Letter: Not peas in a pod (1996)

Letter to the Editors from the October 1996 issue of the Socialist Standard

Not peas in a pod

Dear Editors,

I am very disappointed with Graham Taylor’s interpretation (August Letters) of my letter to the July issue.

Not once in my letter did I say that I supported the Newbury rallies, and I do not believe it is very comradely either to suggest that I might hold Trotskyite or SWP views.

I am a member of the Socialist Party because I sincerely believe in the abolition of the capitalist system. The other views I expressed in my letter are quite clear, that I think some Socialists appear to make a fetish out of not demonstrating or showing solidarity with other workers. Socialists are people, individuals, not so many peas out of the same pod.

Heather Ball, 

Norwich

Letter: Opportunistic exercises (1996)

Letter to the Editors from the August 1996 issue of the Socialist Standard

Opportunistic exercises

Dear Editors,

I found Heather Ball's comments (Letters. June Socialist Standard) somewhat surprising.

A socialist who compromises socialist principles is a notion that makes me feel very uncomfortable.

The question of strikes and the SPGB has been discussed often enough in the party’s history. and there is general agreement on the position individual members should take.

The comment ". . . being a Socialist means being a part of the struggle but without illusions” seems to be misplaced; I would expect to see it in a Trotskyite paper.

Does Heather Ball regard the Newbury rallies or strikes as being action against capitalism? The last paragraph of her letter seems to imply that this is the case, when in fact they arc feeble, defensive measures against aspects of capitalism, and where the majority of people are supporters of capitalism.

The SPGB has always made a point of putting the socialist case at demonstrations, not taking part in them. We leave such opportunistic exercises to the SWP.

Graham C. Taylor, 

Brabrand, Denmark

New Socialist Party pamphlet (2002)

Party News from the June 2002 issue of the Socialist Standard

A Socialist Life is a collection of 28 published and 5 unpublished short stories by Socialist Standard writer Heather Ball. Many readers liked Heather's distinctive writing style and found it full of charm, warmth, humanity and humour. Sadly, Heather died before she could complete her writing project. This collection of her stories, published by the Socialist Party, is a memorial to her indefatigable commitment to socialism. Send a cheque made payable to the Socialist Party of Great Britain to 52 Clapham High Street, London SW4 7UN. Price £3.00.

Blogger's Note:

I'm not sure what happened but for some reason the text of this pamphlet isn't available on the SPGB website, and it also looks like it is currently out of print. Therefore, reproduced below is the introduction to the pamphlet, and links to Heather's short stories mentioned in the introduction. Four of Heather's unpublished short stories which were originally included in this pamphlet are not currently online but they are on my to do list.

Introduction to A Socialist Life by Heather Ball

This is a collection of short stories first published in the Socialist Standard between July 1995 and November 2000. They are brought together here for two main reasons. First, readers have appreciated Heather's distinctive style of writing — they find it full of warmth, humanity and pervaded by a gentle sense of humour. And second, those who haven't previously read anything by socialist writers may find their appetite whetted by Heather's collection.

Sadly Heather died before the project was complete. This collection of her stories is thus a memorial to her indefatigable commitment to socialism.

Most of the collection is divided somewhat arbitrarily into three parts—people, places and situations. In fact all the stories concern people in some way—their ideas, their behaviour, their strengths and weaknesses, their frequent niceness and occasional nastiness. To a large extent places are the contexts in which people live and work, and situations arise out of people trying to cope with the opportunities and problems that they face.

Part 1 starts with Heather's recollections of her parents. Her father was a lifelong Bolshevik, but he taught her how to be a socialist. Her mother endured a life of struggle against poverty, a struggle that included occasional selective stealing to feed and clothe her family. In 'Ordinary People' Heather talks about the men and women who do valuable work, despite sometimes being patronised by ‘experts'. In ’Humankind' she describes how people are normally helpful sociable beings despite their capitalist environment. The same point is well illustrated in 'The Bailiffs' when, after Heather's family furniture is repossessed, the neighbours rally round to replace most of what had been taken.

Next a group of elderly neighbours discover that it's good to party. In 'Passing the Time' Heather finds that chatting about the Queen Mother can be a chore and a bore. Later Heather is visited by Mr Brown, a Social Security Officer, and she wonders whether he is aware that his job depends on the fact that in capitalism some people go to the wall.

In Part 2 we see Heather as a schoolgirl making her revolutionary debut by organising a strike against a tyrannical teacher. The next piece is about Heather's fellow pupil, the unassuming Dorcas, who told the truth about her dislike of the school and most of its teachers and was roundly castigated for doing so. At a 'Careers' interview Heather's school bosses scoff at the idea that she wants to write. An office, shop or factory job was what they had in mind for her. In 'Uncles' she relates how as a child she watched her mother pawn her father's best suit to a man she at first believed was a not very nice relative.

The next few stories are about the places and people Heather encountered as a young worker. In 'The Office' she confesses that she was too young to realise that, rather than failing the workplace, the workplace had failed her. 'The madhouse' is Heather's name for the small hotel she worked in, and she observes how things can go quite well when the boss is on holiday. Then follows an amusing and perceptive account of how she applied for, and rejected a really lousy job as a capstan lathe operator.

As an adult Heather goes to the doctor and is told not to worry about the present profit system and its consequences — whose is the saner point of view, the doctor's or hers? She goes to an open day at her child's school and is mildly mortified at the treatment she receives on inadvertently gatecrashing a room reserved for the bigwigs. A much different kind of place is 'The Naff Caff’, featuring cheap grub and animated (often political) conversation. Within its walls, muses Heather, 'dwells a little bit of socialism'.

Part 3 links people to situations. First, the process of joining the Socialist Party. Not an easy one. Hopefully others will react as Heather did on hearing the case for socialism for the first time: 'SPGB, where have you been all my life?' Next she tells how setting up a literature stall can good way of opening people's eyes to an alternative to capitalism, and meeting their 'human nature' and other objections. In Norwich, elsewhere, a lot of misguided youthful energy goes into 'Direct action': reclaiming the streets, cutting fences, daubing statues, setting up peace camps, guerrilla gardening, critical mass bike rides — in short, 'pissing about with capitalism'.

The later stories are more by way of personal reminiscence, though they all illustrate facets of Heather's socialist life. She puts 'Cleaning Houses', still too often regarded as women's work — in sensible proportion, while not quite going to Quentin Crisp's extreme position that after four years the dust doesn't get any thicker. In 'Ethics' Heather rejects combative and mistrustful capitalist values in favour of unspoken socialist acceptance and acknowledgement of mutual existence. And she rejects 'Ageism' and other discriminatory policies which say who shall have jobs and who shall not. Diana's death is an opportunity to reflect on 'Misplaced Admiration': an occasion for lauding the cosmetic, the contrived and the overly sentimental, rather than a better life for all. Finally, Heather attends a meeting of 'Alcoholics Anonymous' to learn how to fight the demon drink.

Part 4, Last Thoughts, contains only two stories, both written after Heather had been diagnosed as suffering from motor neurone disease. Her frustration is clear in 'Small Talk' as she becomes 'impatient with the foolishness of existence'. But optimism and humanity reassert themselves triumphantly in 'Consciousness', with Heather certain that The system will never succeed altogether in eradicating the understanding we all share of being human and needing one another.'

