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

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lauriepenny said:
I'm getting nowhere with this. You're probably decent people individually, but together you behave like a pack of playground bullies, and your lack of empathy is shocking. I've tried in good faith to engage; you'd be hard-pressed to find another columnist who would- and I regret ever doing so.
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Oh don't give me that bullshit. I've had more support from this place and people on this thread than you are even capable of you vacuous vapid self obsessed little cunt.
 
redsquirrel said:
Wasn't Bea Campbell that horrible scumbag who defended (and to this day still defends) the social workers involved in the "Satanic Ritual Abuse" cases, or am I getting confused?
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Yes, yes she was. She's also a regularish contributor to the Guardian, with some interesting attempts at self-justification:

​

Many of the removed comments refer to her involvement in the "Satanic Ritual Abuse" bollocks, which still casts a long shadow
 
lauriepenny said:
I'm getting nowhere with this. You're probably decent people individually, but together you behave like a pack of playground bullies, and your lack of empathy is shocking. I've tried in good faith to engage; you'd be hard-pressed to find another columnist who would- and I regret ever doing so.
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Why are you engaging with anyone here as a 'columnist'? I think that is partly where you are going wrong tbh and why some folks here can't/won't be able to empathise with you. It's as if you are putting on a 'special' hat to respond, a coloumist is only one part of who you are! If all of us who use these boards only engaged through the limited position/rhetoric of what we do for a job/profession not much in the way of communication would be achieved IMO.

Also...I see you have made no disctinction between the different posters on this thread ' but together you behave like a pack of playground bullies'...I think you are failing to realise that for a large portion of the users here there is no 'together' ...some people agreeing on some things doesn't equate to a 'pack' of anything much in forum using terms.

I wonder why you haven't used the term 'gang'...'pack' is usually used to describe a collection of animals or 'objects' isn't it?

I want to be clear, you certainly do not have to like nor be forced to engage with anyone that you find/feel abusive/lacking empathy. You have your own boundaries, make your own choices etc just like the rest of us...a little reflection on how you have positioned/limited yourself and lumped/characterised/limited everyone else together in your post above might be helpful though IMO.
 
Postmodern wankery? Bollocks! Nonsense to suggest that class is any less central to my politics just because I point out how it is also a culturally/discursively mediated and constructed set of social relations
 
Rutita1 said:
Why are you engaging with anyone here as a 'columnist'? I think that is partly where you are going wrong tbh and why some folks here can't/won't be able to empathise with you. It's as if you are putting on a 'special' hat to respond, a coloumist is only one part of who you are! If all of us who use these boards only engaged through the limited position/rhetoric of what we do for a job/profession not much in the way of communication would be achieved IMO.

Also...I see you have made no disctinction between the different posters on this thread ' but together you behave like a pack of playground bullies'...I think you are failing to realise that for a large portion of the users here there is no 'together' ...some people agreeing on some things doesn't equate to a 'pack' of anything much in forum using terms.

I wonder why you haven't used the term 'gang'...'pack' is usually used to describe a collection of animals or 'objects' isn't it?

I want to be clear, you certainly do not have to like nor be forced to engage with anyone that you find/feel abusive/lacking empathy. You have your own boundaries, make your own choices etc just like the rest of us...a little reflection on how you have positioned/limited yourself and lumped/characterised/limited everyone else together in your post above might be helpful though IMO.
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Exactly, she could have at least taken a leaf out of Andrew Gilligan's book and used a sockpuppet. :D
 
The individual feminist columnist is too often predicated on the assumption that writing about womens' oppression is more effective when it is authenticated by personal experience. So as soon as a writer begins to take themselves and their experiences as integral to whatever is being discussed, there is the temptation to revel in your own direct victimhood or suffering the better to validate your writing as somehow the authentic expression of what your fighting against. The whole genre sets up an implicit "ideal" columnist who has
- been abused as a child
- developed mental health problems or an eating disorder
- worked in the sex industry
- been raped
- been the victim of domestic violence
- had an abortion
...etc
The more you approximate to this ideal (or tick the boxes), the better your chances being offered platforms (and financial rewards) for your ability to claim to personify this suffering.

Clearly LOTS of women have experienced one or more of these. But most of them don't get paid for writing about and authenticating these experiences as qualifications for an ongoing professional position as commentators about women and their oppression. A certain kind of columnist is rewarded for a confessional and sometimes creative approach to their own experiences in order to better position themselves as a tribune of the oppressed. There's been more than a few occasions (inc documented on here) when there are inconsistencies (or downright contradictions) between various accounts Laurie has given of her own personal history (conveniently discovering a life of poverty for instance).

