Griffin and BNP strategy

[durruti02]

bnp votes .. no one else seems to be putting them up .. uaf hnh lmhr serchlight from their side ( too many ) and bnp from their side ( not enough!!)

please those with mathamatical brain help out!

my off the cuff calculation sees them up overall but down in yorks and black country and obviously up in london ... the most comparable year overall is 2004 .. 2007 was the big year for local council elections so if they are over 290k they DID do well

Jim you on this

 

[Paul Marsh]

Do you think about what I write at all?

Having read your most recent piece on anti-fascism, I think it is more appropriate to ask do you think about what you write at all?

 

[treelover]

Aye, if i was one of his students I would ask for a rebate!

 

[The Black Hand]

Having read your most recent piece on anti-fascism, I think it is more appropriate to ask do you think about what you write at all?

I'll go and have a look at it if you mean the BNP and local elections piece, I suppose I should edit it

 

[The Black Hand]

Having read your most recent piece on anti-fascism, I think it is more appropriate to ask do you think about what you write at all?

I've read it again (it doesn't need editing) and I think it was worth putting into the public arena, it says things that are new and interesting, and it is building a position. It encourages people to carry on their autonomous practice and to build a better movement beyond group and ideological boundaries.


I read your article in Black Flag and got bored with it ever so early, it's just a repeat of stuff already in public.

Rather than cut new ground it repeated a lot of stale cliche and its proposals were the usual 'utopian hard working going nowhere' guff.

Anarchists remaining on their own will, with no relation beyond their purist fetishished groups as normal, get the multitude nowhere. You stay in your ghetto Paul, the new world will be built out of something bigger than that though.

 

[The Black Hand]

Aye, if i was one of his students I would ask for a rebate!

you have never read any of my published work!

 

[The Black Hand]

I have said that 'the BNP are doing ok for a petite bourgois party', (what has Duncan said which is the opposite of this?) that is a middle of the road assesment.

Do you think about what I write at all? You as usual, prefer to take an idealised position and project it as my real position. You, and t'others, look at things simplistically because you like nice neat and tidy positions, so you only have a simple binary 'bad v. good', 'doing well V. doing poorly'. This is not real world at all.

On the web here my posts are often opposite to the 'BNP are doing well Brigade' because, and this is an autonomist political reading of fascism - if you look at the totality they are not doing as well as 'you' would lead us to believe.

Have you any reply Paul?

 

[Paul Marsh]

you have never read any of my published work!

Allow me to correct that, by reproducing the following gibberish about the BNP from the much advertised issue 2 of Mayday magazine:

they have no meaningful political life in public, unlike their predecessor, the NF

The success of the BNP website is sadly a matter of public record, whilst this month alone they trounced the left in the British capital. They have more Councillors than any fascist party in British history, and comfortably more than the rapidly dying left.

the Front still look to have a bigger organisation, a different class composition too

No evidence is offered that the BNP has a different class composition than the NF, we are simply expected to take Attica's word for it. Indeed, this looks very similar to the SWP's desperate attempts to argue the BNP's electoral base is middle class.

in terms of candidates the BNP are performing averagely for a 'new' party, but even there they can be stupid, barely capable of putting their mark on the form.

I have no idea what this means, but the BNP has been in existence for some 25 years.

Rather than take quotes out of context, all of the above are taken from the first column of an article that is a bizarre mixture of pompous verbiage, pseudo-academic English and an astonishing lack of knowledge about both fascism and anti-fascism.

Put simply, Attica has read one article by Nick Griffin on the BNP website. He is arrogant enough to believe he is an expert on the far-right solely on that basis. I doubt he has ever seen a copy of Identity, Voice of Freedom or any internal BNP documents.
The second motivation for writing the article appears to be the fact that Attica dislikes the IWCA, and wants everyone to know it - so up to speed is he in this field that he repeatedly talks about Red Action as an actually existing political group. Still, at least his ignorance is consistent - he knows as little about the left as he does about the right!

Whilst the article is tempered by Mayday's disclaimer

"The article below is a personal perspective and does not reflect a collective or agreed position within Mayday magazine

if this is the sort of car crash Mayday wishes to inflict on the rest of the left in their magazine, it is obviously part of the problem, not part of the solution.

In this case at least, the cry of Mayday really is one of distress............

