Mark Antony and Octavian defeated Brutus in the Second Battle of Philippi in 42 BC. The first treaty between Scotland and France against England was signed in Paris in 1295. The Battle of Edgehill was fought in 1642. The first National Convention on Women's Rights was held in Worcester, Massachusetts, in 1850. The UN General Assembly met for the first time in an auditorium in Flushing, New York, in 1946. The iPod was introduced in 2001.
Born today: Ted Fujita (1920-1998), Johnny Carson (1925-2005), Diana Dors (1931-1984), Pélé (1940), Kim Larsen (1945), Ang Lee (1954) and Cat Deeley (1976).
It is Mole Day in North America. A unit of measure, apparently. Not a burrowing mammal. Not an excess of melanin. Not even a Mexican sauce. It's more than my unscientific brain can explain.
Tillykke med fødselsdagen, Kim Larsen.
ReplyDeleteCarrying over from yesterday's thread...
ReplyDeleteAnd every gf I ever had knew jack about music other than the fact that Bowie or Morten Harket or Eminem had great cheekbones
I honestly don't think that chicks know much about music...
Hmm. It could just mean that you have crap taste in women.
I could be in Edgehill in 10 minutes from here (work). It has a lovely pub whose garden looks down over the valley.
ReplyDeleteAh Mark Anthony - I wish I was Cleopatra.
ReplyDeleteIsn't Edgehill supposed to be haunted by a ghostly battle? Some interesting stories about that.
Anyway feel like a refugee today - Miliband for EU Foreign Secretary? Blair for President? Help.
Milly - possibly the worst foreign secretary in living memory - even if your memory goes back to the Boer War - for EU Foreign Secretary?
Pass me the Mogadon quick.
I honestly don't think that chicks know much about music...
ReplyDelete[sounds of spitting]
pah, pthui, peh, puh, ptha, pth, pah
[ends]
grrrrrrrrrrrrrrr...
Bruss - oh god, have just seen that...
ReplyDeletestill, as all the supportive quotes are 'chatham-ed', it could just be pissed-up euro-beuros having a bit of a laugh wit' press. hope so.
Radio 4 asking the big questions this morning.
ReplyDeleteWhat happens when an otter turns nasty?
Just made me chuckle...
@PhilippaB
ReplyDeleteWhat happens when an otter turns nasty?
Dunno. Does it perhaps join the RBNP (Riverbank Nationalist Party) and complain about all the voles and water rats coming round here and nicking all our fish?
swifty - heh heh. and all these moles, coming over from mole-land, taking all the hill-building jobs, because we've ceded sovereignty to the EU ('Edgerow Union)...
ReplyDelete"Does it perhaps join the RBNP (Riverbank Nationalist Party) and complain about all the voles and water rats coming round here and nicking all our fish?"
ReplyDeleteYou'd have to ask Dot for the latest on the far right politics of our riverdwelling friends, he's quite an authority.
QT was pretty brutal, i thought, he was mauled and made to look an utter fool. His constant twitching and visible discomfort didnt help. How this is a propaganda coup for the BNP is beyond me, he looked an utter moron. But the debrief will rage for weeks, i suspect.
Those Cifwatch people are nuts!
ReplyDeleteBru - dunno about haunting, but Edgehill was (I'm told) the first major battle of the civil war.
@Jay:
ReplyDeleteMorning mate. Didn't watch it myself, for a couple of reasons, 1. I doubted there was much insight to be gained from it, frankly; and 2. I was expecting a good deal of back-slappery and polishing of "anti-fash" credentials from the other panellists and Dimblebum, which would have been as nauseating as watching The Griff...
Anyway, you're right, Dot might know - I hear our indigenous, salt o' the earth, actual working class crayfish are being ousted by bigger, tougher, bloody foreign crayfish coming over here and turning our green and pleasant riverbeds into no go zones for honest to goodness native crayfish everywhere?
"actual working class crayfish are being ousted by bigger, tougher, bloody foreign crayfish coming over here and turning our green and pleasant riverbeds into no go zones for honest to goodness native crayfish everywhere?"
