The Vanoculation of "Vanoc II" (1935)

From the December 1935 issue of the Socialist Standard

During the last few years I have regularly met “Vanoc II” in the columns of the Sunday Referee, and alternately have I experienced sensations, both pleasurable and painful, at his writings. My interest is aroused because “Vanoc” claims to be a Marxian and one who lays emphasis upon the principle of Marxian thought known as dialectical materialism. But meeting a fellow behind the screen of cold print is, generally speaking, totally different from meeting the same chap fully materialised in person. And so it came to pass that we met at a meeting convened by the Economic Recovery Association. “Vanoc II” and Mr. W. W. Craik, who at one time was a principal of the National Council of Labour Colleges, were the chief speakers at this meeting. The means of economic recovery was the subject upon which Craik was to speak, whilst that of the present Abyssinian war was to be taken by Vanoc. In the speeches which followed, some affinity was alleged between the two questions, hence were we treated to a fully-rounded “dialectical” process of political and economic phenomena.

In outlining the case for economic recovery, Mr. Craik briefly reviewed the world’s present economic situation and generally exposed many of the economic illusions of capital’s agents. Little objection could be taken to the speaker’s remarks up to this point, but in stating what he conceived to be the chief source of present-day troubles he successfully added to the world’s catalogue of economic illusions. The interest paid to the finance capitalist, the man or groups of people who get their living by loaning money to their fellow capitalists, says Mr. Craik, forms an overwhelming burden on economic and social life, and the heaviest blow in consequence falls upon the working class. Money loaned at gigantic rates of interest has to be borne by the workers whenever they purchase goods of any kind. Further unemployment is induced by the owners of money allowing their money to lie idle because of their not getting a rate of interest demanded by them. The chief task before us, therefore, is to obliterate the finance capitalist by imposing a demurrage charge upon all not directly used for productive purposes, and eliminate the people who merely live by interest alone. Therefore did Mr. W. W. Craik foul all that he had previously stood for in Marxian economic thought.

“Vanoc II” opened his speech by a declaration of his revolutionary “faith,” about which he said he wanted no misunderstanding, but pointed out that he, to some extent, agreed with Craik’s views on economic recovery in view of the fact that “half a loaf is better than none,” which, of course, is a remarkable position for a revolutionary to contemplate. Surely ”Vanoc” must have heard this self-same plea put. in by every social quack and reformer in the world. Nobody this side of a lunatic asylum would dispute that a half-loaf is better than none any more than they would that a quarter was better than none, or even a slice or the proverbial crust. The statement is confusionist and entirely irrelevant from the point of view of Socialist policy. The position is that we need Socialism, and the only means of our getting it is to educate and organise the working class to establish it.

Socialism cannot be brought into being by piecemeal methods any more than capitalism can be reformed out of its existence. If it were otherwise, what sense would there be in declaring oneself a revolutionary? The answer is none whatever, and ”Vanoc” has indicated as much in many of his writings. Until Socialism is accomplished, all the half-loaves are capitalist bread, given by capitalists for capitalist purposes, to permit their dominance to persist. To the workers, the supreme task of their liberation from capitalist control will exist despite all the half-loaves of the social reformers.

“Vanoc” holds that the rise of the finance capitalist lies at the roots of Fascism, and marked Mussolini’s rise to power. Fascism must be smashed, and for this purpose we are urged to join forces with the Conservatives or any political party. Of course, the whole business is bunkum and positively dangerous to the interests of the workers and Socialism. This was made perfectly plain to ”Vanoc” in the discussion which followed. I denied first, that the abolition of the finance capitalist would in any way improve the position of the workers and secondly that the present Italo-Abyssinian war is any concern of the world’s working class.

In the case of the finance capitalist ”Vanoc” and Craik were reminded of the working-class situation in the early part of the 19th century. ”Vanoc” has more than once made reference to that, and has made use of Engels’s work on ”The Condition of the Working Class in 1844.” The horrible conditions portrayed by Engels in this work will convey the devastating effects of capital on the workers at a time when the finance capitalist did not assume the same social significance as he now does.

It seemed strange to have to remind two men who claim to be adherents of Marx, and, unquestionably, both have given a considerable amount of attention to Marx’s writings, that the elementary teachings of Marx were contradictory of their position.

It is an old story, told and re-told by Socialists, that rent, interest, and profit are but different names given to express the various modes of capital’s operations. To the working class it is mainly a matter of academic interest only as to what becomes of the spoils of their exploitation; the important thing is the fact of exploitation.

Marx has made this fact as clear as crystal, and for the benefit of those who have neither the time nor the inclination to refer to his larger and more technical analysis in “Capital," we shall draw their attention to his small work entitled “Value, Price and Profit.” Here we find the following statements set out to indicate to the workers that the holy trinity of capital may divide and sub-divide the swag stolen from the workers as they will, but the position is their business, not ours.

Says Marx: 

  “Rent, Interest and Industrial profit are only different names for different parts of the surplus value of the commodity. . . .
   “For the labourer himself it is a matter of subordinate importance whether that surplus value, the result of his surplus labour, or unpaid labour, is altogether pocketed by the employing capitalist or whether the latter is obliged to pay portions of it under the name of rent and interest to third parties. Suppose the employing capitalist to use only his own capital and to be his own landlord, then the whole surplus value would go into his pocket."

So much, therefore, about our finance capitalists. Socialists want to remove these as part of the entire capitalist system, and nothing is to be gained by our merely concentrating oftr attention on one aspect of capitalism alone.

And now about Mussolini and Fascism. "Vanoc” would have us engage in another bloodbath in the hopeless task of smashing Fascism. Why? Because, says "Vanoc," Socialism is a thousand times more difficult of attainment where Fascism rules. Yet, significantly enough, he holds that Hitler’s Germany is a far greater menace than Fascist Italy. Then what is to be done? First smash Fascism, then Hitler Germany, and we must suppose that the decks will then be clear for action towards Socialism, that is if nothing crops up meanwhile to again urgently require attention.

