End of poverty? Think again.

This is an awesome movie everyone should watch. It looks at how illogical this obsession with growth is, looking at historical and current situations from Bolivia to Kenya. Featuring top grade economists. Watch it!

London's Burning, Police Found Guilty.

On Saturday in Hackney an individual was stopped and searched by police, on the same day as a peaceful vigil was held commemorating the fatal shooting of a civilian again by the police. Later, police in riot gear were attacked.

What connections do we see? Police, Pigs, PoPo. Though titles on the BBC read: 'Police Attacked', 'Mobs in London', 'Violence hits new parts of London'; they should read 'Police behind it'. Can we actually believe the sensationalist reports saying it's 'an absolute war-zone'? or misleading ideas saying shop-owners are losing their livelihoods? were police just walking around, casually on a weekend stroll, in their riot gear when they were attacked?

I've been following the reporting by the BBC. It says who: criminals/youths; when: Saturday, yesterday, today; where: London; what: rioting; how: through violence... But why? Journalism follows a series of conventions, as a to-be journalist I will not follow them. Objectivity benefits the right, the status quo and authority. Moreover it is a myth. Foucault would say it is part of a media discourse, itself a product of the discourses of capitalism and government. Reality is subjective, I see things personally, I project my experiences and ideas to every news story I read. The events in London are done by people.. angry at the way they are constantly mishandled by police.

The Met Deputy Assistant Comissioner says: "When we have large numbers of criminals intent on that type of violence [i.e. burning, looting, protesting], we can only do that, get lots of officers there quickly and try to protect local businesses and local people."

A misconstrued reality, the people are on the street. Business will be payed back by insurers.

We have to look at the reasons why the police are being attacked. Last week an individual was shot, this week someone was being searched. What authority do they have? I have often seen police speed, I have been stopped and photos have been taken of me. I never did anything wrong but go to protests. London has been protesting for much more than just three days. Last year there were 50.000 on the street, the year before as well. It's always youth. What are they unhappy about? Is generation Z anarchic and ungrateful? Or are we having to push the boundaries to express a systematic reality. Climate change, education and the economy are all constructed in a certain way. Neo-liberalism runs wilder and burns faster than and doubledecker bus in London. It's in our food, we spoon it for breakfast, at school, on the couch watching TV. 

The markets are currently crashing, this double-dip has been predicted but the brunt of the hit will again go to beneficiaries and workers, while corporations will receive yet another budget bail-out like the one recently approved by "Left-wing" Obama.

I don't agree with attacking the police, there should be a clear differentiation between attacking property and people. Property is inanimate, it represents the state's authority. People act knowing these institutions exist. I don't think the police should have as much power as they do, but this is not their fault as individuals, the police body stands in front of the government in its protection. Any individual policeman is innocent of the way the system works, so they should not become targets. What if they attack Tottenham blacks and jews? London has not fully integrated these populations, nor has the rest of Europe. From here we see the violence these groups of the population suffer from, like in Sweden. Jews were once scapegoats, now Islam is.

Attacking property though only gives the state an excuse to repress and create culprits. On the other hand it brings the point across. The media love a class-based conflict with burning stores.

A protest scam.

Yesterday there was a protest to keep Hillside jobs and work in Dunedin. It was a failure. I arrived and the Octagon was full, I'd say with around 500 people although the media has said 1000. Talking to socialist comrades, we noticed that the majority of protesters looked as if it had been their first protest ever. There were families and kids, grandparents sitting on benches and then of course hillsiders in their suits and a multitude of unions. This is good and bad. Good because it looks as if solidarity amongst unions is increasing also because many have reached a point which they can no longer stand, and they have become aware that protesting is an effective way of standing up. It is bad though because many protesters had never protested before. The protest was rigged and the wind was blowing wind into the sails of the labour party. It was not democratic and people did not have a voice- their representatives did. There were three Labour speakers, a Green, for some reason someone from Greenpeace and then about three Hillsiders. No open mic, it was electoral propaganda for Labour. It was hardly even against the National party, it was just Labour saying we would not do this. Notice the would not, it is always followed by an if. Labour's trajectory says that Labour would in fact have done the same. And they never stopped the privatisation of KiwiRail, even though they said they would have if they could to the masses.