ReplyDeleteNot just crayfish man, they're like little factory trawlers in our fresh waterways. Me and a mate caught fifty odd of them a couple of years ago for a barbecue. Mean little sods they are.
Ah BW, how's it going dude? Still bottle-necking away?
ReplyDeleteI've got a bit of Townes van Zandt on the go at the minute, there's some lovely pedal steel action in the background...
yes mate - got a couple of supports slot with an ex-bluesbreaker coming up. Nice !
ReplyDeleteTvZ was great, need to get some more.
(Have you heard Robert Randolphs ?? Insane gospel blues pedal steel player. Played on Buddy Guys last album.)
How's tricks ?
Sounds like a quality gig - anywhere down South?
ReplyDeleteRobert Randolph and the Family Band, that pedal steel guy? If that's them, they're mental, I saw a clip of them in concert once (maybe a Bonnaroo DVD or something?), they stopped the gig because the crowd was a bit quiet, the band members swapped instruments and started playing some beautiful gospel number. Must have a look on YouTube for it.
All's well this side of the internet mate, just, you know, hanging out, chilling etc.
swifty - and will nobody think of the squirrels?
ReplyDeleteMoles? lovely little creatures
ReplyDeleteBitterweeds back is he, marching in without even a hello... i tell you, the country's going to pot...
ReplyDeleteRobert Randolph is superb, saw him playing on a crossroads DVD, unbelievable. I wouldnt mind going to crossroads one year actually. Im been listening to a lot of Warren Haynes actually, he's my man of the moment (along with... Bitethehand! He has actually made some good posts lately, bless him).
I had a post deleted yesterday to Kiz, warning her that if she continued being beastly to a troll i would have to slap her wrist. The mods decided to delete it. Perhaps it could have been construed as a threat of violence to a woman.
QT - swifty, yeah was as to be expected. He was torn to pieces for an hour, he was visibly shaken throughout. Plenty of appalling quotes were reproduced, he didnt have a leg to stand on.
But as you say it was lapped up by the panel who were revelling in their new found role as people who actually possess morality of some form.
Re. the Griffster - I need to get hold of that Downfall footage (yes, *that* Downfall footage), I've a germ of an idea for doing a "Hitler hears that Nick Griffin is appearing on the BBC's Question Time". Along the lines that he's absolutely bloody outraged that his TV licence money is being spent on that fucking Nazi appearing on the telly, that is, until the point that the sweating Keitel (or Jodl, or whoever it is) points out that "Actually, mein Fuehrer, we're the Nazis..." An ashen-faced Hitler replies "Anyone who is a Nazi, please leave the room now..." and so it goes.
ReplyDeleteAnd I think those YouTube Downfall videos are one of the very few places on the public internet where the statement "I agree with Hitler" can be uttered without huge amounts of opprobrium descending...
The downfall variations are superb. The michael Jackson one is the best by a country mile.
ReplyDelete@Jay:
ReplyDeleteHave you seen the ones about Op Flash 2 having no dedicated server support...?
Just need to get my hands on the clip now and I'm good to go, all scripted up.
Listen to this alleged 6th former defending his Open Border credentials (i think he may be a BNP stooge, if not, he's absolutely classic):
ReplyDelete"Ah, I think perhaps you might have made a little falacy in logic all too often made. [Sorry if that comes across as condascending, it really isn't meant to be. It is hard to communicate effectively on the impersonal internet, it tends to lead to much misunderstanding and people behaving atrociusly rudely to each other] What you appear to have assumed is that if my beliefs were implemented only one thing would change (i.e Britain would open up its borders). It is absurd to take one policy out of context from a wider worldview. I also believe in equality. I also believe the rulers of Britain should stop investing in the imperialist World Bank, IMF and so on. I also believe the rulers of Britain should get out of Afghanistan, and wish they had never sent ordinary people from this island to fight there or Iraq, or anywhere else on an endless list of places ruthlessly invaded and exploited for our rulers' gain. And, come to think of it, given that my beliefs are so far from being implemented by our rulers, I might as well add that I hope a revolutionary movement sweeps across the world, deposing of all leaders, political, religious and economic, this will lead to a period where we do away with money, States (and consequently borders), and share our resources, creativity. I hope we can build a new world based on friendship and love.
