Russell Brand

[Victor]

In reality, Brand is a London media phenomenon only.  Most ordinary people don't know he exists – and don't care.  Which is not to dismiss him completely – what he says will have some impact, and he does come out with some intelligent and thought-through argument – but he lives in a bubble and his worldview reflects this to an extent.Any constructive discussion about how to get the message about socialism across to people would have to involve an acknowledgement of a few unspoken (and unpleasant) truths about the public.  First, people are ignorant.  Most people see world socialism as pie in the sky material.   Find a way to make your message relevant to people's everyday concerns.  Second, most people aren't literate in the sense that the average SPGB member might be.  Decide on a group you want to target, consider how the message can be delivered efficaciously, look at the words used, the medium selected, etc. – isn't that what Russell Brand does?  This requires an element of dumbing down, but might be effective.  Brand doesn't usually tell people explicitly that he is a pseudo-socialist, New Age spiritualist….or whatever he is.  Instead, he taps into the emotional brain.  He knows his audience and he pushes the right buttons.  He's not sincere.  He's manipulative.  But it works.Perhaps I am being harsh, but at the moment the SPGB in most of its publicity asks for a level of intellectual engagement that, realistically, most people just don't have the capacity for or simply don't have time for.

[robbo203]

Victor wrote:

In reality, Brand is a London media phenomenon only.  Most ordinary people don't know he exists – and don't care.  Which is not to dismiss him completely – what he says will have some impact, and he does come out with some intelligent and thought-through argument – but he lives in a bubble and his worldview reflects this to an extent.Any constructive discussion about how to get the message about socialism across to people would have to involve an acknowledgement of a few unspoken (and unpleasant) truths about the public.  First, people are ignorant.  Most people see world socialism as pie in the sky material.   Find a way to make your message relevant to people's everyday concerns.  Second, most people aren't literate in the sense that the average SPGB member might be.  Decide on a group you want to target, consider how the message can be delivered efficaciously, look at the words used, the medium selected, etc. – isn't that what Russell Brand does?  This requires an element of dumbing down, but might be effective.  Brand doesn't usually tell people explicitly that he is a pseudo-socialist, New Age spiritualist….or whatever he is.  Instead, he taps into the emotional brain.  He knows his audience and he pushes the right buttons.  He's not sincere.  He's manipulative.  But it works.Perhaps I am being harsh, but at the moment the SPGB in most of its publicity asks for a level of intellectual engagement that, realistically, most people just don't have the capacity for or simply don't have time for.

 I would endorse every word of this and, perhaps, when that much touted post mortem conference or discussion happens after the Elections to analyse the predictably dismal voting results (this is not a putdown BTW; its good that the SPGB is putting up so many candidates but Im just being realistic here) the Party would do well to reflect on all this.  Hopefully that will be the cue for it to adopt a more flexible and relaxed approach generally – from modifying somewhat its admissions requirements (for example, softening its absurdly strict and largely redundant stricture against holding religious views) as well as experimenting with new ways of putting across the socialist message, capitalising fully on the potential of modern communication technologies… Brand, though he is clearly not a socialist, (his "revolutuion" does not seem to signify the transcendance of capitalism)  has inadvertently ploughed a furrow for socialists. As Vin has suggested, it is up to us socialists to start sowing those socialist seeds in the soil he has turned over

[LBird]

Victor wrote:

Perhaps I am being harsh, but at the moment the SPGB in most of its publicity asks for a level of intellectual engagement that, realistically, most people just don't have the capacity for or simply don't have time for.

I have the capacity and made the time, and assume that I'm no different to most other workers.If we want socialism, most workers have to have the capacity and to make the time. If they don't, socialism won't happen.It doesn't surprise me, though, to find robbo agreeing with Victor:

robbo203 wrote:

I would endorse every word of this…

Yes, that's why you're not a democrat, but an individualist, robbo.You think you have the capacity, but that most workers don't. You think you can be arsed to find the time, but that most workers can't.You might be correct, but then if you are, the democratic control of production (ie. workers' power) is impossible.This leads me to conclude that your vision of Communism is not mine, because I think that the only Communism is Democratic Communism.

