PTK
Paul Kegan
"When my description of the trashing of David Strachan appeared in 1917"
I am puzzled. You wrote an article for the ET/IBT's joural "1917" while you were still in the SL?
What's the Spartacist League up to these days?
- Thread starter Idris2002
- Start date
I am puzzled. You wrote an article for the ET/IBT's joural "1917" while you were still in the SL?
PTK
Paul Kegan
There is minor error in your document, I believe. Was not the slogan "No to the Shah, No to the Mullahs"? It was “retrospectively” corrected at an international conference, when a member from, if I recall correctly, Germany pointed out that this was in effect abstentionist. The corrected slogan was “Down with the Shah, No the Mullahs”. As you point out, the Spartacists did nothing in practice in Iran, and perhaps if they had done so, they would not have come up with such a faulty slogan.
I like your document. I enjoyed reading it, and it made some good points.
It seems to me that the Spartacist League was never really part of the Labour movement. It was frightened of being genuinely involved in the movement. It appealed to people who felt separate to some extent from society. It made such people feel part of something, but on the other hand it made them more isolated from society.
Carl Steele
Well-Known Member
The slogan was Down with the Shah! Down with the Mullahs! (don't forget the exclamation marks!). Retrospectively "correcting" a slogan which had no practical application kind of sums up the Spart project, in particular because the "correction" doesn't actually change the meaning and probably nobody apart from the Sparts knew about it. When Geoff White wrote (way back in 1968) "I question whether our basic orientation is not toward making a good record in some cosmic history book, rather than making history itself" he was so right.
After I "quit" the sparts for the first time I wrote a letter which I never sent. I did however send a copy of the letter to Judith Shapiro to get her comments. Judith passed the letter on to Riley. Later, after I had rejoined the sparts, Riley published excerpts of the letter in an article in his journal, 1917. My dalliance with what Judith referred to as "the Tom and Cathy brigade" (otherwise known as the ET/BT), was known to the sparts and they were unconcerned about the article.
Incidentally it was probably Riley who sent Doug Hainline (aka VirulentNeocon) here to defend Jim Robertson's revolutionary virtue. Doug and Judith, Tom and Cathy, are buddies from way back, from the good times they spent together with Bill and Adaire in Britain.
And for the connoisseurs on this thread here's a bonus, a laughably obsequious tribute to Jim Robertson complete with photo.
PTK
Paul Kegan
“Robertson ranks among the great heroes of revolutionary Marxism and the worldwide workingclass struggle for socialist liberation”. Indeed. There are reports that birds fell silent, and winds abated worldwide when the Eternal Archivist departed this world.
Either my memory of the Spartacist slogan on Iran is faulty, or reality has altered. I find that reality often alters as I become older. Reality was much more stable when I was young.
Either my memory of the Spartacist slogan on Iran is faulty, or reality has altered. I find that reality often alters as I become older. Reality was much more stable when I was young.
The Spartacists were, on paper, more in touch with reality with respect to the revolution in Iran in 1979 than the rest of the left, who uncritically allied with religious reactionaries.
Carl Steele
Well-Known Member
Are you shouting at me?
When you talk about "the rest of the left" who do you mean? Probably you are thinking of the IMG, SWP, Workers Power, Socialist Organiser and the RCP. Check out the post on page 18 from hitmouse where he provides links to 2 Anarchist groups whose commentary pointed out the reactionary nature of the Mullahs, It really was not so difficult to see how reactionary the Mullahs were. The Trot left failed because of their formulaic, knee-jerk anti-imperialism.
The problem for a serious political group was what to do, and here the Sparts failed just as dismally as their ORO competitors:
"Only the intervention of an Iranian Trotskyist vanguard party can push the strike movement beyond its current demands and win the proletariat to a program for power: the revolutionary struggle for an Iranian workers and peasants government." - see the article I linked to in my previous post.
This was pure fantasy, utterly disconnected from reality - the usual meaningless call for every uprising to follow the same path as the Russian October revolution.
Iran is the last gasp go-to for those who want to salvage something positive from their virtual-reality experience with the old pick-pocket Robertson. I made the point in an earlier post in this thread (and alluded to it at the end of my reply to Riley) - had the Sparts dropped all the "we are the party of the Russian Revolution" bullshit and stuck to political commentary they may have been able to contribute something. But this wasn't Robertson's game.