The scheme is all so simple and would be delightfully good if it weren’t so bad. It always seems to be taken for granted by people who argue in this way that the thing to do is to clear away one or more of the greater anomalies of capitalism and the rest of the task towards Socialism is easy. But all the facts are against the assumption. “Vanoc” was reminded of the position in 1914, which he said he remembered very well, and the cry of the labour leaders of this country on that occasion. Then, the Kaiser was the villain of the piece, he was to be beaten because he and his clique were a standing menace to every democratic idea in the world, and Socialism would be impossible if they had gained a victory. So the Kaiser went, and the workers came back to face their real enemies at home.

Then Hitler came in Germany as Mussolini had arrived in Italy. All over the world the struggle of the workers went on as before the war of 1914.

The defeat of the Kaiser had meant nothing to those who have nothing but their labour power to sell for a living. The same thing will happen again if Mussolini and Hitler are dislodged from power unless in the meantime the workers will awaken to their class interests.

When this was pointed out to Craik and “Vanoc” the inevitable followed—the usual stock-in-trade attacks on the S.P.G.B. We were labelled “idealists" and were called mechanists and, let us breathe it softly, we are anti-dialectical. To such strange uses is the dialectical principle in Marxian philosophy often put that the phrase dialectical should read diabolical. It was not surprising to hear “Vanoc” declare "logic to be a poor guide,” which, of course, is perfectly true if one will insist upon reaching conclusions based upon premises like “the flowers that bloom in the spring,” that ”have nothing to do with the case.”

To prove that we were mechanists who refused to differentiate, Mr. Craik, supported by “ Vanoc," fired a question to us in the middle of his reply, namely, would we not rather live in this country than in Germany?—surely a real teaser. We' replied that we preferred to work for £4 a week in Hackney rather than £3 in Tooting, so what could they make of that. The argument on the difference between capitalist countries is sheer moonshine. Not that we deny the differences, these certainly exist all right, but they do not affect the main task of the workers, which is to remove the capitalist class from control of the means of life. And we are not under the impression that this can be accomplished in one fell swoop, as Craik suggested. The preparatory work of education and organisation is all too necessary for us to labour under so great a delusion.

If being anti-dialectical means that we refuse to square the circle of political compromise and anti- Socialist activity, we must plead guilty to the soft impeachment.

The Marxian dialectic is an exceedingly useful tool of thought when in the possession of those who desire and know the correct road to Socialism, but to those who can’t or won’t see, there is nothing but the dialectical “unity of opposites” to lead them into the opposite camp of sound Socialist thought and action. If “Vanoc II” continues in his dialectical whirligigs and fails to grasp our case he certainly will fulfil the “law of contradiction” and find himself classified by rising working class Socialist intelligence as “Vanoc II,” who also ran.

Robert Reynolds

50 Years Ago: Objections (1962)

The 50 Years Ago column from the November 1962 issue of the Socialist Standard

Two Objections to Socialism —
The avowed opponent of the Socialist movement takes up one of two positions of attack, each antagonistic to the other.

One brand of “anti” informs us, with horror, that Socialism means slavery and vile servitude; that the abolition of capitalism will involve the establishment of prostitution and horrors the like of which capitalism never knew. The other variety tells us that “Socialism is a grand ideal —far too good to be true.” They explain that for Socialism to "work" we have all got to be as heavenly as angels, and they point in despair to the touch of “the old Adam” which they discern in all human kind.

Each type has its cause, and, like most other evils, its cure also. The first is the result of the cast-iron “State capitalism" preached by the Fabian tribe under the name of Socialism, while the second is due to the prevalence of the disease misnamed “Christian Socialism."

*

The “Socialism means slavery” merchant is easily disposed of, for no matter how vivid his imagination may be, he cannot discover one evil which is not found to be rampant in some form under capitalism.

Neither can he show how such evils will be increased by the advent of Socialism, which means to substitute organised social production and social enjoyment for the present chaotic “social” production and private ownership of the wealth produced. That slavery will be more intense under a system of state capitalism is for the advocate of nationalisation to deny, and has no concern for the Socialist.

From the November 1912 Socialist Standard.

A Woman's Place? (1998)

TV Review from the February 1998 issue of the Socialist Standard

Last May saw the election to Westminster of over a hundred women Members of Parliament for the first time in British parliamentary history, trebling the previous total. The benches of the Commons— particularly the Labour benches, for that is the party the vast majority of the new women members represent—are no longer bedecked by the massed ranks of grey suits. There is now more than just a smattering of colour.

In a great many respects this is, of course, a good thing. That Parliament has not represented a wide variety of groups within society previously has been one of the factors undermining trust in Britain's supposedly democratic Institutions and procedures, a trust which has, in any case, always been somewhat fragile. Now it would seem, the House of Commons (if not the House of Lords) is more representative and therefore more democratic and worthy of respect.

Two programmes on BBC2 in January sought to pursue this theme. The first, Women At Westminster was an interesting meander through how the increased numbers of women in Parliament has affected the place, how they allegedly will affect it in future, and how Parliament In turn has affected the women themselves. Much of this concerned the facilities of the Palace of Westminster, an important enough concern to those affected directly but less so for everybody else.

The more compelling part of the programme was an analysis of how the culture of the Commons chamber itself is changing, for the better. It was alleged that there has been (and certainly will be in future) a decline in the "yah-boo" politics previously encouraged by a male dominated chamber. This has - most positively - been evidenced by new women members confronting the sexism of the older male MPs. Such sexism. at its worst, has involved sustained barracking and sexual intimidation of women MPs making their speeches, and has been typically directed at the massed ranks of new Labour women (though at some female Tory MPs too at times, as for instance recounted by Teresa Gorman in her book The Bastards). Unfortunately a number of the other instances of how women are allegedly changing the nature of the House were examples of wishful thinking or were trivial and superficial - like the claim that new women MPs asserted their independence from the stuffy conventions of the Commons when they clapped Tony Blair on his first appearance at Question Time (as clapping in the House is not allowed). This was a claim that was both entirely superficial - just like New Labour itself - and wrong too (ditto). Many new MPs clapped Betty Boothroyd on her election as the first woman Speaker in 1992 but soon learned not to do it again after a few quiet words from the Whips Office. History is likely to repeat itself.

We Begg to differ

BBC2s other effort on the new women MPs focused on Anne Begg, the Labour member for Aberdeen South who is not only a woman but disabled as well. In fact, Begg is the first MP to be allowed to sit on the floor of the House in her wheelchair. The difficulties engendered by her disability in a place like Westminster was brought across excellently in what was, in effect, a video diary of her first few months in the House. It was a programme which demonstrated that Anne Begg, like many of her new colleagues, is a very able and articulate woman. The tenacity she has shown in becoming the first ever wheelchair-bound MP has been tremendous. It was a programme which illustrated what, by and large, it was meant to illustrate, that having Anne Begg and all the other new women members in the Commons is indeed an advance, just as the election of ethnic minority MPs has been.

What was never mentioned is what all this is essentially a product of. It is a product of the shift away from feudal, archaic ideas of noblesse oblige, class and rank, and towards the meritocracy of capitalism. This is a meritocracy where "positive discrimination" is favoured for people who are disadvantaged "through no fault of their own" - women, ethnic minorities, the disabled, but where huge value judgments are still made about anybody else who may be disadvantaged—like the poor There is no special treatment for them, no closed shortlists to get them into Parliament or special sections in the Labour Party. They were the people who couldn't be bothered to do their exams at school, who don't want a job, or deliberately get pregnant so they can be given more benefits or a bigger council slum.

If you are of the view that there is nothing wrong with the system and that everyone but the "naturally disadvantaged" (or those clearly disadvantaged due to the persistence of outdated pre-capitalist ideas) is only disadvantaged because of their own indolence, then you end up like Anne Begg and most of the other new Labour women MPs. You end up voting to cut benefit from single mothers as nearly every single one of them did. If you can be persuaded of their indolence sufficiently, you could even end up voting to cut benefits to the disabled as well. After all, Anne Begg herself has demonstrated that the disabled can invariably do some work with sufficient "encouragement", so why should they be paid to sit at home lounging about on benefit?

It is armed with such thinking that the new women of New Labour aim to take the House of Commons by storm. Convinced - against all the accumulated evidence - that the promotion of "equal opportunities" within capitalism ensures a level playing-field, they go about their mean-spirited tasks with all the zeal of evangelist preachers. And just like evangelist preachers these are people who, underneath the rhetoric, represent a barely diluted danger to the working class and deserve the unremitting, principled opposition of socialists.

Dave Perrin

Election Notes. (1910)

From the February 1910 issue of the Socialist Standard

The meet important feature of the election of 1910 was the circulation of our Manifesto. It was the largest free distribution of literature we have yet undertaken, and Press notices from most unexpected quarters amply prove that it has found its way into many and far distant parts of the country. That we have succeeded in preventing some, at least, of the working class from being side-tracked into the sham fights of the masters is shown by the increasing number who, having gone to the poll, wrote SOCIALISM across their paper. The appearance of these intelligently "spoilt’" papers at Haggerston caused Mr. Herbert Burrows to look glum, while it told the astute politician something it would be well for Mr. Burrows and bis kind to endeavour to understand.

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Another feature, and that also a gratifying one, was the large number of meetings we were able to hold—these being attended, even in very bad weather, by large and attentive audiences. Where opponents took our platform they readily (and always favourably) contrasted our meetings with the political hooliganism of those of other parties.

Again, in heckling candidates and their supporters and in issuing challenges to debate, our comrades lost no opportunity for steady, serious educative propaganda, and have the satisfaction of winning all along the line.

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With the enemy it was different, however, and perhaps it falls to the Social-Democratic Party to provide the most illogical, as well as the most tragic, feature of the campaign. The former is found in their trying to work with the Liberals at Northampton (see front page) and in helping the Tories at Battersea while opposing both elsewhere, as at Burnley. The latter is found in their excuse for abject failure, when they say :

  It is useless to disguise the fact that we have lost. Moral victories do not count in this unequal game; unfortunately tactless blunders do: and we should have done much better in at least three of the seats contested if what we regard as distinct errors of judgment had not been committed at critical moments in the campaign. The hysterical desire of some of our comrades to correct the slightest inaccuracy on the part of a candidate or his Supporters is also a ridiculous but effective weapon in the enemy's hands. (Justice, 22.1.10. Italics ours.)

This, however, but serves to show that Mr. Hyndman was right when he described his followers as being “destitute of political aptitude." They are evidently likewise destitute of a knowledge of Socialist principles.

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The above is almost equalled by the "Independent" Labour Party in their attempt to explain away their candidate's defeat at East Bristol. Says the Labour Leader (28.1.10) : "Had the election taken place on the 15th instead of the 17th we could have won, but the intervention of Sunday permitted the Unionist gains to strengthen the electors’ adherence to their old party's traditions." As the Liberal majority over the “Labour" man was 4,549, it would seem that the 15 Unionist gains had frightened 4,549 Labour stalwarts! ! !

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In the deluge of "cold, calculated frigids" inseparable from a contest where the master class strive with each other for the votes of the working class, it is difficult to make a selection, but for sheer, unadulterated egotism and political mendacity the palm may fairly be given to Mr. Lloyd George. Angling for voles in Wales this gentleman declared : "The first thing I am going to do is this. I am going to cleanse the land of poverty and want." (Morning Leader, 18.1.10.) As a demagogue he has out-Hunnabled Hunnable, but to an intelligent audience his statement simply carried the essence of refined insult. 

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A feature of this election, showing the scarcely veiled contempt the Liberals have for their “Labour" allies, is seen in the return of Mr. Spencer L. Hughes for Stockport. This gentleman had previously entered the field to spoil the chances of Mr. P. Curran, a “Labour" man, at Jarrow bye-election (1907) and similarly at Bermondsey (1909) against Mr. Salter, another “Labour” man, and now as a reward (or as a gauge of his abilities) he is found a “safe seat" at Stockport, but — the irony of it — he had this time to run with a “Labour" man. When the result was known he declared : “My colleague and I kept 'Down with the Lords’ and 'Free Trade' to the front." Had Mr. Wardle of the Labour Party, the colleague in question, been anything more than a Liberal he would not have forgotten Jarrow and Bermondsey but would have resented association with this Liberal hack as an insult to organised Labour. Doubtless, however, four years environment "doing odd jobs in the Liberal workshop " has lowered (as Mr. Curran himself would say) the moral outlook of this Laboural M.P.

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“Motor cars lent by Lord Llangattock and Lady St. Heller conveyed five working-men voters from Raglan, Monmouthshire to Walthamstow, a distance of nearly 200 miles by road." (Evening News, 26.1.10.)

Comment it needless.

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Says Reynolds' Newspaper (16.1.10): “Seeing that statements have been made to the effect that Mr. W. Thorne is a Labour plutocrat, it is as well to give his salary as organising secretary of the Gasworkers Union, it is £3 a week. In Parliamentary allowances he has about another £3 a week. The problem is how it is done on the Money." Of course, the above sum is not all, but even at £6 a week the problem really is what the workers get for it; and there is little doubt that there are many even on the staff of Reynolds' who would willingly take the job on at a lower figure, to say nothing of many of the unemployed who would make a much better job of it at half the price.

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Our Tottenham comrades are to be congratulated on having so far cornered Mr. P. Alden, M.P. as to get him to accept a challenge to debate publicly the claims of the Liberal Party to the confidence of the workers. More particularly so as in his constituency there are two branches of the Independent Labour Party and these are severely split over the support given by their members to this gentleman — who is ready to defend the Liberal Party in debate against a Socialist.

Alex Anderson

Justice for the Miners (1935)

From the December 1935 issue of the Socialist Standard

Outstanding among the election results, admittedly disappointing in the main to the leaders of the Labour Party, are those of the mining areas, particularly those of the South Yorks, field, which embraces North Notts, and North-East Derbyshire. In spite of expressions of sympathy with the miners on the part of the Government’s nominees (some of whom went down pits and came back converted to the justice of the present demand for an extra 2s. per day), the Labour members’ majorities in these constituencies range from ten to thirty thousand. .One outstanding exception, the Bassetlaw seat was won from the Government candidate, Malcolm MacDonald, by only a small margin. He considered he would have held it but for a local strike.

For months past such strikes have expressed the ferment in this area, and the overwhelming majorities for strike action from every pit in the district supply eloquent testimony to the fact, that, if the four years of National Government has resulted in improved conditions, the miners have not noticed it. In face of this the weak-kneed attitude of the miners' leaders calls for some comment.

Before taking the ballot they openly advertised their readiness to compromise their demands and suspend the vote if the owners would negotiate on national lines. As was only to be expected, their offer was treated with lofty aloofness. Their next move was to approach the Government with a request that the provisions of the Coal Mines Act, 1930, for the setting up of selling agencies, should be applied. The Government’s reply was to request the coalowners to set them up by July 1st next.

The advantages of these agencies to the miners must remain a mystery. They (the miners) do not sell coal, but labour-power, and they would need to be childish indeed to assume that any reorganisation of the distributive side of the coal industry is to be undertaken for their special benefit. Capitalists who invest money in distributive undertakings accept the “risks" which such enterprises involve in order to gain a proportionate share of the gross profit, and if the colliery proprietors decide to invade this sphere it will be for the purpose of enriching themselves.

The miners’ only hope of gaining their immediate demands is in being better organised in their trade unions. Even existing wage-rates are difficult to maintain in the face of the ever-increasing encroachment of the machine, and the resulting intensification of the competition for jobs. Under such circumstances delay favours the masters. They can afford to wait till next summer, and beyond. If action is to benefit the miners it must be taken swiftly. The existing epidemic of local struggles is exhausting funds to very little purpose. A month will, in any case, probably decide the issue, and the most the miners can hope for is some slight check to the downward tendency in their condition.

Even complete victory in securing the present demand cannot alter the general line of development. So far from putting a stop to the introduction of machinery it will provide an added incentive.

This being the situation, nothing is more ridiculous than for the miners' leaders to declare, as several of them have done quite recently, that they “want justice, not sympathy." One can readily understand the barrenness of mere sympathy to men and women in the plight of the miners and their wives; but will "justice" prove more fertile?

Obviously it is not legal justice that is invoked. From the standpoint of the law, all contracts or bargains are just which are arrived at mutually and voluntarily, providing nothing criminal or “contrary to public policy" is involved. The law knows nothing of wage-slavery. In its eyes the worker is a free citizen voluntarily entering into a contract with his employer. He surrenders his ability to work in exchange for a wage, and the law will, if needed, enforce the payment of the wage.

Few workers know better than the miners, however, that collective agreements, signed, sealed and delivered by parties representing both sides are more honoured in the breach than in the observance, precisely because of the ever-present fear of the sack.

Perhaps, then, it is to moral justice that the Miners' Federation officials refer. If so, we invite them to tell us where they draw the line. Is an extra 2s. per day their conception of a "just" wage? On what is this notion of a just wage founded? Between the minimum limit, below which the miners cannot exist and work, and the total wealth produced by their efforts there is a very considerable difference. Out of this the colliery proprietors draw their profits, landowners their royalties, and coal-dealers and merchants get a living. These people enjoy comfort, while the miners endure misery. We can, however, rest assured that every one of these sections will resist an attack upon its income, and they will attempt to explain their resistance by saying that the attack is “ unjust.” This, quite irrespective of whether the miners demand an extra 2s. per day, 2s. 3d., or half-a-crown. The cry for justice is, therefore, as futile as the appeal for sympathy.

The miners, in common with the rest of the working class, need to rid their minds of self-deluding cant. Let them not imagine that they can delude their masters. In common with the rest of the workers, they have a commodity to sell, to wit, their power to produce wealth. So long as capitalism exists they are under the necessity of struggling for the best possible price they can get. This applies whether they are inside or outside of trade unions. In this struggle mutual sympathy and support are imperative. The struggle, however, cannot end here.

Labour leaders, political and industrial, are busy trying to persuade us that the essence of capitalism is competition, and that if only industries can be controlled by national boards, paying interest on bonds to the owners, all will be well. Apart, however, from the difficulty of establishing national control of industries depending upon international conditions for their existence, this leaves the antagonism between the classes untouched. If royalties and profits are “unjust" when appropriated privately, by what miracle do they become “just" when the Government guarantees them, which is what the Labour Party proposes should be done?

The capitalist class cannot be got rid of by any scheme of nationalisation. Their existence is based upon their ownership of the national resources and the instruments fashioned by the working class for their utilisation. These means and instruments must be made the common property of the whole people, irrespective of race or sex.

The effort to establish such a system will involve the conscious co-operation of the workers of the world. Only when they are successful will they free themselves from the need to sell their energy to masters, and become able to produce freely for the common good.

