Does the left understand the working class and how would they answer their concerns?
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revol68
what, fucking what?
Sorry what life should I find, I'm reasonably happy with my life as it is, got plenty of good mates, a pretty good social life, a lovely girlfriend and am considering quite witty and intelligent if a tad prone to being obnoxious.
Is that enough of a life to warrant peddling my crap?
revol68
what, fucking what?
Well considering I was discussing the problem of 'false consciousness' with someone who loves Foucault I think it was a bit more apt albeit still quite funny.
But if you feel threatened by people discussing things that go over your head don't feel you have to be so defensive, I'm sure if you ask nicely one of us will explain it in more straight forward terms.
Originally Posted by revol68
from the subjective perspective of collective proletarian interest
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
the promise of the first clause is undermined by the depression engendered by the second.
haven't suprisingly contributed to this thread yet! so ny two pennies worth is this
- the left are based on a form of marxism ( which i believe generally understood history and the mechanics of society and so understood what mattered in the grand scheme to w/c people) , Leninism, which was a particular adaption of marxism to the backward russia in the early 20thC. Leninism in russia in 1905onwards was NOT a w/c marxist movement but a movement of the m/c who wished to overthrow the backward Tsarist regime, which appropriated some elements of marxism and used much phraseology of marxism. BUt fundamentally Leninism was a managerial ideology that saw, rightly, that russian soceity then was backward and needed dragging into the 20thC ( even the 19thC!!)
Biazarrely this is the model the left have chosen today .. although there is a clear reason why .. it was the one form that overthrow the incumbant regime .. but the Leftists never looked hard enough ( or actually they generally ignored or lied or pretended otherwise) at what Leninism meant
so Leninism today remains a m/c managerial ideology .. which it is so attractive to disaffected m/c students
a few groups have broken with Leninism .. e.g. some of the New Left of the 6ts post Hungary and Prague, and that which became Autonomia in Italy , and in this country the IWCA and some groups in the 7ts
Leninism does NOT need to understand the w/c as it is not FOR the w/c , though of course that they do so means they fails to be able to use them for their m/c ambitions
for the left to understand the w/c it would have to reject leninism and actually be w/c .. some chance
- the left are based on a form of marxism ( which i believe generally understood history and the mechanics of society and so understood what mattered in the grand scheme to w/c people) , Leninism, which was a particular adaption of marxism to the backward russia in the early 20thC. Leninism in russia in 1905onwards was NOT a w/c marxist movement but a movement of the m/c who wished to overthrow the backward Tsarist regime, which appropriated some elements of marxism and used much phraseology of marxism. BUt fundamentally Leninism was a managerial ideology that saw, rightly, that russian soceity then was backward and needed dragging into the 20thC ( even the 19thC!!)
Biazarrely this is the model the left have chosen today .. although there is a clear reason why .. it was the one form that overthrow the incumbant regime .. but the Leftists never looked hard enough ( or actually they generally ignored or lied or pretended otherwise) at what Leninism meant
so Leninism today remains a m/c managerial ideology .. which it is so attractive to disaffected m/c students
a few groups have broken with Leninism .. e.g. some of the New Left of the 6ts post Hungary and Prague, and that which became Autonomia in Italy , and in this country the IWCA and some groups in the 7ts
Leninism does NOT need to understand the w/c as it is not FOR the w/c , though of course that they do so means they fails to be able to use them for their m/c ambitions
for the left to understand the w/c it would have to reject leninism and actually be w/c .. some chance
Leninist or not, they're still mired in Fabianism, abrahmic morality and the defence of Bevanite institutions, nationalisation and trade unionism. That's the real chasm between the left and the contemporary working class. The left's premise is simply incompatible with the post-modern condition. (So, indeed is the BNPs, which is why their support is limited to the 5% of the electorate who pull a Meldrew at Dizzee Rascal and Polish delicatessens and so on)
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
I do wish you two would just get a room and relieve the obvious sexual tension between you.
I do wish you two would just get a room and relieve the obvious sexual tension between you.
It's a like a little microcosm of the wider left. Depressing we can't even manage to have a adult debate on a forum board, what hope do we have of providing a progressive future for our society?
I do wish you two would just get a room and relieve the obvious sexual tension between you.
Why, am I the only one who's been answering his juvenile twaddle?
