Sting in the Tail: The common factor (1994)

The Sting in the Tail column from the November 1994 issue of the Socialist Standard

The common factor

Following the Estonia tragedy:

"Swedish and Finnish ferry lines admitted hushing-up six serious incidents which preceded the Estonia’s sinking ” (Teletext 30 September).

These roll-on roll-off ferries are liable to capsize when even a relatively small amount of water enters the vehicle decks, yet Alan Clark, ex-Tory MP, said on Question Time (29 September) that marine architects can quite easily design ships which prevent this, but, with touching concern for human life asked “would this really be worth all the expense and inconvenience?”

And this is what it is all about:

“The economic reason why vehicle decks are not subdivided to prevent rapid capsize is that this would obstruct bailing, increase turnaround times and reduce the number of cars or lorries a ship should carry. That would mean higher fares, lower profits, or both — and at a time, so far as British operators are concerned, when ferries are facing fresh competition from the Channel tunnel” (Guardian 24 September).

Every disaster which comes along, be it Piper Alpha, the King's Cross Underground fire, the train crash at Clapham Junction or the Herald of Free Enterprise, provides evidence aplenty that capitalism’s remorseless drive to cut costs at the expense of safety is the prime cause of them all.

Healthy profits

Today’s economic climate has seen many employers cut the wages and conditions and increase the workload of their employees.

This often leads to the deterioration of the physical and mental health of the workers involved, but some other employers recognise that this approach is counter-productive and are concerned to protect and even improve the health and well-being of their employees.

Companies such as Grand Met, Glaxo. Sainsbury, Marks and Spencer, IBM and Nestle are participating in the Wellness Forum which promotes preventative health care by health screening along with weight control, anti-smoking and anti-alcohol abuse programmes.

There are sound commercial reasons behind this. A spokesman for the Institute of Personnel and Development told the Independent:

“Employers in their own interests have got to maximise the use of people at work as far as they can. Absenteeism is very expensive ” (9 September).

This absenteeism is estimated by the CBI to cost £13 billion a year, and the Independent adds that the Forum has “a belief in the correlation between a healthy workforce and healthy profits”.

Looking after the goose that lays the golden eggs always made more sense than killing it.

YC’s get KO’d

A new book True Blues, claims that Tory Party membership has slumped from 2.8 million in 1952 to below 500,000 now and is still falling.

Feeling better? Well, there’s more good news, because the Young Conservatives are set for the chop. And no wonder. Having been taken over by the “radical right” in much the same way as Labour's youth wing was by Trotskyists, the YC’s have long been a thorn in the side of the parent party.

There were well-publicised links with the BNP and other racists groups, support for apartheid, jokes about the Holocaust, vicious faction fighting and lots of hooliganism From a peak of 100,000 membership has plunged to around 5,000, so Tory Central Office probably reckons that what’s left isn’t worth the hassle.

A Tory' youth organisation may well continue to exist in one form or another, but the heady days when the YC’s seemed to consist of youngsters all desperately trying to outdo one another in sounding more reactionary and bloodthirsty, are probably over for good.

Heller’s history

Joseph Heller’s novel Catch-22, published in 1962, was a brilliant and hilarious account of the corruption and insanity of capitalism set against the background of World War Two.

The long-awaited sequel is now ready, so Sally Vincent travelled to interview Heller, and her account of their meeting appeared in Weekend Guardian (24 September).

Heller’s perception of capitalism has not dimmed. According to Sally Vincent he thinks:

“We can produce enough food to feed the world, hut simultaneously can V because there's no profit producing enough food. ”

And he apparently thinks that “Marx was right”, although about what he didn't say, but his perception leaves him when it comes to interpreting history which he thinks is “autonomous and proceeds independently of the people who make it.”

Marx took a very different view: 

“Men make their own history, but they do not make it just as they please; they do not make it under circumstances chosen by themselves, but under circumstances directly encountered, given and transmitted from the past. ” 

As a novelist, Heller takes some beating, but when it comes to explaining history then it has to be Marx.

Doubting Thomas

The sacking of the Sussex vicar Anthony Freeman for revealing that he doesn’t believe in God highlights the problem facing many of these sky pilots.

Take the example of an anonymous Church of Scotland minister, whose dilemma was reported in Scotland on Sunday (14 August):

“Thomas does not believe in God. There was no virgin birth, no resurrection, Jesus was a mere inspirational mortal like Ghandi and there is, most sadly, no life after death. The last bit gets tricky, for he must pretend to believe in some kind of afterlife to soothe many of the pensioners he talks to each Sunday from the pulpit. "

All workers must sell their ability to work for a wage or salary, and these professional holy men are no different. Here is what our reverend gentleman has to say about it:

“To be honest, I've got a family to feed and a career and a pension to think about. I don't think I should put my job on the line just for the sake of discussion of some arcane beliefs and ideas that probably don't really matter anyway. ”

Blogger's Notes: 

• Joseph Heller's Catch-22 was reviewed in the November 1962 issue of the Socialist Standard.
• The King's Cross Underground fire was covered in the March 1988 issue of the Socialist Standard.
• The Piper Alpha disaster was covered in the August 1988 issue of the Socialist Standard.

A “capital” reward for heroism. (1912)

From the December 1912 issue of the Socialist Standard

” ‘Nearer My God to Thee.’ With the strains of this beautiful hymn ringing in their ears the brave bandsmen of the ‘Titanic’ went to their death, displaying once more that noble self-sacrifice and courage which is so characteristic our ‘men who go down to the sea in ships.’ ”

Such was the gist of the slobbering sentiment that was spewed up in the columns of the capitalist Press after the great disaster. But let us see how far the glowing appreciation by the master class of the self-sacrifice of these brave working has materialised.

At the Liverpool County Court recently a claim was made on behalf of the wives and child­ren of the “Titanic” bandsmen. The magis­trate who heard the case gave judgment in these words : “Although I have felt compelled to hold that the Workmen’s Compensation Act does not apply to the bandsmen, yet I cannot forget that these brave men met their death while perform­ing an act which was of the greatest service in helping to maintain discipline and avert panic.”

This is a good illustration of how the alleged mutuality of interest between the capitalist class and the working class always expresses itself. The widows and orphans may find consolation in the fact that salubrious occupations such as sewing hooks and eyes on cards brings remuneration at the rate of nearly a penny per hour. Such is the reward for the workers’ heroism.

But surely, on the other hand, such displays of animal cunning shown by the master class, should prove a lesson to the workers. Just as, on the “Titanic,” the workers were “kidded” to fix their eyes on heaven and play beautiful hymn tunes while the Rich were busy slipping their oily carcasses over the side of the ship to safety, so the game is played in mill, mine and factory. To shut your eyes and open your mouth to see what God will send you is a pastime worthy of children and lunatics, but reflects no credit on sane adults.

The workers as a class must organise politically for the common ownership of the means of living, for until this has become an accomplished fact they will surely pay toll for their sufferance of a callous and brutal master class.

C. Baggett

Economics Exposed: Ownership and control (1987)

The Economics Exposed column from the June 1987 issue of the Socialist Standard

The whole of human history has consisted of a series of social systems. Each of these social systems has been seen by most of the participants as a way of meeting human needs, by producing and distributing wealth. Those who have been prominent in the introduction of new types of social relationships have claimed that their movements were a step forward for humanity, a dramatic improvement in the organisation of wealth production.

