Left conversion

[SpookyFrank]

...and support for unutterably vile groups/regimes.

Lucky His Majesty's armed forces wouldn't be caught dead associating with any vile regimes eh?

Whose side are you lot on in the current Middle Eastern shitshow again?

 

[PTK]

Larry O once converted Clare Fox to the Left, so maybe it's safer to leave things well alone.

That sounds like libel, to me.

 

[tim]

That sounds like libel, to me.

They both claimed to be on the left in the distant past, so neither are in a position to set Carter Fuck upon me.

 

[PTK]

Going off on a tangent.
It seemed to me that some, or many, of the people recruited to the RCP in the 1980s were quite distant from any personal connection with the labour movement, and it is perhaps not suprising that they went to the right.

 

[PTK]

A defeat for imperialism in the "global south" is considered to be advantageous to the working class of the imperialist countries, for it is thought to weaken capitalism in those countries. This idea is the root of the cheerleading for certain right-wing forces that some engage in.

Is there such a thing as “the left”? How do we define it?

 

[Cloo]

Mainly it has to stop trying to be the right. It has to stop being apologetic and remind people, constantly, that if you poll people on it, time and again, almost everyone wants 'left-wing' policies like higher tax on the ultra rich and on business profits, nationalisation etc and the people who are telling you you don't want those things because they are 'socialist extremism' are telling you that because they represent the people who are benefiting from those not being the case

It needs to stop waffling on about being 'tough' about benefits and immigration, and stop playing along with the narrative that these are major problems for the nation and economy and start talking about being 'fair'; how we need immigration, especially with an ageing population, and how cuts that hit the most needy hardest simply end up being cruel and expensive because 'your taxes' end up paying more to deal with the costs of extreme deprivation and ill health.

 

[ska invita]

You're describing only one small, albeit vociferous, section of 'the left.'

Much of the radical left came to prioritise 'anti-imperiailsm' out of a distant (possibly subconscious in many cases) recognition that socialist revolution, and possibly any form of wide-ranging socialist reform, had slipped off the agenda, probably for good, in the capitalist heartlands. It often does involve tacit or even overt support for some dark forces, and the fact that if they succeed they are usually there to stay is brushed over or simply ignored ('the working class' will rise up against them eventually.) But it also arises from the fact that those dark forces are usually the only ones effectively resisting the havoc caused by western, and particularly US, interference all over the globe, especially when, nowadays, it is forgotten that it was liberal right (and soft left) regimes in the west that routinely supported and armed to the teeth 'fabulously corrupt, homophobic racist and anti-semitic dictatorships' in the name of anti-communism. That the liberals of right and left can now go around posing as the forces of liberation is particularly galling, particularly in those countries which were the targets of the despotism the west supported.

Neither the left nor the liberal right has really come to terms with the chaos of the post-Cold War world, both within their own societies and internationally, more than thirty years on even while this chaos was entirely predictable.

i wouldn't waste your breath, this is a poster who literally "eradicates" people in the name of the empire for a well-earning living...his thoughts on the topic should be taken with a pinch of fuck off

 

[PTK]

Mainly it has to stop trying to be the right. It has to stop being apologetic and remind people, constantly, that if you poll people on it, time and again, almost everyone wants 'left-wing' policies like higher tax on the ultra rich and on business profits, nationalisation etc and the people who are telling you you don't want those things because they are 'socialist extremism' are telling you that because they represent the people who are benefiting from those not being the case

It needs to stop waffling on about being 'tough' about benefits and immigration, and stop playing along with the narrative that these are major problems for the nation and economy and start talking about being 'fair'; how we need immigration, especially with an ageing population, and how cuts that hit the most needy hardest simply end up being cruel and expensive because 'your taxes' end up paying more to deal with the costs of extreme deprivation and ill health.

"It needs to stop waffling on about being 'tough' about benefits". Those who say this are not on "the left". They should not be members of the Labour Party.

