ZIONIST CRIMES.

Posted on July 30, 2014 by stutteringsteps

It may beggar belief that the Zionist State of Israel can bomb and blitz the poor un-armed citizens of Gaza, with hardly a word of condemnation from its own citizens. ‘Not in my name’ is a concept  uttered by only a few citizens of Israel. This absence of humanity or sense of fairness within Israeli society is reflected within the Zionist armed forces.  It is most starkly revealed in the one-sided armament capability available to both sides. One side, the Israeli, has vastly more numbers, vastly superior ground weapons and a total monopoly of air and naval capability. Yet the Palestinian resistance to this barricaded occupation is presented by Israel as the aggressor. The situation truly is a modern day analogue of the mythical sling-shot David facing a well armed Goliath.

It may also confuse some people why this one-sided carnage can continue without any real censure by the political and economic elites of the rest of the world. It has once again become the case that the bourgeois elites of the world put self-interest (financial or electoral) above the general interests of humanity. In this, as with other cases, they can only utter an occasional mealy-mouthed wish for both sides to call a halt to the hostilities, or for a oxymoronically termed humanitarian ceasefire. What is humane about ceasing for a couple of hours the most vicious massacre of men women and children – only to re-commence this one-sided battle of genocidal destruction?

It becomes clear, crimes against humanity are only championed by the pro-capitalist elites if it serves their own personal or class interests to do so.  Otherwise, when not perpetrating them, they turn a blind eye, collude with or excuse such crimes.  Yet the repeated criminal mass killings of civilians in Gaza again reveals that Israel can only be classed as a rogue state.  If  Operation ‘Cast Lead’ in 2008/9 awoke much of the world to the all-out brutal and inhuman punishment of which Zionists are capable, then the current operation ‘Protective Edge’ should wake up the rest. If not then humanity has a long way to go before being able to create any form of society worthy of lasting value. Bourgeois states in general are bad enough, being the apparatus by which its own citizens are exploited and oppressed. Yet those like Israel, based upon the annexing and colonisation of other peoples territory, tend to be even worse.

And Israel is not just any rogue state – it is entirely unique. It is a state for only one particular religion and creed. It is a Jewish State. All other people are of secondary importance and of second class status with regard to the citizens of this state. It was a state formed on the basis of Zionist ideology and created by brutal armed aggression in 1948. The Nakba, or Catastrophe, as the Palestinians named it, which resulted in the declaration of Israel, was the ruthless application of armed force against many unarmed and peaceful citizens of Palestine. It was Zionist ideology which ensured that this 20th century ‘clearing’ of the indigenous people of the Palestinian territory was achieved without any concern for the humanity of the displaced victims.  And it is Zionist ideology which justifies and supports the repeated massacres of Palestinians in the 21st century.

The closest historical analogue to such a rogue state came with the 20th century Nazi dream of an supremacist Aryan race based predominantly in Germany in which all other people were either usefully exploited, ruthlessly dispossessed or Blitzkrieged to death. Not surprisingly the closest analogue to the walled-in situation of Palestinians in Gaza was the walled-in Warsaw Ghetto enforced by the supremacist bullies of the Third Reich. The Nazis have correctly been identified as perpetrating crimes of humanity and as bringing universal shame upon the German nation. Fascism is best described as a disgrace to 20th century humanity.

I find it interesting that finally someone in the United Nations has today (July 30 2014) described the Zionist bombing of UN school and hospital projects in Gaza in exactly these words – ‘the world stands in disgrace’, it is ’an offront’ and the failure to try to prevent or end it has brought ‘universal shame‘. Yet there are still no calls from Europe or North America for sanctions against Israel. Nevertheless, both these sections of the Anglo-Saxon pro-capitalist elite have been busying themselves considering and organising for sanctions against Russia – for much less. The contrast couldn’t be greater.