In reality, however, we can now look back and understand that in each case what was really happening was that a particular class of wealth owners or would-be wealth owners were in fact pursuing their own interests, as a class, and simply dressing up this interest as being "the public interest". This was more than ever the case with the rise of the capitalist class in the seventeenth, eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. At that time, the conflict was between the needs of the "modernising" mercantile and manufacturing interests on the one hand and the landed aristocracy on the other.

The key choice facing humanity in the twentieth century, in contrast, is that between capitalism and socialism as systems of society. The socialist movement is unlike all previous movements for change. It emerged over the past hundred years as an expression of the interests of the working class. And unlike all previous classes, the working class forms a vast, dispossessed majority across the world which has no interest at all in developing any "property" base of its own. Indeed, any utopian schemes to turn all workers into small-time capitalists themselves, are in fact doomed to failure for just this reason; the survival of workers within capitalism depends on selling, at the best price possible, the only resource which, by definition, a wage or salary-earner can control — our own ability to work.

The interests of the majority class in society have therefore become identified more and more obviously with the destruction of all property relationships, rather than with their perpetuation. Even after decades of reformist theory and practice from both Tory and Labour parties in post-war Britain, for example, the existence of capitalism still guarantees that wealth becomes increasingly concentrated in the hands of a minority, as we shall see below.

In this column last month it was stated that this minority "possess” the working class as part of their assets. This reference to possession must, of course, be interpreted loosely, since capitalism has no use for the customs of ancient Greece and Rome, under which the wealth producers were the permanent property of slave-masters. Today, when employers invest in the productive power of wage-earners they still, like their ancient counterparts, enjoy the right of ownership over all wealth created by those wage-earners and yet they are not responsible for housing or feeding their wage-slaves outside any specific periods within which they are contracted to be employed.

What then, are the key differences between capitalism and socialism as economic systems?

1. Ownership and control

Capitalism is the dominant system of society throughout the entire world today. In every country, a minority class own and control the productive resources. Farms, factories, industrial plant and machinery, transport and communication networks; all of these are effectively in the hands of a small minority and controlled ultimately for their benefit, rather than for the free use and benefit of all. According to the official statistics published in the Social Trends survey (HMSO, 1987) the most wealthy ten per cent in Britain in 1984 owned more than half of all marketable wealth. This minority ownership and control of society's productive resources of course takes various forms. In the case of nationalised industries, the former shareholders now enjoy regular interest on the state bonds they were compensated with, so they continue to profit from the wealth created by the workers just as they did in the days when they were explicitly the owners. And in the case of Eastern-bloc style state control, or of "nationalisation without compensation". we see a new class of state bureaucrats, fulfilling the role of owning, controlling and profiting from production within that sector of the world capitalist system.

Socialism, by contrast, means the common ownership and democratic control of all productive resources. Factories and farms would then become the common heritage of all humanity, no more hived off or labelled with title-deeds than is the air we breathe, and freely accessible for the use of all.

2. The motive of production

On the socialist basis of placing these resources firmly in the hands of the human race as a whole, rather than allowing them to be owned and controlled by a minority group, it would then for the first time become possible for us to change the basis on which wealth is produced. At present, wealth production is likely to take place only if the goods and services which would result are likely to be profitably sold for cash on the world market. The level of production of everything across the world today is therefore tailored to meet market requirements rather than human needs.

Because the primary aim of production under capitalism is the generation of profit and the accumulation of capital, rather than purely to meet the needs of humanity as safely and comfortably as possible, it therefore follows that human life itself almost always comes a poor second to the pursuit of profit, as these two clash daily within the present. global social system. Examples of this abound, so here we present just one recent example, of the ironically named Herald of Free Enterprise:

Commercial pressures have prevented design changes in roll-on roll-off ships which might have saved the Townsend Thoresen ferry which sank off Zeebrugge harbour last Friday . . . Captain Nic Ruthford of the International Federation of Ships' Masters Associations, which has long expressed worries over Ro-Ro safety, said he would press for all Ro-Ros to be redesigned. He said: "The big problem is that one owner is not going to make expensive alterations that would put him at a disadvantage compared with his competitors until he absolutely has to".

(The Independent,10 March 1987)

Just like the millions who die each year of starvation or hunger-related disease while politicians dream up schemes for cutting back on production to restore profit levels, or for destroying the so-called "surpluses", likewise those who died in the ferry disaster were also sacrificed on the altar of profit.

3. The lives of the majority

One of the most important myths of capitalist economics, which must be exploded, is that workers are free-acting, independent agents, each "seeking their fortune" as best they can within the economic competition of the capitalist jungle. In fact, it is a key feature of the economic system we currently live under that the working-class majority are forced, through economic necessity, to take their own ability to work on to the labour market to be sold as a commodity. As a result of this, we are compelled to subjugate all of our human qualities of individuality and freedom. to give up our own creative needs and impulses, to cut out any individual style we may have, and present ourselves as neatly packaged and reliably productive machines for the consumption of our employers.

Consider, for example, the following passage from an official report which was attempting to persuade international employers to invest in British workers, by stressing the exploitative potential of what is on offer:

Not only does Britain's work-force perform well, its costs are remarkably low for what is one of the world's most highly developed countries. US Department of Labor figures show that British wage rates are among the lowest in the Western world. In addition, "on costs" (i.e. those labour costs which are additional to wages, such as state social security schemes and the financing of voluntary sick and pension schemes) are very low in Britain . . You will find the British work-force of today disciplined, motivated, skilled and ready for work. 

(BRITAIN, The Preferred Location, prepared by the Department of Trade and Industry, and the Central Office of Information. 1985)

It would appear, from such brazenly degrading statements, that the British ruling class believes they can talk about workers "behind our backs" without our knowledge. Perhaps they were forgetting that mass literacy has been predominant in Britain for some time.

To summarise, then. Past history has been a series of conflicts between classes, with each successive system serving the needs of a different minority class. Socialism means the total abolition of all property relationships, and is therefore the solution to the problems currently facing the working-class majority. Under capitalism, a minority own and control productive resources and production is geared to their profit. In socialism, productive resources would be owned in common by the whole of humanity and democratically controlled, so that production could be geared to human needs rather than the needs of the market. Under capitalism, the lives of the majority are dominated by the need to survive by selling our working ability on the labour market. The misery which results can only be ended by socialism, in which human beings would cooperate together consciously, to produce wealth with the sole aim of meeting human needs themselves.

Next month, we shall examine the precise mechanism by which capitalism functions, the exploitation of wage-labour.

Clifford Slapper

Profitable pollution (1979)

From the July 1979 issue of the Socialist Standard

The main factor involved in accidents to oil tankers and in creating oil pollution at sea is the profit motive. “Pollution is an economic phenomenon . . . Deliberate discharges of oil, and the main causes of accidents to ships and offshore installations can both be explained by economic considerations”, writes Dr Viktor Sebek (New Scientist, 1.3.79).

An “inexplicable tragedy”
                   - Premier Lynch.

The Betelgueuze exploded at midnight while unloading at Bantry Bay. Forty-three crew and seven terminal workers were killed, and sixty-one families fled in small boats from Whiddy Island to the mainland. This ‘accident' was avoidable. From 1968 to 1977 tanker explosions killed 291 people, besides representing enormous financial losses to their owners. An inert gas safety system is now fitted to new oil tankers, but four-fifths of the 3,500 tankers now operating still do not have this system, nearly ten years after the danger of explosive gases became known. “Because of its age the Betelgueuze was not fitted with the inert gas safety system.” That would have cut into profits.