I have to say I left early, the speeches were seriously boring- going on for 5 or 10 minutes. Chants were worse: "Jobkiller Joyce, Give us a choice". Cringeworthy.
No one else was allowed to speak, all the protesters got was an event prepared for the news, with the last full stop included. On the meanwhile though, the protesters were slowly escaping yawning. It was bad, seriously bad. And bad because people who seemingly have never protested before took part in it. They left probably not ever wanting to participate again, disapointed maybe. I almost did. This event was not democratic. It simply relayed the story we have heard again and again, give your power to representatives and every now and then they will pretend to listen, they will come down or maybe just send down a letter, and they will bore you to death. Politics you see is not a thing for you and I. We shouldn't have to know what's going on. An example of this is the speeches themselves, which sometimes got quite technical. They want us to leave it to them, ransack the countries not on our behalf but to our loss. Protesting and striking shows who has the real power, you and I can stop this groth-focussed profit-driven economy. We are the ones who get to choose when machines start and stop and we too can block the roads and demand a true democracy.

The indignation within you and I is a cross-cultural experience, fruit of capitalism in desperation.

On the 15th of May a movement started in Spain, still active now almost a month later. In this article I will look into the reasons for the movement, these are embedded in history but are also a fruit of the capitalist system. The indignant who claim to be “autonomous” and “a-political”, have been left unemployed by the austerity measures imposed by the IMF. The autonomous and a-political nature of the protests though can be seen as a threat. They are tags imposed on the protesters by the media, protesting is political and the idea of autonomously and coincidentally coming together for the same cause is irrational. Wanting a better future is being  political and mass strikes are one of the many ways to achieve it, what this better future looks like and who envisages it is the key. I will argue that only socialism can achieve a better future for the working class and the majority of the people, but to do this socialists have to be not only involved but also leading the movement with their ideas and experience. This movement is currently not present in Spain to a significant enough degree. As a last point I will talk about socialism’s role in the future struggles of Aotearoa.

This movement did not spring out of nowhere, Spain has a long history of mass movements. In the ‘far-left’, anarchists, communists and socialists had successfully put their ideas into practice on a large scale in the 1930’s. In 1931 Spain got rid of the monarchy and within a couple of years had put the foundations of one of the most ambitious social projects in Europe, with reforms to industry, education, marital laws, religious laws... The government though, intent on keeping control of the power void it created tried to put restrictions onto the social revolution that was taking place. Whole communities became fully independent of the state and fully self-sufficient too. Individuals were no longer subjugated to the orders of the nobility and the church. The government though, run by the new bourgeoise class, was mired with corruption and inefficiency. Ministers were being sworn in and out continuously. Its inability to hand out the benefits Spanish society had been promised and so eagerly needed led to widespread dissatisfaction. Anarcho-syndicalist, socialist and communist ideas were spreading, promising a better society. The rising number of strikes and the powerful union movement derived from these ideas became objectives of a government which had quickly failed. The Spanish republic relied heavily on the old military apparatus, thanks to this the generals, who had interests with the old sources of power saw an opportunity to take control of a state which was on the verge of breaking up, economically (as 7 million Spanish were living in communes by 1936 and factories had been appropriated by the working classes) and politically, as Catalonia and the Basque Country threatened to become independent. The military organised a wide-spread coup d’êtat in August 1936. Even though the Anarchist movement had foretold of the date and time, thanks to its spy network, the Republican government was caught by surprise. The efficiency of workers councils, organised by Anarcho-syndicalists and socialists stopped the fascist coup on its tracks but lead to a bitter civil war.

