Declan Curry’s declanbizblog: The Basic Question”
I’m Chris L of South London, by the way. (What, you thought my parents named me Kit?)
I’m tuned in, let’s see what he says.
EDIT: Of course, he pays people a ‘livable wage’. Of course, he’s raking it in, so he doesn’t give a rats ass.
‘Ethical’ capitalism is still capitalism nonetheless.
EMC World of Sport: The Sporting Class by Glenn Aylett
Glenn Aylett’s latest column on Sport, Television and class division in society misses the point.
The assumption Glenn works on is that class divisions are eroding away in society. This premise is an absolute false one. Unless the socialist revolution has passed me by, we are still living in a class based society. It is from that basis that, if Glenn is going to make a class based analysis of sporting media, or the media in general, that we need to start from.
Glenn claims that the class barriers have been broken down in football, and that you see company CEOs alongside their workers in the terraces up and down the land. It’s as if to say that the bourgeoisie were never involved in football! What has happened is that the rich hands have always been involved in football. To set up any kind of football team, especially a major league one, requires a huge amount of start up capital. The rich have always been in football, but with the rise of people like Roman Abramovich and Malcolm Glazier have we seen them come to the fore. But the businessmen with the deep pockets have always been there.
To move onto the class divide between BBC’s Grandstand and ITV’s World of Sport; again, it relates to a question of agency. Both the BBC and ITV are controlled by the ruling class. Both, in that sense, are ruling class. Grandstand is there for the public interest, but the ‘public interest’ in a capitalist society means the interest of those who control the institutions. So, it’s natural that the BBC will follow the sports of toffs.
However, we don’t live in a society of toffs, no matter what they might like to think. ITV might appear to be the working man’s channel - indeed, it has spend the past 50+ years of building an image of being the ‘people’s channel’ but this is just a mirage, a front they put up. ITV only appeals to the common man because of simple capitalist economics; there are more working men than richies, so we must appeal to them. More viewers = more advertising revenue.
BBC: Annan urges action on Lebanon now
So, after killing 50 people in one day during air strikes against Lebanon, Israel has decided to suspend it’s air assault on Lebanon. But it’s not exactly a secret that it has been amassing troops on the border with Lebanon.
I very much doubt that Hizbollah will cease their attacks. Though I am very skeptical that this is some sort of reversal by Israel.
I’ve been having a gander at Stroppyblog, and posted some stuff about mental health, to which Louise, the co-author, has replied in a new post. As some of you may know, I take an active interest in things related to benefits, and IB, and JSA.
I posted this over there, but I’m cross posting it here, too, in the hope someone can help me out.
I remember having a heated argument with a Scots nationalist (a proper hardcore one at that) around such questions of benefits, IB in particular. Sorry for the rant below but I’ve been giving it a think.
To me, it boils down to a question of agency. Who decides? Is it your doctor? Or the person who works down the Job Centre? No offence to people who work at JobCentres - it must be one of the toughest jobs going - but they are not qualified to make medical judgements about people, especially when they’re constantly told to get JSA and IB numbers down to make sure the government looks good. Usually this involves shoving people into low paid jobs which are totally unsuitable, and to hell with that person’s mental health. There are quotas, damnit!
Again, I find myself asking: who benefits? It’s certainly not those people affected by mental health issues. Maybe we’ve finally accepted that stress is a legitimate condition, but I think we’re (when I say we, I mean wider society) are affected by the old Victorian taboos surrounding mental heath, and the image of all people with mental health issues either being locked up in a padded cell or being driven around on a Sunshine Coach. It’s this sort of prejudice which still haunts - like a spectre - over current attitudes to mental health, and a rare few positive representations in happy-go-lucky TV films won’t change that.
We are still told to think, from my experience anyway, that people with mental health issues are ‘modern day lepers’. Which is why I think we see such authoritarian, dogmatic and Victorian attitudes towards it in such legislation. Either there is nothing wrong with you, or it’s off to the asylum. There is only black or white. No middle ground.
I remember leading SWPer Colin Barker telling me an unusual story about the rise of the Solidarity movement in Poland. He told me that those working in mental health institutions reported that when Solidarity was on the retreat, the institutions were full of working class people, but when Solidarity was on the rise, they would check themselves out, and ended up being replaced by the Stalinist bureaucrats. I can’t verify the vaildity of that story, but it’s interesting to note the class context.