Jetty firefighting equipment checked in December was faulty and not subsequently repaired. Life rafts — the only means of escape from the jetty — had never been tested. Gulf Oil’s first five years’ profits at Whiddy were about £40 million. “We had a terrible tragedy. But we have to face one fact of life — business is business”, said a Gulf executive, explaining why Gulf is now sueing Total Navigation over the £30 million compensation.

Accidental Pollution
The ‘accident’ at the Sullom Voe terminal, when the Esso Bernicia collided in harbour, spilling fuel oil and causing the deaths of sheep and otters as well as thousands of rare sea-birds, was foreseeable and need not have happened.

Delay in using equipment, inadequate maintenance of emergency equipment, inadequate supply of available equipment, the lack of a fourth tug on standby when the tanker berthed — all combined to produce a predictable ecological catastrophe. “The possibility of an oil spillage always exists because of failure or malfunction of mechanical equipment or as a result of human failure . . .” a report predicted in 1976.

Deliberate Pollution
‘Operational’ pollution occurs when a tanker captain illegally dumps ballast water at sea, knowing that the terminal he is approaching has no ballast water treatment plant. When Sullom Voe opened in November 1978, its ballast water treatment plant was not expected to be ready until May 1979: during those months, ballast water dumping created a serious ecological problem. Yet the Load On Top system used by many tankers and the segregated or clean ballast systems fitted into new tankers prevent such pollution.

With the ballast water treatment plant at Sullom Voe not yet in operation, there was, according to a director of BP Tanker Co., “a financial incentive for a tanker skipper on a voyage charter to dump ballast when approaching Shetland and thereby take on more oil” Captain Lucas of the Mercantile Marine Service Association alleged that “very few of the world’s ports are equipped to handle the waste products from any ships, let alone tankers.”

Accurate pollution-measuring techniques have been developed and are in use. But enforcing pollution control presents problems: “The economic implications of these pollution control regulations to the major shipping companies are large, and intense international maritime political lobbying is now under way.”

Cutting Corners
Navigational errors, such as caused the Christos Bitas disaster off Pembrokeshire, are common. Near Sullom Voe there have been “repeated reports of tankers cutting corners”. In January, February and March large tankers have been observed within one to one-and-a- half kilometres of the coast, which is at all times difficult but especially hazardous in winter.

To Shetlanders, a tanker is “a floating disaster waiting for somewhere to happen”. Scientist Ritchie Calder declared that Whitehall’s policy is “government by catastrophe”. “All measures to control pollution inevitably reduce profit margins” comments Dr. V. Sebek.

Nuclear Power—Very Hush-Hush

Nuclear technology risks are aggravated by political factors. Government-imposed secrecy shrouds everything nuclear: in the early fifties the Official Secrets Act silenced press reports of “gross negligence during construction work at Windscale”. All Windscale (British Nuclear Fuels Ltd.) and Dounreay (Atomic Energy Authority) staff are ‘positively vetted’ by security; such installations are cloaked by the Official Secrets Act. Though Article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights lays down the ‘right’ to publish information and ideas, this is always subject to “the interest of national security”. The same principle governs public disclosure of accidents, risks and the like in the Soviet Union, where people live next to nuclear installations “without any protest or without any knowledge of them”.

Fears of terrorism — sabotage of installations or theft of plutonium — increase the secrecy surrounding all nuclear installations. The ability to cover up negligence and to conceal even serious ‘incidents’ presents a risk to the whole community.

Energy production is a dirty business. But accidents in coal mines and oilfields do not put at risk the health of the human species for generations to come. Under capitalism, the social — political, economic and military — hazards compound the risk inherent in nuclear technology. “When you build a plant, you look to see whether there are any earthquakes. But you don’t know about social earthquakes.” (Dr. Jungk).

Aldermaston

Staff at the Atomic Weapons Research Establishment were last year found to be exposed to dangerous levels of plutonium contamination. Outdated monitoring methods were in use, the number of safety staff was inadequate, only a hundred personal air samplers were in use, with 250 still on order — although these were recommended in 1972. Levels of plutonium in the air were found to be over the International Commission for Radiological Protection limit in every building, sometimes four times the 1CRP maximum. The Ministry of Defence delayed introducing chest monitoring until ten years after this was in routine use elsewhere.

A 1976 Health and Safety Executive inspector raised only one minor safety point. But if the HSE had demanded improvements the AWRE enjoys Crown Immunity from prosecution. Unfortunately, workers do not have ‘Crown Immunity’ from lung cancer.

Livermore, USA

Livermore, like Aldermaston a nuclear weapons development centre, is sited near San Francisco, right on top of an active earthquake fault. Although a large earthquake is believed imminent in California, evacuation plans are “inadequate and unrehearsed”, claime Friends of the Earth. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission closed down a nearby reactor but cannot control Livermore.

Karen Silkwood

vs. Kerr McGee Corp, Oklahoma

The case of Karen Silkwood exposed the sloppy and dangerous practices at Kerr McGee in producing plutonium fuel rods for nuclear reactors. She provided evidence that faulty rods were habitually approved, and told how dirt was simply “swept up with a broom”.

Windscale’s Wastes

Windscale, where BNFL reprocess spent fuel rods from power stations, is constipated. Many fuel rods are corroding under water. Reprocessing machinery keeps breaking down. One hundred gallons a day of radioactive sludge has been leaking from silos since 1976. The site is “nasty". No sound method has yet been found of dealing safely with nuclear wastes.

Harrisburg: “Nuclear accident raises dividend fears” (Financial Times)

Human error causes scores of incidents at American nuclear power stations. At Harrisburg a valve was left open accidentally. It later emerged that there was not one operating engineer on the site.

Repercussions were widespread. A complete population health check has started. Plants in Canada, Japan, Belgium and the UK (Dungeness) have been reported closed for checks. In the USA, all ten Babcock and Wilcox reactors have been shut down.

Many questions remain unanswered. How much radiation was released? What is the risk? How safe is ‘safe’ — the ICRP and many scientists now think zero is the only ‘safe’ level of radiation exposure. Who is telling the truth?

The near-meltdown at Harrisburg was closely described in the film The China Syndrome: Newsweek dismissed this contemptuously as based “on fantasy rather than fact”. The cover-up industry has been hard at work persuading the media to ‘cool it’. The choice for American capitalism is between growing dependence on the hazards of nuclear power with growing costs and increasing public hostility, or a return to ever-costlier dependence on Arabian oil.

The USA’s soaring trade deficit leaves little choice. Nuclear generating costs are half those of oil, less than two-thirds those of coal-fired plant. In the balance-sheet. costs weigh against profits. People do not appear on boardroom balance-sheets. The board is answerable to shareholders, not to the community. A shareholder’s concern is his dividend, not the health of humanity.

We do not claim that there could be such a thing as zero-risk technology. But technical problems are small compared with political and economic factors. Capitalism’s disaster record is no accident.

Charmian Skelton

Postscript

Our first article discussed some air crashes. “The only thing that forces a Federal Aviation Authority ruling is when enough people get killed.” The FAA has now grounded all USA DC 10s. We also pointed to the appalling fire risks of polymeric materials used in furnishings. The Woolworths fire in Manchester gives us a reminder of how lethal these cheap materials are: ten people died.

References

Oil pollution — New Scientist. 1.3.79. (Dr. Sebek is secretary to the Advisory Committee on Oil Pollution of the Sea.)
‘Betelgueuze’ The Guardian, 9.1.79; The Observer. 14.1.79; New Statesman. 1.6.79.
‘Esso Bernicia - Sullom Voe Environmental Impact Assessment Report, June 1976, cf. New Scientist.

