What magazine/paper/periodical most shaped your political thinking?

[TopCat]

Thank you.

 

[Fozzie Bear]

I remain sceptical of the claim that Mastin was imprisoned either for chucking a Mars bar or because of the awesome subversive power of his comics though.

 

[TopCat]

I remain sceptical of the claim that Mastin was imprisoned either for chucking a Mars bar or because of the awesome subversive power of his comics though.

Ah indeed. His imprisonment caused huge ructions in CW at the time. Then a pants fight at the bookfair when he came out.

 

[Pickman's model]

Ah indeed. His imprisonment caused huge ructions in CW at the time. Then a pants fight at the bookfair when he came out.

pants clothing or pants washout shitty scrap?

 

[TopCat]

pants clothing or pants washout shitty scrap?

Really shitty scrap. He had been given black bombers as a gift when he was released and got wound up when he heard a CW member (and urbanite) argued at the Sunday meeting that no whip round should be done. It was a culture clash really.
Stella (RA/CW) broke it up.

 

[Dom Traynor]

Stella normally starts fights

 

[imposs1904]

Really shitty scrap. He had been given black bombers as a gift when he was released and got wound up when he heard a CW member (and urbanite) argued at the Sunday meeting that no whip round should be done. It was a culture clash really.
Stella (RA/CW) broke it up.

I wish one of you fuckers would write a novelization of the Anarchist Bookfair years. I might actually start reading books again.

 

[TopCat]

Stella normally starts fights

What?

 

[Pickman's model]

I wish one of you fuckers would write a novelization of the Anarchist Bookfair years. I might actually start reading books again.

one for a younger stewart home to do, perhaps, along the lines of red london.

 

[Pickman's model]

although it's not something i came across in my youth, i'm finding much of interest in 'the irishman', a weekly paper which ran from the 1850s to 1885. been reading today about the appalling way fenian prisoners treated in the later 1860s, eg o'donovan rossa having his hands shackled behind his back in a punishment cell for five weeks.

 

[Fozzie Bear]

What?

I think he means the beer.

 

[DaveCinzano]

one for a younger stewart home to do, perhaps, along the lines of red london.

Or any of his other books

 

[Dom Traynor]

I think he means the beer.

Yes.

 

[butchersapron]

Aufheben are doing another issue this year after seemingly called it quits after the appalling brexit one of 2017. I think they should have just let it die, no coming back from that for me. Leaving aside 'other issues' - just going on content of articles and positions took.

 

[chilango]

Aufheben are doing another issue this year after seemingly called it quits after the appalling brexit one of 2017. I think they should have just let it die, no coming back from that for me. Leaving aside 'other issues' - just going on content of articles and positions took.

Do you know what the new one is about?

 

[butchersapron]

Do you know what the new one is about?

The main article is supposed to be about housing/housing crisis etc.

 

[chilango]

The main article is supposed to be about housing/housing crisis etc.

Ok.

I didn't see/read their Brexit issue (I think I gave up reading them at some point before then when they got too into Economic stuff for me) but I heard they took a Remain position? Which surprises me.

 

[chilango]

...also housing is well covered in that prole.info book. I'm not sure what they could add to that

Obviously I'm bound to be missing detail, but still

 

[butchersapron]

Ok.

I didn't see/read their Brexit issue (I think I gave up reading them at some point before then when they got too into Economic stuff for me) but I heard they took a Remain position? Which surprises me.

Almost a pro EU position. I couldn't believe what I was reading.

 

[editor]

SchNEWS was great

 

[Fozzie Bear]

Almost a pro EU position. I couldn't believe what I was reading.

To be fair, it did produce this excellent and very entertaining reply:
Brexit means the sky is falling: how Aufheben learned to stop worrying and love the EU

 

[chilango]

SchNEWS was great

Managed to pick up a couple of their big paperback "best of"s in charity shops recently

 

[editor]

Managed to pick up a couple of their big paperback "best of"s in charity shops recently

I did one of the covers for their annuals. Top folks.

 

[LDC]

To be fair, it did produce this excellent and very entertaining reply:
Brexit means the sky is falling: how Aufheben learned to stop worrying and love the EU

That's excellent, I missed that and the Aufheben piece when it first came out.

 

[chilango]

To be fair, it did produce this excellent and very entertaining reply:
Brexit means the sky is falling: how Aufheben learned to stop worrying and love the EU

Yeah, that was the first I'd heard of it ...

