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post-modernism, cultural relativity and identity politics - attitudes of progressives

I think you'd be hard pushed to claim that life in the UK under Labour was as dark and shitty as it is now (I know some of the shit was already in train and things would have been getting dark and shitty only not quite so fast...):(
 
Which, depsite the claim, says that things are just getting shitter and have to - there's some general law that dictates this. Your party are just the least worst way this increasing shit takes place. Now, this is a) a lie and b) not what you believe.
 
things...can only get shitter (at a slower pace than they would under the Tories)
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I certainly don't believe things have to get shitter, no. But slowing down that rate of the shit being piled on is better than not slowing it down? No?
 
articul8 said:
I certainly don't believe things have to get shitter, no. But slowing down that rate of the shit being piled on is better than not slowing it down? No?
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Join your party and things will get shitter - have i that right? Regardless of whether you - as a committed communist within the party - agree. This goes on your outside stuff right?
 
Slowing down the rate at which things are getting shitter is a good idea, but Labour can't and musn't stop there if it means that things are getting shitter overall.
 
articul8 said:
Slowing down the rate at which things are getting shitter is a good idea, but Labour can't and musn't stop there if it means that things are getting shitter overall.
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When was the last time that Labour actually publically espoused a desire and programme for a genuine transformation of society rather than a 'better than the other lot' management of the system? Was it long enough ago that you might want to reconsider pinning your hopes on them?

Louis MacNeice
 
Not necessarily - build the left, drive them further they would otherwise have gone, and if they can't be shifted break from a position of greater strength.
 
am I saying that only by joining Labour can the left do anything worthwhile? No. But does it follow there is no point building a left inside the party?
 
articul8 said:
But does it follow there is no point building a left inside the party?
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Yes.

There is a point to joining the party if you want to build a nice career for yourself in vaguely left/progressive politics and if you wish to push and build for those sort of politics as well, I can see the worthwhileness of it.

If you want to join to build radical left/socialist politics you are wasting your time, there is no appetite for that within the membership and even if their was the bureaucracy have it stitched up - and I believe you know that to be the case.

You seem to be doing the former while claiming the latter which is a bit naughty really.
 
You know as well as I do that come the next general election there will be a polarisation between people who support the coalition's programme and people who don't. And the overwhelming majority of those who don't will vote Labour. Given that we know this, why is it stupid to for socialists to try to organise a stronger left presence inside the party and at the same time argue for a much more radical break from the status quo than is currently dreamt of?
 
articul8 said:
You know as well as I do that come the next general election there will be a polarisation between people who support the coalition's programme and people who don't.
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Of course.

What some people may choose to ignore is that in terms of political representation, what they've got on offer is the coalition's programme, and a Labour programme that, because of the extreme ideological similarities between the three major parliamentary political parties, will differ merely in delivery, not in content.

And the overwhelming majority of those who don't will vote Labour. Given that we know this, why is it stupid to for socialists to try to organise a stronger left presence inside the party and at the same time argue for a much more radical break from the status quo than is currently dreamt of?
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Why is it stupid? Institutionalised behaviours for a start. At least 40 years of Labour party politics where any socialism worthy of the name has been suppressed by the right wing of the party, and 18 years of institutionalised neo-liberal assumptions within the party heirarchy. Then, of course, there's the lack of democracy within the party, and the lack of mechanisms by which democratic functions can be re-established.
Your party will bring about it's own death because it can't see beyond the need to conform. You can have as many activists as you like, and fuck-all will happen, because it isn't in the interests of neo-liberalism for a re-emergence of a socialist current to take place.

You need to toss your party away like a used tissue, because however fondly you dream of it serving as a platform for socialism, it won't.
 
ViolentPanda said:
Why is it stupid? Institutionalised behaviours for a start. At least 40 years of Labour party politics where any socialism worthy of the name has been suppressed by the right wing of the party, and 18 years of institutionalised neo-liberal assumptions within the party heirarchy. Then, of course, there's the lack of democracy within the party, and the lack of mechanisms by which democratic functions can be re-established.
Your party will bring about it's own death because it can't see beyond the need to conform. You can have as many activists as you like, and fuck-all will happen, because it isn't in the interests of neo-liberalism for a re-emergence of a socialist current to take place.
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The main thing is though the average remaining rank and file and TU activist members in the party in the whole are not even vaguely socialist as articul8 means it, even the ones who moan about the lack of democracy merely want a more democratic liberal capitalist party.

You need to toss your party away like a used tissue, because however fondly you dream of it serving as a platform for socialism, it won't.
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Well that's the nub of it - he can't because of what membership can offer him.
 
articul8 said:
You know as well as I do that come the next general election there will be a polarisation between people who support the coalition's programme and people who don't. And the overwhelming majority of those who don't will vote Labour. Given that we know this, why is it stupid to for socialists to try to organise a stronger left presence inside the party and at the same time argue for a much more radical break from the status quo than is currently dreamt of?
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Why?
 
Spanky Longhorn said:
The main thing is though the average remaining rank and file and TU activist members in the party in the whole are not even vaguely socialist as articul8 means it, even the ones who moan about the lack of democracy merely want a more democratic liberal capitalist party.



Well that's the nub of it - he can't because of what membership can offer him.
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Nothing. The idea that he/they matters whilst arguing that they don't matter.
 
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