During the biggest crisis of capitalism of our generation, why is the UK anarcho-left not growing?

[LLETSA]

Talking about more or better organisation in workplaces or 'communities' is all very well, but assemblies, committees and meetings will only form a radical movement if the people who compose those organisations share some radical programme.

This is the crux of the matter and suggests that, as I've maintained for a while now, the future looks like consisting of a dominate capital, increasingly remote from any control by anybody other than those who own it, and a fractured, piecemeal opposition capable only of occasional and limited victories.

The further we get from the era of socialist revolution, the more it becomes clear that socialism (or whatever people want to call it), was not an alternative to capitalism but a product of it, capable only of altering but not replacing it.

 

[LLETSA]

Who knows

Me.

 

[LLETSA]

as for people having a pop at a black bloc, i haven't heard anyone outside the media say anything negative about a few shit shops getting the whacking they so richly deserved.

Neither have I, but that's because the Black Bloc never come up in any conversation I'm ever likely to have these days. Nor, for that matter, do events like the forthcoming TUC march.

I suspect how much time people have for the likes of the Black Bloc will be reflected in the next election when one or the other of the mainstream parties is elected, the radical left nowhere, and apathy and confusion guiding the decisions of the many who will not vote.

 

[Pickman's model]

It's good to see miserabilism thriving

 

[DotCommunist]

tbf this is the man who recently claimed shakespeare would have been averse to emoticons. The same bard who used the emergent from polyglot english to wield as much influence on our language as the king james bible by utilising a new form in the most inventive ways he could.

So I'll take eeyore with a pinch of salt for now. There is hope. Scant as it may be.

 

[LLETSA]

It's good to see miserabilism thriving

So all the overwhelming majority who never have a conversation about the Black Bloc are 'miserabilists'?

And to entertain the illusion that anybody's going to be in government other than one of the big two parties in the foreseeable future makes you not a miserabilist?

 

[LLETSA]

tbf this is the man who recently claimed shakespeare would have been averse to emoticons. The same bard who used the emergent from polyglot english to wield as much influence on our language as the king james bible by utilising a new form in the most inventive ways he could.

So I'll take eeyore with a pinch of salt for now. There is hope. Scant as it may be.

It doesn't matter how you take me, it's what will happen.

Things are not the way they are because of me saying stuff on here, you know?

 

[LLETSA]

tbf this is the man who recently claimed shakespeare would have been averse to emoticons.

This spreading interest in Shakespeare and emoticons is decidely strange.

 

[DotCommunist]

yeah, cheers. Hadn't realised.

 

[Das Uberdog]

whilst people are getting shat on there'll always be new generations of fresh, angry youngsters to attempt to prove you wrong LLETSA

 

[LLETSA]

whilst people are getting shat on there'll always be new generations of fresh, angry youngsters to attempt to prove you wrong LLETSA

I'm not saying there won't be. But they'll have no alternative other than to be part of that incoherent, fragmented, piecemeal opposition to capitalism I referred to.

Anyway, I'm off out.

 

[JHE]

whilst people are getting shat on there'll always be new generations of fresh, angry youngsters to attempt to prove you wrong LLETSA

There's no shortage of angry youngsters, but hardly any are trying to prove Lletsa wrong. They are far too busy with more lucrative and/or more destructive and/or self-destructive activities. There's no revolutionary youth movement, unless you count this or that sect's latest little batch of recruits from 'freshers' fair'.

 

[Random]

tbf this is the man who recently claimed shakespeare would have been averse to emoticons. The same bard who used the emergent from polyglot english to wield as much influence on our language as the king james bible by utilising a new form in the most inventive ways he could.

So I'll take eeyore with a pinch of salt for now. There is hope. Scant as it may be.

I wondered why Divisive Cotton had written such a mad reply, then I looked again. Btw all the evidence points to LLETSA being right, in many places, like the UK, at least.

