Marxism and McLuhan - pt 4 challenge and collapse

Marshall McLuhan is an interesting intellectual figure. He is best remembered for his connections to the 60s counter-culture. He is considered to have coined the slogan Turn On, Tune In, Drop Out. His legacy, if it is anything, is a techno-evangelism, in part an offshoot of the counter-culture (McLuhan was also the first person to use the word “surf” in its modern sense); computing will save the day the internet will broaden our minds, liberate information and the geeks shall inherit the Earth.

One very modern off-shoot of this philosophy is the argument (distraction in my opinion) over the role of social media in popular rebellion. Does the application of Twitter to 21st century society result in occupations, riots and strikes? It's certainly a more comforting conclusion than admitting people over the world are tired, poor and fed up with living under their rulers.

But McLuhan was not a member of the counter-culture. He was a professor of English Literature, a public intellectual who appeared an adverts and movies. He was a practising Catholic. He may have been friends with Timothy Leary, but he was also on close terms with people like Wyndham Lewis.

But he was an educator, an educator with a very keen sense of the crisis in education, which arose out of post-war society, its contradictions, and came to be known as the Generation Gap.

Capitalism needed an educated, skilled workforce more than ever. Educational opportunities grew. Millions of young people growing up in the core capitalist countries for the first time had the chance to go into Higher Education and so reap the rewards of a better life. At the same time the rigorous application of capitalist norms to a formerly artisan-like HE system generated conflict, conflict between the new mode of intellectual production and the relations of production. The lecturer was slowly proletarianised. The student, promised intellectual liberation, was subjected to fusty, paternal supervision and backward rules. For example: the student struggle in France 1968, which set off the great strike in May, began as a struggle over the right of male students to visit female dorms overnight.

McLuhan was a lecturer during this period of change. He experienced the shift when he began teaching. Though only a few years older than his students, he felt an insurmountable gap between him and them. The difference, he thought, was in the mode of understanding. He was steeped in the literate, sequential and disinterested mode of thought. His students were saturated by modern media and its effects. Their understanding was post-literate, non-linear and deeply involved.

He saw this as the root of the conflict, the crisis of education (and of society at large). It was this he studied. His solutions were humane, intellectual and appropriately utopian – more designed to provoke debate rather than resolve it. His answer was critical reflection, we had to understand the changes we were going through as a society in order to cope with them. Cutting edge thought, and in particular art were to lead the way.

The Marxist response is clear. Firstly, culture is ambiguous. For human history so far every document of civilisation has also been a document of barbarism. In order to have Socrates you also had to have slaves. The prevailing culture of any class society is determined by that society's ruling class, their prerogatives, their preoccupations. An obsolete way of thinking does not simply give way to critical reflection, which brings us onto the second point, Consciousness has its basis in material reality. As Marx pointed out in his Theses on Feuerbach, criticism of heaven takes place on earth.

I want to conclude with two quotes, from Challenge and Collapse, the final chapter of the opening section of Understanding Media, one which Marxists should find intriguing:

Perhaps the most obvious “closure”... of any new technology is just the demand for it. Nobody wants a motorcar until there are motorcars, and nobody is interested in TV until there are TV programmes.

This is a close relation to the Marxist observation that a society does not create problems for which it does not already have solutions. There is no solution to bad weather therefore it is not a problem. There is a solution to poor harvests, to food speculation and starvation. These things are problems. While McLuhan's solutions may be technocratic, we can accept what he is saying here. But, McLuhan continues:

The power of technology to create its own world of demand is not independent of technology being first an extension of our own bodies and senses. When we are deprived of our sense of sight, the other senses take up the role of sight in some degree. But the need to use the senses that are available is as insistent as breathing - a fact that makes sense of the urge to keep radio and TV going more or less continuously. The urge to continuous use is quite independent of the “content”of public programmes... It is ridiculous to talk of “what the public wants” played over its own nerves... Once we have surrendered our senses and nervous systems to the private manipulation of those who would try to benefit from taking a lease on our eyes and ears and nerves, we really don't have any rights left.

This is a vital point, that we can all agree with. However you define 'the media', broadly or narrowly, they are our mode of existence, alienated from us and used against us. We take them back under our control in order to emancipate ourselves.

There you go peasants...

You've had your class struggle, now get back to the field. The truly distressing thing is there are no substantial concessions. You will work longer, harder and get less for your trouble; maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow but someday soon, and for the rest of your life. Does anyone honestly think the Tories will stop at this? Certain union leaders I suppose... but you wouldn't be unreasonable if you felt like the light at the end of the tunnel was a train headed your way.

Well done PCS for standing up to this. The union must stand alone, yet again, and that is for shame on the other union leaders. Give the civil servants, and anyone else who wants to stand up to the Tories properly, your support.

Marxism and McLuhan - pt 3 from narcosis to awakening

McLuhan’s best known writing is more about aphorism and argument than precisely laid out research. This is particularly the case with the opening chapters of Understanding Media. There are two chapters, which run together smoothly, The Gadget Lover and Hybrid Energy. McLuhan begins his argument by retelling the myth of Narcissus.

The myth is generally understood as a warning against self-love, Narcissus fell in love with his own reflection. According to McLuhan this is not quite the intention of the story. Narcissus was transfixed by his reflected image and so became numb to all other stimuli, a closed circuit.

All media are extensions of particular human aspects; the wheel is an extension of the foot, the lever an extension of the arm, clothing an extension of the skin, and so forth. Human invention is a response to need generated by discomfort; the wheel relieves the burden of moving objects, the lever the burden of lifting them, clothes keep us from being cold (or sunburned).

Any new invention is a greater or lesser shock to human relations. A neat illustration, from Rosa Luxemburg’s Accumulation of Capital:

In districts where natural economy formerly prevailed, the introduction of means of transport – railways, navigation, canals – is vital for the spreading of commodity economy… The triumphant march of commodity economy thus begins in most cases with magnificent constructions of modern transport, such as railway lines which cross primeval forests and tunnel through the mountains, telegraph wires which bridge the deserts, and ocean liners which call at the most outlying ports.

The latter chapters of the Accumulation of Capital are a meditation on the various media used to establish a commodity economy in various colonies, including the medium of ballistic weaponry. Colonialism is a rather sharp example but the point stands, changes in the medium of human existence require changes in the way people relate to each other.

On an individual level the shock of change leads to numbness, what might have been disturbing to your ancestors you have to take in your stride. Imagine, for example, your journey to work. You would never get there if you had to regard every single advert trying to catch your attention. This shutting down of the senses blinds us to the effect of various media. Back to the original example, ideology; we do not recognise mainstream ideology as such. Even so the supposedly non-ideological person is in fact the most ideological.

We only recognise a medium for what it is when it is either hybridised or superseded. An example from art is the journey from painted portrait to lithograph to photograph, to moving image, to synchronised sound, to Technicolor. Each invention cried out for the following one. As each medium was superseded it was transformed, the obvious example being after the rise of photography artists began painting concepts and feelings, rather than literal objects.

Another example: we now know that novels are in fact movie scripts. Every successful novel is touted to movie producers as a sure-fire hit (that or it’s cherished as an unfilmable novel). Movies are not novels, however. They almost never make the journey backwards. If anything movies are becoming role-playing computer games, judging by the number of spin-offs that have been made.

Relating this back to the point about ideology; we overcome our numbness to bourgeois ideology, see it for what it is, through its supersession (or, perhaps, hybridisation if we take reformism into account). This of course happens through practical action, class struggle, combined with the critical renovation of consciousness; the interaction, I would argue, between movement and party.

The Top Gear Defence

It's an almost unbeatable strategy, with practically limitless applications: why're you getting upset? It's all just a joke, like on Top Gear. Let's test it out:

Tory youth sing songs about the holocaust, but it's all just a joke... like on Top Gear.

Victims of Domestic Violence are to be charged commission on Child Maintenance payments, but it's all just a joke... like on Top Gear.

Cancer patients are to be subjected to welfare tests to see if they're sick enough, but it's all just a joke... like on Top Gear.

Public sector workers to face 16% pay cut to pay for bankers in need, but it's all just a joke... like on Top Gear.

Gumbies on cocaine

Tory MP Aidan Burley wants to get rid of trade union facility time. Facility time is an agreement between unions and employers whereby some members of staff can devote some or all of their time on union activity. It cannot be emphasised enough these are negotiated agreements, an essential part of collective bargaining, without which union organisation, the only strand of democracy in the workplace, is made just that bit more impossible.

