Which side are you on?

 

There are some things where the choice can only ever be heads or tails. There are really only two types of politics, progressive or reactionary. You can't have a mix of the two. It's like in maths, a plus and a minus will always equal a minus. Reactionary politics being the minus. It's a hard border between the two. One doesn't merge into the other. There is no middle ground, no centre. 

Is there any point voting for one reactionary party because it's not the other reactionary party? I don't think so. You might think they will improve your lot but they really won't. They will always be a disappointment. Maintaining the status quo is a reactionary political choice. 

Unfortunately when you have a population that is politically illiterate how do you affect positive change? I really don't know. I am truly baffled. Without a major political party that supports progressive politics we can't even begin to move forward. Should we just give up and 'know our place'? That is what people seem to want. So I guess the answer is yes.

A broad church of reactionaries and progressives is never going to work. It will always be a constant tug of war with no real outcome apart from political impotence.

The choice is capitalism or socialism, fascism or democracy. Capitalism is fascism. Socialism is democracy in its purest form. Only trust people by their actions rather than what they say. Beware wolves in sheep's clothing; people will claim to be what they are not just to gain power.

If you appease capitalism you destroy all hope.

If you are not a socialist it is probably because you don't understand it. Get a grip. Educate yourself.

Perhaps one day we will have a mass membership socialist party.

Yours despondently

PS. I didn't vote for Keith.

Today is the start of a new decade

 Many people just won't get this, but then so many people are dickheads. It's really quite simple. Today is the first day of the new decade. I'm not going to repeat myself because you can jolly well read what I posted a year ago here. It's maths and in maths you have two choices, the right answer and the wrong answer. If you can't grasp this very simple concept about when decades start then you really are utterly stupid. If you start wittering on about Gregorian and Julian calendars then you are beyond stupid and need to crawl under the nearest stone. This is not up for discussion. You're welcome.

Fascism

Fascism is stupidity.

Fascism is oppression.

Fascism is violence against body and soul.

Don't think that just because you are a loyal follower of the fascist cause that you are safe. Fascism eats itself. No one is safe. Purges are a way of retaining power. Not even those in control are safe. Not even the dictator is safe. There's always a new one waiting in the wings. The trouble is that most people who advocate fascism are idiots. They are incapable of seeing what it causes and how it always ends.Fascism is never stable, never successful. It will always fall. Dedicated supporters of fascism are never safe. Their turn will always come. No one is ever safe.

The decade doesn’t end here!

The current decade ends on 31/12/20.

To distort* slightly Goebbels’ quote “If you tell a lie… ...keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it.” and that’s just what has happened in terms of how we classify what a decade is, thanks to the media. They peddled the lie that the millennium ended on the 31st December 1999 (when obviously it ended a year later of 31/12/2000) and they continue to end decades a year too early. The Victorians knew when decades, centuries and millennia ended why don’t we?

There's enough lazy thinking and illogical behaviour in the world without adding to it unnecessarily. The last year of a decade, a century or a millennium always ends in a zero. It's very simple maths. It has nothing to do with Gregorian or Julian calendars. People that even mention that in a conversation about this stupidity are going off on a pointless tangent. It’s all about logic. Whatever calendar you work to, if you use numbers as the measurement, the first year of the calendar will always be one. You wouldn’t have a year zero. Zero represents nothing. Having a year zero would be like saying this is a year but really it isn’t as it’s a year without value. So by applying logic the first year is always 1, and therefore the last year of the first decade will be year 10, and thus the pattern will continue. If you can’t grasp that then there is no hope for you quite frankly.

Now you're probably saying, so what? In the great scheme of things does it really matter? Well on one level it really doesn't, but it's an indicator of what a poor state we are in if people can't grasp a simple maths concept. If people aren’t capable of understanding simple maths how the hell are they going to grasp even the basics of economics, and therefore be able to make political/voting decisions?

Of course you could argue that you can re-calibrate the calendar and start decades, centuries and millennia at 0. Which you could do, but you could also take 14.5 years and decide to call it a Doris! I'm not sure how useful it would be but there's nothing to stop anyone doing it. The whole point of measurement surely is that it's a communication tool. A way of telling someone how much of something you have got etc. If we're all using different measurements how do we communicate what we really mean?

So people, please stop this gross stupidity and start measuring things properly again.

*I like the irony of that.

Taking back control

I thought this seemed appropriate for a #SocialistSunday.

If you really want to take back control there's only one way to do it, and that's to 'get involved’. If you believe in democracy then you need to play your part as best you can. And as best you can isn't just turning up to vote at general elections.

If you really want to take back control you really need to do it through the democratic process. As without the democratic process any control you have will be tenuous and limited.

If Brexit was a protest vote against politicians then it was a spectacularly immature and stupid protest vote. We get the politicians we deserve and if we are ambivalent, ignorant and/or disinterested in politics then we end up with the corrupt, the idiots, the gangsters, the bullies and the inbreds in charge.

