'Workerist' group?

[Devrim]

I just noticed this. I think there are quite deep problems with 'workerism' though I admit to being a hard-line workerist when ı was younger. I think it is amusing though that more than half of the members are actually students.

Devrim

[Frank Little]

Hah! Students thinking they're something!:laugh:

[Искра]

How do you know who's student and who's not?
And what's wrong if students are only in this group? They'll work one day, and they are still part of working class.

[Il Medico]

A student can't be a worker as well?

[Panda Tse Tung]

Lol, i know i was called a Pol Potist. But the description of their ideas are quite literally what Pol Pot believed. Lol.

[Patchd]

I just noticed this. I think there are quite deep problems with 'workerism' though I admit to being a hard-line workerist when ı was younger. I think it is amusing though that more than half of the members are actually students.

DevrimAnd how do you know they don't work? I'm a student, and have to work part-time, because unlike some other students, my mummy is from an estate and therefore can't afford to pay me lots and lots of moniez, and therefore I have to find a way to pay rent, and that means working for under minimum-wage as it's taken me over a year to look for a part time job which doesn't.

Let's stop this whole generalising of, oh they're students, therefore they can't be workers, because frankly, it's rubbish, especially considering that students these days are worse off than say, 10 years ago, when tuition fees hadn't been introduced, or even earlier, when every student was entitled to a grant, as opposed to me having to go through some bureaucratic process which obviously doesn't want to dish money out for free giving me more than enough hassle to get a bit of income support. Over the summer I couldn't even sign on because you know, I'm a student, and therefore my mummy must be able to keep me fed during that time, I had to rely on friends and my boyfriend to keep me going ...

[Holden Caulfield]

Your just jealous because you're not in it Devrim

[9]

I noticed that group too, and I thought it was kind of strange, but I think maybe that is because of the regional connotation the word has around here. Where I'm from, 'workerist' doesn't refer to workers acting in their interests, but to middle class intellectuals, activists, and the like who try to compensate for their lack of real identification with workers by going over the top and making grand statements about the glory and innocence (etc.) of workers. But.. as far as I know, that's just a regional connotation, because I can't imagine the people in that group would be celebrating that.

[Искра]

I think that this group is about working class and what's in interest of it and not some ideology and its intellectuals.

[ComradeOm]

I think that this group is about working class and what's in interest of it and not some ideology and its intellectuals.So the working class is now unable to develop its own ideology or intelligentsia?

[Die Neue Zeit]

The point is that Kautsky was correct in separating the "intelligentsia" function from the function of ordinary struggles. Gramsci failed to grasp this. Please read the whole Kautsky quote, especially the latter part of it.

[bcbm]

I noticed that group too, and I thought it was kind of strange, but I think maybe that is because of the regional connotation the word has around here. Where I'm from, 'workerist' doesn't refer to workers acting in their interests, but to middle class intellectuals, activists, and the like who try to compensate for their lack of real identification with workers by going over the top and making grand statements about the glory and innocence (etc.) of workers. But.. as far as I know, that's just a regional connotation, because I can't imagine the people in that group would be celebrating that.

i think they mean it more in this (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Workerism#Workerism_as_revolutionary_praxis) sense.

[Искра]

So the working class is now unable to develop its own ideology or intelligentsia?
I haven't meant that.
I meant this group (at least how I see it) is made in purpose of talking/discussing class struggle from the point of working class not some ideology which is claiming that its working in benefit of working class (for example some vanguard parties which only want to seize the power). That dosen't mean that working class is unable to develop its own ideology etc.
In my opinion communism is ideology for working class, even it was developed by Marx who was not part of it.

[Holden Caulfield]

We are a collective of people who reject high minded views of socialism.
and who enjoy to sneer at our own woring class roots, and sneer at other who read the guaridan and thing they are communists.

etc

class war!

[Devrim]

How do you know who's student and who's not?

When I looked at it there were five members. I thought some of them were students so I checked their profiles. Two said student, I know another one is, which makes over half, and the other two could be too.


And what's wrong if students are only in this group? They'll work one day, and they are still part of working class.

Yes, they are. I didn't deny that. 'Workerism' has a particular political meaning though.


I meant this group (at least how I see it) is made in purpose of talking/discussing class struggle from the point of working class not some ideology which is claiming that its working in benefit of working class (for example some vanguard parties which only want to seize the power). That dosen't mean that working class is unable to develop its own ideology etc.
In my opinion communism is ideology for working class, even it was developed by Marx who was not part of it.

This isn't how it's understood, Jurko. It has two meanings. One is a, in my opinion, bad translation of the Italian word 'Operaismo', but I doubt that they are referring to that current here. The second is, as the wiki link that bcbm provided, describes as such "In another sense, 'workerism' refers to the glorification of the culture of the working class, independent of their historical role".


A student can't be a worker as well?


And how do you know they don't work? I'm a student, and have to work part-time,...

Being a student doesn't really fit in with the cultural view of 'workerism'. It doesn't mean you don't have to work. It doesn't mean that some students aren't working class, but they would get laughed out of any serious 'workerist' group.


I noticed that group too, and I thought it was kind of strange, but I think maybe that is because of the regional connotation the word has around here. Where I'm from, 'workerist' doesn't refer to workers acting in their interests, but to middle class intellectuals, activists, and the like who try to compensate for their lack of real identification with workers by going over the top and making grand statements about the glory and innocence (etc.) of workers. But.. as far as I know, that's just a regional connotation, because I can't imagine the people in that group would be celebrating that.

Yeah, there is that too.


Your just jealous because you're not in it Devrim

Absolutely, I am just so hurt that you didn't invite me. Maybe there is a reason though:


We are a collective of people who reject high minded views of socialism.
and who enjoy to sneer at our own woring class roots, and sneer at other who read the guaridan and thing they are communists.

