SWP expulsions and squabbles

[Random]

I'm not sure that this is really a solid foundation to be building your conclusions on.

It's just a Laurie Penny-style attempt to ground my argument in "someone I once met".

Yes, there are many basic socialist arguments which would amount to reasons to join any socialist group from the ICC to the SWP. And then, if those arguments are accepted, there are reasons why you might agree with the opinions of one group over another and it's not particularly odd for partisans of that group to explain why they think that their ideas and strategies and theories are better to someone who is wondering what group to join.

Look at it this way. I need a good kitchen knife. Once I've accepted that it needs to be sharp and the right size for me, why do I then need to agonize over exactly which brand to get? Why should all the knife sellers try to say that the other knives will actually turn in my hand and cut me? Although that analogy is probably true for joining the AWL, tbh.

 

[Random]

You're changing what you said. Purging internally is not the same as hassling or directing attacks against opponent/competitor socialists.
It's borne out from the experience of the Indian Emergency, Zia in Pakistan, South Korea, Turkey, Nigeria when the military takes over - the socialist groups do stop fighting one another - at least for a few years (unless part of them support the coup like in India which can get complicated).

You may be right. I'm not changing what I say, just pointing out a linked fact.

 

[sihhi]

Am I the only person who found all the references to the SA a couple of pages ago a bit 'night of the long knives'?

I don't get what you're saying here.
1 Why did the Socialist Alliance collapse?
2 What is the parallel?

 

[frogwoman]

It's just a Laurie Penny-style attempt to ground my argument in "someone I once met".

Look at it this way. I need a good kitchen knife. Once I've accepted that it needs to be sharp and the right size for me, why do I then need to agonize over exactly which brand to get? Why should all the knife sellers try to say that the other knives will actually turn in my hand and cut me? Although that analogy is probably true for joining the AWL, tbh.

 

[emanymton]

What I keep on remembering is a discussion I had with a socialist at a stall one demo. He was explaining why I should join his group; but at the end, he had basically alo made the argument for me joining the socialist group over the other side of the field, or the stall just by the main road. The basic decent argument for joining a socialist (trotskyist) group is one that applies to almost all of them. So why your group? Why are you better?

Theeeeeen the abstract and/or historical stuff has to be rolled out.

One thing that used to piss me off when I was in the SWP was that if asked why someone should join us and not, say the SP the only answer some would give was that the SWP was bigger. To which my response was and the labour party is bigger than us, should we all join labour? The communist party was once much bigger than the SWP, where all those who joined the SWP at that time wrong to do so? It was full timers coming out with this shit.

I know that doesn't answer your question I just wanted to get it off my chest.

 

[sihhi]

You may be right. I'm not changing what I say, just pointing out a linked fact.

I think your linked fact is correct - people are always purged, but that's the same in all parties mainstream and left.

 

[Random]

Because the argument was "Why do you need to argue so much with other socialists, who also think that there's a need to work for a working class revolution through workplace activity and campaigning?" Sorry but that lowest common denominator approach isn't enough. If Rev Soc had followed it they'd be in Hamdeen Sabahi's much larger group (most of whom are decent enough leftists and jan25 veterans in their own right) now and nobody would be making revolutionary arguments loudly in Egypt.

I'm not able to reply to your points because I don't know enough about Egypt, sorry. Like I've said, though, I can understand why people want to organise separately when they have very different aims or use incompatible methods. In the UK I don't see how this is the case.

 

[TremulousTetra]

yes, yes i can.

but no you won't.

So evidently, being an anarchist is like the film Fight Club. At every meeting the mantra is "the first rule about anarchism is, you do not discuss anarchism".

 

[Nigel Irritable]

Look at it this way. I need a good kitchen knife. Once I've accepted that it needs to be sharp and the right size for me, why do I then need to agonize over exactly which brand to get?

Because the distinctions are rather more than branding. There are basic political disagreements about things with real world significance between various small left groups.

Of course, many people don't bother "agonizing over" which group to join anyway. In my experience, simply joining the first radical group you see is perhaps more common.

 

[Random]

One thing that used to piss me off when I was in the SWP was that if asked why someone should join us and not, say the SP the only answer some would give was that the SWP was bigger. To which my response was and the labour party is bigger than us, should we all join labour? The communist party was once much bigger than the SWP, where all those who joined the SWP at that time wrong to do so? It was full timers coming out with this shit.

I know that doesn't answer your question I just wanted to get it off my chest.

It doesn't answer my question, but it does help me understand things inside the SWP better, thanks.

 

[eoin_k]

... Their later decision to wind up the SA was a fairly straightforward tying up of loose ends when they were moving on....

For example.

 

[Nigel Irritable]

For example.

What on Earth are you talking about?

 

[Random]

Of course, many people don't bother "agonizing over" which group to join anyway. In my experience, simply joining the first radical group you see is perhaps more common.

And the parties' leadership are well aware of this. hence their wanting to be the most visible in whichever campaign is flavour of the month. They know that what mainly succeeds is success itself. So why pretend that its your party that's the one with the uniquely best understanding?

 

[eoin_k]

What on Earth are you talking about?

I was replying to someone else using your post as an example.

 

[emanymton]

The only real thing that separates these groups is that they have different small groups in their leadership, who are using a different hand of cards from the pack of trotskyist socialist tactics. The SP were in Labour before. the SWP were once not in Labour, and now are, etc. All the groups think that the unions' leadership are not to be trusted, hope lies in the rank and file, etc. it's all splitting hairs when it comes to real politics.

To be Frank the AWL are miles away from the rest on the left.

 

[Nigel Irritable]

They know that what mainly succeeds is success itself. So why pretend that its your party that's the one with the uniquely best understanding?

