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I used to think that moderation was good as an early teen; but then... just generally got radicalised the more I read about basic history of social movements and the British Empire.
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Mar 24, 2019 16:47
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People won't remember who Chris Williamson is in a years time.
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Mar 24, 2019 16:47
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For me, my turn from UKIP scion to wet liberal to raging commie was from a) travelling in America, b) reading Iain M. Banks, c) doing an MA and reading a bunch and d) this, our UKMT, this sceptred thread
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Mar 24, 2019 16:48
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I don't remember who he is now.
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Mar 24, 2019 16:48
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i love that this thread claims to be all these pious good things about the left and then the one situation where you should actually be angry at the unelected power of media and blairite style media appeasement and you guys act like it's a loving nonsense story because you think you're better than chris williamson on a personal level, it's genuine tory behaviour and it's astonishing
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Mar 24, 2019 16:52
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Basically Chris Williamson said that Labour was being too apologetic about antisemitism and got suspended for it, people are also calling for him to be expelled. Michael Walker & other Novara guests line is that while they are friends with Chris what he said was dumb and unhelpful and he should have got suspended for it. Like I don't necessarily agree with Novara's take but that doesn't mean i'm going to be all "Michael Walker is CANCELLED" because I don't agree with them sometimes.
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Mar 24, 2019 16:55
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i don’t know what chris williamson is and it seems like i should stay that way
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Mar 24, 2019 16:56
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damnit i read that post!!!!
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Mar 24, 2019 16:56
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brian posted:i love that this thread claims to be all these pious good things about the left and then the one situation where you should actually be angry at the unelected power of media and blairite style media appeasement and you guys act like it's a loving nonsense story because you think you're better than chris williamson on a personal level, it's genuine tory behaviour and it's astonishing What are you even on about
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Mar 24, 2019 16:57
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I became a lefty because my dad was a candidate for Labour MP back in the 1980's. He ran in one of the safest seats for the conservatives in the country and he knew that he would never get elected. He effectively ran simply do that there was always a labour candidate to vote for. Election days in our house back then were an absolute wonder. I used to do polling station runs to get the list of vote registration numbers. One year ended up riding around in the MRLPs candidate's tandem bicycle.
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Mar 24, 2019 16:58
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I couldn't recall who Chris Williamson was until a goon just explained. It is kind of funny that the anti-semitism smear attempt is still on-going. Like do these skidmarks really think "this time, this is going to be the one" every time or what.
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Mar 24, 2019 17:01
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Surely the Labour party are the people to get angry with rather than Novara if you are upset about Williamson?
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Mar 24, 2019 17:03
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crispix posted:I couldn't recall who Chris Williamson was until a goon just explained. It is kind of funny that the anti-semitism smear attempt is still on-going. Like do these skidmarks really think "this time, this is going to be the one" every time or what. One thing it is doing is de-energising the base, even if the public aren't too bothered about it (and it doesn't seem like they are) it keeps Labour members divided and having to constantly deal with it.
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Mar 24, 2019 17:04
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crispix posted:I couldn't recall who Chris Williamson was until a goon just explained. It is kind of funny that the anti-semitism smear attempt is still on-going. Like do these skidmarks really think "this time, this is going to be the one" every time or what. it's a sustained effort and tbh a lot of the left are really loving bad at talking about Israel even if they're technically correct so it keeps happening coffeetable posted:There's a fantastic paywalled Times article on Der Untergang: quote:Bradley said May was the wrong person to lead the second phase of talks. “Having had 40-odd conversations with colleagues over the weekend, the key factor is not the deal but what happens afterwards,” he said. “They don’t have trust in you, prime minister, to re-establish cabinet responsibility and to have the right plans to get a better long-term relationship. The only way it is likely to get through is if you agree to leave in the summer.” Nuclear Spoon fucked around with this message at 17:08 on Mar 24, 2019 |
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Mar 24, 2019 17:05