What I’d like to know is how working class women are treated in the mental health system, an overall picture of the experience. I’d put money on it being a substantially worse experience, but I was wondering if there is any hard evidence for it. And for people of ethnic minorities, too. But especially women.
Far be it for me to teach proclaimed socialists and progressives the essentials of worker solidarity, but when people I know and respect start posting anti-union bile on an anti-socialist blog (in this instance, Students Waiving Placards, an anti-SWP Livejournal community), I feel the need to intervene. These people are my friends (you know who you are), and a friend, when seeing another friend making a massive mistake, you step in and tell them so. It is in this light I hope my friends see this entry.
The entry in question is ‘The AUT Strike’ and you can read it - with comments - here.
I’m going to approach this in a Q&A style, and answer the many glib comments that come up.
The unions were just busting to go on action! They couldn’t keep it in their pants! So to speak…
Despite what most people think, unions don’t like going on strike. They’re an absolute pain in the arse, you lose a day’s pay, and the union bureaucracy would rather sit in nice meeting rooms, eat nice biscuits, drink nice cups of tea (or coffee) and generally get chummy with management. That, after all, is the role of the union bureaucracy; the labour lieutenant of capital, as Marx (or was it Lenin? I forget) oft said.
In any case, current strike levels are still well below their 1970’s levels. Even days lost to industrial action short of a strike were down.
The AUT dispute had been dragging on for several years. There have been a series of one day strikes which achieved little in the face of a determined management. This is not something that happened at the drop of a hat or came out of the ether. Pay rises in acedemia - controlled by a sub-committee of Universities UK - had either been below, or at the rate of, inflation for many years. A pay rise which is below the rate of inflation IS NOT a pay rise - it is a pay cut.
But they’re using the students as pawns!
Really? How so? Because they boycotted marking instead of research? Well, considering this is a lecturer’s strike, over lecturer’s pay, then it would make sense to target areas of work related to lecturing. Remember, the AUT had a series of one day strikes which did nothing. It didn’t even bring UUK to the negoiating table.
The AUT aren’t just using the students to get what they want. The AUT were fully behind the NUS’s opposition to tuition fees (when the NUS were opposed to it), they actively lobbied and fought against top-up fees (wheres the NUS did very little) and, where they are lead locally by a leadership of militants, do fight for students. The AUT have been there for students, because, without students, they would be out of a job! They have put their necks on the line for speaking out against their employers - the university VCs who lobbied for tuition fees, top up fees and for the abolishment of the fees cap. That takes guts.
Whereas those students who oppose the AUT now seem to welcome the AUT’s help when it suits them, but when the AUT need solidarity (note that the AUT never actively sought student solidarity, and only made a hoo-hah about it when socialist NEC members of the NUS managed to win a motion of solidarity with the AUT - a huge mistake on their part) you turn your backs on them. Some friends you turn out to be.
The AUT are being selfish!
As I have shown above, the AUT have always supported students when they have struggled. Apart from their opposition to fees, they also supported the NUS’s Keep Wednesday Afternoons Free campaign, as well as numerous other campaigns.
In the face of an unrepentant, savage management, the AUT have shown remarkable restraint (they shouldn’t have, as it goes). UUK promised pay rises when tuition fees were introduced - they did not appear. UUK promised pay rises when top up fees were introduced - they did not appear. Yet the AUT only took action in May - and won.
The AUT didn’t want to negoiate! They wanted a 40% rise!
This is a lie. All the AUT wanted was to bring management to the negoiating table. The AUT wanted to negotiate. They wanted to bargain. And they did - they settled for less than that, for 20% (or there abouts) over a number of years.
Lecturers are loaded! They’re being greedy.
Some are, sure. But not the majority of them. Lecturers on lower pay scales, who do the actual nitty-gritty of helping students, earn on average £18-20k per year. When the average graduate these days will start out on around £20-22k, this is a joke.
