cardiff's golden jubilee: but where was the previous capital?

[neprimerimye]

Oh, completely unconnected to those before or after us afaik.

a big problem with the @ scene imo.

Not really. We're talking here of distinct phases in what is a regional city that lacks a mileu sizeable enough to support any kind og continuity. Indeed even in london there is precious little real continuity in terms of both organisation and leading figures. 'Freedom' is the only constant.

I suspect that if we excavated the anarcho scene of 68-75 in Cardiff what we would find is a bunch of people with far more varied ideas than the latter groups. Many with semi-marxist ideas and many more liberal and anti-aithoritarian than anything more positive. Which as things got more serious in the 1970's they broke up into their constituent parts.

Then you have Rolys scene which ha some continuity with what went before but was to a considerable degree the result of heavy youth unemployment in those years. Something Class War really capitalised on later and I think we should not ingore the Crass influence or cider-anarchism either. Yuck.

Both waves were then in my opinion the result of specific circumstances and generationally based. Which is not true of chilangos smaller milieu which was the result, to a degree, of the failure the SWP to hold some of them and their becoming pissed off as a result of the conservatism of that degenerating sect. Although to be fair they also felt the first stirrings of the current 'anti-capitalist' wave.

Which the current mob are the present local embodiment of in my opinion. Largely isolated and ideologically ossifed in the alter-ghetto. Very similar to the 'Trotskyist' sects in fact if with formally very different politics.

 

[chilango]

Although to be fair they also felt the first stirrings of the current 'anti-capitalist' wave.

´

If itw wasn`t for us Seattle would never have happenned!

really.

 

[llantwit]

What did you lot get up to the Chilango? (without naming names, like )

 

[llantwit]

Not really. We're talking here of distinct phases in what is a regional city that lacks a mileu sizeable enough to support any kind og continuity. Indeed even in london there is precious little real continuity in terms of both organisation and leading figures. 'Freedom' is the only constant.

I suspect that if we excavated the anarcho scene of 68-75 in Cardiff what we would find is a bunch of people with far more varied ideas than the latter groups. Many with semi-marxist ideas and many more liberal and anti-aithoritarian than anything more positive. Which as things got more serious in the 1970's they broke up into their constituent parts.

Then you have Rolys scene which ha some continuity with what went before but was to a considerable degree the result of heavy youth unemployment in those years. Something Class War really capitalised on later and I think we should not ingore the Crass influence or cider-anarchism either. Yuck.

Both waves were then in my opinion the result of specific circumstances and generationally based. Which is not true of chilangos smaller milieu which was the result, to a degree, of the failure the SWP to hold some of them and their becoming pissed off as a result of the conservatism of that degenerating sect. Although to be fair they also felt the first stirrings of the current 'anti-capitalist' wave.

Which the current mob are the present local embodiment of in my opinion. Largely isolated and ideologically ossifed in the alter-ghetto. Very similar to the 'Trotskyist' sects in fact if with formally very different politics.

You're like some kind of revolutionary sage, there, eh Nep?
Genuine question - have you been in any parties or anything? Ex swoppie? Worker's Power?

 

[neprimerimye]

Depends on how you measure levels of success, I suppose.
You could say the same about the more party-oriented left in Cardiff.

My measure of success is to ask to what degree are class consciousness and class organisation developed from any given initiative.

Which why I consider that just about all initiatives from both the anarchist/libertarian and marxist/trotskyist camps have been pretty much dismal failues for the past thirty years. Despite the best intentions of most concerned and a lot of hard work besides.

In truth the activities of both camps do little to develop class consciousness/organisation at all. Mostly they just build their own sects and only rarely find themselves 'leading' anything larger and then by chance.

That said some do good work in the unions but given the degree of bureaucratisation of those bodies they do so as unionists not as revolutionists. Despite their intentions their work is easily recuperated unless and until they can achieve enough backing to develop autonomous workers action.

 

[llantwit]

My measure of success is to ask to what degree are class consciousness and class organisation developed from any given initiative.

Which why I consider that just about all initiatives from both the anarchist/libertarian and marxist/trotskyist camps have been pretty much dismal failues for the past thirty years. Despite the best intentions of most concerned and a lot of hard work besides.

