Satire and counterpropaganda.
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Hi covvie99, nice to hear from you on the forum.
Just something to add to the discussion, you have stated that ” The idea that the far-left – Communism and far-right – Fascism are related is a new concept that right-whinge think tanks spread.”
If by far Left Communism you refer to the ideas of Lenin, the Bolsheviks and their various political descendents (Maoists, Castroists, etc.), comparing these anti socialist, anti democratic, elitist political movements as having similarities with the far right is not by anyway a new concept and did not originate in right wing think tanks. The Socialist Party of Great Britain has made these comparisons for many decades. The term red fascist has been a commonplace for many decades.
Back in the early 1980s, in a bar room discussion with members of the SWP, I explained to a student member of the SWP that I considered their “democratic centralist” processes as being red fascism. He responded by saying that if I said that again, he would put a pint glass in my face. He did not understand my laughter when I pointed out to him that he had just proved my point.
With regard to left and right, this concept has the idea of a spectrum of political beliefs which places various view points somewhere on that spectrum.
The Socialist Party has long dismissed the idea that for example the Labour Party or the Trotskyists or various other “socialist” movements who put forward the idea of campaigning to reform capitalism in various ways, have anything in common with those (i.e. us) who campaign for the immediate and complete democratic abolition of capitalism and its replacement with a society based on free access, common ownership and the concept of “from each according to their ability to each according to their needs” (i.e. genuine communism).
In that sense our party see the key political decision as being, as one of campaigning to continue with capitalism (with any of the variations of capitalism, including nationalisation of parts of the productive forces and various forms of state capitalism) or do you campaign to end capitalism.
This was the key question that arose in the formation of the Socialist Party of Great Britain when our party split with the Social Democratic Federation, in 1904. The founders of our party put forward declared principles which members of our party continue to put forward. We have continued to organise to promote those democratic principles for nearly 120 years.
You may not have come across our political party before this point, you may not agree with our viewpoint, but if you are interested in political thought and activity, I am pretty sure you will find our perspective interesting and unique.
There are lots and lots of articles from our monthly magazine (which has been in continuous production since 1904) on the website, contemporaneous articles that explain our position and activities, covering events such as WW1, the Bolshevik Revolution, WW2, etc. etc. that stretch back to 1904 as well as lots of current articles.
Going back to the original point, regarding humour and satire, I agree with you that humour and satire can be one of the most powerful tools we have, we do not use it as well as we should.
Bolshevik ideology is revolutionary Socialism. My reference is related to the singular term state, Bolsheviks wanted a Socialist/Communist state. Maximilien François Marie Isidore de Robespierre was a revolutionary leader. Revolution is a bloody game, where innocents and collaborators alike often die. How Paine was treated is a matter for history, he refused to support the execution by guillotine of Louis XVI and for that, he was imprisoned until an American diplomat helped free him and Paine left France in 1802/3 for America. I’m not interested in pedantically debating minutia, I get enough of that with the right. I’m counterpropaganda if you want endless pedantic debate around conflations and semantics you’ve come to the wrong person…
Thank you. I reject the idea that violence is a Fascist concept, revolutionaries use violence to free people from oppression, and Fascists use violence to oppress. When you talk about oppressive aspects of Communism I’d argue that the authoritarian and dictatorial nature of those regimes negates them from claiming Communist or Socialist ideologies. I’m old so when I say new concepts I mean they have been touted by the right in the past few decades to dismiss Socialism and stigmatise Communism. I am a proponent of ending Capitalism through an ideological shift or direct action, but I would propose a new system based on the central principles of Socialism/Communism. I understand that advocating Communism and Socialism directly would be an impossible sell to the world, too much bad blood so to speak. Partly because of preconceptions surrounding those systems, and party because most of us grew up in a Capitalist world and suffer from Capitalist biases, teachings, misconceptions, dogma etc. I am an ally but prefer to remain outside of political affiliation.
From my ebook: “I will admit that despite my preference for Social Democracy/Democratic Socialism over Neoliberalism I think we need to design a new system. Utilising a group of our best city planners, engineers, architects, resource management experts, security advisors, ecological experts, human rights lawyers, inventors, technical experts etc to complete the task of creating a sustainable resource-based economy (The value of goods are based on sustainability, availability, labour intensity etc. To achieve the consistent global values of a resource) and a community that is ecologically sound and based around decentralised power. Essentially taking advantage of modern technology, like the ability to gain a consensus of the population in minutes on any given topic and therefore removing the middlemen who usurp power for their corporate causes via lobbying and corrupt politicians.
A pipe dream maybe, but something to work towards. It just seems to me that rather than wasting our lives in the pursuit of profits/wealth, we should be more concerned with individual growth and personal development – becoming the best version of ourselves. While creating a society using the best technologies and materials available to allow human beings to thrive.”
I’m brand new here too and a new member of the SPGB.
Personally I really dislike the terms “left” and “right” to be honest.
In my view both leftists (Labour, Leninists, Stalinists, Dengists ect) and “rightists” just want to govern capitalism or “make it work” for “us”.“Us” being the people they are trying to convince to get them into power.
While I believe Lenin actually thought he was committing a worthwhile contribution to the establishment of socialism, unfortunately the truth of the matter is, that at best he showed us what not to do and at worst he made the name “socialism” look so horrific it will never be a popular ideology again (I mean real socialism here, not what most people think of ie Norway and Bernie).