Taken in isolation, I've no reason whatsoever to doubt the veracity of LP's rape account. I do want to challenge the structural requirements of the confessional genre though, in terms of the narcissistic masochism it promotes and rewards.
 
It means that when someone claims to be raped, I begin from the premise that, at least provisionally, they are to be believed. Nothing in that article seems to offer any grounds to suspend that provisional position.
 
added bit to my earlier keyboard worrying:
lauriepenny (and i'm not taking your name in vain this time), i've re-read my posts from yesterday and i am genuinely sorry for sending you to triggerville. especially the shrigley song. i posted it with particular references-in-my-head to my situation, and the people around me. i didn't even stop to consider what sort of impact it would have on you, in light of your experiences with nasty fuckers on the internet. and i really hope you don't have me filed under the same category as them. i'm going to take my own advice and think about the impact that every little think i write has on people (you, 'them', and myself). especially when i'm seeing red. re-reading it is really uncomfortable, and looks like i was trying to indulge in a bit of 'i can out-victim yow', while being proper attacky. which is shit. i'd also like to make it absolutely clear that i understand and fully support any and everyone's decision not to report rape/assault, regardless of their reasons. as long as it's *their* decision.

i am going to email you this afternoon if that's still ok? and it's fine if you're a bit busy and can't respond quick sharp.
i think if i spoke to you, i'd be terrified of being your brain twin. we've got more in common than i dare admit in public on here :D (including us both having a 'make the laurie thread 'all about meeeeeeeee' moment ;) at the same time. i think you get automatic rights there... )and i think half of my ranting yesterday was probably aimed at myself the most, with a few choice activists-that-aren't-you in the firing line. all sent in your direction. y'know i mentioned misdirected anger earlier? you're like a mirror of bits of me, if you like. and when i'm going nuclear at myself.. well.. i think my rantivism spoke for itself.
i've only started to go a bit 'raaaaargh' On The Internet in full detail (there's a bit of history of the 'lighter' side of all the shit that happened from march somewhere on here, involving chimneyclimbing fuckmuppets and thier imact on my life), so really need to stop doing it. as a result of going 'raargh' on urban last week, i stopped trying to deal with shit on my own, and got myself referred to some proper kickass agencies who are helping to make me feel safe again, and dealing with shit properly on my behalf. when all this kicked off earlier in the year, i could've really done with speaking out straight away about every single fucking strand of this particular can of worms :facepalm:
so yeah. i'm in the early stages of getting my life back together after it exploded in my face. and have a bit of a hair trigger in terms of Shouting At The Internet at times. irl i'm a mouse that roars - wouldn't say boo to a goose :D

i'm going to go and have a cup of solidaritea. while being a short, pixie like womman, who used to be well into glittery makeup and radicalism :hmm: if i ever meet you (and i think i'd probably like to, as long as i've not scared you shitless), i've got a fluffy blanket (was gonna say with your name on, but that'd be a lie. i could embroider it on in a stitchy bitch session if you want though?) that i suspect you'd like.

and thank you again urbs. you've got me through *years* of disastercrises. seriously, i'm not trying to do 'multiple pm's of support' or anthing, i'm just trying to say that this board has genuinely saved my life more than once.

gonna go listen to le tigre's 'get off the internet' now. and send you a calm, composed, and hopefully friendly message.

articul8 - cheers. you've also given me a lot of food for thought.
 
articul8 said:
It means that when someone claims to be raped, I begin from the premise that, at least provisionally, they are to be believed. Nothing in that article seems to offer any grounds to suspend that provisional position.
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It looks to me like you're saying 'Taken in isolation, I've no reason whatsoever to doubt the veracity of LP's rape account.' just after posting a load of reasons not to take it in isolation. You really have not got a good record so please be a bit more careful - and don't start talking about provisionally believing people ffs.
 
"not got a good record"? I have a record of disbelieving rape victims?! Good luck proving that. As for provisional, you know full well what I meant - ie. In the absence of sufficient reason to think otherwise.
 
Have you read it?! It is not an attack on class politics, it is an attack on narrow and dogmatic assumptions about what the struggle for socialism might mean, to whom it appeals and on what basis.
 
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