 

[Rob Ray]

We could try a smaller DIY job, maybe just install insulation and whack some boards onto left stilts?

 

[planetgeli]

The left is rubbish. How do we make it better?

I'd like to be positive but can't. I first heard the phrase 'disillusioned socialist' when I was 17 and I was quite shocked, as I thought the revolution was around the corner. It's become a more meaningful, inevitable phrase the longer life has gone on.

Compared to a lot of other countries, our Left has always been on the rubbish side of rubbish. Revolutionary organizations even more so. Too much in-fighting, sectarianism and talk of theoretical Marxism done in a way that just doesn't appeal or resonate with the working class. The 'organised' Left has never known how to talk with the working class. It's always been an ongoing internal discussion on correct political lines. And fucking paper sales. So we have all that to overcome for starters.

On top of that, Thatcher won. A bloody big battle. Set in place the atomisation (I believe is the new word) of society and gained hegemonic control over individual vs community through policy. Which is a massive problem because the ideas of the Left rely on community and mass participation. The destruction in strike power was only one of the things that contributed to this. The lack of social housing, the concomitant rise in crime fuelled both by materialist attitudes ("I need those trainers/that phone etc") and unprecedented social drug problems - and lots more, all contributed to the destruction of the Left.

Tl;dr? We're losing. We have more chances of the contradictions of capitalism having a changing effect on people's politics than we do by any reliance on what we can do. We've been losing a long time.

Call me disillusioned.

 

[Silas Loom]

We could try a smaller DIY job, maybe just install insulation and whack some boards onto left stilts?

That’s not a conversion, though. It’s just a loft.

 

[Rob Ray]

For me the lefts problem is that it will tolerate/embrace pretty much any old shit as long as the speaker/writer parrots - regardless of the dishonesty or cognitive disconnect involved - a couple of 70/80's slogans amongst the imperialism, anti-Semitism, and support for unutterably vile groups/regimes.

That you can call for and support the eradication of a culture, language and polity of 40m people at the hands of a murderous, fabulously corrupt, homophobic, racist dictatorship - but if you also think the trains should be nationalised, the 'left' will can you Comrade.

Just, the fuck?

More seriously I think there's a line to be drawn here between "the left" – a broad concept of a section of the populace being huddled around a vaguely socialist-sounding ideal – and The Left, a small number of largely self-sabotaging cobweb organisations populated by a mess of often well-meaning but strategically and ideologically fractious types who make the same mistakes over and over again and seemingly ran out of ideas sometime in the latter part of the 20th century.

 

[Rob Ray]

That’s not a conversion, though. It’s just a loft.

I think you'll find it's a platform in a left.

 

[RD2003]

More seriously I think there's a line to be drawn here between "the left" – a broad concept of a section of the populace being huddled around a vaguely socialist-sounding ideal – and The Left, a small number of largely self-sabotaging cobweb organisations populated by a mess of often well-meaning but strategically and ideologically fractious types who make the same mistakes over and over again and seemingly ran out of ideas sometime in the latter part of the 20th century.

That may be true, but the effective demise of the cobweb organisations has still weakened the overall socialist/left political cause if only because few others are visibly presenting an halfway coherent case for it, however flawed. The writing was on the wall for them when the Soviet Union disappeared. It enabled critics of socialism or working class power, or whatever people want to call it, who after all have control of the mass media, to highlight the SU's failure as the inevitable fate of all left radical projects. Meanwhile, as somebody says above, society continues to fragment, including the working class. We have a whole generation and another one growing up who have little concept of working class unity or solidarity, and no way of reaching them. With what's likely coming over the next few decades it's going to be a rough ride politically. The EU countries and beyond already tell us which political forces are currently best eqipped to capitalise on it.