In short the civil war was a failure on the behalf of the Republic. At the time the European powers were wary of the costs of war so the Republic was left to recuperate a country it never fully controlled by itself- until the USSR got involved. As Franco’s military possessed more arms and had the aid and support of Mussolini and Hitler, the Republic called for the military aid of the USSR. Stalin was opposed to the more democratic nature of the anarcho-syndicalist and socialist troops fighting for the Republic. He actively fought against them, instead of actually fighting the common enemy: Franco. Many anarchists and socialists were executed, if not by Stalin by Franco once he won the war. This decimated the number of Trotskyist and anarcho-syndicalist groups working around the country. The fascist dictatorship, which lasted as long as 40 years in some parts of the country imposed a culture, a history and sense of unity which have only started to be questioned now. To understand Spain now we have to be aware that it has only had 30 years worth of ‘democracy’, moreover its transition to a democratic state took place when the UK and the USA were jumping onto the ideas of neo-liberalism. Spain has had low-salaried jobs for decades, unions have never had much strength since the late thirties and the introduction to the EU in 87 forced it to become even more of a low-wage economy with few incentives for a higher education. Nowadays a ‘good’ job in Spain is one earning a 1000 euros a month and the minimum wage is 624 euros, incomparable to the rest of Europe. In France the minimum wage is above 1350 euros a month. Housing in Barcelona or Madrid can easily cost around 600 euros, add on to that the relatively high price of food, the price of electricity, transport, education... It is no wonder Spanish youths live at home until they’re thirty. Low-paying jobs, high rents, an awful system of education and the constant bombardment of capitalist products makes it difficult, but more so if unemployment is at an average of 21%, 45% for youths. In this aspect Spain resembles Northern Africa, the series of governments have happily abided the orders of the IMF- making Spain a heavily poor and indebted society- a lapdog of US interests since Franco’s time. In the last couple of years there have been job losses in the public sector, cut-backs in education, a raise in the retirement age and some unemployment benefits have been done with.

Where Spain doesn’t resemble Northern Africa though is in the fact that Spain is supposedly democratic. Democracy is relative, when the citizens don’t have any actual input into how society should run, when there are only two parties who represent the same set of companies, when the benefits of society are not reaped by those who overwork for little pay and when the individuals ‘participating’ in the democracy are constantly being lied by media sympathetic and benefited by a system advertised as pluralistic and free; democracy starts to resemble an oligarchy, or a dictatorship by a handful of individuals. Spanish are starting to wake up from their somber mid-day nap to realise they are being robbed. These protests, with protesters ranging from high school kids to grandparents, are against the current parliamentary system.

In the squares the protesters almost seem like an amorphous range of individuals with nothing in common but a desire for a job, a flat and some money. There is no actual, concerted, goal. Some groups within the ‘plataformas’ are demonstrating for a better electoral system while others are wanting to create an actual revolution out of the spurs of fury. The media and the politicians have used this to their advantage. It is hard to find objective news articles in the Spanish press that do not call the protesters anti-system, rebels or “ni-nis”, a term used to describe Spanish youths, who “neither work nor study”. It is also difficult to find news on sites such as the BBC, CNN or even Al-Jazeera; there has been an effective media blackout. The anarchist group FAI, present at the protests, says that though the political and media circles were initially shocked: “Naturally, we couldn’t be hopeful, we knew there was the danger of the situation becoming midiatised: criticising the more radical propositions and reducing the situation to a simple critique of bipartisanship and the financial system without shaking the foundations of the state and capital”#. It definitely does look like the media have taken control of the situation to say it is run by the “fringes of society”, this way giving legitimacy to any police or government action. They go on to say that the right has in effect always been in power to differing degrees at different points in time. A case which in Spain is very much true and the Anarchists of FIJA agree, going so far as to say that the current protest movement is “suspicious” and aims to “dissipate frustrations”#.

Although these ideas seem to verge on the side of wacky conspiracy theories, what is true is that political groups and campaigning has been banned. This is because the organisers did not want mainstream parties to use the platforms as a rallying point for the 22nd of May elections (In which by the way the ruling party lost 40% of its vote).FIJA points out that there is an inconsistency with the platforms position as by protesting you are being political, however these protests are not actually imposing too much of a threat to the capitalist system for the time being. The government could simply call for a vote to change the electoral system, thus appeasing many of the present.