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can't wait until there's 3 left wing mps left who haven't been suspended on spurious antisemitism charges and someone retroactively says we should have done more to fight this for the 900th time while approving john mcdonnell being kicked out for quoting a holocaust survivor saying sometimes israel can be a bit rough around the edges, I mean he had to go, can't say that in this environment novara and especially michael walker specifically came out in favour of the suspension before any information was out, him, sarkar, lansman and jones all heavily contributed to making it acceptable when the ONLY (and I mean only, anyone pretending that he was seriously bringing the party into disrepute by arguing for a change in media engagement at a momentum members meeting can gently caress right off) response should have been solidarity with someone being unjustly oppressed, for speaking out for those who have also been unjustly repressed. If you haven't noticed that half the arguments involve smearing him with other people who haven't done anything remotely wrong like Jackie Walker, Wadsworth and now Winstanley, whom were all suspended for obviously (like before replying please for the love of god actually look some of this stuff up) spurious reasons. you guys should be furious at what's going on but instead you're placated because the media whom you get your information on have made an unelected judgement call on what is considered important information, that judgement call in the case of these people has deliberately enabled injustice and the weakening of the left in the PLP and labour party machinery and a lot of it comes from Lansman and his incredibly dodgy history on this stuff, notably being the one to push for IHRA inclusion on the left despite it clearly being a bad idea, trying to become NEC chair against everyone's wishes and making momentum less democratic over time. power corrupts everyone and to not expect it out of people on your side is just being dumb and lame and stop doing it marktheando posted:Surely the Labour party are the people to get angry with rather than Novara if you are upset about Williamson? yes I am angry with the labour party but the labour party isn't the left, it could become a vehicle for the left (and under corbyn I expect it will eventually be) but if you think 30 years of the most authoritarian party apparatus probably in history just goes away with a new leader, that's a bit naive, what I can criticise are people who are meant to be the voices of the left not acting as voices of the left and notably whitewashing injustice brian fucked around with this message at 17:22 on Mar 24, 2019 |
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Mar 24, 2019 17:14
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UKMT radicalized the hell out of me. I joined SA after spending 8 years on and off playing Eve with Goons. I grew up dirt poor in the Ozark Forest in the middle of North America, where my mother exposed and was sued by a company that was poisoning places like my home with medical waste incinerators. That made me hate corporations with a passion as a youth, then getting fired from my first non-academic job in early 2018 made me realize the extent of how horribly undemocratic corps are. Coming to this thread and seeing how lefts from all over the world think and act has really inspired me. Thank you UK goons, I appreciate you all.
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Mar 24, 2019 17:15
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I grew up in a Labour family in South Wales on the 90s (Dad was a councillor, we were good friends with the MP). Ended up doing lots of work experience with Welsh Labour while in school, and in doing that I learned all about the political divisions in the party wrt to Blairites and New Labour. Interesting education tbh.
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Mar 24, 2019 17:27
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Bobby Deluxe posted:Hey that was something I meant to ask. How did y'all get into leftist thought?  I think by the time I was thirty I knew we should eat the rich and I've only gotten more and more left-wing as time passed. Obviously reading this thread has helped speed that along.
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Mar 24, 2019 17:32
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Bobby Deluxe posted:Hey that was something I meant to ask. How did y'all get into leftist thought? I don't know much about leftist theory, it all comes as a matter of experience. I suppose you could say I took the vocational route to socialist thinking. I was raised in the 90s. My dad was in the RAF, meaning I was brought up in a lovely community within the UK where everyone's given a house to live in and everyone's dad (or the odd mum) has the same job. There are some downsides however, and after being deployed to Bosnia for almost 2 years my dad had enough of being away from his family. He left the RAF early in the 00s which allowed him to avoid the Iraq war. It's incredibly lucky considering the fates some of our family friends have faced. Once out of the RAF I saw my dad struggle to find a job and mortgage a house. Worst of all I saw him struggle to adapt to working for corporations. I wasn't political in my upbringing, but I did hear his frustrations at corporate working culture. In the military everyone is a tight family drilled to get things done. In a company everyone is an island, there for their income. The lack of what he called "unity" and "discipline" pissed him off. In short, the tranquility of life on RAF camps was lost in the outside world, taken over by concerns about property and income as well as stress owing to work culture. As much as he tried to hide it, I could also feel that stress. In 2008 I left secondary school. I felt like it was time for me to begin my life and discover who I am. I wanted to be an engineer, and had a great time at a work experience