I read the Guardian on the intenet. Only for the football though because I like its coverage. Does that excuse me?

I presume that you are being ironic here, including the spelling mistakes.

Change 'sneer at our own woring class roots' to 'glorify...'. On second thoughts don't. It has got three syllables.

There are people who think like this though. Possibly the worst example wa s the UK group 'Class War'. Personally, I find the idea that working class people are so stupid that they can only relate to a political paper if it looks like the Sun quite offensive. You could be preet sure that the people writing it had their university degress though. It was more than a bit patronising in my opinion. Actually, the only people I have ever met who went to a UK public school* were in 'Class War'.

Devrim

*Note for American readers: In the UK, this means private school, not public school as you use it.

[Искра]

Ok. Thx. I didn't know what workersim is.
Direct translation of "workerism" etc. to Croatian is something which quite different from wiki definition.

[Pogue]

I just noticed this. I think there are quite deep problems with 'workerism' though I admit to being a hard-line workerist when ı was younger. I think it is amusing though that more than half of the members are actually students.

Devrim

Yeh, its incredibly amusing, the idea of working class people being in education is quite frankly hilarious.

[Devrim]

Yeh, its incredibly amusing, the idea of working class people being in education is quite frankly hilarious.

No, it's not and if you had read what I posted here you would know that I don't think that.

Devrim

[Pogue]

No, it's not and if you had read what I posted here you would know that I don't think that.

Devrim

So whats your point anyway? Are you criticising the group, criticising the tendency, or is this just another thread in which you aim to demonstrate your intellectual superiority to the rest of us over the internet?

[Wanted Man]

There are people who think like this though. Possibly the worst example wa s the UK group 'Class War'. Personally, I find the idea that working class people are so stupid that they can only relate to a political paper if it looks like the Sun quite offensive.

That's not enough. Workers also need hot chicks:

http://londonclasswar.org/newswire/media/3/20090110-cw3c.jpg

[Pogue]

to be honest i reckon class war would be quite pelased that you find them so offensive :lol:

[BobKKKindle$]

Actually, the only people I have ever met who went to a UK public school* were in 'Class War'.

Are you serious?

[Pogue]

Are you serious?

There were actually a few of them :lol:

[BobKKKindle$]

There were actually a few of them :lol:

We are talking about places like Eton and Harrow right?

If so...wow.

[Pogue]

We are talking about places like Eton and Harrow right?

If so...wow.

Yeh, mainly Eton. Mysteriously these people managed to assume 'cockney' accents through their involvement in the group.

If you read the article, I'll find it and post it up if the thread is lost, reflections of a working class anarchist in the UK, it talks a bit about the influence of alot of these types in the organisation. Its quite embarassing really.

I don't know really, I guess eventually every group will have such an element within it.

[scarletghoul]

Yes, Pol Pot would certainly have endorsed this usergroup, judging from their description

[Pogue]

Yes, Pol Pot would certainly have endorsed this usergroup, judging from their description

this usergroup would have forced pol pot to choke to death on his own vomit

[Panda Tse Tung]

this usergroup would have forced pol pot to choke to death on his own vomit
Yes, thats the Pol Pot way of doing things :). You are a quick student.

[Pogue]

Yes, thats the Pol Pot way of doing things :). You are a quick student.

nah he had innocent people beaten to death, i'd just make him choke to death on his own vomit

[scarletghoul]

i think i can see a hole in your strategy, pogue

[Pogue]

i think i can see a hole in your strategy, pogue

in fairness its in the early stages

[RHIZOMES]

http://londonclasswar.org/newswire/media/3/20090110-cw3c.jpg

Oh my fucking god

[Pogue]

i know, you cant believe you missed it :lol:

i heard it went quite well

[RHIZOMES]

this usergroup would have forced pol pot to choke to death on his own vomit

While committing quite similiar mistakes due to your guys macho contempt for theory. This is how I went, Pol Pot: "LOL FUCK ACTUAL THEORY" *does a bunch of insane completely uncommunist shite* Pol Pot: "WHUPS LOL"

This contempt for theory is one of the reasons I think the NZ left is so fucked.

[Pogue]

While committing quite similiar mistakes due to your guys macho contempt for theory. This is how I went, Pol Pot: "LOL FUCK ACTUAL THEORY" *does a bunch of insane completely uncommunist shite* Pol Pot: "WHUPS LOL"

This contempt for theory is one of the reasons I think the NZ left is so fucked.

Aww, our little group is generating so much controversy :lol:

Can you demonstrate where we have displayed a contempt for theory?

[scarletghoul]

"Workerism" is stupid and bound to failure. Read about Pol Pot, Pogue. You'll see his methods are not as practicle as you seem to think they were

[Wanted Man]

to be honest i reckon class war would be quite pelased that you find them so offensive :lol:

Offensive?

[Olerud]

it's just a little elitist club for the wee gang of anarchists.

[Pogue]

"Workerism" is stupid and bound to failure. Read about Pol Pot, Pogue. You'll see his methods are not as practicle as you seem to think they were

Workerism's revenge on this statement shall be the laughter of its children

[Pogue]

it's just a little elitist club for the wee gang of anarchists.

anarchists such as holden caulfield, nice one mate :laugh:

[Pogue]

Offensive?

yep. you need to chill out, once we've got some internal discussion going we'll have a thread where we'll engage you on what we believe, until then just relax

[Wanted Man]

How can I be a manly workerist like you guys? I want hot chicks with tattoos too.

[Pogue]

How can I be a manly workerist like you guys? I want hot chicks with tattoos too.

Sorry mate, hate to break it to you, but liklihood is they are lesbians.