19.4.79 and 26.4.79.
Deliberate pollution — New Scientist. 29.3.79 and 19.4.79.
Cutting Corners — New Scientist. 1.3.79 and 26.4.79.
Nuclear power — Franks Report, 1972, quoted in Nuclear Prospects by Flood and Grove-White (FoE), 1976; Zhores Medvedev in New Scientist, 17.5.79; Jungk in New Scientist, 5.4.79. Aldermaston — New Scientist, 7.12.78.
Livermore — New Scientist, 26.4.79.
Karen Silkwood Panorama, BBC1. 5.3.79.
Windscale — The Listener (from Horizon), 26.4.79 and The Listener, 7.6.79.
Harrisburg — The Nugget File 1950-1976, cf. New Scientist, 1.2.79; John Lyons, general secretary. Electrical Power Engineers — The World This Weekend, BBC Radio 4, 27.5.79; The Economist. 5.5.79; Herald Tribune, 31.5.79; Newsweek, 19.2.79 and 2.4.79; New Scientist, from 5.4.79 to 31.5.79.

Jottings. (1912)

The Jottings Column from the July 1912 issue of the Socialist Standard

Councillor W. C. Anderson, presiding over the I.L.P. conference at Merthyr Tydfil, is reported to have said : ‘‘Social justice is not compatible with private ownership of land and industrial capital "

Seeing that capital is the exploiting form of wealth, and that the capitalist is capital personified, I should like to know from Mr Anderson how that ‘‘social justice” he prates of is going to come about by the exploiting form of wealth merely changing ownership and not being abolished. There is “industrial capital” under State ownership (the only form of ownership in which it can exist other than private ownership) in the State railways of various countries Mr. Anderson may have heard of, even if he has never visited. Let him give us an instance where the workers have obtained “social justice," and I will show that his conception of “social justice” includes exploitation.

#    #    #    #

Mr. J. Burgess (Bradford) said at the same conference that there was “nothing in the Parliamentary Report of the Party to show that the I.L.P. was a Socialist organisation.”

I wonder what Mr. Burgess wanted? Did be want the Parliamentary Report to lie by stating something that was not and is not true? For shame, Mr. Burgess!

#    #    #    #

Mr. George Lansbury passed through a fit of paralysing candour at the I.L.P. conference. He said: -

  “When the vote on the Akbar incident was taken the Labour whips were running about scooping their members up for fear anything should happen to the Government. I, for one, have always felt ashamed of the vote I gave on that occasion.”

Mr. Lansbury, like the old bird he is in the game of spoof, is wide enough to appreciate the value of the sack-cloth and ashes dodge among such a conglomeration of sentimentalists as the I.L.P. But the old what-d’yer-call-him has the brazen effrontery to call himself a Socialist, which essentially implies internationalism. Then how’s this, from the report of the Parliamentary proceedings of May 21st ?

Mr. A. Shirley Benn (U , Plymouth) “thought the time had come when the great shipping industry should have one Government department devoting all its attention to maritime affairs. He would like to see every ship flying the British flag manned with British officers.”
Mr. Lansbury: “ And men.”

More sack-cloth and ashes for Mr. Lansbury.

#    #    #    #

The mission of the B.S.P., as outlined in their organ, “Justice,” June 1st, 1912, and defined at their recent conference, is “to give political voice and vision to the blind and inarticulate discontent of the workers ; to bring their political organisation at least abreast of their industrial, so that they will not continue to vote into power the very men whose class greed they are continually forced to strike against."

The italics are mine.

It was only provisionally, then, that they advised the workers to vote for the Liberals at the St. Rollox and East Northants bye-elections.

#    #    #    #

According to “Justice” (1.6.12) Mr. H. M. Hyndman, in his presidential address to the B.S.P. conference said:

 “Though the British Socialist Party was a definitely revolutionary organisation, he took it there was not a single delegate there but would hold up both hands and use his best energies to secure forthwith the Free Maintenance of Children, the Co-operative Organisation of Unemployed Labour, the Minimum Wage in all industries, and the Eight Hours Law, for which Socialists have agitated continually for a full generation. Such measures properly used were stepping stones to peaceful revolution.”

Here I might say that to properly use the measures presupposes possession of political power by the working class, which dispenses with their necessity. But the above extract was uttered on the Saturday morning; hear him now on the Monday evening, as reported by the “Manchester Guardian ” (28.5.12.):

  “The capitalist parties seemed to have pretty nearly exhausted the possibilities of blundering. There was not a measure before the country, from either of the political parties to-day, which, if carried into effect to morrow, would benefit the men, women and children of this country to any appreciable degree.”

There you are, Hyndman on Saturday and Hyndman on Monday. Which is the Hyndman and which the behindman, eh ? Why, me little man, yer pays yer money and yer takes yer choice. It’s the same H. M. H., only he has such a bad memory.

#    #    #    #

It has been stated previously by Socialists and is here repeated, that Capitalism knows no national boundaries, that labour is the source of all value, and that to economise in labour-power with as great or greater output is the very acme of efficiency.

That has been stated by opponents of the existing system of production for profit. Hear now a witness for the defence, an upholder of the present capitalist system. Sir Alfred Mond is the witness, and on the matter of establishing better relations betwixt Germany and England he delivered himself thus in "Nord und Sued”:

   “In all countries the great world of commerce knows no national bounds and tolerates no interference with its labour by such limitations. The cohesion of the various parts of the business world is more one by industries than by nationalities. The relations between the captains of industry of all countries are getting more friendly every day, and exhibit a growing mutual respect and inclination to co operate on a labour-saving basis.” (Italics mine.)

That phrase “captains of industry” seems familiar—or at least its definition does. It is alluded to by Karl Marx in the XIII. chapter of “Capital” thus:

  “It is not because he is a leader in industry that a man is a capitalist. The leadership of industry is an attribute of capital, just as in feudal times the functions of general and judge were attributes of landed property.”

Stand down, Mond, the Socialist case has been well upheld by you.

#    #    #    #

Mr. Andrew Carnegie in his rectorial address to the Aberdeen University students said: “Youths should have a decisive voice, if possible, in the selection of their future occupation.”

There is another thing he might have advised them to do, viz, choose their own parents. If they did what large families the Carnegies, Rockefellers, Goulds, and Morgans would have! Why, no poor man could have any children at all, unless some foolish young man chose a labourer on 16s. a week to be his father.

#    #    #    #

The question of leaders and their actions commented upon and replied to in the last issue of the “S.S.” recalls to mind the case of Mr. Havelock Wilson (Seamen’s Union). This leader stood as candidate at South Shields bye-election in 1910. He then spoke against the action of the Board of Trade in raising the load-line of British ships and thus imperiling to a greater degree than formerly seamen’s lives and permitting an increased tonnage to be carried in the same ships. That was as candidate for Parliament. But the evidence given on June 11th, 1912, before the Commissioner of Wrecks (Lord Mersey) by Mr. A. M. Carlisle was to the effect that Mr. Wilson had signed the report of the Board of Trade Advisory Committee of 1911. This report’s recommendations would have involved the “Titanic” carrying even fewer lifeboats than she did. And of such is the kingdom of labour leaders.

