How should the non-party political left respond to the rise of the far right?

[Rimbaud]

hard to disagree with any of that but one massive problem the left has is that there is no organisation to rally to...no parliamentary party or extra-parliamentary group. The right-wing media propaganda all has direct influence on elections in the UK and the USA, whereas the left in UK and USA dont have anything to channel that to and it ends up as hot air without building up a head of steam. Existing left groups are all shunned by the left to different degrees

I think this combined with a lack of funds is really the root of the problem tbh. We don't need to overthink it.

 

[LDC]

Anyway, coming back to this argument...yeah, I'd been thinking of some stuff along similar lines, I think there's limits to how useful "subcultural" on its own is as an explainer. Woodstock or the RAR carnivals were subcultural, and I'm sure they had their problems and limitations, but they were also a lot more popular and wide-reaching than most of what we have to offer.
Also, dunno if you read that Robert Evans piece, but again I think it had some quite strong parallels with what you're saying: We failed to stop the rise of fascism. What comes next?

In particular, on the subculture discussion, I had also been thinking about how it is that the far-right's subcultures with their QAnons and cereal-naming Proud Boys and sigma grindsets and blackpilled groypers or whatever can be so bizarre that they make anything on the left look tame and sensible, and yet they seem to have found a way to harness the energy of deeply-weird-yet-very-energetic subcultures while also broadening their reach and growing their base. Of course, it's hard to make direct comparisons with the right, because the first and strongest lesson you can learn from looking at the contemporary MAGA movement is "it helps to have very rich and powerful men on your side", which isn't really applicable.
And, as we've discussed, there is an inherent asymmetery here, it seems like they've adapted well to the internet because alienated and isolated people forming one-sided parasocial relationships with Andrew Tate or Trump or Musk or Farage or Robinson or whoever seems to be a fairly strong basis for a certain kind of right-wing politics, but even if we did succeed in getting Corbyn to start a successful podcast with Mick Lynch or whoever I'm not sure that would be too much of a basis for a genuinely liberatory communal movement.
In 2016/17 I got the impression that the 4chan trolls really struggled at trying to turn all their memes and so on into a functional street movement that could stand up to a bit of pressure irl, I dunno how much that may or may not have changed this time round.

There's probably been some interesting stuff written/thought about re: subcultures and political power. In my head I think of leftie subcultures as hanging together more with music, dress, ways of living, etc. whereas those right wing sub-cultures share more overtly political positions above dress, etc. In some werid ways maybe right wing ones less individualist and moral? As 'progressive' forces have made cultural and social gains as well it's been easier for the right to position itself as rebelling as well, whereas much of what sub/counter-cultural left wanted in the last decades has slowly been adopted in many cases (I mean alongside class politics being largely destroyed).

Also think there's an important difference between subcultures and countercultures; with former being more commonly youth orientated and accommodating with the system (even if on some level they oppose it) and the later being more cross-generational, broader and actually able to wield some form of social power. Again though, in my head differences, not sure how much translates exactly to reality!

 

[Eric Jarvis]

Interesting discussion, there's a lot more I'd like to chip in on when I have the time, especially the bits about the comparison with the far-right and their subcultures because there's a lot to say about that, but that can wait for another time.

Just on that "assemblies community democracy movement online call" above, yeah I don't want to be too negative and tbh I'm exactly the kind of sucker who might well go to an event like that if it was happening at a social club ten minutes down the road from me, or a squat that I could get to easily on the bus, or a pub that I could get to with a bus ride and a short walk, and I thought I might bump into some people I know there, and especially if they offered a free meal.
But it being an online event means that it's not happening anywhere near me, and it's not happening near anyone else either, which might not be as much of an issue if they weren't talking about "community action groups that give local people power in their neighbourhoods" seemingly without really being based in actual neighbourhoods. I appreciate there's a need for groups to federate on a more-than-local level at some point, but running on to talk about electoral work when you've not managed to organise a meeting near my house seems like completely backwards deadend priorites.

The point is we can't create a face to face meeting for people involved in community actions from Thurso to Penzance without limiting attendance to people who have the ability to travel long distances pretty much on a whim. Aside from maybe one or two of the Assemble people (who I don't know that well), everybody involved in this has a background of local or trade union action on the ground. However with the core people being in London, Newcastle, Southport, Northampton, Bristol, Brighton and Leicester, it has to be done initially primarily online. The groups are out there, there's even cash out there to back them, but the communication between groups (and the people who have the money) isn't. Once upon a time a lot of local authorities could be relied upon to create local "forums" so that community groups in a locality would meet and exchange information frequently. That has fallen apart in a lot of places, not least because local authorities have taken on the role of deciding which community groups should or shouldn't be supported and make those decisions sometimes on a very partisan factional basis.

 

[LDC]

Yeah I do think the starting online is no bad thing if it's used to connect people in similar areas that might have never met otherwise. Starting in the middle as it were, niether hper local nor national, but some appropriate geographical area that's big enought to connect a few people in an area that's big enough to draw others in, yet small enough to be practical for meeting etc.

Don't Pay did this very well, people resgitered and then were put in touch and Whatsapp groups started. Our local one had 200 people on which we then broke down into smaller areas. We did find areas that were too small didn't quite work initially, people liked and wanted the bigger groups. There was also huge problems translating online activity into face-to-face activity, but that is standard problem for lots of things now, not just political projects and groups.

Enough is enough also had potential with that, pity they fucked it up totally.