And now for the answer you probably want (you won't be satisfied of course, but you'll probably judge at least slightly less utopian)... Millions and millions of people would enter the country to begin with. We would have to rethink our economy and infrastructure (as outlined in the extract I quoted earlier) to accomodate all these new, wonderful minds. It could lead to similar policies throughout the world, this would lead to, over time, an equalising of population fairly evenly throughout the world."
"Have you seen the ones about Op Flash 2 having no dedicated server support...?"
ReplyDeleteSwifty is that your doing?
No mate, I don't have the echt German clip, I need to get hold of it so I can subtitle over the top of it...
ReplyDelete"The BBC TV Centre is here, mein Fuehrer... Herr Griffin will enter by the West gate at approximately 16.30 UK time"
"Good, good - have you prepared the eggs, Keitel, I would like to bounce a few off that ugly Nazi's head"
"Erm, mein Fuehrer..."
etc etc
Are you actually going to do it Swifty? Post it up here if you do.
ReplyDeleteWould do mate, but I need the raw 4.05 clip of him blowing his top first... I'll let you know if I find it anywhere.
ReplyDeleteAnyway, POETS beckons shortly, have a gute Wochenende everyone.
PS I like this one
ReplyDeletehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cqqxRPZdfvs
It's gone all self-referential. Excellent.
Ha! Never seen those before, they're brilliant!
ReplyDelete"And I've never had a problem with Windows Vista.."
Thanks chaps!
Gah, I'm frustrated now.
ReplyDeleteAH: "But but but... I've got my Red Wedge badge round here somewhere... I was Billy Bragg's biggest fan... Mick Hucknall sent me a signed photo 'with warmest regards' and everything..."
Later...
AH: "Well, that's it then, we ARE Nazis. Keitel, cancel the Rock Against Racism gig. And somebody tell the PRS we won't be needing a performance licence for 'Ebony & Ivory' any more..."
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ReplyDeleteApparently the griffers is complaining to the beeb about his treatment last night - he's saying they changed the format and he was "held down by the pack".
ReplyDeleteMust have had some bad feedback from the boys. Good.
swifty - thanks for that H parody, it was hilarious!
ReplyDeleteJay, yeh, Warren rocks alright. Still in CiF borstal though, hence "quiet" at moment. heh.
ReplyDeleteGood evening all.
ReplyDeleteEnjoyed QT last night, in a weird kinda way. Just been catching up on last night's comments. Thought Bonnie Greer was absolutely wonderful.
Jay
Can't believe you got a jokey comment for Kiz deleted. Whatever next?
swifty
LOL!
And as for that HankScorpio dissing women's knowledge of music, well ... I'll borrow what Philippa said above:
[sounds of spitting]
pah, pthui, peh, puh, ptha, pth, pah
[ends]
grrrrrrrrrrrrrrr...
I'm keeping my head down tonight, mschin.
ReplyDeleteAll you lovely ladies will have completely forgotten about it by tomorrow, bless your fluffy little heads (-;
MsC
ReplyDeleteAnd as for that HankScorpio dissing women's knowledge of music, well
Am ignoring His Grace on that one.
The moaning continues from griffin - he's now saying he faced a lynch mob on QT last night - bit rich coming from the man who was happy to share a platform with the KKK.
News Quiz now covering QT...
ReplyDeleteheh heh
Your Grace - have always wanted to smack a Lord...
ReplyDeleteHey Hank, did you ever go out with this chick? She knows a bit about music.
ReplyDeletething called love
There's a new trafficking thread on CiF.
ReplyDeleteThe idiots BTL are asking the victim to give her name & location. How stupid can you get? Why cannot they respect her human rights?
I'm not really into all that S&M stuff like most aristos, sheff. Wrong public school obviously (-; Although as I said yesterday, might make an exception for thauma in light of her new avatar.