In truth the activities of both camps do little to develop class consciousness/organisation at all. Mostly they just build their own sects and only rarely find themselves 'leading' anything larger and then by chance.

That said some do good work in the unions but given the degree of bureaucratisation of those bodies they do so as unionists not as revolutionists. Despite their intentions their work is easily recuperated unless and until they can achieve enough backing to develop autonomous workers action.

Fair enough.

 

[neprimerimye]

Fair enough.

No it's not. It's crap. It doesn't take things forward.

Although in my defence it does at least try to be realistic which is not something i see coming from either of the two camps at present.

 

[UncleRoly]

one of those involved remains a friend to this day.

I wonder who. Any answer off board, natch.

108 it should be made clear was not an anarcho thing.

Didn't say it was, but @s were a large component of the volunteers.
It sold Stalinist "Progress Editions", (good markup); Uni. reading list stuff; LGB; Marxist Humanist; CPGB, (Still remember Ed) etc etc. as well as @ and squatting. I got in trouble for ordering Furry Freak Brothers and similar in an attempt to get some punters through the door.

By the mid-1980's it was marginal and very badly organised as I recall.

I can't remember when the Nett Book Agreement was broken, but the competition was hotting up.

The Claimants Union that you mention was also dying when you guys got involved.

Before my time. I arrived in Cardiff in '79

none of you were actually in unions the syndicalism bit didn't actually mean anything.

I was, before during and after. Which has not entirely helped my career.
In the pub, nwnm mentions, I organised membership of (GMB) Five Star, (no, not the ones with hair and sequinned lycra), and co-led a successful wildcat strike over a sacking.

At the last place you saw me, an accounts clerk got sacked for pregnancy. We got her in the union, which helped her legally. Too bad the place got closed before we were realy organised.

Adhering to A-S rank and file principles, (as much as possible), helps overcome the cynicism of prospective members.

Was Bone involved with the Scorcher? It was very funny as i remember it with many of the jokes designed to appeal to/piss off the official Labour movement types and the far left. Quite dissimilar to Class War really.

Am I right in detecting irony in a Marxist? Bone was "ap Asgwrn" of course.

Do you still have the Tory Funerals tape? If not i may be able to locate a copy. As for the Megaton Men single, contact address my Nans house as you note, there was nothing anarcho about it.

I've still got the quarter inch master of TF, and put the tracks up on the old MP3.com but some obscure hip hop outfit are now impersonating us, so that's stuffed searching for anything.

I really need to get any recordings of a previous session with "Island Wars" if you have it. I do have a copy of the Abergavenny gig, but that is a feed off the PA, and crap. It still didn't stop the sound of the crowd's err... "friskiness", mind, or the incoming beer glasses. Metallic K.O. or what?
Worth hearing for Bone slurring "You can't f*cking dance to this, w*nkers".

I didn't claim that the Megs were overtly @ but 50 to 75% of the members were, and a lot of the lyrics were intended to be provokative. This actually worked: I got threatened over "Press Ups", but that might have been something to do with the Basil Fawlty goosestepping. No sense of irony, some people.

 

[chilango]

What did you lot get up to the Chilango? (without naming names, like )

will get back to you on this soon...

 

[llantwit]

No it's not. It's crap. It doesn't take things forward.

Although in my defence it does at least try to be realistic which is not something i see coming from either of the two camps at present.

I was generally agreeing with you, not having a go - not sure I liked the feeling.

 

[neprimerimye]

I was generally agreeing with you, not having a go - not sure I liked the feeling.

Sure I understood that. My post was self critical not critical of you.

In any case i'm only little concerned by the labels epople pin on themselves whether they be anarcho or trot or whatever. i'm far more interrested in what their actions result in. Which as iv'e pointed out in both cases has for the main part been up themselves.

The problem is in pointing this out, which itself outrages those for whom politics is a relgious faith not a path towards the emancipation of man, it does not move us forward.

 

[UncleRoly]

I've got to agree with neprimerimye on the lack of continuity, and the in-fighting at its root.

There's often too much concern with ideological purity rather than what unites us.
(By the time we get the theory right, everything will have moved on).

