Why are other countries militant?

[Fruitloop]

Subjective view really - if you want to think that stuff in Greece isn't reported intentionally then that's the conclusion you'll draw. If the action in France gathers weight and momentum you'll start seeing it reported, usually as a story on what a pain in the arse the French are for British truckers and holidaymakers...

Well, I've noticed for some time now that there are some things that don't get reported over here in a persistent kind of way. The most detailed one I've followed is the none-reporting of post Good Friday Agreement violence in Northern Ireland, because I have an in-house news pipeline to NI so I do find out what goes on there.

The quashing of some types of news is not really news, if you see what I mean. D-notices and all that...

ETA: There is the definite issue of parochialism, which has been the case in the UK for a while - there's the (almost certainly apocryphal) reporting of the sinking of the Titanic in Glasgow: 'Glasgow man lost at sea'

 

[Fruitloop]

Yes, and changes in police tactics. But if the energy of your 'movement' can be broken by changes in police tactics and a few legislative tweaks then maybe it wasn't a movement to take seriously in the first place...?

All I'm saying is, I don't think it's the street action that needs encouragement in this country. If there's decent organisation then that will happen when it needs to. I suspect that what needs to be built first is actual organisations mobilising large interest groups.

I see things completely the other way around. First you need the mobilisation in the presence of the essential germs of left ideas (solidarity, mutual co-operation etc) and then the organisation arises from that. Anything else is doomed to irrelevance. I mean, you can be the best surfer in the world, but if there aren't any waves...

 

[London_Calling]

What strikes me about demo's here is the near absence - at least in London - of 30-40-50 year old working men using their physicality in organised protest groups, they were the mainstay of union activism back in the day. Young coppers were out of their depth. Look at the old footage of protests, or that recent protest in the Midlands about Italian workers. All geezers.

Contrast French union membership as compared with the UK. Mostly kids at demos here now. G20 . . . jesus.

 

[Brainaddict]

I see things completely the other way around. First you need the mobilisation in the presence of the essential germs of left ideas (solidarity, mutual co-operation etc) and then the organisation arises from that. Anything else is doomed to irrelevance. I mean, you can be the best surfer in the world, but if there aren't any waves...

But what do you do if solidarity and mutual cooperation (and indeed left ideas generally) are alien concepts to huge sections of the population? You can't just run around on the streets making angry noises and hope something good comes of it.

 

[Fruitloop]

There's a big wealth divide here. 80% of the capital in the hands of the over-50s or something like that.

 

[Fruitloop]

But what do you do if solidarity and mutual cooperation (and indeed left ideas generally) are alien concepts to huge sections of the population? You can't just run around on the streets making angry noises and hope something good comes of it.

Personally I'm gonna do some leafletting. Failing that I'll go door-to-door.

 

[Belushi]

There's a big wealth divide here. 80% of the capital in the hands of the over-50s or something like that.

Big wealth divide in Greece as well, not sure about France

 

[Corax]

There's a big wealth divide here. 80% of the capital in the hands of the over-50s or something like that.

And when they die, that gets passed on to the kids yeah? A new aristocracy then.

 

[Fruitloop]

Big wealth divide in Greece as well, not sure about France

That's true, but don't they stay at home longer like in Italy? It's not like here where parents start charging their kids rent as soon as they finish education.

 

[treelover]

I'm less concerned with militancy in the UK, does that mean more more anti-war marches, peace marches, environmental action? etc, than the lack of an effective progressive left opposition/formation which can attempt to ameliorate the worse excesses of the NL regime, the then Etonians and neo-liberalism in general. The dismal response to the welfare reforms comes to mind.

 

[Belushi]

That's true, but don't they stay at home longer like in Italy? It's not like here where parents start charging their kids rent as soon as they finish education.

They dont stay at home out of choice, usually its because they have less economic independece than your average young brit ime.

 

[Fruitloop]

I'm less concerned with militancy in the UK, does that mean more more anti-war marches, peace marches, environmental action? etc, than the lack of an effective progressive left opposition/formation which can attempt to ameliorate the worse excesses of the NL regime, the the Etonians and neo-liberalism in general. The dismal response to the welfare reforms comes to mind.

The big issue at the moment, the one that has energised the protests in Europe, and the one that will dominate politics here for the next 5-10 years is the economic crisis. If the government are allowed to get away with what they're doing at the moment then there will be no hope at all for any of the individual issues that you mention, as the transfer of wealth from our and our descendant's future productivity into the hands of the ruling class will already have been set in stone, and there will simply be no money available for any of that stuff.

 

[Fruitloop]

They dont stay at home out of choice, usually its because they have less economic independece than your average young brit ime.

I disagree. It's a cultural difference, and in my experience and that of most of my age-group 'economic independence' here means the opportunity to work for shit money, pay extortionate rents and subsidise the pensions and healthcare of the older generation - benefits that will with a high degree of certainty be a distant memory by the time we might want to take advantage of them.

 

[kyser_soze]

and in my experience ...

Your personal experience and opinion - most of you generation don't look at economic independence in the way you do.

 

[Fruitloop]

Most of them try to make the best of what is on offer, try to get by and have a good time when they can. So do I, for that matter. Most of them aren't explicitly political in the way that I am, but I've talked to a hell of a lot of them up and down the country, from all kinds of socioeconomic groups, and there are plenty of them aware that something is seriously amiss.

ETA: In any case, the distribution of wealth between different age-groups, the cost of housing as a proportion of income etc are verifiable facts. Whether a particular group of people are aware of them is neither here nor there.