The Zionist State is guilty of war crimes. Shame upon those who stay silent and inactive in face of this savage onslaught on defenceless people, be the victims, Palestinians, Ukrainians or anyone else. Shame on all those who in greater numbers, armed to the hilt with the latest destructive weaponry, pick on those unarmed or poorly armed and in less numbers and those in the way, to vent their patriarchal masculine viciousness upon. Even from a traditional patriarchal perspective, any gang of armed thugs picking on smaller people, women and children would be judged bullies and cowards.  From a revolutionary-humanist perspective those who take part or support such inhumanity are part of the problem facing humanity and as long as they persist, will never be part of any permanent solution to the other problems we face. Much of the world does indeed ‘stand disgraced‘.

Roy Ratcliffe. (July 2014.)

PS. For more on Israael and its settler state status ee http://blackagendareport.com/content/victim-colonial-settler-shifting-paradigm-israel

Posted in dispossession, Nationalism, Palestine, Patriarchy, The State | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

ANGLO-SAXON HYPOCRISY!

Posted on July 20, 2014 by stutteringsteps

The different treatment of three recent sets of fatality statistics, indicate once again the unbridled hypocrisy of the Anglo-Saxon, neo-con elite and their supporters. First, there are the 295 casualties suffered by those aboard Flight MH17 over eastern Ukraine. Second there are those hundreds of civilian fatalities in eastern Ukraine suffered under the bombing and shelling by the armed forces wielded by the Kiev government. Third there are those 380 plus (and rising) citizens of Gaza (many of them children) at the hands of the second Israeli full-scale Blitzkrieg of this tortured and besieged land.

The tragic deaths of those 295 passengers aboard Malaysian Airlines flight MH17 have received extensive coverage in all strands of news media. For days now, politicians, reporters and editors of newspapers, radio and television have rushed to display their outrage, shock, grief, dismay and many other emotional outpourings. In comparison, very little has been said against the equally murderous actions of Kiev or of Israel.  However, the sincerity of these establishment figures over the plights of flight MH17 passengers, is also questionable given that this emotional outpouring has also been accompanied by something of a stampede to blame Russia.

There are no pictures of the faces of children killed in Eastern Ukraine or Gaza, plastering the front covers of newspapers, nor are there charges of murder laid at the doors of the presidents of Ukraine or Israel. No politicians are lining up to condemn Israel or Kiev. Yet charges of murder have been laid at the door of the Russian President and the faces of the children of flight MH17 have appeared on at least one UK newspaper.  This highly selective outpouring of grief demonstrates more than anything the utter hypocrisy of the neo-liberal elites in Europe and the West, who care little for the children or citizens in Ukraine or Gaza, or those millions killed in their own military wars, proxy wars or austerity wars.

Blame games and denial.

This blame game aimed at Russia is a continuation of essentially the same narrative that has been constructed over the tragic situation unfolding in Ukraine. Now I am no greater fan of capitalist Russia, than I was of Stalinist Russia, but it is clear the Anglo-Saxon elite narrative (US, UK and Europe) serves an ulterior motive. Those with this motive do not require substantiated evidence to attribute guilt. They cannot wait to point a finger of blame. Apparently everything, which happens in Ukraine is directly Russia’s fault. No fault at all lies with the Kiev government nor in the manipulations of the USA and Europe in this and other regions of the world.

For their self-serving neo-liberal politicised forensic analysis there is no chain of events, leading to any terrible outcomes. At least none in which they played a decisive part.  The neo-liberal pro-capitalist narrative dictates that everything bad which happens in the world is the fault of someone else. It is not the financial, economic, political or military sections of the capitalist class who cause any problems, nor the mode of production itself.

In Iraq, Afghanistan, for example, the military interventions – according to the western narrative – were undertaken for the best possible reasons. If things turned out badly in these two theatres of war, it was someone else’s (usually the occupied peoples) fault. This type of narrative is studiously copied and paraded by the Israeli establishment. Everything bad which happens in Palestine is not the fault of the illegal military occupation and oppression, but the fault of those who choose to resist it. Capitalist, Colonialists and neo-liberal Imperialists, like many alcoholics  and drug addicts are in a state of complete denial.

Direct and indirect culpability.

