SWP expulsions and squabbles

[Limerick Red]

Sport more and more clearly expresses the rottenness of a bourgeois society without a future

but this is pretty much true, I assume they are speaking of the comodification of sport rather than the sport itself, no?

 

[Limerick Red]

http://en.internationalism.org/icco...sm-part-iii-sport-nationalism-and-imperialism here you go

Ill give that a go!

 

[xslavearcx]

http://en.internationalism.org/icco...sm-part-iii-sport-nationalism-and-imperialism here you go

cheers!!

 

[phildwyer]

Bredrin of mine is proper ABE but because he is scots. Even unto wearing Brazil shirts to work at the point where that would be most provocative.

The trend sounds well facepalm though- I mean nobody likes the brit state but when its just football you should be able to cheer england along. Its not like you are tacitly endorsing the irish famine and indian partition etc

I'm ABE because I'm Welsh.

It's nothing personal, but simply a pragmatic issue. If England win anything, the entire nation is convulsed for weeks in a patriotic frenzy in which I cannot share. It creates a triumphalist attitude which is inevitably unpleasant viewed from the outside.

 

[frogwoman]

but this is pretty much true, I assume they are speaking of the comodification of sport rather than the sport itself, no?

The article has some good points and in general I've a lot of time for the ICC but they do appear to be talking about sport itself.

 

[DotCommunist]

everything is commodified now. Even our dissidence. So much shit on a shovel to be fed back.

Snooker is probably the last sport where a man can come from disreputable dives and all the way to the Crucible and glory.

I spotted Ebdon in Barrats the other week. On his own, just playing the table. Nearly went for an autograph but manned up instead

 

[xslavearcx]

Bredrin of mine is proper ABE but because he is scots. Even unto wearing Brazil shirts to work at the point where that would be most provocative.

The trend sounds well facepalm though- I mean nobody likes the brit state but when its just football you should be able to cheer england along. Its not like you are tacitly endorsing the irish famine and indian partition etc

I can't stand the ABE one. but thats because, i spent a good chunk of my life living near hampden park and ive grown to detest tartan army fans over the years. (whereas never been any of the annoying stuff you get from them from club fans).. Also, i want to see an amalgamation of the FA and SFA because scottish football is beyond shit, and its peoples fixations on maintaining a scottish national team, the old "no to team GB" mantra that prevents that from ever happening. even when national team football is on the decline, and specifically to scotland that we will never qualify to the world cup or european championships again.

 

[frogwoman]

I'd have to read it again. There are three articles about the history of sport all quite long and detailed but following a similar line of argument, although I know some ICC members are also sports fans so either I misunderstood something (which is likely) or..

 

[xslavearcx]

everything is commodified now. Even our dissidence. So much shit on a shovel to be fed back.

Snooker is probably the last sport where a man can come from disreputable dives and all the way to the Crucible and glory.

I spotted Ebdon in Barrats the other week. On his own, just playing the table. Nearly went for an autograph but manned up instead

Yeah, if ever there was a contentor for real working class sport its got to be snooker. DId you fall asleep when seeing ebdon play?

ETA you should have asked him to play a frame against you, or failing that, and you are as shit as me, ask him for a game of pool

 

[DotCommunist]

Yeah, if ever there was a contentor for real working class sport its got to be snooker. DId you fall asleep when seeing ebdon play?

ETA you should have asked him to play a frame against you, or failing that, and you are as shit as me, ask him for a game of pool

I recall one competition were a fella from the latinate countries proper lost it and threw in his cue cos Ebdon was being such a boring bastard.

I've also watched him up against Rocket Ronnie and having a bad run of balls so Ronnie took the fucker apart. Jobs a goodun.

 

[Limerick Red]

The article has some good points and in general I've a lot of time for the ICC but they do appear to be talking about sport itself.

Ya there are some good points, its mainly just talking about football though, but..