I also fully agree with humour and satire, but I honestly feel the SPGB needs to move with the times and really become active on social media like YouTube if we hope to wake people up (obviously as a new party member I do not know for sure what methods we are using to reach fellow workers, so I may be being presumptuous here).
Anyway this is my first post so hi all!
Hi and welcome, as far as I’m concerned left and right is just a term to describe the difference between ideologies that seek to control or free humanity. The right is about control and manipulation, while the left is about community and compassion. We are social animals so the left is a natural inclination for me. Unfortunately all systems no matter how well intended are subject to human flaws. People who want to use them to rise to power so they can dominate others. The sooner we drop the idea of hierarchy the better, unfortunately, those who seek to dominate will say it’s inherent in human beings, I’d disagree.
Please feel free to read some of the Tory bashing and salient points regarding Capitalism and Finance on my blog. I’d hope to provide a few laughs too.
Take care!
Welcome along ActualSocialist10 and welcome to the Party.
I was saying a similar thing to you regarding Lenin a few weeks back, when I was talking to a guy I know who’s involved with Socialist Appeal (effectively the Militant Tendency who stayed in the Labour Party). If it was Russia and it was Oct 1917 you might think his approach might work and it was worth a shot.
The problem is that despite the fact it was a miserable failure and resulted in oppression of workers since day 1, many workers seem to think that the Leninist approach is a way forward!
I also agree with you that social media is the currently the most powerful way of spreading our ideas. Sadly we haven’t done that as well as we could. This isn’t meant as criticism of the worry of comrades who do this work, I think that from a generational frame of reference we are not particularly “tech savvy”.
The good thing is that because we are a truly Democratic Party, the resources of the party are available to any member to use as a way of spreading our message.
The status of a member of our party is the same regardless of them being a member for one day or being a member for 60 years
AS10
also glad to find a new voice on the forumRegards Lenin, there have been two views of him among party members. That he was always a social democrat revolutionary masquerading as a Marxist or that he was a sincere Marxist but had to respond pragmatically to events and conditions he encountered. Our obituary of him was fairly sympathetic
A blast of satire from the past:
I always take the view that Lenin was the ultimate Anarchist which I believe was the view of some Social Democrats of the time…
I like that, It’s a strange world where comedians tell the truth and politicians provide the jokes. The Wicked Witch of Westminster and her crocodile tears. If only we could find the object that ties Suella Braverman to this world and then destroy it, in doing so send her back to the underworld from whence she came! The same goes for Priti.
Covvie, the problem is not the Tories, it’s capitalism.
Do you really think a Labour government is going to make any difference? They are just the alternative management team for British capitalism and will run it in the future in the way they did in the past — in the only way it can be, as a profit system in the interest of the profit-takers not the wage-earners.
Hey ALB, *my reply was deleted and now it’s telling me I can’t repost it as it’s a duplicate* Part 1 attempted repost: I left Labour when Blair dropped clause 4 mate. Starmer is a second-rate Blair tribute act. Until you overthrow Capitalism then we have to deal with the consequences of the current system. Labour are the lesser of two evils, If you’ve read my stuff you’ll have seen that I’m aware that we have the choice between red and blue neoliberalism. I’d prefer Social Democracy over Neoliberalism and I’d prefer to change the system. But pipe dreams aside we have to deal with what’s here right now. I’ll be first in line at the march when that day comes mate, but I’m not an optimist and I’m also not going to pretend the overthrow of Capitalism is likely to occur in my lifetime. We have Authoritarian legislation coming down the pipeline to stop striking, stop protests, increase surveillance, increase censorship, increase kangaroo courts via remote judgements and a legal aid desert and much more.
I understand the points in your argument, but while they are useful theoretical points and for the most part accurate. We have to deal with the reality we face right now. Tories are the problem right now, cronyism, corruption, nepotism, authoritarianism and a leaning towards Fascist corporatocracy are the immediate concerns we face. The Overton window has shifted far to the right, not only in Britain but also globally – Italy, Hungry etc. You aren’t going to convince anyone to change Capitalism by arguing among yourselves on semantics and interpretations of ideology. I’ve spent decades influencing people on social media and it’s still only a drop in the ocean.
I’m sure we’d agree on much, unfortunately, logic and reason don’t work against the gestalt weight of a million idiots. Especially when they just regurgitate tabloid narratives. The media is a kaleidoscope of multicoloured bullshit and most people don’t look further than the pretty colours. Spend some time on social media and you’ll see what you’re up against. Not to mention the censorship you’ll face. I’m kicked off Twitter and barely get 10% of comments through the youtube filter.
Hey Alb, Part 2 of repost of deleted, spam-filtered reply: You have two choices as I see it; an ideological shift or direct action. The wealthy will block direct action with more than just legislation and the police. They’ll be quite happy to get rid of us in a heartbeat if we threaten their hegemony.
The wealthy aren’t planning to keep us plebs around anyway mate. The global market for “incident and emergency management” (bunkers, supplies, closed systems for air and water) is expected to jump in value from $132.4 billion in 2021 to $423 billion by 2025. In Switzerland alone, there is space for approximately nine million people in one of the country’s 360,000 bunkers. While Norway hosts the Svalbard seed bank with over a million varieties from all over the world. While American companies currently control a leading share of the $224 billion global private military and security company (PMSC) industry. The rich aren’t worried about the rest of us, they can wait it out in bunkers. What plan do you have to deal with billionaires their bunkers and private armies?
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