SWP member Expelled
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Das Uberdog
remembers the alamo
Laughing at the irony of a name which shows itself within the article to be ironic?
Are you accusing the SWP of over publicising this incident as though we have delusions of self importance, when it was infact a blindly moronic sectarian nutjob who started the topic in the first place? Or do you too simply resent the fact than when criticisms of SWP policy or conduct are made SWP members will try to defend their organisation's stance?
Are you talking for me? Because I'd rather you didn't. I believe that as within any organisation, the self-perpetuation of the SWP in terms of membership recruitment and self-expansion does play too heavily upon many senior member's minds when deciding party policy. I also believe that this is damaging not only to the movement but also to our own organisation, and is certainly not the reason I am in the party.
I'd also like you to point to any major national campaign in which the SWP hasn't played a significant and irreplaceable role in achieving any great success in this country over the past 15 yea... oh wait! sorry, I remember, I've asked you before - there aren't any.
Are you accusing the SWP of over publicising this incident as though we have delusions of self importance, when it was infact a blindly moronic sectarian nutjob who started the topic in the first place? Or do you too simply resent the fact than when criticisms of SWP policy or conduct are made SWP members will try to defend their organisation's stance?
Are you talking for me? Because I'd rather you didn't. I believe that as within any organisation, the self-perpetuation of the SWP in terms of membership recruitment and self-expansion does play too heavily upon many senior member's minds when deciding party policy. I also believe that this is damaging not only to the movement but also to our own organisation, and is certainly not the reason I am in the party.
I'd also like you to point to any major national campaign in which the SWP hasn't played a significant and irreplaceable role in achieving any great success in this country over the past 15 yea... oh wait! sorry, I remember, I've asked you before - there aren't any.
Das Uberdog said:
actually i can think of only one major sucess in the last few decades and that was the poll tax campaign .. and ok lets rememeber that the SWP at first refused to have anything to do with it, then tried to take it over causing unneeded distraction but essentially had little overall role ..
the poll tax campaign , politically was an unholy alliance of miilies (majority) and and community @'s ( minority) but critically had the involvement of hundreds of thousends of ordinary people .. indeed i suspect the ABSENCE of the SWP at critical times enabled so many people to get involved!
bolshiebhoy
socialism leinster drink
I never sympathised with this argument when I was in the party nor do I now. But it seems particularily wrong when you consider the leadership has devoted so much energy to the Respect project. A strategy that arguably has cost the party in terms of members and the political level of those members it has. A strategy that sacrifices the short term retention and recruitment of members for the bigger picture of building a real left alternative to New Labour. Now it may not work (I hope it does as a member of Respect!) but the last thing you could do vis a vis Respect is accuse the CC of putting the party's narrow interests ahead of that of the movement as a whole.Das Uberdog said:
cockneyrebel
New Member
Das Uberdog whatever the rights and wrongs of what you're saying you just come across as a tosser. Why do you bother?
You're never gonna change anyones minds on here even if you were constructive, let alone with all the bile you come out with. It obviously winds you up being on here and all you do is give the SWP a bad name and confirm hack stereotypes.
Why not put your feet up and have a beer? Go out and do some extra political activity? Go out to a club?
Any of it has to better than your head banging on here......
You're never gonna change anyones minds on here even if you were constructive, let alone with all the bile you come out with. It obviously winds you up being on here and all you do is give the SWP a bad name and confirm hack stereotypes.
Why not put your feet up and have a beer? Go out and do some extra political activity? Go out to a club?
Any of it has to better than your head banging on here......
JHE
.
A variety of people have played the role of Prime Social Working Hack here, and standards have declined over the years.
Cautious Fred was pretty good. He had some wit.
Rebel Warrior was funny too, though entirely unintentionally.
Then there was Nwwnww, who was always up for a bun fight and didn't take it too seriously, but his illiteracy and weirdly eccentric punctuation didn't help.
Now there's Doggy, who's just furious.
Perhaps the CC should reinstate the ban on Social Workers using internet message boards.