That having been said, when the various factions do get behind a mass movement like CND; Anti-Poll-Tax; Iraq, the results can be startling.

@s are not interested in membership. What is important is proximity to the half-interested, and the huge boost in confidence with even the most generalised opposition to to the established order.
SWPies do this as an established tactic, and have tried to jump on every bandwaggon I can remember. I know this from many tiresome meetings in the Central Hotel etc. Their problem was always that their focus was to sign everyone up to the paper and party discipline, and chuck the issue overboard.

Every step to freedom has an importance in its own right, and just because they are single issue successes, rather than a putsch does not diminish them.

We are social revolutionaries and don't want to seize anything to usher in the "dictatorship of the proletariat".
The movement is a means to an end, and that end is the realization of a philosophy.

 

[neprimerimye]

Oh the idiot on drums is still a chum although we've not been in touch for while. And i still run into a lot of the people involved with the Megs. From a later era Chilango is a distant friend - well he is lving on another continent!

On 108. Sure volunteers came and went. I was one for a while! Don't think that the abolition of the NBA did for the left bookshops so much as a lot of their sales dissappeared as we moved into different conditions in the late 1970's and then the 1980's. And a lot of the feminist stuff was going mainstream too which ripped a chunk of the market away.

Anarchosyndicalism. Ok respect for that. But thats one individual and i a marginal workplace. What my mob were on about back then was actually a lot closer to the older Anarchosyndicalist ideas of building in industry than anything you gys were involved. And we had a bit of a toehold in those days too so it was a bit more than talk though i would not like to exagerate what we had it was marginal. But our comrades related to networks of rank and filers in other cities which gave us more clout than an individual operating on his/her lonesome.

Irony? You've obviously not read any Marx even now. Unlike say Bakunin the guy was deliberately funny.

On the Megs. Aw c'mon I know the drummer was involved with Class War and stuff but he wasn't political properly speaking. Other than repeating a couple of stock phrases he hadn't a clue and little real interest. That said he was and is principled in that he knows who the class enemy are and how to spot them. As for the others which of them was really political PM me with a reply.

Tapes. I'll ask Robin R and through him Jason S both have stacks of old tapes of the various bands they were in over the years. Something might turn up.

I wonder who. Any answer off board, natch.

Didn't say it was, but @s were a large component of the volunteers.
It sold Stalinist "Progress Editions", (good markup); Uni. reading list stuff; LGB; Marxist Humanist; CPGB, (Still remember Ed) etc etc. as well as @ and squatting. I got in trouble for ordering Furry Freak Brothers and similar in an attempt to get some punters through the door.

I can't remember when the Nett Book Agreement was broken, but the competition was hotting up.

I was, before during and after. Which has not entirely helped my career.
In the pub, nwnm mentions, I organised membership of (GMB) Five Star, (no, not the ones with hair and sequinned lycra), and co-led a successful wildcat strike over a sacking.

At the last place you saw me, an accounts clerk got sacked for pregnancy. We got her in the union, which helped her legally. Too bad the place got closed before we were realy organised.

Adhering to A-S rank and file principles, (as much as possible), helps overcome the cynicism of prospective members.

Am I right in detecting irony in a Marxist? Bone was "ap Asgwrn" of course.

I've still got the quarter inch master of TF, and put the tracks up on the old MP3.com but some obscure hip hop outfit are now impersonating us, so that's stuffed searching for anything.

I really need to get any recordings of a previous session with "Island Wars" if you have it. I do have a copy of the Abergavenny gig, but that is a feed off the PA, and crap. It still didn't stop the sound of the crowd's err... "friskiness", mind, or the incoming beer glasses. Metallic K.O. or what?
Worth hearing for Bone slurring "You can't f*cking dance to this, w*nkers".

I didn't claim that the Megs were overtly @ but 50 to 75% of the members were, and a lot of the lyrics were intended to be provokative. This actually worked: I got threatened over "Press Ups", but that might have been something to do with the Basil Fawlty goosestepping. No sense of irony, some people.

 

[UncleRoly]

our comrades related to networks of rank and filers in other cities which gave us more clout than an individual operating on his/her lonesome.