 

[newme]

Mainly it has to stop trying to be the right. It has to stop being apologetic and remind people, constantly, that if you poll people on it, time and again, almost everyone wants 'left-wing' policies like higher tax on the ultra rich and on business profits, nationalisation etc and the people who are telling you you don't want those things because they are 'socialist extremism' are telling you that because they represent the people who are benefiting from those not being the case

It needs to stop waffling on about being 'tough' about benefits and immigration, and stop playing along with the narrative that these are major problems for the nation and economy and start talking about being 'fair'; how we need immigration, especially with an ageing population, and how cuts that hit the most needy hardest simply end up being cruel and expensive because 'your taxes' end up paying more to deal with the costs of extreme deprivation and ill health.

I'd like a politician to say things more like this, I could actually feel I was backing them not just voting against someone worse.

 

[PTK]

I'd like to be positive but can't. I first heard the phrase 'disillusioned socialist' when I was 17 and I was quite shocked, as I thought the revolution was around the corner. It's become a more meaningful, inevitable phrase the longer life has gone on.

Compared to a lot of other countries, our Left has always been on the rubbish side of rubbish. Revolutionary organizations even more so. Too much in-fighting, sectarianism and talk of theoretical Marxism done in a way that just doesn't appeal or resonate with the working class. The 'organised' Left has never known how to talk with the working class. It's always been an ongoing internal discussion on correct political lines. And fucking paper sales. So we have all that to overcome for starters.

On top of that, Thatcher won. A bloody big battle. Set in place the atomisation (I believe is the new word) of society and gained hegemonic control over individual vs community through policy. Which is a massive problem because the ideas of the Left rely on community and mass participation. The destruction in strike power was only one of the things that contributed to this. The lack of social housing, the concomitant rise in crime fuelled both by materialist attitudes ("I need those trainers/that phone etc") and unprecedented social drug problems - and lots more, all contributed to the destruction of the Left.

Tl;dr? We're losing. We have more chances of the contradictions of capitalism having a changing effect on people's politics than we do by any reliance on what we can do. We've been losing a long time.

Call me disillusioned.

I agree with most of what you say but “It's always been an ongoing internal discussion on correct political lines” is not what I have experienced.

Back in the 1990s someone was saying to me that one of the things that had changed was not only was there that there was much less industry in this country (production having been moved to China and other places) but that the factories that remained were much smaller. It was in the huge workplaces like Longbridge and Dagenham that class consciousness had been strong.

A problem that I noted with the “left” (by which I do not mean social democrats) was not that it had did not have answers to this problem, it did not even recognise that there was a problem. I have never noticed the SWP addressing this problem in their meetings, in fact they have always been rather anti-intellectual (despite the fact that a high proportion of them attended, or had attended, university, and that a fair number were teachers). I did not notice Militant/the Socialist Party addressing such issues.

 

[PTK]

That may be true, but the effective demise of the cobweb organisations has still weakened the overall socialist/left political cause if only because few others are visibly presenting an halfway coherent case for it, however flawed. The writing was on the wall for them when the Soviet Union disappeared. It enabled critics of socialism or working class power, or whatever people want to call it, who after all have control of the mass media, to highlight the SU's failure as the inevitable fate of all left radical projects. Meanwhile, as somebody says above, society continues to fragment, including the working class. We have a whole generation and another one growing up who have little concept of working class unity or solidarity, and no way of reaching them. With what's likely coming over the next few decades it's going to be a rough ride politically. The EU countries and beyond already tell us which political forces are currently best eqipped to capitalise on it.

Yes, I agree with what you say.
There were people in the SWP who saw the decline of the Communist Party in Britian as a positive thing, but the CP was not replaced with something better, it was replaced with nothing. Once upon a time, ordinary working class people could get some political education from the CP. I knew of one person who worked in a gas works, who at lunchtime sold political pamphlets - at work.