Included in part 5 are five stories that for one reason or another were not published in the Socialist Standard. In 'Adoption' Heather writes of her feelings about her adopted granddaughter, to be loved and cherished as all children should be. In 'Books' we are able to compare our favourite choice of reading with Heather's. 'The Car Boot Sale' shows her speculating that socialism will give us the same opportunity to give and take things without the intrusion of money. 'Vegetarianism' gives Heather the opportunity to explain how, as a child, she came to this philosophy and its consequence for eating habits. Finally, she writes of her wartime experience of evacuation as very much a mixed blessing.

Heather wrote from the heart as well as the head. For her socialism meant more than just common ownership and the absence of poverty and war, etc. Economic equality and the resolution of class conflict were only the beginning. Nowhere is this better illustrated than in 'Humankind'. And perhaps no single paragraph exemplifies the biting anger, the humour and the inspiring sense of aspiration that characterised her view of socialism:

"[in present day society] there is an erosion of everything socialism requires and capitalism despises — co-operation, self-respect, love even. I hesitate to use the word 'love' when talking about human relationships' — the suspicious sidelong glances I get sometimes make me wonder if it is thought I am advocating multiple orgasms for everyone. Love to me represents the possibility of having such good feelings about ourselves that we can afford to have them about other people too. Yet in this miserable society where money and exploitation must come first, we are discouraged from showing too much concern for one another in case this detracts from our real purpose—to provide profit and power for a minority”.

Michael Gill 

Stan Parker 

2001

Part I People

• My Father
• My Mother
• Ordinary People
• Humankind
• The Bailiffs
• Neighbours
• Passing the Time

Part II Places

• The Strike
• Truth
• Careers
• 'Uncles'
• The Office
• The Madhouse
• Whitlow And Boyle (Engineers)
• Madness
• Local Dignitaries
• The Naff Caff

Part III Situations

• Joining the Party
• The Stall
• Direct Action
• Cleaning Houses
• Ethics
• Ageism
• Misplaced Admiration
• Alcoholics Anonymous

Part IV Last Thoughts

• Small Talk
• Consciousness

Part V Unpublished

• Adoption
• Books
• The Car Boot Sale
• Vegetarianism
• Evacuation

Letter: Part of the struggle (1996)

Letter to the Editors from the June 1996 issue of the Socialist Standard

Dear Editors,

To me Colin Skelly in his letter to the April edition of the Socialist Standard reveals an almost religious zeal in his description of his efforts to resist the "temptation" to join a rally protesting about the proposed Newbury Bypass. I wonder, does he think he may have been in some way tainted by reformism had he succumbed to this "temptation”?

Surely, we are all involved in the class struggle (I know I am and have been for most of my life) whether we like it or not. Under this senseless and barbaric system of society we all have to compromise our principles every day of our lives and in fact those of us who still have a job may sometimes be faced with the prospect of industrial action. So tell me, Colin, would you avoid the "temptation” to strike along with your fellow workers for higher pay or better conditions? Would you honestly remain alone in the factory or office muttering "reformism" to yourself?

If we spent all our lives trying to avoid being involved in achieving “small, meaningless actions" then we truly risk becoming an elite and we also miss the opportunity of experiencing solidarity and comradeship with other workers. But what we most miss out on is the chance to tell other people about what we believe and why we think reformist action will not solve the problem.

To me being a Socialist means being a part of the struggle but without any illusions. If we do choose on occasion to unite with others against capitalism then we learn and grow as people. The end of capitalism is surely not some deadline that we must all sit down and wait for! Do you really believe that, Colin? Somehow that notion makes me feel very uncomfortable.

Heather Ball, 

Norwich, Norfolk

Two new pamphlets from the Socialist Party (2002)

Party News from the January 2002 issue of the Socialist Standard

Socialist Principles Explained, which explains what we mean by our object and declaration of principles (see page 18), is now available.

Send a cheque for £1.50, made payable to the Socialist Party of Great Britain, to Head Office, 52 Clapham High Street, London SW4 7UN. Tel: 020-7611 3811.

A Socialist Life is a collection of 28 published and five unpublished short stories by Socialist Standard writer Heather Ball.

It will soon be available for £3. Order from he Socialist Party of Great Britain, to Head Office, 52 Clapham High Street, London SW4 7UN. Tel: 020-7611 3811.

Letters:What about education? (1) (1999)

Letters to the Editors from the March 1999 issue of the Socialist Standard

What about education? (1)

Dear Editors,

“Where my offspring spent every day of the week being trained to serve capitalism.” So Heather Ball describes her daughter’s school in the December Socialist Standard. This recalls the words of Pik Smeet in the August issue in his article on Labour’s education policy, “a vast factory for turning out workers tuned to our masters’ requirements”.

I don’t deny that our education system has many faults, most notably the existence of private schools, but the case for socialism is strong enough to make exaggerated attacks on the system both unnecessary and off-putting for many potential socialists. Any society needs its members to have a thorough grasp of “the three R’s” plus an appreciation of history, geography, science, the arts, and so on. At present these are taught by the majority of teachers in a politically biased way. But these subjects would be required in a socialist society, or is it to consist of ignoramuses?

It would be useful to have a major article setting out positively what education would be like in a socialist society. Which subjects would be taught and how would teaching differ from that which operates now?

Bryan J. Fair, 

Dorchester, Dorset

Reply: 

We will try to publish an article on what education might be like in a socialist society. In the meantime see the letter which follows – Editors.

What about education? (2)

Dear Editors,

If Bryan Fair does not think children are being “trained for capitalism” in our schools, then what does he think they are being trained for? What about the stock market, banks, building societies, retailing—the endless sales of endless crap because the system cannot survive without it; a system which insists on showing us inane little stories (called advertisements) over and over again and again on television so as to persuade us to spend our earnings on stuff that most of us have no use for and could do without. Undeniably we need builders, doctors, scientists, teachers, and it says something about humanity that, despite the ethos of capitalism, it yet still has within it, compassion, albeit a sentiment constantly eroded by manipulation for profit.

From the moment a baby emerges from the womb (and even before that) it begins the process of learning. “Playing” is a part of that process. I cannot myself visualise a socialist society where children are regimented into education, conveyor-belt style. It is my belief that the competitive atmosphere of the classroom can make kids resentful and anxious, and those who do not, for various reasons, come up to scratch, are sometimes made to feel worthless and insignificant, whereas if their latent talents were to be encouraged to burgeon without coercion, then I can only think that this would make for a better world. What do we say to the thousands who the education system fails? I don’t imagine young people selling the Big Issue on every corner of every street in towns and cities in a socialist society, anymore than I would expect there to be homeless people. I am not blaming teachers for this. We each of us are forced to make a living whilst at the same time deal with our own sorrows and problems, but if I was a teacher I would feel it incumbent upon me to explain to my pupils how the system works, and that one day some of them may be jobless, surplus to requirement, or press-ganged into a sort of slavery in order to have food and a roof over their heads. And, is history really taught in a politically unbiased way? Think about it.