#    #    #    #

Methought the enquiry being held in London under Lord Mersey was to investigate the circumstauces of the lose of the “Titanic” and to fix the responsibility for the disaster. It appears not to be so, however, judging from the following passage, taken from the evidence given on June 6th:

Mr. Sanderson (White Star manager): "I understand that the purpose of this commission is to find out how we are to reduce those risks (i.e., incidental to sea travel) to an absolute minimum.” Lord Mersey : “That is quite true.”

 #    #    #    #

All our judicial and semi judicial enquiries are above suspicion of being impartial. The “Titanic” enquiry shows this to great advantage in the following comment of Lord Mersey : 

Lord Mersey (to Mr. Harbinson, counsel for third class passengers, who had asked whether the captain in handing in a Marconigram to Mr. Ismay was inviting an expression of opinion as to what the vessel’s speed should be):—“When you come to address the Court—if ever you do—I don’t know whether we shall ever reach the time to make your speech—you may make such a comment to me, but at present yon must confine yourself to facts.”

Even the third class passengers’ counsel can make a speech commenting upon a steamship director—if there’s time!

J. B.

After shipwreck (2020)

From the WSPUS website

Socialism will never work. It goes against human nature. 

So we are often told.

But where do we get our ideas of human nature? Partly by observing ourselves and those around us. Partly also from the books we read and the films and TV programs we watch.

Few books can have had as big an impact on people’s ideas of human nature as William Golding’s Lord of the Flies. First published in 1954, this novel has been bought by tens of millions of people, translated into over 30 languages, turned into two films (1963 and 1990), and adapted for radio and the stage. As the many study guides devoted to it show, it has been a set book for innumerable students of English literature. And it was the inspiration for Reality Television!

The story line is simple enough. A group of schoolboys are marooned on a desert island. They soon start fighting. Out of their fears and the power lust of a dominant boy they create an idolatrous cult with chants, rituals, and painted faces. The message is painfully clear: the veneer of ‘civilization’ is skin-deep and once the constraint of authority is removed our inner savage quickly emerges.  

But this is fiction – a lesson taught by a misanthropic schoolmaster prone to alcoholism and depression. Now Dutch historian Rutger Bregman has uncovered a true story of how a bunch of real schoolboys behaved in the same situation – a ‘real Lord of the Flies’ that conveys a very different idea of ‘human nature’.

In 1965 six boys, aged 13–16, got bored with their life at a Catholic boarding school in the Polynesian island kingdom of Tonga, so they ‘borrowed’ a fishing boat and set sail. They were shipwrecked in a storm, drifted at sea for eight days, and were washed up on a deserted Pacific island where they lived for 15 months before being rescued by Australian adventurer Peter Warner. By that time they had been given up for dead and their funerals had been held. 

Even while adrift at sea, these boys cooperated and treated one another as equals:

They managed to collect some rainwater in hollowed-out coconut shells and shared it equally between them, each taking a sip in the morning and another in the evening.

On the island

  the boys set up a small commune with food garden, hollowed-out tree trunks to store rainwater, a gymnasium with curious weights, a badminton court, chicken pens and a permanent fire… [They] agreed to work in teams of two, drawing up a strict roster for garden, kitchen and guard duty… Their days began and ended with song and prayer. 

The boys survived at first on fish, coconuts, tame birds, and seabird eggs. Later they found wild taro, bananas and chickens in an ancient volcanic crater where people had lived a century before. 

When one boy slipped and broke a leg, the others set it using sticks and leaves and looked after him until it healed. Occasional quarrels were resolved by imposing a time-out. 

In short, they demonstrated – on a very small scale, to be sure – that socialism is not against human nature and that it can work. 

Unfortunately, the owner of the fishing boat did not fully appreciate the boys’ achievement. He  pressed charges against them and had them imprisoned for theft. It is understandable that he should have been annoyed at the boys, but a more constructive reaction would surely have been to get them to build him a new boat.

A study of post-shipwreck societies

The original version of this article ended here, but after uploading it I discovered an author who has made a comparative study of post-shipwreck societies — Nicholas A. Christakis, Blueprint: The Evolutionary Origins of a Good Society (New York: Hachette Book Group, 2019). 

Christakis examined numerous historical accounts of shipwrecks and their aftermath, but focused on 20 cases between 1500 and 1900 in which a group of at least 19 initial survivors set up camp on an uninhabited island for 2 months or longer. What factors were most important in determining which of these groups succeeded in ensuring the continued survival and eventual rescue of their members?

Available resources mattered a great deal, of course – both resources found on the island, especially food and fresh water, and things salvaged from the wreck. Another factor that mattered was terrain. For example, the survivors of one shipwreck were handicapped by finding themselves at the bottom of steep cliffs that they had to climb. And it helped if members of a group had a variety of usable skills. 

However, the relationships that developed within a group of survivors also made a big difference. The mini-societies that fared best were those based on cooperation, equity, and altruism. Their members worked together on agreed tasks, shared food fairly, and did not separate into subgroups based on military rank or social status. 

One group in this category consisted of survivors from the Julia Ann, wrecked in 1855 in Pacific reefs known as the Isles of Scilly. This was an unusually large group of 51 people, all of whom were rescued after 2 months. The ship captain set an example of unselfish behavior right at the start, when he saw the second mate about to remove from the wreck a bag containing $8,000 belonging to the captain. He told the man to abandon the money and carry a child ashore instead. 

In 1864 two ships were wrecked on opposite sides of Auckland Island, south of New Zealand. The two groups of survivors, though on the island at the same time, were unaware of one another. Of the 19 who came ashore from the Invercauld, only 3 were still alive when rescue came a year later. They had behaved in accordance with the motto: every man for himself. By contrast, all 5 initial survivors from the Grafton worked closely together and were rescued after almost two years. 

One striking difference between the two kinds of group concerned how the sick and injured were treated. You might think that by looking after ’useless mouths’ a group would lessen its chances of survival. There would be less time to gather food and the food would have to be shared among a larger number of people. Abandoning the sick and injured would seem to be more sensible. Eating them would seem to be even more sensible (cannibalism was actually a rare occurrence). In reality, this sort of crude arithmetic was outweighed by the fact that taking care of the sick and injured helped a group build mutual trust and solidarity. It was on balance an activity that increased chances of survival. 

In terms of political structure, non-cooperative groups might be either anarchic or harshly authoritarian. Cooperative groups were more democratic, but this did not exclude an element of leadership. Thus the 5 men from the Grafton elected one of their number to act ‘not as a master or superior but as a head of family.’ It was his assigned duty to ‘maintain order and harmony with gentleness but also firmness.’ It was agreed that this person could be replaced on a future vote if necessary.     

Christakis acknowledges that cooperative groups were relatively few. This should not be too much of a surprise, considering that many shipwreck survivors were traumatized and all had come from competitive and highly status-conscious societies. What is remarkable is that cooperative post-shipwreck societies did exist, demonstrating that even under unfavorable circumstances human beings have the capacity to act together as equals. 

Stefan

Blogger's Note:

See also, 'But Flies Are Not Human' (August 1993)

The Class Struggle on board the ‘Titanic’ (1998)

From the April 1998 issue of the Socialist Standard

You’ve seen the film. Now read what the Socialist Standard said at the time.

Once again humanity has been staggered by an appalling catastrophe, in which hundreds of human lives have been thrown away, and hundreds of homes plunged into grief and despair. Once again the wild cry of horror has vibrated through the world, and the multitude have been not only shocked, but astounded, as if the unexpected had happened. Once again the newspapers have been slobbering sentimental platitudes and unctuous hypocrisy as though this were not the best thing that has happened for them for many a long day. Once again the machinery of bogus inquiries and sanctimonious “charity” has been set in motion in order to hide awkward and incriminating facts. And finally, once again have the flouted working class, on whom the brunt of this stupendous sacrifice to Mammon has fallen, begun to forget all about it.