[Frank Little]

Sorry mate, hate to break it to you, but liklihood is they are lesbians.

Oi! you :blushing:

[Vanguard1917]

Workerism is identity politics.

[Devrim]

So whats your point anyway? Are you criticising the group, criticising the tendency, or is this just another thread in which you aim to demonstrate your intellectual superiority to the rest of us over the internet?

It is chit-chat. Do I need a point?

I just thought a 'workerist' group full of students was amusing.



Actually, the only people I have ever met who went to a UK public school* were in 'Class War'. Are you serious?

Yes, I think there were a few. I can definitely remember two.


We are talking about places like Eton and Harrow right?

If so...wow.

I don't know which ones. I doubt they were that famous.

Devrim

[Holden Caulfield]

it's just a little elitist club for the wee gang of anarchists.

pogue is in L&S ffs, hardly anarchist

[Pogue]

It is chit-chat. Do I need a point?

I just thought a 'workerist' group full of students was amusing.



Yes, I think there were a few. I can definitely remember two.



I don't know which ones. I doubt they were that famous.

Devrim

Again, whats so amusing? Assuming students can come from a working class background, which you admitted they can, and assuming all of us are working class, which we are, why would it be odd for working class students to be in a workerist group?

[Pogue]

Workerism is identity politics.

Yes, it is. We identify with the working class and wish to forward the interests of this class. I would have thought that was standard for socialists, at least the majority of them.

[Devrim]

Again, whats so amusing? Assuming students can come from a working class background, which you admitted they can, and assuming all of us are working class, which we are, why would it be odd for working class students to be in a workerist group?

Do you understand what 'workerism' means? Have you ever met any 'workerist' groups?

Devrim

[Revy]

"Class War" is a pathetic group which probably has little actual understanding of the idea of classes, since their immature, pop-anarcho rhetoric revolves around "the rich" not the capitalists.

[Pogue]

Do you understand what 'workerism' means? Have you ever met any 'workerist' groups?

Devrim

If you read our group description perhaps you will see what we mean by it?

[Pogue]

"Class War" is a pathetic group which probably has little actual understanding of the idea of classes, since their immature, pop-anarcho rhetoric revolves around "the rich" not the capitalists.

Actually, it revolves around a concept of a ruling class and also one of a middle class, as outlined in Unfinished Business, their position paper, which is linked in my signature.

[Panda Tse Tung]

Pogue, please just admit you wuv Pol Pot sexy times :).

k thnx bai!

[Pogue]

Pogue, please just admit you wuv Pol Pot sexy times :).

k thnx bai!

go shop. lok for humour. find it. buy it. use it here.

[Stranger Than Paradise]

Workerism is identity politics.

No it is the support of politics which work in favour of the working class.

[9]

i think they mean it more in this (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Workerism#Workerism_as_revolutionary_praxis) sense.

Yes, part of that is actually sort of what I was talking about:



Originally Posted by Wikipedia:
More broadly, workerism can imply the idealisation of workers, especially manual workers, working class culture (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Working_class_culture) (or an idealised conception of it) and manual labour (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manual_labour) in generalThe idealization of manual labor is a huge part of what I was referring to.

[Panda Tse Tung]

go shop. lok for humour. find it. buy it. use it here.
What a waste of money... (using it here that is) You prolly buy the cheap stuff too, seeing your contribution0rzz.

[Pogue]

What a waste of money... (using it here that is) You prolly buy the cheap stuff too, seeing your contribution0rzz.

i tour mate, with that funny one, you know his name, i tour with him

[Vanguard1917]

No it is the support of politics which work in favour of the working class.

That's socialism -- an outlook which, after all, wants a society where the working class no longer exists (a classless society).

One of the main problems with workerism -- and i think some here may be using a definition of the term a bit different from that which Marxists criticise -- is its idealisation of working class existence. This is actually a conservative outlook, since it in the end means celebrating the status quo (as with all politics based on the celebration of current 'identities').

[Pogue]

That's socialism -- an outlook which, after all, wants a society where the working class no longer exists (a classless society).

One of the main problems with workerism -- and i think some here may be using a definition of the term a bit different from that which Marxists criticise -- is its idealisation of working class existence. This is actually a conservative outlook, since it in the end means celebrating the status quo (as with all politics based on the celebration of current 'identities').

No, because we have defined it as support for the working class. We see supporting the working class as supporting it in the class struggle, continued through the stage of working class dominance until the point at which the working class no longer exists.

[Stranger Than Paradise]

There is nothing in the definition of the group which glorifies the status quo or talks about identity politics.

[nuisance]

This thread has teh lol factorz.

[Il Medico]

Being a student doesn't really fit in with the cultural view of 'workerism'. It doesn't mean you don't have to work. It doesn't mean that some students aren't working class, but they would get laughed out of any serious 'workerist' group.

I am a full time worker and go to college because the government decided that I was poor enough to get enough money to pay it in full. I have to take at least 4 classes (I take 5 now), which is a bit tough with a full time job. And it isn't like my job pays much, I figured it out, I'll make around $10,000 this year. (probably less, because my income is based on sales, which means it fluctuates, usually down) If I would get laughed out of a workerist group, then they are laughable themselves. (But I don't think the group Pogue made was in the spirit of what you are talking about.)

[Devrim]

No, because we have defined it as support for the working class. We see supporting the working class as supporting it in the class struggle, continued through the stage of working class dominance until the point at which the working class no longer exists.


There is nothing in the definition of the group which glorifies the status quo or talks about identity politics.


If you read our group description perhaps you will see what we mean by it?



Workerism is identity politics.No it is the support of politics which work in favour of the working class.

You are not Humpty Dumpties:

http://www.authorama.com/files/humpty-dumpty.gif
Words have meanings and you can't use them to mean anything you like.


