Halo Halo (2025)

The Halo Halo! column from the December 2025 issue of the Socialist Standard

Some names of Father Christmas/Santa Claus across the world: Finland: Joulupukki, ‘Yule Goat’; Russia: Ded Moroz, ‘Grandfather Frost’; Norway: Julenissen, ‘Christmas gnome’; Japan: Santa-san (Santa Kurōsu); China: Dun Che Lao Ren ‘Christmas old man’; Mongolia: (Övliin övgön), ‘Grandfather Winter’; Georgia: tovlis babua , ‘Grandfather Snow’; Armenia: Dzmer Papik ‘Winter Grandfather’.

A band produced a song in 1970 and sang, ‘teach your children well’. Should we presume that parents in the countries listed above taught their children that there was a Santa Claus, a Tooth Fairy and an Easter Bunny whilst knowing full well that these were all made up fictional beings?

What have the children living in these places got in common? Gift receiving obviously, but by the age of eight or so no longer believing that such persons, as they have been taught, actually exist. They may have been disabused of this belief by a peer who has sussed this out and wants to disillusion others for whatever motive. Once the deceit is discovered, and the knowledge that presents come from those who have to sell their labour power in order to afford them, then the hunt for gifts stored somewhere in the house before Christmas becomes likely. Admittedly, knowing about wage slavery and capitalist exploitation is likely to come a little later in life.

Knowing about Santa generally means that there is an unspoken agreement on the part of both children and parents to maintain the illusion. The fantasy that there is a being in the sky who monitors all behaviour at all times, known as god, usually takes youngsters longer to find out the truth.

Santa can be used to modify the behaviour of children: if you’re naughty Santa knows and he’ll cross you off his list to bring you nice presents. So behave! Compare that to the threat of gods who demand unconditional ‘love’ and ‘worship’ or else they will cast you into hell to suffer all its torments forever and ever.

Children may eventually come to the conclusion that this is just the reality of life and not blame parents for fibbing to them about Santa. But at what point do children come to realise that being taught that they are getting Yuletide presents because of a virgin birth that supposedly occurred two thousand years ago is also twaddle, baloney, humbug and tosh?

Do primary/junior schools still force the very young to wear tea towels on their head at Christmas and act out a meaningless scenario which they are too young to understand? Turning children against religion may be a positive factor from that event though when the resentment against getting a star part is compared to only being asked to be a sheep or a donkey.

Which is more harmful to teach susceptible young minds? A belief in a jolly bearded guy who can fly through the sky in a sled pulled by reindeers or the deception that there exists an insecure, controlling, vindictive being who demands constant idolisation and validation?

DC

Editorial: The Festive Season. (1908)

Editorial from the January 1908 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Festive Season.

The usual cant is now being uttered concerning the “festive season,” and the conventional phrases are on most people’s lips. To those with the wherewithal to purchase the good things of life it is possible to be merry and joyous, but to these Christmas is no exception to the rule. They can and do eat, drink and be merry, taking no thought of the morrow, even if it be that on the morrow they die. But although the working class may, for the time being, “forget their sorrow and remember their misery no more,” their ever-present poverty and the constant dread of even harder times, makes a “joyous” Christmas impossible.

What is the position to-day ? Says that wordy describer of evils for which he has no remedy, Mr. Geo. R. Sims :

“No one has any money. The cry of an impoverished people rings through the land. The West End weeps and the City sits in sackcloth and ashes. All parties agree that there is “very little money about.”

One is bound to accept the statement when one hears it so plaintively put forward in every direction. Commercial and professional men, dukes and doss-house keepers, traders and toilers, all tell you the same thing, and yet—capitals, please, Mr. Printer, AND YET

Luxury and Extravagance

leap to your eyes everywhere, and the shop windows this Christmas time are making as glorious a show of goods as ever delighted the eyes of a passing public in the palmy days of booming British trade and national well-being.

Magnificent hotels and gorgeous restaurants, such as the capital never possessed before, flourish and pay dividends ; men who used to go to the City in a twopenny ‘bus are now whirled thither in a thousand-guinea motor-car.”

And yet from all the industrial centres, not those of England alone, but of all parts of the world, come accounts of the distress among the working class. In London the starving condition of the school children has forced leading members of the exploiting class to issue an urgent appeal for funds, fearful lest the supply of efficient wage slaves may be impaired, or that this starvation, in the midst of plenty, if allowed to continue, may goad people into action that may threaten the supremacy of the master class. In the North of England special appeals have been issued for funds to help the unemployed and their starving dependents. As the Newcastle Journal of Dec. 10th said :

“The cry for Relief of Distress is in evidence that the contrivances invented to prevent so many people falling into poverty and to ease the lot of such as might fall have been a dead failure—a most lamentable failure. For, as the means of relief have gone on increasing, the number demanding to be relieved goes on increasing in still greater proportion. . . . Our country abounds with orphan asylums, houses of refuge, training ships for outcasts, hospitals for every kind of disease, convalescent homes, alms-houses, and charity organisations of one sort and another—each and all of which were designed to play their part in reducing the mass of poverty, and in elevating the condition of those dwelling on the borders of pauperism, in social and moral respects. But their failure to attain such end is dismal. Never was the mass of poverty in our country greater than it is to-day—never was the cry of the distressful louder than it is to-day. . . The Distress Committee in every town is proclaiming that the state of things is worse than it was before.”

We agree with the writer that all these benevolent contrivances have failed lamentably “because they do not get near to the root of the evil—because they do not even aim at touching the root of the evil.” And in endeavouring to earn his money as a capitalist hack he, as might be expected, charges the working class with improvidence, thriftlessness, and wastefulness ! He accuses them of being reckless of future needs, and given to living from hand to mouth. As if the wage slaves of capitalism could do other than live from hand to mouth ! He suggests that the distress in Sunderland is largely due to the workers’ extravagance and self-indulgence when the day was long and work was plentiful. Other writers state that these Sunderland mechanics have been receiving £7 or £8 per week in wages, and they have spent it all as they received it. We do not believe these amounts have been paid in wages, but even if they have, and the receivers have spent all their takings each week, what has been the effect? They have found employment in other departments of industry which would not have been provided had they refrained from spending their wages. Tailors, shoemakers, producers and purveyors of food and drink, employees of transit companies, etc., have had work as the result of the “thriftlessness” of these Sunderland shipwrights. Had they “hoarded,” had they put by for a rainy day, it would have been necessary long before this to make appeals to relieve the distress of unemployed workers who have been kept going by the “extravagance” of their fellows.

Under capitalism, it is in the interests of the working class that wealth should be destroyed as quickly as possible after it is produced, and the Newcastle Journal’s claptrap no more suggests a solution of the problem than any of the “contrivances” it writes down.