These two anarchist groups are calling for a social revolution: “a radical change at all levels to decentralise politics and the economy through direct action”. These two groups have been involved in the protests, the direct action they call for verges on the IST idea of an armed insurrection. At OGNA we agree that political organisations should be able to show a presence at the protests but we disagree with armed insurrection: this will only alienate the majority of the ‘indignados’, who are admittedly apolitical individuals. Socialists though have not had much of a say. En Lucha, a trotskyist organisation, has had some involvement, mainly in Madrid, but other than that there are many groups that are even rejecting to participate- as the ideas held by the organisers are reformist. These groups that are against participating are Stalinist and their position is similar to that taken by Stalinist groups in Greece a couple of years ago. In our view, it is upto socialists to point out the injustices of the system and call for a concerted struggle against the ruling top echelon. We have to point out that unions “signed agreements with the ruling Socialist Party which attacked workers’ rights. [Making] it easier to sack people, attack[ing] pensions and rais[ing] the retirement age.#” At the same time though we have to prove that unions are the only protection mechanism the working class has and that it is through the cooperation amongst unions that we will achieve an educated proletariat ready to confront the government non-violently. What’s more, we have to show that this recession is an inevitable downfall of capitalism, it will happen again in 10 years time and again and again until we defeat the system, worldwide.

Socialists in Spain have hitherto not seen the potential of these protests. One month on and we still have people on the streets, still largely ignored by politicians and the media. Although recently police have been more violent against the peaceful gatherers. The youths in Spain, like in Tunisia and Egypt, have nothing to lose as they admit they cannot see a future as a part of capitalism. The potential lies in how far Marxist ideas can be spread. As a general rule the protesters see the problem as lying in the system. For now though they have been given no alternatives. As the days go on, numbers are stagnating. While the police violence used to get rid of protesters in Barcelona caused them to come back in multiplied numbers, after a couple of hours the protest was back to its usual size#. The failure of socialist organisations to see the importance of these protests and also to show up with significant numbers is a key to the slow decimation of the movement.

Only with the spread of socialist ideas can the movement increase in size and span.Youths are unemployed and furious. Quite reasonably, Spanish workers are disenchanted with unions, it is up to socialists though to prove the unions’ worth. Spain has been hit hard by the IMF, but only because it is in the interest of capitalism to seek for profit instead of humanity. Socialists should use the platform to spread their ideas to youths and to workers, this way we can achieve a conscious working class. Socialists must also promote ideas of tolerance in terms of sex, sexuality and immigration- the inability of Spanish society to accept these is a remnant of fascist Spain. It is curious to see how little immigrant involvement there has been, compared to their percentage of the population. We must also see the spread of ideas as the only way to achieve an equal and fair world system. Spreading the ideas through Spain will push the ideas to Portugal, France and Central Europe. For now Greek and Italian ‘indignados’ have already started to protest.

For OGNA, the only way forward for Spain is to keep the protests strong and to remain non-violent. Non-violence attracts more followers and non-violent direct action is much more difficult for governments to confront. There has been talk of dismantling the platforms, in Barcelona there was a decision to pack up. Even then, 80% of tents are still pitched#. We think this is a mistake, these platforms provide the opportunity to express the widespread dissatisfaction society feels and the symbolic presence in central squares of cities across Spain will be like a thorn constantly jabbing the ribs of the politicians. It will be a forum for debate. Breaking up the presence counts as a victory for the ruling class, a pat on the back of the policemen who have brutally battoned protesters, this way showing the true nature of democracy in Europe.
In New Zealand the situation would be treated much the same by the media, for this reason it is up to unions and revolutionary organisations to lay the seeds for revolution and disseminate the truths of who does and who should hold the power in society. The large number of revolutionary organisations and the emergence of working class oriented unions and parties such as Unite and Mana is a significant development. The situation here is not too indifferent from that in Spain, youth unemployment is at 26% and there are some obviously underprivileged sectors of society, namely Maori and Pacifica. As socialists we have to break down ideas of racism and unite forces across Aotearoa. The government is not supplying jobs and is raising the hurdles to get in to education and for decent health care, it is time for Kiwis to protest too.

If we want a true democracy socialists have to direct the working class, history has shown that privilege belongs to the rulers but it is being handled by the working class, we must take grasp of this privilege and distribute it fairly to society as a whole.

Prisoners forever?