The sporting Central Asian Games, organised in Tashkent (Uzbekistan) by the Bolsheviks in 1920, aroused nationalist sentiments and strengthened the local states, a real mosaic of the ex-Russian empire, which only increased political confusion. Worse, it solidified the cordon sanitaire of the Entente troops around the besieged Russian soviets. The Spartakiades of Moscow in 1928, completed the defence of the 'socialist country' through sporting games which already embodied the counter-revolution. The only real 'triumph' was that of Stalinism, exhibiting with pride his 'Bolsheviks of Steel'!

is it all just an excuse to attack the revolution?

 

[xslavearcx]

I'd have to read it again. There are three articles about the history of sport all quite long and detailed but following a similar line of argument, although I know some ICC members are also sports fans so either I misunderstood something (which is likely) or..

it is quite a verbose article, but all it seems to be giving examples of what sports in the present context can and does symbolise; but i dont think it demonstrates that this is necessarily the case in the capitalist context.

In future post revolutionary times it goes on to say that

But it is certain that sport, such as it exists now, will disappear in a society without social classes.

which seems to suggest that whilst it will be transformed that it will still exist, albeit in a different form.

it then says:

It's much more difficult for an amateur to conceive of that today because it's dependent on seeing a world without addictions[16]. To all sorts of artificial separations between physical and intellectual activity, to forced opposition between players and spectators, must be substituted a human world, unitary, creative and free.

which i think rests upon a misconception as to the level of participation in a sport that is involved in being a spectator. Can't speak for all sports since im only really aquainted with football and to a (far) lesser extent american football, but i think fans certainly don't concieve of themselves as not being involved in the game, but rather that their support has some impact upon what happens on the field. That probably does rest in an over-estimation upon what impact being a fan has, but certainly in american football the fans can impact upon the ability the offense to make plays by being too loud to allow players to communicate with each other.

Be that as it may, can't really see what problem there would be with having a spectator/player split, i mean, hey i like playing football, its great fun, but im fucking shit at it, and i quite like seeing people that are amazing at it do amazing things. Both particpation and spectatorship on their own have their charms...

 

[xslavearcx]

I recall one competition were a fella from the latinate countries proper lost it and threw in his cue cos Ebdon was being such a boring bastard.

I've also watched him up against Rocket Ronnie and having a bad run of balls so Ronnie took the fucker apart. Jobs a goodun.

I stopped watching snooker for years when stephen hendrys dominance was too much to take. so i missed out on the rockets best days, which im really kinda gutted about. was he really as good as people described him?

 

[Das Uberdog]

imo the reason there's an anti-sport streak in the left derives from a snarky subcultural hangover from the 60s... one which looked down its nose at 'mainstream' culture and defined itself exclusively in some kind of 'enlightened' other. unfortunately the left seems to lap up all that anti-social guff...

it also goes hand in hand with another factor which i think is the tendency of the left to pick up a sector of anti social types. specifically, a mediocre layer of the underachieving middle-class. people who decided they agreed with socialism because criticisms of capitalism gave them an excuse for their general failure to achieve what they expected of themselves in life. the sort who never quite fit in at school and never got picked for the sports teams, etc. radical 60s music and general social subcultures (like left politics?) can satiate these peoples' desire for 'cultured' labels to cement their superiority over all the oiks they grew up with and reify to themselves that they are as superior, innately, as they always secretly thought they were.

an awful lot of those folks in the SWP, occupying positions in social services, teaching, low level lecturing and other halfway professions.

btw i fucking despise teachers.

SWP was the wrong org for me.

 

[xslavearcx]

Yeah maybe its like they see working class people liking sports, and they want wc to like them cause after all, they've read all the books that unlocks the keys to working classes real interests. so when the working class don't join their parties in droves, they have to say fuck sport because if they were to vocalise their hatred of working class for rejecting them, it would undo their whole ration etre!

 

[DotCommunist]

I stopped watching snooker for years when stephen hendrys dominance was too much to take. so i missed out on the rockets best days, which im really kinda gutted about. was he really as good as people described him?

the Jimmy whirlwind White of his day- when he is on form. Bloke struggles with depression and is from a background where his old man was incarcerated for murder. You can actually see when he throws a match and loses interest. When he is on the for it though, my god. He's a genius.