ReplyDeleteOff out for a few beers. Will be back later, once the pot is properly boling!!
hank
ReplyDeleteMy offspring collectively say your judgement is flawed there - both on the music knowledge & the possibility of MsChin forgetting your misdemeanor (sp?).
Evening possums
ReplyDeleteI am so tired I gave up eating my pork chop half way through because it was too much effort to chew it... zzZZZZZzzz... where was I? Oh yeah.
HANK!
That's all.
I've just watched Question Time and to be honest I thought it was a fuckin shambles. I don't exactly feel sorry for Griffin, turgid little fuckpig that he is, but he seems to have a point about his treatment.
ReplyDeleteThe BNP has been used to bolster the credibility of a political class who otherwise have none; who've thrown in the towel and accepted that they're interior designers adding a bit of nuance and character to the capitalist edifice who's design and construction is out of their hands. They sicken me every bit as much as him...and he totally turns my stomach. The BNP is an irrelevance. They've picked up some tiny support from voters who rightly feel unrepresented..but they've still made virtually no impact even though the entire mainstream political class is in disarray and widely loathed.
The best they can come up with is: we're anti-fascist. Well so's every other fucker...it's not enough..it's nothing. That's the very least we expect. The Left was always at its best opposing fascism; opposing fascism for what it stood for; not like friggin Churchill who didn't fight fascism. He fought Germany; for his class and to preserve what he could of the Empire.
Watching a bunch of craven opportunists shouting down a bumbling dickhead of man and assuming the old Left's anti-fascist mantle in doing so is sickening. The BNP is the best thing that's happened to mainstream politics for years. If the BNP weren't there, they'd have to invent them..which, to a large extent, they have.
Having said that, I blame the Left..or rather, those 'Marxists' who managed to read Marx, somehow manged to disregard the economic base and focus on what Marx regarded as the contingent, almost arbitrary, cultural superstucture and decided to change society through language. The structuralists, post-structuralists, deconstructionists, postmodernists, relativists, multiculturalists who decided to get radical with symbols and texts. They'd accepted capitalism as inevitable...unchangeable..even though their philosophy should have been founded on its inherent instability. They accepted the classical economic self-righting 'equilibrium' theory yet still called themselves Marxist cos it felt radical and annoyed mummy and daddy. Even better they decided to free the proletariat from bourgeois values with a critical rereading of texts the proletariat never read in the fuckin first place...everything except Kapital it seems.
That's why the postal workers are getting shafted, that's why Beatrix Campbell calls herself a fuckin Marxist, that's why the Guardian thinks of itself as leftwing, that's why...., that's why nobody shouted last night "YOU ONLY GET VOTES BECAUSE PEOPLE WHO HAVE NOWHERE ELSE TO TURN ARE GETTING LEGITIMATELY FUCKED BY THIEVING RAPACIOUS BASTARDS WITH THE BLESSING OF MAINSTREAM POLITICIANS"
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ReplyDeleteA realisation suddenly strikes me. I've been drinking vodka tonight. When I was off on my Irish rant the other night I'd been drinking Guiness...my brain's so finely attuned to alcohol, it seems to pick up on ethnic vibes. Not that I don't stand by tonight's efforts (although I should probably have read them back first).
ReplyDeleteMight nip out for a latte tomorrow and see if CIF will let me back. Or I could even start drinking my own piss and see if Liberal Conspiracy will reinstate me. Seems Sunny Hundal's dropped multiculturalism and become a born again left winger. Notice he has a go at 'leftie twitterers' praising Bonnie Greer. Well, this is for you Sunny...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/aug/26/climate-camp-climate-change
You fuckin hypocritical chancer
Guess who's back...shady's back...
ReplyDeleteYeh, nice Bonnie Raitt link, scherfig. And just for the record, I didn't say that chicks can't make good music, I said that chicks generally aren't interested in music.
I've done a completely unscientific poll of the office today and the results are just in: 100% of blokes agree with me; 90% of women were out shopping for shoes or were too busy reading Bella to respond; 10% of women said they liked Robbie Williams and/or Leona Lewis.
Anyway, women making music...
