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This has to be Seen to be Believed TK:  “Do you believe that matter has an existence independent of your perception of it?”LBird:  “The answer is ‘No’” LBird’s irrelevance that “nature is matter or energy” doesn’t alter his answer ‘No’.LBird’s immaterialist “we created matter as inorganic nature” doesn’t alter his answer ‘No’.LBird’s denial of inherent properties to nature confirms his answer ‘No’.LBird’s denial of nature’s incessant dynamism—from the universal to the quantum—confirms his answer ‘No’.LBird’s assertion that only we change nature—because we create it—conclusively establishes his Berkelean reality that the ultimate philosophical answer is ‘No’.     Marxismus est Berkeleismus     —LBird [22/09/2016]
   

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ALB wrote:

After all, while nobody, not even us, can make capitalism work in the interest of the workers, it is still possible to make things less worse — though of course that’s not the job of the party

But the 20th century history of things made “less worse” against the interests of capital reveals their subsequent reversal by, and in the interests, of the very capital they were vainly supposed to thwart.Every substantial “less worse” gain has been wound back.Capital must grind the working class inexorably for as long as the working class supports it.  In that context, amelioration of the effects of capital is a natural reaction to the grinding effects of capital, but its lasting “less worse” efficacy can only be wishful thinking.

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The substantive point is can anyone—the Party included—run capitalism in any but the interests of capital?

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The SPA case, as quoted above, is the only socialist position.The Party has only one Object.  Its Object and Declaration of Principles leave no room for doubt.It is a mug’s game for the Party to attempt to administer capitalism in the interests of the working class.The Party case is that nobody—not even the Party—can run capitalism.  Otherwise what on earth is its case against reformism?The Party case is that capital runs capitalism.Do you really think that anyone—including the Party—can steer capitalism in working class interests?Do you really believe it possible?

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What a feeble cop out from the rampant anti-socialist who urges people to vote for the Truth of Capitalism in his other life, yet feigns esoteric mental elitism to dodge exoteric substantiation of his anti-Party sniping in this one.Chomsky’s fantasy is that mankind is born innate with every language that was, is and ever will be.LBird’s fantasy exceeds Chomsky’s.  His fantasy conjures into thought a Utopia ruled by post-doctoral encyclopaedic dilettantism.LBird’s Utopians are indistinguishable from games-show contestants whose special subject is the truth of everything that was, is and ever will be.LBird’s Utopians’ perpetual task is to dictate to the social practitioners actually practicing the actual truth of the practitioners’ actual practice.From such Utopian omniscience, nobody buys your feigned intellectual cop out.Demonstrate the courage of your convictions:Lay yourself open to exoteric criticism, or else skulk off ignominiously like a rebuffed cur with tail between legs.

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Well join the Jehovah’s Witnesses if their campaigning—a purely capitalist electoral issue—is so superior.  Follow the leader….

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Have you finally gone round the bend?

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‘Write-In’ VotingAustralian voters are legally permitted to ‘write-in’ a political message on their ballot paper as long as it doesn’t identify the voter nor obscure the voting intention.This lets you squib ALB’s dilemma…You could shamefacedly cast a reformist “NO” on a Referendum ballot paper while simultaneously ‘writing-in’ a revolutionary message     W O R L D   S O C I A L I S M without spoiling your vote.Against this dualism, I hold that no better electoral case has ever been—or could ever be—written, and ‘written-in’, than the Socialist Party of Australia’s case ALB quotes:

The SPA wrote:

Therefore, the Socialist Party of Australia maintains that it is not in the interest of the working class to vote either “YES” or “NO”.  One issue, and one issue alone, is worthy of working class support: Socialism.  You can use this referendum to reject the two evils offered to you, and at least protest against this rotten system by writing “SOCIALISM” across the ballot paper.  Then, when you understand the choice before you, come and join us in more positive action!"

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Wasting the Vote?In answer to those who scoff that writing     W O R L D   S O C I A L I S M across a ballot paper is wasting or spoiling a vote…In 1981 the Australian state of Tasmania held a state Referendum over whether to build a hydro-electric dam above or below the junction of two wild rivers, but without an anti-dam choice.As the proposed dam was to be built in UNESCO World Heritage wilderness, the disenfranchised “No Dam” movement openly urged people to use their vote by writing—as if in emulation of century-old Socialist Party practice—     N O   D A M S across their Referendum ballot papers.Here are the Referendum results https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franklin_Dam_controversy8% for a dam above the junction47% for a dam below the junction45% informal.Significantly, over 33%, or one-third of Tasmanians, voting under a compulsory franchise, wrote     N O   D A M S across their Referendum ballot papers to register their intention.  The Referendum was ultimately lost.Writing     W O R L D   S O C I A L I S M across your ballot paper is a vote for Socialism.  It is not, in the socialist sense, spoiling your ballot paper nor wasting your rare opportunity to vote.Abstention is how you waste your precious vote for socialism!