 

[DotCommunist]

'scant' its always been thus in the UK. Things change though. Impossible till inevitable etc

 

[Spanky Longhorn]

'scant' its always been thus in the UK. Things change though. Impossible till inevitable etc

It always comes back to optimism of the will

 

[Random]

'scant' its always been thus in the UK. Things change though. Impossible till inevitable etc

Lefties saying this makes me agree with LLETSA that you're running on a near-pure fuel of faith. Things change all the time, but not through people just waiting and hoping.

 

[DotCommunist]

no one has argued that inaction effects change while keeping the flame in your heart. Wether what is currently done works, ah, well theres a different question. 34 and counting dead saffa miners lying on the ground isn't encouraging- but we have had victories in the past, we do have victories today. The world changes though, nothing is constant.

 

[Spanky Longhorn]

no one has argued that inaction effects change while keeping the flame in your heart. Wether what is currently done works, ah, well theres a different question. 34 and counting dead saffa miners lying on the ground isn't encouraging- but we have had victories in the past, we do have victories today. The world changes though, nothing is constant.

you've convinced me.

 

[DotCommunist]

I'm not not an evangelist, I'm just right.

 

[Spanky Longhorn]

I'm not not an evangelist, I'm just right.

What are you right about?

 

[TremulousTetra]

Hmm... Not sure about that. Quite an interesting piece on ressentiment and Anarchism by Saul Newman; http://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/saul-newman-anarchism-and-the-politics-of-ressentiment.pdf

Some slightly simplistic interpretations throughout (think it's intended for undergrads), but interesting.

Thanks, I liked that. MUCH food for thought.,

 

[Fruitloop]

Me.

So what's going to happen? What does the future hold?

 

[Bernie Gunther]

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

 

[Pingu]

So what's going to happen? What does the future hold?

personal jetpacks and space travel for all

 

[Fruitloop]

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

Well quite.

 

[LLETSA]

So what's going to happen? What does the future hold?

I've already said what I think the future holds. It's a worldwide capitalism that eludes anybody's control, and a fragmented opposition that will win victories here and there but will be able to offer no alternative to capitalism, or at least no alternative that people will embrace en masse, not least because capitalism controls the mass media-the main guide to everybody's actions now, even those who vehemently deny it. And, of course, mass consumer capitalism will eventually destroy itself. We can already see the indicators of this. But it will probably destroy the conditions for 'socialism' along with it, if not all or most human life itself (one reason 'socialism' failed to replace capitalism because it was too much like capitalism, accepting all its major premisses, and those of liberalism-capitalism's main cultural driving force. Why make the sacrifice involved in overthrowing capitalism only to be landed with a system and way of life that's little different?)

This, however, is only the opinion of a poster on a messageboard. I might be wrong.

 

[LLETSA]

no one has argued that inaction effects change while keeping the flame in your heart. Wether what is currently done works, ah, well theres a different question. 34 and counting dead saffa miners lying on the ground isn't encouraging- but we have had victories in the past, we do have victories today. The world changes though, nothing is constant.

Victories for the working class do not necessarily point towards the overthrow of capitalism. Nobody is going to make it all up as they go along. There's either a clear alternative or no alternative.

It's the way it is, suckers.

 

[Delroy Booth]

LLETSA has anyone ever told you how tiresome all this pish is?

 

[LLETSA]

LLETSA has anyone ever told you how tiresome all this pish is?

Yes, many times. Do you think I should care?

As I said, anybody is free to say why I'm wrong. Usually people on here try.

 

[Delroy Booth]

Yeah but we're also free to do a million and one other things, doesn't mean they're worth doing. You are wrong on a few points, but I really don't wanna get into a protracted boring unproductive discussion with you about it. Whatever I say you'll dismiss out of hand anyway, coz you get some sort of buzz being the harbinger of doom, so I can't see much point in bothering.

Just this sort of relentless pessimism is so cliché it's like your trying to be a parody of a bitter as fuck failed lefty, who mistakes being honest and forthright with being as negative as possible.