hip-hop isn't very good because neoliberalism". ffs

Big fan of Laurie Penny. Naturally.

I remember John Molyneux saying never write about your favourite band or genre of music for a dissertation because it'll not even be properly read.

 

[SpineyNorman]

re: discussion a few pages earlier about privately educated leftists who use things like flashmobs for activism - a privately educated 'anarchist' at my uni who's going to be a sabb next year is talking about how he's made a Foucault finger puppet who inspired him to write a dissertation about why "contemporary hip-hop isn't very good because neoliberalism". ffs

Big fan of Laurie Penny. Naturally.

Who's that? (PM if necessary)

 

[J Ed]

Who's that? (PM if necessary)

Sam Rae - he's gonna be education officer

 

[Firky]

'Education Needs a Rae of Sunshine'

Another one for the bayonet.

 

[Firky]

inspired him to write a dissertation about why "contemporary hip-hop isn't very good because neoliberalism". ffs

Ever got an essay back that you really thought was first class but got a 2:2, and none of your lecturers have taken the time to explain why?

Does he really have to ask?

 

[Idris2002]

I'm still getting over this cunt being against the Chicago teachers' labour rights because he thinks that schools are a prison. I kind of want him to die.

Here's what Chicago teachers, students and parents are up against:

As you may have heard, Mayor Rahm Emanuel recently jetted in from his Utah ski vacation to tell the city—particularly south- and west-siders—that he'd done them a big favor by closing 54 of their schools.
That meant that 30,000 children would be moved into new schools. But to hear the mayor tell it, more money would be available for things like air-conditioning, libraries, and computers when the Chicago Public Schools didn't have to spend so much heating all those unneeded buildings.
It's an interesting approach to public education—helping low-income children by turning their undercrowded classrooms into overcrowded ones.

If you can stomach it, there's more where that came from at this link:

http://www.chicagoreader.com/chicag...ing-rahm-emanuel-closings/Content?oid=9203188

(Rahm Emanuel was one of the key figures in the early years of the Obama White House, btw).

In general, one thing I've seen crop up sometimes in debates on education is the claim that the school system as we know it is a product of states' military needs. The usual case cited is that of Prussia after it's awful defeat in the battle of Jena in 1807. After that, Prussia did expand a compulsory state school system - but what this meme ignores is the fact that Prussian teachers were heavily involved in the revolution of 1848. What I mean by this is that the relationship between public education and state power is a lot more ambivalent than this point of view allows for.

 

[sihhi]

some fucking oxygen thief hipster scumcunt

Who is worse - this kind of anarchist or a Labourist radical like Sunny Hundal?

I remember John Molyneux saying never write about your favourite band or genre of music for a dissertation because it'll not even be properly read.

Malcolm Harris on music defending a musician with homophobic lyrics (213 f-words on one album)

It’s out of this therapist’s office that Odd Future’s music emerges, half-joking about being half-joking. Tyler used the framing device of a self-voiced school counselor in his debut mixtape Bastard, and returns to the technique in Goblin, the first Wolf Gang album sold in stores. Even though some of Tyler’s slogans (“Kill people/Burn shit/Fuck school”) are reminiscent of Pink Floyd’s adolescent rejectionism, his adult antagonist is no authoritarian. The counselor’s attitude is more like Tyler’s critics, spouting knowing condescension with a dose of liberal tolerance. As the ‘two’ of them discuss Tyler’s fame in the album’s title track intro, he defends his colorful language: “You’re gonna have to cut down on that ‘faggot’ word, that’s very, that’s a bad word-” “I’m not homophobic” “I mean, I don’t think you are-” “Faggot.”

Odd Future is the articulation of antagonism in a nation that swears it doesn’t have any. Against Glee’s sing-song commercial pluralism and Gaga’s tolerant biological determinism, Wolf Gang screams that a world with so much suffering must have deeper conflicts, of the existential fear that being “born this way” is the problem. This contemporary collective version of Dostoevsky’s underground man is a rebuke to Dan Savage’s state-approved historical view “it gets better.” If adulthood is free from the agonies of youth, why do adults produce such violently sad children? When Earl calls himself a “rapist in training,” asking if he hates women is the wrong question. The inventor of adolescence G. Stanley Hall wrote that “youth is prophecy,” and Odd Future is no exception, they’re the dark promise of the shape of things to come.