Point taken.

Irony? You've obviously not read any Marx even now.

Marx... was not a Marxist.

On the Megs. Aw c'mon I know the drummer was involved with Class War and stuff but he wasn't political properly speaking. Other than repeating a couple of stock phrases he hadn't a clue and little real interest. That said he was and is principled in that he knows who the class enemy are and how to spot them. As for the others which of them was really political PM me with a reply.
[/QUOTE]
I'm glad you qualifed your comments on D**no. I've been trying to get hold of him for a long time. Other than trying through his parents, I've drawn a blank. I will PM or Skype

 

[neprimerimye]

No no no! You do not agree with me! You don't even understand what i wrote. Which is my fault for not being clearer.

The lack of continuity is not due to infighting at all. The infighting s a result of various class pressures on tendencies and individuals in the anarchist movement. (The same is true of the marxists of course). Which is then mediated into fights over direction of the collective concerned. All of which is made more flamable because most of those concerned are young and to some degree unskilled ideologically and personal facors loom large as a result.

Look it doesn't matter one little bit if one of you says i'm a communist anarchist, another says i'm a council communist, another an anarcho-syndicalist, another a platformist-anarchist and yet another claims to be an intertemporal pilot of the space-time continuum. What matters is what you do as a group the splits arise because you an't agree on that not because you disagree on ideology which is a mystified response to a lack of agreement as to common action.

now we disagree too on the importance of theory. certainly if we wait till we have sorted it out then the moment will pass but unless we have workable theory before the moment the most we can do is tail behind events or, at best, provide a momentary leadership which fades away with the mass movement failing to take the mass movement to a higher level of consciousness. Which is what happened in the anti-war movement in after the first protests in my opinion.

You are badly wrong when you say 'we' are not interested in membership but in proximity to the half interested. What is the point in being in close proximity to those becoming active unless you can offer them something more than bodyheat? Unless a movement recruits people and educates them then they will lapse back into inactivity. Like it or not organisation is very important or you will remain on the sidelines until the end of your days.

Which btw many an old time anarcho-syndicalist or Platformist would agree with. it is a crude individualist anarchism that is anti-organisational but it is all too typical of modern day anarchism. Which is another reason why you found it so hard to fight life stylist ieas as in actually you were very close to them but prefered another discourse due to the infleunce of the workers movement of the day. A movement then more real than that of today I might add.

Social revolutionaries do not srife to seize the present sdate but to smash it that is true. but the Dictatorship of the Proletariat is nothing but the self emancipation of the proletariat given form and substance and protecting itself from reaction. The social revolution is not the realization of a philosophy but the negation of philosophy.

I've got to agree with neprimerimye on the lack of continuity, and the in-fighting at its root.

There's often too much concern with ideological purity rather than what unites us.
(By the time we get the theory right, everything will have moved on).

That having been said, when the various factions do get behind a mass movement like CND; Anti-Poll-Tax; Iraq, the results can be startling.

@s are not interested in membership. What is important is proximity to the half-interested, and the huge boost in confidence with even the most generalised opposition to to the established order.
SWPies do this as an established tactic, and have tried to jump on every bandwaggon I can remember. I know this from many tiresome meetings in the Central Hotel etc. Their problem was always that their focus was to sign everyone up to the paper and party discipline, and chuck the issue overboard.

Every step to freedom has an importance in its own right, and just because they are single issue successes, rather than a putsch does not diminish them.

We are social revolutionaries and don't want to seize anything to usher in the "dictatorship of the proletariat".
The movement is a means to an end, and that end is the realization of a philosophy.

 

[UncleRoly]

The lack of continuity is not due to infighting at all. The infighting s a result of various class pressures on tendencies and individuals in the anarchist movement. (The same is true of the marxists of course).

What various class pressures?

Which is then mediated

By who? Ourselves? I'd agree that the root cause is frustration at a lack of results.

What matters is what you do as a group

It is useful to have a concrete goal we can all sign up to, rather than sterile arguments about tactics, but we are not joined at the hip, and can see there are many facets to the problem which can be dealt with according to our situation and drawing to the same strategic aim. What we are doing is what we are doing and not the be-all and end-all.

unless we have workable theory before the moment the most we can do is tail behind events

We already have a workable class analysis.