Tory MP Aidan Burley goes to parties where people dress up as SS Officers, toast the third reich and belting oh-so humorous chants about the holocaust. A Tory MP toasts the Third Reich but (presumably) will keep his job... He'll probably use the Top Gear Defence. In fact, why didn't Hitler think of that when he killed those millions of people? It's all just a joke, like on Top Gear.

We might as well be ruled by Gumbies on cocaine.

Tony M Nyphot's Flying Riscu

Marxism and McLuhan - pt 2 Hot and Cold Media

Hot and cold media are important concepts for McLuhan. ‘Hot’ and ‘cold’ are slightly misleading names. The basic opposition is between high definition/low participation and low definition/high participation media. It is, say, the difference between a live action film and a drawn animation. With live action the visual detail is fairly rich, leaving little room for the viewer to fill in/interpret. With a drawn cartoon (a good example being Matt Groening cartoons) there is minimal visual information, few lines, few surfaces, and wide room for viewer inference.

Why should hot and cold media bother us? I think, firstly, because it is a useful way to track cultural development. Ruling classes attempt to develop culture appropriate to its rule. This means that culture is a site of conflict in class society. In Understanding Media, McLuhan cites the example of the waltz (a ‘hot’ dance) versus the twist (a ‘cool’ dance).

Dance is an expression of sexuality. The waltz, a formal dance, where the information is largely filled in beforehand, was consistent with early capitalism and its attempt to mould sexuality to the nuclear family and capital accumulation. The twist is an informal dance, with room to improvise and, most dangerously of all, does not require two closely locked partners. The twist and related forms of dance were consistent with a period of affluence and immanent sexual liberation. They were consequently terrifying to authorities committed to the capitalism and sexual propriety. Let’s not forget the added bourgeois horror of mixed race social dancing. It may seem unbearably backward and strange now but American cops used to attack Ray Charles concerts for precisely this reason (brilliantly evoked in Mike Davis’s writings on post-war youth riots).

But there’s a second point of interest. In McLuhan’s scheme new media cause a shock to our system. In order to overcome this shock, so we aren’t sent reeling every time we walk down the street or glance at a TV, we numb ourselves to the medium’s effects. One way of doing this is by cooling down the medium.

The printed word is visually hot. Spoken word on the radio is aurally hot. They each take particular senses and fill them out. One thing you will not have missed is the rise of right-wing demagogy in the internet and talk radio. These are cooling media that allow for greater participation; but this participation is as a kind of reflective surface in an echo chamber. Slanders become rumours and rumours become facts, as host and audience goad each other.

This can create false notions that are very difficult to dispel. An example: after the murder of Jean Charles de Menezes the Metropolitan Police put out a number of statements that simply weren’t true: he jumped the barrier, he was wearing a suspicious device, he challenged the police, he looked like Hussein Osman, etc. These claims were recycled through public forums and consequently longer in people’s minds even after they were disproved.

What is ideology, the medium itself; hot or cool? As far as the question is relevant I would suggest it is a cool medium, participatory. For example: The Conservative is a key outlet for bourgeois ideology. But the party cannot win general elections on the vote of its social base, the bourgeoisie, alone. There is a Conservative Party for big capitalists, but there is also one for small business people, there is even a party for a minority of conservative workers. This can only be achieved by incorportating the concerns, the points of view of other groups into the broader bourgeois perspective of the Tories.

The point here is not to suggest hot, cold or cooling media are better, worse, beneficial or pernicious, but to understand them so we are not taken by surprise by their effects.

A world without escape

Developments in the American Occupy movement:

Activists at Occupy Wall Street have issued a call to thousands of protesters across the US to reoccupy outdoor public spaces to mark the movement's three-month anniversary.

The Occupy movement has stalled in recent weeks after a wave of evictions swept away a raft of encampments, including the largest in Los Angeles, Philadelphia and New York. On Wednesday, it suffered a fresh blow as police in riot gear cleared Occupy San Francisco camp on the orders of the mayor, who had been sympathetic to protesters, while Occupy Boston lost legal protection against eviction.

This is of concern as there's no such thing as an insurgency on the defensive. Various municipal governments have collaborated to remove the occupations. If the theory of struggle for autonomous space free from capitalism is followed through to its logical endpoint we should see the emergence of a military wing of the movement, an autonomous red army... good luck with that. It could also be observed that the ruling class (especially in a vast country like the United States) does not worry unduly about occupied space. In America vast urban tracts are written off, bypassed by capital, used as silos to store (from their point of view) human waste. Interrupted capital accumuation on the other hand is another thing. The Occupy movement is strongest when linked to organised labour. The ruling class does not like having downtown areas in major towns and cities occupied, but it's merely a matter of isolating the occupation and biding time to hit back.

One last thought, though we should be prepared for this, we should also take some time out to be amazed at the bone-headedness of our ruling class. Voting isn't good enough, lobbying isn't good enough either, demonstrations don't cut it, occupations are merely a health-hazard. These people have no answer for the pain and suffering they are causing. They are creating a world without escape. They are begging to be overthrown.

Marxism and McLuhan - pt 1 The Medium is the Message

Start with a quote:

It is always necessary to distinguish between the material transformation of the economic conditions of production, which can be determined with the precision of natural science, and the legal, political, religious, artistic, or philosophic — in short, ideological forms in which men become conscious of this conflict and fight it out.

It is not exactly an aphorism, but it is a neat segment of Marx’s Preface to the Critique of Political Economy with an important implication. Ideology is reasonably defined as a collection of ideas based around a distinct point of view. The argument here suggests ideology is the medium of class consciousness.

In the clash between forces and relations of production, the basis of class struggle, people can achieve things which are contrary to the ideas they hold. This was something Antonio Gramsci dwelt upon in his Prison Notebooks repeatedly. The achievements of the Biennio Rosso were not capitalised upon because there was not sufficient critical renovation of ideas; long story short, the workers rebellion was not translated into a workers state.

Ideology is the medium of class consciousness and, as we know, the medium is the message. The key benefit of Marshall McLuhan’s media studies was the spotlight he shone on the media themselves, media as physical objects, and the effects they have. For example, (in this case David Sarnoff, pioneer American broadcaster) people often advise that the “products of modern science are not in themselves good or bad; it is the way that they are used that determines their value”.

Suppose we were to say, “Apple Pie is in itself neither good nor bad; it is the way that it is used that determines its value”. Or “the Smallpox Virus is in itself neither good nor bad; it is the way that it is used that determines its value”. Again, “Firearms are in themselves neither good nor bad; it is the way that they are used that determines their value”.

A useful point for consideration, the ideology of Protestantism helped found capitalism. Not because of some supposed work-ethic, plenty of harsh toil had been carried before anyone pondered the nature of a personal god, but because its dispute with Catholicism over humanity’s relationship to the divine was in effect an argument over the individual’s relationship to authority. “No King But Jesus” is a roundabout call for a republic.

But why does this matter? One of the crucial points about ideology, specific ideologies, is why do they arise when they do. As Frederick Engels pointed out, early socialism was utopian because:

What was wanted was the individual man of genius, who has now arisen and who understands the truth. That he has now arisen, that the truth has now been clearly understood, is not an inevitable event, following of necessity in the chains of historical development, but a mere happy accident. He might just as well have been born 500 years earlier, and might then have spared humanity 500 years of error, strife, and suffering.

So, Protestantism didn’t just happen to rise up during the feudal era to attack it, it arose out of the feudal era, part of it but against it (and eventually to be supplanted by more advanced articulations of bourgeois ideology). There is no debate about a personal versus an impersonal god without print technology and the beginnings of mass literacy. There are no ideas apart from the means of articulating them.

We exist in a state of media saturation, to the point where we do not regard the effects such media have upon us. We live in the medium of Earth’s atmosphere. We do not notice it because our bodies are evolved to live at around sea-level pressure; we live at the very bottom of an ocean of air. You can only get a handle on this when you climb a large mountain, get into a submarine or a spacecraft.

We tend not to notice the dominant ideology, the collection of ideas based around the point of view of the dominant class in our society. It is only when we are outside that medium that we see it for what it is. The recent public sector general strike in Britain, baby step thought it might have been, was amongst other things an important blow struck against the prevailing ideology, a temporary exodus transporting millions of people (not just the strikers) out of neo-liberalism, austerity and atomisation.

McLuhan’s strength is that he looks at the effect of technology on consciousness. It is easy to accept that electronic media creates almost instant global communication, and thereby bridges the gap between cause and effect, core and perhipery in the public mind. You can extrapolate from this. We have lived through a period of growing gated bourgeois communities, increasingly militarised policing, the enclosure of more and more public space, and so forth. The mass media batters away, the poor are dangerous, deracinated and, look, they're living among us. It’s all very logical.

But there is one clear problem with techno-determinism. Take something like the Canary Wharf Complex in East London. To the bourgeois Londoner it is a sleek monument to their power. The working class Londoner would be forgiven if they found it a cold, bewildering and unwelcome place (built upon the ruins of a former trade union stronghold let’s not forget). Technology, mass media live inside the greater medium of class society; that is the message they carry to us, everywhere, all the time.

The end of democracy

There are technocratic governments in Greece and Italy, formed to enforce austerity. They may cry tears at what they have to do, the sacrifices you have to make, but you still have to make them.

The democratic impulse is an obstacle to austerity. People don't vote to be fleeced, not generally (hence, also, the general trend of declining election participation in supposedly advanced democracies). There is active vote rigging, suppression and violence going on in Russia right now. Russia has been ruled by a former KGB agent for rather too long. According to the NAACP the American political establishment is preparing something similar:

In its report, Defending Democracy: Confronting Modern Barriers to Voting Rights in America, the NAACP explores the voter suppression measures taking place particularly in southern and western states.

Fourteen states have passed a total of 25 measures that will unfairly restrict the right to vote, among black and Hispanic voters in particular.

The new measures are focused – not coincidentally, the association insists – in states with the fastest growing black populations (Florida, Georgia, Texas and North Carolina) and Latino populations (South Carolina, Alabama and Tennessee). The NAACP sees this as a cynical backlash to a surge in ethnic minority voting evident in 2008.

Barack Obama is part of that establishment. His election in 2008 chipped a small crack in the American political monolith, also known as the Southern Strategy, in short the means by which whatever way the people vote they get a solidly conservative government. However flaky his programme might have been, Obama inspired the Black and Hispanic working class to become politically active, and that is dangerous.

Space news

Planetary Habitability Laboratory (PHL), has produced an online list of potentially habitable exoplanets. That habitability will then be means tested. The most habitable planets will be turned into Private Finance Planets. Any creatures living on planets exceeding the habitability limit will be forced to move to Croydon or Romford.

In other news

Francis Maude's publicly funded pension is £43,825 a year with a pot of £731,883
David Cameron's publicly funded pension is £32,978 a year with a pot of £550,725
George Osborne's publicly funded pension is £32,978 a year with a pot of £550,725
Nick Cleggs's publicly funded pension is £28,404 a year with a pot of £440,000
Eric Pickles' publicly funded pension is £43,825 a year with a pot of £731,883
Vince Cable's publicly funded pension is £39,551 a year with a pot of £660,507
Andrew Lansley's publicly funded pension is £39,551 a year with a pot of £660,507
Danny Alexander's publicly funded pension is £26,404 a year with pot of £440,942

With antimonies like these...!

Who needs, um... ontology? And that's as far as I got with Historical Materialism. But seriously, a note on the contradictions of class baiting: In order to get their buddy Clarkson off the hook rightwing commentators have had to insist it was all said in jest (c'mon, any fool knows Clarkson does want to see us all shot, he just doesn't think it's practical right now). The trouble is the strike wasn't in jest, hence the 'joke' fell flat. Days ago the right was screaming blue murder about the cost to the economy, now they have to about face and dismiss the strikers as having non-jobs.

Similarly Cameron has claimed Wednesday's strike was a damp squib and, 24 hours later, obviously big.

Which is it, we're left wondering? For rightwingers it's both and everything.

Never forget

You pay his wages - he advocates your murder.

And in the topsy-turvy Land of Chocolate most right-wingers inhabit that's fair exchange no robbery. If Top Gear is Britain's cultural expression of fascism I suppose we have to comfort ourselves it's ironic fascism (it's all just a joke you see, can't you take murder fantasies with a pinch of salt?). If Clarkson and co get the upper hand we'll have ironic jackboots, kitsch swastikas and self-reflexive zyklon B.

[Extra note] The point about Jeremy Clarkson's statement is not that it shows him to be a violent minded idiot, there are plenty of those in the world. Clarkson and his Top Gear cohort consistently push aggressive, bigoted language from a public platform into everyday life, acclimatising people to violence. Where does it all end? One example is Anders Breivik, the Utoya mass murderer, who was inspired and encouraged to do what he did by over a decade of bigoted mainstream language and attitude directed against multiculuralism and immigration in general, muslims in particular. Amongst other things Breivik was a Clarkson fan.


It's a small thing in the long run but you can make your complaint here.

Why do the rich keep getting richer?

It might have something to do with union membership.

Gideon Osborne's £5bn gamble to stave off recession

Really...? £5 billion to halt further economic recession...? It makes you wonder if Gideon Osborne realises the seriousness of the situation, the damage his government has been inflicting, on top of the damage caused by the banking system and stock market. What's he going to do, put it all on black? No, it seems:

Some of the £5bn extra capital investment over the next three years will go to a £600m schools programme to fund an extra 40,000 places by 2014.

Well, that's nice of him, but is this money going to Michael Gove's 'free' schools, or will comprehensives get some of the money? What else is there?

In what is rapidly turning into a full scale "game-changer" budget to stave off the impact of collapsing European economies, Osborne will also announce plans to:

• Help energy-intensive industries.

• Increase the bank levy to maintain an annual income from banks of £2.5bn.

• Place a cap on announced rail fare rises.

• Defer a 3p rise in fuel duty which was due to be introduced in January

• Remove health and safety bureaucracy from 1 million self-employed people as the next stage of labour market deregulation.

Does any of this apply to you? I suppose it would if you were a commuter or a small businessman/woman, i.e. Tory voting fodder. Also:

The chancellor may also be able to garner funds for the investment from overseas. China Investment Corporation is considering investing in the infrastructure of the UK, according to Lou Jiwei, the fund's chairman. The $410bn Chinese fund "is keen to team up with fund managers or participate through a public-private partnership in the UK infrastructure sector as an equity investor," Lou writes in today's Financial Times.

Britain's public works will be further tied up with private capital, the same kind of private capital New Labour used to fund projects that were late, badly made and expensive.

In other news, fewer and fewer people are satisfied with Tory shit served up as ice cream. There will be a public sector strike on Wednesday, not in France or Greece or Egypt but in Britain of all places, phew! What's more it has majority support: 61% of all polled, 67% of women and 79% of young people.

Profits and the labour theory of value - as explained by the Tories

See here:

With less then a week to go before the biggest walkout in decades, the ministers in charge of pensions negotiations, Francis Maude and Danny Alexander, said the strikes would impose a "significant hit to the economy at a very challenging time" as they urged public sector staff to go to defy their unions and turn up to work next Wednesday.

If 2.5m workers striking for a day costs the economy £500m, that's £200 per worker; compare that to how much they actually get paid per day. That's the source of profit, right there.

Never forget, folks, organised workers should not be allowed to hold the country to ransom, bring the economy and our society to its knees... Only the Tories and their banker chums are allowed to do that. Public sector workers are on strike in the first instant because a 3% across the board increase in worker pension contributions, which amounts to all but a day's wages each month. Hello? Anyone heard of effective demand? Who has got a day's wages going spare to donate to bankers in need? No one I know.

Call careers information. Have you got yourself an occupation?

A million unemployed kids and all Cameron and co, mofos who never had to work a day in their lives, have is gas about 'aspiration' and 'opportunity'.



They should just change Britain to Poundland and have done with it. Abandon hope or take up struggle. All out on November 30th.

A week away from finking...

For very, very personal reasons (happy ones)... but here's something to put down; not a match for something like this, but what is...?

Rosa Luxemburg's argument with Eduard Bernstein, known as Reform or Revolution, is rightly celebrated. There are two obstacles to even roughly applying her arguments today, one is contemporary to her time, one to ours.

The first one is well rehearsed. Luxemburg's argument was with the figurehead of the revisionist movement within the SPD at the end of the 19th century. It was an intra-party argument. Rosa Luxemburg won, in argument. The trouble is arguments are won in practice, to the extent that honest champions of one set of ideas can end up bringing another set to life. The ideology of the SPD was revolutionary, the day to day practice of the SPD was strictly legal.

Her revolutionary career is negative proof of the old argument, you need a revolutionary organisation (however you might see it) to test and win revolutionary ideas.

But the second difficulty, our difficulty is this, who are the reformists? If there was one lesson the last decade has taught us all it is the modern system of government is impervious to the people's will. The next time a Labour left tries to assert how realistic and serious they are, compared to your (simultaneously) utopian and dangerous designs, it's worth parrying them with this. Who honestly still thinks you can change the world for the better through parliament (let alone bring about something like socialism)? Social democrats are the true believers. In this age revolutionaries are the realists, social democrats are utopian.

But, back to the first point, reformism does not arise out of a collective mind, but a social body. Reformism is not a bourgeois minority sport but the formalised version of the general mixture of impressions working class people gain in ordinary life. It is part of life. Who is trying to practice it these days?

Autonomists are often suggested to be the new reformists. One striking connection is the famous aphorism of Bernstein's, “the movement is everything, the final goal nothing”. A modern (and rather sectarian, if I may say so) version is “we are the demands”.

Another connection I believe is the rejection of violent confrontation. This can just be a tactical question. If you are outnumbered and outmatched by an opponent it would be wise to duck battle. This was of course the origin of the SPD's tactics, building a party in a semi-absolutist state. But if this is worked up into a strategic point trouble begins. The problem is obvious; you may reject violence but will violence reject you?

Lets not go too far, neither autonomists nor socialists think the system can be used to bring about communal democracy. Both favour encouraging ordinary people into direct activity, rather than passively engaging them through voting and lobbying etc. Many autonomists would regard themselves as revolutionaries, and who's going to stop them from doing so?

It's worth adding though, there's a difference between revolutionary activity and revolution. Autonomists often see socialists as waiting for a revolution for their cue to spring into action. Any who cares to notice knows this is hardly the case. There is also a link between modern autonomism and the sixties counter-culture, through the slogan “turn on, tune in, drop out”; drop out being the key element, you have to abandon bourgeois society in order to fight it. The sectarian streak in autonomism tends to see autonomist activity as revolution and everything else as missing the mark; “we are the demands”.

So autonomism is not reformism, but is related. There is call for a fraternal, reasoned critique of autonomist ideas, as distinct from traditional points made in the dialogue with reformists. A start may be that autonomism has a strong ethical dimension but no political economy (what it has is borrowed from neo-liberal theory).

Stasi

World of Stupid 2... Godwin's Revenge!

Rhetoric 101: everyone is opposed to fascism, find a link between your opponents and fascism, even if it's just a cheapjack neologism like "feminazi" or, in this case gaystapo, and you will prevail in your argument. See here:

An Anglican newspaper has defended the publication of an article that compares gay rights campaigners to Nazis, saying the author has "pertinent views".

Pertinent is a synonym for relevant. What are these views relevant to?

In his column [Alan] Craig referred to a number of high-profile legal cases where Christians claim to have been penalised for their views on homosexuality.

He wrote: "Having forcibly – and understandably – rectified the Versailles-type injustices and humiliations foisted on the homosexual community, the UK's victorious Gaystapo are now on a roll. Their gay-rights stormtroopers take no prisoners as they annex our wider culture, and hotel owners, registrars, magistrates, doctors, counsellors, and foster parents … find themselves crushed under the pink jackboot.

"Thanks especially to the green light from a permissive New Labour government, the gay Wehrmacht is on its long march through the institutions and has already occupied the Sudetenland social uplands of the Home Office, the educational establishment, the politically-correct police. Following a plethora of equalities legislation, homosexuals are now protected and privileged by sexual orientation regulations and have achieved legal equality by way of civil partnerships. But it's only 1938 and Nazi expansionist ambitions are far from sated."

Yes, before you know it they'll be sending heterosexuals to the gas chambers. Pertinent, in this case means relevant to Alan Craig's vivid imagination (as a side note - I hope, for the sake of sanity that Alan Craig is mixing his metaphors and doesn't actually think the Gestapo led the French Revolution).

It may not have always been the case, privileged, white, heterosexual men have insisting that they are the most downtrodden in society. It is a nice illustration though of the superiority/fear dialectic of bigotry. Bigots simultaneously feel superior yet consistently undermined by the object of their hate. They have the upper hand, yet everywhere they see inevitable doom, in this case hallucinations of pink swastikas. They may be dominant, but their enemy is vital and alive.

There's almost certainly a degree of projection here too. It's rather like Martin Amis's characterisation of Muslims as fascists, followed by thought experiments in a final solution.

We may want to give Alan Craig the benefit of the doubt on this account. I certainly have never heard of him before, and let's not forget for every one of him there may be many Giles Frasers are there?. But why bother? He sounds like an absolute scumbag.

A world of stupid...

Apparently:

Britain is losing its moral compass to such a degree that the armed forces can no longer rely on young recruits to behave in a way once expected by senior officers, General Lord Dannatt, a former head of the army will say on Tuesday.

He may be suggesting this because there was systematic torture of prisoners in Iraq. But that was a (well organised) one off, surely... OK, so there was internment and torture in Ireland in the 1970s... internment and torture in Kenya in the 1950s... back in the 1850s there was this weird phase of executing Hindu rebels by strapping them to cannons, but in no way does this constitute an abbreviated inventory of British army torture... Only a fool or a communist would suggest as much.

Also:

Dannatt, a committed Christian...

Is clearly not so committed that he's heard about the ten commandments, particularly the sixth, "thou shalt not kill"; fairly unambiguous, wouldn't you say? Not to mention difficult to reconcile with soldiery but ho hum...

Arise, ye starvlings... and save the music industry

From all the fucking hippies clogging up London with wax jackets and vintage bikes. Here's why:

Yet there is something profoundly odd about the hyperbolic championing of Florence Welch. At a time when a climate of burgeoning radicalism should be reorienting our culture so that hitherto suppressed voices from the margins might be heard, why is the Great British Hope of 2011 a fashion-obsessed, privately educated young woman from a family of privileged metropolitan movers and shakers? In fact, shouldn't the red carpet treatment afforded to Welch make us question the extent to which we are all complicit in a top-heavy system that no longer has any qualms about poshness and ostentatious consumer decadence?

The huge popularity of FATM's hermetic, Bloomsbury-meets-Björk aesthetic is symptomatic of a society that has become almost irretrievably divided without knowing it. Though it often makes the right noises and appears sympathetic to reform, liberal, middle-class Britain has abandoned counterculture and true radicalism for an unfortunate lingering obsession with escapist lifestyle fantasy. While inequalities have mushroomed in the UK in recent years, the British bourgeoisie has increasingly indulged in a way of life that seeks to cover over its affluence with vague gestures at radical chic, pastoral myth, and down-at-heel "folksiness".

Please elaborate:

The most aloof, entitled middle-class since the Edwardian period has become inured to its position at the top of an emphatically inegalitarian social hierarchy. Meanwhile, deprived of its vocabulary and identity, the real "folk" or working class has increasingly receded from view over the past couple of decades, as several commentators this year have noted. And the pervasive notion that There Is No Alternative has been compounded by the fact that the alternative, proletarian, bottom-up traditions of the past (independent music, folk culture, communitarian politics) have been casually appropriated by a liberal-conservative elite that blithely attaches itself to faux-populist causes such as "big society", nu-folk music, Blue Labour, and Green Toryism. FATM's catwalk pastiche of Kate Bush's wayward, subversive English eccentricity is merely the latest in this series of top-down co-options of "grassroots" marginality.

The answer:

So what is the alternative? Perhaps the point is that we politicians, journalists, academics, and indie musicians are part of the problem rather than the solution, and are likely to carry on being so until substantial reform of the political system allows the genuinely marginalised, alternative sectors of the world a chance to shine.

The author probably isn't suggesting workers power, but something like the above solution should be applied much more broadly, to all of our society.

What is Stalinism and why does it matter?

1. Stalinism is a form of statecraft practiced in Russia somewhere between 1924 and 1953. It is a series of policies, some of which ended with Stalin's death, some of which endured. If Stalinism is this and nothing more then it is an historical curiosity.

2. Stalinism is a system of government best described as bureaucratic state capitalism, where the state is fused with the economy but the imperative is capital accumulation. Its value and necessity depends on your perspective. From the point of view of the group effectively governing Russia during the late 1920s Stalinism, as it came to be, was essential and justified. Stalinism was, from the point of view of Russian history, progressive. It made Russia into a modern society. But that's not our perspective. Capitalism is a global system, and was a global system back when the USSR was founded, even back when the Russian Revolution began. Capitalism did not need developing, it was ripe to fall. This has bearing on the 3rd point.

3. Stalinism is a political strategy whereby Communist Parties around the world were effectively agents of Russian foreign policy. This meant different things in different countries. The consistent theme was Russia need to survive and compete within the capitalist world. Though the Communist Party contained many serious revolutionaries it's political strategy was never revolutionary. Without having an Actually Existing Socialism to serve surviving Communist Parties in the core capitalist countries adapted their strategy only slightly, by positioning themselves as left social democrats, to the point where in several countries they are almost the only true surviving social democratic parties, the official social democrats having become social liberal.