You're in this thread more than I am.
ericjarvis
give a feck for the feckless
What about porn? Surely the Internet is for porn, the trading insults is simply a by product.
Do either of them consider themselves of the left? News to me. As for “progressive". Well. Boy Scoutism.
revol68
what, fucking what?
Well there is next to no chance of any sort of political discussion with LLETSA because he doesn't actually have a political principle or stance beyond sniping. He doesn't appear to be of the left and I don't give a shit about the left as it has tended to be of the attitude so explicitly obvious in this thread title, namely that the working classs is an inert homogenous object on which it is the job of the 'left' to act.
In so much as I'm off the left I'm an 'ultra leftist', something Lenin much like LLETSA see's as an infantile disorder.
I'll grant you he has a very annoying posting style but LLETSA does have a political opinion that's probably a bit too grounded in the here and now for you to grasp.
revol68
what, fucking what?
Yeah cos my politics are completely alien to the here and now, they certainly don't entail any sort of support for striking workers, resistance to benefit cuts, the scapegoating of immigrants and appeals to nationalism?
I would suggest that without a politics that look beyond the present you should hardly be suprised to see yourself stuck in it.
revol68
what, fucking what?
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
Yeah, but the sexual tension is so much more obvious between you two.
Piles playing up today?
That list of how you will be occupying yourself says more about you than anyone ever could.
revol68
what, fucking what?
That i'm a pretty normal twenty something?
I don't know many twenty-somethings who are as self-important, self-absorbed and ultimately selfish.
revol68
what, fucking what?
Reading books, going to gigs, drinking in the sun with mates and generally enjoying your summer is self absored and selfish?
Perhaps you could explain what great acts of selfless atruism I could be doing instead? Perhaps I could take a job in an insurance company or bank, not only would I be keeping someone else out of a job who might need it more than a single twenty something male with no dependents, but I'd also be giving back to that wonderful world of finance. Or I could be really selfish and do a medical trial for a drug aimed at treating MS.
Reading books, going to gigs, drinking in the sun with mates and generally enjoying your summer is self absored and selfish?
Perhaps you could explain what great acts of selfless atruism I could be doing instead? Perhaps I could take a job in an insurance company or bank, not only would I be keeping someone else out of a job who might need it more than a single twenty something male with no dependents, but I'd also be giving back to that wonderful world of finance. Or I could be really selfish and do a medical trial for a drug aimed at treating MS.
Why do you keep saying twenty something? Are you trying to pretend you're not a kick up the arse from thirty?
You might come across as a schoolkid but you've let slip how old you are more than once.
Reading books, going to gigs, drinking in the sun with mates and generally enjoying your summer is self absored and selfish?
Perhaps you could explain what great acts of selfless atruism I could be doing instead? Perhaps I could take a job in an insurance company or bank, not only would I be keeping someone else out of a job who might need it more than a single twenty something male with no dependents, but I'd also be giving back to that wonderful world of finance. Or I could be really selfish and do a medical trial for a drug aimed at treating MS.
Reading books, gigs etc. is not particularly selfish. But expecting others to fund that for you is. I can think of plenty of acts of selfless altruism that you could occupy yourself with. The fact that you seem unable to speaks volumes.
Are you being paid for that medical trial btw?
revol68
what, fucking what?
Of course I'll be paid for the medical trial, why woud avail of my body to a medical company for free?
You don't seem to have the grapsed the fact that if I took a job I'd also be fucking someone over that probably needs it more than me.
There is simply no way of living under capitalism whereby you aren't fucking someone over indirectly. I mean where does it end, do I refuse to buy cheap clothes because the workers who make them are paid shit wages? Should I feel guilty about living in a 1st world country because it was built on the enslavement and rape of colonies? If I took a job in the financial sector would I not be getting paid off the back of usury? if I went back to my old job for Allstate insurance would I not paid in someway out of the ripping off of thousands of homeowners in New Orleans who got shafted by Allstate when Katrina struck? Shoudl I not support the wage demands of council workers or tube saff because it will come out of the taxpayers pocket?
The simple facts is that we are all trying to get by and whilst the working class allows itself to led down cul de sacs of scapegoating the unemployed, aslyum seekers, foreign workers, people doing the double and the like it will never get anywhere.
The work ethic had to be beaten into the working class and it serves as a form of self policing to those proles who step out of line.
J
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