I am a full time worker and go to college because the government decided that I was poor enough to get enough money to pay it in full. I have to take at least 4 classes (I take 5 now), which is a bit tough with a full time job. And it isn't like my job pays much, I figured it out, I'll make around $10,000 this year. (probably less, because my income is based on sales, which means it fluctuates, usually down) If I would get laughed out of a workerist group, then they are laughable themselves. (But I don't think the group Pogue made was in the spirit of what you are talking about.)

No, I don't think they meant it that way. There are groups like this. There was a guy who used to post on here who was in a group that only allowed workers to join. Of course it excludes vast amounts of the working class, housewives, the unemployed, the retired, the seriously ill.

I certainly don't agree with these ideas. I just see it as funny that a 'workerist' group is made up of students.

Devrim

[Revy]

Operaismo (Italian for "workerism") (http://www.generation-online.org/t/toperaismo.htm)

The Italian theoretical and political movement, Operaismo was fundamentally active during the 1960s and the beginning of the 1970s. In an epoch when the crisis of the workers movement was dominated by excessively “ideological” debates, Operaismo was essentially characterised by the proposition of a “return to the working class”. It is characterised by:

1) A method. “We too have considered in first place capitalist development, and only afterward the workers struggles. This is an error. It is necessary to invert the problem, change the sign, and begin again: and the beginning is the struggle of the working class.” (M. Tronti, p. 105) As such, not only is class struggle the motor of history, but rather, above all, the relation is asymmetric. It is the ever visible movement of the working class that explains capital and capitalist society, and not the inverse.

This abstract idea acquires its meaning with the introduction of the concept of class composition. The working class is not a mythological notion, but rather a historically constructed whole. Technical composition: analysis of the labor process, of the technology, not in sociological terms but rather as sanction of the relations of force between classes. Example: fordism and taylorism embody the principle of eliminating the resistance of the workers and their unions imposing a new type of work. It makes sense then, to analyse the labour process and its modifications in detail in order to understand what “class struggle” means: there has never been more Marxist “evidence”. Political composition: inside the working class certain factions play a minor political role. The working class is not content with reacting to the dominion of capital, it is continually immersed in the process of political recomposition, and capital is obliged to respond with a continual restructuration of the labor process. As such it makes sense to analyse this political recomposition, the cycle of struggles.

2) A global point of view. In the first texts of Raniero Panzieri, attention is centred on planning. Capital acquires more relevance as a social power that tries to control the movements of the class, and less relevance as private property. From here there arises a new vision of the state: no longer is it the simple guarantor of exploitation, but rather the organiser, intervening directly in production. The form of the state is a consequence of the class composition. Antonio Negri can thus demonstrate that the “keynsian” state and what he calls in general the “planner state” is nothing other than the insertion of the October Revolution into capitalist development: workers' power is considered as an independent variable.

3) A political movement. If the working class is the motor of capitalist development, it can equally be, and is, a force of rupture. In a period of apparent reflux, in which one can speak of a working class will to integration, the operaists preached about and tried to organise new struggles impelled by a new figure: the “mass worker”, the nonqualified worker in the large factories. Struggles for wage equality were not corporatist claims but rather political forces of rupture capable of blocking the system and augmenting workers' power. The movement of 1968 would be perceived as confirmation of this thesis. There exists the possibility of rupture, and therefore the possibility for construction of communism (against socialism, the new form of development). But equally the state can also impose its restructuration, once again transforming the workers struggles into simple motors for development.

4) A movement in history. The will to organize the movements in open conflict with the traditional worker movement provoked a rupture in Quaderni Rossi (the originary journal of this tendency), lead by Panzieri. In 1964 the periodical Classe Operaia was born, animated by Mario Tronti, Romano Alquati and Antonio Negri among others - from which a part of the group, lead by Mario Tronti, separated in 1966 - that would end up entering into the PCI. After 1968, the group Potere Operaio would be one mode of inheriting the earlier tendency; its self-dissolution in 1973 signalled the appearance of “Autonomia Operaia”. Negri would elaborate the theory of the “diffuse social worker” as a new figure of a working class that had ceased to be concentrated in the large factories and had come to be distributed in a more diffused form in the totality of the territory, with the concept of productive work adopting a greater extension, and the state converting itself into the principle direct enemy. But that is already another story.

I put the text in Comic Sans for the lulz.

[RHIZOMES]

Aww, our little group is generating so much controversy :lol:

Can you demonstrate where we have displayed a contempt for theory?


For all those who are committed solely to working in the interests of the working class, as opposed to following the ideological line of some 'great leader' or theorist.

We believe our politics are grounded firmly in the realities of what needs to be done for our class, as opposed to some ideological dogma.

Sounds like macho contempt for theory to me.

[Wanted Man]

AO43p2Wqc08

[nuisance]

Sounds like macho contempt for theory to me.
Worried that you can't match up, or something?

[Il Medico]

AO43p2Wqc08
Damn, you. I am usually the first to post a song by the Village people. :closedeyes:
(See best navy slogan thread)

[Patchd]

Actually, it revolves around a concept of a ruling class and also one of a middle class, as outlined in Unfinished Business, their position paper, which is linked in my signature.
Is that the same one which sees teachers as being middle class? Might as well have put bourgeois in there if it wasn't for Class War's attempt at moving away from big words and adopting 'mockney' accents.

Still ... kudos to them for some lulzy stickers:

"[INSERT ANYONE/THING YOU HATE]

... BASTARDS!!!"

:lol::lol:

Also, macho man win LOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOL

[Pogue]

You are not Humpty Dumpties:

http://www.authorama.com/files/humpty-dumpty.gif
Words have meanings and you can't use them to mean anything you like.



