barney_pig
Po-cha-na-quar-hip
I was a lefty train spotter in the SWP- even had the spartacists round whilst I was a member, there were plenty of others, but one had to be quiet about it in front of the gaffers.
SWP expulsions and squabbles
- Thread starter Nigel Irritable
- Start date
Maybe my memory is fuzzy but I really don't recall trainspottery tendencies. I was very active for the short period of my membership - one of those off to conference 2 weeks after joining kind of member, maybe that makes a difference. I have to say that the SWP was very good for me personally in many ways - it remains possible that despite my many criticisms, I rose-tint a little.
Das Uberdog
remembers the alamo
they existed, but as barney says they were actively discouraged by the leadership
articul8
Dishonest sociopath
Where should they be looking in terms of theory post adorno and debord?
One_Stop_Shop
Well-Known Member
Not sure what you mean about other groups as I'm not in a group?! Most threads I've started have been about practical stuff to try and stop the cuts. However my point here is that people actually in far left groups, despite being so marginalised, spend a huge amount of time fighting other left groups. The damage this has done to the anti cuts groups is a good example where they all have their fronts that all do very little in practical terms.
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
Theory?
Cornetto
yesh
What theory BA, how will we ever storm heaven?
Earlier on, I asked about the SWP's new-member-alienating and off-pissing tendancies, active for at least the last 40 years.
No-one's given me any kind of honest answer about why the fucking fuck the SWP's Central Committee is so completely OK with that 'piss off the anyone' and maximum bolierplate-ranting strategy.
IE pissing normal lefties and non-lefties off so much.
Vanguardist?
Rubbishist, surely
No-one's given me any kind of honest answer about why the fucking fuck the SWP's Central Committee is so completely OK with that 'piss off the anyone' and maximum bolierplate-ranting strategy.
IE pissing normal lefties and non-lefties off so much.
Vanguardist?
Rubbishist, surely
Das Uberdog
remembers the alamo
it comes from the general contempt the CC holds for the membership more broadly, i think. for a long time now there has been no criteria for membership, not even the slightest degree of political like-mindedness - this is because the CC consider the education of the 'footsoldiers' as a sickening decadence, when time would far be best spent not knowing anything and just selling papers. this is also a by-product of the CC's degraded ambitions for the organisation, which having lost sight of an overarching project long long ago, now focus solely upon fulfilling the same ritualistic activities centred primarily around sustaining the bloated bureaucracy in its place.
the real issue is that the CC don't really care about politics, engaging people, or anything else. they're all mates from way back when, the creme de la creme of Cliffite arselickers, and they have a neat little niche in a world for which they are otherwise unqualified (only Callinicos has spent any significant time in a job not on the CC and not being a student). this niche allows them to essentially live a lazy lifestyle, in which they are simultaneously revered, and in which they can ostensibly live the life of an exciting Bolshevik revolutionary.
IMO
the real issue is that the CC don't really care about politics, engaging people, or anything else. they're all mates from way back when, the creme de la creme of Cliffite arselickers, and they have a neat little niche in a world for which they are otherwise unqualified (only Callinicos has spent any significant time in a job not on the CC and not being a student). this niche allows them to essentially live a lazy lifestyle, in which they are simultaneously revered, and in which they can ostensibly live the life of an exciting Bolshevik revolutionary.
IMO
Thanks for that -- interesting 
I'm as lazy as beyond-fuck myself, both politics-wise and anything else-wise, but at least I spend my lazy times in the pub and in CAMRA activism rather than by promoting anti-politics.
I'm as lazy as beyond-fuck myself, both politics-wise and anything else-wise, but at least I spend my lazy times in the pub and in CAMRA activism
rather than by promoting anti-politics.
Complete misreading IMO
Das Uberdog
remembers the alamo
go on...
Thanks for that -- interesting
In what way is it interesting william? In what way does that add to your understanding of that kind of organisation in this kind of context?
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
I presume he meant that as uberdog has recently been one of the more aggressive SWP defenders on here over the last 5 years that for him to say that was interesting. Certainly was interesting to me.
To say they don't really care about politics, is absolutely staggering especially coming from a former member...