The ancillarly staff associated with the striking unions accepted the 12.6% but were knocked back by the lecturers. (Verbatim quote)
This is also a lie. The ancillary staff form a seperate bargaining unit to the lecturers. The anc staff (who are in UNISON I believe) decided to accept 12.6%. They should have held out for more, but to say that the lecturers scabbed on the anc staff for holding out is absurd. Indeed, the anc staff blackened any lecturer-related work, an action of solidarity.
Despite the whiter than white image of democracy, peace, and freedom that the Kurdistan Regional Government likes to portray of Iraqi Kurdistan - even going as far as calling itself The Other Iraq and using images of innocent schoolgirls playing happily in the streets (no, really), a quick scan of the left wing blogs, speficially David Broder’s blog, brings me to this;
On July 27th, the police and security forces of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan opened fire on 700 workers of the Tasloja Cement Factory near the city of Suleiumanyia in Iraqi Kurdistan. Three workers were killed and sixteen more were injured in this cruel attack. The workers came under attack because they launched a strike asking for a wage rise and that 300 workers previous fired by the administration be reinstated in their jobs.
The Iraqi labour movement is under real pressure from state terror and the terror of reactionary militias - the solidarity of trade unionists in the West is vital.
Please come and support the protest in front of the PUK’s London office on Tuesday 1st August - from 12:00 to 14:00
At 5 Glass House Walk
London SE5Nearest tube station: Vauxhall (Victoria line)
Or, write a letter of condemnation:
We the undersigned call on Trade Union Branches and human rights organisations to send messages to Jala Talabani who was selected as president of Iraq in April. condemning this action.
Appeals to:
Mr. Jalal Talabani
President
Republic of Iraq
Convention Centre (Qasr al-Ma’aridh)
Baghdad, IraqIf you have a fax, please send appeals via the PUK offices abroad and ask them to be forwarded to President Talabani:
- PUK office in United Kingdom: fax: +44 20 7 840 0630
- PUK office in United States: fax:+1 202 637 2723
- PUK office in Germany: fax: +49 30 863 987 94
- PUK office in France: fax:+33 1 409 00282
- PUK office in Italy: fax:+39 06 50 37120 (if someone answers ask for the fax line)
- PUK office in the EU: fax:+31 703 895832 (if someone answers ask for the fax line)
- PUK office in Sweden: fax: +46 8 917693 (if someone answers ask for the fax line)COPIES TO: International Federation of Iraqi Refugees-d.jamal@ntlworld.com, TEL: 07856 032991
Dashty Jamal, International Federation of Iraqi Refugees
David Broder, Convenor of Iraq Union Solidarity
Karen Johnson, No Sweat
It’s a shame it’s being organised during the day, because it means it will be a bit of a crap protest. Because ordinary people will be at work, or school, natch. So, if you can (and, let’s face it, if you’re sat there rivited by this blog, you CAN), you should send an email to the above email addresses.
Indeed, you might also want to send an email to the Kurdistan Regional Government and give them a right earful about this too. They, thankfully, make this rather easy to do.
They have a web form here - make sure you set it to “Administration” and that you don’t give the poor sod who just runs the website an earful.
The KRG also have a London office. Here are the details:
KRG Representation in the United Kingdom
Winchester House, 8th Floor
259-269 Old Marylebone Road
London NW1 5RA
Phone: +44 (0)20 7170 4300
Fax: +44 (0)20 7170 4301
Email: uk(at)krg.org
Hopefully, they might be able to put some pressure on the PUK to leave workers and their organisations alone. The bastards.
EDIT: Isn’t technology wonderful? I’ve just rememberd this, if it’s of any help: if you have an email account, you should be able to fax the PUK office in London rather easily, without the need for a fax machine, for free.
Click on this email link:
remote-printer.London_Office/Patriotic_Union_of_Kurdistan@442078400630.iddd.tpc.int
… and send it like an email. Thanks to the folks at tpc.int, and their UK partner Demon, it should be sent straight away. Easy.
Don’t forget to CC it to d.jamal@ntlworld.com!
Well, as of Monday, I begin training to see whether or not I’m good enough to be a commission only based travel agent.
The job itself is in Kentish Town, near Camden Lock. Ish. When I went to the interview (which was the most uninterviewy interview I’ve ever been to) I was bedazzed (ish) by the amount of commission people were earning. It’s all incoming calls to, so no cold-calling (which I refuse to do since I worked as a street fundraiser).