Well, there is nothing at all unusual in that. The workers have proverbially sort memories. They have forgotten Featherstone; they have forgotten Whitehaven, they have forgotten Bolston, and in a few short days they will have forgotten the “Titanic”.

Murder of workers is so common; the workers are so used to it, that they cannot even recognise it for what it is. When the murderous rifles of the soldiery shoot unarmed workers down, it is only the operation of the Law, and there’s and end on’t. When mine-owners neglect to keep their mines ventilated, and blow hundreds of miners into eternity, or brick them up in the pit to be burnt alive, it’s a lamentable occurrence but quite an accident, and again there’s an end on’t. And now that the vast “unsinkable,” the floating city, has carried its full living cargo to the bottom of the Atlantic, the workers arouse themselves in horror of it for a day or two, note with approval that the Royal Family have donated about one day’s income to the relief fund, and then slip quietly back into their sleeping sickness.

And, of course, they are to be helped to do this by a sham enquiry which will start out with the set purpose of fixing the blame on the iceberg, or at most on the dead officers who were supposed to have control of the ship. But this enquiry is a mere blind, a cunning attempt to cloak the real position and to screen from blame the real culprit.

The enquiry in America, for all its seeming fierce determination to get to the bottom of the matter, and for all the awkward evidence it has elicited, was only embarked on for the purpose of skating on the surface. If they could fix the blame on the White Star people, then so much the better for the American shipping interests. But beyond this they did not go; beyond this they never intended to go; beyond this they dared not go. All their virtuous indignation is of a piece with the “patriotism” of their grandfathers, who poisoned Washington’s soldiers with villainous provisions with an unscrupulousness even modern Chicago fails to beat.

To those who understand modern conditions no enquiry is necessary in order to apportion the blame. The starting point of this enquiry will, of course, be the hour immediately preceding the collision. They will go on the worn-out assumption that the captain had the command of the ship. No one will ask why was the "Titanic" built? No one will dream of making the designing of the ship the starting-point of the enquiry. No one will dare to suggest that the captain and his officers had not the command of the vessel.

May 1912 Socialist Standard

Yet this way lies the truth. In the very designing of the “Titanic” is the first word of the tragic story, in keeping with which is every jot and tittle of evidence to the end. In the luxurious furnishings—the swimming baths, the flower gardens, the racquets courts—read the secret of the catastrophe. The ship was built to carry rich passengers across the herring-pond.

Almost the first comment that was made by the newspapers when the fatal news came to hand was that among the first class passengers aboard the vessel were millionaires who were collectively worth £30,000,000. This in itself is significant.

The fares of those six hundred first and second class passengers must have totalled an enormous sum, compared with which the passage money of the steerage was a negligible quantity. The “Titanic,” then, was essentially built for rich passengers upon whom the White Star Company depended to enable their vessel to “earn” a dividend.

The course is clear from this. The ship was on her maiden voyage; it was necessary to convince the wealthy, whose time is so extremely valuable, that she was a fast boat. So, as it is admitted, there was a general order to “smash all records”—which was duly done.

This explains why the look-out men had glasses until they reached Queenstown, but not afterwards-record smashing on the Western voyage commences at Queenstown. When records are to be smashed it is very inconvenient to have the look-out seeing too much—especially when the ship is an “unsinkable” and well-insured. It also explains why the vessel was on a wrong course at a wrong speed, and why no notice was taken of the look-out’s warning.

Much will be made of these latter facts, no doubt, and the dead officers will be blamed. It must not be forgotten, however, that capitalist companies invariably choose for responsible positions those men to do what they are paid to do. It is all moonshine to talk of the captain being in command. They command who hold is livelihood in their hands. If we will not take risks and get the speed they want, then he must give place to one who will.

So at the bottom it is the greed for profit and the insatiable desire for speed on the part of the rich that is responsible for the disaster, whatever conclusion the Committee of Enquiry may come to. Of course, they will not give any such verdict as that, for that would be to indict the capitalist system.

The actual details of the wreck afford a further opportunity of pressing home a lesson. The evidence of the survivors and the evidence of the official figures of the saved, show that even on the decks of the sinking liner, and to the very end, the class struggle was on.

Those who had clamoured for speed were the first to monopolise the boats, and the way was kept open for them by the officers’ revolvers. Even the capitalist newspapers are compelled to admit the significance of the figures. Of the first class men 34 per cent were saved: of the steerage men only 12 per cent. Figures like those are eloquent enough without the evidence of the officer who admitted that he kept steerage passengers from a half-filled boat with shots from his revolver.

Much has been made of the fact that the cry “Women and children first” was raised, and it is not necessary to cast aspersions on the courage of any man who survives. The salient fact is that it was not a question of courage but of class. “Women and children” meant women and children of the wealthy class. Of first class women and children practically all were saved, some even with their pet dogs. Of the steerage women and children more than half perished. The “chivalry” of the ruling class does not, save in very rare instances, extend itself to the class beneath them.

We are not of those who expect any great results from this ocean tragedy. Working-class lives are very cheap, and the age that abolishes the Plimsoll Line at the demand of those greedy for profit is hardly likely to insist upon the provision of proper means of life-saving or the careful navigation of passenger vessels. Murder by wholesale may be committed without doing violence to “law and order,” so long as it is committed by the capitalist class in the “legitimate” scramble for profits. The law only moves against the Crippens and the Seddons, but the murders quite commonly committed by the capitalist class are not one whit less foul, for all nobody is hanged for them.

A.E. Jacomb

(From front page article, Socialist Standard, May 1912)

The Class Struggle On Board The "Titanic." (1912)

From the May 1912 issue of the Socialist Standard

Once again humanity has been staggered by an appalling catastrophe, in which hundreds of human lives have been thrown away, and hundreds of homes plunged into grief and despair. Once again the wild cry of horror has vibrated through the world, and the multitude have been not only shocked, but astounded, as if the unexpected had happened. Once again the newspapers have been slobbering sentimental platitudes and unctuous hypocrisy as though this were not the best thing that has happened for them for many a long day. Once again the machinery of bogus inquiries and sanctimonious “charity” has been set in motion in order to hide awkward and incriminating facts. And finally, once again have the flouted working class, on whom the brunt of this stupendous sacrifice to Mammon has fallen, begun to forget all about it.

Well, there is nothing at all unusual in that. The workers have proverbially short memories. They have forgotten Featherstone; they have forgotten Whitehaven, they have forgotten Bolton, and in a few short days they will have forgotten the “Titanic”. Murder of workers is so common; the workers are so used to it, that they cannot even recognise it for what it is. When the murderous rifles of the soldiery shoot unarmed workers down, it is only the operation of the Law, and there’s and end on’t. When mine-owners neglect to keep their mines ventilated, and blow hundreds of miners into eternity, or brick them up in the pit to be burnt alive, it’s a lamentable occurrence but quite an accident, and again there’s an end on’t. And now that the vast “unsinkable,” the floating city, has carried its full living cargo to the bottom of the Atlantic, the workers arouse themselves in horror of it for a day or two, note with approval that the Royal Family have donated about one day’s income to the relief fund, and then slip quietly back into their sleeping sickness.

And, of course, they are to be helped to do this by a sham enquiry which will start out with the set purpose of fixing the blame on the iceberg, or at most on the dead officers who were supposed to have control of the ship. But this enquiry is a mere blind, a cunning attempt to cloak the real position and to screen from blame the real culprit.