This is lovely, and doesn't she look like her mum...
juniorjune
An old fave and done with real panache...
badapple
And one song that's stuck with me since the first time I ever heard it...Just fucking wonderful...
uglyducklings
Evening Mr Fish. Have you been adding red bull to the vodka perchance?
ReplyDeleteYour first post about last night's QT is spot on. I said pretty much the same on yesterday's UT thread at 23.25.
As for Churchill, well, I'll never get tired of telling the anecdote my dear old nan told me that when he toured Shoreditch during the Blitz to "raise morale", he was met with widespread hostility. He was lucky not to get assailed by powdered egg by all accounts. The wwc knew who Churchill was and what he stood for, and they would have rather stood shoulder to shoulder with the darkies in India and Iraq who dear old Winnie shat on at best, or starved and then bombed at worst, in pursuit of his class interests, than they would with Churchill and the ruling class who still maintain the myth that he was the Greatest Briton.
Where was I? Oh yeh...Griffin claiming allegiance with Churchill, and the rest of the QT panel shouting him down...
Sums it up really doesn't it? The political centre has moved so far to the right in this country that there's not a single speaker on QT who's prepared to stand up and say, "You're right actually, griffo, you're a racist imperialist fucker, as was Churchill."
Yep, never really heard a good word from anyone of that generation for Churchill. Another opportunistic, self-promoting populist aristocratic (sorry) shitbag.
ReplyDeleteTonypandy, Gallipoli, sacrificing the Lusitania..the old twat loved making people suffer for his own and his class's ends.
Here's another couple of crackers about the 'greatest Briton'. Drunk as usual and shown the weekly wartime ration, he said "That'd make a fine meal... don't know what all the fuss is about".
Also, he was noted for nonchalantly stepping out for a evening stroll at the height of the blitz period to demonstrate his indefatigable devil-may-care spirit...but only he'd after had advanced clearance from coastal radar stations to give him a 'safety envelope'. The guy was a fuckin fraud.
Clement Atlee won the war. He was the brains. Churchill was the moronic drunken figurehead who spent his time composing obsequious letters to Rooseveldt petitioning for concessions which would save the empire.
'safety envelope'
ReplyDeletedunno why I typed that..sounds like it's got something to do with bubblewrap.
Monkeyfish at 21.57 - couple of points, fella...
ReplyDeleteWe owe nothing to the Russian peasantry. Agricultural workers have never been unionised, collectivist or intelligent enough to understand why they are poor and will remain poor. The footsoldiers of the Countryside Alliance are a classic example.
And the peasants played a negligible part in the Bolshevik Revolution, a negative one if anything. Which explains the need, as Trostsky saw it, for the elimination of the Kulaks.
Secondly, I'm a Marxist because I see history, power relations, economics etc in class terms as set out by Marx. Not sure about your distinction between Marxist and Marxian as a result.
As for your argument about the Bolshevik Revolution paving the way for our welfare state, yeh, up to a point.
But you're overlooking the reforms (National Insurance Act etc) brought in by the 1906 Liberal Govt, which owed a lot to organised labour in this country, dating back to the 1888-9 dockers and matchgirls strikes, and the formation of the LRC and then the Labour Party between 1900 and 1906.
I understand where you're coming from, but I still think that the unions deserve a lot of credit for the welfare state and for making this country a better place to live in for most of us.
I posted a comment the other night about how it was no wonder the Left lost its way when we all got colour tvs. It was a bit oblique, so I'll explain in more detail if anyone's interested...
The unions and the Labour Party, the forces of social democracy, had been tremendously effective in improving living and working conditions for the poor between 1945 and 1979. Working hours were reduced to an average 40 hours a week, we had the NHS, accident and unemployment insurance, we had something approaching full employment, trade unions were universally recognised and workers' rights along with them, public housing wasn't great but the slums had been cleared, people had money in their pockets and central heating and colour tvs had become more of a norm than outside toilets and rickets.
Sadly that was the point at which the intellectual left thought that the class war was over and that the future lay in identity politics.