I just answered a poll on the stuff.co.nz website: Should prisoners be given a healthier range of food? Answer: Yes. 62% said no...
It may be a bit farfetched, but I reach the conclusion that this majority-part of the population also believes that prisoners should never be forgiven, they should rot in jail, much like the green loaves of bread we are giving them, they should die because they are bad and they are a threat to society and the status quo. The Status Quo Ante. I do not know what sort of food prisoners eat. I do know that the facilities they are incarcerated in tend to be rather fabcy in this part of the world, which sparks the question that 62% ask: Aren't they meant to be penitent of their actions? Answer: Yes.
We are all filled with a sentiment of remorse when we do something we know is wrong, what if there is no alternative? Should a bank robber be enjailed forever, if all he was trying to do was to provide some means for his family? If this person happens to be black or indigenous in a still racist socoety, how do we know the crime they committed is one they are in fact guilty of?
I'm too naive to think people are bad, and even more to believe that people cannot improve. We all do things we regret and we also do things because we need to. Families do tend to take priority over the system, and mine does too. If I were in a desperate enough situation to have to steal food from a supermarket in order to keep my kids healthy I would steal that supermarket. I'd be scared, no one wants to go to jail; even if it does have satellite TV, a gym, library, etc. There is another factor though, some jails are so much better than the society the criminals live in that it is better and more life-saving to be in jail than to walk the streets in a gang whose use is the protection of communities.
On food, should we give them better food? Yes, why? Because prisons are meant to rehabilitate. This is why there are workshops, criminals are obliged to do community service, go through counselling sessions. They aren't people born naturally defective, we cannot hide them behind high walls forever. Like a toy, if it comes out broken whose fault is it, the toy's or the machine's? I'd say the lattter, we cannot blame something on an inanimate object. We aren't inanimate but we do learn from the way we've been raised. I'd say the environmental factors are key in distinguishing who is going to turn out well or not. Genetics has a role; some people are naturally more aggressive or have more addictive personalities but these genetic differences will be pushed to the for by environmental injustices.
Why should they have better food? Simply because they should learn how to eat healthily so that they do when they leave prison. Then there children, if these prisoners have actually been rehabilitated, will stand a chance to grow healthily and in good environmental conditions.

This system throws more Maori in prison than Pakeha. Maori, as a fact are also poorer, there communities are unsafe due to the lack of jobs and because the youths parents are in prison. How are they meant to give their children a decent childhood if they aren't there? Maori also lost out in their culture, they were pushed away from their original communities and large family units into small private houses, uninhabited for the ten, eleven hours of work a week but for their children, who have no-one to teach them, show them or protect them.

Spain: No time for siesta, we need true democracy first!

Just before Summer, Spain has taken onto the streets under the banner of revolution. Spain is the first European country to take onto the new craze- we need a better revolution and we in the West are entitled to an Arab Spring too! This 2nd Spanish revolution though will not achieve its goals unless it has a clear idea of changing the system though and for the moment, it is only being legal.

Spain was under Arab hands for 800 years in some areas. Although they are, for now, still very racist, I will argue that this is due to the sense of nationalism that has been instilled into Spaniards since the end of the 15th century. Most notably though, this sense of nationalism is a fruit of Franco's many trees which still exist in Spanish society- trees planted to shade and suffocate the saps of Communism and Anarchism, that were not only present but blooming before 1939- the end of the Spanish Civil War and Franco's consolidation into power.

I have talked about Franco's legacy before so if you're interested read here, where I talk about the reasons Franco won, or here where I talk about Spain still being under his influence. Briefly I'll say that, Franco appeared as the second 'great' Spanish dictator in the 20th century and he continued Primo de Rivera's objective of keeping Spain culturally united but speechless. As I've said many a time, Spain is not a country, it is an amalgamation of nationalities, many of which strive for freedom still. During the second republic these nationalities were being given increasing autonomy as the economy was swaying dangerously to the left. The old sources of power: Clergy, nobility and the military; were being slowly pushed out of politics. The nobility was taken down and many churches were burnt as the penitent turned against their priests, the military was also becoming minor but due to the complicated landscape of Spanish unity, they were deemed necessary to quell rebellion. This gave the military an open door to control Spanish politics and only 5 years after the foundation of the Republic, it staged a coup d'etat which would end up abolishing the freedoms of the Spanish people and reintroducing nobility, imposing religion and controlling all autonomy. Franco made it his task to unify Spain under [g]od and design a feeling of unity to keep the industrially more developped, historically independant and socially working class areas of the Basque country and Catalonia in Spanish hands. These two culturally different regions are two of the many, but they have suffered a longer history of suppression; they clung on to marxist and anarchist ideologies as a point of freedom and they fought for it long and hard during the Spanish Civil War.