The radical educationalist, A.S. Neill, proved that most children desire to learn. His school, Summerhill, made lessons available, but voluntary. Children who wished to become engineers, doctors, teachers, etc, used their self-discipline to attend appropriate classes and many of them achieved their goals. So to me a socialist society would include places of learning without compulsion.

You say that “our education system has many faults most notably the existence of private schools”. To me that is rather like saying that the coal mines, water, and the railways should not be privatised. I don’t think it makes much difference whether they’re privatised or state-owned. As a radical socialist I no longer support reforms.

You say “it would be useful to have a major article setting out positively what education would be like in a socialist society”. We cannot predict, but this socialist, for one, has her dreams.

Heather Ball, 

Norwich

Inconsistent?

Dear Editors,

I feel the article “Pinochet and Socialism”, (Socialist Standard, December 1998) contains a familiar inconsistency as regards your view of the role of political democracy in abolishing capitalism.

The fact that the working class on the eve of socialism will be a world-wide self-conscious organised socialist majority will itself constitute a powerful material force and it is this force which is the basis of the principle that the emancipation of the working class must be the work of the working class.

How does it then follow that this movement needs to use, or should use, capitalist political democracy to abolish capitalism? Capitalist democracy is a capitalist institution created in the interests of the capitalist class to ensure a smoother running of the capitalist system. What is so special about sending a group of Socialist MPs into a parliament to declare the abolition of capitalism when the material force for actually delivering this abolition is the Mass Socialist Movement outside?

Why cannot this declaration be made by the Movement itself through its own representative democratic structures, which will have been created by the working class itself, specifically for the purpose of developing and furthering the mass movement for socialism?

I know you say using capitalist political democracy is essential in order to gain control the state. But in response to “Leninist” claims this would invite a “Pinochet style” response, you argue that the state apparatus is staffed by workers who will inevitably be won to the Mass Socialist Movement. The armed forces would in effect be a broken reed in the face of the MSM, literally generals without troops. Again, you confirm the key to effect change, to gain control of the state apparatus, is the Mass Socialist Movement, not the comparative handful of Socialist MPs sent into a Parliament.

So why the continued emphasis on the importance and need for (capitalist) political democracy to secure the transition to socialism?

The importance of a representative institution to demonstrate a majority for socialism and to ensure the abolition of capitalism is done in as peaceable and co-ordinated manner as possible is not denied. But isn’t it far preferable to use structures and tools created by the working class itself, and for itself, to achieve this more effectively?

We cannot guarantee capitalist democracy will always be available to use for the purpose yet by definition we know for sure a Mass Socialist Movement will be based on organs of working class democracy which are certain to be available to us and better fashioned for the purpose.

Andrew Northall, 

Kettering, Northants

Reply: 

You are right. Once what you call “the Mass Socialist Movement” has come into existence capitalism’s days are numbered and there is nothing supporters of capitalism can then do to stop socialism coming. Even if they were to try armed resistance they would lose and, after a period of chaos and bloodshed, socialism would still end up being established.

You are also right that, if the Mass Socialist Movement so chose, it could simply go ahead and seize power. This too would result in a period of chaos and perhaps bloodshed (it would give the opponents of socialism a perfect excuse to resist) but the end result would still be the establishment of socialism.

But what’s the inconsistency in conceding that this is theoretically possible but not advocating that it should be tried? Using existing representative and elective institutions would be the best way to proceed for the reasons you yourself mention: “to demonstrate a majority for socialism and to ensure the abolition of capitalism is done in as peaceable and co-ordinated manner as possible”.

We don’t agree either that it makes sense for the socialist movement to duplicate existing representative and elective structures. Obviously, the socialist movement will have to have its own democratic structures, but what would be the point of drawing up registers of electors, rules for nominating candidates, counting procedures, etc when these already exist for political elections? Why not use those that exist? Admittedly, new democratic structures will have to be developed at the workplace, where none exist at present, and we have always envisaged this happening through workers’ unions of one sort or another, but this does not have to be done as far as geographically-based local and national elections are concerned.

So, all in all, using existing institutions is the best option which is why we have always advocated it.—Editors.

Millennium Bug

Dear Editors,

It is no coincidence that every year many thousands are struck down with influenza in the wake of the so-called “Christmas festivities”. Having indulged in just about everything that we know is not good for us our resistance to disease is at its usual annual all-time low. Little wonder that the old ‘flu bug jumps down so many throats and hey ho! A few thousand more get their come-uppance before they have had time to put their baubles away.

The ‘flu epidemic post-Christmas 1999 promises to be the biggest ever. The Christmas binge will of course be dragged on into the 21st Century as countless millions make themselves ill while celebrating and having a “good time”, little doubt the millennium bug will strike . . . but it won’t be computers catching cold.

So why are so many people hell-bent on making themselves ill in order to “celebrate”? And what is there to celebrate? What difference will there be in the world a minute before midnight and a minute after midnight? Disregarding the millions who will have made themselves ill in the attempt to bring some joy into their hapless lives there will be no difference whatsoever. There will still be people living in cardboard boxes while others have several homes to live in. There will still be millions dying for the want of a bowl of rice while others die of obesity. There will still be one million children in this country alone being supported by others than the people who brought them into the world.

The bugs of deceit, corruption, greed, sleaze and dishonesty will continue to flourish and permeate every strand of our society and will continue to do so till the demeaning values upon which world society is based are replaced by values of a higher intrinsic worth . . . when that happens we will truly have something to celebrate.

John Phazey,

Sutton Coldfield

Letters: Super-nurses (1998)

Letters to the Editors from the November 1998 issue of the Socialist Standard

Super-nurses

Dear Editors,

Being a student nurse I had spent the day looking after nine seriously ill patients, together with a junior staff nurse and part-time nursing auxiliary. Most of the patients required help to perform the basic activities of living, some in the terminal stages of illness. Just dealing with the urinary and faecal incontinence was a full-time job,. With the best will in the world, we tried to get basic care completed and to a large degree we somehow managed, needing the ability to do three things at once. Or did we? Struggling to get basic care completed leaves no room for the so-called “holistic” approach required by the models of nursing. The gap between theory and practice is measured in light years.

After a mentally and physically exhausting day I arrive home to be told that Tony Blair is going to introduce the concept of the super nurse. The concept is flawed and ignores the real problems in the NHS. Nurses are not angels or super, just workers seeking meaningful work, doing a job that helps to care for people. a caring attitude that is exploited to get nurses to do as much as possible for as little as possible. The clinical grading system already means that a few nurses are paid higher rtes of pay than the average nurse and it is the higher grades that are now being made redundant at my present hospital, because the Hospital Trust is in the red. If any NHS Trusts can afford the super-nurse it will represent a desirable post for the few and help pit nurse against nurse in the competition of who can achieve the most unpaid overtime or least amount of sickness.

The UKCC code of conduct for nurses requires that they serve the interests of society, to do this nurses need socialism not super status.

M.T., 

Wessex

 

Nothing but the truth

Dear Editors,

Herewith is a short piece which I wrote when serving with the West Midlands Police in the early 80s. I have been prompted to send it to you as the result of reading the short story by Heather Ball in September’s issue of the Socialist Standard.

It was whilst serving with the police that I came to the conclusion that it is the values upon which society is based which creates world-wide dishonesty. The world revolves on dishonesty.

Before giving evidence at any judicial proceedings it is practice to take the Oath or make a sworn affirmation, thereby promising to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth in the name of God, Allah or any other mystical omnipotence that you have been conditioned to have faith in. a sworn affirmation amounts to much the same thing except that the “almighty” is not brought into it.

Having completed this solemn and apparently sincere ritual all that remains to be done, so you might think, is to relate your evidence to the Court as honestly as you can recall . . . but, it doesn’t end there. Having given evidence the witness is then invariably subjected to a verbal flailing form a highly trained advocate with the sole purpose of proving that the witness has, wholly or in part, told anything but the truth. This so called cross-examination has the full backing of the Court and effectively reduces the value of the Oath/affirmation to something akin to the scribblings to be found in most public toilets.

Regardless of any promise to tell the truth the fact remains that the honesty of a witness is not enhanced one jot in the eyes of the Court by taking the Oath. If any value at all was placed on this ritual then there would be no need for the demeaning Court scenes where highly educated and articulate lawyers seek to prove that some hapless (though possibly truthful) witness is telling porkies.

If you or I should be so naïve as to believe that all witnesses, some witnesses or just a few witnesses tell the truth or, are expected to tell the truth, despite having taken the Oath/affirmation, then the procedure in our Courts confirm beyond all reasonable doubt that such a belief is just wishful thinking. So why take the Oath? It certainly doesn’t do anything to elicit the truth and what is more no one expects it to . . . and so the Oath/affirmation is without value and meaningless. Additionally it reduces any concept you might have of God to something less than a scab on a donkey’s ear and the holy scripture might just as well be a pile of second-hand comics.

John Phazey, 

Sutton Coldfield

 

Goldwater

Dear Editors,

Dave Alton (September Socialist Standard) was far too lenient to Barry Goldwater.

In the first place, the word “libertarian” is a gross misnomer for those who advocate capitalism without a welfare state or government intervention in the economy, and we should not use it uncritically. What they actually stand for is slavery—wage slavery. As Dave says, “there can be no liberty to defend until humanity is liberated from capitalism”.

Secondly, Dave claims that Goldwater’s opposition to welfare spending involved “detesting the concept of people becoming dependent upon the state”. Leaving aside the point that most capitalist who spout this stuff are more than happy to accept state subsidies for themselves when they’re available, the fact is that such campaigns are basically designed to cut taxes and so keep up profits. Goldwater of course wasn't opposed to workers being dependent on selling their labour power.

Paul Bennett, 

Manchester

Truth (1998)

A Short Story from the September 1998 issue of the Socialist Standard

It sometimes seems to me that most of my life has been spent in conflict with other human beings, and I have recently come to the conclusion that this is not a desirable situation, in fact it can be acutely uncomfortable and so lonely that I once forswore the battle and went around for at least a month wearing a beatific smile on my face and dodging anything I perceived to be potentially controversial. Eventually of course I came to my senses and relapsed into being the argumentative, intolerant woman I really am.

I don’t think it’s genetic. It first happened when I discovered that there was something very wrong with the world. I think the seeds were sown early when my father talked about politics, but there was a time too, when at school I realised that some adults were so stupid that I was tempted to spend as much time as possible disagreeing with what they said. It all began when our class was asked to write an essay called “My likes and dislikes”. My essay was contentious enough but there was a girl in my class called Dorcas (her real name and how could anyone forget a name like that?) who wrote that she disliked lessons at school in general and nearly all the teachers, though fortunately for her she didn’t name names. My essay was read aloud to the class and the listeners either sneered or smiled indulgently but when Dorcas’s essay was read (as an example of how not to write) I was overcome with admiration for her. A mouselike girl, she sat at the back of the class and I had seldom given her a moment’s thought but when I heard her essay I glanced at her and noticed she wore a halo round her head. She was so forceful in what she had to say that I reeled under the power of it, as did the teachers only for different reasons. Poor Dorcas, she was castigated. Oh, so she didn’t like school, they said. So who did she think she was daring to undermine the work of so many good people who strove each day to knock some sense into her thick head? So this was gratitude-people were endeavouring to educate her and yet she had the nerve to say she didn’t like them, didn’t like school. What impertinence. And so on . . . Dorcas who had appeared to be relatively serene while her essay was being read went suddenly white and squirmed, then slumped back in her seat looking utterly dejected. My contempt for adults in general began thus. They didn’t want the truth. They preferred sycophantic little toads.

From that day my conviction grew that people, on the whole, do prefer other people to be nice and agreeable. It makes life so much easier when there is no confrontation. This way we can withdraw into our own little world of safety, secure in the knowledge that we are right. We must be, no-one else disagrees with us. I sometimes think that the biggest compliment we can pay another person is to tell them what we think of as the truth. As long as we don’t overdo it. We all know that truth is not necessarily objective, but there comes a time when to say to someone that “No, I do not share your adoration of the Royal Family”, or “Yes, I am aware of what the suffragettes did for me but I don’t want the vote, thank you”, is recognising that they are worthy of your honesty, and, if it makes them unhappy then you were also made unhappy in the first place listening to their crap beliefs.

Being a socialist always means seeing things from a different perspective, and it also means, if we are forthright, that we must at some time or other upset other people. My family are always telling me that confrontation is often pointless, but while agreeing with them one day, I’m off the next day confronting somebody else.

So I don’t find it at all easy to be nice, and, anyway, when was life ever easy for socialists? We see a world organised in such a way that it offends us and we seek to change it. In the process we challenge other people and so they feel like the teachers who hated Dorcas’s truth. I think of Dorcas from time to time and hope she didn’t draw her head back into her shell after the verbal whacking she got from the fearers of truth. I hope she’s still out there somewhere trying to tell the truth, and I hope it isn’t as painful for here as it sometimes is for me. What about you?

Heather Ball

The Stall (1998)

A Short Story from the January 1998 issue of the Socialist Standard

On Saturday 1 November an Alternative Politics Fair was held in Norwich and three of us decided to go along for the day to run a couple of stalls. We set the stalls side-by-side with one section piled high with copies of the Socialist Standard, including some free back numbers, and the other with literature, books, pamphlets, and leaflets of a radical nature.

Norwich (for those of you who have never visited it) is a colourful and cosmopolitan little city and political people know one another, either by sight, shared experience or reputation, so as we gathered in the auditorium of the Norwich Arts Centre there was no lack of co-operation between stall-holders as stalls were set up and boxes were carried into the hall. A general atmosphere of camaraderie reigned and some curiosity shown for other stalls. The Anarcho Syndicalists were there, a Disabled Rights Group, Friends of the Earth, Black Womens Rights, Ethical Investments—don’t ask me, I was told it was to do with investing ethically which is much as I thought. At ten thirty we opened to the public and waited for the surge.

The surge did not come and there were no hordes but there was a steady trickle and people did look round and some left laden with books and leaflets. Interest was shown in the Socialist Party stall and explanations required as to our political colour. We had to refute that we were anything to do with Militant Tendency, Socialist Workers, the Independent Labour Party or Arthur Scargill. Helpful discussion ensued from this but the idea of a system without the use of money was usually greeted with smiles of disbelief and some people said it would be very nice but . . .

The main problem for people seemed to be “human nature”. Fortunately the Socialist Party’s leaflet on the human nature question was included in packs of leaflets and Socialist Standards and handed to everyone who came to the stalls.There were the usual arguments. People would not work if food and shelter did not have to be struggled for. There would always be people who would grab more than others. We have to have leaders to represent us. Some people are bone idle and would live off the backs of those who worked harder. We endeavoured to deal with these arguments as they cropped up, but I have always found when talking to people about the abolition of money that they are, on the whole, not comfortable with the idea, seeing themselves as perhaps bereft without cheque books, wallets and purses to carry about with them. There is a general ignorance about the part money plays and a belief that it is money that is valuable and not the goods which are produced by people's labour. In fact I suspected that in the minds of some people money had been raised to that of almost supernatural status.

October's Socialist Standard was snapped up, the illustration on the front cover about Class War spotted immediately. We were asked what had happened to them. People agreed that in theory Class War s aggression had been unacceptable, but glints in the eyes of people told me that they found it exciting and satisfying, in some way responding to anger and frustration about the capitalist system. I found no-one to support anything the Labour government is doing and no-one who expected it to do anything other than it has done since it came to power.

It was a good day and Alistair sold many books on his stall, but disappointing to find that reformism is still depended on and money is still seen as the best means of exchange apart from perhaps the LETS system and bartering. A little sadly, I think, we packed our literature away and dismantled the stalls until the next time.

Heather Ball

Obituary: John Ball (2005)

Obituary from the April 2005 issue of the Socialist Standard 

John was someone I first came across in the early 90s in Norwich along with Heather prior to us all being properly acquainted with the Socialist Party. Our enthusiasm for responsible anti-authoritarian values and the politics of a world so different from this one, along with the reasonably close proximity of our houses helped to create a lasting bond and friendship.

John was born in Plumstead, in London, is 1932 and worked for most of his working life as an electrician. He was a warm and generous person, very down to earth who would call a spade a spade; at the same time he could be very understanding with people he got close to whose conclusions may have been  different from his own, seeing the basis of those conclusions as a possible connection to build on. He was well-read and enjoyed connecting with people of all ages and backgrounds and had a penchant for helping the underdog sometimes to the detriment of his health. He was a vegan, painted in oils, and loved upbeat music and dancing.

Towards the end of his life John would say that he felt ever more convinced that the Party’s sole pursuit of socialism and not reformism was the correct and only practical solution to the ongoing problems that a capitalist world is always throwing up. He recognised the importance of humour, connected to a  constructive politics and philosophy in contrast to the sober authoritarian politics of the Left he was always falling foul of in the earlier period of his life (he had been in the Communist Party, which he left in 1957, and then in the Trotskyist SLL, from which he was expelled in 1960).

John died in February. I’m sure his way of being would and did affect positively many people he had come across throughout his life.

Stair

Careers (1999)

A Short Story from the February 1999 issue of the Socialist Standard

During the 1940s schools had the equivalent of what I suppose today would be called “careers” officers. Three people (it was usually three) would visit a school and pupils of fourteen and fifteen would be called in, one-by-one, for an interview about their job prospects. The interview took place with a head teacher present and was, at least in my own experience, a scanty and one-sided affair. It should be borne in mind that this was 1949 just four years after the end of the second world war and there was a serious shortage of labour. The resultant devastation wreaked by the Blitz called for massive re-building, but the thousands slaughtered both at home and abroad meant that jobs were plentiful but at very low wages in most cases.

In those days (and I suspect the situation is still prevalent today despite mass unemployment) poor families viewed their offspring’s school-leaving as a time when perhaps a little more money would be brought into the house to help alleviate hardship. The word “career” did not come into the thinking of people who spent a major part of their existence wondering where the next meal was coming from. And as far as I know not one child went from my school to either Grammar school or to a university. As for me, I was aware that, like my brothers before me, I would one day quit school and be expected to do something to contribute to household funds, but what that “something” was going to be was a thought I had never entertained. I think I fondly imagined that once freed from dreary old school I would spend joyous hours reading and writing or tearing round streets on the clapped-out old bike a neighbour had passed on to me. And I was encouraged in this self-deception simply because no-one at home had thought to discuss with me how I was going to earn a living, though once my father had remarked that he would not want to see me end up at Tate & Lyle’s, the sugar factory on the other side of the Thames.

I remember my career interview with as much clarity as though it was yesterday. Hauled in from the playground where I had been taking part in a game of net-ball, sweaty and dishevelled, I entered a room where four people, one woman, two men and the headmaster, sat round a table and eyed me suspiciously. But without looking at me the woman asked “What are you going to do when you leave school?” Without a moment’s hesitation I told her “I am going to write, Miss”. There was a stunned silence. I knew by the smiles of disbelief on the faces of those present that I had voiced a preposterous idea. The headmaster cleared his throat. “Heather writes very competent essays and poetry and edits the school magazine, but her other subjects are weak, particularly her maths. She could never earn her living as a writer.” I keenly felt the injustice of this statement. I had never said that I wished to earn my living as a writer. I had been asked what I was going to do when I left school and had answered in all honesty that I was going to write.

The woman said, still avoiding looking at me directly (I noticed that nobody looked at me or even addressed their remarks to me; they spoke only to each other) “What about an office job?” The headmaster stroked his chin. “Yes,” he said, “we had given that some consideration.” I wondered who had given that “some consideration” because it certainly wasn’t me. Then one of the men consulted his notes. “You could get a job in a shop,” he told me. Well, he didn’t actually tell me, he told the others. The second man ventured another splendid proposal. “What about a factory?” I was beginning to feel that eventually someone would come up with the bright idea of suggesting sending me up chimneys like poor Tom in The Water Babies.

I was gazing out of the window as they talked among themselves. I heard murmurs of “Pleasing appearance” and “Nicely spoken”. How could they tell? I had spoken only six words since I had entered the room.

The rest of that interview has always remained rather hazy for me. When I left that room depression descended heavily upon me. I saw, in my mind’s eye, years and years of office, shop and factory work stretching out before me. The attitude of those people, helpful though they may have thought they were being, had instilled in me the notion that I really wasn’t up to much, that I was in some way deficient. Now I know what is meant by a self-fulfilling prophecy. If children are told they cannot do this or that, then the chances are that they never will. To me education means always starting with the premise that kids are unique and social little beings, that they can do anything. But if they are treated as I was, only as fodder for a capitalist system, then in all probability they will become unhappy adults doing work that in their hearts they despise. That is what happened to me.

Heather Ball

Obituary: Heather Ball (2000)

Obituary from the December 2000 issue of the Socialist Standard

Readers of her regular column will be saddened to hear of the death of Heather Ball last month. As they will have gathered from her recent articles, she had come to suffer from a degenerative disease which increasingly disabled her.

