Ozymandias
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I had a look at the website but I don't trust this shit. The minute I saw photo's of red flags with hammers and sickles, talk of revisionism vs anti-revisionism, "Imperialism" and "cadre development and leadership" I just turned off. It's the sick lexicon of the "Left"…it fills me with monstrous anger and rage. The problem for me with the "Left" is that as long as they continue to identify themselves as being on "the Left" then I wouldn't trust them as far as I could throw them no matter what they call themselves.
More about the Baltic Dry Index here… http://www.thedailysheeple.com/global-economic-slowdown-signals-sad-new-year_122012 How bad could this actually get? Reminds me of a front page from the Standard from a couple of years ago which stated "You ain't seen nothing yet".
"I'm not quite sure why we're discussing accents in a thread on Zeitgeist since, being in the Technocracy tradition, they probably think we should all speak like Stephen Hawking".Fuckin excellent!
I have never read an article in the Standard concerning regional accents and how they have impacted on the class divide. To me as a Glaswegian, listening to the entire myriad of different accents and inflections is always a musical delight for me. It's generally the earthiest accents which always interest me the most. The hundreds of different ways we proles talk in this island is a thing of beauty.
So what you are saying is that the working class could end up becoming a mass of Epsilons whilst the competing Alpha's control Frankenstein style dystopian states…with the prospect of class consciousness more and more unlikely without access to all of the essentials of education and life in general?Master smeet could you give me a link to the article you wrote? Aren't there some in the party who believe the problem of "Recursive Robotics" (a term I've never heard of) is a misnomer because the task of actually building and designing robots will make up the shortfall of other lost jobs which are irretrievably lost. I don't know enough about this issue. Does the party have one single stance on this?
I have just read the 7 page thread entitled "Is there, "Something wrong with the party's case and/or it's methods?" and it has profoundly depressed me. What a laughing stock the SPGB would be should left wingers (or anyone else for that matter) ever read this discourse. My eyes were opened at Summer School in July and when I was there my position was confirmed that I would never rejoin the party…I think the main thing that swung it for me was the way the speaker from Occupy Norwich was handled at Summer School. Frankly I was disgusted by the way this guy was treated. The party really doesn't do itself any favours does it?. The dude was being patronised from the start by members asking questions in the Saturday afternoon session incl an inebriated member who (even though he was pissed with a can of beer in his hand) was later allowed to chair an impossibly obtuse and highly intellectualised evening talk about Shakespeare which would have sent your average worker in the street fleeing in utter boredom. When it came time for a Q&A in the earlier afternnon session, another dissolute party member (a scruffy sort of dishevelled guy…don't know his name) posed a question then just as the Occupy dude was about to answer, the same member just got up and shuffled out of the room them came back in few minutes later then went out of the glass doors into the garden! The Occupy guy didn't know what was going on. To top all of this, at the very end of the night after having sat through that Shakespeare dreck the same poor cunt from Norwich was standing in the garden being ganged up on and lambasted with the case for Socialism by three evangelical members! I mean what kind of impression does this sort of arrogance give off? I say arrogance because most members wouldn't even see any of this as a problem. It would not even occur to them and it didn't that weekend…because in their heads the SPGB is always right no matter what. On top of all this was the homophobic shit that I had to sit through at dinner when another member was spouting out her distaste of the social mores of gay men in South London. Being gay myself I was obviously offended and flabbergated that a party member should be coming out with this shit. Yet despite my protestations the member in question seemed to be totally unconcerned. This really disgusted me."Clinical, critical, often aggressive cynicism." is what "SocialistPunk" stated is the main problem and I could not agree more. I think it is aggression in particular. I saw this at Summer School and also when I watched the video of the recent discussion with TZM in London. This is the problem with humans…it's the old ego that get's in the way every time when things aren't going as planned or hoped for. And things haven't been going anywhere for 108 years and herein lies the rub. I see the Party disappearing in years to come or at least surviving as a relic to be kept alive by a few curators. But it's not really the party's fault either. 108 years of frustration and disappointment coupled with the collosal and increasingly sophisticated Capitalist media/news/entertainment machine turns something like the SPGB into what it is today. This is the main reason behind the fact that the SPGB is wee because it is wee because it is wee etcThis problem also has an element that is much closer to home for me.The ultimate price has been paid by me (again because of this "Clinical, critical and often aggressive cynicism) because 18 months ago I had a massive blowout with my own father who is a 75 year old member. The reason? I dared to make similar criticisms of the party whilst making comparisions to TZM. I was basically disowned by him and that is when the big fall out came. Bearing in mind of course that my old man (like many members I imagine) has never actually read or watched a single piece of TZM material. I digress. I just fear the owning class will win in the end…and I'm talking about the end of history and humanity here because not only is our class hopelessly disorganised and utterly clueless, but the few hundred workers who are organised in WSM are in some ways totally at odds with each other. No wonder TZM decided to totally ditch all of their forums.I think this method of communication is counter-productive in a way because the level of invective I have read today might never happen if members were all together socialising in real life…although from some of the stories I heard over the years from Glasgow branch I wouldn't know so much. All you have to do is read some of the comments pages in newspaper websites or anywhere and eventually you will get folk slagging each other off. Sorry to be so pessimistic but I think we are all fucked. If even the SPGB can't get it together after all this time then humanity is doomed.