In the “Empire Beyond the Seas” thousands of good workmen are workless and hungry. From Canada comes the news that every industry is overcrowded. In Toronto there are 10,000 out of work, 4,000 in Winnipeg, and similar numbers in other large centres. Even Lord Strathcona, the High Commissioner, whilst not confirming (nor disputing) these figures, admits that “the general conditions of labour and business are not so brisk as at this time last year, but everything is reasonably satisfactory.” “Reasonably satisfactory” means, of course, that the unemployed are quiet, that they are not making themselves a nuisance. Let it be remembered that these unemployed workmen in Canada are not of “the idle, loafing, profligate class” : they are men who have been mainly selected for their physical fitness and mechanical skill, as only those who can pass a very severe test in these respects are allowed to join the parties of emigrants “assisted” by various capitalist agencies, open or disguised, to “start afresh.” And although it is admitted that there is an acute unemployed problem in Canada, “General” Booth is advertising for 600 men and women to join a party going there, under government auspices, on Feb. 20th !

From America, the “land of the free,” the paradise that the Tariff Reformer points to, but (like the Christian and his paradise) is in no hurry to go to, we learn, on the authority of the Daily Mail, that

“Distressing stories of a vain struggle for existence in America are told by crowds of sad-faced emigrants streaming from the steerage decks of every arriving trans-Atlantic liner. The vast majority, according to competent assurance I have received, are arriving only with money for the barest immediate necessities. I have interviewed a number of distracted wanderers—broad-shouldered, industrious-looking Galicians, Bohemians, Poles, and Italians—who, in broken English, picked up during brief sojourns in America, declared that they were willing to do any kind of work, they had not earned a dollar for three months” 

(Daily Mail’s Bremen Correspondent, Dec. 5)

These workers out of European countries left their homes (capitalism having broken them up long before the advent of Socialism) because conditions of livelihood were productive of poverty and unhappiness, and they are now leaving Protection-ridden America for the same reason.

Let us take another phase of the workers’ existence.

Early on the morning of the 18th December, an explosion occurred at a mine belonging to the Pittsburg (U.S.A.) Coat Company at Jacob’s Creek, some eighteen miles from Connellsville. Two hundred and fifty miners lost their lives, and we are told that the women relatives of the men gathered around the pitmouth frenzied with grief. What a merry Christmas ! What a prospect of a happy New Year for these women and children deprived of bread-winner by this sudden “act of God” !

This is the third great coal-mine explosion that has occurred in the United States in less than a fortnight. On December 6th between four and five hundred miners lost their lives at the Monongah Mine, and on the 16th another seventy met their doom in the Yolande Mine, Alabama. On the day of the Jacob’s Creek explosion the Commission appointed by Mr. Garfield, Secretary of the Interior, issued a pamphlet showing that 22,840 persons have lost their lives in coal-mine accidents in America in the last seventeen years. Half of these deaths were caused during the last six years. In 1906 alone 6,861 persons were involved in accidents, 2,061 of whom perished. In 1906 there were 1,116 lives lost in British mines. It is well that the accidents and diseases of occupations should be borne in mind when our opponents are telling us of the “reward” to which the capitalist is entitled because of the risks he takes. He never risks his life for a paltry wage insufficient at the best of times to keep one decently.

When one takes into consideration, then, the conditions of the working class all over the wide world ; when one remembers that, no matter what political, fiscal, or religious systems are in vogue, all over the world the working class is poor and the master class is rich ; when one knows that their exploitatation must continue, what a farce it is to talk to the wage slaves of “A Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year !” There is no festive season for them. There cannot be until capitalism is abolished. When the workers, organised as a class-conscious party, not only in opposition to those political factions which are avowedly capitalist, but also to those which, while professing to be anti-capitalist are yet pro-capitalist, by reason of their efforts at “reforming” this system and their support of capitalist candidates and parties, shall be preparing to take over the means of wealth production and thus end working-class exploitation, they will be able to indulge in good wishes and encouragement. When, however, their historic mission is fulfilled it will not be a case of wishing each other a good time once in 365 days, but life for all, young and old, will be a festive season all the time. To hasten that good day is the work which the Socialist Party of Great Britain has been doing and which it hopes to do even more vigorously in the year now before it.

Halo, Halo! (2025)

The Halo Halo Column from the March 2025 issue of the Socialist Standard

Babies don’t enter the world going ‘Yay, I’m an [insert one of the 4000 religions here]’. Children growing up believing all sorts of that nonsense is down to nurture, not nature. Fortunate are the children whose carers doesn’t indoctrinate them into hokum.

My parents were not religious. My mother grew up in a Methodist household and her sister was devoted all of her life. Time has made me regret not having a conversation with them both to ascertain the difference in their views and why both my parents eschewed religion.

There was a small chapel about a quarter of mile from where we lived. Given its size I surmise that it may have belonged to a small sect. A neighbour’s daughter, I’m guessing aged around 19, somehow persuaded my parents to send me, around eight or nine years old, to the Sunday School there. I don’t blame my parents. Perhaps they wanted a little peace and quiet from a demanding child.

Time has dimmed the recollection as to how long I endured this. I do recall that after a number of weeks children there were given a religious book. A bribe? I was a bibliophile even at that age. It was upon the receipt of my second ‘gift’ that I informed my parents I would no longer be wasting my Sundays by sitting through such nonsense.

The reason? Having been given the same book twice. I still can remember the outrage I felt. A similar outrage remains with me for having unfairly been given a detention in senior school. Speaking of which, not even the compulsory daily school assemblies consisting of hymns and a recitation of the Lord’s Prayer changed my views of religion. Perhaps nature imbues individuals with a natural disinclination toward fairy tales after all.

I once had a partner who, like me, wasn’t religious, but who liked the spectacle of church theatre on occasions such as Christmas. Her best friend, known since childhood days, had a boyfriend who was also, like her, of a Christian bent. My nature towards other people always having been of a non-discriminatory sort this didn’t prevent a social relationship developing.

At Christmas time, after spending a long convivial evening in a pub, we would go to the midnight service at the non-Catholic church which these two individuals attended. My non-religious partner enjoyed the theatre of the occasion. Keep your partner happy, right? Now it would be different.

Around the third year of this ritual, she told me that we wouldn’t be doing the same that year as her friend had informed her that the presence of two atheists, as we were known to be, was ‘upsetting’ to the two Christians at such a ‘sacred’ event. Outrage kicked in again. I was indifferent as to whether we went or not but ‘friends’ don’t behave like that to one another. She was more forgiving and remained friends with them. Love god or else!

DC

Film Review: Miracle on 34th Street (1947) (2025)

Film Review from the January 2025 issue of the Socialist Standard

We deconstruct a ‘classic’ film that is always shown on some TV channel over Christmas.

For those who don’t know, this is a Christmas film about a nice, elderly man – called Kris Kringle – who gets a job as a department store Santa Claus, but thinks he really is Father Christmas. Kringle befriends: a lawyer (whom he later moves in with); his girlfriend (whom he also works for at Macy’s department store); and her little girl from a previous relationship.

The story has two main plots that connect. The first is about a court case in which the lawyer has to prove that Kringle is the real Santa Claus in order to stop him from being put in a mental hospital. The second plot is about Doris (the single mother) who won’t let her daughter believe in Santa Claus or use her imagination in any way, because she wants her to have a realistic outlook on life. It’s not entirely clear why she decided to do this, but it has something to do with Doris’s husband/Susan’s father abandoning them both.