 

[The Black Hand]

A) Allow me to correct that, by reproducing the following gibberish about the BNP from the much advertised issue 2 of Mayday magazine:

B) The success of the BNP website is sadly a matter of public record, whilst this month alone they trounced the left in the British capital. They have more Councillors than any fascist party in British history, and comfortably more than the rapidly dying left.



C) No evidence is offered that the BNP has a different class composition than the NF, we are simply expected to take Attica's word for it. Indeed, this looks very similar to the SWP's desperate attempts to argue the BNP's electoral base is middle class.



D)I have no idea what this means, but the BNP has been in existence for some 25 years.

Rather than take quotes out of context, all of the above are taken from the first column of an article that is a bizarre mixture of pompous verbiage, pseudo-academic English and an astonishing lack of knowledge about both fascism and anti-fascism.

E)Put simply, Attica has read one article by Nick Griffin on the BNP website. He is arrogant enough to believe he is an expert on the far-right solely on that basis. I doubt he has ever seen a copy of Identity, Voice of Freedom or any internal BNP documents.
F) The second motivation for writing the article appears to be the fact that Attica dislikes the IWCA, and wants everyone to know it - so up to speed is he in this field that he repeatedly talks about Red Action as an actually existing political group. Still, at least his ignorance is consistent - he knows as little about the left as he does about the right!

G) Whilst the article is tempered by Mayday's disclaimer if this is the sort of car crash Mayday wishes to inflict on the rest of the left in their magazine, it is obviously part of the problem, not part of the solution.

In this case at least, the cry of Mayday really is one of distress............

A)
Your comprehension is totally awful Paul, and you displayed it in your first statement. That quote was aimed at TREELOVER - not U - dimwit. The evidence is clear for all to see. MISTAKE ALERT MISTAKE ALERT!! ho ho hoho.

TO the rest of your diatribe;

B) The 'no meaningful life in public' was referring to their late of presence on a routine basis in the wards in which they stand. It was saying that standing in elections is not enough.
C) I agree, no evidence was offerred - either way - you never supplied any either.

D) 'New' in this case was talking about their contending in democracy and winning or not seats. In terms of history of political parties (Labour, Tory), they are the new kid on the block. That surely is not too much for you to understand?

E) Being wrong has never stopped you before Paul. AS usual you are the one who is full of "pompous verbiage, pseudo-academic English and an astonishing lack of knowledge about both fascism and anti-fascism." As it goes I have read a lot of BNP material, lots from their official website and from the others, I have read their stuff for years from the IRR library so YOU ARE FULL OF BLUSTERING SHITE AGAIN.

F) Yawn - pathetic desperation Paul, as usual you have nothing to say politically. You should have tried a politics/history/economics/Marxism Msc rather than the pathetic one you did which is of no relevance politically. I do not give a toss whether RA have folded or not, everybody knows who they are.

G) Gibberish.

 

[audiotech]

Which golf club did they crawl out of?

BNP members returned to Buchanan Street at the weekend. Ostensibly there to sell papers, their choice of location suggests they're more interested in provoking confrontation with the non-fascist groups whose regular pitch it is. They left in the back of a police van.
http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2008/05/399131.html?c=on#c195828

 

[Joe Reilly]

I find it hugely ironic that the people and parties and who insist the BNP 'are constantly looking for confrontation', even though that policy was abandoned by the mid 1990's, are the self-same people and parties who when the BNP were 'constantly looking for confrontation', sought refuge behind police lines and condemned those who did step up to the plate as 'worse than the fascists'. Talk about fucked up.

 

[audiotech]

I find it hugely ironic that the people and parties and who insist the BNP 'are constantly looking for confrontation', even though that policy was abandoned by the mid 1990's, are the self-same people and parties who when the BNP were 'constantly looking for confrontation', sought refuge behind police lines and condemned those who did step up to the plate as 'worse than the fascists'. Talk about fucked up.

Politics is more than hero worship Joseph.

The people I knew never 'sought refuge behind police lines', but do I alway's bang on about it? No.

 

[Joe Reilly]

Politics is more than hero worship Joseph.

The people I knew never 'sought refuge behind police lines', but do I alway's bang on about it? No.

Why is it that whenever there is a criticism of the SWP/ANL/UAF on such matters you try and deflect it - not by denying it as the proof is easily attainable - but by personalising it -' I' was big supporter of the republican movement'... my miners support group worked wonders...the poll tax group I was in...'the people I knew never hid behind police lines'...and so on.