 

[Brechin Sprout]

Yeah, if ever there was a contentor for real working class sport its got to be snooker

Interesting that you should choose an individual over a team sport to represent the class.

 

[Nigel Irritable]

Meanwhile, the ISN start reaching towards the logical endpoint of the "prostitution is just work" position and complain about an escorting job getting taken off Universal Jobmatch: http://internationalsocialistnetwor...stress-magpie-hey-job-centre-sex-work-is-work

 

[xslavearcx]

the Jimmy whirlwind White of his day- when he is on form. Bloke struggles with depression and is from a background where his old man was incarcerated for murder. You can actually see when he throws a match and loses interest. When he is on the for it though, my god. He's a genius.

Jimmy white was a legend - my favourite snooker player so he was. Was always a nightmare to see him always nearly clinching the crucible title against stephen hendry but would always fuck up near the end. was a shame, i think any other time he coulda probably dominated the sport for a few years...

 

[xslavearcx]

Interesting that you should choose an individual over a team sport to represent the class.

Only insofar as (IME) snooker clubs still tend to be populated by working class people, that it hasnt really been 'gentrified' like say football arguably has.. But playing it doesnt represent anything, when im watching snooker im not thinking of it as a metaphor for whatever, im just enjoying seeing people with immense skill - a result of a well honed craft that few of us out there probably has the dedication to put in the hours for...

the notion that there is a real class sport is a lot of nonsense anyway. sports change their class compostition all the time, i mean football, considered to be the quintessential working class sport, originated in the posh schools that are (sometimes) associated with rugby union. now its prawn sandwhich brigades, maybe some time else it will be something else. snooker may change as well at some point too, but i think its generally working class people that play it and watch it.

 

[Spanky Longhorn]

Quite a lot of the left act like that about religion. They fail to notice that not everyone who believes in God is a right wing homophobe and that it can be more about culture and family tradition than going to mass every week.

What they ignore of course is the absolutely important role of sport, faith, and family in reinforcing community solidarity which is of course an essential prerequesit of socialism.

 

[imposs1904]

Think you're right. I broadly agree with his analysis of sport under capitalism and how it might change under socialism. It's also the only real argument I've ever heard for the preservation of capitalism! If Leinster won't still be winning European cups under socialism I'm not sure I want to live under socialism.

I guess a pretty good argument for the preservation of capitalism and nation states is that it allows us to witness England getting gubbed - preferably on penalties - at International tournaments every two years.

 

[redcogs]

i remember being told to stop wasting my time watching match of the day or going to see spurs play (apparently I should have been using the time usefully to build the next branch meeting, marxism, demo etc) when I asked why it was ok for certain comrades to watch cricket I was told that CLR James wrote extensively about it!!!!
So I asked if I could take up fox hunting as Trotsky used to like fox hunting...that went down like a lead balloon

i used to dream of being part of an swp branch that comprised of comrades who indulged in some of Trotsky's hobbies - salmon fishing, rabbit husbandry, hunting, interesting mistresses (no doubt fine wine consumption featured prominently also?).

Instead i was saddled with those whose only discernible passtime was assuaging their middle class guilt through early morning paper sales and smoking dope (never had a problem with that - but the mc guilt thing was a bit wearing) ;-)

 

[xslavearcx]

is baseball not huge in cuba and venezuala?

 

[phildwyer]

is baseball not huge in cuba and venezuala?

 

[xslavearcx]

thats a great picture

 

[frogwoman]

What about if an English SWP member moved to Germany? As a minority would he/she be allowed to support England or would they still have to support Germany, which would make things awkward with the German SWP members who would presumably have to support England?

 

[Trotter]

What about if an English SWP member moved to Germany? As a minority would he/she be allowed to support England or would they still have to support Germany, which would make things awkward with the German SWP members who would presumably have to support England?

Your main enemy is your home state - wherever home happens to be. When I lived abroad, it would have allowed me to support England, but I didn't because I can't stand English nationalism.

 

[articul8]

I can't stand English nationalism but I stll support England (even though we are always shit)

 

[laptop]

The prohibition on supporting England makes perfect sense in terms of cult membership.

Rule 1: isolate recruits from family and other ties.