Yet practically everyone knows that very few things happen, without a chain of events leading up to them. When considering any serious circumstances, including disasters, those who do not have anything to gain from quickly pointing the finger of guilt at someone else, seriously consider the links in any chain of events and establish direct and indirect responsibility.  In such chains of events it then becomes possible to establish direct and indirect culpability.

In the case of the tragic downing of flight MH17, the capitalist operators of the Airline, will wish to point the finger of blame at external circumstances and away from their own profit-motive led decisions.  Yet this particular flight orientated chain of events includes the financial decision of the airline to fly over the airspace of a military conflict. This decision was taken in full knowledge that other aircraft had been shot down, and which it was known that a number of actors (Kiev, Russia, and possibly the dissidents) had the capacity to operate high level missiles capable of reaching 70,000 feet.

These facts were well known and many other airlines had decided to incur the extra costs of flying around Ukraine. But not Malayan Airlines. Profits at Malayan Airlines clearly trumped safety. Now if I decide to enter a war zone and get shot, then the direct culpability will be the person who pulled the trigger. But any reasonable person would also attribute an indirect responsibility to myself for taking such a stupid risk. By the same token, if the plane crash was in fact caused by a missile, any reasonable person would not only direct their anger and criticism against those who launched it, but also against those who chose to risk flying over a known dangerous hazard – in order to save fuel.

Similarly, the existence of a dangerous war zone in Eastern Ukraine is itself a product of a chain of events with a number of links not only over time, but to internal and external actors. If we only start from the events of the Maidan demonstrations, then we know that money and weapons were introduced into the Ukraine by both the USA, Europe and Russia. If flight MH17 was downed by a missile, (as yet there is no definitive evidence) then those who introduced these weapons bear an indirect responsibility, along with those who helped create the civil-war in the first place. Missiles could not have been used if they were not there in the first place, and manned by trained operatives. There would not be a militarised war zone, but for the events which unfolded over months in the Ukraine. Many actors contributed in one way or another indirectly and directly to this tragedy.

False flag ops and fabricated evidence.

In a world not dominated by powerful economic, financial and political forces, then the circumstances surrounding this second tragedy of a Malayan Airlines flight, could be examined impartially and the full circumstances surrounding it – including any direct and indirect responsibility eventually established. However, given the high political and diplomatic intensity of the struggle over the future of the Ukraine, this outcome is unlikely. Any guilty actor (Western backed Kiev, Russia or pro-Russian activists) will be highly motivated to destroy any incriminating evidence against themselves. Any guilty or even non-guilty actor will be motivated to fabricate evidence to make it appear that their enemies are guilty.

We need to remember, when sufficient powerful interests are at stake anything can happen. The history of the elites in control of the capitalist mode of production, proves that nothing devious is beyond them in order to pursue their interests. Nuclear and biological warfare, genocide, area bombing of civilians is well documented. Donning the enemies uniforms and committing  atrocities against their own allies, has been done. Allowing atrocities, which could have been stopped, to be carried out, is nothing new. Evidence (photographic or recorded) of wrong-doing destroyed or doctored – is routine. Fabricated evidence to lay guilt on an undesirable person is par for the course.

For revolutionary-humanists and anti-capitalists, there are many lessons to be learned from the current events throughout the globe. Number one: the neo-liberal fundamentalist elites in control of the capitalist mode of production, will attempt to save and promote their economic and political system, by any means possible and will use any tactic which their depraved patriarchal imaginations can conceive. They will blame anyone else but themselves, using whatever deceitful means they are allowed to deploy.  But we need to recall that these same male-stream Machiavellian characteristics were manifested within anti-capitalism by the Stalinist political elites and are manifested by fundamentalists of the religious kind.

Undoubtedly, humanity needs a completely different paradigm of organisation and way of thinking from those of the past.  The lesson I draw form the current state of the world is that there is an urgent need for the establishment of a revolutionary-humanist movement, free from sectarianism, dogmatism and patriarchy in any of their deceitful political or religious forms.

Roy Ratcliffe. July 2014.)