In the meantime every effort at compromise on the part of the workers' leaders weakens the workers' resistance, and delivers them still more into the hands of their enemies—the master class. Unremitting hostility to those enemies on political and industrial field alike is the only policy consistent with a clear understanding of the situation. Justice as a watchword must be replaced by emancipation.

Eric Boden

50 Years Ago: Lloyd George on his "War to End War" (1987)

The 50 Years Ago column from the January 1987 issue of the Socialist Standard

  “The whole surface of the ground consisted of nothing but a series of overlapping shell craters, half full of yellow, slimy water. Through falling into these ponds hundreds upon hundreds of unwounded men lost their lives by drowning. 

"Hundreds of thousands of British troops fought through the slough . . .  slept in mud-holes. When they squelched along, they were shot down into the slush; if wounded they were drowned in the slime; but the survivors still crept and dragged onward for 4 months, with their rifles choked with Flemish ooze . . . A tragedy of heroic endurance enacted in mud, and the British Press rang with praises of . . . the Commander-in-Chief!" 

A "highly placed officer from H.Q." on his first visit to the battle front burst into tears and cried; "Good God. did we really send men to fight in that?" — Lloyd George, War Memoirs, pp. 2208-11.

[From an article "What newspapers did not tell", Socialist Standard. January 1937.]

Promises (1987)

From the January 1987 issue of the Socialist Standard

"Anyone's better than that bloody woman", is a phrase that is often heard. It will be used a lot more in the coming months with the prospect of a general election, where Thatcher's Conservative party will be seeking another five-year term to run British capitalism. The argument behind the disgust is that the Tories are largely responsible for the many problems people in this country are facing, and that, despite the many inadequacies of Labour and the Alliance, anything has to be an improvement on Thatcher.

All shades of political opinion will be asking people to cast negative' votes. Most of the so-called left-wing parties will be urging you to vote Labour — supposedly the mass party of the working-class' — despite the fact that they spend much of their time criticising the Labour Party. Some people in the Communist Party will call for a broad anti-Thatcher alliance, seeing Thatcherism as a new, worse form of Tory rule. The tactical voters, people who vote for someone they disagree with to keep out someone they dislike even more, will be out in force.

The argument works the other way as well. Thatcher and Tebbit will be issuing stern warnings about how the opposition will ruin the economy and leave the nation defenceless. Disillusioned Tory voters will be warned not to vote for the Alliance and let Labour in by the back door. The scare stories the government put out will be designed to focus attention away from their own numerous shortcomings.

Life for most people in the last seven-and-a-half years of Conservative rule has certainly been no bed of roses. Before she was elected in 1979. Thatcher made a big deal about the doubling of unemployment under the last Labour government. Pictures were distributed of a long queue outside a dole office with the caption. "Labour Isn't Working". The bitter irony is that unemployment hasn't doubled under the Tories — it's trebled. The frustration and anger people feel at the humiliation of the dole queue can only intensify when the government apparently shows no concern for their plight. The poverty of existing on a giro can only feel worse when ministers show righteous indignation at the supposed large number of social security scroungers.

More recently the Tories have been worried that their uncaring image may be losing them votes. Lord Young, the (un)employment secretary, has been told to make the right kind of noises about caring, and to present the various cheap labour schemes, like YTS. as being indicative of the government's concern. This real social security scrounger is obviously in a position and of the right social background to sympathise with someone getting £30 a week supplementary benefit.

The Thatcher government has made cuts in health and education and the number of new houses being built has been drastically reduced, despite the fact that thousands of people are homeless and thousands of building workers are unemployed. In view of the poverty workers endure, these cuts seem callous, although welfare can never eliminate the basic impoverishment of working-class life in capitalism

The Tories have passed several laws designed to weaken the trade unions. They have made it harder for workers to go on strike, and made the unions open to court action if they don't follow certain procedures for striking. They have also 'toughened up' the law and eroded many of the civil liberties that people 'enjoyed'.

Thatcher's 'Iron Lady' image, her projection as a strong leader, also worries many people, who fear her enthusiasm for nuclear weapons. Her support for the American bombing of Libya last year plus the Falklands War makes her seem a dangerous warmonger. She and her government are certainly maintaining the long tradition of conservatism by endorsing the slaughter of millions of workers in the interests of British capitalism.

The Conservatives have shown once again that they stand for the dominance of the privileged few, the small number of people who effectively own and control this country. It may seem tempting to vote for some other party just to get them out — until you consider the alternatives.

The main alternative is the Labour Party. Many people still see them as the party of the working people, a party out for a fairer society which will tackle the problems mentioned above. A brief look at what the Labour Party does when it is in power shows that they are no different to the Tories.

The Labour Party makes a great noise about the evils of unemployment and how it is going to get people back to work. At the 1983 election they claimed that they would cut the dole queues to under a million in five years. However, this was seen to be too wild and extravagant, so they now claim they will reduce unemployment by one million in two years. However, every previous Labour government has left office with a higher level of unemployment than it faced when it entered office. The claim that Labour is the party to tackle unemployment is a lie. The level may rise or fall but it is beyond the power of any government to affect it significantly.

Despite its current opposition to the cuts in services the last Labour government also introduced drastic cuts in the health and social services and in education. It was also willing to impose wage restraint and break strikes, hardly the actions of a party anxious to redistribute wealth and create a fairer society. Its current concern with tackling poverty can also be seen for the lie that it is.

It is important to contrast what Labour (or any other party) say when they are in opposition, hunting for votes, and when they are in power, having to act in the only way they can. in the interests of capital. The most obnoxious and deadly contradiction between what Labour says and does is in the sphere of war and peace.

The Labour Party claims that it is the party of peace, and has promised to get rid of nuclear weapons and rely on conventional forces. These so-called conventional weapons have been used in wars where millions have been killed, wars which the Labour Party supported. They are prepared, just like the Tories, to use armed might to protect the interests of capitalism, the usual reason why wars are fought.

Apart from the rhetoric there is no real difference between Labour and the Tories. The argument that you should vote for one rather than the other is untenable. The Liberal/SDP alliance claim to be a real alternative, or at least they try to present themselves as a nice bunch of people, much more decent than the rotten old parties. The leaders of the SDP were senior ministers in the last Labour government. a regime they only now find convenient to criticise. Their objection to the other parties cannot be very deeply felt as they are continually going on about the conditions necessary for entering into a coalition with them in a 'hung' parliament (where there is no overall majority, not the more attractive meaning).

The Liberals can present themselves as political virgins, uncorrupted by power. They have not been in office since the days when Lloyd George was Prime Minister and thousands of troops were being sent to their deaths in the trenches of World War One. From 1977-79 they kept the last Labour government in power. David Steel said they were doing it to prevent the worst excesses of Labour. These excesses obviously did not include the wage cuts imposed and the strikes broken by troops in this period.

Whether the politicians seeking your votes are really committed to changing things for the better, or whether they are just power-hungry careerists is really irrelevant. Once they get into power they have to administer the system in the only way it can be run — against the interests of the vast majority, the working-class. Capitalism is a system of society where the means of life are owned by a small minority, and the majority of people have to work for them in return for a wage or a salary. This basic class division means that workers have only a limited access to society's wealth, that their needs must constantly be denied in the interests of profit.

Attempts to work within the system to make things fairer, to reform away the problems people have, ignore this harsh reality. A society based on the exploitation of the majority can never work in the interests of that majority, no matter how caring or well-meaning the reformers might be. Unemployment, poverty, bad housing and all these other problems are inevitable in this system.

The fact that the main parties work within these limitations results in the narrow, limited political debate that currently prevails. So we are confronted with arguments about the level of unemployment, but not why — in a world of potential abundance — people are poor as a result of class division; and arguments about how best to defend a country, not why workers should be prepared to lay down their lives defending their masters' interests.

The only real alternative is the Socialist alternative, a world of common ownership and democratic control, where everything on and in the earth is used solely to satisfy human needs, where people take control of their own lives. Arguments about 'doing something now', about choosing the lesser of the evils on offer, serve only to delay the achievement of Socialism, to prolong the life of this miserable society.

To achieve Socialism, workers must understand and desire it. and reject the insulting nonsense put out by these other parties. We must decide to work and vote for something really worth having, and not get lost in the muddy waters of capitalist politics, sifting through the shit for something worth voting for. At the next election, you will, as always, be faced with two alternatives: voting for Capitalism or Socialism. Make your choice!

Ian Ratcliffe

Out of the mouths of . . . (1987)

From the January 1987 issue of the Socialist Standard

  Doesn't it all begin to seem a little silly One moment these two great nations are deadly enemies, then they are all pally . . . and all the time the media pour out endless pictures of two tired old men in heavy overcoats. How many of these summits have there been now? Has there been any change in the insane level of armaments . . .  is the world a safer place to live in because of these summits?
   It is to the mutual benefit of both America and Russia to make sure that nothing changes. No one asked me if I wanted to be represented by dear old Ron. . . .  leaders of the free world' and 'socialist world'. As if they were really in any kind of conflict. Basically they need each other. So after a few days of Ronnie and Mikhail shaking hands and kissing each other on the cheeks they send home a few of the spies that they both know exist in order to stop the ice melting completely. They have to keep the game going. There are too many forces on both sides with powerful vested interests in ensuring that everything remains the same. . . .
  powerful Californian scientists and industrialists who are going to make sure that nothing really changes and no real agreement is reached. That is where real power is.
   History will see the two great power blocks coming closer and closer together to squeeze the rest of the world over dwindling economic resources. That is the true logic of the situation and the rest is just a game.

You could be excused for thinking that these are extracts from a letter to the Socialist Standard. In fact they are taken from "Summit for Nothing ", the editorial of About Town (10 November 1986), one of the weeklies distributed free at bus stops and tube stations. Their content consists of approximately 90 per cent job advertisements, with the remaining pages filled with fashion and film reviews, job features and What's On.

Usually I don't even bother to open the paper, so you can imagine my surprise on reading this evidence for our contention that socialist ideas will evolve out of the capitalist environment. Mind you, "evolve" is the relevant word because, after such a promising start, the end of the article shows an incomplete understanding of the workings of the system. The final sentence "Next time they play at having a summit, I just hope they do it in private" shows that Robert Elms objection is to the play-acting of the figureheads rather than a wish to do away with the system of whose economic basis he is aware.

Eva Goodman

Running Commentary: Beating the wife (1987)

The Running Commentary column from the January 1987 issue of the Socialist Standard

Beating the wife

It seems that domestic violence or wife beating is to become a priority concern for the Metropolitan Police. Hitherto they have not been noted for their sympathy towards the plight of women who approach them because they are being abused by their husbands. Generally they prefer "not to get involved" in disputes involving domestic violence — tacit endorsement, in fact, of the sanctity of the family and a husband's "right" to do what he likes with "his property" especially when the wife has, in the judgement of the police, contributed to the incident by causing aggravation to her husband through nagging.

Now there are demands for a change in the law to enable the police to bring prosecutions against husbands who beat up their wives. Up till now the woman herself had to prosecute the husband and, understandably, many women were reluctant or even scared to press charges. So is the new attitude on the part of the Met. an indication of a new, more enlightened attitude towards women?

Not if these remarks by Walter Easey, police advisor to the Association of London Labour Authorities, are anything to go by. He said: “It has been a puzzle why there has not been more movement in the past. Wife battering is often an indicator of serious problems with drinking or drugs". In other words it fits into an overall pattern of deviant behaviour which might be of more interest to the police than wife beating. But wife beating is also an indication of serious social and sexual problems that are not confined to a small minority of deviants but are typical of a sick society. And neither changes in the law and policing policy, nor more prosecutions against men who beat up their wives will cure it.

Look at it this way, Sid

As is well known to everyone who cooks on a gas stove, privatisation is now the name of the game. Another might be How to Win The Next Election. For the Tories are obviously hoping that every applicant for shares in concerns like British Gas will believe the publicity which tells them that they can be a capitalist for £150. The Tories hope that this will be enough to so change their ideas about class society that they will stop voting for capitalism to be run by the Labour Party and start voting for it to be run by the Tories.

Of course if the shares' price goes up anyone who has bought them will be able to make some profit by selling them quickly; whatever they make will probably come in handy to pay the next gas bill or to clear up some other debt. That is how the working class live. On the other hand investment — the sinking of capital into an industry, buying land, materials, machinery, buildings, labour power in order to make profit — is the exclusive function of the capitalist class. They monopolise the means of wealth production and distribution and their position allows them to exploit the workers whose labour power they buy.

The workers live by the sale of their labour power and their position is unchanged by temporary and insignificant variations in their income. Having money in the bank, winning a few pounds in the betting shop, selling some shares for more than they cost, all help to stretch the pay packet for a few workers but do not lessen their reliance on it. None of this changes how we get our living, our class position under capitalism, where our economic interests lie. It does not. in other words, remove the need to get up in the morning and go to work, to submit ourselves to the exploitation process.

Meanwhile, it is worth asking one important, but neglected, question. British Gas was a nationalised concern and we have always been told that nationalisation was public ownership — ownership by us. How then can we buy something which we already own? The answer is simple and also neglected. We didn't own it in the first place. Nationalisation. with its claim to give us all a stake in industry, was as much a confidence trick as privatisation is now.

Surely even Sid is not so daft that he can't see that?

Crime going up

Although its practitioners never produce any figures of profit or loss, crime is still, amid the recession, a growth industry. For England and Wales, 1985 was a boom year for crime: more offences were committed than ever before. The figure recorded by the police — 3.6 million offences — was a three per cent rise on 1984.

Some of the biggest increase was in sexual offences, statistics for which are notoriously prey to subjective influences. Rape, for example, went up by 29 per cent but this did not mean that nearly a third more women were being raped in 1985, rather that some changes in police practice resulted in more of the cases which were reported to them being recorded as rape. (What did these "changes" amount to? Presumably some women once came to the police station after being raped only to find the incident regarded as something less horrible).

The same might be said for some of the figures for violence against the person, some people, in some circumstances, would not dream of going to the police after being assaulted whereas other people would; all manner of factors can influence the decision either way.

But whatever allowance we make, however the statistics are weighted, it seems clear that the social disfigurement which is crime continues to flourish. This is happening after more than seven years of a Tory government who assured us. when they came back to power in 1979, that they had the answer to the problem. It was, apparently, a matter of more police — higher pay for them — and tougher punishment for the criminals — short, sharp shocks for the youngsters, longer stretches behind bars for the adults. Well there are more police but they are clearing up proportionately less crime now than when the Tories came to power — 35 per cent in 1985 as against 42 per cent in 1978.

Is there, then, no answer to crime? (we are referring, of course, to the illegal sort, not the offences which the capitalist system constantly commits on the majority of the human race and which are legally sanctioned as essential to this society's stability). Reformers, including those who want hanging and flogging, treat the problem in isolation from the social situation which gives rise to it. This is a society of private property and property is not just possession: it is also the denial of possession to others who, in some circumstances, will try to penetrate that denial through force or subterfuge. Poverty and all it means — stress, hunger, slums, a sub-standard existence — breeds frustration, and relief is often seen in terms of "get-rich-quick". The worker on the factory production line dreams of winning the pools; the criminal of the big, once-for-all, haul.

Whatever the Tories, or any government, may do will not affect the cause of crime. For that we must look a long way beyond the promises, if we are to have a society of harmony, a world safe to be alive in.

The Only Way. (1921)

From the January 1921 issue of the Socialist Standard

A deputation of a few London mayors headed a procession of unemployed to Downing Street, with the object of interviewing the Welsh wizard, to whom they look to solve the unemployed problem.

Somehow, the futility of it did not penetrate the skulls of even the mayors! If Lloyd George or the Cabinet were to solve the question, there would ho no further need for either him or his fellow agents.

Workers, you must realise that unemployment is a necessary prop to the capitalist system; therefore to abolish the evil of “out of work” it is necessary to overthrow the cause of its existence—it cannot be done otherwise.

The members of the Socialist Party know the futility of processions, demonstrations, and other such means the Workers employ. They also know that the political power which the working class give the master class by their votes, enables the latter to confront the former with armed force, and until the control of that armed force is wrested from the capitalists the unemployed and the working class as a whole might as well try punching a brick wall.

The only way in which the emancipation of the working class can be achieved is by studying the Socialist position, organising class-consciously inside the Socialist Party with the object of overthrowing the capitalist system. There is NO other way, and it cannot too often be re-iterated.

Don’t waste time running your heads against police batons: the cost of repairing a cracked skull would be sufficient to purchase all the literature necessary for your enlightenment.

W. A. G.

The Waste of War (1918)

From the February 1918 issue of the Socialist Standard

A point often overlooked by the man-in-the-street is the connection of war with waste. A list of figures covering the cost of the war day by day conveys little to the layman's mind. Parliamentarians give you these statistics freely, that you may be beguiled into sacrificing your mite on the altar of War. Not that the combined savings of all the working class would maintain the war for a single day, but it tends to instil into their minds the illusion that they are doing something for "their country.”

War is absolute waste of men, material, and brain power. The question is not concerned with any supposed “rights.” The fact is—just allow this point to sink into your mind—war is absolute waste.

Since August 1914 practically all advances in science have been in connection with war. Eminent men have devoted their faculties to the solving of the problem of defeating the submarine menace. Others have given their time and energies to the production of new chemical compounds for the greater slaughter of the “enemy.” Inventors concentrate upon means of destruction. A huge man-of-war, involving the labour of thousands of men and women for many months, is sunk in a few minutes. A gun of large calibre, again the product of months of toil, reaches the slaughter-ground, and a shell from the “enemy” reduces it to scrap-iron. And so with all the material produced for war.

And then the men. Men covering every branch of science have been sacrificed. Torn from their laboratories and studies, they have been thrown into the Army like so much meat a sausage machine. And in addition the finest men of half the world, the very flower of every advanced race under the sun, are flung like so much garbage into the pit, from which few indeed will come out as sound in mind and body as they were when their masters claimed them to be wasted in the war for commercial supremacy.

Only by one method can you eliminate this tragic waste. That method is by realising your position as wage-slaves and emancipating yourselves therefrom. The science of Socialism will teach you how to do this. Read our literature. Ask us questions on any point you do not agree with or do not understand. We are ever willing, nay, eager, to assist our fellow workers--men and women—along the road to liberty.