 

[Rob Ray]

One thing I always thought Ian Bone got dead on - no-one respects powerless whinging. Everybody knows working people are being screwed over, all going on about The Victims and "demanding" things does, in the absence of leverage to impose consequences, is highlight is your own weakness. People don't ignore the left because it's wrong or making bad arguments, they ignore it because it's ineffective. Corbynism is an example of what happens when people think there's an actual chance of something happening - mass, immediate uptake.

It's about effectiveness. Ideological position is basically irrelevant.

 

[Smokeandsteam]

That may be true, but the effective demise of the cobweb organisations has still weakened the overall socialist/left political cause

Has it? Put another way, would we think matters were in a better place if the SP/SWP had 20,000 members and the more niche trot outfits were more visible and pursuing ‘victory to the intifada’ ‘save the NHS’ front campaigns, staging more A to B marches and calling for ‘critical’ votes for Labour?

if only because few others are visibly presenting an halfway coherent case for it, however flawed.

Is the demise of ‘ Dictatorship of the Proletariat’ the demise of ‘a halfway coherent case’ or a millstone? Is the slow death of it as a form of praxis a necessary prerequisite for something better to emerge? Similarly, is the death of labourism (no matter how flawed etc) such a bad thing?

Meanwhile, as somebody says above, society continues to fragment, including the working class. We have a whole generation and another one growing up who have little concept of working class unity or solidarity, and no way of reaching them. With what's likely coming over the next few decades it's going to be a rough ride

Yes. And any organisation or set of ideas that doesn’t take as its starting point the working class as it finds it and in its actually existing form is doomed to failure

 

[RD2003]

Yes, I agree with what you say.
There were people in the SWP who saw the decline of the Communist Party in Britian as a positive thing, but the CP was not replaced with something better, it was replaced with nothing. Once upon a time, ordinary working class people could get some political education from the CP. I knew of one person who worked in a gas works, who at lunchtime sold political pamphlets - at work.

I knew a number of CP shop stewards in the decade in which I worked in factories. They had the advantage of being working class people themselves, who were generally good at their actual jobs, and thus listened to by even those who disagreed politically. This culture has disappeared.

 

[PTK]

One thing I always thought Ian Bone got dead on - no-one respects powerless whinging. Everybody knows working people are being screwed over, all going on about The Victims and "demanding" things does, in the absence of leverage to impose consequences, is highlight is your own weakness. People don't ignore the left because it's wrong or making bad arguments, they ignore it because it's ineffective. Corbynism is an example of what happens when people think there's an actual chance of something happening - mass, immediate uptake.

It's about effectiveness. Ideological position is basically irrelevant.

It reminds me of that sketch from "Beyond the Fringe" where two old upper class men are discussing the Second World War. One says that he was against the whole thing from the start, and the other says that he was too, to which the first man replies "I wrote a letter to The Times".

 

[RD2003]

Has it? Put another way, would we think matters were in a better place if the SP/SWP had 20,000 members and the more niche trot outfits were more visible and pursuing ‘victory to the intifada’ ‘save the NHS’ front campaigns, staging more A to B marches and calling for ‘critical’ votes for Labour?




Is the demise of ‘ Dictatorship of the Proletariat’ the demise of ‘a halfway coherent case’ or a millstone? Is the slow death of it as a form of praxis a necessary prerequisite for something better to emerge? Similarly, is the death of labourism (no matter how flawed etc) such a bad thing?



Yes. And any organisation or set of ideas that doesn’t take as its starting point the working class as it finds it and in its actually existing form is doomed to failure

I didn't mean that they were necessarily a positive influence, although they could be at times. The point was, as PTK says regarding the CP, they've been replaced by nothing. Which isn't to denigrate those who still have a go, but they're invisble to the vast majority.

The idea of the DOTP was both a coherent thing and a millstone. Most people in western consumer societies wouldn't have wanted it, but it could inspire activists who at times could do otherwise useful work. Labourism was a negative overall, but it did get people involved on a day-to-day scale we no longer see.