No, I don't think they meant it that way. There are groups like this. There was a guy who used to post on here who was in a group that only allowed workers to join. Of course it excludes vast amounts of the working class, housewives, the unemployed, the retired, the seriously ill.

I certainly don't agree with these ideas. I just see it as funny that a 'workerist' group is made up of students.

Devrim

Again, read what our group description says, its our definition against yours. And stop getting so upset about it Devrim, its just an internet forum.

[Pogue]

Is that the same one which sees teachers as being middle class? Might as well have put bourgeois in there if it wasn't for Class War's attempt at moving away from big words and adopting 'mockney' accents.

Still ... kudos to them for some lulzy stickers:

"[INSERT ANYONE/THING YOU HATE]

... BASTARDS!!!"

:lol::lol:

Also, macho man win LOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOL

Many people can testify to me saying I disagree with the teacher bit.

Yeh the stickers are jokes :lol: They've changed them for this year though.

[Devrim]

Again, read what our group description says, its our definition against yours. And stop getting so upset about it Devrim, its just an internet forum.

I am not at all upset, just slightly amused.

Devrim

[Pogue]

I am not at all upset, just slightly amused.

Devrim

Great sense of humour there mate

[Tyrlop]

this thread is filled with bullshit,

[NecroCommie]

It's because I hadn't posted yet...

[gorillafuck]

That's not enough. Workers also need hot chicks:

http://londonclasswar.org/newswire/media/3/20090110-cw3c.jpg
Oh my fucking christ is that real?

[Il Medico]

Oh my fucking christ is that real?
You've never seen that before?:confused:

And yes, its real.

[gorillafuck]

You've never seen that before?:confused:

And yes, its real.
No, I never saw that before just now.

Wow.

[Bilan]

Great sense of humour there mate

Doesn't the fact that he is amused kind of undermine that? If he had no sense of humour, he would be annoyed at a group of 5 proclaiming workerism as their ideology. However, he is amused by this, as well as by the fact that you are predominatly students.
My amusement comes from the fact that the workerism (As defined in your thing) is scarcely any different from regular socialism. Though that's not so amusing. It would be more amusing for a non-socialist browsing the forum thinking "Heh, communists. Always spilitting into the same thing"

Kids these days.

[Pogue]

Doesn't the fact that he is amused kind of undermine that? If he had no sense of humour, he would be annoyed at a group of 5 proclaiming workerism as their ideology. However, he is amused by this, as well as by the fact that you are predominatly students.
My amusement comes from the fact that the workerism (As defined in your thing) is scarcely any different from regular socialism. Though that's not so amusing. It would be more amusing for a non-socialist browsing the forum thinking "Heh, communists. Always spilitting into the same thing"

Kids these days.

Maybe if he had a sense of humour he wouldn't have got so wound up by it. Did no one think maybe part of our intention in seeting up this group was tog enerate the controversy you see now? Its amazing how a word and 2 sentences can get so many people wound up, but I guess when a political forum is the main focus of your political activity that tends to happen.

[Bilan]

Maybe if he had a sense of humour he wouldn't have got so wound up by it. Did no one think maybe part of our intention in seeting up this group was tog enerate the controversy you see now? Its amazing how a word and 2 sentences can get so many people wound up, but I guess when a political forum is the main focus of your political activity that tends to happen.

I don't know if you should really be calling Devrim's activity into question. You are, after all, a hell of a lot younger than him, and with a lot less experience. I wouldn't really play that card.
There isn't really any controversy, either. People giggled at a Workerist group set up by students. Then some people claimed Workerism was identity politics, and others said it glorified the working class and had a reactionary out look. And now we're here.
Not much controversy.
I think it's funny. The description doesn't distuingish Workerism from socialism in any way.
Personally, I find Workerism quite interesting, but eh.

[black magick hustla]

i like more the combat state-capitalism group

[black magick hustla]

trollwar:

stalinotrolls vs trollarchists

who would win??????

[black magick hustla]

comradejoe is prettygood at it. i remember reading some one liners that almost made me spit my soda. pogue gets angry to easily. i will pidgeonhole holden in the trollarchist side he can be p. good. on the other side, i dont generally read stalinotrolls because most of them are kindof boring but scarletghoul can be somewhat good.

[Plagueround]

Words have meanings and you can't use them to mean anything you like.


Not only is this is so priceless coming from you I'm thinking about printing it out and framing it, but it's also not true. The entire history of words is a constant evolution of meaning, context, and appropriation.

[RHIZOMES]

Worried that you can't match up, or something?

No idea what you mean by that? Oh yes, my masculinity has been threatened by the might "Workerist" group :rolleyes:. "Macho contempt for theory" is a phrase I have heard used a couple of times to describe a certain attitude prevalent on a lot of the NZ left, which is exactly what it's described as, a macho contempt for theory. Such a flippant attitude towards theory and having a coherent revolutionary ideology has usually resulted in quite a few fuckups. So I find the anti-intellectualism in the Workerist "tendency" quite amusing like other comrades in this thread do.

[ZeroNowhere]

trollwar:

stalinotrolls vs trollarchists

who would win??????
Stalinists aren't archists? So they're anarchists, then?


Did no one think maybe part of our intention in seeting up this group was tog enerate the controversy you see now?So you're the equivalent of Marilyn Manson on Revleft?
Ew.

[Revy]

I think it would be better rendered as "anarchotrolls".
Just from a linguistic standpoint.

[Pogue]

I don't know if you should really be calling Devrim's activity into question. You are, after all, a hell of a lot younger than him, and with a lot less experience. I wouldn't really play that card.
There isn't really any controversy, either. People giggled at a Workerist group set up by students. Then some people claimed Workerism was identity politics, and others said it glorified the working class and had a reactionary out look. And now we're here.
Not much controversy.
I think it's funny. The description doesn't distuingish Workerism from socialism in any way.
Personally, I find Workerism quite interesting, but eh.