Just because we all had colour tellys it didn't mean that those colour tellys wouldn't be repossessed if we didn't keep up the payments, nor that the gains the organised working class had made were entrenched, set in stone, impervious to a backlash by the rich and powerful who might see the identity politics of the New Left as an open invitation to divide and conquer.
You know all this of course, mate. I just needed to have a little rant on here, given that I'm not able to rant at the home of identity politics and well meaning liberal bullshit.
"We owe nothing to the Russian peasantry."
ReplyDeleteWell, I'd agree but for..
the one's who threw themselves at the Wehrmacht in their hundreds of thousands thereby defeating the 3rd Reich..
and..
the ones who'd collectivised even in Marx's own lifetime and caused him to lend qualified support to the Narodniks, overturning his own 'historical' theories in the process and 'allowing' for a revision which allowed for an agrarian revolution, thus inspiring the People's Will to assassinate Alexander II as a result of which the brother of an 18 year old Lenin was hanged..setting in train a revolution that shook the world and scared capitalists across Europe to make concessions to the working class which they repackaged as a reward for the heroes of the trenches.
NO doubt about it, the unions and gradualists seized the chance and instituted reforms which benefited everybody. But, I contend it was the shock of the Russian Revolution which spurred the change.
"Working hours were reduced to an average 40 hours a week"
Yeah, but that was Marx. The 8 hour day was one of the bits of Kapital that was readily digestible. The opening section on commodities is what puts people off..including Harold Wilson who used to boast he'd only ever read the first two pages.
Thing is..right now..the bastards have got a free hand. What's gonna stop them turning us all into exploited serfs?...there's even a policy whereby we import a ready made desperate lumpenproletariat to keep us all lean, desperate and divided. Seriously..why couldn't they? What would anyone do..put their faith in solidarity?
Tonight's newsnight special on the Wall Street crash of 1929 was class - an interesting view/discussion of the aftermath of the crash on economics and the arts .
ReplyDeleteFor those with iplayer facilities who didn't see it - it's well worth the time of a look in over the next seven days.
For others:try the BBC website "newsnight review" webage.
Got to admit mind, it's fuckin years since I read the thing and it turned into a sorta mission. It's the most turgid, prolix thing imaginable...unlike a lot of his other stuff.
ReplyDeleteIncidentally..I saw someone was on about "a spectre is haunting Europe..." the other day. That was the second version. The first translation of the manifesto had it..
"a hobgoblin is stalking Europe.."
Gotta say...I'm a hobgoblin man myself.
"the ones who threw themselves at the Wehrmacht in their hundreds of thousands" were, of course, Russian patriots, cannon fodder. Not intrinsically anti-fascist or revolutionary.
ReplyDelete"But, I contend it was the shock of the Russian Revolution which spurred the change."
Not buying it, mate. Look at the governance of Britain, the US, France and Germany between 1919 and 1933...Look at the didsparities in wealth in those countries in the Roaring Twenties. It wasn't until the 1929 Crash that Keynesian economics kicked in in FDR's America and, yes, Hitler's Germany, and, even then, it took four years before either govt came to power.
There's no doubt that the fear of Bolshevism led to concessions on the part of the ruling class, but those concessions were gradual and piecemeal.
The ruling class in the UK never needed to make sizeable concessions anyway given that they knew that the organised left was gradualist as opposed to revolutionary, and that owed much to the Fabian middle class leadership of the labour movement here.
And the Fabian influence has now come full circle. And the Fabian influence has neutered the anger of the Left in the UK, those who would really like to see bankers, politicians and generals brought to account at Tyburn for their crimes.
Re. the Blitz - my old man is from Belfast. He was brought up a stone's throw from the Harlan & Wolf shipyards. Come 1940, come the German bombers, come the largely forgotten Belfast Blitz... dad, Aunty Genevieve, Grandad and Granny bombed out. Dad, Aunty Genevieve and Granny repair to Galway (chez the Coulters) to see out the war. Grandad (works at the Royal Mail sorting office in Belfast, reserved occupation), lives in a fucking tent in the bombed out house, with his father's (ex-Raj) service revolver, to stop looters taking what was left. Working class solidarity my arse.