Even though this film is regarded by many as a Christmas classic, from a socialist point of view it’s terrible. Firstly, Kris Kringle is used as a metaphor for God, with the film being an allegory about why it’s important to have faith. In that respect, the famous ending of this film is what Americans would call a giant cop-out. The New York Post Office decides to send Kringle all the letters they get from children addressed to Santa Claus (they do this to cut down on their waste). Because of this, the judge rules in favour of Kringle due to the Post Office (a branch of the US government) recognising that he is Santa Claus.

The ending of the 1994 remake makes a lot more sense. In that version, Kringle is proven to be the real Santa Claus because ‘In God We Trust’ is written on US bank notes, which shows that if the US Treasury is allowed to put its faith in God on the currency – without the requirement of evidence that God exists – then the people of New York should be allowed to believe Santa Claus is real without evidence.

Another reason why this film is bad from a socialist perspective is because of a sub-plot in which Kringle uses his position (as the department store Santa) to advise parents to go to other stores to get what their children want for Christmas if Macy’s doesn’t have it. This leads to a lot of positive feedback from customers, and also to Gimbels (Macy’s main market rival) copying them. And, wouldn’t you know it, this leads to both stores making super profits, therefore, they don’t have to compete with each other anymore. How wonderfully reformist!

In conclusion, it’s not hard to see why this is regarded as a classic. However, it’s very preachy and believes that rival businesses can and should co-operate with each other in order to optimise the interests of both capitalists and customers.

Matthew Shearn

Christmas every day? (2024)

Viv and Keith.

From the December 2024 issue of the Socialist Standard

In 1961 Viv Nicholson, whose husband had won the equivalent of over four million pounds on the football pools, became famous after declaring she would ‘spend, spend, spend’. Which she then proceeded to do. At this time of year, without that amount of geld available to you, do you feel pressured to follow that example? Do you wish you were like Viv and could win loads of lucre on the national lottery. That would solve all your problems, wouldn’t it? Or would it?

Festivity: ‘a joyous feast, holiday or celebration’. Do you buy into Christmas because it makes you temporarily forget how pitiful it is to be a wage slave? Not that you’re being pressured. Much. The retail outlets have been selling Christmas commodities since September. Poverty, or struggling with the rising cost of living or unaffordable energy bills is no excuse. Not believing in the Christmas fairytale doesn’t excuse you from participating. The UK now has more atheists than believers in a fairy tale. So what are you celebrating? It’s a British tradition, you say? Christmas trees, Charles Dickens, God bless us one and all, blah blah. The Queen’s, oops, King’s Speech telling you that no matter how bad your year has been the privileged ruling class have had it much worse.

Is it because the kids expect presents, expensive ones too? Do you want them to be embarrassed because their friends got much better ones? They’ll probably still be dissatisfied. Don’t you realise that the true meaning of Christmas is spend, spend, spend until it hurts? Is no one thinking of the poor capitalists and their profits? Oh, you are fighting your way through the Boxing Day sales where wage slaves in shops are forced to work the holiday to add to capital’s rapacious pursuit of even more profit. They don’t have a choice. This applies to many other workers in various industries. Selling your mental or physical labour power is necessary to live in a capitalist system.

The mainstream media will no doubt have faux anger stories about a single parent spending huge amounts of money on presents for their children. This will elicit gasps of horror in the comments section from the indignant who will be incensed that someone on benefits can afford to do that. ‘I work long and hard and I can’t afford to do that’, they will cry. ‘It’s my taxes that’s paying for that!’ Note that in order for the media to manufacture outrage the story has to be about someone being supported by the state.

Once there was a time when preparations for the winter festival did not begin until a week or two before… Home-made paper chains as decorations. Catching the bus with your mom to go shopping in the local town or village to buy all the necessary prerequisites. Salvation Army bands busking in the streets, guilt-tripping passers-by into putting money in their hat. It’s for charity! It should be noted that the lyrics of many carols would have made William McGonagall ashamed to have written them.

Charities love Christmas. An excellent time to prick people’s consciences and get the money rolling in. The homeless and dispossessed may enjoy a few days of respite at Christmas before once more disappearing out of sight and out of mind. Society won’t begrudge them a little warmth, some decent food and a warm bed, but will happily turn them back onto the streets and leave them to their fate.

Oh, how naive we were then. Pillowcases of presents to open when you awake. At that age there was no conception of how hard it might have been for your parents to provide the gifts. Your dad getting up early to build a fire in the grates to warm the rooms. Him making the first cup of tea of the day for everyone and adding a generous measure of whisky to it, even for the thirteen year old. Mothers and female relatives working as hard as they did every day, or even harder, with no labour-saving devices to help them.

This is not to romanticise the past, but to highlight that for many of us it would be many years before we learnt how exploitative the capitalist system is and discovered that there was and is a better alternative. Back then there was no knowledge of how one’s parents might have had to scrape and save to buy their children presents and provide the enjoyable, but ignorant, experience.

Season of goodwill to all men, women and children? Not to those who are still being killed and maimed because some capitalists within particular states are intent on fulfilling their desire for yet more profit irrespective of the cost to innocent lives. Is there likely to be a Christmas truce, like the one in the First World War, in the conflicts currently raging across the world? You wouldn’t bet on it, and in any case a cessation of hostilities for one day is hardly sufficient. Hostilities across the world need to be suppressed forever. What is the likelihood of that happening under capitalism? Zero.

When the ‘festivities’ have ended what is there to look forward to? The rich will get richer, the poor won’t, and the global working class will continue to be exploited. The world will continue to be a less safe place.

Greg Lake sang that the Christmas you get, you deserve. Don’t you think you deserve something better than capitalism? Don’t wait until another year has gone by. Make your new year’s resolution a Lennon one… ‘Imagine there’s no countries. It isn’t hard to do. Nothing to kill or die for. And no religion too. Imagine all the people living life in peace.’ There’s many more benefits to a system where goods and services are produced for use, not profit. No classes, no leaders either. Give yourself and everyone else a real present – socialism.

Dave Coggan

Halo Halo! (2024)

The Halo Halo! column from the December 2024 issue of the Socialist Standard

Shakespeare used the idiom ‘He who sups with the Devil should have a long spoon’. The ‘Devil’ is a character in a fairy story, similar to the one wherein this month millions still ‘celebrate’ the birth of a made-up ‘messiah’.

As a writer in a previous Socialist Standard wrote, ‘religion is intensely anti-working-class… the whole panoply of belief, ritual, salvation and miracle stands against the interests of all working people.’ The Catholic Church and totalitarian states have much in common.

Proponents of mumbo jumbo, the Catholic Church, should have used a longer spoon. A United States Commission on International Religious Freedom report noted that ‘the Vatican entered into an undisclosed agreement with the Chinese Communist Party (sic) in 2018 that established cooperation between Church authorities and Chinese officials in appointing bishops. But “the government has unilaterally installed CCP-aligned bishops without the Vatican’s consultation and approval” despite that agreement’.

‘Chinese officials have ordered the removal of crosses from churches and have replaced images of Christ and the Virgin Mary with images of President Xi Jinping. They have also censored religious texts, forced members of the clergy to preach CCP ideology, and mandated the display of CCP slogans within churches. “Ultimately, the Chinese government is solely interested in instilling unwavering obedience and devotion to the CCP, its political agenda, and its vision for religion, not protecting the religious freedom rights of Catholics”’ (Ncresister.com).