[alanjjohnstone]

Robbo and LBird…i think we have to be sure of our words…Victor is wrong …people aren't ignorant…they are unaroused politically. We know our friends and co-workers only too well…they can analyse a football game with precision…they can judge a racehorse's capability to a photo fuinish…and they leave me mathematically dumbfounded when it comes to calculating all those complex bets at the bookies…it is certainly not from lack of intellectual prowness that workers do not understand socialism…it is the missing will that they lack.

Quote:

From Hegel from his Philosophy of the Mind:“If, therefore man does not want to perish he must recognize the world as a self-dependent world which in its essential nature is already complete, must accept the conditions set for him by the world and wrest from it what he wants for himself. As a rule ,the man believes that this submission is only forced on him by necessity. But, in truth, this unity with the world must be recognized, not as a relation imposed by necessity, but as the rational …therefore the man behaves quite rationally in abandoning his plan for completely transforming the world and in striving to realize his personal aims, passions and interests only within the framework of the world in which he is a part.” 

Socialist Parry members are not superior to society. We understand how the class society basically works. That is the difference to the majority of the working class, which do not understand and therefore do not see the need to abolish capitalism. I would like to quote Bookchin and Mattick

Quote:

From his Anarchism , Marxism and the Future of the Left :-"…human beings cannot be free – except under very rare conditions , such as during revolutions and for limited periods of time ; even then , they must still leave the barricades and return to work to satisfy their needs and those of their families . They have to eat , if you please….."Bookchin continued with an example:-" …In May 1937 in Barcelona , the workers had to conquer the Stalinist counterrevolution then and there . But they delayed , and after four days they had to leave the streets to obtain food…"

 

Quote:

“There is no evidence that the last hundred years of labour strife have led to the revolutionizing of the working class in the sense of a growing willingness to do away with the capitalist system…In times of depression no less in than these of prosperity , the continuing confrontations of labor and capital have led not to an political radicalization of the working class , but to an intensified insistence upon better accommodations within the capitalist system…No matter how much he [ the worker ] may emancipate himself ideologically ,for all practical purposes he must proceed as if he were still under the sway of bourgeois ideology .He may realize that his individual needs can only be assured by collective class actions , but he will still be forced to attend to his immediate needs as an individual .It is this situation , rather than some conditioned inability to transcend capitalism. He may realize that his individual needs can only be assured by collective class actions , but he will still be forced to attend to his immediate needs as an individual .It is this situation , rather than some conditioned inability to transcend capitalist ideology, that makes the workers reluctant to express and to act upon their anti- capitalist attitudes ” – Marxism, Last Refuge of the Bourgeoisie

From our literature, these two supplementary quotes are of interest“A period of revolution begins not because life has become physically impossible but because growing numbers of workers have their eyes suddenly opened to the fact that problems hitherto accepted as part of man’s unavoidable heritage has become capable of solution…No crisis of capitalism, however desperate it may be, can ever by itself give us socialism ” – Will Capitalism Collapse ?And here we also stated :-“If we hoped to achieve Socialism ONLY by our propaganda, the outlook would indeed be bad. But it is Capitalism itself unable to solve crises , unemployment, and poverty, engaging in horrifying wars, which is digging its own grave. Workers are learning by bitter experience and bloody sacrifice for interests not their own. They are learning slowly. Our job is to shorten the time, to speed up the process.” – Socialism or Chaos Socialist consciousness involves understanding socialism which means talking about it, sharing ideas about it – in short educating ourselves and our fellow workers about it.But some detractors, have the mistaken idea that the Socialist Party of Great Britain thinks selling a copy of the Socialist Standard and holding meetings is the key to revolution. If that really was the case, the world would be in for a very long wait. People become socialists from their experiences; meeting socialists is part of that experience. Some in our party have the view the problem with the SPGB's theory is NOT because it emphasises education but because it inadequately theorises the relationship between education and struggle/practice. For example, it has little or nothing positive to say about what workers are to do in the meantime. The working class is simply the working class, a bundle of contradictions. It is both the most conservative class because they have the most to lose AND, at the same time, the most revolutionary because they have the most to gain. I think early members understood aspects of socialism better that some of us today.