Never underestimate the stupidity of the English electorate. They consistently vote in governments that do them harm. Large parts of the electorate would sign their own death warrant if handed to them wrapped in a sugar coated lie.

Sadly we don't yet live in a democracy. There are several things that need to change before we can truly call ourselves a democracy. The obvious thing that needs to change is our way of voting. First past the post is undemocratic and needs to go. Secondly we need to educate people. People need to be capable of critical thinking. They need to understand that “nothing is ever black and white”. If you have a blinkered view of the world how can you make informed choices.

People can't help being stupid. They've been condition to be stupid. The whole system is set up to suppress thinking. They are fed lies in the form of easy to digest bigoted soundbites by the capitalists. They fall for it all.

I was brought up on a council estate. I'm working class. I don't remember a time when I wasn't interested in politics even though I didn't always understand what was going on. I became a socialist at the age of seventeen and have never wavered since. I know that we will never achieve a fair, just and equitable socialist society until the working class have been educated so that they are equipped to make informed choices. The state aren't going to do it so as a movement we should. We will never have a socialist society until that happens.

I rarely apologise for my arrogance in calling stupid people stupid. Sometimes one has to tell it like it is. The trouble with stupid people is they don't realise that they are stupid because, yes you guessed it, they are stupid. The working class will only ever free themselves when they learn how to do so.

If you really want to take back control you can help here.

Saving the planet, my arse!

I really wish people would stop talking about saving the planet when they do a bit of recycling or start to cut down on waste. You may even be an eco-warrior but you won’t be saving the planet. Don't get me wrong as I'm no climate change denier. I do try very hard to keep my footprint as low as I feel able (these things are never enough). I'm firmly of the opinion that we as a species are heading for our own personalised environmental disaster. But if you want to do your bit to slow down our certain demise, please don't do it under the slogan of 'saving the planet’. You're not saving the planet and you are not even saving the environment. Let's be honest about this, what is really meant when talking about saving the planet is perpetuating the survival of the human race, for as long as possible.

The human race will die out eventually, but the planet will still be here long after we are gone. The planet doesn't need saving and there will still be an environment. An environment that will probably sustain some forms of life. Just not human life, or that of many of the animals that we are hell bent on taking down with us. Let's face it we've fucked things up big time. We've created an environmental avalanche and we're trying to stop it with a seaside bucket and spade.

We've effectively shat on our own collective doorstep and we're continuing to shit everywhere else too. Big time. So please don't talk nonsense about saving the planet, it's self preservation we're talking about here. Let's talk about it for what it is. The human race is self destructing. We can't stop it's eventual demise but we can try and make it as comfortable as possible for us and those that follow on if we're sensible about things. If we're careful with the resources that sustain human life and we start to cooperate rather than compete then our future will be prolonged. But if we carry on down the path of capitalism and tribalism then collectively we are well and truly fucked!

Don't follow leaders, watch the parkin' meters

I've been a socialist since the age of 17 when I went to work as a bank clerk. It opened my eyes in so many ways. I saw the vast difference between rich and poor. I also saw how people toadied up to those with money, and more so if they had a title. I concluded that such differences in wealth were unjust and the unfairness and snobbery that went with it was all just morally wrong. I’m now 63, the divide has become even greater, my politics have become if anything more left-wing and I do believe (although this could just be the old bloke in me) that the vast majority of the population are less well educated than they were fifty years ago.

I like people, I believe in them, but at the same time I loathe people and rather arrogantly consider many to be utterly stupid. I become very frustrated at times because of people’s stupidity. I’m no fan of leaders either. In a true democracy we would be an autonomous collective although it would require a highly intelligent population to even contemplate that notion let alone put it into practice. We therefore end up with leaders. Leaders we can either love or loathe. A third party we can either blame or praise; someone we can abdicate our responsibilities to.

In reality leadership should be about facilitating the requirements of their electorate. Leadership should never be dictatorial. In fact it can’t be as telling people what to do is not leadership at all. Therefore whilst it’s important to protest about evil people like Trump we should never forget that the reason why the evil fascist bastards of this ilk worm their way into power is because of the stupidity of the population who didn’t oppose them. It really is that simple. The difficult bit is enabling the education of the masses. Many don’t realise that they’re in need of education. Education should be about enabling people to think for themselves, to question and to formulate opinions based on sound arguments of economic and philosophical reasoning.

Unfortunately if you're an idiot you probably don’t realise that you are an idiot. Perhaps I’m an idiot? Perhaps everything really is black and white? Perhaps there is a god and he is white? I somehow doubt it but I might be wrong.

“Talk sense to a fool and he calls you foolish.” - Euripides

The big problem with stupid people is that they are usually too stupid to know that they are stupid. Of course the dilemma and possible irony of me saying this is that I could well be stupid too. Ignorance I suppose is bliss.

"Questioning anything and everything, to me, is punk rock." Henry Rollins