A Christmas Message

 

So it’s Christmas Day and I thought my follower (who would normally settle down with his Mum to jeer the Queen’s speech) might well have a bit of time on his hands, so this post is just for you, dear reader, as a thank you for giving up your time to read my ramblings this year.

The thing is I’ve never written a Christmas special before so I want to get the tone right. No banging on about how awful the Government is, or how they are responsible for thousands of deaths, or how their incompetence has turned Britain into the exact opposite of Love Island - hate island (the whole World hates and fears us now, good job Tory scum). Or, how poverty is at its worst levels ever, condemned by the United Nations and necessitating UNICEF feeding British children for the first time ever.

No, the tone has to be upbeat. So no mention of the Labour Party and it’s cowardly and shameful attacks on its own members. That would not be upbeat and neither would pointing out that Jeremy Corbyn was not the only Labour leader ever criticised in a report. I won’t be mentioning the Chilcott Inquiry and how it concluded that Tony Blair had lied to parliament and the British people to send us into a war in Iraq for which we are still paying the cost. Who would want to read that on Christmas Day?

Wikileaks

Tone is everything (I looked it up on Google) so it’s important that my reader (who doesn’t even have a Xmas Day Doctor Who special to look forward to) is cheered. Best then to take a leaf out of the BBC’s book and avoid any mention of Wikileaks founder Julian Assange who currently languishes in HMP Belmarsh after his show trial for revealing that the Americans were complicit in torture. I’ll keep that to myself for now. I’m sure the Beeb and The Guardian (who used Wikileaks to win awards and then when it suited them turned on the provider of that information) will give extensive coverage to the pre-determined guilty verdict as Julian is taken off to spend the rest of his life in a maximum security prison in America. 

Writing a Christmas blog is easy just concentrate on all the good things that have happened this year. No one said it had to be a long blog. Perhaps some news from around the World would be good. Not Israel though because if I point out that they are an apartheid state who define citizenship on strict ethnic grounds I could be accused of being anti-Semitic. So no mention either of the Palestinian villages that have been destroyed or the children, including 15 year old Ali Abu Aliah that have been killed by Israeli soldiers. I’ll leave it to Mondoweiss to point out that this “was the 6th killing of a Palestinian child in the occupied West Bank this year. And though Israeli soldiers have killed 155 children in West Bank in recent years, they have had near complete impunity-- a process "unworthy of a country that proclaims it lives by rule of law," the U.N. says.” But, that isn’t a story of peace and goodwill is it? So best not to go there. Besides I don’t want to get expelled from the Labour Party (or do I?)

I also won’t mention that the catastrophe that is Syria continues to unravel as Assad’s thugs murder their way through Idlib Province causing hundreds of thousands to flee their villages. That’s not the sort of thing to think about over Christmas dinner. The fact that hundreds of thousands of Syrians are trapped on the Turkey border should not detain us too long. After all, they’ll either be murdered by Assad’s thugs or starve, because nobody is lifting a single finger to help them. Nobody is prepared to take responsibility for a war in which the arms are being provided by American and British arms manufacturers. After all, if we didn’t sell them somebody else would.

Bolivia

But, this is Christmas and the message has to be one of hope. And, let’s be honest, amidst the catastrophe that has been 2020, there have been some spots of good news. The victory of the Movement for Socialism (MAS) in Bolivia following a near-coup by the USA which saw Evo Morales forced into exile shows that the left can prevail even against insurmountable odds. The thousands who contributed to Jeremy Corbyn’s defence fund showed that even in the U.K., a country where if 4 left wingers enter a room they emerge in 2 factions, the left are capable of working together.

I remain optimistic, even knowing that the current pandemic is far from over. Sadly, it has been so badly managed that a few more hundred will die, and many more left with long-term illness (a fact that pretty much has passed the media by because of their obsession with the economy). That the Tories remain ahead in most polls, though it should be said without a significant majority, is more a reflection of the woefully inadequate performance of the opposition than anything that Johnson and his band of incompetent misfits have done. But, this is reason for hope. Clearly, the Labour Party is now in the hands of a group of people who aspire to be conservatives but lack the conviction.

As this year - 2021- develops it will become obvious to more and more people that the Labour Party can offer them nothing more than a watered down version of the Tories. Don’t get me wrong I am not expecting a mass movement for socialism to emerge from the current mess. I said I was optimistic, I never said I was delusional. But, the Tories have no answers other than attacking the poor, and the Labour Party offers no alternate vision at all. Just a more competent version of what we already have, and perhaps a trade deal with Israel.

Peace and Justice Project

I am enthusiastic about Jeremy Corbyn’s Peace and Justice Project and if Corbyn is true to form, released from the fetters of the Labour Party bureaucracy, it may well develop into something approaching a mass movement. At the very least it gives those of us on the left not attracted by any of the existing or emerging fringe parties of the left a place to go. Quite how it works out is difficult to guess, but one thing is for certain unless SirKeith has a sudden epiphany Jeremy is not getting the whip back any time soon. Personally, I can never forgive the right wingers who control the party for their treachery at the 2017 and 2019 General Elections. I hold them personally responsible for delivering this mess of a Tory government. I can also never forgive them for the way in which they have bent the knee to Zionism and demonised a thoroughly decent man in a way which in any other circumstances would be considered the worst type of institutional bullying.

I don’t share the belief that hundreds of CLPs passing motions of no confidence in David Evans and SirKeith will do anything other than strengthen their resolve to clear out the party of the remaining vestiges of the left. For those still in the party it is going to be take the knee or be suspended and expelled. But, I think this could turn out in the long term to be a good thing. For too long too many of us have maintained a belief in the Labour Party as some sort of socialist party in waiting. It never was. What is now clear is that it never can be. Now is the time to shatter that illusion once and for all. There is no parliamentary road to socialism. Or certainly not if the Labour Party is supposed to be the vehicle.