4. So, ok, Stalinism is not a strategy for transcending capitalism, why does it matter? Firstly it matters for the simple, ideological point regarding all revolutions leading to tyranny/co-option. Secondly, it matters because the violent intervention from the top of Russian society around 1927/8, which created Stalinism, did lead to significant change. Can change from below compete, full democracy, self-government compete? The fact that the Russian Revolution ended up founding a bureaucratic command economy when it started as an experiment in communal democracy would suggest to some that such democracy is utopian. We can only make extrapolations from the present into the future, but there're three things worth noting:

(i) For centuries now significant mass movements that have challenged the status quo have developed communal forms of democracy, even if only in embryo. Why would a utopia keep cropping up throughout history?
(ii) The development of capitalism prepares us in part for communal democracy. An example; the republican ideal of citizenship, of popular sovereignty (even if deferred to an elected representative) means that each is able, or should be able, to take their place as head of state. This also applies (in an obviously more round-a-about way) to constitutional monarchies.
(iii) It's a sore day for humanity if it's still not capable of liberating itself. Without change from below, at this point in time, human civilisation is almost certainly doomed.

More on the Greek referendum

Six years and still no book deal...

Through the Scary Door, 97th worst political blog in Britain, is six years old today. Vulgar Marxism, vulgar jokes and music videos, what more could you want... apart from information... insight... moral uplift... jazz...?

Metronomy - Holiday



Elastica - Car Song



Jimi Goodwin - Bird Effect



Brian Eno - Glitch

Live in the real world... there is no money... etc

There is 'no money' because the bankers and stock market jockeys are deliberately withdrawing it. European stock markets are tumbling on the news that the Greeks will be given some kind of say over their future, through a referendum on the current debt package.

Our capitalists are in no doubt as to how popular they are, how welcome their policies are. They are generally realistic when their precious, precious wealth is on the line.

Functioning democracy is seen as an obstacle to capital accumulation. Beware, Greece has had dictatorships before, in living memory. If the Greek working class lets up for a moment the ruling class wouldn't hesitate to impose another dictatorship if it felt it needed to.

Vote, vote, vote - vote while you still can!

Because, by 2020, universal suffrage will be deemed bad for business and abolished.

A fool or a knave?

Immigration and race are right wing wedge issues. The ruling class's wants a stratified and atomised work force in order to up the general rate of exploitation, boosting profits. That's the plan, anyway.

Modern governments are compelled to violently manipulate the working population. That's why, regardless of their political persuasion, a generation of Home Secretaries have tried to outbid their predecessors in obnoxious authoritarianism.

The only trouble is, at least for the Labour Party, is, as (former Home Secretary) David Blunkett has pointed out:

You can't outdo the Conservatives in relation to immigration.

When you play this game you aren't triangulating but helping to shift political discourse to the right.

If Blunkett is sincere there is a degree of irony involved. He was the Minister who introduced the Britishness Test (because nationality can not only be measured but sorted into increments). Blunkett also had the children of asylum seekers segregated from other children to prevent swamping; yes, your children are being swamped by a tiny minority and no it's not to facilitate divide and rule, preventing local families getting dangerously familiar with potential refugees... oh no. Blunkett also did his bit to improve race relations in Britain by describing the young men incarcerated for trying to stop violent nazis from rampaging through their neighbourhoods as whining maniacs.

Erstwhile war-supporters used to say things along the line of "it's all very well making these points with the benefit of hindsight". The obvious answer was that many of us seemed to have the benefit of foresight. If Blunkett knew all this before and during his career in government then he is a deeply cynical man. If he's only just realised this now he's merely a total and utter fool.

Brian Coleman is a fat piece of shit

In the Evening Standard of all papers:

Brian Coleman, a senior member of Boris Johnson's administration and leading Barnet councillor, responded to Sharada Osman's appeal for help by telling her that people in her situation should "deal with their own issues".

Ms Osman, 39, today accused him of "hypocrisy" and called for an apology. Part-time student Ms Osman has lived in North Finchley for six years with her six-year-old son Kylan, who has learning difficulties.

She wrote this month to Mr Coleman, who is said to earn almost £120,000 a year, asking for help after her private landlord increased the rent for her home from £950 to £1,100. In an emotional email, unemployed Ms Osman told the Tory Assembly member that she was writing to him "out of desperation in hope that someone can offer some help and guidance". Ms Osman told Mr Coleman that she wanted to avoid having to apply for a council house.

Mr Coleman, chairman of the London Fire and Emergency Planning Authority, replied nine days later and suggested she turn to the private sector, saying: "There will never be enough council houses available."

Ms Osman, who made clear she was living in private, rented accommodation, replied and said: "I am in complete shock by your lack of empathy and regard for my situation."

One hour late Mr Coleman replied and said: "Lack of empathy?????? Councillors simply cannot conjure housing out of thin air and the private sector is your only option. That is a fact.

"I am afraid you have to live in the real world where the country has no money and residents will have to deal with their own issues rather than expecting 'the system' to sort their lives out. This correspondence is now closed."

It's the last line that's the most infuriating, I think; don't bother me again, peasant. I'd also like to point out a common Tory canard, it's been on my mind for a while: "there is no money". No money? Maybe Brian Coleman is paid in kind, perhaps £120,000 worth of pies. He looks jolly enough, like Father Christmas, but in reverse.

Roobin's extra note: as was pointed out in the comment section, thanks to Finchley Methodist Church, a charity, Brian Coleman's monthly rent is £546; half that of his constituent, Ms Osman. Link here. The peasants may not be living in the real world, but Mr Coleman's clearly living in the Land of Chocolate.

For no raisin

Some Fast Show sketches.

The Off Roaders:



Fat, Sweaty Coppers:



Indie Club:



And finally John Actor is... MONKFISH!

Hmm... How to express it... Are words even adequate any more?

Rents are going up. Wages are stagnating. Housing benefits have been capped. Now the Tories want to make it a crime to see an empty house and try to live in it.

Kenneth Clarke has moved to toughen up his controversial sentencing bill by criminalising squatting and strengthening the law of self-defence for those who confront intruders in their own homes.

The decision to ban squatting in residential buildings has been taken despite warnings that making trespass a criminal offence could also affect sit-ins and occupations and lead to an increase in the most vulnerable homeless people sleeping rough.

Kenneth Clarke, Secretary for 'Justice', was caught recently fobbing off half his council tax and claiming the mortgage on his second home as a parliamentary expense.

On 12 May 2009, The Daily Telegraph reported that Clarke had "flipped" his council tax. He had told the Parliamentary authorities that his main home was in his Rushcliffe constituency, enabling him to claim a second homes allowance on his London home and leaving the taxpayer to foot the bill for the council tax due on that property. However, he told Rushcliffe Borough Council in Nottinghamshire that he spent so little time at his constituency address that his wife Gillian should qualify for a 25% council tax (single person’s) discount, saving the former chancellor around £650 per year. Land registry records showed that Clarke did not have a mortgage on his home in Nottinghamshire, where he has lived since 1987. He instead held a mortgage on his London house, which he had most recently charged to the taxpayer at £480 per month

Would it be so bad if his two (no doubt luxurious) homes burned to the ground?

Thought Police Note: I am not saying anyone should do this. It would be a lot a time and effort wasted not affecting government policy in the slightest, not to mention risking a life or two. But wouldn't you savour the irony of Kenneth Clarke kipping on David Cameron's sofa while he got his life back together (as tens of thousands of people are having to do right now, thanks to the Tory government)?

But seriously, folks...

Autonomists disagree with Marxists, generally speaking, in that they don't see socialism (or whatever you'd call an egalitarian democracy) as immanent within capitalism. Hence the need, one assumes, to create autonomous space outside of capitalism. If that is the case then autonomists cannot help but agree with Tory MP Louise Mensch's contention; you cannot criticise capitalism from within it.

But, if you do agree, you're missing one of the most basic philosophical points assumed (assumed but not often understood). It is generally given that to critique something you have to know it. The surest form of knowledge comes from a combination of theory and practice, hence Engels's conclusion that the working class, which both thinks and does, is the inheritor of German classical philosophy.

You cannot criticise capitalism, practically, theoretically or practically/theoretically without being within it. So enjoy your coffee.

Hearken, self-styled revolutionaries

Thanks to the bold effort of Leftie Hippie, working up the concise materialist observations of Tory MP and Living Genius, Louise "if you drink coffee you can't protest" Mensch, we now have The Louise Mensch Beverage Scale of Permitted Capitalist Criticism. Observe:

Level 4
Permitted criticism of capitalism = Total. Academies, Goldman-Sachs, concentration of capital, etc.