How can you say it doesnt differentiate from socialism? Socialism is aimed at creating a classless, stateless society, but look at what people have done claiming to reach that. The workerist group was just something a few of us who thought the same way wanted to do after talking in a joking manner about how we are 'workerists' - it means what it says, we adhere to advocating a pro-working class politics, as opposed to say the customary detached ruthlessness of some Leninist politics and the obstructive idealism of some Anarchist politics.

[Holden Caulfield]

this thread is proof of pogues ability to argue and argue and argue over anything, always, and never stop, ever

[Revy]

I wonder why the Combat State Capitalism group is invite only....there's like no button to join. it's almost like.....state capitalism disguised as anti-state capitalism, to deny the workers adequate participation.

[LeninBalls]

Seems more like an "Anarchists and Pogue's friends only" group.

[Holden Caulfield]

Seems more like an "Anarchists and Pogue's friends only" group.

don't you dare class me as simply pogue's friend, if anything he is my friend.
dont ever undermine my forum ego, what were you thinking, i mean jesus christ man.

[Devrim]

but I guess when a political forum is the main focus of your political activity that tends to happen.

I presume that this is aimed at me, so I will reply.

First, it is very interesting the way this sort of line always comes up, and how very often when it does come up, it is raised by people who live in different continents from, and have never met, the person that they are talking about. This sort of thing makes me think that is always an accurate description of people' lack of activity, and not just a completely uninformed line.

Second, It isn't the main focus of my political activity, and as Bilan points out I am much older than you, and obviously have been involved in more. Of course this is the internet, so I could be lying. I will only refer to things I was involved in when I was in London, which as you know anarchists there you can check on it with. I was involved in various strikes, organised flying pickets and illegal solidarity action, I was on a strike committee during a wildcat three and a half week long strike of 180,000 workers. ran a workplace publication with a circulation of 8,000, was a member of a political organisation and took part in its activities,...On and by the way, I was about your age at that point. When you have done half of that, try coming back with this line to me.

Finally the whole thing about the Internet, which in itslelf is quite strange coming from someone who makes nearly three times as many posts here as I do, and belongs to an organisation, which has a website instead of a paper. For us it is a tool for getting across our ideas and talking with people, just as our press is, or holding a public meeting is, or talking with our fellow workers is. I don't see this difference between the Internet and 'real life'.

We use the internet. If it were the main focus of my political activity, I wouldn't be too worried by it as my political activity is directed by an organisation, and is a part of the totalality of that work. Yes I do a lot of things on the Internet. I post here, and also, less often, on Libcom. I run two websites, the ICC'S Turkish page, and the site of an independent Turkish left communists journal. They can be found here:

http://tr.internationalism.org/
http://enternasyonalbakis.org/

Devrim

[Olerud]

Seems more like an "Anarchists and Pogue's friends only" group.

so fucking true.

[Pogue]

I presume that this is aimed at me, so I will reply.

First, it is very interesting the way this sort of line always comes up, and how very often when it does come up, it is raised by people who live in different continents from, and have never met, the person that they are talking about. This sort of thing makes me think that is always an accurate description of people' lack of activity, and not just a completely uninformed line.

Second, It isn't the main focus of my political activity, and as Bilan points out I am much older than you, and obviously have been involved in more. Of course this is the internet, so I could be lying. I will only refer to things I was involved in when I was in London, which as you know anarchists there you can check on it with. I was involved in various strikes, organised flying pickets and illegal solidarity action, I was on a strike committee during a wildcat three and a half week long strike of 180,000 workers. ran a workplace publication with a circulation of 8,000, was a member of a political organisation and took part in its activities,...On and by the way, I was about your age at that point. When you have done half of that, try coming back with this line to me.

Finally the whole thing about the Internet, which in itslelf is quite strange coming from someone who makes nearly three times as many posts here as I do, and belongs to an organisation, which has a website instead of a paper. For us it is a tool for getting across our ideas and talking with people, just as our press is, or holding a public meeting is, or talking with our fellow workers is. I don't see this difference between the Internet and 'real life'.

We use the internet. If it were the main focus of my political activity, I wouldn't be too worried by it as my political activity is directed by an organisation, and is a part of the totalality of that work. Yes I do a lot of things on the Internet. I post here, and also, less often, on Libcom. I run two websites, the ICC'S Turkish page, and the site of an independent Turkish left communists journal. They can be found here:

http://tr.internationalism.org/
http://enternasyonalbakis.org/

Devrim

I could ask people who know you from London, I have done, its interesting that one thing that comes back is that you have a tendency to lie alot.

And don't say I started this. Your the one who mentioned the fact we're students in a mocking way. As if its particularly odd for people to be in sixth form college or university and still have a political analysis that advocates what we claim to have advocated.

Basically, don't mock other peoples ideas or what they are doing in life if you don't really have a leg to stand on. I don't care if you've done stuff in the past. The point I was making was that I think its odd you'd be so concerned about a user group on the internet, I think the extent to which you care is evidence of your activist priorities at the moment. Maybe I'm hilighting the fact its funny that someone who has something of a reputation for not getting up to much politically in the real world these days would say its funny that people who are in a 'workerist' group are also in education.

[Devrim]

I could ask people who know you from London, I have done, its interesting that one thing that comes back is that you have a tendency to lie alot.

Please Pogue what about? Please give one thing that I listed above that I am lying about?