Quote:

"he has to ask what are the essentials of Socialism. The first essential he discovers is—a human race. Without humanity there can be no Socialism. Directly he admits this he discovers that, even as the frigidly pure, passionless, scientific exponent and advocate of Socialism the every day affairs of men do matter, for assuredly if any calamity threatened to blot Man out of the scheme of things, to obliterate one of the essentials of his scientific obsession, it would concern him….  ….To say that the Socialist can view all things from the standpoint that nothing matters but Socialism is an easy matter, but it wants a deal of upholding when the worker has got to view the labour market from the standpoint of the seller of labour-power. Is he, if he understands Socialist economics, and therefore all the better understands the necessity of the struggle against capitalist encroachment, to give up personal participation in the struggle? Is he, directly he becomes armed and equipped for the battle of the future, to be rendered powerless and paralytic in the equally necessary struggle of the present?If, when a worker attains to class-consciousness, he ceases to require food, clothing and shelter, ceases to be a vendor of labour-power, ceases to be under the necessity which all commodity owners are under—of fighting for the realisation of the value of his commodity, in this case labour-power; if, in short, he ceases to be anything but a pure abstraction in whom even the charitable raven could find no want to minister to, no lodgement for a beakful of material sustenance, then it might be logical to say that no Socialist can belong to a trade union.But if the class-conscious worker still must live by the sweat of his brow, or rather by the sale of his potential energy, then he must resort to the instrument which make the conditions of a sale, as distinct from the conditions which environ the chattel slave’s dole.Among these instruments, for a certain number, are, under present conditions, trade unions on a non-revolutionary base. And as far as the Socialist thinks them necessary to his personal economic welfare, as far, that is, as economic pressure forces him to, he is right and justified in using them."http://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/socialist-standard/1910s/1911/no-87-november-1911/socialist-and-trade-unionism

 Sorry for the extensive extracts…

[Victor]

LBird wrote:

Victor wrote:

Perhaps I am being harsh, but at the moment the SPGB in most of its publicity asks for a level of intellectual engagement that, realistically, most people just don't have the capacity for or simply don't have time for.

I have the capacity and made the time, and assume that I'm no different to most other workers.

Your intelligence, political knowledge and willingness to think about issues 'rationally' (in the social sense) are not typical.  I can understand why you might be reluctant to admit this, but for the purposes of discussions like this, I think it's useless pretending that you are typical just so as to appear 'nice' or politic.  If you're typical or, to use your own turn-of-phrase, 'no different to most other workers', then why doesn't the SPGB have more members?

LBird wrote:

If we want socialism, most workers have to have the capacity and to make the time. If they don't, socialism won't happen.

I agree that socialism cannot work unless the majority of people have the capacity to understand it, and then choose to understand it and accept it.  I am not saying socialism won't happen, and I do hold to a democratic position similar to yours, but the issue remains of whether people (workers), on the whole, are able to understand.  (i). Is LBird special? (ii). Or are you really just typical and for some odd reason humanity has never had socialist societies (barring primitive exceptions in the distant past and in the present)?I accept there is ample evidence for (ii).  Workers have demonstrated plenty of times a capacity for self-organisation and self-direction, when given the opportunity.  Workers run the present capitalist system.  There seems to be no reason why, now that capitalism has reached an advanced stage of abundance, socialism could not replace it.  So why hasn't that happened?  Why are we as far as ever from that goal?I should add there is another way of looking at my post.  My remarks could be seen, less threateningly, as just an argument that you might take a leaf out of Russell Brand's book and make the arguments suit the audience. 

[Victor]

alanjjohnstone wrote:

Robbo and LBird…i think we have to be sure of our words…Victor is wrong …people aren't ignorant…they are unaroused politically. We know our friends and co-workers only too well…they can analyse a football game with precision…they can judge a racehorse's capability to a photo fuinish…and they leave me mathematically dumbfounded when it comes to calculating all those complex bets at the bookies…it is certainly not from lack of intellectual prowness that workers do not understand socialism…it is the missing will that they lack.

Quote:

From Hegel from his Philosophy of the Mind:“If, therefore man does not want to perish he must recognize the world as a self-dependent world which in its essential nature is already complete, must accept the conditions set for him by the world and wrest from it what he wants for himself. As a rule ,the man believes that this submission is only forced on him by necessity. But, in truth, this unity with the world must be recognized, not as a relation imposed by necessity, but as the rational …therefore the man behaves quite rationally in abandoning his plan for completely transforming the world and in striving to realize his personal aims, passions and interests only within the framework of the world in which he is a part.” 

Socialist Parry members are not superior to society. We understand how the class society basically works. That is the difference to the majority of the working class, which do not understand and therefore do not see the need to abolish capitalism. I would like to quote Bookchin and Mattick

Quote:

From his Anarchism , Marxism and the Future of the Left :-"…human beings cannot be free – except under very rare conditions , such as during revolutions and for limited periods of time ; even then , they must still leave the barricades and return to work to satisfy their needs and those of their families . They have to eat , if you please….."Bookchin continued with an example:-" …In May 1937 in Barcelona , the workers had to conquer the Stalinist counterrevolution then and there . But they delayed , and after four days they had to leave the streets to obtain food…"

 

Quote:

“There is no evidence that the last hundred years of labour strife have led to the revolutionizing of the working class in the sense of a growing willingness to do away with the capitalist system…In times of depression no less in than these of prosperity , the continuing confrontations of labor and capital have led not to an political radicalization of the working class , but to an intensified insistence upon better accommodations within the capitalist system…No matter how much he [ the worker ] may emancipate himself ideologically ,for all practical purposes he must proceed as if he were still under the sway of bourgeois ideology .He may realize that his individual needs can only be assured by collective class actions , but he will still be forced to attend to his immediate needs as an individual .It is this situation , rather than some conditioned inability to transcend capitalism. He may realize that his individual needs can only be assured by collective class actions , but he will still be forced to attend to his immediate needs as an individual .It is this situation , rather than some conditioned inability to transcend capitalist ideology, that makes the workers reluctant to express and to act upon their anti- capitalist attitudes ” – Marxism, Last Refuge of the Bourgeoisie

From our literature, these two supplementary quotes are of interest“A period of revolution begins not because life has become physically impossible but because growing numbers of workers have their eyes suddenly opened to the fact that problems hitherto accepted as part of man’s unavoidable heritage has become capable of solution…No crisis of capitalism, however desperate it may be, can ever by itself give us socialism ” – Will Capitalism Collapse ?And here we also stated :-“If we hoped to achieve Socialism ONLY by our propaganda, the outlook would indeed be bad. But it is Capitalism itself unable to solve crises , unemployment, and poverty, engaging in horrifying wars, which is digging its own grave. Workers are learning by bitter experience and bloody sacrifice for interests not their own. They are learning slowly. Our job is to shorten the time, to speed up the process.” – Socialism or Chaos Socialist consciousness involves understanding socialism which means talking about it, sharing ideas about it – in short educating ourselves and our fellow workers about it.But some detractors, have the mistaken idea that the Socialist Party of Great Britain thinks selling a copy of the Socialist Standard and holding meetings is the key to revolution. If that really was the case, the world would be in for a very long wait. People become socialists from their experiences; meeting socialists is part of that experience. Some in our party have the view the problem with the SPGB's theory is NOT because it emphasises education but because it inadequately theorises the relationship between education and struggle/practice. For example, it has little or nothing positive to say about what workers are to do in the meantime. The working class is simply the working class, a bundle of contradictions. It is both the most conservative class because they have the most to lose AND, at the same time, the most revolutionary because they have the most to gain. I think early members understood aspects of socialism better that some of us today.

Quote:

"he has to ask what are the essentials of Socialism. The first essential he discovers is—a human race. Without humanity there can be no Socialism. Directly he admits this he discovers that, even as the frigidly pure, passionless, scientific exponent and advocate of Socialism the every day affairs of men do matter, for assuredly if any calamity threatened to blot Man out of the scheme of things, to obliterate one of the essentials of his scientific obsession, it would concern him….  ….To say that the Socialist can view all things from the standpoint that nothing matters but Socialism is an easy matter, but it wants a deal of upholding when the worker has got to view the labour market from the standpoint of the seller of labour-power. Is he, if he understands Socialist economics, and therefore all the better understands the necessity of the struggle against capitalist encroachment, to give up personal participation in the struggle? Is he, directly he becomes armed and equipped for the battle of the future, to be rendered powerless and paralytic in the equally necessary struggle of the present?If, when a worker attains to class-consciousness, he ceases to require food, clothing and shelter, ceases to be a vendor of labour-power, ceases to be under the necessity which all commodity owners are under—of fighting for the realisation of the value of his commodity, in this case labour-power; if, in short, he ceases to be anything but a pure abstraction in whom even the charitable raven could find no want to minister to, no lodgement for a beakful of material sustenance, then it might be logical to say that no Socialist can belong to a trade union.But if the class-conscious worker still must live by the sweat of his brow, or rather by the sale of his potential energy, then he must resort to the instrument which make the conditions of a sale, as distinct from the conditions which environ the chattel slave’s dole.Among these instruments, for a certain number, are, under present conditions, trade unions on a non-revolutionary base. And as far as the Socialist thinks them necessary to his personal economic welfare, as far, that is, as economic pressure forces him to, he is right and justified in using them."http://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/socialist-standard/1910s/1911/no-87-november-1911/socialist-and-trade-unionism

 Sorry for the extensive extracts…

Thank you for this response.  I've read through this carefully and I think you've persuaded me that there are reasons beyond the capacity of workers that make it difficult to spread the case for socialism. LBird can probably ignore my earlier response now, though I'll leave it up as my concerns I think are legitimate and may yet be proved right (I hope not).

[alanjjohnstone]

Quote:

there are reasons beyond the capacity of workers that make it difficult to spread the case for socialism.

And i want to be fully frank – i don't think we as socialists ourselves fully understand the reasons, apart from abstract generalisations.But we do what we do as we see fit right now.Some may take issue with this claim i now make – "first do no harm" – the Hippocratic Oath – i think our political approach indeed reflects this precautionary principle. Brand too could be seen early on following a similar guideline…but the deeper he got into actual politics, the more he muddied the waters and began to get out of his depth. 

[Darren redstar]

I wrote months back really critical of you and others for approaching Brand, I wrote a acerbic article very critical of Brand which was rejected by the standard, and I had changed my mind. I had realised that in approaching Brand we were not compromising ourselves or our principles. I was therefore happy that such approaches to continue. I wrote the post above after Brands interview with Miliband and endorsement of Lucas. Still saying I thought reaching out to brand was worthwhile, but criticism was necessary too. I can't see why you decided that I should be held up some sort of ejaculating member (lol). I am agreeing with you  (mostly)

[LBird]

Victor wrote:

I think it's useless pretending that you are typical just so as to appear 'nice' or politic.  If you're typical or, to use your own turn-of-phrase, 'no different to most other workers', then why doesn't the SPGB have more members?

'Nice'? Me? Have I logged into the wrong site?Thanks, Victor… the most agreeable assessment of me ever!As for 'no different to most other workers', I'm not an SPGB member.Like most workers, I have a healthy suspicion (from experience) of 'socialist parties' who want to tell workers what the 'truth' is. In my experience, they never listen to workers. And when they recruit them, they still don't listen!In fact, my analysis of the 'failure of workers to develop class consciousness' places more emphasis on all the parties that have tried since Marx to supposedly help develop this.I think that they've been an impediment, not a help, in this necessary process.Never once, in over 130 years, has a socialist party successfully explained 'value' to workers. They've all said 'Read Marx', which is awful advice, since Marx must be one of the least understandable writers ever – perhaps with the exception of Hegel. Other explanations always involve other mysterious concepts, like 'abstract labour', which just piles on more nonsense upon nonsense. There has never been an explanation in terms of something workers already understand, so that once they grasp the general idea in non-economic terms, they can then move onto the difficulties of Marx's theories.And… you won't believe this, Victor… when I've tried to make value understandable by using metaphor, I've been roundly criticised, by all, not just the SPGB.IMO, most party members want to believe that they know more than workers, and they like it that way, and want it to stay that way. The last thing party members want is someone simplifying Marx's ideas, so that they are common currency!No, Victor, I don't place the blame on workers, who've often joined 'revolutionary' parties (for me, it was the SWP), but on the parties and their 'materialism', which is a religious approach to the world, which allows 'those in the know' to understand 'material conditions' better than workers. That's why 'materialists' won't have workers voting and telling the party what's right or wrong, whether in politics or physics.

Victor wrote:

I agree that socialism cannot work unless the majority of people have the capacity to understand it, and then choose to understand it and accept it.  I am not saying socialism won't happen, and I do hold to a democratic position similar to yours, but the issue remains of whether people (workers), on the whole, are able to understand.  (i). Is LBird special? (ii). Or are you really just typical and for some odd reason humanity has never had socialist societies…

Yes, I share your democratic position – even in physics and the production of all human knowledge. But most don't. They still look to academics and physicists, not workers, to tell them what the 'truth' of the social and natural world is.So, (i), I'm not special;and (ii) I'm a typical worker, wary of the self-appointed saviours.The reason is not odd, but that the socialist parties have made the very idea of 'socialist societies' seem like nonsense to workers.The simple fact is that, for most workers who have lived until today, the capitalist system has suited them. Even those prepared to struggle for higher wages and better employment conditions have not wanted a different society.The one thing I do agree about with the SPGB is the need to educate, develop and organise amongst our class. But no party is doing this, not even the SPGB, which, as far as I can tell, still subscribes to the religion of 'materialism', which maintains that 'knowledge' doesn't come from workers, but from 'matter'.Unless this nonsense is addressed, we'll all still be here in another 130 years… well, not 'us', but our political descendants.Parties have bullshitted workers since Marx's day, and workers aren't stupid. They might not know the answers, but they do know that the so-called workers' parties don't have them.Thanks again, for calling me 'nice', Victor. A refreshing change, comrade!

[Victor]

You're a very, very, very, very nice man.  Yes, you are. 

[robbo203]

alanjjohnstone wrote:

Robbo and LBird…i think we have to be sure of our words…Victor is wrong …people aren't ignorant…they are unaroused politically. We know our friends and co-workers only too well…they can analyse a football game with precision…they can judge a racehorse's capability to a photo fuinish…and they leave me mathematically dumbfounded when it comes to calculating all those complex bets at the bookies…it is certainly not from lack of intellectual prowness that workers do not understand socialism…it is the missing will that they lack.

 Alan, I will ignore LBird's, as per usual, idiotic drivel  about democracy anbd individualism – this from someone who hasnt a clue what democracy is for and  wants to organise several thousand plebiscites per year among a global population of 7 billion on the "truth" of  every new scientific  theory that comes on stream – and simply say that that  is what I took Victor to be saying – not that people are intellectually incapable of understanding socialism but that they are "politically unaroused".  In other words its motive that they are lacking, not ability. If Ive misread what Victor is saying then I take back what I said.  But it seems to me to be the case that by and large the workers are apathetic and disinclined to want to do anything about changing the world fundamentally.  Quite probably that stems from feelings of powerlessness and a lack of belief in themselves to make a differnece.  I dont like that state of affairs any more than you do but we have to know what it is we are up against in order to be able to do something about it.  Recognising what the problem is might just give us a clue as to how we go about solving it….

[Victor]

I suspect the central issue here is not going to be addressed honestly – partly because it possibly can't be.  Why does humanity have these hierarchical property-based systems in the first place?  Class systems, slave-holding and feudalism have all manifested in different ways in different human societies down the ages.  None of these were inevitable.  So why did they arise?  What does it say about the human condition?   Something is fucked-up here.  Something's wrong.  No-one really knows what it is.  Capitalism relies on the notion that it is a 'rational' or reason-based system, but if you ask me it is thoroughly irrational.  That's political knowledge.  It's putting the political back in the economic.  Why do only a few of us have this knowledge and awareness?  That can't be right, can it.  Which is not to say we're bound to be right.  We might be wrong, but most of us were once pro-capitalist or reformist, so we have experienced both sides of the fence.  How did we get here? I think there is an intellectual problem.  Not an intelligence problem, just a problem of culture and inclination, which may in turn have its roots in biologic factors.  Maybe the human brain (or mind, or both) is geared to be led in most cases, and those of us who 'odd' are the would-be leaders under different social circumstances.  It just so happens that, due to the accident of social circumstances, it's Richard Branson who is the captain of industry, not you and me.  Or is that just reactionary crap?A prospect can have all the intelligence in the world, but unless they're willing to receive the information and have an inclination to listen, then you might as well be talking to a brick wall.  Education in a way acts as a block.  It's a form of indoctrination.  We've all engaged online with the typical 'educated' American who has been indoctrinated in Austrian School linear economics and thinks socialism is anything to the left of John McCain.  That's what education (schooling) does.  It befuddles the mind.  That's why I suggest the problem is not intelligence, but intellect.  Anyone who has attempted to argue the SPGB case (I have) must surely recognise this.  It's represented in different forms in all our experiences.  Is this a result of something to do with the way people are, or is it just the social conditions?