To achieve level 4, you must drink untreated mineral water collected yourself from a babbling mountain brook near your hermitage. Of course, you must not boil the water before drinking it, unless you mine the metal to create a kettle yourself. Purchasing so much as a camping kettle with one of those little whistle cap thingies on it basically takes you right back to the level of the Koch brothers.

Famous Level 4s: none.

Level 3
Permitted level of criticism of capitalism = TNCs, sweatshop labour and the military-industrial complex.

To achieve level 3, you are allowed to drink water from the tap, despite its being produced by privatised water companies. You *must not* add Robinsons' Barley Water to it to make a weak lemon drink, however.

Famous Level 3s: basically, this is John Harvey Kellogg.

Level 2
Permitted level of criticism of capitalism = privatised train networks, quality of the gifts in Kinder Surprise.

To achieve level 2, you may drink tap water and fairtrade tea and coffee. On no account must you purchase this coffee from some kind of franchise or drink Ribena. THIS WILL RENDER YOUR UNHAPPINESS WITH TRAIN JOURNEYS NULL AND VOID.

Famous Level 2s: Lucy Mangan, probably.

Level 1
Permitted level of criticism of capitalism = the speed of service in Nando's. AND NOTHING ELSE.

Level 1s will drink Fentiman's lemonade at National Trust gift shops, then think NOTHING of washing it down with R Whites. Why don't these people just FUCK OFF AND DIE? They probably drink Ty-Phoo, the despicable BASTARDS.

Famous Level 1s: YOU. If you're LUCKY.

Level 0
Permitted level of criticism of capitalism = What on earth makes you think you can criticise capitalism, you insignificant, smelly turd? IT PROVIDES YOUR BEVERAGES.

Level 0s would drink Coca-Cola at a Showcase Cinema, EVEN IF SOMEONE WAS WATCHING.

Famous Level 0s: given the size of the sample, it was hard to narrow it down.

Occupy Space

Life of Brian vs Animal Farm

The Life of Brian was rebroadcast on Saturday night, I watched it again for the umpteenth time and enjoyed it very much. I love the satire on left-sectarianism, because it's partly true but also in the spirit of the-only-thing-worse-than-being-talked-about-is-not-being-talked-about.

The trouble is LoB a millstone around our necks. A bit like Animal Farm and 1984, it is a work of fiction that's often taken as proving something in real life. Animal Farm doesn't prove that all attempts at socialism end in dictatorship. It is a work of fiction. If it proves anything it shows you shouldn't put pigs in charge of farms.

There are some who use the People's Front of Judea witticism as a form of alert. The left can and does involve itself in bitter, directionless faction fights; but doesn't every political persuasion? Isn't the Labour Party wracked by conflict between the Blairite and Brownite factions? Don't the Tories regularly tear themselves apart over the European Union issue? Aren't the BNP currently imploding?

But not every argument is a fruitless faction fight. Godwin's Law is invoked sometimes too often; occasionally the people we discuss are nazis. The same applies for the People's Front of Judea. Sometimes things have to be debated to a conclusion.

But the Life of Brian is also a prime weapon in Red Baiting. It often shows the red baiter's paradox. Revolutionary socialists are at the same time both Students Waving Placards and a Sinister Worldwide Plot; but they can't be both, they have to be one or the other. Get it right, either the left is too fractious to ever get it together (Life of Brian) or it is full of brilliant, machiavellian schemers secretly bent on absolute power (Animal Farm).

For no raisin

On the right LkCa 15, roughly 450 light years away, it is the closest we have to a second pale blue dot. This is a cloud of incandescent gas halfway to becoming a a Jupiter-like planet, discovered through some of the latest tricks in studying distant, faint light. See here.

Naomi Wolf on her recent arrest

Link here. The incident began at an evening dinner event called Game Changers 2011 - a group of OWS supporters wanted to speak to Governor Andrew Cuomo.

On our exit, I saw that the protesters had been cordoned off by a now-massive phalanx of NYPD cops and pinned against the far side of the street – far away from the event they sought to address.

I went up and asked them why. They replied that they had been informed that the Huffington Post event had a permit that forbade them to use the sidewalk. I knew from my investigative reporting on NYC permits that this was impossible: a private entity cannot lease the public sidewalks; even film crews must allow pedestrian traffic. I asked the police for clarification – no response.

I went over to the sidewalk at issue and identified myself as a NYC citizen and a reporter, and asked to see the permit in question or to locate the source on the police or event side that claimed it forbade citizen access to a public sidewalk. Finally a tall man, who seemed to be with the event, confessed that while it did have a permit, the permit did allow for protest so long as we did not block pedestrian passage.

I thanked him, returned to the protesters, and said: "The permit allows us to walk on the other side of the street if we don't block access. I am now going to walk on the public sidewalk and not block it. It is legal to do so. Please join me if you wish." My partner and I then returned to the event-side sidewalk and began to walk peacefully arm in arm, while about 30 or 40 people walked with us in single file, not blocking access.

Then a phalanx of perhaps 40 white-shirted senior offices descended out of seemingly nowhere and, with a megaphone (which was supposedly illegal for citizens to use), one said: "You are unlawfully creating a disruption. You are ordered to disperse." I approached him peacefully, slowly, gently and respectfully and said: "I am confused. I was told that the permit in question allows us to walk if we don't block pedestrian access and as you see we are complying with the permit."

If you want an illustration of the fear and loathing in in every copper's (reptile) heart:

He gave me a look of pure hate. "Are you going to back down?" he shouted. I stood, immobilised, for a moment. "Are you getting out of my way?" I did not even make a conscious decision not to "fall back" – I simply couldn't even will myself to do so, because I knew that he was not giving a lawful order and that if I stepped aside it would be not because of the law, which I was following, but as a capitulation to sheer force.

This is the point. If the police break the law what do you do? The police are a legalised crime syndicate, an armed gang employed to solve rich men's problems with force.

Ms Wolf was then arrested.

The police are now telling my supporters that the permit in question gave the event managers "control of the sidewalks". I have asked to see the permit but still haven't been provided with it – if such a category now exists, I have never heard of it; that, too, is a serious blow to an open civil society. What did I take away? Just that, unfortunately, my partner and I became exhibit A in a process that I have been warning Americans about since 2007: first they come for the "other" – the "terrorist", the brown person, the Muslim, the outsider; then they come for you – while you are standing on a sidewalk in evening dress, obeying the law.

The purpose of the War on Terror was not just to shift the balance abroad but at home as well. In many countries government agencies now have sweeping, ill-defined powers. Often you need a permit for most basic aspects of political activity (or if not the cop in question takes it for granted you do) - not so much different to Imperial Germany, where a policeman would sit on every platform in every public meeting to make sure the Kaiser wasn't insulted. We can't all be famous, well-to-do writers, there is only safety in numbers. We must exercise our rights or risk losing them, and at a time of greatest need.

I can haz anti-capitalist transition?

Fans of da ant-capitalist transition mites also appreciate this.

News: many and various

Sometimes I feel like a right sour old git, but sometimes I have the courage of my convictions, like when I see It's Time to Democratise Money Creation . I just think: "Is it...? Is it really?"

Meanwhile in Chile military service is obligatory, public education is not.

Chile has given nearly 57,000 18-year-olds one month to report for potential military duty, saying the government needs to fill gaps in its armed forces because a nationwide student protest movement has reduced the number of volunteers it usually gets.

Chilean government is preparing for war on someone, probably the Chileans.

New spaceport opens, new tax-funded (but privately owned) $209m spaceport offering $200,000 2 and 1/2 hour flights, 2 and 1/2 hour flights with 5 minutes zero gravity, new spaceport opens for test flight. We at TtSD are all in favour of this, on one condition, they set the controls for the heart of the sun. Blastoff! Feel the world getting lighter!

Follow coverage of the Dale Farm evictions, LIVE! Watch marauding police and bailiffs batter ordinary people, LIVE! Watch people's homes and lives being destroyed, LIVE! Then go back to your business as if nothing's happened.

Not about left and right?

This is the statement-cum-list of demands from the London occupation:

1 The current system is unsustainable. It is undemocratic and unjust. We need alternatives; this is where we work towards them.

2 We are of all ethnicities, backgrounds, genders, generations, sexualities, dis/abilities and faiths. We stand together with occupations all over the world.

3 We refuse to pay for the banks' crisis.

4 We do not accept the cuts as either necessary or inevitable. We demand an end to global tax injustice and our democracy representing corporations instead of the people.

