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

[SpineyNorman]

that criticism was present in Britain as well. Cobbett's comment on leaving Britain was that at least there were no Wilberforces in the US. but anti slavery became the national moral crusade, beside which all else was unimportant. and under which just about anything could be justified.

Also, Wilberforce was one of the biggest cunts going if you were poor or working class. The same hypocritical moralism that informed his anti-slavery crusade also informed his temperance work, anti-vice work, and a whole host of other things that encroached on the freedom of the working class to spend their leisure time as they wished. The authoritarian cunt.

Nothing gets my goat more than when liberals and right wingers hold him up as some kind of hero. He wasn't. He was a massive cunt, and one who went on to benefit from slavery even after it had been 'abolished'.

Cobbett's a really interesting character though, his political trajectory confuses and fascinates me - I don't suppose you know of any reading you could recommend on him?

 

[toggle]

Are you thinking of Time on the Cross? I read that a bit back for a course I was doing on historiography - they used 'cliometrics' which was supposedly a scientific means of analysing history (sounds like dianetics and is about as scientifically rigorous) by looking exclusively at quantitative data in specific and narrow cases, then using that to generalise across time and space. That mental American poster who ruins any thread in world politics that talks about either slavery or the US civil war (deluded microbe or something) appears to have been heavily influenced by it, either directly or indirectly.

I think so, I'd have to find where I left my notes to be certain.the bloke teaching the course I did was a great bloke, and a great dissertation supervisor, but his class teaching left me completely cold. but for a liberal, he did do a fair job of explaining how the focus on anti slavery was at the expense of any reform at home and he is very critical of what anti slavery became

Also, Wilberforce was one of the biggest cunts going if you were poor or working class. The same hypocritical moralism that informed his anti-slavery crusade also informed his temperance work, anti-vice work, and a whole host of other things that encroached on the freedom of the working class to spend their leisure time as they wished. The authoritarian cunt.

Nothing gets my goat more than when liberals and right wingers hold him up as some kind of hero. He wasn't. He was a massive cunt, and one who went on to benefit from slavery even after it had been 'abolished'.

Cobbett's a really interesting character though, his political trajectory confuses and fascinates me - I don't suppose you know of any reading you could recommend on him?

I covered him more in passing, he was one of the few commenting on the pre reform act levels of corruption in Cornwall, and then again as one of the criticizers of Wilberforce.I'm mainly focused on the other end of the 19th century, mostly on how Cornwall responded to the third reform act and the home rule debate, the result of which is I'm drowning in Liberals atm.

 

[SpineyNorman]

I think so, I'd have to find where I left my notes to be certain.the bloke teaching the course I did was a great bloke, and a great dissertation supervisor, but his class teaching left me completely cold. but for a liberal, he did do a fair job of explaining how the focus on anti slavery was at the expense of any reform at home and he is very critical of what anti slavery became



I covered him more in passing, he was one of the few commenting on the pre reform act levels of corruption in Cornwall, and then again as one of the criticizers of Wilberforce.I'm mainly focused on the other end of the 19th century, mostly on how Cornwall responded to the third reform act and the home rule debate, the result of which is I'm drowning in Liberals atm.

Fair enough - he was a Tory but drifted into radicalism and founded a newsletter that Thompson at least seems to think was really important in the development of the early labour movement - I don't really know anything of him beyond what Thompson wrote in The Making of the English Working Class though so I'd be interested if anyone knows where would be good to look.

 

[treelover]

Big Hollywood film on Wilberforce: Amazing Grace, don't think it did much box office though.

 

[toggle]

an important part of the campaigns for electoral reforms.

i'm just not close enough to know what is going to be good, or judge by names fro that period. soz.

 

[toggle]

Big Hollywood film on Wilberforce: Amazing Grace, don't think it did much box office though.

it got accross a few things that i can recall, wilberforce as the bloody pain in the arse enthusiast, and the treatment of equiano as a display rather than an individual and equal.

 

[Smyz]

Fair enough - he was a Tory but drifted into radicalism and founded a newsletter that Thompson at least seems to think was really important in the development of the early labour movement - I don't really know anything of him beyond what Thompson wrote in The Making of the English Working Class though so I'd be interested if anyone knows where would be good to look.

Checked index and bibliography. Thompson says

-- I have referred frequently to Cobbett's Political Register

-- and M Morris From Cobbett to the Chartists (1948)

and a load more Cobbet mentions on Page 943

 

[sihhi]

Fair enough - he was a Tory but drifted into radicalism and founded a newsletter that Thompson at least seems to think was really important in the development of the early labour movement - I don't really know anything of him beyond what Thompson wrote in The Making of the English Working Class though so I'd be interested if anyone knows where would be good to look.

The newspaper is the Political Register from 1802-1835 and it was important in creating the ground for the mass actions of 1830-2 that lead to passing the Great Reform Act and the first wide-scale extension of franchise in British history.

 

[Idris2002]

Another point that's not usually mentioned is that the abolition of 1830 did not, in fact, end slavery-like practices in her majesty's realms:

Blackbirding is the recruitment of people through trickery and kidnappings to work as labourers. From the 1860s blackbirding ships were engaged in seeking workers to mine the guano deposits on the Chincha Islands in Peru.[2] In the 1870s the blackbirding trade focused on supplying labourers to plantations, particularly the sugar cane plantations of Queensland, Australia and the nation of Fiji.[3][4] The practice occurred between 1842 and 1904. Those 'blackbirded' were recruited from the indigenous populations of nearby Pacific islands or northern Queensland. In the early days of the pearling industry in Broome, local Aboriginal people were blackbirded from the surrounding areas, including aboriginal people from desert areas.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackbirding

I'm pretty sure British capital remained involved in the slave trade after 1807 and 1830, even if it was no longer involved British ships.

And slavery wasn't abolished in the interior of Sierra Leone until 1928, after pressure from the League of Nations.

 

[J Ed]

Another point that's not usually mentioned is that the abolition of 1830 did not, in fact, end slavery-like practices in her majesty's realms:



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackbirding

I'm pretty sure British capital remained involved in the slave trade after 1807 and 1830, even if it was no longer involved British ships.

And slavery wasn't abolished in the interior of Sierra Leone until 1928, after pressure from the League of Nations.

IIRC, British 'anti-slaving' ships which 'rescued' slaves from countries that continued to traffic in slaves would sell the slaves that they 'rescued'.

 

[Idris2002]

IIRC, British 'anti-slaving' ships which 'rescued' slaves from countries that continued to traffic in slaves would sell the slaves that they 'rescued'.

Really? I've never heard that one before. In the case of Sierra Leone, at least, a lot of the early setllers who formed the Krio ethnic group were people rescued from slave ships.

 

[rosecore]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/01/activists-feminism-digital

Nice to see they picked a majority of white women. Great work Guardian.

 

[frogwoman]

did anyone that "chime for change" thing about women's rights which had beyonce on the bill and lots of lyrics telling women they should look sexy and please men etc?

 

[toggle]

Another point that's not usually mentioned is that the abolition of 1830 did not, in fact, end slavery-like practices in her majesty's realms:



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackbirding

I'm pretty sure British capital remained involved in the slave trade after 1807 and 1830, even if it was no longer involved British ships.

And slavery wasn't abolished in the interior of Sierra Leone until 1928, after pressure from the League of Nations.

In theory, I think, there were penalties for investing in slavery.

one thing I did come across was the discussion of 'Chinese Slavery', immigrant indentureships in British Controlled South Africa.

 

[Idris2002]

In theory, I think, there were penalties for investing in slavery.

one thing I did come across was the discussion of 'Chinese Slavery', immigrant indentureships in British Controlled South Africa.

Churchill (when he was a Liberal) complained about "chinese Slavery" in the Rand goldfields, and he was badgered into a retraction, saying that "slavery" was a "terminological inexactitude".

 

[toggle]

Churchill (when he was a Liberal) complained about "chinese Slavery" in the Rand goldfields, and he was badgered into a retraction, saying that "slavery" was a "terminological inexactitude".

I've got it noted down as a huge issue in a 1903 by election, in a constituency where a lot of families were supported by miners working in south africa. but i won't know much else until i get into the newspapers for that era

 

[el-ahrairah]

i dont even know where to begin with this: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/jun/03/day-i-became-a-terrorist

 

[ViolentPanda]

Also, Wilberforce was one of the biggest cunts going if you were poor or working class. The same hypocritical moralism that informed his anti-slavery crusade also informed his temperance work, anti-vice work, and a whole host of other things that encroached on the freedom of the working class to spend their leisure time as they wished. The authoritarian cunt.

Nothing gets my goat more than when liberals and right wingers hold him up as some kind of hero. He wasn't. He was a massive cunt, and one who went on to benefit from slavery even after it had been 'abolished'.

Cobbett's a really interesting character though, his political trajectory confuses and fascinates me - I don't suppose you know of any reading you could recommend on him?

Anthony Burton's "William Cobbett - Englishman" is okay, but (IMHO) over-focuses on Cobbett's "Englishness".

 

[articul8]

Cobbett's a really interesting character though, his political trajectory confuses and fascinates me ?

Blue Labour avant la lettre

 

[butchersapron]

With Cobbett the best thing to do is read rural rides (not the wurzels song) and watch as he goes around the country getting angrier and angrier and more radicalised by the conditions he encounters.

 

[butchersapron]

Blue Labour avant la lettre

What utter nonsense. And still writing like a wanker Even in a sentence with only five words.

 

[el-ahrairah]

With Cobbett the best thing to do is read rural rides (not the wurzels song) and watch as he goes around the country getting angrier and angrier and more radicalised by the conditions he encounters.

my only knowledge of Cobbett is through Rural Rides - my old history teacher was very fond of it and drummed large sections into us! not that i can remember it twenty years on, but i was definitely lucky to have a load of old fashioned lefties teaching me when we studied the Corn Laws and the Enclosures and all that malarkey.

 

[articul8]

What utter nonsense. And still writing like a wanker Even in a sentence with only five words.

he has this "merrie England" golden age thing going on

 

[SpineyNorman]

Blue Labour avant la lettre

While we're recommending reading, here's something for you.

 

[toggle]

Another point that's not usually mentioned is that the abolition of 1830 did not, in fact, end slavery-like practices in her majesty's realms:


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackbirding

I'm pretty sure British capital remained involved in the slave trade after 1807 and 1830, even if it was no longer involved British ships.

And slavery wasn't abolished in the interior of Sierra Leone until 1928, after pressure from the League of Nations.

picked up this link, thought it might be an interesting addition:

http://www.ucl.ac.uk/lbs/

 

[JimW]

With Cobbett the best thing to do is read rural rides (not the wurzels song) and watch as he goes around the country getting angrier and angrier and more radicalised by the conditions he encounters.

I brought a copy of that (in two vols) with me when I came here to start work in that rural development project. Was interesting comparing his observations then to what I was seeing. His concern with the well-being of people was always to the fore and speaks well of him I think.

 

[The Pale King]

Now that privilege checking has broken out and is now happily gambolling across the broadsheets, a quick thought. It seems to me to be a quite transparent act of displacement, in which a sort of phony egalitarianism of discourse stands in for a proper politics of egalitarianism. It's freighted with all the liberal baggage (you have to work on yourself to remove the taint of racism, the aggregate of individual improvements will re-make society). It's as though you can level everyone at the level of discourse and that's enough. As long as subaltern voices are 'listened to' then we've really done all we can. The kernal of it as a mode of thought is both craven towards the actual political / economic situation and grossly patronising to the system's victims.
That's all, as you were!

 

[where to]

i dont even know where to begin with this: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/jun/03/day-i-became-a-terrorist

The woman winked and said "I know yr not really"! You can't make an article out of that! He ran off the bus for that?

humourless prima Donna.

 

[Idris2002]

Big Hollywood film on Wilberforce: Amazing Grace, don't think it did much box office though.

Nollywood - Nigerian film industry - not Hollywood, I think.

 

[Firky]

did anyone that "chime for change" thing about women's rights which had beyonce on the bill and lots of lyrics telling women they should look sexy and please men etc?

Big fucking Gucci advert wasn't it? I only saw the highlights on the news but that was enough to see that Gucci were promoting it. The same Gucci which often gets adverts pulled for being sexist.