ReplyDeleteAnd here lies the grave of Gerard Charles Swift. Ulster Rifles, seconded to 1st Airborne Btn, died March 1945, Hamminkeln in Operation Varsity.
Known to my dad as "Uncle Gerry".
Anyway, Hank, you're not denying the sacrifice of yer actual Krasnii Armeetz in WWII? I've been drinking heavily tonight, and I'm in the mood for a row with anyone who tells me the Russian Army didn't do for the Wehrmacht...
"Not sure about your distinction between Marxist and Marxian as a result."
ReplyDeleteOh yeah, to clarify this. I'd say a Marxian is someone who accepts the characterisation of capitalism, regards economics, particularly the means of production, as the basis of historical change and social consciousness but doesn't accept the historicism or the need for revolution.
I'd regard a Marxist as a revolutionary; classically, not a supporter of scial democratic politics or indeed unions.
I'd classify a pseudo-Marxist as an heir to all that flowed from the Frankfurt school..Marcuse, Althusser, Adorno, the 68ers...basically those who rejected the economic determinist aspects (ie the entire point of Marx) and instead focussed their 'revolutionary' zeal on popular culture; what Marx would have called the cultural superstructure which he regarded as bourgeois culture.
All they did was realign bourgeois culture along lines dictated by variously, structuralism, post-structuralism...various other crazes inc. Derrida, postmodernism, identity, diversity blaah blah fuckin blah..until we arrive at a point (most blatantly exemplified by occasional cif 'big gun' John Gray) where any belief system is utopian folly and human agency is a myth.
Also...
#But you're overlooking the reforms (National Insurance Act etc) brought in by the 1906 Liberal Govt, which owed a lot to organised labour in this country,#
as well as the first Russian revolutionary blast of 1905...got them thinking.
Also must admit. At school, I was taught history by a drunken Christian Brother from Meath. History was a long list of atrocities committed by the British Army and the the Black and Tans.
ReplyDeleteIt was a bit myopic. History to me was Hobsbawn tbh. much later on. Maybe I'm biased in that regard but I like his take on things (if not his wartime activities) and for him the October Revolution rocked the world...and I tend to agree. The Labour movement in this country never really had teeth, just, as you say, accumulated more and more power. I think the impetus must have been external.
@Swifty - you're in the mood for a row, are you?
ReplyDeleteFair play. Go on then, fella, where did I say that the Red Army didn't do for the Wehrmacht? What are you actually accusing me of? I'm aware of the history of WW2, I know about the Battle of Stalingrad, I know that 20 million Russians died in WW2.
And I know about the Blitz of London, and how ordinary Londoners think that Churchill was a cunt.
Just as most working class men and women always thought that Churchill was a cunt, dating back to his time as Home Secretary during the General Strike of 1926.
Not entirely sure what your point is here, Swifty.
As we don't ever interact on this site, I'm guessing that you've had one too many and you're looking for a row with me on any sort of pretext. Don't have a problem with that tbh, happy to oblige.
But don't play the sentimental shite about how your uncle Gerry died for this country.
That's bollocks. You might as well link to a site in Basra where little orphan Ali remembers his innocent ma and da who died at the hands of the RAF for the glory of this country.
How's the Hitler homage coming along btw?
Swifty @ 16-15 above.
ReplyDeleteYou looking for a copy of the Hitler parody video without subtitles ??
If so is this any use for you subtitling project??
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4J4sZQihkk0
"Just as most working class men and women always thought that Churchill was a cunt, dating back to his time as Home Secretary during the General Strike of 1926."
ReplyDeleteor even 1910...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tonypandy_Riot
certainly by 1915
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gallipoli#Gallipoli_Campaign
anyway..bedtime for me..
ReplyDeleteI'll leave you boys to your drunken brawling. I'd offer to hold your coats but I wouldn't be seen dead with a couple of dayglo orange shellsuit jackets.
Night all.
ReplyDeleteI don't think Swifty was a Brylcreem boy Hank.
Whoa there, Hank, way over the top with that comment at 0.55. Withdrawn with abject apologies, Swifty. Genuinely.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDelete