Letter: [Also] Not amused (1979)

Letter to the Editors from the November 1979 issue of the Socialist Standard

[Also] Not amused

I am writing because I take very strong exception to an article in the August issue of your party journal, “We Are Not Amused” by SC. It is anti-working-class.

If SC wants to announce that entertainment is commercially based: that isn’t news. But he presents this profound information in the form of one long sneer at the working class. Anything they enjoy is mindless and only “someone else’s values” pushed at them by the capitalists. “Some kid themselves that they’re cultured”—of course, the workers are incapable of any culture of their own!

I’ve read and heard all this before, from middle-class “intellectuals” of whom SC obviously thinks he is one. He even puts in “bloody” and “bum” to show he knows how to talk down to ignorant workers who (between visiting strip clubs and watching “Crossroads”) might read the Socialist Standard.

“Someone else’s values”? Sorry, but I can’t see the difference between ITV’s and SC’s.

However, my question is; Are they endorsed by your party as the publishers of the Socialist Standard.

J Wolveridge 

London E1

Reply:

One task of the Socialist Standard is to expose the inherent contradictions of the capitalist system. Many articles deal with what capitalism is, why it cannot run in the interest of the working class and what it must be replaced by. We also spend a considerable amount of space exposing the means through which mystifying ideas are expounded, such as the political parties, the churches, the schools and the universities. The intention of the article, We Are Not Amused (August 1979), was to demonstrate not only that ‘entertainment is commercially based’, but that its “values are only put before a mass audience by courtesy of a class whose interest is hostile to yours, whose values will be hostile to yours”.

A number of commercial TV stations, theatres and newspapers are run at a loss and paid for from profits accumulated by capitalists from other industries. This occurs because the entertainment industry has valuable political, as well as simply commercial, advantages for its owners.

It is not necessary to be a “middle class intellectual” (whatever that may mean) to express the view that the working class does not possess a culture of its own. The ruling culture of any property society is that of the ruling class; The only meaningful culture for the subject class is that activity which leads to the erosion of the ruling ideology. Crossroads, The Two Ronnies and strip clubs do not constitute an independent working class culture. There can be anti-establishment entertainment (the article mentioned the satire programmes of the 1960s), but that is insufficient without a commitment to political action.

It is wrong to deduce from the article that jokes, art, TV serials, songs and dances will not exist in socialist society. The difference then will be that people will freely create these activities not buy and sell them.

On the matter of values, it is significant that ITV is currently involved in an expensive battle with its employees which largely relates to the control of programme output; we hold the view that the means of communication should be the common property of the people.

Editors.

Blogger's Note:

'J. Wolveridge' was Jim Wolveridge, who co-wrote the book Muvver Tongue with SPGB member, Robert Barltrop.