Brand and Paxman

[alanjjohnstone]

The collapse Jones warns Scottish Labour about begins to set in. http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-scotland-politics-29765415

[moderator1]

Reminder:  1. The general topic of each forum is given by the posted forum description. Do not start a thread in a forum unless it matches the given topic, and do not derail existing threads with off-topic posts.

[J Surman]

Back to Brand, there's an article by Jonathan Cook today that I consider well-balanced – 'Brand shows his irritation with mediacracy.'http://www.jonathan-cook.net/blog/2014-10-24/brand-shows-his-irritation-with-mediacracy/Tried to paste a quote but it's not doing my bidding.try the FT’s interview with Brand. This part of their exchange had me howling in mental anguish at the sheer obtuseness of Lucy Kellaway:When I ask how lucrative [acting] is, he shrugs.“It makes me scared if I think about money too much, then it makes me feel guilty. The only thing I tell the people who look after my money is, ‘Make sure my fucking taxes are 100 per cent legitimately paid,’ and then I do my own shit.”But isn’t he against taxes? “Only as part of a mass movement, not as tax evasion,” he says.- See more at: http://www.jonathan-cook.net/blog/2014-10-24/brand-shows-his-irritation-with-mediacracy/#sthash.iYV88JBd.dpuftry the FT’s interview with Brand. This part of their exchange had me howling in mental anguish at the sheer obtuseness of Lucy Kellaway:When I ask how lucrative [acting] is, he shrugs.“It makes me scared if I think about money too much, then it makes me feel guilty. The only thing I tell the people who look after my money is, ‘Make sure my fucking taxes are 100 per cent legitimately paid,’ and then I do my own shit.”But isn’t he against taxes? “Only as part of a mass movement, not as tax evasion,” he says.- See more at: http://www.jonathan-cook.net/blog/2014-10-24/brand-shows-his-irritation-with-mediacracy/#sthash.iYV88JBd.dpuftry the FT’s interview with Brand. This part of their exchange had me howling in mental anguish at the sheer obtuseness of Lucy Kellaway:When I ask how lucrative [acting] is, he shrugs.“It makes me scared if I think about money too much, then it makes me feel guilty. The only thing I tell the people who look after my money is, ‘Make sure my fucking taxes are 100 per cent legitimately paid,’ and then I do my own shit.”But isn’t he against taxes? “Only as part of a mass movement, not as tax evasion,” he says.- See more at: http://www.jonathan-cook.net/blog/2014-10-24/brand-shows-his-irritation-with-mediacracy/#sthash.iYV88JBd.dpuftry the FT’s interview with Brand. This part of their exchange had me howling in mental anguish at the sheer obtuseness of Lucy Kellaway:When I ask how lucrative [acting] is, he shrugs.“It makes me scared if I think about money too much, then it makes me feel guilty. The only thing I tell the people who look after my money is, ‘Make sure my fucking taxes are 100 per cent legitimately paid,’ and then I do my own shit.”But isn’t he against taxes? “Only as part of a mass movement, not as tax evasion,” he says.- See more at: http://www.jonathan-cook.net/blog/2014-10-24/brand-shows-his-irritation-with-mediacracy/#sthash.iYV88JBd.dpuf

[J Surman]

Sorry for the above mess. When I saw the result above, (my post finished after 'tried to paste a quote' sentence) I tried to edit it but it won't allow me to change anything! When i tried to paste the quote nothing came up in my post.I'm baffled.

[J Surman]

I won't try anything fancy! Just Jonathan Cook's update on the media and Brand today:http://www.jonathan-cook.net/blog/2014-10-25/brands-critics-are-asking-the-wrong-question/

[Socialist Party Head Office]

Email received at Head Office from a sympathiser in the US:

Quote:

Oh what a world!!  I have been wondering if you guys have approached Mr. Brand…he and the spgb are a perfect match!  He's so nearly on the same page (if not there already)…and has a huge following.PLEASE get him on board, so he has an organisation he can believe in, and vote for, and bring attention to your ideology…the right kind of socialism!

[alanjjohnstone]

I was reminded by another website of this comment by Chomsky.Chomsky in an interview witth David Barsamian said four years ago that “there is no real left now” in the U.S… “If you are just counting heads,” Chomsky elaborated, “there are probably more people involved than in the 1960s, but they…don’t coalesce into a movement that can really do things.” And another line from Chomsky: “One commonly hears that carping critics complain about what is wrong, but do not present solutions. There is an accurate translation for that charge: ‘they present solutions and I don’t like them.’” I think quite honestly, the prospect of Brand getting aboard with ourselves is fantasy…not until we have that movement with solutions he agrees with. We are neither that movement and i doubt very much if our principles would convince him of expressing anything more than perhaps sympathy to our ideas. Our objective is all too rather vague for him to offer up as a viable vision, and our means to achieve it possess too many nuances for him to issue as media sound-bites.These ar our problems that we need to address, not Brand's, therefore i refrain from criticising him too much.On another thread ALB described quoting Gramsci as pretentious but i will commit that crime, again picking up something from another website.“The old world is dying and the new world struggles to be born. Now is the time of monsters.” He rephrased it “This crisis consists precisely in the fact that the old is dying and the new cannot be born; in this interregnum a great variety of morbid symptoms appear.”Dark shadows are already looming and a divided and disorganised movement will be all too easily defeated. (Doom and Gloom Johnstone, as they called me). What we require is inspiration to restore confidence. But at time i think when we witness such things as Brand's ability to express hope, all the various recent struggles from Zapatista's, Occupy, Rojava, the construction of spaces where we can raise the arguments of long forgotten or ignored people…Debs, Bookchin and Pannekoek, to name just a few and merge their ideas with our own case for socialism and the future. To go beyond mere protest and to begin to build. We need to offer feasible alternatives that for all their flaws serve as an example of what we are trying to strive towards…workers' self-organisation. If we ourselves keep offering nagativity, then that is what we will receive in return. It doesn't mean not being critical but it does mean offering that criticism comradely. Highlighting the positive, while correcting the weaknesss, and that may mean participating, not simply as individuals but as a party. The reality is that wherever there is resistance we are ceding ground to the reformists. We saw it with Occupy, there lofty aims reduced to currency crankism and one issue campaigns. No pat answers from myself. These are questions and problems that have to be tackled and solved collectively. And we will make mistakes…To quote Luxemburg: "Social Democracy becomes the haven of all discontented elements in our society and thus of the entire people…But socialists must always know how to subordinate the anguish, rancor, and hope of this motley aggregation to the supreme goal of the working class. The Social Democracy must enclose the tumult of the nonproletarian protestants against existing society within bounds of the revolutionary action of the proletariat. It must assimilate the elements that come to it." and to paraphrase "the errors committed by a truly revolutionary movement are infinitely more fruitful than the infallibility of the cleverest [political party]"We are hopelessly small and our sympathiser from the US is clutching at straws instead of wondering why Brand seems so alone. (He actually reminds me of Oscar Wilde)My thought for today 