ETA: Also, could Ger Whatisface be persuaded to join?
Cautious Fred was pretty good. He had some wit.
Rebel Warrior was funny too, though entirely unintentionally.
Then there was Nwwnww, who was always up for a bun fight and didn't take it too seriously, but his illiteracy and weirdly eccentric punctuation didn't help.
Now there's Doggy, who's just furious.
Perhaps the CC should reinstate the ban on Social Workers using internet message boards.
ETA: Also, could Ger Whatisface be persuaded to join?
Das Uberdog
remembers the alamo
cockneyrebel said:
So I keep hearing from you established Urban folk - however the responses I seem to get from those either new or less prolific on the boards seems to be decidedly oblivious to the angrier aspects of my posts.
I'm not going to put up the pretence of being polite around here when others are hiding what are clearly childish and rudimentary insults disguised in a phony banner of 'moderacy' and 'constructive criticism'.
PS - I didn't ask for 'succesful' campaigns, I asked for campaigns.
PPS - Welse language protests? You might as well accuse me of not taking into account the Countryside Alliance protests... As though it wasn't a blatantly Plaid Cymru issue from the start...
PPPS - cockers, though your concern over my social life is flattering and appreciated, you don't need to worry about how much I'm socialising. It's plenty.
PPPPS - so the only example we can come up with are the Poll Tax protests? Out of every national campaign in the last 15 years?
exosculate
a stagger with a beat
JHE said:
If anyone knows him they should get him to join the boards, so we can hear what he has to say.
You're currently wrecking the Anti Health Cut's Campaign.
There's also Road Protests, Defending Working Class Communities from nonces, Trident Ploughshares, Anti Incinerator Movement, Anti Airport Expansion, Pensioner's, etc etc.
You're pathetic, not very bright, and an ideal replacement for Ger.
There's also Road Protests, Defending Working Class Communities from nonces, Trident Ploughshares, Anti Incinerator Movement, Anti Airport Expansion, Pensioner's, etc etc.
You're pathetic, not very bright, and an ideal replacement for Ger.
Fisher_Gate
Active Member
mk12 said:
yeah like put them in debt to the swiss bankers for a few decades ... but I know what you mean about the uselessness of competition. The thing that the SWP got wrong the worst over this period was to stand outside the Miners Support Groups for the first 3-4 months of the strike, and then , without blinking or acknowledging any change, pretend they practically invented them. Oh yeah and opposing the referendum on the scottish assembly wasn't their finest hour either. For the Militant their worst line was that on the Falklands/Malvinas war, though at least they didn't welcome the troops going into Northern Ireland ....
JHE
.
I've been berated on these boards by an ex-Social Worker (Donna, IIRC) for pointing out the Social Workers' odd line in 84. I'm glad I'm not the only person here who has not had his/her memory wiped.Fisher_Gate said:
The oddest thing about it was that the Social Work leadership line at the time was: 'We are not a strike-support group'. How fuckin' odd was that? The best thing about the Social Workers' activity before that was that they had run around trying to raise money and solidarity for any strike going!
They were going through a period of farting on about being 'hard' Bolshevik types. Silly arses.
Who cares, anyway? I shouldn't. They (and you?) have given up on all that stuff and become half-arsed but keen and indignant cheer-leaders for that loathsome medieval bollocks called Islam.
belboid
Exasperated, not angry.
the SWP line ws, not entirely unfairly, that the important thing was not to be a 'left-wing oxfam' but to get real solidarity from other unions. In that they were right - support groups only help the workes stay out longer, they dont actually help them win.
Of course there is/was a massive hypocrisy, not least in that they would later be at the forefront of setting up such support groups (thinking of the ambulance workers in particular) but the basic point does still stand.
Of course there is/was a massive hypocrisy, not least in that they would later be at the forefront of setting up such support groups (thinking of the ambulance workers in particular) but the basic point does still stand.