[steve colborn]

I am a worker, no different to any other worker! I can understand the "Case" for Socialism and the necessity for the same. I had no especial knowledge, when I first approached The Socialist Party, in 1980. I had a sense of disquietude with society, something was not "right". When I met The Socialist Party, the disquietude was silenced, the confusion, abated.Why????????I'm nowt special. No particular acumen, no particular insight. Just a worker who was/is unsatisfied with the way society is organised.I agree with L Bird, we are nowt special! so what makes us special?Sort that out, solve the riddle of the Sphinx, the Gordian Knot, the Rosetta Stone and we've cracked it!!!Roll on the post election symposium/post-mortem!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Ozymandias]

Mate we are brainwashed in Capitalism from day one of life. How different it would be if along with the colossal bourgeois media empire there existed a parallel universe of Socialist media. School books, university courses, TV shows, current affairs, movies, books, radio shows, art, music…all about socialism. Mate you are talking as if all the worlds workers for the last 200 hundred years are completely clued up with Socialism and they are just self sobaotaging by not going for it. The majority of the 99% have just never ever heard an alternative put forward as a contrast to the shit we are all dished up every day. The mode of capitalist indoctrination is vast and utterly all encompassing…on all levels overt and covert, perceptible and subliminal. We've also been living in some form of private property society for about 10,000 years (or something) so many attitudes are hot wired into us. However there's more and more anger and dissatisfaction now. Btw the guy (Lbird?) who lumped the SPGB in with all the other arseholes calling themselves socialists is wrong. The SPGB  has never bulshitted a worker in its 111 year history. It's is the anthithesis of bullshit mate. You're the bullshit artiste. 

[robbo203]

steve colborn wrote:

I am a worker, no different to any other worker! I can understand the "Case" for Socialism and the necessity for the same. I had no especial knowledge, when I first approached The Socialist Party, in 1980. I had a sense of disquietude with society, something was not "right". When I met The Socialist Party, the disquietude was silenced, the confusion, abated.Why????????I'm nowt special. No particular acumen, no particular insight. Just a worker who was/is unsatisfied with the way society is organised.I agree with L Bird, we are nowt special! so what makes us special?Sort that out, solve the riddle of the Sphinx, the Gordian Knot, the Rosetta Stone and we've cracked it!!!Roll on the post election symposium/post-mortem!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 Its not a question of acumen or insight or intellectual ability Steve; its a question of motive or, if you like, values. Hence your paradox:  we are nowt special! so what makes us special? Vastly more people have heard the case for socialism than there are socialists.  Why do so few go on then to become socialists? There has to be something "special" about these few who become socialists in the sense that they are atypically predisposed more than others to become socialists.  To deny that seems foolish – a case of burying one's head in the sand  (not saying this is what you are doing though – you are clearly not which is why you recognise the paradox above) I think people exist along a spectrum of receptivity to socialist ideas and this may very well mean a more targeted approach to socialist propaganda is required. Part of the reason why many are currently reluctant to become socialists or work for socialism  is that they think it is just not credible in the sense that it is not going to happen in their lifetime. So why bother.  This of course then becomes a self fulfilling prophecy.  However,  as the movement grows and it crosses a certain critical threshold this factor is likely to weaken so you will start to see a significant acceleration in  the growth of the movement itself  Consciousness tends to expand exponentially rather than arithmetically. But, again, this reinforces the point about motive.  Some people may be inherently more conformist or unwilling to break the mould and may therefore require the presence of many more socialists around them before they feel secure enough to begin to make a move in the direction of socialism

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