What is the point in being in close proximity to those becoming active unless you can offer them something more than bodyheat?

I took it as read that we argue our side; try to steer the campaign in a revolutionary direction, and if we can't prevent recuperation, at least expose it beforehand, so we "fail with clarity".
It is an iterative process and neither the succession of single-issues or the movement are end stages. Each feeds the other in a virtuous circle of self-confidence, probably.

I wouldn't say I'm for crude individualist lifestyle anarchism. Organisation is a tool to muster ideas; self-confidence and practical synergy without having to internalise a group ideology. Discipline should only extend as far as not gobbing-off on other people's behalf without reaching a concensus.
If it doesn't nurture, and is an inhibitor, it ain't worth it.

God, I haven't exersized these head muscles for years, so bear with me.

the Dictatorship of the Proletariat is nothing but the self emancipation of the proletariat given form and substance and protecting itself from reaction.

Hang on. Are you saying it is NOT top-down social engineering?

The social revolution is not the realization of a philosophy but the negation of philosophy.

It is the negation of ideology. I'm using philiosophy to denote something more instinctual. Something virtually all anarchists share at root.

Sorry to cut and run. Even abusing my employer's hospitality to do f*ck-all has a limit and I gotta go home. L8r

 

[neprimerimye]

Replies point for point as far as can manage.

What class pressures? That depends on the group concerned and the ambitions/desires of those concerned as well as the external pressure of various class forces. Which makes it an almost impossible question to answer directly as individuals and small groups do not directly reflect specific class or fractional pressures. Now if i were an 'orthodox trot' which praise Satan I'm not i would say that we can reduce the question to one of program and point to petty bourgeois influences on those setting up food co-ops and the like and working class pressures on those identifying with say syndicalism. Which is banal but there is some core of truth to it.

Much of what follows the above in your post seems to me to be empty of real content for example you say 'we already have a workable class analysis' which is laughable. Where is it? To be honest most anarchist treatments of class steal from Marx. At least Bakunin was clear on that and said so forthrightly.

As for success coming when we unite thats a complete crock of shite. We have lost a lot of struggles because we were united and unity meant reducing the demands of a struggle to those of the most backward elements or those elements that one or other group sought to ingratiate themselves with. STWC has been the most dismal failure i can recall in over 30 years and largely due to the SWP holding the struggle back but from my observation nobody else was making much sense or pointing the way forward either except to raise slogans for actions that could not be raised. Like say TUC must call strikes againt the war! Great slogan but not a piss in hells chance of being realised. Or Diect Action Now! Which means occupy a road and get yer bum cold sitting on it for a couple of hours. Great fun the first time but where does it lead? And before anyone says but Mike you raising all these criticisms and you might have a point but what would you say was the way forward Ill tell ye. But not now.

And I simply cannot find any concrete discussion of how revolutionaries relate to others involved in the struggle at all that passes beyond platitudes. Which point I make bluntly - well I'm no fucking diplomat - because it is the honest way to address the problem. Although i do agree that individuals should not gob off on behalf of others unless they have a clear mandate. But the formlessness of so much of the anarchist movement does facilitate that does it not?

Yes I am saying that the Dictatorship of the Proletariat is not top down social engineering. Where did you get such a weird idea? It is the class rule of the majority class nothing more nothing less. The entrance hall to the building named freedom if ya wanna get poetic. And yes the Russian commune was the D of the P and yes it went wrong real early. But that does not invalidate either October as a proletarian revolution or the concept of a transitional period as put forward by Marx and rejected by Bakunin.

As for this "It is the negation of ideology. I'm using philiosophy to denote something more instinctual. Something virtually all anarchists share at root" well i've no idea what it means. ideology for Marxists is more or less systematic false consciousness which is why we represent Marxism not as an ideology, pace anarchism, but as scientific socialism. That is to say it represents the most developed form of pioletrarian class consciousness as developed in the struggle between the classes. As such it has a scientific and dialectical method based on the conflict of the material forces and relations of society. Which stands in conflict with this nebulous idea of instinct which seems positively primitive an atavistic form of idealism if you like.