[jondwhite]

So Brand who has rejected 'class' in the talk last Thursday appeared on Jonathan Ross last night and said 'I'm not talking about some sort of crazy communist thing, I'm talking about democracy'https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=65pqQDLtbK0This isn't a criticism of Brand but for a 'sympathiser' to state 'he and the spgb are a perfect match' seems a bit off.

[Anonymous]

jondwhite wrote:

 'I'm not talking about some sort of crazy communist thing, I'm talking about democracy' (Brand) 

 He may have been referring to the likes of the Soviet Union. 'communism'

[SocialistPunk]

Vin Maratty wrote:

jondwhite wrote:

 'I'm not talking about some sort of crazy communist thing, I'm talking about democracy' (Brand) 

 He may have been referring to the likes of the Soviet Union. 'communism'

I don't see how Brand could be talking about the former Soviet Union, Vin. Apparently the SPgb has successfully managed to get through to millions of our class, that must mean the myths of "communism" have been laid to rest, surely?

[J Surman]

Quote:

I don't see how Brand could be talking about the former Soviet Union, Vin. Apparently the SPgb has successfully managed to get through to millions of our class, that must mean the myths of "communism" have been laid to rest, surely?

I'd be interested who and where the millions are you mention Soc. Punk, your source I mean. It certainly doesn't strike me like that.As to what people think of when 'communism' is mentioned that would make for a good discussion on this forum. I often find it to be a stumbling block, having to politely point out the huge gap between 'state capitalist communism' and what we mean by communism/socialism. I'd also like to hear from the younger generation on this one – the under 30s say.A new thread?

[alanjjohnstone]

SP was being sarcastic about the millions, referring to a discussion he has engaged in on another thread with certain other party members. .I think we can take it for granted tat one of the "crimes" of Leninism and Trotskyism has been the legacy of confusion over Russia with socialism, and it suited the pro-capitalist intellectuals to reinforce that misrepresentation. I think it still lingers even for the younger generation. Isn't  Orwell's Animal Farm still on the school curriculum and Koesler's Darkness at Noon, to continue the misinterpretations.But be intereting to know the figures. They say the idea of socialism has a rising approval rating in the USA with the young. 

[alanjjohnstone]

Further to what i was saying and also why the media are providing him with such a wide-ranging platform, Russel Brand is no threat whatsoever without a movement. Offering him an access to the newspapers and television is a luxury and indulgence capitalism can well afford with the comforting side-effect of making it appear liberal and democratic. If there does become a prairie-fire of revolutionary organisation around Brand, be rest assured, the corporate  media have lined up a lot more than the likes of Johnny Rotten Lyndon to take Brand down. 

[SocialistPunk]

J Surman wrote:

SocialistPunk wrote:

I don't see how Brand could be talking about the former Soviet Union, Vin. Apparently the SPgb has successfully managed to get through to millions of our class, that must mean the myths of "communism" have been laid to rest, surely?

I'd be interested who and where the millions are you mention Soc. Punk, your source I mean. It certainly doesn't strike me like that.As to what people think of when 'communism' is mentioned that would make for a good discussion on this forum. I often find it to be a stumbling block, having to politely point out the huge gap between 'state capitalist communism' and what we mean by communism/socialism. I'd also like to hear from the younger generation on this one – the under 30s say.A new thread?

Hi JSAlan is correct when he said I was being sarcastic, with reference to another discussion with a Party member who made a statement along the lines of millions or our class being aware of our definition of socialism. It's from the thread "Can the workers ever be wrong", if you would like to comment.In reality I agree with Vin when he says Brand is probably referring to the old Soviet Union and other communisms, and I think he sees a distinction between communism and socialism, with socialism being preferable.

[ALB]

Brand was interviewed by the Financial Times this weekend. Amongst the things he told his interviewer was:

Quote:

This planet — there's a number of people, there's an amount of resources, we need to make sure that the people get the resources. What's the reason we that we're not doing that? The answer is because of the ideology you are propping up.

According to the article, he has been

Quote:

trying to incite his 8.4 million twitter follows to a peaceful revolution.

Ok, his message is mixed up with some New Age spiritual stuff but he is still getting over to millions of people simple points as above that we make. Of course he's never goingto join us or probably any other organisation but I can't see how it can be denied that he is preparing the way for an easier hearing of what we say.

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