placement at a local firm that makes agricultural machinery. I saw the college in my city advertising an NVQ. Naturally I visited their open day, where they saw my grades and told me I'm a prime candidate for going "the university route" through their A level programme. I took their word for it. Over the next two years the national news turned darker each day. The personal news wasn't much better as I got unusable grades in my A levels. With the news (and my grades) the promise of a good future after education seemed farther and farther from my grasp. I missed out on being old enough to vote in 2010 by a few months but I followed the campaign closely. The media were taking every chance they could to punch Brown. Every blunder in his speeches, slight stumble in his step or oddity in his mannerisms was blown up in the press. I could feel a shift in the people around me. There was this sense that Labour were untouchables: they had dirtied themselves with irresponsible spending and wars, therefore we mustn't be seen to be irresponsible by supporting them in this. It worked. The only people around me supporting Labour were supporting them on the basis that they were "the lesser of evils". The left wing was so convinced by Labour's irresponsibility that a good portion of them took their chances on the Lib Dems. It was nuts. This campaign is where it began for me. I didn't know much about the political past. I don't think I even knew who Margaret Thatcher was back then or what Labour really was under Tony Blair. I don't think I ever truly will. All I knew is that It made no sense in my mind to promote sweeping welfare cuts and reforms during an election campaign at a time when more people will need help. To me it seemed cold blooded. Trying to argue for spending at this time wasn't very easy, but for the first time I got a little bit of knowledge. An online article introduced me to John Maynard Keynes. I can't say I took this man's ideas from an unbiased or scholarly point of view at all. I embraced the economic view tightly because it allowed me to promote spending as an economic as well as moral position at this time. In 2011 I was on the dole. When I saw the news I felt attacked. I was the person everyone was screaming about as being lazy, cheating the economy. Over years I never saw any opportunity to get a career, just a long string of temporary work and/or low to zero hour contracts that always ultimately saw me back in the jobcentre each time. All I saw was an ever increasing set of bureaucratic demands on jobseekers and a growing pool of temporary or unsustainable work. There was a boot up my rear end but nowhere for it to really push me. That was until I took an apprenticeship with our county's NHS mental health trust. In 2012 I was working as an admin apprentice in the NHS. I was working in an office with two others and our manager in a wider department under one of the Trust executives. I was spending most of my meager wage on rail tickets that formed part of a 2 hour commute by train and bicycle each day. While difficult to justify even at the time, I was hopeful that maybe this was my chance at a secure job in the long term. That's not really how it played out. The huge reforms the coalition had made to the NHS were beginning to come into effect and the effective cuts were coming in hard. Our trust announced a recruitment freeze and a company was invited to complete a cost reduction audit. They came in and decided how many people they thought it took to do a certain job in exchange for a share of the savings when redundancies were made as a result. People were dropping like flies with no one to replace them. The corporation's probe allowed them the information to make an offer to TUPE over certain areas of our staff into their multi national. It was an agreement to provide the same service the staff were offering as trust employees back to the trust while under the employment of the multi national. They ultimately failed to deliver all the contracted services to the NHS and ran off with the good workers. By the end of this I was working alone in my office with a manager I didn't particularly like, paying through the nose in time and money to do so. I learned that after completing a level 2 I'd need to do a level 3 and they may even stretch it over two years. I admit it was my own weakness that ended this one: Imagining two years of paying those rail tickets just to cycle to that pressure cooker of a workplace was too much for me. I quit. Since then I've been back in the cycle of unsustainable or temporary work and have seen the introduction of universal credit. When I work a store I stack shelves with products that cost more than I'll earn in a day and I wonder where the gently caress that money goes. When I work a factory I see kilometers of goods stream through the machinery. I know the price on each bit of that stream and I wonder where the gently caress that money goes. When I'm not in work that boot up my rear end keeps pushing but there's still nowhere for it to shove me. My only option is to work a job that profits an already wealthy person to pay rent on a house owned by an already wealthy person and feed myself with things made by others in this situation, which profits already wealthy people. That's me until I die. That's how I got into leftist economic thought at least. Leftist social thought is a story I don't have the energy to type right now. Azza Bamboo fucked around with this message at 17:51 on Mar 24, 2019 |
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Mar 24, 2019 17:36
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Sort of already was from the start. Raised working class in the 80s in NI, looking around as a kid and saw there was 'only' 2 sides, us or them, catholic or protestant. And always thought 'gently caress that! Why?'. Saw the fraud and pointlessness that was religon at the same time, both which then morphed into lefty thoughts as the only way to 'help' everyone.