What various class pressures?

By who? Ourselves? I'd agree that the root cause is frustration at a lack of results.

It is useful to have a concrete goal we can all sign up to, rather than sterile arguments about tactics, but we are not joined at the hip, and can see there are many facets to the problem which can be dealt with according to our situation and drawing to the same strategic aim. What we are doing is what we are doing and not the be-all and end-all.

We already have a workable class analysis.

I took it as read that we argue our side; try to steer the campaign in a revolutionary direction, and if we can't prevent recuperation, at least expose it beforehand, so we "fail with clarity".
It is an iterative process and neither the succession of single-issues or the movement are end stages. Each feeds the other in a virtuous circle of self-confidence, probably.

I wouldn't say I'm for crude individualist lifestyle anarchism. Organisation is a tool to muster ideas; self-confidence and practical synergy without having to internalise a group ideology. Discipline should only extend as far as not gobbing-off on other people's behalf without reaching a concensus.
If it doesn't nurture, and is an inhibitor, it ain't worth it.

God, I haven't exersized these head muscles for years, so bear with me.

Hang on. Are you saying it is NOT top-down social engineering?

It is the negation of ideology. I'm using philiosophy to denote something more instinctual. Something virtually all anarchists share at root.

Sorry to cut and run. Even abusing my employer's hospitality to do f*ck-all has a limit and I gotta go home. L8r

 

[phildwyer]

Oh the idiot on drums is still a chum although we've not been in touch for while.

Was that Dean or Jess? Mike was on bass, right?

 

[neprimerimye]

Was that Dean or Jess? Mike was on bass, right?

Deano. Jess may have already left the country by then. Yup Mikey on bass. At least neither RR or Bone were 'singing'.

Lets hope those two never meet again! Mikes still pissed at Dean after the studio shut. Blames him for the loss of kit you see. He has a point.

 

[phildwyer]

Deano. Jess may have already left the country by then. Yup Mikey on bass. At least neither RR or Bone were 'singing'.

I wish they'd *both* been singing, a duet made in heaven if ever there was one. Was it Keyo on guitar? Ah this takes me back...

 

[neprimerimye]

I wish they'd *both* been singing, a duet made in heaven if ever there was one. Was it Keyo on guitar? Ah this takes me back...

2 egos that size and talents that small.......

Can't remember who was plank spanking but mark g did some and my copy of the 7" lives with most of my vinyl in RR's attic so I can't check. Roly?

 

[phildwyer]

my copy of the 7" lives with most of my vinyl in RR's attic

That's not all that lives in his attic, I'd rescue it if I were you.

 

[UncleRoly]

2 egos that size and talents that small.......

Can't remember who was plank spanking but mark g did some and my copy of the 7" lives with most of my vinyl in RR's attic so I can't check. Roly?

Which band are you talking about?
If it's the Megs then Keyo was guitarist early on in the band. Mark G (aka Woosh Oleander ), was the spanker on Drop 1, (not kidding - there were that many overdubs ), and on the 7". Jess never made it onto any recordings.
Mike M. on bass, (deserves an OBE for lasting the course); me on vocals and Deano on Drums

I'm slightly confused. I know Rob R did some old SWS and Megs numbers, but did he ever front the Megs by name?

 

[phildwyer]

Which band are you talking about?
If it's the Megs then Keyo was guitarist early on in the band. Mark G (aka Woosh Oleander ), was the spanker on Drop 1, (not kidding - there were that many overdubs ), and on the 7". Jess never made it onto any recordings.
Mike M. on bass, (deserves an OBE for lasting the course); me on vocals and Deano on Drums

I'm slightly confused. I know Rob R did some old SWS and Megs numbers, but did he ever front the Megs by name?

Don't think so. I think Rob had more or less given up performing live by then, after breaking his leg in an ill-advised stage dive. I also thought Keyo (and Jess) had gone off to Eddie and the Hot Rods by the early 90's.

 

[Dic Penderyn]

What did you lot get up to the Chilango? (without naming names, like )

will get back to you on this soon...

?????


http://www.urban75.net/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=170694

 

[chilango]

I`d forgotten about this....