 

[Fozzie Bear]

Well perhaps Aufheben will respond in their next issue...

 

[ska invita]

To be fair, it did produce this excellent and very entertaining reply:
Brexit means the sky is falling: how Aufheben learned to stop worrying and love the EU

the original article in Aufheben is totally correct in placing the fate of "EU citizens" , or rather residents of Britain without British citizenship, directly at the centre of the response, and is also totally correct that Lexit splits class solidarity by shrugging off their fate

"This conflation can well unite leftwing Remainers and Brexiteers, by sacrificing, and forgetting about, EU migrants and their rights."

The migrants whose lives may be wrecked by Brexit do not count, the democratic mandate does.

Proven utterly correct by the details we now see regarding settled status and other elements of law changes

Never read anything in Aufheben before, seems very good.

(the bit about the minibus was shit tbf)

 

[redsquirrel]

To be fair, it did produce this excellent and very entertaining reply:
Brexit means the sky is falling: how Aufheben learned to stop worrying and love the EU

That's a great article Fozzie, cheers

 

[Ming]

I'll bite...

• Beano - general anti-authoritarian themes, especially from Leo Baxendale's characters, though often Davey Law's Dennis was cooler
• Crisis - ‘3WW’ and its chronologies pointed me in the direction of all sorts of groups, books, ideas and people
• Warrior - I came to it in the late 1980s, but both ‘Marvel Man’ and ‘V For Vendetta’ leaped out and made challenging the status quo seem not just possible but essential
• Breaking Free - okay, so not a periodical, but fun stuff, and in the back there were addresses for a bunch of anarcho/lefty groups, which is how I got into...
• Class War - I may have come to it after its 80s heyday, but even in the early 90s it was still exciting and provocative and funny and I ended up doing bulk orders and selling it round school
• Green Anarchist - non-whiney environmentalism (more the diaries of than the interminably long articles)
• Arnie - I must admit the big draw was Arnie's mum
• Living Marxism - I was influenced not so much by the politics of the actual magazine or the RCP, but by interacting with the group's members up close; it taught me a lot about arseholes (and the power of the relentless argument)
• Eat Shit - made Bristol sound awesome and politically interesting
• Weekly Worker - the Heat of lefty gossip
• Do Or Die - enjoyed the intersection of anti-capitalism and green stuff; less tedious than the ACF, less fruitcake than GA.
• Culture Vulture - I was lucky enough to be picking Marc's brains at just the time he was first brewing up his idea of CV and its melding together of sometimes complex anti-capitalist critiques with often very simple visuals, and was hooked once the zine and its off-shoot ‘little books’ came out
• Squall - conscious raver-traveller mash-up of SchNEWSy titbits and in-depth long-form investigations which mostly (MOSTLY!) stayed the sane side of conspiracy
• Lobster - did somebody mention ‘conspiracy’? I meant parapolitics! I first heard about Lobster in Crisis, but only started reading it regularly in the solo Ramsay years, though in more recent times I've dug out plenty of the ones co-edited by Dorril.
• Year Zero - Adam Porter's valiant attempt at a tabloid newspaper (think Class War for the RTS generation) which reflected a serious but not po-faced or sectarian interest in the politics of resistance to globalised capital and pervasive liberal democracy; in the end it was filled a little too much with Pilger and Chomsky and Klein, and began to be undercut by the opportunities the web provided to journalists and activists working at the margins, but still some had some great reportage
• Covert Action Quarterly - along with lots from South End Press a preferred rabbit hole full of spooks and School of the Americas and Operation Condor and Plan Colombia and COINTELPRO and the rest
• CounterPunch - Cockburn and St Clair's The Week-inspired muckraker was a welcome regular treat through the letter box
• The Bristolian - proudly pro-working class and cheerfully lumpen, a great local scandal sheet that shits on municipal politicos of all hues, and despite the angry denials of those targeted (mainly for incompetence, crookedness or being venal, snatching, greedy bastards) has essentially never published a story it couldn't stand up, thanks to a solid network of sources throughout the city; dozens of its investigations and stories have been stolen wholesale (and without attribution) by the ‘proper’ media, too

Year Zero! That was good stuff. He used to post on here didn't he.

 

[Serge Forward]

Nerd alert.. I still have my complete set of Warrior comics