5 We want regulators to be genuinely independent of the industries they regulate.

6 We support the strike on 30 November and the student action on 9 November, and actions to defend our health services, welfare, education and employment, and to stop wars and arms dealing.

7 We want structural change towards authentic global equality. The world's resources must go towards caring for people and the planet, not the military, corporate profits or the rich.

8 We stand in solidarity with the global oppressed and we call for an end to the actions of our government and others in causing this oppression.

9 This is what democracy looks like. Come and join us!

Some vague, some very specific and challenging but, more importantly, if you go to the link and look at the swarm of right wing trolls hurling idiotic abuse at the occupation from the safety of the CiF comment section, the right think it's aimed at them because, well, it is.

More vicious, sectarian carping

In attempting to conquer space from capitalism we must give regard to the enemy defending it. The ruling class, in the form of the state has the benefit of prior organisation. An anti-capitalist movement must be equal to this organisation otherwise it will not be effective, unless of course you intend your movement to be merely platonic.

Which begs the question, has there been a serious attempt to put together serious political economy for autonomism, beyond constructing neologisms like precariat? Don't autonomists adopt neo-liberal paradigms (such as the end of the working class, horizontal organisation, power is everywhere and nowhere, grandnarratives are oppressive etc) and simply invert them?

There are two pitfalls to a purely moral opposition to capital. One is voluntarisn, the dangerous kind that can lead to totalitarianism (or would lead, if it were not completely Utopian at this point). The other is platonic, gesture politics, the kind where a demonstration stops to work out the fine details of democratic decision making while the police are swiftly kettling it.

In order to achieve any worthwhile goal you need a tested and trusted political tradition. You can't make one up as you go, least of all pretend you don't need one. Your demonstration has to be about left or right (approximate as those political coordinates may be) or it's about nothing.

It's a shame that some people don't see any viable political tradition that can express their political will, but it's pointless crying over such things. They can't be made to see it. But there are others, often first to the megaphone, who actively seek to keep things primitive and inchoate. As far as I can see we may lose the world, but at least those people get to keep their beautiful souls.

Something about the development of class consciousness

Occupy CoL - some observations

The picture sums the current situation up. To be blunt anyone who is not rooting for the St Paul's campers is an idiot or a scumbag. I went along to the inital demo to check it out. The following thoughts occur:

(1) A few thousand people put together in a few days by people working over the internet is not to be sniffed at. Of course larger, formal organisations can deliver greater numbers and have them better organised, which leads on to...
(2) There is not enough time to faff around with demonstrative democracy when there's a job to be done - if you're going to occupy the stock exchange work out how you're going to occupy it (preferably don't advertise it to the police first) occupy it and, once that's done, then you vote on stuff...
(3) If you were asked to rebuild the pyramids you wouldn't round up 10,000 slaves, you'd buy a load of JCBs. If there is no prohibition on amplifying your voice in the City of London there's no need for a human megaphone - it's just frivilous. If this was anything else but the beginning of something you'd be tempted to think the camp is just mass playacting.
(4) Da sound of da police: According to the Graun:

The Metropolitan police said some "containment" had been in place to prevent a breach of the peace

... An utterly baffling reversal of logic. The only purpose of kettling is to give the police total physical superiority in order to provoke and frustrate, thereby allowing them to pick off 'troublemakers'.

The cops made a serious bodge when they didn't close down the nearby shops and restaurants before putting their kettle in place. It meant they had to 'assess' (their exact word) who was legitimate and who wasn't.

PC Brains: Why're you here, sonny jim?

Person: Well it's just such a beautiful day...

Brains: Not good enough.

Regards whether this was collective imprisonment I also heard from two separate plods that it's not imprisonment because you're not being held under a roof; which is a novel definition, one that may have been comfort to Ivan Denisovich.

I felt lucky to get out when I did... Once they weeded out the tourists, I expected a police riot on Saturday. Give them time... or don't, actually, give the campers your support.

True or False?

Jeremy Irons
Britney Spears
Stevie Nicks
Ryan Giggs
Axl Rose
William Shatner
Thora Hird
Shabba Ranks
Busta Rhymes
Gordon Burns
Mark Spitz
Muddy Waters
Roger Waters
Bill Withers
Jimmy Greaves
Chaka Khan
Brian Cant
Jedward
Lee Majors
Stephanie Powers

Yay! Radiohead can be bothered!

I'm a bit mean, a bit unfair, they all have lives and families, bur, rejoice, Radiohead are going to make another album.

They have planned recording sessions for December and January, and at least one song – Come to Your Senses – is nearly finished. "It's a five-minute rehearsal, but it has the essence of what we need," he said. "There are a few of those. It would be fun to have them ready when we go to play next year. I don't know how we would release them."

Unlike the boring old Dadrock fans who still pine for The Bends, I only got into The 'Head after Kid A. The King of Limbs was a fine, if slight, album, crying out for a quick follow-up, a companion record. Here is one of the highlights of the last album, Separator:



Also, a possible album track, The Daily Mail:

Because everything looks bad if you remember it

Iain Duncan Smith is mad as hell, and he's not going to take it anymore:

Campaigners accused the welfare secretary, Iain Duncan Smith, of "losing his cool" after the cabinet minister launched an extraordinary attack against a charity for challenging the government's proposed housing benefit reforms in the courts, describing the action as "ridiculous … irresponsible behaviour (and) an ill-judged PR stunt" which resulted in "a massive waste of taxpayers' money and court time".

The Child Poverty Action Group (CPAG) had sought to overturn the government's cap on housing benefit, arguing in the high court that such a move would result in the "social cleansing" of expensive areas of the UK.

How dare anyone attempt to use the state and law to anyone's benefit...? Anyone except defence consultants and arms dealers... and Vodafone... and News Corporation... not forgetting the City of London... How dare they point out the likely shortfalls of my policies?

The caps mean that benefits paid to the poor to cover rents cannot exceed £250 a week for a one-bedroom property, £290 for two bedrooms, £340 for three bedrooms and £400 for four bedrooms. The government's own assessment shows that groups affected include people with disabilities, teenage mothers and ethnic minority families.

Charities had argued that the effect would be felt first in the capital, saying 9,000 London households facing would have to leave their homes as a result of the caps – and about 4,600 would be unable to find anywhere else to live "locally".

This could mean upwards of 20,000 children having to move, 14,000 out of their local area, resulting in disruption to education, health and social services.

Oh that's how. It could be argued that the way to reduce the housing benefit bill would be to tackle unemployment, poverty pay, introduce rent control and a building and renovation programme (it's not as if there isn't large unemployment in the construction sector, hey!). But that would involve siding with the poor against employers and landlords, and that would be wrong, wrong, WRONG!

Jim Crows again...

The state of Alabama has passed a law making immigration all but a crime in itself. The same law also allows private prisons to use prisoners far more extensively for work. A Guardian writer wonders where this is going?

The difference between Alabama and adjoining states is that it is willing to go further down this track. Recently, John McMillan, agriculture commissioner, proposed that the farm work left behind by immigrant workers be supplied with inmate labor. Decatur, a private detention center about 50 miles to the north-west of Alabama, which had been unable to find jobs for inmates, has now witnessed record numbers of requests for labor (for an estimated 150 detainees a day).

So, here is how it goes. First, the state passes a harsh immigration law. Then, it detains large numbers of immigrants. Third, private prisons (LCS, CCA, GEO) receive fresh inmates. And finally, the artificially created labor shortage is supplied by the new inmates. Does this sound like modern-day slavery to anyone?

It has been well observed that the American prison industry is huge. The justice system is a racist system, the cutting edge of a racist society, disproportionately punishing ethnic minorities. Work is effectively forced. Slavery has effectively been restored.

But the relation of work to compulsion and control. We are all wage slaves. We don't need a whip, merely an alarm clock to make us fall into line. We don't have to work for anyone in particular, but we have to work for someone. What the capitalist class wants is, in effect, labour like water. It can turn the tap off and on as and when it needs to.

The capitalist class's plan, it's only plan, for dealing with the current depression is to hold down costs, especially wages, and export. Individually this makes sense, as a collective this is madness, but competitive accumulation drives this system, the first point of view must dominate. Racist laws such as the one passed in Alabama are not just an attack on a people but a class, an experiment in setting a new, lower baseline in working class life. A portion of the working class will go from working for next to nothing to all but nothing, a further downward pressure on all working people, at least in Alabama. It is another illustration why the working class, if it is to be a class for itself, for its own interests, must be staunchly anti-racist.