I agree entirely with your last point.

 

[Smokeandsteam]

I knew a number of CP shop stewards in the decade in which I worked in factories. They had the advantage of being working class people themselves, who were generally good at their actual jobs, and thus listened to by even those who disagreed politically. This culture has disappeared.

We’ve had this conversation before and we agree on this. But the stewards you are talking about here were a feature of a particular type of workplace, in particular places and at a particular time. Any approach that presumes that the culture you describe can be restored is problematic. The culture still exists but highly residually. The structures and organisations (collective institutions particularly) that the culture emerged from and reflected have been smashed up.

 

[Rob Ray]

Deindustrialisation, legislation, virtualisation and workplace fragmentation have all had a deep impact on the ability to create the sorts of coherent workplace cultures that produced those legendary communist shop stewards – and they were produced by their circumstances. I remember an old Tory I used to work with when I was on my first news desk in the regional press, he was considerably more up for doing things like smashing equipment to win an argument with the bosses than the younger generation coming up, even though most of them considered themselves "left" (or at least liberal). The culture of "make them negotiate" crashed and with it the next generation of socialist troublemakers.

 

[Cloo]

"It needs to stop waffling on about being 'tough' about benefits". Those who say this are not on "the left". They should not be members of the Labour Party.

The trouble is I have heard Labour saying this because they're trying to appease Mail readers who will never vote for them anyway - I think it would have much more integrity to refuse to play along with, and to refute the Tory narrative rather than reinforcing it. After all, in 14 years of Tory government, slashing benefits and being shittier to immigrants has clearly not improved the country in any way.

 

[PTK]

The trouble is I have heard Labour saying this because they're trying to appease Mail readers who will never vote for them anyway - I think it would have much more integrity to refuse to play along with, and to refute the Tory narrative rather than reinforcing it. After all, in 14 years of Tory government, slashing benefits and being shittier to immigrants has clearly not improved the country in any way.

The primary aim of every Labour Party member should be to make the world a better place, rather than to get Labour Party members elected to public office.

 

[RD2003]

We’ve had this conversation before and we agree on this. But the stewards you are talking about here were a feature of a particular type of workplace, in particular places and at a particular time. Any approach that presumes that the culture you describe can be restored is problematic. The culture still exists but highly residually. The structures and organisations (collective institutions particularly) that the culture emerged from and reflected have been smashed up.

I know-and again replaced by nothing.

 

[T & P]

The left is rubbish. How do we make it better?

Phew! When I saw your thread title I feared you were going to tell us someone in America had started a left wing conversation therapy course for youngsters, similar to the gay conversion ones. Which frankly wouldn’t have surprised me in the world we live in.

 

[Sasaferrato]

For me the lefts problem is that it will tolerate/embrace pretty much any old shit as long as the speaker/writer parrots - regardless of the dishonesty or cognitive disconnect involved - a couple of 70/80's slogans amongst the imperialism, anti-Semitism, and support for unutterably vile groups/regimes.

That you can call for and support the eradication of a culture, language and polity of 40m people at the hands of a murderous, fabulously corrupt, homophobic, racist dictatorship - but if you also think the trains should be nationalised, the 'left' will can you Comrade.

Just, the fuck?

Well put.

The thing that amuses me most about the hard left* is firstly the assertion that the whole world is in agreement with them, and secondly their refusal to engage with any electoral process, because six votes is embarrassing.

*As opposed to the nominal left, a la Starmer.

There are still hard left left in the PLP, but to quote Eric Bogle 'Someday no one will march there at all'.

Blair I suppose was the start of the end of what I regarded as 'the left', who would have imagined the left of old introducing tuition charges?

I've always been right of centre, but with some left beliefs, such as social housing and a decent welfare state. It struck me the other day that I'm probably left of Starmer.

 

[Elpenor]

Anyone else reading this thread and feeling grateful that Dwyer is on an enforced break?