Thank you Gnome. Have read everything. V interesting. Esp the article by Adam. God what a goldmine there is in the Standard back catalogue! Cheers Ray
Are there any articles concerning the SPGB stance towards the SLP? I believe the SLP thought that the working class could abolish Capitalism by means of union action. What were the problems the SPGB saw in this position? Cheers Ray
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/sep/24/mitt-romney-self-creation-mythMissed that show last night Adam but just read this article which I thought was pretty good. As usual the comments are mostly good value. The words Capitalism and Socialism being banded about right, left and centre. Not in any way as streamlined as the SPGB or even the Zeitgeist scene but all bubbling under the surface. You wouldn’t have read this mainstream 10 years ago. Cheers Ray
Hi Mike, At summer school in July I mentioned to you that I would like to see a weekend devoted to the issues surrounding human sexuality and relationships in an insane society and what might be prefigured in our imaginations about how human intimacy might work in a sane society. I would also really appreciate a talk about societal attitudes towards same sex attraction both historically and currently through the prism of a purely socialist perspective. I think this would be a great idea for summer school…I mean we all have/or have had sex right? Cheers Ray
Five Minimalist Masterworks… Steve Reich: “Music for a Large Ensemble” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=96pj1SkFHsE John Adams: “The Chairman Dances” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Sde2s-tTOI Philip Glass: “Satyagraha” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CHKUt5fDbH0 Meredith Monk: “The Dolmen Music” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7su7d76LhWg Terry Riley: ” In C” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OjR4QYsa9nE Enjoy! Cheers Ray
Five Minimalist Masterworks… Steve Reich: “Music for a Large Ensemble” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=96pj1SkFHsE John Adams: “The Chairman Dances” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Sde2s-tTOI Philip Glass: “Satyagraha” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CHKUt5fDbH0 Meredith Monk: “The Dolmen Music” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7su7d76LhWg Terry Riley: ” In C” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OjR4QYsa9nE Enjoy! Cheers Ray
Some might say that the inclusion of “Imagine” at the end of the ceremonies is just an example of the “Illuminati” co-opting another working class rallying call…like what happened a few months ago with the image of Karl Marx on a credit card! I watched the whole ceremony (ritual?) last night and I could see signs of occult imagery and symbolism. It was fuckin obvious. I was trying to kid myself on that it was all just co-incidental but I am beginning to think some of this shit is REAL…
When will Sunday’s debate be available to watch online? I can’t see any reference to it on the UK Zeitgeist site. In the past couple of years I have noticed a distinct falling off in TZM activity. I don’t think they are going anywhere. Peter Joseph’s decision to get rid of the global forum (just one example of how undemocratic they are) is central to this. Also the last few times I’ve logged onto the TZM teamspeak site there is nobody there. When I first heard of TZM (by way of SOYMB) I put up a rather hard line post on the Zeitgeist website which led me into a mini online debate with PJ himself. My position towards TZM softened somewhat after this especially after watching “Zeitgeist: Moving Forward” which (except for the last 10 minutes) I thought was mostly excellent. I find that I oscillate between hope and enthusiasm that TZM even exists and despair that they can be so short sighted…especially about concepts of class and history which they ignore completely. I think at the end of the day despite how professional their message is presented, their position is totally half baked. Their story contains gigantic plot holes which only a Socialist can see through. I think in the past I had naively hoped that in some way both TZM and WSM could collaborate in some way. However as long as the Zeitgeister’s believe that Capitalism will eventually collapse and that the next society can be arrived at gradually and with no recourse to political or democratic action then they are about as relevant as the SWP or any other anarchist group. After I rushed into a branch meeting in Glasgow four years ago like a loon to tell the members about this new miracle called Zeitgeist, Vic Vanni prophesised that they could end up doing more harm than good in the end. Maybe he was right.
