London Anarchist Bookfair 2022
- Thread starter ska invita
- Start date
An American friend (who's been here for a long time), says you can tell a British person is really pissed off when they move from signing emails off with 'best regards' (for example) to just 'regards'.
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
Rob Ray
Weight is meaningless
As personal lexicon: All the best is fine, best regards is "I'm irritated with you but I suppose I should be cordial" and regards as above. If it's just the text followed by your own name then it can be either absolutely fine (I don't need to all the best or best regards you, you're a mate) or absolutely not (you don't get a regards you bastard), depending on context.
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
i normally put 'best wishes' but today i thought i'd strike out in a new direction
As I work in a very international environment, my colleagues don't even have the grace to notice/understand my pissed off 'regards' thing.
hitmouse
so defeated, thinks it's funny
That's an impressively mixed metaphor, unless I missed something and the SWP actually did occupy Afghanistan for a while?
I may have mentioned elsewhere how I used to have a really toxic passive-agg coworker who always signed off with "Kind Regards", which did my head in at the time but I have now adopted for whenever I'm cunting someone off via email. [resists temptation to go into inappropriate levels of detail about difficult email conversations I'm having at the moment and the challenge of finding appropriate sign-offs.]
chilango
Hypothetical Wanker
Not a huge fan of the direction Lisa has taken in recent times, but so what? That book appears to be a valid collective project that seems eminently suitable to have a stall at an anarchist book fair.
If an anarchist can't sell their book at an anarchist book fair then it does raise the question of what's the fucking point of holding in the first place?
If an anarchist can't sell their book at an anarchist book fair then it does raise the question of what's the fucking point of holding in the first place?
The39thStep
Urban critical thinker
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
they are bookfair reasons
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
no, but they did a papersale at kabul airport
The39thStep
Urban critical thinker
There was a smart , if smarmy senior policy officer, on the Council who would always sign off his emails /whats apps with 'Thanks Steve' which I found so irritating I started to use it myself.
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
oh yes, i've seen that - might join you in using
The39thStep
Urban critical thinker
Have these been handed down from bookfair to bookfair or do they change from bookfair to bookfair? It's at times like this one almost feel some nostalgia for the days of The Black Hand and his bookstalls. Thanks Steve.
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
These are new rules known only to the mysterious organisers
There was to be a boycott following the Helen Steele debacle so the organisers threw the towel in and now some new folk took it on armed with a guest list.
LDC
On est tous des pangolins
I said earlier; they might be fully booked already. Or have very limited space (no idea how big the venue is) and they'd rather reserve that for groups and campaigns rather than stalls selling single books that could be bought elsewhere. Or maybe the book is really dodgy politically.
No idea, but those would be pretty fair reasons to me. But whatever the reason, the easy answer is they should just give it to Lisa, then nobody has to speculate, people can answer it if it's inaccurate, apologise if it's something they did they now think is shit/regret, etc etc.
IMO it's just decent, normal and politically sound behaviour to explain to people why you turn down a stall like this.
The39thStep
Urban critical thinker
Wasnt Ska Invita going to go down last year to have a word with them ?
The39thStep
Urban critical thinker
LDC
On est tous des pangolins
TBH having a look at the Kickstarter they set up, and seeing this collective seems to comprise of 7 people, 3 of which are doctors (I assume academic ones) I'm a bit meh about the whole thing being much of an anarchist project at all tbh. But who knows, it's another mystery in the Bookfair world...
A380
How do I change this 'custom title' thing then?
TBF it’s closer to Henley on Thames than Helmand Province these days…
A380
How do I change this 'custom title' thing then?
To provide vicarious entertainment for the denizens of Urban obvs…
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steeplejack
trapped lbw for a duck
steeplejack
trapped lbw for a duck
Yes indeed. I was more aiming for a description of this place being a graveyard for patiently explaining Trots (RIP cliffite, Rebel Warrior & co.) and hi-vis jacketed coy bootsale organisers. Clearly my shot wasn't accurate enough
LDC
On est tous des pangolins
No, of course they're definitely not at all mutually exclusive. It's more the project tone, of which that is a part, maybe not a very important one for sure. But nowhere does it mention anarchism etc., and I've not seen any collective anarchist projects ever have a few members that call themselves Dr ... as some public thing. I'm not making a huge deal of it, but it does look like a thing that might seem slightly odd to give a stall to if space was limited for example.
The book might be great, like I said I have no idea, which is why I think all this could have been prevented by the Boofair giving reason why they turn people/stalls down.
muscovyduck
Good IT skills and food hygiene competent
Interestingly ime this has been the way events coordination/organisation has been going in the past few years, shifting to this sort of dysfunctional "we don't want you here and we aren't going to explain why" attitude. Like everything else the practice has been de-skilled and standards have dropped.
Imo it doesn't matter if there's a legitimate reason in this case or not because it's just normalising behaviour that can be used illegitimately
steeplejack
trapped lbw for a duck
Ah not to spin it out anyway, all could have been avoided with a two line e-mail ("We choose not to platform indivduals associated with GB News and Russia Today", for example.)
It's also a shitty demonstration of power differentials- as stated by muscovyduck "we don't want you here and have too little respect for you to bother explaining why".
LDC AFAICS the title "Dr" is useful for the bank manager but no-one else. The book concerned is a genuine grass roots project / set up and entirely admirable as a project. If the "Drs" involved had been looking for academic bonus points from it, it wouldn't have been self-published and would have had reviews from half a dozen well know professors on the back cover.
It's also a shitty demonstration of power differentials- as stated by muscovyduck "we don't want you here and have too little respect for you to bother explaining why".
LDC AFAICS the title "Dr" is useful for the bank manager but no-one else. The book concerned is a genuine grass roots project / set up and entirely admirable as a project. If the "Drs" involved had been looking for academic bonus points from it, it wouldn't have been self-published and would have had reviews from half a dozen well know professors on the back cover.
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