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In Malaysia, where almost two thirds of the populace practise Islam, the state’s official religion, the government is seeking to enact a Mufti Bill which would grant ‘greater authority to religious courts, potentially eroding the rights of non-Muslims’. ‘The Mufti bill is not just about religious matters. It’s about power and control. If this bill passes, it could lead to a situation where religious authorities have the final say on a wide range of issues, from personal relationships to public policy. Supporters of the bill contend that it is necessary to strengthen the role of Islamic law to uphold traditional values. They argue that the bill would not infringe upon the rights of non-Muslims.’ Flying pigs come to mind. Oh, not halal. Flying gibbons or crocodiles?

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Christmas, and hopefully all other religious festivals, may be on its way to extinction. The UK now has more atheists than people who believe in the existence of God.

‘Queen’s University Belfast, in a global project Explaining Atheism (nearly 25,000 people from six countries surveyed) to find out why people become atheists and agnostics. found that the common notion of the “purposeless unbeliever”, lacking a sense of ultimate meaning in life, objective morality, and strong values is not accurate, challenging the stereotype that atheists lead lives devoid of meaning, morality, and purpose. Dr Lee said: “The UK is entering its first atheist age. Whilst atheism has been prominent in our culture for some time, be it through Karl Marx, George Eliot, or Ricky Gervais, it is only now that atheists have begun to outnumber theists for the first time in our history”’.

DC

'It's Clichéd to Be Cynical at Christmas* . . .'

Charles Dickens has a lot to answer for. 

There, I thought I'd get the humbug out the way, and then move on. Posted below are links to a selection of Christmas-related articles that have appeared in the Socialist Standard (and elsewhere) down the years. Dive head first into a Christmas box selection of articles about the historical origin of Christmas, humorous short stories involving Santa and his non-unionised and over-worked elves, and caustic commentary about rampant consumerism, I'm sure you'll agree that, unlike a tin of Quality Street in 2024, there's something here for everyone.

It's interesting to note that Christmas related articles were scarce on the ground in the early decades of the Socialist Standard. You have to wonder why: A conscious decision on the part of the Editorial Committee, or just an acknowledgement that Christmas wasn't that big a deal back in the day? I know that my Grandparents would work a half day on Christmas Day, but that was in Glasgow and New Year's Eve was always the bigger deal back then. Alcoholic spirits trumped Scalextric sets.

*And what's with the title of this post? Just another Half Man Half Biscuit modern classic.

Dec 1922: Christmas Shops by Alex Anderson

Dec 1948: Just Once A Year by Bill Waters

Dec 1954: A Slight Christmas Carol by Robert Barltrop (Short Story)

Dec 1965: Christmas, past and present by Bill Waters

Dec 1965: Christmas —the great delusion by Ivan

Dec 1969: Socialists and Christmas

Dec 1979: Festival of fools by Steve Coleman

Dec 1980: How to survive Christmas by Ivan

Dec 1981: Ghost of Christmas past by Ivan (Short Story)

Dec 1983: Having a rotten Christmas by Ivan (Short Story)

Dec 1986: Toys Galore: A Story for Girls and Boys by Ron Cook (Short Story)

Dec 1986: Xmas eve at the grotto by Tone (Short Story)

Dec 1987: Season of Goodwill

Dec 1988: Editorial: The Alternative Queen’s Speech

Jan 1991: Had a happy christmas? by Dave Coggan

Dec 1991: Editorial: Festival of Commerce

Dec 1991: Between the Lines: Humbug! by Steve Coleman (TV Review)

Dec 1995: The ghost of Christmas yet to come by Steve Coleman (Short Story)

Dec 1997: The Last Word: Why Santa should get stuffed by Steve Coleman

Dec 2010: Santa’s New Clauses (Short Story)

Dec 2020: Merry Christmas? by Dave Coggan

Dec 2021: Proper Gander: Capturing The Christmas Spirit by Mike Foster (TV Review)

Dec 2021: Stamping Out Capitalism by Dave Coggan

Socialism or Your Money Back blog

Dec 2006: Christmas Musings by John Bissett

The waiting game (1985)

From the December 1985 issue of the Socialist Standard

Millions of people, young and old. are waiting with baited breath. In October, we had the annual farce of the party conferences, where the rhetoric of failure was spouted from various seaside resorts. Now it is the turn of the great politician in the sky. With Christmas and the New Year almost upon us once again, the Christian god will no doubt be looking towards his (or her) 1.986th successive term of unelected office (this makes Thatcher s ambition pale into insignificance). What might this "god" have in store for us in the coming twelve months? A few more tens of millions of people starving to death as in previous years, because their need is not visible as cash demand in the market? A bit of nuclear conflict, perhaps, to sort out which gang of bosses are world champions?

Of course, it is only fair to point out that this "god" is far less powerful than many of his most prized creations down below. Millions of people persist in keeping well away from church every Sunday. They are not struck down by lightning as a result; they just have a bit longer in bed. But if one of those people decides to stay in bed on a Monday morning as well, they would soon feel the consequences. As a direct outcome of this intimidation by our fellow mortals, thousands of infidels can be seen flocking without fail every Monday morning towards the altars of profit, which have been erected to honour the names and the bank accounts of our earthly bosses.

Once a year, however, things are different. We enter the season of good will. Overcome by an irresistible wave of generosity towards their wage-slaves, employers sometimes even lose all touch with reality and buy their class enemy a meal! And that is the season we all wait for. the time of year when strangers kiss each other in Trafalgar Square (as long as they have drunk themselves into a stupor first).

People will be wrapping up presents, cooking cakes and organising parties. Desperate efforts will be made to over-eat and drink in order to make up for the rest of the year. And then, after weeks of waiting, and with the hang-over still throbbing, it occurs to you that there are just 364 days left . . . till the end of 1986. In the meantime, we can look forward to the Spring and Summer. Having got back from a "package" holiday which seems designed to encourage us to want to get back to work again, we can tell ourselves that it wasn't half bad. and start to look forward to Christmas time again.

This pattern of constantly "looking forward" to a time which will be an improvement on the present moment has its counterpart in looking back on the "good old days", and is deeply ingrained in present- day society. At school, the whole day is made up of waiting for the next bell to ring, bringing 4 o'clock a bit closer. Each time 4 o'clock comes, it brings the end of term one day nearer. This applies as much to most teachers as it does to most school children. And the discipline of school is intended, of course, as a preparation for the regimentation of employment. The cliché is quite right: only outside of the work-place can you say that "your time is your own".

Take, for example, a couple of conversations I overheard recently. Firstly, a woman who had been chatting to a "check-out” assistant (that is. a person forced into the socially pointless task of being an appendage to a cash-register) left the shop with the friendly comment. "Hope your day goes quickly!" Is it not a profound condemnation of what capitalism has done to work that this is the best we can wish for one of our fellow workers?