The enquiry in America, for all its seeming fierce determination to get to the bottom of the matter, and for all the awkward evidence it has elicited, was only embarked on for the purpose of skating on the surface. If they could fix the blame on the White Star people, then so much the better for the American shipping interests. But beyond this they did not go; beyond this they never intended to go; beyond this they dared not go. All their virtuous indignation is of a piece with the “patriotism” of their grandfathers, who poisoned Washington’s soldiers with villainous provisions with an unscrupulousness even modern Chicago fails to beat.

To those who understand modern conditions no enquiry is necessary in order to apportion the blame. The starting point of this enquiry will, of course, be the hour immediately preceding the collision. They will go on the worn-out assumption that the captain had the command of the ship. No one will ask why was the “Titanic” built. No one will dream of making the designing of the ship the starting-point of the enquiry. No one will dare to suggest that the captain and his officers had not the command of the vessel.

Yet this way lies the truth. In the very designing of the “Titanic” is the first word of the tragic story, in keeping with which is every jot and tittle of evidence to the end. In the luxurious furnishings—the swimming baths, the flower gardens, the racquets courts—read the secret of the catastrophe. The ship was built to carry rich passengers across the herring-pond.

Almost the first comment that was made by the newspapers when the fatal news came to hand was that among the first class passengers aboard the vessel were millionaires who were collectively worth £30,000,000. This in itself is significant.

The fares of those six hundred first and second class passengers must have totalled an enormous sum, compared with which the passage money of the steerage was a negligible quantity. The “Titanic,” then, was essentially built for rich passengers upon whom the White Star Company depended to enable their vessel to “earn” a dividend.

The course is clear from this. The ship was on her maiden voyage; it was necessary to convince the wealthy, whose time is so extremely valuable, that she was a fast boat. So, as it is admitted, there was a general order to “smash all records”—which was duly done.

This explains why the look-out men had glasses until they reached Queenstown, but not afterwards-record smashing on the Western voyage commences at Queenstown. When records are to be smashed it is very inconvenient to have the look-out seeing too much—especially when the ship is an “unsinkable” and well-insured. It also explains why the vessel was on a wrong course at a wrong speed, and why no notice was taken of the look-out’s warning.

Much will be made of these latter facts, no doubt, and the dead officers will be blamed. It must not be forgotten, however, that capitalist companies invariably choose for responsible positions those men to do what they are paid to do. It  is all moonshine to talk of the captain being in command. They command who hold is livelihood in their hands. If we will not take risks and get the speed they want, then he must give place to one who will.

So at the bottom it is the greed for profit and the insatiable desire for speed on the part of the rich that is responsible for the disaster, whatever conclusion the Committee of Enquiry may come to. Of course, they will not give any such verdict as that, for that would be to indict the capitalist system.

The actual details of the wreck afford a further opportunity of pressing home a lesson. The evidence of the survivors and the evidence of the official figures of the saved, show that even on the decks of the sinking liner, and to the very end, the class struggle was on. Those who had clamoured for speed were the first to monopolise the boats, and the way was kept open for them by the officers’ revolvers. Even the capitalist newspapers are compelled to admit the significance of the figures. Of the first class men 34 per cent. were saved: of the steerage men only 12 per cent. Figures like those are eloquent enough without the evidence of the officer who admitted that he kept steerage passengers from a half-filled boat with shots from his revolver.

Much has been made of the fact that the cry “Women and children first” was raised, and it is not necessary to cast aspersions on the courage of any man who survives. The salient fact is that it was not a question of courage but of class. “Women and children” meant women and children of the wealthy class. Of first class women and children practically all were saved, some even with their pet dogs. Of the steerage women and children more than half perished. The “chivalry” of the ruling class does not, save in very rare instances, extend itself to the class beneath them.

We are not of those who expect any great results from this ocean tragedy. Working-class lives are very cheap, and the age that abolishes the Plimsol Line at the demand of those greedy for profit is hardly likely to insist upon the provision of proper means of life-saving or the careful navigation of passenger vessels. Murder by wholesale may be committed without doing violence to “law and order,” so long as it is committed by the capitalist class in the “legitimate” scramble for profits. The law only moves against the Crippens and the Seddons, but the murders quite commonly committed by the capitalist class are not one whit less foul, for all nobody is hanged for them.

A. E. Jacomb

Maritime Disasters (2012)

From the April 2012 issue of the Socialist Standard

The movie, Titanic, was a big money-maker for Hollywood. Its plot was an unlikely melodrama between a seemingly rich girl and a poor boy. The Titanic itself was simply the backdrop to their romance. The movie grossed over $600 million dollars, placing it at number two on the all time box office lists. Here’s another list.

The sinking of the Titanic was number three in the all time list of non-military maritime disasters. At number one, with a death toll reckoned to be 4,375 people was the Philippine’s ferry MV Doña Paz. Originally it ferried passengers in Japanese waters, when its passenger capacity was 608 people.  The MV Doña Paz sank after a collision with the oil tanker MT Vector. It took eight hours before the Philippine authorities learned of the accident, because the Doña Paz had no radio. And eight more before any rescue attempt. The owners, Sulpicio Lines, claimed that 1,499 people were aboard. Later inquiries alleged that a further 2000 were not on the ship’s manifest. This was reinforced by the recovery of 21 bodies, and only one was to be found on the official manifest.

The Doña Paz was insured for a million dollars. The owners offered an indemnity for those on the official manifest of $472 each. The Vector was later revealed to be operating without a licence, with no properly qualified master, and without a lookout. The victims’ families pursued claims against both companies, but both were cleared of financial liability.

At number two is the Senegalese government-owned ferry MV Le Joola which sank off of the coast of The Gambia in September 2002. At least 1,863 people died on a ship built to carry a maximum of 580. It also had a long history of being poorly maintained. The Le Joola was built only to navigate in coastal waters but was sailing beyond its coastal limit when high winds and rough seas struck – the probable cause of the ferry’s capsizing. It’s believed that many people would have survived the sinking, but official rescue teams didn’t arrive until the following morning. 

Once again compensation was offered to the victims’ families.  In contrast to the owners of The Doña Paz, the Senegalese government decided that a human life was worth around $22,000. Several officials were dismissed including officers of the Senegal Armed Forces who it was deemed failed to respond quickly enough to the sinking. No criminal charges were ever brought against anyone for the gross overcrowding and poor maintenance of the MV Le Joola.

There’s not much in these two disasters to spark the mind of the Hollywood capitalist. What about calling it Murder on the High Seas: a story of profit, greed and inhumanity? But there’s no glamour in a movie about thousands of piss poor people drowning on vastly overcrowded, hulking ferries. That’s simply a reality of life under capitalism.

___________________________________________

For those who’ve come across the seas

‘For those who’ve come across the seas/We’ve boundless plains to share’. These words come from the Australian national anthem. But a rider needs to be added – unless the state has decided that you’re an illegal immigrant.

In August 2001 the Australian state, headed by the Howard administration, refused permission for the Norwegian freighter MV Tampa to enter Australian waters. The Tampa had rescued 438 Afghan refugees from a distressed fishing boat. The boat was only designed for a crew of 27, and lacked any form of safety equipment. When the captain of the Tampa, Arne Rinnan, attempted to enter Australian waters he was threatened with prosecution as a people smuggler by the Australian state. The refugees were eventually transported by naval ship to the Island of Nauru to newly built detention camps. Consequentially, a new policy that sought to prevent illegal immigration by sea was to be enacted.  Polls taken by Australian Television suggested that 90% of the anthem singing population supported Howard. 