ETA - and I would add, there is a difference between looking at a political situation and getting it wrong, which certainly most of the Trot left did on Iran, and believing you are Napoleon Bonaparte, or Vladimir Lenin, or Leon Trotsky, or the predestined leadership of the revolutionary vanguard of the working class, which is how the Sparts thought of themselves (well maybe not Napoleon!).
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PTK
Paul Kegan
For some reason that I could not control, the last part of my post was in a larger font, and in bold. I was not trying to indicate shouting.
The Stalinists also supported the Mullahs, and in terms of poltical weight they were far more important than the Trotskyist groups.
Carl Steele
Well-Known Member
The39thStep
Urban critical thinker
JeffTipps4
New Member
No reply to Carl Steele, but Tom Tiley found time to write this
bolsheviktendency.org
Exchange with a former member of the Spartacus Youth League - Bolshevik Tendency
The following is a recent exchange between a former member of the Spartacus Youth League (SYL–the youth group of the Spartacist League/U.S. [SL]) and Tom Riley of the BT. Greetings…
bolsheviktendency.org
JeffTipps4
New Member
I hear that a new issue of Spartacist is out now? Anyone seen it?
spring-peeper
Well-Known Member
I was wondering if the Canadian branch of spartacist league will be aligning itself with The United People of Canada (TUPC) ?
I'm asking because the spartacist league showed up during the Freedumb occupation in Ottawa last February.
They have set up an embassy in Ottawa, and plan on opening more embassies throughout the country. They have recently set up their own security forces because they feel that the Ottawa police are not taking the vandalism (someone wrote CULT on their building) and theft of one of their flags properly.
www.tupoc.ca
This is the lastest news article about them.
I'm asking because the spartacist league showed up during the Freedumb occupation in Ottawa last February.
They have set up an embassy in Ottawa, and plan on opening more embassies throughout the country. They have recently set up their own security forces because they feel that the Ottawa police are not taking the vandalism (someone wrote CULT on their building) and theft of one of their flags properly.
Diverse Intergenerational Fraternal Organization | The United People Of Canada
The United People of Canada: Together, through appreciation and celebration of our unique culture and heritage, we offer a network of locations across Canada - and beyond. We build strong communities, offering safe access to education, networking, community events and new friendships.
www.tupoc.ca
This is the lastest news article about them.
The39thStep
Urban critical thinker
Dr Chuck Wilson - Fuse ( The magazine of PNL Student Union)
imposs1904
Thread Killa'
Didn't the RCP control the PNL Student Union at one point?
DaveCinzano
WATCH OUT, GEORGE, HE'S GOT A SCREWDRIVER!
Certainly I spent far too much of my time as a schoolkid at UNL in the early/mid 90s. Even dragged my parents to an IFM meeting there about the Downing Street Declaration
Hmm, not really the kind of casuals I used to come across back in the day.
('A right bunch of nutters' seems like a reasonable description of various groups mind.
)
The39thStep
Urban critical thinker
Not during the Harrington Out/ Miners Strike period that Wilson was covering . The Labour leaning Exec was voted out and a Harrington Out ticket ( anti fash/SWP/non aligned coalition) voted in .
The39thStep
Urban critical thinker
imposs1904
Thread Killa'
What's worse? Student politics or student journalism?
The39thStep
Urban critical thinker
imposs1904
Thread Killa'
Looks like Paul Mason in the flattened Busby.
The39thStep
Urban critical thinker
It is , and that's the answer to your very pertinent question
imposs1904
Thread Killa'
imposs1904
Thread Killa'
People who haunt a thread like this have probably already seen this but here's a clip of Paul Mason from 1987. (2 minutes in.)
The39thStep
Urban critical thinker
Yup .
I was just pissing about. Is that him in his Workers' Power days?
DaveCinzano
WATCH OUT, GEORGE, HE'S GOT A SCREWDRIVER!
Mind map ground zero
The39thStep
Urban critical thinker
Long term pro Putin sleeper
imposs1904
Thread Killa'
Now on social media.
David Clapson
Well-Known Member
Having a meeting in Brixton on Monday.
hitmouse
so defeated, thinks it's funny
Seems like that must be the final deathblow to Facebook, if even the Sparts have decided that they can't be arsed with it.
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