Then, as we were surfacing slowly from the depths of the Angel tube station in Islington, the lift-attendant whose job is to escort passengers up and down all day, like day-trips to hell which the damned even have to buy tickets for, bewildered the passengers by actually saying something. (They thought he was only supposed to push buttons and throw away their tickets for them.) Looking at his watch, he sighed: "That's another day gone. Maybe one day money will fall from the sky". After a moment's embarrassed silence somebody rather stupidly told the attendant who had made this remark that he would do the same job even if he won the pools, as it was quite interesting by the look of it. Imagine what it would be like to have to stay in one of those lifts after each successive batch of people has rapidly exited, and you will see in what bad taste this joke was made.

The point, however, had once again been made: our daily conditions of work make the majority dread the start and yearn for the end of every day. and likewise of every year. Of course, if there were a genuine community of interests and work were organised democratically, its conditions being arranged by those doing it. then many of the tasks which are today regarded as menial and unpleasant could become a positive pleasure in themselves. Guiding people around stores where they could have access to food and so on (without the hated cash registers existing to ration that access) would become a pleasant task, as would the operation of good transport facilities, including lifts. At the moment, however, the majority are cut off from ownership of industry, agriculture, transport and communications, so that we have little or no say in how our working lives are organised. We are the tools of production rather than its masters, and the only consolation we can seek is to wait for the evening, the weekend, for Christmas . . .

The child who has the honesty to ask why it can't be Christmas all the year round deserves an honest answer. The answer is that if Christmas means a brief rest from the strain and stress, the tensions and pressures which are inflicted on the working class by the rest of the capitalist calendar, then it could indeed be Christmas all the year round.

In the words of the 1911 Socialist Party pamphlet on Socialism and Religion, religion is the "paralysing hand of the dead past upon the living present". Socialism, on the other hand, means the working-class majority taking history into our hands for the first time, and re-organising society on the basis of production to satisfy human needs directly and freely, rather than production to serve the needs of the market, for the profit of a minority. On this basis, and by democratic political action, we can create a real community of interests world-wide, which will show up such ideas as the "public" good expressed through the state to have been mere con-tricks to mask the vicious self-interest of a propertied few.

If we as workers are going to liberate ourselves from the system in which a privileged class own and control the means of human survival, the productive machinery (as well as the means of human destruction), we must first throw off the trammels of religious thought. Religion has always preached submission in one form or another, as it emerged historically at a primitive stage in humanity's mental evolution. Sometimes. sandwiched between Morecambe and Wise and The Poseidon Adventure on Christmas day, Thora Hird suddenly pops up out of nowhere and tells us to remember what it's all in aid of. At first, you get confused and think that she's standing in for Bob Geldof. But let's take up her suggestion, and glance at some of the offensive and authoritarian nonsense which it is all in aid of.

First, we must get out the sack-cloth and ashes, or whatever other perversion takes your fancy, in order to "be clothed with humility" (1 Peter, 5:5). Women in particular must, of course, bear in mind, that as far as the Bible and Christianity are concerned, they are intrinsically inferior beings. The Old Testament pulls no punches either: Exodus 22.18 states that "You shall not permit a sorceress to live". This one statement alone has caused the deaths of hundreds of thousands of innocent women during the Middle Ages, to say nothing of the thousands tortured to death over questions of interpretation. (Don't forget, this is all part of "god's plan".) Above all. however, consider the key clause in the Christian "Declaration of Principles": 

Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers. For there is no power but of God: the powers that be are ordained of God. Whosoever therefore resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance of God. and they that resist shall receive to themselves damnation.

(Romans 13: 1.2)

This is a clear blue-print and defence of every murderous dictatorship which has stalked the earth in past and present, and yet there are still those absurd enough to refer to themselves as "Christian socialists" as if this incompatibility between social democracy and the ultimate defence of dictatorship were a minor quibble.

Finally, it seems that the "divinely-inspired" authors of the Bible were not great fans of the pop-charity business. Jesus Christ is supposed to have had a far simpler approach than Geldof to mopping up the poverty and suffering which property has generated for those who do not possess it. His answer to the starving? "Go to the sea and cast a hook, and take the first fish that comes up. and when you open its mouth you will find a silver coin." (Matthew, 17:27). Very handy.

And what is it that we are actually supposed to be celebrating on the 25th? According to Matthew 1:20. a bloke called Joseph got married to a woman called Mary, and found that she had become pregnant, even though her marriage to him personally had not been consummated. He "resolved to divorce her quietly", which would be quite understandable under the circumstances. "But," the story continues, "as he considered this, behold, an angel of the lord appeared to him in a dream . . In other words, in a fit of jealous despair he allowed wishful thinking to convince him that whoever had got his wife pregnant so soon after their wedding was obviously no ordinary guy. in fact he was called "the Holy Spirit" and had a bit of a reputation in the local, so that was that.

It is fitting that the whole Christian religion is based on a dream. This time round, whilst waiting for the Queen's Speech (certainly the highlight of Christmas TV entertainment). why not think about giving up all of these dreams? In fact, we need to get rid of a social system which makes us want to dream the whole time. After all. if we need to dream so much about what things could be like, or were like, or will be like, what does that tell us about what things are like?

Clifford Slapper

Mr. Dooley in “Capital and Labour.” (1907)

From the April 1907 issue of the Socialist Standard

At Christmas time Capital gathered his happy fam’ly around him an’ in th’ prisince iv th’ ladies iv th’ neighbourhood gave thim a short oration. “Me brave la-ads,” said he, “we’ve had a good year (cheers). I have made a millyon dollars (sensation). I atthribute this to me supeeryor skill, aided by ye’r arnest efforts at th’ bench an’ at th’ forge (sobs). Ye have done so well that we wont need so manny iv ye as we did (long and continyous cheerin’). Those iv us who can do two men’s wurruk will remain, an’ if possible do four. Our other faithful servants” he says “can come back in th’ spring” he says “if alive” he says. An’ th’ bold artysans tossed their paper caps in th’ air an’ give three cheers f’r Capital.

They wurruked till ol’ age crept on thim, an’ thin retired to live on th’ wish-bones an’ kind wurruds they had accumylated.

Mr. Dooley in “Capital and Labour.”

50 Years Ago: Christmas Shopping (1972)

The 50 Years Ago column from the December 1972 issue of the Socialist Standard

When November was scarcely half spent, the shops began to make their special displays. Now, as I write, the wares of the world are heaped behind the shining windows. Like so many Aladdin’s caves they will yield their store to him who has the golden key; to all other the frail glass pane is a barrier impassable.

And who are they that can command the best and largest share? Those who took no part in producing it … Alaskan furs, Chinese silks, ivories of Japan, Sheffield cutlery, Spanish, Arabian and Tasmanian fruits, do not create and convey themselves, even at Christmas time. That which shaped, transported and arranged them was your work, and that of your fellows in all corners of the earth.

These goods, and the posters that advertise them, the factories where they were made and the machines within the factories, the engines and ships that carried them here—you made them all. Yet your part in the season’s celebrations is to watch more fortunate folks enjoy them, and feel your own needs more bitterly. You who have distant friends and families—why cannot you visit them? You fathers and mothers of children, do not even their small delights mean the sacrifice of something necessary to yourselves?

There are young men and girls among you who dreamed homes of your own; and this winter finds you further off than ever from your desires.

* * *

If a crowning absurdity was lacking, it is supplied by the presence of multitudes who are not even allowed to work.

(From an article in the Socialist Standard, December 1922, signed “A”)

The ghost of Christmas yet to come (1995)

The A Word in Your Ear column from the December 1995 issue of the Socialist Standard

It is Christmas morning and little children lay half-snuggled, half-sleeping in their beds awaiting the miracle of the gifts as advertised on TV and available for a price in their local shops. Parents toss and turn in the next room thinking of empty purses, overdrafts and sinister threats from the building society. Meanwhile, in the misty twilight between bad and worse, lurks the grim-faced oracle of times-yet-to- come. Can it get worse under this profits-first, needs-second system? Come, little ones, and see the bleakness of Christmas-yet-to-come.

You remember a time when there were just beggars squatting in the doorways. Folk knowledge had told that they were not always there, but it is all rather hard to remember. Then came the first of the families. Most disconcerting. The first dead body you walked round, careful to avoid the stench and flies, was always the one that stuck in your mind. Poor little thing—not enough money to feed it and the others, so . . . Then came the neighbours who had collapsed under the swamp of the threatening letters from the moneylenders. She was on drugs; the doctor put her on tranquillisers so that she would never properly have to think of those hopes she once had when he had the little shop and they bought the house. It makes you stop and think when you see the people from down the road out in the street begging for a few quid to feed the ones who might survive the winter.

Of course, the Straw Laws helped none. Jack Straw was one of the most hated Home Secretaries ever (they all are, aren’t they?). Although the Sun was full of praise for his measures to hose down the pavements at five each morning. “Spraying the No-Hopers", the kids call it. And the Prescott Act. long in planning but only realisable with a government that could get the unions to support the scheme, has done wonders to put the young jobless in uniforms and give them a dose of good old-fashioned discipline. The Lib-Dem amendment to cut all welfare payments to scroungers without A1 workfare reports was highly praised in a Guardian editorial.

The deaths from the nuclear blowout in the Ukraine show no signs of letting up. What woman would want to be pregnant this Christmas, with the rate of miscarriages and still-births greater than the number of healthy children born? Everyone saw it coming. After Chernobyl, when that report was issued in the late Nineties about the cover-up on deaths from radiated beef, there was a short scare that if another one went up it would be goodbye to a few million Europeans. They never said it would be as bad as it was when the next one did blow up. Will the war with Russia ever end? These weekly nuclear-alert drills are getting everyone down.

Who would have thought there would be a civil war in the USA? It’s the kind of thing we used to read about in history books. You expected it in Ireland or Yugoslavia, but somehow it all looked so stable from a superficial point- of-view . . . hundreds of thousands dead and who knows how many maimed and homeless? The wags say that the IRA are taking collections in Dublin pubs for the New York Police Militia who have been taken as political prisoners by the Nation of Islam.

The ads become more depressing every day. And there are so many more of them, even on the BBC now. Everyone wants to sell you insurance. It’s like one big protection racket. That one about the little boy with leukaemia who gets turned away from the State Market Hospital and has to sell his bike to get some painkillers . . .  I mean, come, on. there are limits to taste.

But that's the thing: there are no limits. The future of the profit system is not a subject for the delicate of taste or the nervous in mind to study. Best think that everything will just go on as it is. What a horrible thought! Best not think at all.

And the children wake up to find at the end of the bed the bargain models of the goodies which advertisers spent millions persuading them they wanted. What it is to be a carefree infant on such a lovely day. The parents take confidence that the kids will always be snug and forget for a while the abject poverty which the majority of the world’s kids are living in right now. The Queen will come on after the Tesco chicken-bites and reassure them that all is well in this sickest of social orders. She is the Ghost of Christmas Present. And whether what we have allowed ourselves to think for a while about the times to come does come? Well that is up to us to permit or forbid, for we make history, and we alone have the power to stop nightmares from coming true. Even Scrooge could see that. 

Steve Coleman

Santa’s New Clauses (2010)

A Short Story from the December 2010 issue of the Socialist Standard

Memo to: Little Helpers Team Leaders

To be cascaded to all staff

Dear Colleagues

As we approach our busy season I feel it only fair to remind you of the financial difficulties we find ourselves in as a result of the on-going recession. As you know, the juvenile gratuity market is experiencing heavy turbulence and we are committed to making savings wherever possible. As your Chief Executive I am setting a personal example by reducing my 2.6% annual growth in intake of mince pies and sherry by approximately 0.8%, phased in over the next fifteen years.

Certain scurrilous tabloid newspapers have been spreading unsubstantiated rumours that I have awarded myself a bonus of ten million pounds. Rest assured this is utterly unsubstantiated. In fact it was a modest seven million pounds ‘performance & productivity’ reward – which reflects well on all of us, by the way! – plus one million for the Management Consultation exercise with myself, one million in stress-related compensation for writing this, and one million in shares which may go down as well as up.

Needless to say, our core business strategy still revolves around putting children first, and Management has agreed a bold new plan to ensure our competitiveness in the difficult times ahead:

• To enhance efficiency and fairness we must recognise that unfairness is more efficient, and thus end the practice of a Universal Entitlement to Presents..
• The work-shy must play their part in maintaining the true spirit of Christmas. It is hardly fair on taxpayers that those on benefits who refuse to work for nothing should continue to expect presents for their children.
• We will no longer be delivering free chocolate to children in hot countries – it only melts. Instead we will introduce a fair trade agreement – their arable land in exchange for toy guns, pistols, machetes and napalm.
• You may have heard that those spiteful Fire Fighters threatened to go on strike on Bonfire Night, which would have spoiled the fun for so many young ones – obviously it wouldn’t be right to reward their young ones this Christmas!

Meanwhile, let’s remember that special group who have had a very tough time lately and borne it all without complaint. Our hard-working Cabinet ministers and Captains of Industry in the C.B.I (Collect Bank Interest) have taken courageous and selfless decisions in order to resuscitate our ailing economy – a task which has earned them No Thanks Whatsoever from the ungrateful population – their children deserve our special kindness this Yuletide. With the money saved from the undeserving, we can afford to pay all these children through £9,000 pa college courses!

With all of us making sacrifices, here’s where you can play your part in making Christmas special for certain children the world over. The great news is that you get to keep your jobs, on condition that you agree to certain new terms and conditions. Your friends in the Reindeer Union have already welcomed these new clauses with open legs and the abattoir sub-provision has not been invoked even once!

There will be a downward restructuring of wages, holiday and sick pay entitlements to zero while the statutory retirement age will be infinitely extended so that now you work for eternity.

Failure to accept this generous offer will necessitate the immediate relocation of the Grotto and Workshop to New Zealand where all staff will be replaced by sub-minimum-wage Hobbits.

Thank you for your cooperation.

Ho, ho, ho, and have a Merry Austerity,

Santa

Santa

 

It’s that time of year again (2023)

From the December 2023 issue of the Socialist Standard

‘Many people complain that the Christmas sales campaign starts too early. But as the market is stimulated to grow, and as it grows, so will the effort to exploit it. This might mean an even longer sales drive in the future—wasn’t there a story about a business man who said that Christmas was good business as long as they kept religion out of it?’ 