If all the above is true and who can say, it makes it easy to see why you chucked it in, but what is less clear is why having done so, you still defend 'the party', and in doing so display the standard body language of the type of common and garden hack known and hated throughout the world.

 

[audiotech]

Why is it that whenever there is a criticism of the SWP/ANL/UAF on such matters you try and deflect it - not by denying it as the proof is easily attainable - but by personalising it -' I' was big supporter of the republican movement'... my miners support group worked wonders...the poll tax group I was in...'the people I knew never hid behind police lines'...and so on.

If all the above is true and who can say, it makes it easy to see why you chucked it in, but what is less clear is why having done so, you still defend 'the party', and in doing so display the standard body language of the type of common and garden hack known and hated throughout the world.

It is all true. I have lots of experience to pass on and correct any historical inaccuracies that I may come across.

Chucked it in? Ha! I'm working class - the struggle never ends. It takes different paths at different times, depending on circumstances.

Body language? What on a discussion board? Don't make me laugh. Oh, hang on you just have.

 

[Joe Reilly]

It is all true. I have lots of experience to pass on and correct any historical inaccuracies that I may come across.

Chucked it in? Ha! I'm working class - the struggle never ends. It takes different paths at different times, depending on circumstances.

Body language? What on a discussion board? Don't make me laugh. Oh, hang on you just have.

I was wondering what it was or or who it was the smug pretentious
tone of our reply reminded me of? Then it came to me - Attica! (Including the use of icon)

For all your previous big talk; being working class and so forth its evident your just another lefty wanker utterly unable to answer a straight question.

I

 

[The Black Hand]

I was wondering what it was or or who it was the smug pretentious
tone of our reply reminded me of? Then it came to me - Attica! (Including the use of icon)

For all your previous big talk; being working class and so forth its evident your just another lefty wanker utterly unable to answer a straight question.

I

Mirror mirror on the wall.....

 

[The Black Hand]

The doing well BNP doing poorly with fools as members and activists in Scotland;

BNP members were taken away in a police van

Around 11:30 on Saturday afternoon, before the full array of groups had set up stalls outside Borders, 4 BNP members marched to the centre of the street, displaying newspapers and looking smug. Two minutes after they arrived, a police car parked 50 yards down the road, strongly suggesting that the BNP had called them in the expectation that they were going to provoke trouble.

On being outnumbered and surrounded by people objecting, strongly but without violence, to the hatred for sale, the racists showed their true colours. Charlie Baillie, Glasgow organiser first attempted to claim that they are not a Nazi party (but hey, just happy to promote Holocaust-deniers, eh?), then lost his temper and threatened to kill someone. (That seems to confirm rumours we've heard that under the cheap suit he's a mindless thug.)

Other BNP members present were their Highlands & Islands organiser John Robertson and their MidScotland & Fife organiser, John MacGuire (07913 219640). Seems odd that a group claiming to be concerned about local issues would need to bus in people from outside Glasgow for a simple paper sale.

Police officers moved them on after they issued death threats. While they claimed to be going to the top of Buchanan St, they went less than 100 yards and carried on. This was obviously unacceptable and this time they were surrounded by an even larger group of people objecting to their presence, this time including shoppers, passers-by and an evangelical preacher. Two vans of police turned up this time, and officers formed a cordon to protect the strong and fearless fascists with hands strangely shaking. Finally they were put into the back of a police van and taken away.

While this was a pleasing sight, they hadn't been arrested for wasting police time. Throughout the afternoon they had been observed on friendly terms with the police (shades of Richard Barnbrook on the Police Federation march?) and their choice of location strongly suggests that this was what their plan was from the start. The party who if in power would run the country as a totalitarian police state like to claim that they have as much right to be on the street as the groups they'd send to death camps. The police evidently agree. The challenge for groups maintaining the "no platform for fascists" policy (which the BNP is desperate to overturn) is this: how do they counter the BNP's attempts to make publicity out of the public humiliation? To stop them from selling their papers whilst denying their attempts at martyrdom requires some creative thinking.

 

[JimPage]

The following analysis disagrees with the BNP are doing well approach, and is evidence of combined and uneven development of class consciousness. Orthodox politico's can only bluster in the face of real world evidence which disagrees with their pov.

In most areas the BNP share of the vote was well down on last year, which in itself was down on the previous election, particularly in its traditional heartlands.