Egyptian Revolutionary Socialists’ statement on the massacre of Copts at Maspero

Link

Glory to the martyrs of Bloody Sunday
Shame on the military and the reactionaries
The Revolutionary Socialists send sincere condolences to the families of the peaceful demonstrators who were murdered by the bullets of the Central Security Forces and crushed by the military’s armoured cars after they came on the night of 9 October to defend the right of Coptic Christians to freedom and equality.

The police repression of the demonstrations is an extension of Mubarak’s policies, just as it is a continuation of the policies of oppression of the Copts which goes hand-in-hand with a policy of divide and rule between Christian and Muslim working people, while the bosses and the military from both sides enjoy the fruits of their hard labour. And at the same time as these events, the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces has announced new decisions which will assist the followers of the old regime in their takeover of parliament, in order to tighten their grip once again.

The goal of the counter-revolution led by the Supreme Council at this moment is to distract the masses in preparation for striking a blow at the revolution. The military’s crime is an expression of their fear, and the fear of their internal and external allies of developments in our continuing revolution.

Over the last three weeks more than half a million working people, Muslim and Christian have joined the struggle, in the historic strikes by teachers, public transport workers, doctors, irrigation ministry workers and others. Muslim and Christian have been on strike together, and they have joined the sit-ins together. Sometimes they have faced repression, at other times they have been victorious. Their struggle has provided the finest examples of how to erase the false divisions which our exploiters impose on us for their own benefit.

This coalescence between Muslims and Christians proves the interconnections between the struggle for social justice on one hand, side-by-side with our fight to defend full equality for the Copts and all the oppressed in this country.

Meanwhile Mubarak’s generals continue to use the blood of the workers and peasants who fell in battle during their past wars with Israel to glorify themselves and their role in history. The truth is that the policy of the Military Council is an extension of Mubarak’s policy of weakness and subservience to the Americans and the Zionists. The generals have not taken any position against the continued aggression of the Zionists against our brothers in Palestine, or even over their killing of Egyptian soldiers. The Military Council responded with silence, and with the crushing of demonstrations demanding the rights of the martyrs.

The perpetrators of the massacre at Maspero are not only those who took part in the killing in person; soldiers and those the military and the Interior Ministry like to call “honest citizens”, the thugs which the Interior Ministry put into action and some of the reactionary religious forces which spout sectarian rhetoric and whose followers are themselves directly involved in the crimes of burning churches and incitement to tear down buildings in the name of religion. They did not commit the massacre of Maspero on their own. Their accomplices are all those who published ‘facts’ in order to mislead the masses, all those who justified the slaughter in cold blood, and all those who refused to see that these are crimes against humanity and not only crimes against the Copts.

We will continue to defend our revolution, and the people’s right to free expression, to protest, demonstrate and strike, in order to restore our stolen rights, and to cleanse the country of the roots of corruption, which is still poisoning our revolution and attempting to overturn it.

In defence of freedom of expression, we declare our condemnation of the attack by the Military Council on the 25 January and Al-Hurra TV stations because they were broadcasting the massacres committed by the army and police that night.

While we know that it will probably not wipe away the tears or quench the burning loss of a son or loved one last night, we swear to continue the struggle for the success of the revolution, so that our country can become a nation of equality, freedom and justice.

The Revolutionary Socialists
4am, 10 October 2011

Raisins ahoy!

For no particular raisin, except that I don't want that butt-ugly picture at the top of my blog for long, here's a list of probes active in our solar system. There are currently five probes heading out of our system. The oldest active probe, if it is active, is Pioneer 6, launched in 1965.

En route
Rosetta, launched after several delays and mission changes, is currently on an intercept course with 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. It will deploy a lander for further investigation after reaching the comet.

New Horizons was the fastest artificially-accelerated object and will be the fifth probe to leave the solar system. It will be the first spacecraft to study Pluto, ultimately destined for the Kuiper Belt.

Juno is on route to Jupiter and upon arrival will enter a polar orbit around the gas giant.

Mission in progress

The Cassini orbiter began studying Saturn and its moons after passing Venus and Jupiter and deploying the Huygens landing probe to Titan. It is primarily investigating Saturn's rings, its magnetosphere, and the geologic composition of its satellites; the mission may potentially continue until 2017.

2001 Mars Odyssey, a tribute to the classic novel and film, is one of three active human-made Mars satellites. It will continue its mission to map the surface of Mars until at least September 2010.

Mars Express: Mars orbiter designed to study the planet's atmosphere and geology, search for sub-surface water, and deploy the Beagle lander. Mission extended until at least December 2012.

MESSENGER is studying Mercury. It is only the second probe to do so and is the first to orbit the planet. Technologically, it is far superior to its 1975 predecessor, Mariner 10. Having previously passed Earth once, Venus twice and Mercury three times, it entered orbit in March 2011.

Opportunity Rover landed on Meridiani Planum. Expected to last 90 Martian days (sols), it continues to function effectively after sol 2470. Its twin, Spirit Rover, explored an area on the other side of the planet, but became stuck in soft soil May 1, 2009, and communication was lost March 22, 2010 (sol 2210).

Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter is the second NASA satellite orbiting Mars. It is specifically designed to analyze the landforms, stratigraphy, minerals, and ice of the red planet, which will aid in selecting a landing site for future lander Mars Science Laboratory.

Venus Express, modeled after the Mars Express, is collecting data on the Venusian atmosphere and cloud conditions. Mission extended until at least December 2012.

Dawn successfully entered asteroid Vesta's orbit on July 16 2011. It will study Vesta until July 2012, when it will depart for dwarf planet Ceres and arrive sometime in 2015.

Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter is engaged in lunar mapping.

Chang'e 2 is studying the geography of the Moon.

Mission complete: New mission in progress

Voyager 2 has not yet left the solar system, but will become one of the first five probes to do so eventually. Its mission to study all four gas giants was one of NASA's most successful, yielding a wealth of new information. As of January 2010 it is some 91 AU from the sun,[2] and it is hoped that it will continue to operate until at least 2020. As with Voyager 1, scientists are now using Voyager 2to learn what the solar system is like beyond the heliosphere.

Voyager 1 is currently the farthest man-made object from Earth. As of January 2010 it lies about 112 AU from the sun[2] (10 billion miles, or 0.0018 light years), and it will not be overtaken by any other craft. It was originally tasked with investigating Jupiter and Saturn, and the moons of these planets. Its continuing data feed offers the first direct measurements of the heliosheath and may eventually provide data on the heliopause. It is hoped that Voyager 1 will continue operating until at least 2020.

Deep Impact was designed to study Comet Tempel 1 by impacting it with a high-speed projectile and photographing the results. This accomplished, a mission extension to Comet Hartley 2 was authorised (target changed from Comet Boethin).

New mission under consideration

ISEE-3's original mission was to study the solar wind; later, redesignated ICE, it flew by Comet Giacobini-Zinner. It is currently[when?] in a 355-day heliocentric orbit. Deactivated on 1997-05-05 leaving only a carrier signal, it was reactivated on 2008-09-18. NASA began considering using the spacecraft to observe additional comets in 2017 or 2018. No decision has been reached on the future use of the spacecraft. If no future uses are made, the spacecraft could be captured and given to the Smithsonian Institution in 2014. Reuse of the spacecraft would delay the possible capture to 2040s.

Akatsuki would have been the first Japanese Venusian probe. Also known as Planet-C and Venus Climate Orbiter, Akatsuki failed to enter Venusian orbit in December 2010. It is still functioning, and has a possible second chance to orbit Venus in 2017.

No future missions projected

Pioneer 6, launched in 1965, is the oldest functioning probe (if still operating). Contact was last attempted 8 December 2000 to celebrate its thirty-fifth anniversary, and the attempt was successful.[3] Like the three craft which superseded it, it took measurements of the solar wind, solar magnetic field and cosmic rays.

Pioneer 7 was last contacted 31 March 1995; no attempt has been made since, and this probe may or may not be operational.

Pioneer 8 was last contacted in 22 August 1996; no attempt has been made since, and this probe may or may not be operational.

Giotto approached within 600 kilometers of Halley's Comet on its flyby mission, and survived some particulate impact on the inbound flight to capture scientific data and stunning images of the comet's nucleus. Its multicolor camera was subsequently destroyed, but the probe remained otherwise functional. Its mission completed, deactivation commands were transmitted on 15 March 1986. Awakened four years later on 2 July, it studied the comet Grigg-Skjellerup as it approached within 200 kilometers eight days later, and was again deactivated on the 23rd.

Genesis returned a capsule with a solar wind sample to Earth in 2004. The rest of the probe was put into a parking orbit near Earth's L2 point.