(Socialist Standard, December 1965).

Although it appears to have been so three months ago because that’s when Christmas commodities started to appear in retail outlets. Even more than the rest of the year the mantra is purchase, buy, consume, spend!

It’s no wonder that alcohol consumption soars and family rows escalate in this period of joy and peace. Coping with capitalism creates enough stresses on a daily basis in itself but, at this time of the year, especially for parents, but not just confined to them; they increase many-fold life’s everyday pressures.

Sympathy must go out for one to the residents of towns served by Medway Council in Kent because it has ‘cancelled all its Christmas lights this year just to save £75,000. Medway Council in Kent announced the “sad and difficult decision” after identifying a potential overspend of £17 million this financial year.’ Local folk have labelled the Council ‘Scrooge’ (Sun, 10 October).

Think that can be filed under the heading of ‘First World Problems’.

Snowflakes

It’s very hard to get through this period without Charles Dickens and A Christmas Carol impinging in some way or other. George Bernard Shaw, channelling Scrooge, (before the ghost’s visitations) in a 1946 letter to Reynolds News expressed his vehement opposition to Christmas:

‘I am sorry to have to introduce the subject of Christmas. It is an indecent subject; a cruel, gluttonous subject; a drunken, disorderly subject; a wasteful, disastrous subject; a wicked, cadging, lying, filthy, blasphemous and demoralizing subject. Christmas is forced on a reluctant and disgusted nation by the shopkeepers and the press: on its own merits it would wither and shrivel in the fiery breath of universal hatred; and anyone who looked back to it would be turned into a pillar of greasy sausages’.

Perhaps Santa let him down as a child. Proper pantomime villain, boo, hiss? Did Outraged Christian of Easily Offended inundate the letters page with their outrage? The latter-day aficionados of Christmas are rushing to social media to express their umbrage at a particular seasonal advertisement.

Speaking of outrage, there’s always a competition amongst capitalist enterprises to ‘win’ the best Christmas advertisement. The purpose being to maximise sales in the ‘golden quarter.’ Back in November an ‘edgy’ anti-Christmas advertisement from Marks and Spencer apparently upset some as M & S were forced to apologise because the destruction shown of party hats in an open fire was deemed to be an insult to Palestine. How, you ask? The colours of the hats were also those of the Palestinian flag! Even socialists know that red and green are traditional Christmas colours.

This is surely taking taking offence to the level of the absurd. The events across the world in 2023 are more demanding of offence, outrage and umbrage.

A world of dread and fear

John Donne’s 1624 Meditation XVII piece, No Man is an Island seems particularly relevant almost four hundred years on:

No man is an Iland, intire of itselfe; every man

is a peece of the Continent, a part of the maine;

if a Clod bee washed away by the Sea, Europe

is the lesse, as well as if a Promontorie were, as

well as if a Manor of thy friends or of thine

owne were; any mans death diminishes me,

because I am involved in Mankinde;

And therefore never send to know for whom

the bell tolls; It tolls for thee.

As in other years of mass bloody conflicts the bell has tolled for far too many in 2023 in places other than Europe.

Almost forty years ago Band Aid released a charity record, Do they know it’s Christmas? in response to famine in Ethiopia. The lyric included, ‘It’s Christmas time, There’s no need to be afraid, At Christmas time we let in light and we banish shade’. And ‘There’s a world outside your window, And it’s a world of dread and fear’. It is to be fervently hoped that, over the intervening weeks, the chilling prospect of more ‘dread and fear’ will not have spread to a far wider arena.

"Well, if you knows of a beter ‘ole, go to it"

In 1961, at his presidential inauguration, John F Kennedy said, ‘Ask not what your country can do for you but ask what you can do for your country.’ Sixty plus years on this exhortation would seem to now mean ask what you can do for the capitalist state engaged in armed conflict with the full support of the capitalist state where you reside – or else. A reminder that the global working class have no country. Patriotism is the refuge of the scoundrel, even if is it being forced upon many; but many, even if they do not, as of yet, understand that socialism is the only viable solution, are resisting the brainwashing and propaganda. But, without the realisation that socialism is the only alternative, nothing will change.

When the working class of many states were engaged in capitalist wars in the early part of the twentieth century, black humour was much evident as a way of coping with great adversity.

Bairnsfather’s 1915 cartoon of two British soldiers under fire in a foxhole with the caption ‘Well, if you knows of a better ‘ole, go to it’ is an example.

Well, we do know of a ‘better ‘ole’. It’s a money-free, leader-free, state-free society where conflicts and wars are forever abolished and consigned to the dustbin of history.

Dave Coggan

Finance and Industry: What is an incomes policy? (1966)

The Finance and Industry column from the August 1966 issue of the Socialist Standard

What is an incomes policy?

Last month we examined the wealth of people at the time they leave this world and found, in the majority of cases, that they had little to leave. Could it be that working on the basis “you can’t take it with you" they had the wealth at one stage, but had frittered it away on a merry-go-round of solo, scotch and sex? Alas, the answer, as they say in the best American war films, is negative.

For our evidence on this point we again turn to the report of the Commissioners of Inland Revenue for the year 1964-65, where we find the table of personal incomes for the year ended 5 April. 1964, on page 82: —

It is difficult to understand how so many people enjoy such affluent pursuits as Continental holidays and motor cars, until it is realised that of 12,780,900 married men included in the above table 36 per cent of them send their 4,592.000 wives out to work.

We do not intend to join the argument here as to whether the place of a wife is in her home. But the evidence does suggest that there is a large number of families who might be homeless if the wife did net bring home that additional pay packet.

There arc some ladies of course who are not even bothered by the thought of losing their job because of the Selective Employment Tax as they are already in the £20,000 per year class.

What can a government armed with an “incomes policy" do about such incomes? If words were the answer it would all be resolved by now. But the words have to be translated into actions that are consistent with capitalism. And the only thing consistent about capitalism is that the few will continue to exploit the many—just as long as the many are prepared to stand for it.

Them and us

One thing abundantly evident from the previous item is that we still live in a world of them and us. The wide disparity of incomes coldly tabulated in columns of figures can be confirmed upon examining the dual quality of commodities produced, even those satisfying such basic human requirements as a house to live in.

The latest occasional bulletin issued by the Co-operative Permanent Building Society is an analysis of the 2,802 people to whom they advanced mortgages, during the quarter December, 1965-February, 1966, to purchase new dwellings. From the survey Mr. Average emerged as 28 years of age, producing a deposit of £846 toward a house costing £3,864; and earns £24 14s. 0d. per week from which to pay a mortgage of £20 9s. 0d. per month for approximately 25 years.

As two-thirds of these workers were buying homes for the first time they were probably pleased to get them before the increase of “hundreds of pounds” threatened by the National Federation of Building Trade Employers in response to the government's proposals to raise the standards required of building and house equipment.

If this is how some younger members of the working class are trying to acquire a piece of the property-owning- democracy—and you will notice there is a prejudice against the older ones—how does the enemy fare?