Also to say they don't care about the political education of their members - why Bookmarks? Why ISJ? Why the pamphlets and discussion forums/public meetings?
It may not be the politics or political education we would like to see but it's writ large across loads of what they do...
You are of course correct about the membership criteria, and about the CC being a gang of mates who run their fiefdom as they see fit - but that is a symptom of what they do as much as being one of the reasons behind it.
Das Uberdog
remembers the alamo
should say that all the time i was defending the SWP on here i was raising criticisms internally.. i was never in line with the majority in the organisation. people who know me from in the party wouldn't be as surprised by the above statement
Das Uberdog
remembers the alamo
they don't care, and that's shown up in the way they've dealt with the present dispute. i can't go into details yet, but by expelling Paris and the rest the CC have pretty much openly declared that they care more about maintaining their own little fiefdom than they do about any kind of politics - especially in light of the allegations which have been made about a given CC member. how else do you explain the absolute and utter hostility to otherwise productive and loyal individuals who raise even the most minor internal criticisms? or the happiness of the leadership to allow the organisation to stagnate into repetitive and directionless activities? or the way they so quickly sell out with campaigns like UAF as soon as it starts to present any kind of personal risk to them individually?
they don't give a shit mate
Das Uberdog
remembers the alamo
you don't even need to be critical to raise their ire, often you can do it simply by acting off your own initiative and running local campaigns which aren't directed entirely through the centre
Pretty much that. I certainly remember Das Uberdog being much more of an SWP defender than he was in that earlier post.
The current dispute is evidence that they do very much give a shit that their political leadership and ideas remain unchallenged within the organisation - if they didn't give a shit about "politics" they could quite easily have either dealt with the expellees through internal polemic or a combination of polemic and throwing a few bones.
Yes I'm aware of that, I was briefly a member as well around 01/02
discokermit
Well-Known Member
income.
Das Uberdog
remembers the alamo
they give a shit that they stay in their untouchable positions and don't have to work a real job - give me one consistent theoretical position on a given issue that any of the CC have maintained against criticism over the past 10 years. nothing they stand by, democratic centralism, analysis on anti-fascism, the economic crisis, is ever clearly defined and the rhetoric in no instances lives up to the reality. the SWP still churns out books like 'The Two Souls of Socialism' to its young members, chats shit about how they can't allow their members to get tangled up in the bureaucracy of Trade Unions, whilst simultaneously and brazenly promoting its members into bureaucratic positions in the TUs... on nothing can you pin them down
So the books and pamphlets they publish play no role in pushing the political ideas the CC want to push to members and the wider public?
Maybe it was the smile that did it William. It comes over as gleeful, like you're watching a freakshow, which I don't like, as if you don't really give a shit, but fancy a bit of entertainment. But I am familiar with your way of expressing yourself and know that you've a fondness for smilies...so maybe I'm wrong. You post in this forum more than me so apologies if I've misjudged.
All this I agree with, except it doesn't mean they don't have politics, it means that they have many faces which they use to promote and build the party - but the politics are clearly there - how much does a CC member get paid?
sihhi
Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered
What about Charlie Kimber industrial organiser?
Das Uberdog
remembers the alamo
on paper they get paid around £15k i believe, but there's also expenses and stuff factored into that. they get a lot for free. but a shit wage for a fun, powerful position and lifestyle like they have isn't really a poor pay-off, especially if it's the only work you've ever known.
i don't see where their politics 'clearly' manifests itself at all - where is it? again, i think from the face of things it's clear that they're institutionalised within the party and scared like fuck of losing their stations
i don't see where their politics 'clearly' manifests itself at all - where is it? again, i think from the face of things it's clear that they're institutionalised within the party and scared like fuck of losing their stations
Das Uberdog
remembers the alamo
all of them have displayed significant personal cowardice over the years to survive Cliff's zany purges and then to continue flourishing in the post-Cliff SWP environment. Kimber is a likable sort i can't lie but i can't imagine him willingly martyring himself for anything either.
Das Uberdog
remembers the alamo
in fact if i were to make a personal exception to the rule it might be Mark Bergfeld, but i understand his time on the CC is to be short-lived too
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