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Vote No or Vote “World Socialism”In Australia, voting at federal and state elections is compulsory.  Abstention is not an option.The [World] Socialist Party of Australia’s default electoral position was to register a vote for world socialism, either byvoting for a standing Party candidateor writing     W O R L D   S O C I A L I S M across the ballot paper.ALB asks whether a vote of “No” is an appropriate response to a referendum like the 1951 Australian federal Referendum to “Ban the Communist Party”, a ban that readily extends itself to embrace the Socialist Party?My answer is that, despite the serious emergency situation of such a Referendum vote, with dire collateral consequences for the Party, an opposing vote of “No” is not the appropriate response, and I would personally vote the default:     W O R L D   S O C I A L I S M But I would not urge others to vote the same way on such a crucial issue that puts the short-term survival of the Socialist Party on the agenda.I point out that the reformist—though, at the time considered, revolutionary—German Social Democrats flourished under Bismark’s anti-socialist laws.  That, of course, is no convincing argument against voting “No”.  But it does suggest that suppression of social movements and censorship of social thought rebounds in the long term against the short-term social suppressor and thought censor.I wonder if any articles from Australia appeared in the Socialist Standard at the time that may suggest what stance the Australian Party took.

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Australian ReferendaAn Australian referendum is a vote to change the Australian Constitution.  For it to succeed, and thereby change the Australian Constitution, the referendum vote—which is compulsory under the Constitution—must jump two distinct hurdles:a majority of votes across the nationa majority in a majority of the states (excluding the territories: ACT & NT).The second hurdle is a historical safeguard, written into the Australian Constitution, to assure electoral protection to the constituent states that wrote it, independent of the size of their individual population.  How the populous states agreed to this is anyone’s guess.Consequently, the second hurdle often turns into a barrier to Constitutional change, for if a group of less populated states (e.g., Tasmania, South Australia and Western Australia) opposes a federal referendum proposal—perhaps on party lines—that proposal will fail no matter how overwhelming the national majority.  As a consequence, only 8 out of 44 Australian referendum proposals have been carried since Federation in 1901.Equal representation by unequally populated states, in both referenda and in the senate [the federal upper house], once famously provoked frustrated Prime Minister Paul Keating to call the senators “unrepresentative swill”.Australian PlebiscitesOn the other hand, when the Australian federal government drafts a plebiscite it is free to set its own electoral criteria, and to ignore state-by-state breakdowns.Even so, federal government-backed plebiscites are not necessarily pushovers for the government that proposes them.As ALB mentioned, in 1916 the Australian Labor government lost two plebiscites over military conscription during WWI, the second was lost even after Prime Minister Hughes extended the franchise to troops at the front.  [Unlike other WWI armed forces, Australian soldiers were non-conscripted volunteers—a testimony both to innocence bred of isolation and the emotional hold over them of the “ideal” of heeding the mother country’s call “in the defence of her Great Empire”.  That was a century ago.]I will discuss the issue abstention in a subsequent post.

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LBird’s methodology for “developing class consciousnes”

LBird wrote:

So much for socialists helping to develop the class consciousness of workers, and bringing the class up to the abilities of the bourgeois elites.

“I tell workers to vote for the Labour Party”  Voting for Labour = Labour is True  Labour is True = Capitalism is True∴ LBird tells workers:       Socialism is False.LBird tells workers what to think  Elitists tell workers what to think  Manipulating thought = Falsifying the Vote  Falsifying the vote = Untruth  Voting is the basis of LBird’s Utopia∴ LBird’s Utopia condones:       falsification of Truth by elitist manipulators.LBird’s voting practice in light of Marx’s Thesis VIII“All social life is essentially practical.  All mysteries which lead theory to mysticism find their rational solution in human practice and in the comprehension of this practice.” — Karl Marx, Theses on Feuerbach.The mystery of LBird’s wacky theory is unmasked by LBird’s practice of how he actually votes for the Truth.   Thanks Karl Marx.

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Anti-socialist illusion of political power in socialism

LBird wrote:

the class conscious democratic proletariat is going to have political power in socialism

The Socialist case (Object and Declaration of Principles [1904] originating from Marx) has always been:Political power is a necessary attribute of a class-divided society.Common ownership and democratic control of the social means of production removes class division, and hence removes classes and class politics.LBird seeks political power over non-existent class enemies in a classless society — chief among whom are political power hungry bourgeois scientists, intent on taking over the socialist world and experimenting, à la Dr Mengele, on unsuspecting class-conscious proletarians in socialism!

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Et tu, Alan!

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Meel wrote:

So, who is currently taking the course in Acology in the SP?  I would like to enrol.

Meel, you happen to be in luck.  Student LBird hastily pulled out in a huff.Student LBird proved constitutionally incapable of advancing beyond Acarology (mites) — things mite happen if you think them into existence, like Yahweh.  External necessity is a myth!Student LBird failed for not advancing beyond a philosophical mindset.This explains why failed student LBird must repeat, repeat, repeat, repeat, repeat, …

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