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Mar 24, 2019 17:50
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Bobby Deluxe posted:Hey that was something I meant to ask. How did y'all get into leftist thought? Video games. When I was a kid I read a book about a young kid who slowly became part of the bourgeoisie in 17th century netherlands - starting as a craftsman, turning into a trader and ending up owning a bunch of mills and other properties. The book obviously painted this as a good thing, but at around the same time I played Pharaoh and Anno 1602, and I think the triple whammy instilled in me an interest in macro-economics. In high school I followed economics, was bored to tears by the accounting but lapped up everything about how economy at large works (or is supposed to work). It helped that there was a keynesian slant to how the classes were given, rather than whatever neoliberal horsecrap that got expressed elsewhere. There was always a small nagging voice that there were inconsistencies in the theory and the results seen in daily life, but rational theory sounds really convincing, and if *I*'m a rational actor, which I clearly am, surely so are the people running things? And then the financial crisis happened, and I started reading about how the banking system worked, the bonuses, the systemic fuckups, the treatment of the PIIGS which was blatantly at odds with keynesian thought, etc, and it instilled a deep mistrust in a political and economic system. Around this time I had to write a paper, and the topic assigned was Marxism. That was a bit of a watershed moment/combination of events  .
double nine fucked around with this message at 17:56 on Mar 24, 2019 |
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Mar 24, 2019 17:51
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remember 2 years ago when May was 'more popular than Thatcher' lmbo
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Mar 24, 2019 17:54
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remember when may called an election and lost her majority lmao
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Mar 24, 2019 17:55
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My folks were politically aware in Bristol during the 80s and involved in anti-war protests and things like that - my mother took me to the Greenham anti-nuke protests as a baby, and as a kid I was exposed to politics and as far as I can recall, have always been aware of it - and loathed the Tories. I was 7 when Thatcher resigned - I remember sitting in the school hall and one of the teachers excitedly telling the other that Thatcher had resigned and that was cool and good. I think my parents always veered towards the green party rather than Labour, but the South-West isn't really a Labour stronghold, but I was never told left wing thought was bad, like a lot of things my folks left me to my own devices to make up my own mind. But during my teens I was interested in history and certainly when studying the second world war I became quite fascinated about how fascism could take over a country, how an educated modern society in post enlightenment Europe could be seduced by such a hateful ideology. And of course during history lessons we studied the communist revolution in Russia, I read some Marx - tried to make it through das Kapital, but it's is a loving dense read as a teenager, but read essays by him and biographies along with keeping up to speed with day to day politics in the UK. Studying + reading history really put me off totalitarianism and I think made me realise that Stalinism + Maoism are a really bad loving time just as Nazism is a really bad loving time. I was 18 when 9/11 happened and I really hated the Iraq war from the loving get go, I thought it was total bullshit and set to be a colossal catastrophic disaster for a whole host of reasons and that really put me off the Labour party, like to a massive degree. Although I certainly do remember the euphoria of Blair winning in 1997 - it felt like things really could change for the better after living my entire life under the tories to that point, and the whole country (at least from what I could see) seemed optimistic and positive. Wild to think that 9/11 was only 4 years later! To the poster who talked about the Iraq war being a radicalising event, I dont think it was for me because I definitely had my feelings on imperialism and the modern American military solidified by that point, and I can remember using fascism to describe the PATRIOT act in America because it really loving reminded me of things like the enabling act in Nazi Germany lol In fact Iraq war pushed me towards the lib-dems because of their anti-war and the fact that Blair turned into an authoritarian nutter. But then the orange bookers took over the lib dems and they went to poo poo too. Long story short, when the country had collectively forgot what it was like under the tories and voted in Cameron and the orange book lib dems in May 2010 I decided gently caress this and moved out of the UK in September 2010 because I loving knew they would be poo poo. Didn't quite imagine brexit levels of poo poo though. I figured I'd just wait out the Tories and come back... Socialist and left wing policies just make sense to me, practically speaking. They are what does the most good for the most people, but I totally disagree with totalitarianism enforced by a police state - whatever ideology they say they are. Tories are driven by an ideology which is at the best of times deluded, and as we are seeing now can end up utterly divorced from reality.
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Mar 24, 2019 17:57
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Ratjaculation posted:remember 2 years ago when May was 'more popular than Thatcher' lmbo I keep reminding people because they seem to have forgotten I had a lib friend earnestly asking "why do Labour think they'll win the next election? They're way behind in the polls!" as if 2017 never happened
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Mar 24, 2019 17:57
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Talking about political dawnings? Some of my earliest memories are watching my mum go without food for several days so we were fed and clothed during the early 90s. Who the gently caress would vote for a party that brought that on.