Two months later a suspected illegal entry vessel, SIEV X, entered Australian waters without permission. Over 400 asylum seekers were on board this nameless, ramshackle Indonesian fishing vessel.  On 19 October it sank in international waters; 353 human beings drowned. One of the claims the Howard administration made for its new policy was that, through the efficiency and dedicated work of the Royal Australian Navy, it would prevent people smuggling.  The Royal Australian Navy had been issued with stringent orders to monitor and intercept all SIEVs.

Three non-Australian vessels went to the aid of the SIEV X over a period of two days. There must have been considerable radio activity during this period between the rescue ships. But the Australian State claims that it was unaware of the sinking until three days after the event when the 45 survivors, including an eight-year-old boy who lost 21 members of his family, disembarked in Jakarta. 

A 2002 Australian Senate Select Committee investigation concluded that: ‘While no government department was found to be to blame for the tragedy, the Committee was surprised that there had been no internal investigations into any systemic problems which could have allowed the Australian government to prevent it from occurring’.

In 2006 the Australian Education Minister, Julie Bishop, attacked a PhD student’s study on the drowning of SIEVX’s human cargo, which was due to be taught in Australian high schools. Ms Bishop said the study “promoted a political agenda”. On the same day the government decided that a permanent memorial to the 353 drowned was not appropriate.

So for some, ‘who’ve come across the seas/We’ve boundless plains to share’.  But those without the permission of the state might find that they’re sharing a watery grave with 353 people who simply wanted a better life. The Australian national anthem, like all national anthems, is designed for the consumption of the gullible and docile wage slave and is a paradigm of the hypocrisy and bullshit that is intrinsic to capitalism.

What About the Deckchairs? (2012)

From the April 2012 issue of the Socialist Standard

Everybody has heard the saying about “re-arranging the deckchairs on the Titanic”. It has become a stock phrase to describe some futile or pointless activity, especially in the face of some impending disaster.

Online dictionaries offer various interpretations, ranging from, “[to] illustrate the futility of concentrating on the trivial details of some enterprise that is ultimately doomed or in the midst of some serious crisis that can not be overcome,” through, “when someone tries to futilely reform the ways things are done in a failing system,” to “to do something pointless or insignificant that will soon be overtaken by events, or that contributes nothing to the solution of a current problem.”

It’s a neat way of describing what all governments of capitalism do, not just in the present economic crisis but generally. Not that capitalism is sinking –it’s not going to collapse of its own accord, even if it is no longer sea-worthy –but it is failing in that it is not properly meeting the needs of the vast majority of people. It cannot but fail to do this.

Because capitalism is a system based on profit-making on the backs of those who actually produce wealth by their work, it can only ever function in the way it does –as a profit-making system in the interests of those who live off profits. It can never be made to function in the interest of those obliged by economic necessity to work for a wage or a salary for a living.

Anyone who thinks that it can and proposes some measure to achieve this –and this includes opposition parties, single-issue groups and campaigning charities as well as governments in office –is just re-arranging the deckchairs. Much better, socialists say, to steer away from the icebergs of economic crisis, war and global pollution and head for socialism where we can lastingly arrange the deckchairs for the benefit of all.

The Titanic: A Member Writes . . . (2012)

From the April 2012 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Titanic was a family theme in my wife’s family – her mother’s grandfather (that is, my wife’s great-grandfather) went off in 1912, having booked his passage on this marvellous new apparently unsinkable ship, to visit a daughter who had emigrated to Canada, and nothing was heard (no mobile phones then) till the news came of the sinking. So my mother-in-law went down (aged 3) with her father several days running to see the lists of the drowned and the saved in the local Post Office window. Then they found out – my wife’s great-grandfather had missed the boat, and went over safely on a later ship. So it’s not always a good idea to be punctual.

Here are some figures for numbers of people saved –

• First class ….. 202 out of 325 62%
• Second class ….. 118 out of 285 41%
• Third class ….. 178 out of 706 25%
• Crew ….. 212 out of 908 23%
• Whole ship ….. 710 out of 2224 32%

Apparently they had iron grille doors to keep the third class passengers in their own part of the ship, and in the panic following the collision with the iceberg the stewards didn’t get round to unlocking them all. So some third-class passengers found it difficult to get to the lifeboats. Apart from that the designer had had to reduce the number of lifeboats in order to make room for more first-class cabins and their private  promenade decks. J. Bruce Ismay, head of the White Star line, was aboard, and though five other ships warned the Titanic of icebergs in the area, apparently he insisted on full steam ahead, so as to make a fast (and profitable) crossing.

But luckily Ismay found a place on the lifeboats, and was saved.

So the usual moral – don’t be poor.

AE

The Titanic: Who Was To Blame? (2012)

From the April 2012 issue of the Socialist Standard

Seven days after the Titanic settled at the bottom of the Atlantic the first of the enquiries charged with answering questions, exposing negligence and apportioning blame, got under way in New York’s Waldorf Astoria hotel. Central to the enquiry would be the questioning of Bruce Ismay, Chairman and Managing Director of the White Star Line, who had been on the Titanic throughout its first and last voyage. In the chair was William Alden Smith United States Senator for the state of Michigan, whose opposition to alcohol drove him to try to prove that the Titanic’s captain and other officers had been drinking when the ship hit the iceberg. Smith’s questioning was resented by the officers for its ignorant bluster; for example his asking Fifth Officer Lowe what an iceberg was made of (“Ice, I suppose, sir” was Lowe’s answer). And again when he asked Second Officer Lightoller about the possibility of some passengers taking refuge in Titanic’s watertight compartments to be rescued later.

But in spite of what has been called his ‘raucous scapegoating,’ Smith carried on, matching his persistent pressure against Ismay’s stonewalling. Smith was, after all, a politician who had to have regard for his votes and for the “Yellow Press” of the tycoon William Randolph Hearst who nursed a long-standing personal antipathy to Ismay. For his part, Ismay had influenced the design of the Titanic in its early stages, reducing the number of lifeboats, for example, partly because the “practically unsinkable” liner was safer than any lifeboat. And when on the day of the collision the Captain, Edward Smith, gave him a vital telegram warning of ice directly ahead Ismay simply put it in his pocket instead of passing it on to the ship’s officers.

But in the chaos after the collision Ismay stayed on board to help other passengers into the boats until there were no others left there and an officer more or less ordered him to jump in. He then sat in the boat’s stern apparently in a coma until he was taken aboard the rescue ship Carpathia, when he demanded, and was given, food and a stateroom apart from the other survivors. He spent the rest of the voyage under sedation. And what of other wealthy passengers? There was Lord Duff Gordon who took over a lifeboat with just his wife and her maid, and seven crewmen to row. While Lady Duff Gordon commiserated with her maid on the loss of her “beautiful nightdress” he was giving each of the crewmen five pounds, seemingly as a bribe to either row away from the drowning people or to keep silent about the entire incident.

The given history of the Titanic is concerned largely with scapegoats, from Captain Edward Smith to the seven crewmen in the boat with Duff Gordon and the assertively influential Bruce Ismay. But there is more to it than individual culpability which takes no account of the chaos and waste endemic to capitalism with its privilege and exploitation which we still have to live with. After all, only a couple of years after the Titanic the world launched another tragedy which cost the lives of millions of its people.

RC