 

[Brainaddict]

A related historical question is: Why did trade union militancy become discredited among many ordinary people in the UK?

The answer a lot of leftists give is Thatcher/Thatcherite ideology and they leave it at that - which is very easy and comfortable for them because if the devil herself is to blame, well, there's no need to look any further. But if you assume that historical events tend to have complex causes and Thatcher is only part of the answer, what is the rest of the answer?

 

[cesare]

A related historical question is: Why did trade union militancy become discredited among many ordinary people in the UK?

The answer a lot of leftists give is Thatcher/Thatcherite ideology and they leave it at that - which is very easy and comfortable for them because if the devil herself is to blame, well, there's no need to look any further. But if you assume that historical events tend to have complex causes and Thatcher is only part of the answer, what is the rest of the answer?

Not just trade union militancy, but trade unions generally. It doesn't help that they mostly fund NL of course.

 

[kyser_soze]

The gap between public and TUs was there before Thatch and before the Miners Strike - fucks sake, it's one of the reasons the old hag was elected in the first place.

 

[Fruitloop]

The funny thing about the MPs expenses thing is, and I'm aware that I'm verging on the conspiranoid here, I think that electoral disengagement without a doubt serves the interests of the ruling class. To paraphrase Chomsky, there is a danger inherent in democracy, in that it is potentially democratic. No accident that the first thing to go from Nu-traitor's 97 manifesto promises was electoral reform.

 

[Belushi]

I disagree. It's a cultural difference, and in my experience and that of most of my age-group 'economic independence' here means the opportunity to work for shit money, pay extortionate rents and subsidise the pensions and healthcare of the older generation - benefits that will with a high degree of certainty be a distant memory by the time we might want to take advantage of them.

Exactly the same way many young Greeks and French feel - except until recently they had far fewer job opportunities.

 

[Belushi]

The gap between public and TUs was there before Thatch and before the Miners Strike - fucks sake, it's one of the reasons the old hag was elected in the first place.

Yes, there was plenty of dislike of Unions and union bosses long before Thantcher.

 

[butchersapron]

Yet, union membership rose throughout the 70s. So many myths about this period - not helped by simplistic talk of 'the public' without uncovering what construction is being placed on that.

 

[Brainaddict]

The gap between public and TUs was there before Thatch and before the Miners Strike - fucks sake, it's one of the reasons the old hag was elected in the first place.

Indeed, so why were TUs hated? Undemocratic? Self-interested? Too closed? Was the propaganda against them just very good? Why did many ordinary (working) people feel that they were being held to ransom by strikes, rather than feeling that they could be part of whatever was happening? Was the dislike more ideological or more pragmatic?

Genuine questions to which I don't know the answer, but it must be important with regards to the difference in TU militancy between here and France say.

 

[kyser_soze]

How much of that was down to volountary membership and not to closed shop practices which meant you had to join to get a job? How is it that there was a disconnect between a general public pissed off with electricity brownouts and the TU movement managing to persuade them that it was in some way helping to advance toward a better society?

 

[Fruitloop]

Exactly the same way many young Greeks and French feel - except until recently they had far fewer job opportunities.

In which case maybe the disappearance of the chimeric service-industry that provided those mcjobs will lead to an increase in militancy amongst the youth here? There's no doubt in my mind that there is here a culture where people are expected to (and expect to) leave home at an earlier age than elsewhere. I remember talking to some Russian friends about it who were horrified by that tendency in the UK. They said 'but at that age, they are just children!'.

Grist to the mill....

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Britain was deeply divided in the Thatcher years – she was elected three times with well under half the vote. No matter that over half the country vehemently opposed her agenda – she was able to push it through anyway due to a combination of a deeply undemocratic electoral system that gives large majorities to minority governments and a dysfunctional constitution with a moral vacuum at its head that allows the PM of the day almost unchecked power.

 

[butchersapron]

How much of that was down to volountary membership and not to closed shop practices which meant you had to join to get a job? How is it that there was a disconnect between a general public pissed off with electricity brownouts and the TU movement managing to persuade them that it was in some way helping to advance toward a better society?

It didn't rise by one and half million members in the 2nd half of the 70s because of closed shops no - if this were the case then these people would already be in unions. So many many myths. They rose because people needed their conditions defended from the combined attacks of state and capital.

 

[kyser_soze]

@LBJ

If they were that vehement in their dissapproval why did so many waste their votes on the lib dems instead of voting labour back into power in 1983 & 87? No different to the 15 million who voted against Labour in 1974 - you have to go back to 1929 to find any government elected with more than 50% of the vote so sorry, that's a non-starter as an argument.

 

[butchersapron]

If they were that vehement in their dissapproval why did so many waste their votes on the lib dems instead of voting labour back into power in 1983 & 87? No different to the 15 million who voted against Labour in 1974 - you have to go back to 1929 to find any government elected with more than 50% of the vote so sorry, that's a non-starter as an argument.

What is? That's got nothing to do with my posts. Bizzare.

 

[kyser_soze]

It didn't rise by one and half million members in the 2nd half of the 70s because of closed shops no - if this were the case then these people would already be in unions. So many many myths. They rose because people needed their conditions defended from the combined attacks of state and capital.

So not because they were pressured into doing it by fellow workers? Not for any negative reasons whatsoever? Given the bile reserved for scab workers, and the militancy of unionism in the 70s, are you asking me to believe that peer pressure wasn't a major contrinuting factor to TU membership rising during the 70s? That everyone who joined did so out of a completely free choice and not because they would have been ostracised or abused at work for not being in a union?