Reports that SWP bookshop Bookmarks attacked

[SpookyFrank]

Well his mate (Buska in the Park aka Mark Martin) that was filming appeared to believe it was relevant and repeated several times "he's got autism", "he is a vulnerable person" etc if you watched the vid.

Mark's a nazi, don't be like Mark.

 

[FridgeMagnet]

Well his mate (Buska in the Park aka Mark Martin) that was filming appeared to believe it was relevant and repeated several times "he's got autism", "he is a vulnerable person" etc if you watched the vid.

Ah. A speakers corner YouTube cunt.

 

[cantsin]

Or anti-SWP left, random hooligans etc

you serious ? can you name a single instance of anti left violence / attack like this, like, ever ?

 

[cantsin]

It would have been some people who had attended this picket of Facebook over them banning Alex Jones. You can see the placards here( 37 mins best) , they actually say Bolshevik Brainwashing Cult and the Trump mask is around 45 mins ( tbh I have only glanced at this as its so fucking boring):



So not DFLA/ Millwall but a light weight altright UKIP type grouplet .Couldn't punch their way out of a wet paper bag.

ffs, would love to see this little crew bump into the wrong lot, wrong time/place etc

eg : Steve Hedley and the RMT lot a couple of weeks back

 

[Red Sky]

ffs, would love to see this little crew bump into the wrong lot, wrong time/place etc

eg : Steve Hedley and the RMT lot a couple of weeks back

Tbh my money would be on Goldsmiths S.U safer spaces committee.

 

[winjer]

They've taken the video down..

Part still here Twitter. It's what's happening /DAYFORFREEDOM4/status/1026079765328027648

 

[The39thStep]

Keith Flett

We have been here before.

In the mid-1970s in North London as a socialist and anti-fascist I rarely left the house without wearing a pair of steel toe capped Doc Martens. I still have them and they still fit but I hope more agile people can now move into the frontline.

Why the shoes? Because in those days you had to be careful walking the streets. You might be attacked (I narrowly avoided it on several occasions. In those days I could run fast). The fascists of the National Front were on the rise and their aim was to control the streets.

That meant attacks on socialist and trade union meetings and any street campaigning. You had to have security but even then you couldn’t guard 100%. Events were broken up by fascists and people injured.

That hasn’t happened for 40 years but its what Yaxley-Lennon & Co. have in mind again as the attack on Bookmarks underlines.

The Battle of Wood Green, on 23rd April 1977, was a key moment last time (as was Lewisham in August 1977). Jeremy Corbyn, then a Labour Councillor in Haringey, brought together Councillors (Labour and Tory) and anti-fascists organised to stop the National Front as they tried to march down the busy Wood Green High Rd on a Saturday afternoon.

The NF was a virulently anti-BME and anti-Semitic party. ( Islamophobia is a more recent arrival in the fascist playbook) Its march was designed to intimidate and show that it controlled the streets.

It did not. The march was broken by protesters as it came out of Ducketts Common in Turnpike Lane.

The fascists did not recover. After Bookmarks the same resolve to stop them is needed.

Resolve meaning by the way, building a mass opposition to isolate them, including those who one might not otherwise have much time for, not punch-ups down alley-ways. Fascists are usually very good at that and mostly very bad at organising mass support on their side, provided the left gets there first.

The Battle of Wood Green

Funnily enough I remember us going round the pubs looking for them before the march and then attacking them in alleyways as they went to the meeting point

 

[Toast Rider]

ok to be fair I couldn't care less about a trot bookshop.

You're joking, right?

 

[The39thStep]

Part still here Twitter. It's what's happening /DAYFORFREEDOM4/status/1026079765328027648

its on the Red London site

 

[The39thStep]

ffs, would love to see this little crew bump into the wrong lot, wrong time/place etc

eg : Steve Hedley and the RMT lot a couple of weeks back

Best to leave that to the AFN

 

[Red Sky]

 

[Red Sky]

Best to leave that to the AFN

Which bit?

 

[Toast Rider]

It was hardly a big bad gang of jackbooted fascists with links to football hooligans etc it was a bunch of cosplaying alt right fuckwits.. it was hardly Kristalnacht 2 FFS



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Ridiculous response.

A group of people happy to manhandle the books (so not just content to walk in and make arses of themselves), happy to call people pedophile lovers such that you can hear the anger spat in their voices. But because it's not devolved into violence this is not a big deal?

This is completely fucking out of order

 

[ska invita]

I'll take your word on that mate because I've never been there and I'm sure never will. The point I was making is that the swp would not be rushing to offer solidarity to other leftist, independent or anarchist bookshops in similar circumstances, well not unless they could score some political points out of it in their various publications. I see the whole thing has really come to nothing other than a couple of idiots shouting their mouths off and kicking over some newstands. It's a shame to say but that's what people working in shops, railway stations, and anywhere groups congregate have to deal with on a regular basis. Now if they had petrol bombed the bookshop I may be showing some solidarity.
BTW cheers for wishing me banned ska i. There's always someone who wants to ban other people isn't there.

Pretty sure Bookmarks did express solidarity after Freedoms firebombing and in general all the left leaning bookshops look out for one another behind the scenes via the Alliance of Radical Booksellers.

 

[Toast Rider]

Yeah, not an 'attack' to be worried about post-event for us on here, but can imagine it was a bit more nervey if it was your quiet afternoon working in the shop that was suddenly interrupted by that.

It might be nothing more than a few idiots after a few pints winding each other up to do something 'daring' that comes to nothing, or it might slightly embolden other more handy groups to think they can do better and then try and prove they can.

Either way, it needs stamping on hard and fast, and solidarity needs expressing with those that this kind of thing happens to, whether we like them or agree with them politically or not.

Whatever the reason we cannot ignore the febrile context within which this is happening.

I find the flippant answers on this thread frankly mind blowing

 

[krink]

100% nailed on they'll find some disturbing stuff on the camera twats hard drive when he gets lifted. Definitely grade a wrong'un.

 

[PaulOK]

It wasn't an attack as such. More of an unpleasant incident. I am not sure if anything criminal occured and I doubt the Police would press charges over this.

Obviously the SWP are milking it for all that its worth (mentioning the shop's TUC affliation a lot and their front group SUTR....although the letters SWP are mentioned nowhere in their publicity for the incident....surprise, suprise).

I thought the shop guy handled it very well (better than I would have done) although when he appeared to be trying to debate them at the beginning I kinda rolled my eyes and thought, "You're not at Marxism pal".

 

[PaulOK]

I've "debated" RED CAP BOY a few times at Speakers Corner. He's not very bright. The last time I was there he got escorted from Speakers Corner for flying a Trump flag and complained about "freedom of speech".
Apparently he's autistic.

Was he the annoying gobby twat doing the voice over? The one who seemed surprised that left wing books were in a left wing bookshop?

 

[Rob Ray]

LUKE, LUKE! Jesus not the sharpest tools in the box are they.

 

[DaveCinzano]

Ah. A speakers corner YouTube cunt.

Another tick for the I-Spy Pocket Book Of Contemporary Wankers

 

[Toast Rider]

It wasn't an attack as such. More of an unpleasant incident. I am not sure if anything criminal occured and I doubt the Police would press charges over this.

Obviously the SWP are milking it for all that its worth (mentioning the shop's TUC affliation a lot and their front group SUTR....although the letters SWP are mentioned nowhere in their publicity for the incident....surprise, suprise).

I thought the shop guy handled it very well (better than I would have done) although when he appeared to be trying to debate them at the beginning I kinda rolled my eyes and thought, "You're not at Marxism pal".

No, it was an attack. Plain and simple.

Not really sure how you can view it any differenlty tbh

 

[Red Sky]

It wasn't an attack as such. More of an unpleasant incident. I am not sure if anything criminal occured and I doubt the Police would press charges over this.

If Plod wanted to there are quite a few charges here. Aggravated Trespass, section 4 POA, even conspiracy.

 

[PaulOK]

Keith Flett

Funnily enough I remember us going round the pubs looking for them before the march and then attacking them in alleyways as they went to the meeting point

Re:Flett's "not punch ups down alley ways" comment

This is the usual SWP dig at Squadism. It is pointless as the SWP could now not recruit the types who could and would form effective squads anyway. It is more just knee jerk sectarianism and fighting the tactical battles of the past (the SWP talk off the past A LOT !) .

It is ironic in a way as the early SWP did tacticly approve of Squads and were happy to receive their protection against a very violent far right. It was only in the early 1980s when they wanted to drop anti fascism altogether and wind up the ANL did they start expelling mainly working class activists for it as they were afraid of factions forming (an anathema to them as it threatens their internal "democratic centralism")

 

[Rob Ray]

Shop owner's right as well, tearing up the placard is technically criminal damage if the owners decide to press charges.

Edit: Seriously though what kind of utter moron films themselves doing an intimidatory shop invasion and then puts it up online? Genuinely mind boggling.

 

[PaulOK]

Shop owner's right as well, tearing up the placard is technically criminal damage if the owners decide to press charges.

As recently as 2014 the SWP (the shop owners) stated categorically that "The Police and bourgeois Courts system cannot deliver justice for victims"

Or do they only beleive that when it suits them?

 

[The39thStep]

Which bit?

There are bits in the AFN ?

 

[Rob Ray]

In fairness, putting fash away for filming themselves attacking leftie bookshops is less about delivering justice for victims than it is about punishing fascists for rampant stupidity.

 

[Red Sky]

As recently as 2014 the SWP (the shop owners) stated categorically that "The Police and bourgeois Courts system cannot deliver justice for victims"

Or do they only beleive that when it suits them?

I wonder if it's as straightforward as the SWP owning the shop. I'm imagining a right thicket of limited companies and ownership trusts.

 

[The39thStep]

As recently as 2014 the SWP (the shop owners) stated categorically that "The Police and bourgeois Courts system cannot deliver justice for victims"

Or do they only beleive that when it suits them?

They might be right depending on what they believe justice is but pragmatically if the courts banned the offenders from the premises it might be in the staffs interests .

 

[Ax^]

In fairness, putting fash away for filming themselves attacking leftie bookshops is less about delivering justice for victims than it is about punishing fascists for rampant stupidity.

being that public in the age of social media is the high of stupidity...

saying that they are that daft can they possibly hold down day jobs