Devrim

[Pavlov's House Party]

trollwar:

stalinotrolls vs trollarchists

who would win??????

neither

us trots would ruin the lulz with our poor sense of humour

[Pogue]

I'm going to stop this Devrim because its getting stupidly personal and I don't really have a problem with you, I'm just saying you shouldn't hilight the fact we're in education as a negative thing, its quite offensive and its also getting personal.

[Pirate turtle the 11th]

That argument was fucking shit no one threatened to come round anyone's house with a shotgun despite the practical difficulties involved.

[bcbm]

That argument was fucking shit no one threatened to come round anyone's house with a shotgun despite the practical difficulties involved.

im on the first plane to your front door with a .45 fucko

[Patchd]

Words have meanings and you can't use them to mean anything you like.
Oh, the beauty of the evolution of language. The meaning of words have kept changing throughout history, obviously some more so than others, here's another example of it happening.

The term 'libertarian' is an example of how it's definition has changed in some places, precisely because of people using it the wrong way.

[Pirate turtle the 11th]

im on the first plane to your front door with a .45 fucko

Thank you!

Christ its nice to have some normality around here.

[Jazzratt]

That argument was fucking shit no one threatened to come round anyone's house with a shotgun despite the practical difficulties involved.

Nothing will beat one the threads I saw when I first came here when one of the restricted members actually challeneged someone to a duel. An honest to fuck duel. In Somalia.

[Panda Tse Tung]

:) I wuv this thread.

[BobKKKindle$]

Nothing will beat one the threads I saw when I first came here when one of the restricted members actually challeneged someone to a duel. An honest to fuck duel. In Somalia.

Source or it didn't happen.

[Leo]

I think something like that actually happened on libcom, a member of the Communist League group in England challenged a regular poster on libcom to a duel. It was quote awesome.

I don't recall anything about Somalia though.

[Jazzratt]

Source or it didn't happen.

From this post onward:


So its insult upon insult. :angry: Well ive had enough. You think you can screw around with my girls honor. I wish we still had dueling but the lefts outlawed it.

YOU WOULDNT DO THIS IN REAL LIFE WOULD YOU YOU SICK COMMUNIST!!

Name a time and place. I can fly out to anywhere in the world to duel you, i have the means and infinite time beleive me.

aND DONt divert with that African stuff again. Ive had enough of your antic-capitalsim. Their country is busted. Abolishing capitalism is not enought and you know it. They need a healthy capitalism injection with their anti-malaria.

The thread in question devolves into further lulz.

[Pogue]

don't tell me we banned that clear winnar?

[Jazzratt]

don't tell me we banned that clear winnar?

I'm afraid we did :(

Nothing to do with me though, I wasn't even in the CC back then, I don't think.

[Pirate turtle the 11th]

Link to the thread now and I will forgive your lack of hygiene.

[ls]

Hm, for starters I am not a 'student', I'm just unemployed and I'm a member of that group.

I would've thought that Devrim supported the 'operaismo' movement in Italy (from which the term workerism originates in my mind, not Lenin's criticism of Trotsky's supposed 'workerism').

Of course, the whole attack on workerism as being based around a bunch of middle-class intellectuals is completely wrong, if anything the workerist movement in Italy was extremely proletarian, some the people part of that group on here may be students, but I can vouch for the fact that almost everyone on there is definitely working-class too (from personal interaction).

I'm not sure if I speak for the whole group but I don't think most on it mind being called ultra-leftist bastards or something, but some of the criticisms levelled are kind of surprising and unnecessary, then again I suppose it's to be expected from Revleft. :p

[Pirate turtle the 11th]

I think something like that actually happened on libcom, a member of the Communist League group in England challenged a regular poster on libcom to a duel. It was quote awesome.

I don't recall anything about Somalia though.

Link it. Now.

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

'Workerism' is only useful if we accept that a sizeable chunk of what capitalist sociological models define as the 'lower middle class' are actually part of the working class.

I despise hearing the exploited 'lower middle class' rejected by workerist groupings. Completely unhelpful.

[Bilan]

How can you say it doesnt differentiate from socialism? Socialism is aimed at creating a classless, stateless society, but look at what people have done claiming to reach that. The workerist group was just something a few of us who thought the same way wanted to do after talking in a joking manner about how we are 'workerists' - it means what it says, we adhere to advocating a pro-working class politics, as opposed to say the customary detached ruthlessness of some Leninist politics and the obstructive idealism of some Anarchist politics.

That doesn't really make you Workerists. I mean, any old Leninist will tell you their politics are "pro-working class" (What is that supposed to mean?), as will most Marxists and anarchists (Those who have maintain class politics, anyhow).

[Plagueround]

Link it. Now.

Go to the post jazzrat linked. Click the arrow next to person's name.

[Bilan]

anarki for the uk.
anarki for the nanana

[Panda Tse Tung]

Sex 'n the City is a clear example of what a workerist society would look like.

[Bilan]

'Workerism' is only useful if we accept that a sizeable chunk of what capitalist sociological models define as the 'lower middle class' are actually part of the working class.

I despise hearing the exploited 'lower middle class' rejected by workerist groupings. Completely unhelpful.

I'm not sure what exactly you are trying to get across.
Are you saying that the lower middle class exists, and that workerists need to accept that within their framework? Or, alternatively, are you saying that it (the lower middle class) doesn't exist, and that workerists need to recognise that discrepancies within income are not defining features of class; that the capitalist socological framework creates fictitious classes (such as the lower middle class) to undermine the unity of the working class?

[The Ungovernable Farce]

If SpanishInquisition fought a duel with Radical, it'd be amazing.

Also, I'd understand the term "workerism" as being most useful in defining anarchists who still believe in class struggle as against individualists/lifestylists/whatever. Since there aren't many of those on here, it's of limited use.

[revolution inaction]

I think something like that actually happened on libcom, a member of the Communist League group in England challenged a regular poster on libcom to a duel. It was quote awesome.