This is a false opposition. If you think that your set of theories, strategies and structures is better than any other on offer, you would also, quite reasonably, want to put that set of stuff in the shop window as prominently as possible.

 

[barney_pig]

Why do you think I'm stifling the glee filled contributions to the thread?

PS. I've just won that debate again.

And your attitude toward the rape allegation? What do you think of the way in which the dc handled the investigation?
What do you think of the attempts of the cc to close down debate? Are you content that the UAF sent Delta to Greece as their representative?
Have you anything relevant to contribute to the actual issue which this thread is about, which at this moment is tearing apart the party you have spent all your time on urban defending?

 

[bolshiebhoy]

One thing that used to piss me off when I was in the SWP was that if asked why someone should join us and not, say the SP the only answer some would give was that the SWP was bigger. To which my response was and the labour party is bigger than us, should we all join labour? The communist party was once much bigger than the SWP, where all those who joined the SWP at that time wrong to do so? It was full timers coming out with this shit.

I know that doesn't answer your question I just wanted to get it off my chest.

That is pretty poor fair enough and yeah I've heard that stuff too. On the other hand if the full timer spent several hours explaining why they thought the SP's politics represented a break with classical marxism wouldn't there be loads of people around here who'd denounce them as splitter leninist loons obsessed with meaningless differences?

 

[Nigel Irritable]

I was replying to someone else using your post as an example.

You've fired out a series of one line posts with no real content to them.

 

[frogwoman]

To be Frank the AWL are miles away from the rest on the left.

probably flying over iran on a reconnaissance mission

 

[Random]

Anyway I'm off home now, so no more replies from me. Good night

 

[TremulousTetra]

So? Are you saying it wasn't in mind?

Anyway, why not just either contribute to the thread sensibly or fuck off so those of us who want to can? Bolshieboy, discokermit, emanymton and other posters who sympathise with the SWP haven't had any trouble doing so and we were having quite a good debate until you came along. I'm not going to help you derail this any further so your next stream of nonsense will go unanswered.

you are seriously frightened I will stifle the debate? Debate? Or gleeful celebration?

unless the were able to predict the future, yes it definitely was not in mind, as respect didn't exist.

See what happens when you look at the facts, through the lens of a lie ?

Anyway, the discussion may as well end there, because neither you or random have provided one logical argument why the SWP would want to control the tiny SA.

 

[eoin_k]

It was intended merely as an aside - clearly a badly expressed one. If you go back a few pages after a few glasses of wine and read SA as Sturmabteilung instead of Socialist Alliance it seems apt, clearly with reference to a different context. My quote of your post was only meant to be illustrative. No offense intended. Carry on with the debate comrades.

 

[cesare]

Surreal.

(RMP3's dialogue)

 

[sihhi]

The only real thing that separates these groups is that they have different small groups in their leadership, who are using a different hand of cards from the pack of trotskyist socialist tactics. The SP were in Labour before. the SWP were once not in Labour, and now are, etc. All the groups think that the unions' leadership are not to be trusted, hope lies in the rank and file, etc. it's all splitting hairs when it comes to real politics.

But some believe the rank and file can be mobilised by the correct left leadership, others don't. Some (RCP and ex-SWP Counterfire) believe the Trotskyist playbook is at a dead end and finished, others don't.

SWP will never be pro-Labour. SP might be pro-Labour in order to encourage a left split from Labour - note that TUSC didn't stand against Labour Lefts - to form what the CNWP wants. AWL will always be pro-Labour. Those differences will basically not change.

Your argument, Random, essentially is that no party or fraction of a party should ever have left the
the 1938 vintage Revolutionary Socialist League. That itself was a Trotskyist union.

 

[butchersapron]

Or set it up.

 

[Hocus Eye.]

Just found this.

 

[butchersapron]

This is what an interventionist party looks like:

What this involved was the Bolsheviks acting as what is sometimes called a "vanguard party". They represented for most of their existence before October 1917 a small minority of the Russian working class. But this minority was united by a shared Marxist understanding of the world. And, above all, it organised and acted on the basis of this understanding.

The Bolsheviks collectively intervened in the struggles of the Russian working class. In doing so, they put forward proposals that would help to advance the struggle in question. But they simultaneously sought to encourage workers to recognise that they had to fight for political power and, to achieve this, to support the Bolshevik Party itself.

The CC says they want an interventionist party so this is what they mean when you support it, doing good things, not bad things.

 

[TremulousTetra]

And your attitude toward the rape allegation? What do you think of the way in which the dc handled the investigation?
What do you think of the attempts of the cc to close down debate? Are you content that the UAF sent Delta to Greece as their representative?
Have you anything relevant to contribute to the actual issue which this thread is about, which at this moment is tearing apart the party you have spent all your time on urban defending?

you mean like discussions of Kronstadt etc. And whether this kind of thing is inevitable in a Leninist organisation?

If people are going to make bold statements, then there is no guidelines that suggests I cannot ask them to back up their bold statements with a logical analysis, facts.

Correction, I have spent my time attacking what I perceive as Bullshit arguments, and saying "if you're going to attack the SWP, attack it for what it has really done, instead of making shit up."

Dealt with current affair issue in post 3078

 

[frogwoman]

you mean like discussions of Kronstadt etc. And whether this kind of thing is inevitable in a Leninist organisation?

If people are going to make bold statements, then there is no guidelines that suggests I cannot ask them to back up their bold statements with a logical analysis, facts.

Correction, I have spent my time attacking what I perceive as Bullshit arguments, and saying "if you're going to attack the SWP, attack it for what it has really done, instead of making shit up."

Dealt with current affair issue in post 3078

no this is about a rape allegation and how the swp dealt with it not kronstadt