When Franco took over he imposed a culturally Spanish state in order to force the Basques and Catalans to assimilate. History was rewritten but it hung on to the age of a strong Spanish monarchy in the 16th and 17th centuries, where Spain was devoutly catholic but also a vast empire since the 15th. The focus on these latter two undoubtedly forced an idea of superiority in terms of both religion, thus the anti-islamism and culture, thus the anti-arabism. Of course the 16th and 17th centuries were when the Basques and Catalans were surpressed harshest, for this reason the inculcation Franco taught left a bitter after-taste in the mouths of these two cultures. Underground organisations in the two regions, including terrorist ones, kept the cultures alive and the spirits high, even if the languages were prohibited. The majority of the workers though, not forming part of secret literary circles nor holding any strong positions in the hitherto existing regional governments, were in large part left out and the failure of the USSR and the control over unions in already battered workplaces made them lose their ideology, in public.
Of course, when under oppression one will not happily accept the conditions enforced, he'll only comply. What is known as the first Spanish revolution took place with the coup d'etat. As the existing state collapsed and hid in official buildings, the ideology the Spanish had learnt during their short time of freedom of speech was put into practice. Anarchists, socialists and communists took hold of the factories and social life actually changed. Though it was a civil war, workers continued production and many fought for a better world. Education and civil life continued arguably better than it had done at any previous point in time. 8 million Spanish lived this alternative lifestyle, about half the population at the time. So when Spain became an authoritarian dictatorship, these people must've imprinted this burning desire for a better world to their children.

In the streets now we have the children of the children, but one protesters was reported as saying that she'd been waiting for the revolution for 50 years. The reality though is that the revolution in large part is being used by alternative sections of the Labour party, even if it was started off by anarchists especially. Many of those there are demanding better access to university, higher wages, more jobs, better wages but also a change in the electoral system. This is not a change in the democratic system and this is important, because it is this neo-liberal system which is the root of the problem. Much like in North Africa (and may I say, from day one the protesters themselves have linked this as a continuation of the Arab Spring, sympathising with the efforts of Tunisia, Egypt and Libya), this revolution is being run through the social networks- Facebook but also mobile phones. This is where they are easy to control, the political parties can see what the plans are and thus turn up to them and use them. Spain is voting in the Spanish elections in only a couple of days time, so these protesters have come as a shock to the system. The timing is also perfect because the government will have to see them gone in order to have the non-political period of reflexion just before the elections- during this period no political party is allowed to campaign. The Catalan government has already said that it will not forcefully move Catalan protesters, this way contradicting the decision of the supreme court. And if the regional governments push the protesters out, a chance for a real revolution is more possible. The protesters will be able to see that the system goes against there desires.

It is important to note that these protests have followed the Egyptian model of camping in the main square, they are more widespread then the Egyptian ones started out though. Every capital province has had protesters in some numbers, so that is 49 cities plus others. In different regions they have had different directions. In Catalonia they seem to be more anarchist and anti-system- with wide support from university lecturers. They are calling for an all-out boycott of the Spanish elections. They are also Catalan in spirit, with banners for independance as well. In Madrid they seem to be more mainstream and with more main party involvement, from what I can tell so far.

These protests though will not succeed unless they have an ideology behind them that tells the protesters that it is the system that is wrong. As I've said, anarchists are heavily involved in regions where they historically have been, communists on the other hand are staying away from it. I'm planning on writing a letter to the Trotskyist Communist Party of the Catalan People telling them that I think their position is wrong. They say they are not taking part because the ideas of the protesters seem to be focussed in fixing the system. I think that this is the best chance in 80 years to gain support. It is the task of communists to guide the protesters. At the very least what they will get is a bigger base with which to act next time. The anarcho-syndicalists are calling for a boycott in the elections and they are showing a larger than known presence in the demos, why then shouldn't the trots do the same?

The only way these revolutions can spread is by defying presidential and judicial orders, boycotting too but direction is needed to both teach the protesters about communism but also to show them that past revolutions have been succesful. I think these protests can grow, 45% of Spanish youths are unemplyed and the average of the population is almost 1 in 4. My mum is part of that group and so are friends of mine, they are fed up but they are not active. An organisation can provide information and tactics to get these people active.