Harry Grattan

Strikes Better than Arbitration (1968)

Party News from the December 1968 issue of the Socialist Standard

A member of the Socialist Party of New Zealand, our comrade Ron Everson, sends us the following report on recent industrial unrest in that country:

On 17 June for the first time in twenty-seven years the Arbitration Court refused a general wage order application. The unions had sought increases of up to 7.6 per cent to compensate for cost-of-living increases following devaluation and the imposition of restrictive economic measures by the government.

The decision amazed even some employers who were prepared to give their workers a five per cent increase and some had already adjusted their prices in anticipation. The decision of course roused the ire of the workers. Widespread interest was taken in trade union activities; erstwhile apathetic union members attended work stop meetings and demonstrations. On the day of the State opening of parliament on 26 June trade unionists staged a demonstration. They were supported by students with placards pledging support for the workers and demanding bigger bursaries, by the Campaign Against Rising Prices, the Maori organisation for Human Rights and the CND. The demonstrators forced an unprecedented change in the State opening of parliament by Governor General Sir Arthur Porritt. Never before had a Governor General entered parliament for the State opening other than by the main entrance. On this occasion poor Sir Arthur had to sneak in by a side door.

Demands were made for the abolition of the Arbitration Court. Delegates to the Federation of Labour conference were in favour of ignoring the Court. It seems this, the strikes and industrial unrest that followed frightened the employers into agreeing to go back to the Court for a rehearing. As a result the Court made a wage order of a five per cent increase restricted to the first $40 earned by men, the first $30 by women and the first $25 by junior workers. Whether the nil order was the outcome of the inexperience of the new Judge of the Court, Blair, or the employers’ contempt for the workers’ will to fight is anyone’s guess.

However, the outcome was an illustration of the passage in the Socialist Party of Great Britain’s pamphlet Questions of the Day:

   “In practice arbitration bodies exist for the purpose of preventing industrial disputes from taking the form of stoppages of work, and their awards on wage claims are bound to be influenced by the attitude of the workers. If workers were to abandon all idea of strikes the employers and the arbitration bodies alike would reduce still further the amounts they were prepared to offer. The strike remains the workers' indispensable weapon".

Need we say that on the day of the march on parliament among the forest of banners there was not one advocating the “abolition of the wages system”. When workers in sufficient numbers reach that degree of understanding an effort to fob them off with a few miserable cents of a wage increase will only raise a laugh. It is a sad fact that now a few cents flung in their direction can take the fight out of workers.

While they lack knowledge of the nature of wages, and the wages system, they will be forced to engage in these never-ending struggles which merely maintain their subject position as wage-slaves.

Meanwhile the July issue of the New Zealand Building Worker,' official journal of the Carpenters and Related Trades’ Industrial Union of Workers, reprints our leaflet on devaluation (also an issue in New Zealand as the government there followed Britain), an article from this journal on the IWW and one from The Western Socialist on the materialist conception of history.

Ron Everson

Brewers & Preachers (1968)

From the December 1968 issue of the Socialist Standard

The pro-and anti-Sunday drinking referendum that has recently taken place in Wales has been fought, on the one hand, under the guise of democracy and the freedom of the individual and. on the other, as a struggle to maintain a tradition in the face of a decline in standards and morals. One was an attempt by the brewers and those who, consciously or otherwise, supported them to change existing social habits, and the other an attempt by religious organisations (mainly Nonconformist) to maintain a way of life that has been peculiar to Wales for generations.

The sponsors of Sunday opening were without doubt headed by the brewery interests and other allied organisations. One found strange members in their camp — even religious people who claim to be supporters not only because of the 'freedom’ involved but because they could not find any scriptural command in the list of “Thou Shalt Nots" which was anti-drink. The Rev. Cannon R. Williams of Haverford West (the Brewers’ Chaplain) was a case in point. The public hoarding adverts and nation-wide door-to-door distribution of pamphlets must have cost the brewers a fortune — a fortune they hope to recoup in the years ahead.

Another reverend spokesman stated in the Western Mail that “the nation that loses its Sunday loses its soul”. But it is only fair to say that other, non-religious organisation have added their weight against the Sunday extension, for instance. National Life-Line (a movement similar to the Good Samaritans though primarily confined to industry) stated:

  Alcoholism is costing industry £75 millions annually . . . 250,000 men failed to turn up for work because of that ‘Monday morning feeling’.

Well, what is to the advantage of the brewing industy can be to the disadvantage of other industrialists—that’s capitalism.

It is indeed a comment on democracy in Britain that it grants ten minutes broadcasting time to the “Communist” Party, five minutes to the Welsh Nationalists and none whatsoever to the Socialist Party of Great Britain in Wales, but can spend a huge sum of money to build up a national campaign, including television and sound broadcasts, on the benefits of a Sunday pint of beer.

W. Brain

Science and Race (1968)

Book Review from the December 1968 issue of the Socialist Standard

Science and the Concept of Race, Margaret Mead, Theodosius Dobzhansky, Ethel Tohach, Robert E. Light. Editors. (Columbia University Press, $6.50)

About one third of this book is for the specialist; the remainder an absorbing discussion of one of society’s big problems. Not a one-sided discussion, either; Dwight J. Ingle writes

    . . . both types of racists seek to place individuals in schools, jobs, and housing on the basis of racial identity rather than of abilities, interests, drives, and behavioral standard.

Both types of racists! But even this determined bending over backwards does no more than suggest that there might be the very tiniest mouse of evidence in favour of racism—and that after all the mountains of prejudice which have been probed to find it.

Gloria Marshall makes the crucial point, that racial classification is usually taken as the starting point for an investigation of that very classification. In other words, assume that a Negro is different and then look into his differences. In other words, a case of heads I win and tails you lose.


The pity of it is that such knowledge, such discussion, does not penetrate into the council estates and the suburbs, where racism flourishes in so many forms. This can be fought only with knowledge; Science and the Concept of Race, with its up-to- date review of scientific thinking on the subject, is a sound introduction for anyone wanting to understand and attack this most pernicious of theories. It also has a comprehensive list of references for further study.

Ivan

Marxism and Communism (1968)

Book Review from the December 1968 issue of the Socialist Standard

Marxism and Communism by Katharine Savage (Bodley Head 25s.)

Katharine Savage specialises in books for young people. Her latest is a skilfil mixture of ignorance and confusion and will probably sell very well.

John Crump