I don't recall anything about Somalia though.



Link it. Now.


http://libcom.org/forums/thought/communist-league?page=2#comment-206440

[Pirate turtle the 11th]

^ Cheers dude.

[Devrim]

I'm going to stop this Devrim because its getting stupidly personal and I don't really have a problem with you, I'm just saying you shouldn't hilight the fact we're in education as a negative thing, its quite offensive and its also getting personal.

Pogue, you can't just call somebody a liar, and then back out. Please show which of those things I said above I was lying about. It isn't acceptable behaviour.

It wasn't getting personal. You got personal. I wasn't getting upset either. You were because somebody had laughed at your group name.

Nor do I think that being in education is a negative thing. I don't have a problem with that at all. It seems to me though that you are embarrassed about it, or you wouldn't have come over as so defensive. There is nothing wrong with getting an education.

What is funny is when students start to call themselves a 'workerist group.', and if you read the thread, I am not the only person who thinks so.


Oh, the beauty of the evolution of language. The meaning of words have kept changing throughout history, obviously some more so than others, here's another example of it happening.

The term 'libertarian' is an example of how it's definition has changed in some places, precisely because of people using it the wrong way.

Yes, I suppose this is true. I am not sure that it works with 'libertarian'. I think that is more connected with the American use. Sort of like 'suspenders'.

Words do change, but it still doesn't mean you can just decide to appropriate them for whatever you like. If someone told you he was a social democrat, and then explained that he believed in the armed seizure of power, and dictatorship of the workers 'councils, you would be understandably confused. If he then told you he was a social democrat because he was a socialist who believed in democracy, you would probably laugh and tell him what it meant.


I would've thought that Devrim supported the 'operaismo' movement in Italy (from which the term workerism originates in my mind, not Lenin's criticism of Trotsky's supposed 'workerism').

Of course, the whole attack on workerism as being based around a bunch of middle-class intellectuals is completely wrong, if anything the workerist movement in Italy was extremely proletarian, some the people part of that group on here may be students, but I can vouch for the fact that almost everyone on there is definitely working-class too (from personal interaction).

I think the term in English suggests the critique of economism. The Italian groups tend to be refeered to as 'Operaismo' in English, maybe because it sounds artistic or something in Italian.

The discussion about the Italian groups is a lot more complicated. Basically there were really positive trends coming out of some of the groups that emerged from the factories in the Italian struggles. I think that it lost its way with 'Autonomia Operia' and ended up talking about everybody's autonomy, but workers. Incedentaly, it was about the time that they siesed to be workers groups and were taken over by students.


'Workerism' is only useful if we accept that a sizeable chunk of what capitalist sociological models define as the 'lower middle class' are actually part of the working class.

I despise hearing the exploited 'lower middle class' rejected by workerist groupings. Completely unhelpful.

It depends what you mean by the 'lower middle class'. If you are refeering to teachers of course they are workers. If you are talking about small shopkeepers, they are not.

In my experience, most of the rejection of teachers comes from groups with a high proportion of members who come from the sociological middle class.


http://libcom.org/forums/thought/communist-league?page=2#comment-206440

That was a great thread.

Devrim

[ls]

The discussion about the Italian groups is a lot more complicated.

Exactly, I think sweeping it all aside is pointless. Everyone on this thread has had their little joke at the contemporary left definition of workerism (and yeah some posts have been funny to be fair), but all-in-all I understood operaismo to mean workerism in English, obviously I seem to be wrong on this point.


Basically there were really positive trends coming out of some of the groups that emerged from the factories in the Italian struggles. I think that it lost its way with 'Autonomia Operia' and ended up talking about everybody's autonomy, but workers. Incedentaly, it was about the time that they siesed to be workers groups and were taken over by students.

It was a mixed set of currents by that time I would say. You had factions that were leaning Trotskyist, Marxist-Leninist as well and they were not really true to workerism/autonomous marxism or even left-communism at that time (although some factions within Autonomia Operaia were, they were a minority from what I can make out though). It's simply not fair to say the entire movement was petty-bourgeois students, that is pretty much historical revisionism.

We claim the tradition of the progressive workerist organisation(s) and factions of organisations in Italy that formed out of mass struggles, we obviously don't over-fetishise working-class culture with machismo crap though, which is what's being made out as the case, calling for workers' self-organisation shouldn't be interpreted as meaning that.

Incidentally, the talks about Class War federation here are pretty funny, I'm sure I speak for the group when I say: we do not really endorse class war federation at all. :p

[Devrim]

It was a mixed set of currents by that time I would say. You had factions that were leaning Trotskyist, Marxist-Leninist as well and they were not really true to workerism/autonomous marxism or even left-communism at that time (although some factions within Autonomia Operaia were, they were a minority from what I can make out though). It's simply not fair to say the entire movement was petty-bourgeois students, that is pretty much historical revisionism.

We claim the tradition of the progressive workerist organisation(s) and factions of organisations in Italy that formed out of mass struggles, we obviously don't over-fetishise working-class culture with machismo crap though, which is what's being made out as the case, calling for workers' self-organisation shouldn't be interpreted as meaning that.

The whole Italian thing isn't something I know that much about. Somewhere along the line, as I understand it', what were genuine workers' groups ended up as what is today 'autonomism', which to me seems to be almost the antithesis of where it started out.

We have an article about 'Autonomia Operaia' here: http://en.internationalism.org/specialtexts/IR016_auto_operaia.htm


Incidentally, the talks about Class War federation here are pretty funny, I'm sure I speak for the group when I say: we do not really endorse class war federation at all. :p

CWF are a funny groups. They have declined from there height though. When I lived in England they made the front page of the papers and Ian was on chat shows.

Devrim