Heather was born in 1933 and brought up in London to where her father had moved from Scotland and before reaching pension age had worked in the various kinds of factory, office and cleaning jobs that was often the only choice for working class women of her generation. Her father was a member of the Communist Party and she was brought up to join first the YCL and then the party itself. However, she was one of the many who left after 1956 following Khrushchev’s secret speech about Stalin and the Hungarian uprising. She joined the Trotskyist Socialist Labour League—a case of out of the frying pan into the fire—from which she was expelled in 1960. This put her off vanguardist politics for good and she became active in the peace movement in East Anglia to where she and her family had moved. In 1994, tiring of single-issue politics too, she joined the Socialist Party. She was active in our Norwich Group and of course as a writer of a regular column in the Socialist Standard which many readers liked as a contrast to the other, more overtly political articles.

We extend our sympathy to her husband John, also a member, and family.

Ethics (1999)

A Short Story from the January 1999 issue of the Socialist Standard

As a socialist I have always found myself slipping quite naturally into what I think of as “ethical” behaviour when dealing with other human beings and life generally. I don’t make my ethics up as I go along; they are more to do with an insecurity in me which says I desperately need people to be decent to me and that requires me to be decent to them. It has nothing to do with any religious creed on my part, nor is it an attempt to exhibit a smug do-goodism. It is more a need to survive a system which teaches us to “Do others down the way you would expect them to do you down” and another one of those commandments I shall disobey with relish whenever I get the opportunity.

An article, “The Car” by G.T. in last March’s issue of the Socialist Standard illustrates this to some measure. G.T. sells his car knowing fully well that it is dodgy, but is oddly relieved when the people he sells it to do him out of a hundred quid when they hand over the envelope with the money in it. He says “I was initially relieved as if the lack of honesty on their side somehow reduced the guilt on ours.” He admits that he later felt depressed every time he thought about it. And I’m not surprised. Who wouldn’t?

Ethics are not easy to practice daily. I mean you can’t get out of bed and do an hour of them like you can yoga or Chinese exercises and immediately feel the benefit of them. The social mess we live in reminds us to look constantly to our own survival and we have to work hard at that. In my book though, this does not give us carte-blanche to cheat others or to turn a deaf ear when sympathy and understanding are called for. It means trying to be a psychologist and applying this to the way we live—which is what most of us do all the time anyway.

For example I live in one of a row of terraced houses, all stuck together, cheek-by-jowl, the walls so thin that even the turning on of a light switch by someone next door can sound like the faint crack of a whip. I can hear my next door neighbour sneezing, sighing and belching, and a quarrel between he and his spouse can send me scuttling to a part of the house where I hope I won’t be able to hear them. Yet these very same neighbours would not dream of disturbing my peace with very loud music or of turning up the volume of the television to an uncomfortable (for me) pitch. This is because they are on the whole decent people but more to the point they know that if I wished to I could retaliate and so we share an interest in keeping the peace. There is in this arrangement an unspoken acceptance, an acknowledgement of mutual existence. The basis for socialism.

But there is another example. For some reason (probably to do with the ethos of capitalism) there are those people who view another’s ethics as some kind of dreadful weakness and exploit it. They are those obsessed with their own existence. The system has taught them that the individual (to the cost of all other individuals) is the most important and so to them behaving in an ethical way is what someone else does. The other person is often the listener, the helper, the provider, the sympathiser. Then they look into another’s eyes they see nothing but their own reflection. They seldom see that another human life has its heartaches and problems. They are the same people who never seem to buy a round of drinks in a pub when it is their turn. Their pocket or purse always contains a twenty pound note and they don’t wish to break into it. Such mean-spiritedness! Money, plus self-obsession has become their God and it is a God we could all do without.

Once when offering a homeless person a small amount of money I was told by a well-heeled acquaintance of mine “I had to make my own way in life. Why can’t they?” It is precisely this kind of attitude that helps to promote capitalism. It is a deeply-engrained notion that we can all get along without each other. We can’t and we don’t and our lives would be a good deal happier if we all realised that. The influence of the capitalist system has ensured that many do not yet understand the necessity for the working class to free itself from slavery. It is a slavery not only of the body but of the mind too and that must be the worst enslavement of all.

Heather Ball

The Madhouse (1995)

A Short Story from the July 1995 issue of the Socialist Standard

Everyone (or nearly everyone) agreed that Mr Thomas was getting a well-deserved holiday — but how on earth would they all cope without him . . . . ?

Josie told me the news when she came upstairs to help me with the beds. Mr Thomas, the owner, was going to the Bahamas for a month's holiday and the staff were in a ferment over it. How would they manage without him? Whom would they turn to in a crisis? We worked quickly while we talked, dragging the sheets off the beds, replacing them with clean ones, washing up the tea trays, scouring the baths, making sure the pubic hairs escaped down the plug holes, vacuuming the carpels, cleaning the mirrors. Josie was a trifle breathless because she had been serving breakfasts in the dining hall since seven.

I dared to suggest that the staff would run the hotel in exactly the same way as they did when Mr Thomas was here, but Josie saw this as a criticism of Mr T. Her mum had told her that she should be grateful to him for giving her the opportunity to work, that he had brought jobs to the tiny market town of Stoppham and that it was kind of him to do this

Josie asked me if I remembered the time that Cook was off with her leg. Chef, under pressure with all the extra work, had thrown a joint of meat at one of the waiters (followed by the carving knife) and Karen, the washer-upper, had offered to rescue it from the grimy floor and give it a rinse, but Chef, still in a rage, had declared that he didn't give a toss and insisted on serving it up to the customers with bits of hair and fluff clinging to it, so the waiters didn't get any tips that day. And there was that Sunday morning (a time when Mr T. was absent) when a guest had asked Flora, a chambermaid, to take a photograph of him with his camera. The problem was that he had just that minute emerged from the bath and had a towel around his waist, and how was Flora to know that he would let the towel drop as soon as she aimed the shot. Result: A tearful young woman sobbing that she sometimes wondered if it was all worth it for under two quid an hour.

I remarked to Josie that we could all do with a month off instead of having to take a week here and a week there, never feeling any benefit from a few days away from The Madhouse. Josie was silent for a few moments as she scrubbed the loo seat with the washing-up cloth. “Well, I think Mr T. needs a complete rest. I mean, he does have the responsibility of everything!” She dumped the dishcloth back into the basin with the cups and saucers and squirted in about half-a-gallon of washing-up liquid. “He’s good really. D’you remember that time I smashed a television screen? He didn’t dock it out of my wages or anything.” I reminded her that he had actually said that he would and she had worried about it for weeks and, in any case, if he had docked the amount she wouldn't have had any wages for months. Rather like the time I went into work with the 'flu and he looked at me kindly and said “Heather, I don’t like to see you looking so ill’’, so I took the rest of the day off and he didn't pay me for it.