Wish me luck.
You know it makes sense.
I think not.
That photo was taken by Lenin (no, not the Russian one, a pro-SWP blogger) yesterday at the anti-Isreali protest in Central London, called by the Stop the War Coalition, CND, the Muslim Association of Britain, and I believe, a new outfit called the British Muslim Initative.
It doesn’t surprise me that there are such people from the Muslim community who identify with Hizbollah, but what does irk me greatly is that no-one, speficially from the Socialist Workers Party, ever challenges it. Socialists have nothing in common with groups like Hizbollah.
More needs to be done to break Muslim workers from auto-Islamism, and that means raising a socialist programme.
The Scum: Putting the GREAT in Great BRITAIN
Rebekah Wade wants to put the BIG into BIG BROTHER… but she needs YOUR help.
The linked story above gives The Sun’s helpful hints to obey and serve Furher Blair’s new totalitarianism. Unfortunatly, some sly Sun hack edited down the original article. Here is the (un)original version:
1. Teachers, cops and doctors are battling to do tough jobs against a growing tide of cynicism and abuse.
RESPECT these vital authority figures so they can work effectively. Do not ask questions. WHERE ARE YOUR PAPERS, CITIZEN?
2. Britain is a great country with a history that is the envy of the world.
Have the guts to display PATRIOTISM about living here and speak up in public about our nation’s remarkable qualities. Celebrate our history. Our Empire. Our mandate of Palestine and Messopotania…
3. Yobs routinely spread fear among vulnerable pensioners and young kids.
Yet millions of us turn a blind eye to their thuggery.
Together, we must CONFRONT teenage hoodies if we see them taunting, abusing or spitting at passers-by.
Every troublemaking lout is somebody’s child.
So KEEP TABS on your own kids and make sure you know what they are up to.
Your vigilance will safeguard their welfare as well as strengthening your community.
And, if they misbehave, slap an ASBO on them. And electronic tagging never hurt anyone.
4. Britain is a nation at war — we can no longer worry about being labelled a “grass”.
Don’t hesitate to REPORT suspicious activity or anti-social behaviour.
Call your local police or phone the anti-terror hotline on 0800 789 321 if you have important information or suspicions.
Remember, a tip-off from a member of the public led Spanish police to the Madrid bombers.
We are watching you, citizen. We have cameras everywhere.
5. Ranting clerics are free to spit hatred thanks to the Human Rights Act, which prevents their deportation.
WRITE to your MP demanding that this crazy law is repealed.
Do not resist arrest when you critizise Furher Blair and Furher Murdoch.
6. Many of us no longer know the names of our neighbours, even though we have sometimes lived side by side for years.
Take the trouble to CHAT to those who live close by to revive close-knit communities of the past.
It may also save you from being burgled next week.
Even though your neighbour won’t be as stupid to burgle their neighbour.
7. New York police commissioner Bill Bratton helped to reform the city by highlighting basic crime prevention measures including the “broken window” theory.
This showed that a chain of crimes could be prevented just by repairing a smashed window, foiling an obvious opportunity for a crook who could then be tempted into escalating villainy.
By the same token, we must TACKLE anti-social behaviour such as littering or vandalising.
More ASBOs!
8. Security and police services face a huge challenge in overcoming the alarming new terrorist threat.
Help cops by ensuring you CO-OPERATE fully if you are ever stopped and searched.
Avoid triggering needless security alerts by leaving bags unattended.
Don’t worry about the racist nature of stop & search. If you’re black, tough shit, you’re fair game.
9. Communication while travelling on public transport has almost broken down, fuelled recently by an atmosphere of mutual suspicion.
Don’t be afraid to challenge the climate of fear by making CONVERSATION.
But, if they look either Arabic, Pakistani, or Brazilian, then report them to the police STRAIGHT AWAY. Or, pump them full of lead if you’re on the tube.
Open doors and give up your seat for mums-to-be or the elderly.
Yer tight bastards.
10. Soaring levels of apathy have made voting and neighbourhood initiatives unfashionable.
Don’t be afraid to PARTICIPATE in them — or even launch them.
And report on anyone who’s even shifty looking.