The words of a Catalan poet from Valencia pop to mind: No et limitis a contemplar aquestes hores que ara venen, baixa al carrer i participa. No podran res davant d'un poble unit, alegre i combatiu.

Don't just sit there and watch those hours here to come, take the streets and participate. They won't be able to do anything against a united, happy and combative people. Vicent Andres Estelles.

Marx Never Wrote a Bible.

Marx himself was jewish, but he considered himself an atheist. He saw religion as the "opiate of the people", it was the drug the higher powers could use to keep the masses in line. In this life people have to follow the rules, from God and their lords. If they do, in the next life they will be rewarded with absolute salvation. Simple enough, it keeps people hooked up to the status quo.

However I find it ironic that so many Marxists follow Marx as if he himself were a God. He isn't. His ideas may have been 'revolutionary', but by no means does it mean that we should follow him every step of the way...
There are so many more writers to be read, not only Marxists. If we want a system that is inclusive, we have to be ready to accept ideas from other cultures and other movements. This will create a true democracy, it will create a system that people will feel identified with, no matter if Chinese or San.

It's quite basic, people won't jump into a boat if it only seems to be heading to chaos. Many people see Marxism as an idealistic system. People ask why a doctor would want to earn the same wage as a rubbish-man. Let me say two things, if it weren't for cleaners, we'd probably be all dead; the plague would have passed on again and the toll couldn't be smaller this time round. My second point is that this isn't about money. Marxism calls for a society where money isn't needed. We'd all do things for good will. Albeit, to get there we'd have to take steps. Marixism is an ideal system, of course it is! But it is a real alternative only if we know what it is. As I said before, people wouldn't gamble for a system that seemed somewhat unclear. David Harvey did a talk in Marxism in the UK a couple of years ago. He says that we can start the movement at any point in time, however we must constantly evolve, improve in order to reach the goal we want to reach. This is the idea of a revolution. We have to debunk the current system, but we cannot wait to see something spring up from the flowerbeds, I guess we have to dig the prize first and keep on digging until we've found it. Capitalism as a system constantly evolves: technologically, socially, culturally; it sets into us a bit more. As it sets in though, we become trapped and jobless or without a sufficient education, or maybe too much of one.
In order to reach this system of peace in which we all have a place to learn and express ourselves, David Harvey says we need ideas. Thinking about ideas after a revolution would lead us to communist Russia, or a stalemate like we are seeing in Tunisia. Has there been any advancement there, or will there be a new form of repression? Any future stuctures for a new system have to be created and tested beforehand, this way we'll know what we are aiming for. If we don't have everything configured, we won't get the enthusiatic support to back it and we will probably end up in a system much the same as the one we've got now. He says "the bourgeoisie does things that [open] up possibilities", a crisis is one of these things. He defines a crisis as "the irrational rationalizer of an irrational state". The state is one of oppression and a crisis is a rationalizer because it opens up those possibilities: workers get laid off and frustrated, this is irrational as they were made by the system, one that is irrational because it is unfair yet we live by it. There is the possiblity, not slim, that workers will "lose [...] their chains".

For last, in this long rant of mine in which I seem somewhat mad obsessed and both, religion has a place in this society. Marx is wrong. I don't believe in God, but those who do have been building temples and shrines possibly since humanity's dawn. Religion gives people hope, stories and a shared culture. While this society will be much better, tragedies will always happen. We either need hope or rationality to get through these, no offence intended. I see religion as a seeking for a perfect self, a notion from Fauerbach, isn't it human to want to be perfect?

Military and the Revolution.

At the ISO's meeting today we talked about the military's power in social revolution, it was interesting, fairly weighty stuff. Of course we don't want the Egyptian revolution to die down, but it seems the army is acting in counter-revolutionary ways: hey are trying to get those still camped out in Tahrir square to budge, to go back to work.
It's important to note the army will never be able to create a state like the one it witnessed fall. By now the people are conscious of their power, they know they can achieve what they want and they know that they can shut down the most powerful state in the Middle East. There has been a shift in consciousness that has proved that revolutions are still possible in the 21st century, indeed revolutions aren't a bit of the past but maybe an undeniable piece of future. As a comrade said, we are more connected now than ever, it is easier for us to organize, an example of this is the UKuncut campaign that has blocked stores of companies that dodge tax, including vodafone.
However, capitalism is an always shifting system, it continuosly gives more powers to the rulers, but their technology will always trickle down. In order to keep the revolution working and to keep the new military government in check, people will always have to be one step quicker than the governments. They will have to keep their demands and not bend down.