Josie was eternally sympathetic over Mr T's finances. She said we shouldn’t get paid if we weren't there to do the work. “There’s no sentiment in business, is there?” I suggested that without us he wouldn't have a business. Josie’s eyes widened. “He doesn't need us, he could get plenty of other people to do the work. It’s a good thing there are people like him prepared to take risks with their money, making work for the likes of us ”

“Let’s have a tea break,” I said We each sat down on a comfortable plush chair and swung our feet onto the bed, a fag in one hand and a cup of tea in the other. It was a hot day and we were both sweating profusely, perspiration trickling from our armpits, leaving soggy patches on our ugly, nylon overalls. I said suddenly, “What about if the wages system was abolished and everyone agreed to co- operate, working for perhaps a couple of hours a day, everybody doing what they're capable of.” Josie was aghast. “Me work for nothing. No bloody fear.” I had to say it: “You already do . . . for next to nothing!”

In the days that followed the workload at The Madhouse increased and tempers got shorter. The Trainee Manager began to see his boss's absence as a good opportunity to relax a little, so he infuriated the staff by strolling around in his best suit with his hands in his pockets. Chef gnashed his teeth and muttered curses under his breath as he chopped the steaks. Yvette, the kitchen maid, had a heavy cold and was severely admonished for sneezing on the sandwiches she was preparing, while Karen, the washer-upper, cast off her rubber gloves and gave in her notice. But Cook was heard to say “Good luck to Mr T.—if anyone deserves a holiday, he does.”

I heard all this from Josie when she came up to help me with the bedrooms. “I’m glad to get out of it,” she told me, and just think while all this is going on old Thomas is lying on a tropical beach sunning himself.” My comment was that she'd obviously changed her tune. Josie pouted, “Well, I’ve been thinking about that week I took in Yarmouth when it rained every day.”

Changed her mind
But gradually the tensions eased. Oh, the workload was just as heavy but the staff became used to Mr T. being away. I heard that some people even cherished thoughts of him never coming back. And I came into Reception one morning and heard voices raised in song coming from the kitchen. 1 thought, they wouldn't have done that if Mr T. had been there. Karen had changed her mind about leaving because Chef had been instrumental in getting the washing-up machine repaired. (Mr T. had been dragging his feet over that for some time ) Yvette had been told to go home and nurse her bad cold but returned to work the next day looking quite cheerful and the Trainee Manager was persuaded to pay her for the day she was absent.

"The thing is," Josie told me as we checked through the laundry list, "the work goes much more smoothly in the kitchen when there isn't anyone there to spy on us. and old Thomas is always popping up and interfering with everything. He gets on Cook's nerves, she’s been here for thirty years and yet he still tries to tell her what to do.” "And," she added, “I know they all sound as if they hate each other but you know some of them have worked together for years and they’ve got a sort of understanding, if you see what I mean. " I did.

Mr T came back from the Bahamas looking very sun-tanned. He went into the kitchen and beamed at the members of staff. I think he was somewhat surprised because the greeting he got wasn't quite what he expected. It’s true everybody said "Good morning” and, as usual, Chef consulted with him over the day’s menu, but on the whole people had rather forgotten him. Though to be honest I was disappointed to hear Cook say, "Well, I must say, Mr T. looks a treat, the rest has done him good.”

Heather Ball

On The Box (1998)

TV Review from the October 1998 issue of the Socialist Standard

Last Friday I found myself in a television studio feeling unable to take part in what was going around me without wanting to throw up. I am seldom at a loss for words, but I am struggling now to describe this programme with any degree of objectivity or enthusiasm. I wouldn't know whether to call it a game show or a quiz show. And I am still not quite sure what the point of it was. True the information I had received on it had not endeared it to me long before I was due to take my place, along with three other socialists, in the studio audience. I rarely watch programmes of this ilk. A woman representing the Audience Research Unit had promised me we would be involved in a lively debate. Now I think I could be forgiven for believing this might lead to an opportunity to voice ideas sympathetic to socialist thinking. I didn't know then that the studio audience had been—how can I put it? — manipulated.

We arrived at the television centre several hours before the programme was due to go out, whereupon we were ushered upstairs, along corridors, round corners until we finally reached a place called "hospitality", but which looked like a works canteen. We were invited to help ourselves to tea and coffee. I jokingly asked if we got a glass of wine. Sharon from the Audience Research Unit told me "We can't run to that." I bet they "ran to it" for the guest celebrities. Someone called out names from a list and about six people marched off to another part of the building. The same people turned up later, already in place in the studio, and did most of the talking once the programme had got underway. And I had thought it was going to be a free for all. What naivete on my part; but this was my first time ever on television. Of course this did not necessarily mean we could not voice our opinions, but what it did mean to us was that having once discovered that people had been previously singled out for their contribution, and having realised also that the programme was tasteless and a load of rubbish to boot, we became hard put not to sit in the front row of the studio audience with arms folded and wearing, each of us, expressions of doom. It was so awful.

This is what was on offer. A panel of three celebrities (one of them describing herself as a "socialist anarchist" in some information handed out to us), a studio audience taken from a cross-section of the public, a well-known name to "host" the programme, and a chair reminiscent of the Mastermind hot seat. Three people in the news that week had been asked along to occupy the chair, one at a time. Each member of the panel would ask questions of the newsworthy guest with the intention, I think, of making him squirm. The audience got its turn, but the people who had been primed beforehand spoke first and had the most to say. Anyone lucky enough to get in after that was often cut short so that the next chair guest could be introduced. But not before we had voted. We were asked to hold up a card with an H on one side and a V on the other. H for hero, V for villain. Such responsibility! We three didn't bother, except that I did vote once in an attempt to look as though I was joining in. Debate was very limited before we were expected to make that all-important decision as to whether the chair guest was a hero or a villain. One contestant for the chair was the landlord of a pub who had incurred local disapproval for wishing to employ male strippers on his premises. The host went to town on this one with a line in jokes and puns on male genitalia, the kind of which I had given up laughing at when I was thirteen years old, and I didn't laugh much then either. "Turkey's giblets" was one of the expressions used. It was all so pathetic that my fellow-socialists and I looked at our watches and yawned. It was going to be some time before we could repair to the pub.

It is no wonder that when the programme went out the cameras seemed to have missed the three of us. We could be seen as three blurred images. It was obvious that someone in authority had given us the thumbs down. What self-respecting producer, concerned for his ratings, is going to allow shots to be taken of three people who look as though they are taking part in a mass suicide? What a relief. Who wants acquaintances coming up to them in the street the next day saying "I saw you on telly last night" when in reality that turned out to be the last place they ever wanted to be. And talking of reality-that little square box in the corner of our living room is not reality whatever else anyone thinks it is. Even members of the celebrity panel looked bored and lethargic and they were getting paid. Since we live in a world where money is the name of the game then perhaps audiences should be paid too. Not that a freebie could ever be any inducement for me to take part in such tripe.

Heather Ball

Alcoholics Anonymous (1999)

A Short Story from the September 1999 issue of the Socialist Standard

Idly browsing through a magazine not so long ago I came across a questionnaire on people's drinking habits. The questionnaire, which was headed "Are You An Alcoholic?" suggested that anyone answering with a total of five "yes's" out of twelve questions had a proclivity towards alcoholism. I was stunned to discover that my score was eight. Alcoholics Anonymous here I come, I thought.

Several days later I took stock and reflected that in all seriousness I could hardly believe myself to be a true alcoholic. I could, by a sheer effort of will, abstain from drinking for weeks at a time, though I was honest enough with myself to own up to the fact that as soon as I resumed the habit I seemed to be making an unconscious effort to make up for lost time. The questionnaire advised that this was not good news. It pointed to bingeing, it said. I made enquiries about the next meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous and took myself along.