Thats because you have hijacked most of them, as you are trying to do with the campaign aginst climate change with your fellow traveller, Phil Thornhill. Since, when did the SWP asa party become environmentalist? nah, sheer opportunism,
this years, globalise resistance!
this years, globalise resistance!
Fisher_Gate
Active Member
belboid said:
No it doesn't. The key point was to both work in the support groups and to take the battle into the labour movement particularly to the TUC general council. The abstentionist position of the SWP on both of these was based on wrong analysis of the character of the period and an incorrect understanding of the united front tactic. Their darkest hour (well since supporting the troops in Northern Ireland anyway).
exosculate
a stagger with a beat
belboid said:
The first act of the left is solidarity with the working class, so of course the left should assist support groups. So I think its entirely fair to criticise the SWP on this.
They started off on the poll tax not wanting to support the anti polltax groups, expecting it to be defeated through the unions of Council tax workers instead, same sort of nonsense there too if you ask me. It never should be either/or.
Das Uberdog
remembers the alamo
treelover said:
As the science and general knowledge amongst the population increased, dipshit? What can we do right? We become envionmentalists, it's opportunism. We support ongoing campaigns, it's self-interested membership increasing tactics.
All the fuck I'm doing is responding to ongoing criticism - Jesus fuckin' Christ it's not like I started this sectarian rant. I wouldn't have the competition - but if SWP member failed to respond to criticisms levelled we'd be accused of not having the answers.
For starters - "Defending Working Class Communities from nonces"? Dipshit, this is not a campaign.
"Trident Ploughshares" is not a national campaign, and is reserved almost solely for those who are willing to live in a tent in Faslane - not a mass movement.
Anti Incinerator Movement is a localised campaign, reserved for places near incinerators
.Pensioner's protests - well I'll tell you for a fact I was down selling papers at the conference in Blackpool when it happened, but it's sorta unreasonable for you expect us to play a hand in organising a (completely failed) movement when it's being organised exclusively by pensioner's associations.
So, outside exclusive, localised or make-believe campaigns, what would get done without the SWP?
The reason this long and ill-tempered exchange started is because someone said 'what have the swp achieved that is of note?'.
It's quite clear that for some on these boards eg treelover, it doesn't matter what we do. If we join a campaign it's a hi-jack, if we don't we're neglecting some crucial issue to a scandalous degree. Hardly surprising that ppl get narky in reply to such bollocks.
As far as the miners support, poll-tax arguments go, yes we've got some stuff wrong (in both cases, a similar over-optimistic assessment of the prospects of wimnning quickly by work-place militancy). So fucking what? Any group or person that does anything in the real world makes mistakes.
What were we supposed to do when the ambulance dispute happened? Print articles saying 'we are for setting up support groups, and we'd like to add that we were wrong, wrong so wrong at the start of the miners strike.. we'll just go outside and beat ourselves with big sticks..'
It would be nice if we could see the bollocks that the Militant was coming out with at the end of the miners strike. They point blank refused to accept that the miners had lost. Their members in the town I lived in used to take the piss out of the swp for being too miserable, and not understanding that the miners 'marched back to work undefeated' which looks pretty fucking funny 22 years on (and minus 200,000 miners).
The fact is the SWP have survived the last 20 years better than any other tendency, which is why we become a CONSTANT point of reference on these boards. We've made mistakes, and will do so again. Reports of our imminent demise are vastly exaggerated.
It's quite clear that for some on these boards eg treelover, it doesn't matter what we do. If we join a campaign it's a hi-jack, if we don't we're neglecting some crucial issue to a scandalous degree. Hardly surprising that ppl get narky in reply to such bollocks.
As far as the miners support, poll-tax arguments go, yes we've got some stuff wrong (in both cases, a similar over-optimistic assessment of the prospects of wimnning quickly by work-place militancy). So fucking what? Any group or person that does anything in the real world makes mistakes.
What were we supposed to do when the ambulance dispute happened? Print articles saying 'we are for setting up support groups, and we'd like to add that we were wrong, wrong so wrong at the start of the miners strike.. we'll just go outside and beat ourselves with big sticks..'