Local
authority Sandwell Dudley Kirklees Burnley Thurrock
2006 33.0% 26.5% 18.4% 30.0% 26.7%
2007 24.6% 18.7% 16.5% 25.1% 24.5%
2008 17.4% 14.7% 14.4% 22.8% 21.4%

Broxbourne
2006 N/A
2007 20.0%
2008 15.4%

Epping
2006 N/A
2007 18.5%
2008 15.0%

To answer you specifically, Sandwell, Dudley, Eppinga and Burnley, granted, their vote went down. The local BNP didnt campaign in a meaningful way for Kirkless - working instead to get Colin Auty elected as BNP Chairman

They got elected in Thurrock and fought full a slate in Broxbourne so dotn accept what you say there

Now, any thoughts on the London result, which certain antifascists dont seem to have yet accepted has happenned?

 

[JimPage]

A) . How is this increasing overall in a context where they got 808K in 2004 - they haven't surpassed this.

simply because this was an euro-election covering all of england, scotland and wales- and there has not been a similar election since- next one may 2009

 

[audiotech]

For all your previous big talk; being working class and so forth its evident your just another lefty wanker utterly unable to answer a straight question.

There was no question.

 

[The Black Hand]

simply because this was an euro-election covering all of england, scotland and wales- and there has not been a similar election since- next one may 2009

My point is that I know the votes came from all over - and the council votes are those same people.

To crow on that the BNP vote is going up all the time is not true imho cos we have already had the vote. Do you see what I mean?

If it is true, and the bnp vote is going up, how many votes are the BNP on course to get in 2009?

 

[The Black Hand]

To answer you specifically, Sandwell, Dudley, Eppinga and Burnley, granted, their vote went down. The local BNP didnt campaign in a meaningful way for Kirkless - working instead to get Colin Auty elected as BNP Chairman

They got elected in Thurrock and fought full a slate in Broxbourne so dotn accept what you say there

Now, any thoughts on the London result, which certain antifascists dont seem to have yet accepted has happenned?

I agree with you on Broxbourne - its up 2% from approx 13% to approx 15% - apologies for the fuck up.

Goes to check others....

 

[The Black Hand]

After a look at Thurrock I can confidently predict that the BNP vote has fallen from 2007, to the 21.3% of 2008 (the last figure I have revised downwards by .1%).

Proper stats to follow in a bit.

 

[audiotech]

Mirror, mirror on the wall....

 

[The Black Hand]

Why do you post pictures of yourself?

 

[The Black Hand]

They got elected in Thurrock... so dotn accept what you say there

Now, any thoughts on the London result, which certain antifascists dont seem to have yet accepted has happenned?

I have done the complete calculations for Thurrock now.

2007 BNP vote 25.40% of approx turnout of 30%. 7149 BNP votes cast out of 28143.

2008 - 21.3%

So that's down 4% even with a BNP councillor for the first time in this area.

If we look at the IWCA V. BNP head to head in Standford East (Thurrock) we get the following;

2007 IWCA 144 votes - BNP 505
2008 IWCA 98 votes - BNP 344

Both votes went down, the IWCA vote down by approx 33%, the BNP vote down approx 32%. What does this tell us?

As for London I do not have the time to number crunch these, but I hope to. If you note I have spread stats on this thread as a way to help others compute their own analysis.

 

[audiotech]

Both votes went down, the IWCA vote down by approx 33%, the BNP vote down approx 32%. What does this tell us?

That the 'new decent working class movement' has collapsed at the first hurdle?

 

[The Black Hand]

That the 'new decent working class movement' has collapsed at the first hurdle?

Well it shows they are regarded as not so different to the BNP by people... they 'are just another party'...

 

[The Black Hand]

Sunderland BNP Vote analysis.

2007 BNP 7653 total votes out of 72117 = vote share of 10.6134%

2008 BNP 7540 total votes out of 73799 = vote share of 10.2169%

Going down again, year on year. Though I must add - some wards show dramatic improvements and some reductions. It clearly is affected by the level of campaigning (or not) in each ward.

 

[The Black Hand]

Rochester South and Horsted ward - Medway, yesterday:

Conservative 1,847
The Green Party 104
Liberal Democrat 767
Labour 819
British National Party
257

The turnout was 41 per cent.

Total votes 3794 according to you. I am going to add 2 votes to the total cos I bet a couple were spoilt. So that's 3796.

Which gives a BNP vote of 6.77%. Even if were do not add those 2 votes I decided to, we get 6.77%. Either way - it's crap.