The army doesn't have to go against its people, right now I'm not commenting about the situation in Egypt. In Portugal in '74 the army helped topple down the fascist dictatorship of Salazar. Within three weeks of the provisional government, the number of unions rose by a thousand percent.

In part this is because the army will always have a working class element. Even though it is one of the state's traditional powerhouses, they are mostly formed by the working class. Those who get their hands all bloodied are sons of workers. So they will always be reluctant to go against the people, because they too have worked as tanners or in market stalls or on the dumps of the city.
The army and the police are quite different.  The army is nationalistic, it exists to protect its citizens from foreigners and it is a working class source of pride to be in it.The army is seen as the ultimate power symbol of the country and because it represents the country in all its classes, it will not always go against the people.
For example, in the more than famous Tianamen square protests, reform protesters had been demonstrating for weeks. The army was present, it was the local branch though so it felt unable to shoot against people they potentially knew. In order to 'disperse' the crowds, China was forced to send troops from elsewhere. Then the tanks rolled in, curtains fell and hidden behind sheets thousands were murdered. This shows that the military is reluctant to shoot its own people, the same isn't true of the police. The police were the ones reported to kill many in Egypt and Tunisia and very recently in Bahrain.

The police, on the other hand, exist to maintain the status quo ante, the class system. It is there to protect the richer. If there is a robbery in a store, the police will be there quick, if there is a robbery in a house, the police will take more time, it simply isn't as important.

The military could thus be seen as a potential weapon in favour of the revolution, but of course, who says armed revolutions work out?

Who are jobs for?

I've worked 23 hours in the last four days and I'll soon be off to work four more. I'm quite tired, retail is a tiring job, not as tiring as most but more tiring than many would think. You need a permanent smile and a lot of patience. But more than anything I'm tired because there are many nights when I finish in the early hours of the morning... and I'm an early-bird by nature.
I work because I need the money and I will no doubt continue working throughout the year. Yes working in a convenience store isn't the most gratifying of jobs, but I'd never say that I'm too good for it. I must have taken that from my dad, he needed money quickly so he worked in McDonalds over the summer; he's 45 and with an unfinished doctorate who on Tuesday started working at John McGlashan college. He has no qualms and I'm proud of him. He is the sort of person, with a higher than average education who doesn't think that he is better than anybody. He treats everyone with respect and isn't proud, in the christian sense.

I'm not totally like him but I felt very insulted when an old teacher of mine, buying smokes, told me that there were better jobs out there. She saw this job as a lower-status, uneducated, low-paid piece of trash. Instead of telling her that there were much better ways of spending her money than on smokes, I told her that this job is in fact alright. It pays higher than minimum wage and yes the hours can be quite bad, but the working atmosphere is good, the bosses respect and apreciate us and anyhow, there aren't any jobs out there frankly. I will continue looking but I'm not going to let go of the one I have.
She left with a shrug and a ta! I stayed at the counter thinking what a horrible person she actually is. All I can think of is that if someone is serving you, all you can show is apreciation. You cannot deem them as stupid at first glance, that is prejudiced. They may be working in one of the highest deciled schools in the country and have an unfinished PHD! You cannot be unapreciative because if you are, they can make your life hell. 'They' is everyone who serves you, if you think you are better you will get served badly. In retail we can do this. I've had people who study at uni come up to me assuming I cannot count so I called them an asshole and threw in some burnt chips.
I'd like to first point out that there is this thing called dyscalcula, which I do not have but I know people who do. Secondly, that an education doesn't make you any wiser, maybe just a bit more prepotent and insolent.

People work because they need money. Everyone would like to work as James May in his ToyWorld, many would like to be paid to read or write bad poems or scribble for millions. However, these jobs don't really exist for the majority of us.

Last, someone once told me that because I'm a student I cannot be a worker. I'm a socialist so that wouldn't comput with my system, but also all students are, are in fact the next generation of workers, our education is paid by the last.