My optimism is fuelled by two movements that exploded without a political party in sight. Black Lives Matter and the environmental crisis (though technically that’s a description not a movement). BLM was important because it showed that a worldwide movement could develop without the obvious support of politicians who are always wary of movements that place ordinary people at the centre. Who was the leader of BLM? As far as I’m aware there is no one person who speaks for a movement that is global. And, yes, it’s a movement not a moment. Those dopes who booed footballers for supporting BLM are a minority who in their poverty of imagination cannot understand that the black footballers they cheer are actually human beings and deserve their respect. 

Greta Thunberg

And, of course, the environmental movement does have a voice. Greta Thunberg. Like any woman who puts her head above the parapet politically (and at 17 is it fair to even call her a woman, she is still a girl, though she turns 18 on January 3rd) she gets abused for her looks rather than what she says. Those keyboard warriors who spit out their bile (number one bile creator one President Trump) are the last echo of a dying breed of misogynistic white losers whose sole contribution to society can be expressed in a ‘sad’ emoji. Greta, on the other hand, is taking forward a fight so important that the World literally hangs on its success. That she has the support of so many young people who, inspired by her dogged determination, walked out of school demanding change, gives us all hope. It is, after all, their future. 

The pandemic, Brexit, Labour’s civil war have encouraged us to push the environment to the back of our minds. After all we have 10 years before things are really catastrophic. When the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) warned that limiting global warming to the 1.5-degree Celsius (2.6 degrees Fahrenheit) mark by the end of the century — a goal set to stave off the worst impacts of climate change — "would require rapid, far-reaching and unprecedented changes in all aspects of society," we had 12 years to act. We have already lost 2 years of that time. 

Watching the way people in the U.K. have reacted to the SARS-Cov-2 virus (to give it its proper name) we can see why making the significant changes necessary to save the planet is not going to be easy. Most people were initially scared of what was labelled a killer virus, but over time more scepticism has crept in to the point that people not directly affected by the virus have started to question its veracity and even its existence. Much like telling people not to smoke because it may do them harm in the long run, telling people to work from home and avoid contact with others has been a difficult sell to people who have been encouraged to think that if you are under 50 you are safe and that even if you get it it’s just like the flu. I can only assume these people have never had flu and are confusing flu (which is a really nasty virus which in extreme cases can kill) and the common cold which is mildly irritating but most of us shrug off within a week. 

Socialism or barbarism

Although people are aware that we are getting more extreme weather for many people this is just an inconvenience and not worth making massive changes for. Now it is Christmas and I don’t want to depress people, but sticking your head in the sand and pretending that the climate emergency is not, well, an emergency is not only short sighted but potentially suicidal. When I say suicidal I don’t mean on an individual basis but for society. The fact is people cannot both maintain the lifestyles they now have and make the changes necessary to avoid a catastrophe in a few years time. Indeed, it is probably the case that maintaining lifestyles which include commuting miles for work, jumping in jets 2 or 3 times a year in search of sunshine and guzzling up the earths resources for our amusement is to put it simply no longer sustainable.

As a socialist I am motivated by a desire to build a better future for everybody. I am prepared to make sacrifices if it is to the benefit of everybody. I’m not prepared to make sacrifices so that the worst polluters can continue to hoard the wealth they take from the labour of others. In the coming months many of these issues will come to a head. The experience of the pandemic has shown one thing clearly: in a crisis you need a governmental/state response, the private sector is simply not geared to care about the wider community. As the Tory establishment seek to transfer all the burdens of the past 12 months on to those least able to pay, and as normality returns and they go back to attacking working people, an opportunity for a different kind of conversation will emerge.

My hope and my dream is that socialists, be they organised in Labour, or other left groups or independent will be able to have a significant impact on those conversations. Some of them will take place on picket lines, some on demonstrations, some through petitions and other forms of solidarity. Some over tea in the works canteen, some over a quiet pint in the local. But the truth is this Christmas Day as we look over the tattered remnants of what we still laughingly call ‘Great’ Britain, we can be sure that people are pretty fed up and seeking answers. If we allow a void to develop those answers will be provided by right-wing bully boys (and girls) who will seek to divide in order to bring in their own version of fascism. We know that the Labour Party has no answers, but socialism doesn’t need a party to flourish. The idea of socialism is so strong that attempts to destroy it have consistently failed. 

I would like anybody who reads this blog to enjoy Christmas as best they can. Take a break and have a rest. But come back rejuvenated for we will face significant challenges ahead, but if we are strong willed and determined we can develop the ideal of socialism in a new generation who may unite behind a red-green banner and both save the planet and humanity. That, at least, is my dream. As Rosa Luxemburg (citing Friedrich Engels) once said: “Bourgeois society stands at the crossroads, either transition to socialism or regression into barbarism.” That choice has never been starker. In 2021 let’s see if we can’t change course and avoid barbarism. In the meantime, I hope you enjoy Christmas and thank you for your continued support for this blog.

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Socialist reading: Please support the following socialist blogs

Charlotte Hughes https://thepoorsideof.life/

Rachael Swindon http://rachaelswindon.blogspot.com/

Jonathan Cooke https://www.jonathan-cook.net/blog/

And avoid the MSM and support these left wing sources instead:

The Canary https://www.thecanary.co/

Skwawkbox https://skwawkbox.org/

Counterfire  https://www.counterfire.org/

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