The London Evening Standard carries a property news page, and on July 7 it had items on the following which might be of interest to you. A fifth-floor flat overlooking Hyde Park; the owner. Val Parnell, only asks £37,000. Are you a top executive fed up with commuting and want to move back into London? Your solution is in course of erection at Enismore Gardens, price range £35,000-£68,000. Perhaps you are only a younger executive, then unfortunately you must commute to the riverside at Chiswick, mooring fees are £13,000-£I8,000. Did you enjoy canvassing for the Socialist Party of Great Britain in Hampstead at the last election? Then you will be sorry you missed the eight bedroomed house sold recently for £40,000 by Sir Arthur Porritt, the Queen’s surgeon.

Do you still think there is an equality in poverty?

146 Shopping days to Christmas

Most newspapers make claims on the earnings of their readers in the scramble to attract advertising. And although many products are advertised in most newspapers there are some which only appear in those papers generally thought to be read by the higher income groups.

In case you missed the Sunday Times of July 3, we would like to bring the following to your notice, which might be of some help when preparing your present list for Christmas.

Firstly, Dupont have a new range of lighters selling at £10 I5s.-£165 and they even boast that “a few people can afford a Dupont."

Secondly, if you are fed up with the old plastic salt and pepper pots used  by your mother-in-law, nip along to Gerrard, the crown jewellers; they have a silver set for £44 10s. Or perhaps she would prefer the sauceboat for £24 10s., the sugar dredger for £25 or the coffee pot for £101 10s.

When you go, please don’t show your working class origin. Don’t ask for trading stamps.

Ray Guy.

Christmas (1974)

From the Special 300th issue of The Western Socialist

There are several, differing ways of looking at Christmas. The pious Christian regards It as a religious festival, the commemoration of the supposed birth of the S-O-N as opposed to the pagan Egyptian's celebration of the birth (or re-birth) of the S-U-N. The kids all look forward to toys and other presents (if they are young enough) from Santa while the charities and the press have a field day raising funds to buy gifts for the more poverty-stricken victims of capitalism.

The joy in this joyous occasion, in the case of the merchants and money-lenders is directly in proportion to their take from the shoppers and borrowers. And millions of struggling wage slaves, bracing themselves for further escalation of their debt levels, manage somehow to enjoy the festivities, postponing their added worries until December 26th.

The socialist observes this annual scene with a jaundiced eye. Not that socialists are opposed to festivals as such. The custom of celebrating the changing seasons long predates Christianity and it is at least conceivable that festivals will be enjoyed when religions of all sorts have become a remembered historical episode in man's development. So our emotions at this time can best be termed "mixed.”

For leaving aside the religious and the commercial significance of Christmas there is a certain something in the air at this time that underscores the true nature of mankind. The propagandists of capitalism would have us believe that we are, intrinsically, competitive and aggressive toward one another, that a society that can (we claim) best be described as cannibalistic, such as capitalism, is a natural way of life. We are supposed to believe that it is normal for big fish to eat little fish in the world of man as well as the world of fish. There is supposed to be nothing bad about a society that compels working people to compete among themselves for the opportunity to work, to support themselves and families, that divides them on the basis of skin pigmentation or ethnic background or religion.

But despite all of the pressures, including the added pressures of a capitalist Christmas, the gregarious, cooperative, nature of man does bob to the surface, if only briefly, during this period as it does on other equally brief occasions throughout the year. True, the feeling to which we allude is largely debased by the spirit of charity for charity debases the giver at least as much as it does the receiver. Charity is and must be accompanied by the attitude that it is normal and right that there should be those who are in a position to give and those who must be compelled to receive. It is a non-recognition of the fact that divisions such as this exist only because of the economic organization under which we live and that such organization has long outlived its usefulness. Charity fosters passiveness and reaction rather than a spirit of genuine revolution, the urge to organize for the abolition of the social system that degrades humanity.

What, then, would be the nature of a festival in December in a socialist world? We can, of course, only speculate on the positive aspects at this time. It is much easier to predict what will not exist. For one thing, any religious significance will have vanished. It will be no longer necessary for society to support institutions that serve no useful function and with the knowledge of man's dominion over economic forces the urge to maintain religions will undoubtedly disappear. There is nothing, certainly, instinctive in man that makes him believe in a supernatural. Religion must be learned —Secondly, the custom of exchanging gifts, if indeed it will exist, will not be based to any extent on the proddings of an economic class that benefits from such an exchange. For the rest, we are content to leave it to a socialist future.

The Gall of Charity (1974)

From the Special 300th issue of The Western Socialist

We are now in that time of the year known as the Holiday Season. The spirit of good cheer permeates the atmosphere. Everybody is urged to love one another. But there is something else afoot, at this time, which would indicate that loving one another is by no means sufficient. Not for the millions of victims of poverty, even in America, at any rate. For not all the love for one’s fellow man that has been poured out over the years, has contained, let alone eliminated, the stark hunger that stalks capitalism everywhere, even in this richest nation of all time. And so, in these closing months of the year, the annual drive is on, and we are urged, even bullied by psychological tricks, such as cleverly phrased notices on bulletin boards or desks in the sweatshops where we earn our daily bread: "Have you pledged your fair share,” they ask us, "to the United Way?”

Now it would almost seem that there could be no argument here. One must be hard-hearted to turn a deaf ear to suffering, to fail to come up with some sort of pledge from one’s meager pay for such a good cause. But for those who understand the world, how it is organized; and who are consciously attempting in one way or another to change it, the institution of organized charity is the rubbing of salt in the wounds of the working class. "Pledge one’s fair share" Indeed! Just whom do they think these victims of poverty are? From where do they come? From the capitalist class? Hardly! They can only come from one section of society, the working class, the class that is being importuned to pledge for their support.

Just consider the import of this in the cold light of reason. Here is a section of the working class that, generally, through no fault of its own, other than selecting the wrong parents, winds up on the bottom rung of the ladder. What is the ladder doing there in the first place? Simply making it possible for a handful of idlers, who happen to own the means and instruments for producing and distributing wealth, to sit on the top rungs, while those below them produce their wealth and serve them personally in order that they can get full enjoyment from life.

Now, because of the odd, topsy-turvy manner of thinking under capitalism, the mass of working people on the lower rungs are supposed to be grateful to the few on the top for giving them a chance to work for them. How kind of them, we hear so frequently, to erect factories and found banks and all the other places of employment, so that we can have a chance to earn a living. Strange reasoning? It certainly is, because it is those on the top who should be eternally grateful to the rest of us for making life so easy for them. What else can they do with their money but invest it in more capital? They can't eat it! They can’t wear it! They can’t drive around in it or live in it! They must invest it in institutions that make it possible for the rest of us to work for them (excepting when there is a surfeit of labor); else there is nothing left for them but to lie down with the rest of us and die, unless we abolish the capitalist way of production.

But no! We, the majority, are expected to be the grateful ones, even to the extent of pitching in for our fellows who fall to the bottom rung. Capitalists buy our brains and our brawn for enough, on the average, to produce and reproduce this brain and brawn, then ask us to give back some to those of us who have not been able to stay in the rat race, instead of taking care of the needy themselves as a sort of bonus for a lifetime of dedicated toil. That is the future that capitalism holds for a growing percentage of us, the opportunity to have salt rubbed in our wounds, and the opportunity to be on the receiving end of their sweet charity.

TAPES

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