On the night if I thought I would be entering a room occupied by red-nosed, broken-veined down-and-outs, carefully concealing their hip flasks and uttering in slurred voices, then I was certainly in error. I am not sure that I did think that, but still my expectations were such that I imagined alcoholics not to be "normal" people going about their daily lives just like everybody else. A couple of people introduced themselves to me and I was offered a cup of tea. I heard friendly banter being exchanged between those who were regulars and knew each other. About twenty people had gathered, their ages ranging between twenty-five and sixty. (Later I was to learn that a few of the older people hadn't "touched a drop" for ten to fifteen years.) We stood round a large table, linked hands and in unison (except for me; I didn't know the words) recited a kind of litany, which talked about life and what our attitude should be to it—presumably to contribute to keeping us sober. What I remember most about the litany was a phrase which said we should learn to "accept that which we cannot change". My hackles were up. I found that idea too fatalistic, believing that most things can be changed, apart from the fact of death, that is. Then we sat down and the meeting began.

People who felt moved to speak gave their case histories—all in matter-of-fact tones, rather as though they were relating an assortment of experiences common to us all, events likely to overtake most people during a lifetime. Marriages and partnerships had come to an end because all money coming into the house had been, either surreptitiously or openly, squandered on booze. Some people had lost their houses, businesses and jobs, their careers, the love of their spouses and children. A few of those present had spent nights on park benches often landing up in hospital to be dried out. Some were not regular drinkers but were now and then compelled to go out on nights of carousing, seeking asylum in pubs and in the company of other drinkers, consoling themselves and each other in their addiction.

Sitting amidst all this tragedy, endless cups of tea and overflowing ashtrays, I stayed silent but tearful. One thought, however, persisted in my mind and I knew I should be ashamed of it; it was that if we could all have a cosy drink together then we would, at least temporarily, be able to forget all our misery. It was fortunate indeed that what little wisdom I had prevented me from voicing this absurd, and somewhat revealing, notion.

Some alcoholics had sought refuge in religion, others in a simmering hatred of the social system under which we live. "I couldn't get a job" was one refrain. "I felt the world was a cruel place and there was very little compassion in it" was another. Politicians failed people and so did religion and much of what happened in our social order appeared not to make sense.

As a socialist I recognised what had sustained me over the years (as well as frustrating me and causing me enough rage to find me reaching for the bottle on occasion). I understood something about social alienation and if I had not been so overcome with emotion at the sad stories I heard that night, then maybe I would have told my own story, of years of reading and learning to analysis, at least to some extent, the capitalist system and the effect it can have on people's lives. If the propensity for alcohol is innate (and that is debatable) then the profit system, the National Lottery with its appeal to selfishness and greed, this grab-all environment against which we are expected to function, will always be a hindrance to the cure of sensitive people who bend under the strain of so much social tension.

I never returned to Alcoholics Anonymous, though I did kick alcohol for seven months. The truth is that I lacked the courage to re-visit the place where I had listened to so many harrowing stories . . . and so many heroic struggles with the demon drink.

Heather Ball

The Office (1996)

A Short Story from the August 1996 issue of the Socialist Standard

Soon after leaving school I worked for a short time in an office. One climbed a rickety staircase, opened a door and entered a world where very strange people dwelt. Mrs Badcombe the wages clerk, Mr Willis the accountant and Pamela the typist.

All day Pamela bashed away at her typewriter, clackety-clack, brown wage envelopes and Mr Willis had his own fountain pen and studied lists and ticked them and sometimes went to the other department upstairs and then came back and started to study lists and tick them again.

And me? I sat at a desk in Reception and filed mysterious items away under the wrong headings and worked the switchboard and got too friendly with the customers who often rang with their enquiries. Truth to tell I was only too pleased to find someone to talk to in that odd little place where SILENCE boomed out alongside the clackety-clack of Pamela’s machine, and if the people I chose to exchange words with were the firm's clients then it had never occurred to me that they were anything more than people, so that a little chat about some topic of the day seemed innocent enough.

Mr. Chubb the manager also dwelt there . . .  in another little office where Manager was writ large on his door. He invited me in one day to discuss my “behaviour”. I wasn’t ladylike, he told me. I had a very unpleasant habit of clattering up and down the stairs. My jocular way of dealing with clients on the phone was not to be borne, he told me. My mode of filing was unacceptable. But my worst sin by far was that I encouraged Mrs Wilson, the office cleaner, to talk about her ailments and in particular her recent hysterectomy; not befitting a place of business, he told me.

I struggled to be ladylike, ever uncertain of what exactly that entailed. I avoided asking Mrs Wilson about her operation and so, normally a cheerful soul, she went about her business sulking and I no longer got a mug of cocoa at tea-break. But my filing improved and I was given letters to type. (I had begun attending a Commercial College in the evenings at my own expense.) I even answered the phone in a more business-like way and put calls through to the other department immediately instead of detaining the clients to gossip. In fact I was becoming just like the others and was worried about it.

One day I did a thing deemed to be more unforgivable than anything I had done to date. I referred to the boss Mr Len Carter as "Len”. “One thing you will have to learn,” said Mr Chubb,” . . . is that your superiors are never called by their first names.” Niggled at the distinction I retorted that I thought people were only "superior” by sheer virtue of the fact they possessed more money, more power or both. This remark brought on a silence that disturbed me by its intensity as Mr Chubb regarded me with contempt. “I wonder,” he said softly. “1 wonder if Mr Leonard Carter realises he is employing a communist.”

I did not settle easily into my new role as a communist, indeed I felt that it had been thrust upon me. Office colleagues eyed me suspiciously and as time went by I grew withdrawn. I made typing errors and everybody complained about the tea I made on Mrs Wilson’s days off.

Then one Friday I opened my wage packet, emptied it out onto my desk and found an extra threepenny piece amidst the cash. I must tell you that it never for one second occurred to return it to the wages clerk. My wage was paltry as it was and because I was a naive sixteen-year- old I really believed I had been awarded a pay-rise. I was foolish enough to entertain the notion that my new-found industrious ness had been noted and rewarded. That was until Mr Chubb emerged from his office.

“Miss Tweedie,” he asked. “Did you find a threepenny piece in your wage packet?” When I nodded his lip curled. "Then may I ask why it has not been returned to the Company?”

I tried to explain. I quickly realised that there was no indication of a pay-rise on my payslip. I felt confused but in no way guilty. Mr Chubb extended his hand, palm upwards, “Come on, give it back, it’s not your property.” He returned to his office and I knew I had been tested and found wanting. Now not only was I a communist but a thief too.

I found myself another job and left L.E. Carter. Mr Chubb said he hoped my future employer would find me satisfactory but he very much doubted it.

For the last time I went down the rickety staircase making as much clatter as I could. But a year in that strange place had done something to my perception of the world. I no longer believed it was wise to speak honestly or to be friendly and outgoing. As a commodity in the workplace I had failed miserably. I was too young then to realise that the workplace had failed me!

Heather Ball