It would be nice if we could see the bollocks that the Militant was coming out with at the end of the miners strike. They point blank refused to accept that the miners had lost. Their members in the town I lived in used to take the piss out of the swp for being too miserable, and not understanding that the miners 'marched back to work undefeated' which looks pretty fucking funny 22 years on (and minus 200,000 miners).
The fact is the SWP have survived the last 20 years better than any other tendency, which is why we become a CONSTANT point of reference on these boards. We've made mistakes, and will do so again. Reports of our imminent demise are vastly exaggerated.
Ger Francis once helped me move house. Seemed alright. Didn't know him that well but he drove the printshop van a long way for me twice so was ok by me for that.
What he did in Brum (with other comrades) over the last few years was fucked up though. Shame.
What he did in Brum (with other comrades) over the last few years was fucked up though. Shame.
GarfieldLeChat
fucking awesome but wrong
Das Uberdog said:
huh
jesus you conceited prick....
no i'm say that tis is eminenatly dull for the billion or so people not involved in your 4 person circle jerk tossathon this isn't the SWP boards wh the bloody hell would we want to know about your lastest atom bomb like cacade theory split...
TIme in time out we have fought against the monopoliseation by the SWP of these politics boards not becuase we mighten agree with the acutal content but becuase you lot are so fucking dull and lifeless and bloody sectarian and every fucking thing you touch turns to shit...
now really send a fucking email fuck it considering the level of dullness and insignificane the swp has in the REAL world fucking use a carrier pidgeon and fuck off with this shit...
you bucnh of oversized uni wiberals...
bolshiebhoy
socialism leinster drink
Uberdog care to expand on this? What areas of party policy have been too influenced by this over-obsession with recruitment? Cause in their rush to dismiss you as a hack everyone seems to have let this little oppositional nugget slide.Das Uberdog said:
bolshiebhoy
socialism leinster drink
By posting on yet another swp thread?GarfieldLeChat said:
bolshiebhoy
socialism leinster drink
Although they (the Millies) did and do have crap positions on the Hungers Strikes, sectarian marches, the republican struggle and most importantly the very question of a 32 county workers republic. I spent too long being called a left nationalist by Millies for being in the irish swp not to laugh at the suggestion that the swp is pro-imperialist.Fisher_Gate said:
belboid
Exasperated, not angry.
I had to go and do some research at the British Library newspapaer section a few years back. I coudlyn find the stuff I was looking for so looked through old lefty rags instead. I did indeed read that SW at the time said the arrival of the troops would 'provide a breathing space' for catholics - not quite welcoming them in as FG implies, but still pretty crap. I tried to look up what te militant said fro that week, but it was impossible - the copy had been ripped out of that years collection! Not sure what it actually said, but it was meant to be equally embarassing.
bolshiebhoy
socialism leinster drink
I have no issue with the tactical argument of the swp leadership at the time. The full quote is:
"The breathing space provided by the presence of British troops is short but vital. Those who call for the immediate withdrawal of the troops before the men behind the barricades can defend themselves are inviting a pogrom which will hit first and hardest at socialists." (Socialist Worker, No. 137, 11 September 1969).
The greater danger at that moment was the RUC and the Specials and behind them the loyalist death squads. Arguing for troops out immediately in that situation would have been a disaster. Just as lenin didn't respond to Kornilov's rising by saying 'kerensky out now'. Did that mean lenin supported kerensky in power?
"The breathing space provided by the presence of British troops is short but vital. Those who call for the immediate withdrawal of the troops before the men behind the barricades can defend themselves are inviting a pogrom which will hit first and hardest at socialists." (Socialist Worker, No. 137, 11 September 1969).
The greater danger at that moment was the RUC and the Specials and behind them the loyalist death squads. Arguing for troops out immediately in that situation would have been a disaster. Just as lenin didn't respond to Kornilov's rising by saying 'kerensky out now'. Did that mean lenin supported kerensky in power?
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