leftwrongs
I say again: Bah humbug!
Over @ Leftwrites, Tony Hartin — in Scientific Socialism for the dull — welcomes a revival of interest in Marx & Engels. Sadly, Leftwrites does not welcome my commentary — first accepting and then rejecting my words of wisdom. Ah well. Probably just a glitch in Teh Matrix. Anyway:
- 1. “The only fantasy at work here is possibly the idea that the
2. The Bolsheviks and Workers’ Control: The State and Counter-revolution, Maurice Brinton (1970).
3. ‘The Soviet Union Versus Socialism’, Noam Chomsky, Our Generation, Spring/Summer, 1986.
Update : A glitch in Teh Matrix : my comment is now up…!
bloggy goodness
A coupla really neat-o blogs I’ve stumbled upon recently are the sensibly-titled:
Includes a video of a presentation by some bloke called Harjit Singh Gill at the 2009 Left Forum, and a dialogue between Harjit and Joshua Stephens.
Arguably one of the rising stars of north american anarchism, Harj recently sealed his status as someone to watch in a panel (in somewhat hostile territory, even) on Prefigurative Politics at the Left Forum, and totally wrecked house. Definitely check out the video below, and follow his writing at Planes for Baskets (he’s far better about staying on top of this blog business than I could ever hope to be).
[Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9. Also : Anarchism & Marxism…]
— and —
In the classic anti-imperialist film, The Battle of Algiers there occurs a moment at which a leader of the FLN, Ben M’Hidi, is captured by the French occupying military forces and given a press conference, an opportunity for the French military to attempt to glorify their capture.
During the press conference one of the reporters asks M’Hidi why it isn’t cowardly to have bombs carried in baskets to public places by Muslim women.
M’Hidi quite sensibly replies, “Is it any less cowardly to bomb villages from planes with napalm? Give us your planes and we’ll give you our baskets.”
Or as The Celibate Rifles sang, weren’t the IRA just an army that delivered bombs by hand?
Joshua ‘Dangerous’ Stephens and Harjit ‘Planes for Baskets’ Singh Gill are co-conspirators with the totally kick-arse Institute for Anarchist Studies in the US. In the UK: Welcome to the Anarchist Studies Network website. In Australia… genocide is legal.
Supreme Court of Victoria Decisions, Thorpe v Kennett [1999] VSC 442 (15 November 1999):
…In summary, the criminal law in this State does not recognise a crime of genocide. Such a crime is not recognised at common law or under the Crimes Act 1958 (Vic) or any other statute at this point in time. In England genocide constitutes a crime under specific legislation, namely, the Genocide Act 1969. The English legislation specifically creates an offence of genocide if a person commits any act falling within the definition of “genocide” in Article II of the Genocide Convention. Under Article II genocide is defined as meaning specific acts committed with the intent to destroy a national, ethical, racial or religious group by one of the following acts:
(a) killing members of the group;
(b) causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
(c) deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;
(d) imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
(e) forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.
45. An equivalent provision to the Genocide Act (UK) does not exist in the State of Victoria. In my view, therefore, genocide is not recognised at this time as part of criminal law in this State. Even so, having considered the exhibits in support of the appellant’s case I do not consider he is able to make an arguable case on the material of an intent on the part of the respondent such as to satisfy the intent contemplated by Article II of the Convention. The materials, in part, tell of a tragic time in the history of this State but of itself such materials cannot demonstrate on the necessary basis an intent of the respondent.
46. Insofar as it is necessary for me to do so I consider that genocide is not recognised as part of domestic law in any event in this State in so finding I rely upon and adopt the principles expressed by Wilcox and Whitlam JJ in Nulyarimma and Buzzacott and Nyland J in Sumner. It follows that I consider that the appellant has failed to make out a prima facie case and accordingly the appeal from the Master is dismissed.
BONUS! : Martin Sostre article in The Squealer, whittlin’ away, May 8, 2009.
Harjit rocks good stuff
How did you get blocked from Leftwrites, when they allow Greenslime, and Phil Travers’ meanderings?
huh? ‘rising stars of north american anarchism?’ Are we a sports team or something? And next week on ESPN the rising stars of north American anarchism vs the rising stars of Australian anarchism with the molotov throwing contest to be followed by intense political debate on insurrectionism vs syndicalism.
anyway, good to see some other Sikh anarchists…i have a cousin with the exact same name.
sd
Ana,
Yes. I must also now go see Marley & Me: “A family learns important life lessons from their adorable, but naughty and neurotic dog.”
See : Dogs Are The Best People.
Cats are awesome too!
(Especially Bübi!)
THR,
Dunno. I think I’ve been pegged as crazy. (Unlike Greenslime and Phil.) But yeah: the blog was — afaik — the brainchild of Jeff and/or Jill Sparrow. I dunno if they’re still maintaining the blog — I suspect that responsibility has been transferred to members of Socialist Alternative. In my experience, when it comes to anarchism and anarchists, SAlt are delicate little flowers, and my frequent references to their leader Mick Armstrong’s sensational outburst following G20 has rendered me a persona non grata.
sourdough,
Yeah: a bit silly, but I think more affectionate than anything else. As for north american anarchists, I reckon we could take ’em on the playing field — I would not like to go up against the 40 Kiwi anarchists, however. They are crazy. And ultra-violent.
There used to be an anarchist of sorts who commented at Leftwrites (under the moniker of ‘A bloke I met’), but he hasn’t popped up for a while. Jeff Sparrow has been blogging at the Overland site, and hasn’t turned up on Leftwrites for a while. I agree that they shouldn’t be so precious about anarchists. Hell, they even let the Stalinist League leave a few anti-Semitic comments on a post.
THR,
My comment was approved, removed, and then re-posted — dunno why. I would’ve written LW direct, but whoever is maintaining the blog needs to update the other pages — including ‘about’ and ‘comments policy’ — as it appears a bug has gone wild… I think it was hacked at some point?
Yeah. I’ve met ‘ablokeimet’…
LW seems to have slowed down a good deal over recent months. I dunno what kinda traffic it attracts, but two posts in May, five posts in April, three posts in March, six posts in February, seven posts in January, three posts in December and three posts in November suggests it — along with contributions from bloggers — has declined. overland is worthwhile reading, and Jeff is also publishing on Crikey (and elsewhere), so… Whether or not LW is ‘precious’ about anarchists I dunno — my reading is that the majority of its contributors are coming from the iSt (or derivations), with some others — such as Tristan Ewins — the social democratic left (Fabianism). For various reasons, it’s a tough gig bringing together the Marxist left at the one place — one reason being that most already have their own outlets — mostly written publications, but sites too.
As for the Stalinist League — aka Peter — he’s now describing himself as being a white nationalist / national socialist. Not much of a leap really.
Allowing anti-Semitic comments is a vexed question. For example, I’ve allowed similar comments to be published on my blog, even from known neo-Nazis. There are a number of reasons for this, but they have little to do with providing a forum for these views as such, and are more closely related to various forms of monitoring. Also, some of theses comments are so bizarre they are, quite frankly, rather amusing. Recently, however, I’ve decided to take a harder line with trolls — the stoopid is so bad it hurts.
I have incorporated the word “neat-o” into my daily language now.
Then my work here is done.