[DJP]

Janet Biehl, a proponent of Bookchins 'Libertarian Municipalism' will be speaking at the Anarchist Bookfair in London this year, I might try and check that out…EDIT:Interestingly she seems to have gone further from Anarchism than Bookchin, calling herself a plain "social democrat" so the above should probably read "Janet Biehl, an ex-proponent…"http://social-ecology.org/2011/04/biehl-breaks-with-social-ecology/

[DJP]

Why would we want to buy them? There's a couple thousand or at least a few hundred in the basement of HO.

[DJP]

I've just read the book. It's not too bad. Bookchin is I think on of the best recent writiers to come out of Anarchism. I'm now taking notes and will hopefully be able to write something useful about it..

[DJP]

We're not (or shouldn't be) attacking *people* we're attacking *ideas* and *ideologies* etc…

[DJP]

Young Master Smeet wrote:

Slumps only end when the value of unprofitable capital is destroyed, either through bankruptcies or, as they are trying to do at the minute, through a slow heat death of inflation[*] (actually, falling wages could restore profitable investment, but obviously there are limits to that as well). [*] Yes, inflation is a form of taxation, since it is the state leeching value out of the economy, so I suppose we could count increased taxation as a means of destroying the value of capital, but the state would have to squander that tax money, and not spend it.

Inflation does not affect the amount of value in the economy it is only an increase in the amount of tokens representing that value. To talk of inflation as a means of taxation or means of ending a slump is quite wrong.

[DJP]

lanz the joiner wrote:

On August 16th The Socialist Party (@OfficialSPGB) tweeted along with a picture of Jeremy Corbyn's face superimposed onto a Marmite jar:"We oppose reformism for diverting people away from real socialism, and prolonging the profits-before-people system."On the WorldSocialism.org How the SPGB Is Different From Others page, it is written that:"The SPGB and our companion parties in the WSM neither promotes, nor opposes, reforms to capitalism."Is this an inconsistency, or is it the case that opposing "reformISM" is not the same thing as opposing "reformS".

Reformism is the belief that all the problems of capitalism can be overcome step by step through the incremental addition of piecemeal reforms.An individual reform is just that, an individual reform. Certain reforms, such as the legalisation of trade union activity, will be benificial to the whole of the working class though at the same time cannot overcome the root problems..

[DJP]

I think the interesting question though, is given that it has been shown again and again to not work, why do people still believe it does? The vast majority of people are still under the influence of magical thinking it seems..

[DJP]

I have to break the rules and agree. The last bit of moderation of this thread was unnecessary and rather OTT as far as I’m concerned…

[DJP]

There's a good explanation of how homeopathy works on this website.www.HowDoesHomeopathyWork.com

[DJP]

alanjjohnstone wrote:

This may be of interest to you Meel – a report of a talk given by the late Pieter Lawrence on the topic of law and socialismhttp://socialismoryourmoneyback.blogspot.com/2012/05/socialism-and-law.html

Good article. Just to re-emphasize democracy is not the absence of rules and structures quite the contrary an absence of rules leads to what Jo Freeman called "the tyranny of structurelessness".

[DJP]

The difference being that democracy would allow things to be more fluid and not dominated by the interests of a minority.I don't think we need to go overboard with details or cases since it is not up to us but the people then and there.And of course it depends how you define 'laws', to me that suggests something too rigid and outside the influence of society at large.

[DJP]

Yes there will be some kind of socially decided rules, what they are and how they are enforced will be decided democratically like everything else. And democracy itself, after all, requires certain rules and structures in order to operate and exist.

[DJP]

I think this is a long way off..But anyhow a spoilt vote isn't really a vote for socialism. The only way to get more of those is to get more candidates to stand 

[DJP]

gnome wrote:

Emulate Kent & Sussex branch?  

Out of interest how do most new enquirers find the branch, through the website, seeing the street stall or something else?

[DJP]

I wonder if the BBC lost it's state funding it would continue to make programmes such as this one:http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p02gyz6b

[Author]

Posts