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Mar 24, 2019 17:57
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I used to think the west wing was great since then i've gone increasingly further left to make up for this
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Mar 24, 2019 17:59
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I've never seen any of it and for that i'm glad
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Mar 24, 2019 18:00
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Can someone photoshop a book case of UK political history, with small books for 1997-2016, then a huge bumper sized books from 2016-2019
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Mar 24, 2019 18:01
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Jose posted:I've never seen any of it and for that i'm glad there's a part of me that wants to say that it's genuinely good television for the first few seasons but then i remember the politics
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Mar 24, 2019 18:03
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I saw the clip where they're talking about proportional response or whatever and it was so incredibly pro war I was surprised how popular the show was
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Mar 24, 2019 18:05
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I really enjoyed Special Agent Jack Bauer as the President in Designated Survivor, because he was a progressive dude getting bombed and kidnapped all the time. Then the action stopped and it became a snorefest
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Mar 24, 2019 18:06
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Camrath posted:Add me to the list of people radicalised by this thread. I grew up a public school educated libertarian and ended up working running security for a whole collection of private banks in the west end and city (Coutts and the like). Started lurking the ukmt in LF when that was a thing, primarily to gather intel prior to the various protests around the end of the noughties (as I was younger and less obviously in league with big capital at the time I was often used semi-undercover to report on the various protests in order to provide a better security response). That personal story makes you more Marx, especially if you have a serious drinking habit and a lot of not-necessarily-good ideas how to fix things. Me? I was born visibly disabled and realized from fairly early on most of humanity are beasts that will devour each other unless seriously incentivized to cooperate and consistently told nobody is innately better than anyone else, that it's just luck. "There but for the grace of god" may not always be right, but it's the cornerstone of society.
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Mar 24, 2019 18:07
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Ratjaculation posted:I really enjoyed Special Agent Jack Bauer as the President in Designated Survivor, because he was a progressive dude getting bombed and kidnapped all the time. Then the action stopped and it became a snorefest That's really funny to watch since trump won
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Mar 24, 2019 18:08
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Jose posted:I saw the clip where they're talking about proportional response or whatever and it was so incredibly pro war I was surprised how popular the show was The only thing the fictional, idealised liberal presidency actually achieves is cutting welfare spending and instituting tax cuts for people who send their kids to college
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Mar 24, 2019 18:10
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endlessmonotony posted:That personal story makes you more Marx, especially if you have a serious drinking habit and a lot of not-necessarily-good ideas how to fix things. No drinking habit but I smoke the equivalent of a major forest every month if that counts? Ideas for fixing things generally involve walls, lampposts and the like- up to the reader on how good or not that is.
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Mar 24, 2019 18:11
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https://twitter.com/LeftieStats/status/1109109009620127751 Still confident that Remain would find a way to lose, even with this poll.
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Mar 24, 2019 18:12
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Jose posted:I saw the clip where they're talking about proportional response or whatever and it was so incredibly pro war I was surprised how popular the show was the weird thing about that episode is that it wasn't a proper episode, it was a direct response to 9/11 and while it was at the height of its popularity, it's straight propaganda. I've always wondered if there was government involvement in getting it made, although far more likely is that Sorkin just believed it was his responsibility because he's such a massive narcissist it sucks as an episode because it's a bottle episode that breaks up a really good storyline so it sucked on two very equally important levels
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Mar 24, 2019 18:13
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Gonzo McFee posted:https://twitter.com/LeftieStats/status/1109109009620127751 It is quite incredible it is that close at all. Don't really see how anyone can think brexit is still a good idea at this point
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Mar 24, 2019 18:14
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Bobby Deluxe posted:Hey that was something I meant to ask. How did y'all get into leftist thought? I think for me it was engaging with actual leftists itt with regards to the monarchy and people being coached in to steward for the Jubilee parades on threat of losing their benefits if they declined the work jfc I just went back to one of these threads from 2012 and it's an incredibly embarrassing experience. Thanks for calling out my awfulness UKMT, I'm one more ex-lovely opinion haver who believed that because things just worked out for me they could for anyone.
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Mar 24, 2019 18:17
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