Posted in Anti-Capitalism, Critique, Fundamentalism, neo-liberalism, Palestine, Patriarchy, Politics, Revolutionary-Humanism, Sectarianism, Ukraine., US military atrocities | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Book Review: ‘The Trouble with Islam Today’

Posted on July 13, 2014 by stutteringsteps

By Irshad Manji

Given the rise of militant Islam in the 20th century, this is an important book, despite its many shortcomings. Where the Muslim author of this book deals with the religion of Islam and its patriarchal violence her arguments are strong and the material she wields rests on solid ground. However, where she strays into politics, economics and other religions the weakness and fragility of her understanding is demonstrated. More of that later. Meanwhile, I shall consider the books considerable strength and its potential importance.

Although in parts she appeals to non-Muslims, the book is written as a sort of lengthy critical ‘open letter’ in order to challenge non-violent Muslims.  The author describes herself as a Muslim Refusenik and says in the introduction that she is ‘hanging onto Islam by her fingernails’.  Her challenge is for the creation of a  ‘critical mass’ of moderate Muslims which will begin a two pronged process. First a serious criticism of the Qur’an itself, and in a parallel second prong, a scrupulous self-criticism of Islamic practices. In short she wishes to contribute to kick-starting an Islamic ‘reformation’ process.

That is to say a process similar to the one Christianity in Europe went through in the 15th and 16th centuries. Fuelled by economic and social changes, this European Protestant reformation was also a ‘protest’ against the oppression, moral and pecuniary outrages perpetrated by Roman Catholicism. It commenced in Switzerland and later Germany as an intellectual movement of criticism based upon the actual reading of the Christian Bible and contrasting this with the institutionalised practices of Roman Catholicism. Among the more well known initial intellects were Erasmus, Huss and Reuchlin. It gathered pace and eventually became a popular movement of resistance to Papal authority and its control of all forms of governance. This movement, eventually led to a reform of how Christian religion was practiced and how communities were governed in much of Europe.

The partial separation of politics from religion; championed by Martin Luther and various European Princes and Burghers, has not been replicated in the Islamic World.  It should be noted at this point, that all the Abrahamic religions, Judaism, Christianity and Islam are forms of earthly patriarchal governance with a textual claim of divine authorisation for their oppressive forms of rule. However, direct  religious (papal) governance was shattered during the above-noted protestant reformation. Political governance was separated from religion and religion became mostly a private matter. Apart from some orthodox Jews, only Islam retains the ancient aspiration to religious forms of governance and conformity and it is this among other things which Irshad Manji draws attention to. For example;

“..how we Muslims behave, not in theory, but in actuality, is Islam…..we have to snap out of our denial……We Muslims have a lot of catching up to do in the dissent department.”(Introduction.)

After describing her childhood as a Muslim with a father who typically had a ‘ready fist’ and her struggle in young adulthood faced with male Muslim prejudice against females, she decided that her ‘home’ was where her ‘dignity lives’.  She relates that a severe wake-up call for her came with a colleagues comments on the news that a Nigerian girl was to receive 180 lashes after being coerced into pre-marital sex by three males.  She begins chapter 2 with a question and a statement. The statement is as follows.

“Pick a Muslim country, any Muslim country, and the most brutal humiliations will grab you by the vitals. In Pakistan, an average of two women  every day die from ‘honour killings’, often with Allah’s name on the lips of the murderers. In Mali and Mauritania, little boys are seduced into slavery by Muslim hustlers. In Sudan, slavery happens at the hands of Islamic militias. In Yemen and Jordan, Christian humanitarian workers have been shot point-blank. In Bangladesh, artists who advocate for the rights of religious minorities have been locked up or driven out of the country altogether.” (Chapter 2.)

And that short list of course, is only the tip of a veritable iceberg of torture, throat slitting, gang-raping, murder and mutilation perpetrated by followers of the religion of Islam. What she mentions and what mystifies many non-Muslims is – the lack of condemnation from mainstream Muslims against these outrages perpetrated in the name of Islam. In regard to the Taliban’s destruction of pre-Islamic statues of Buddha she asks ‘Why the absence of mass Muslim demonstrations? She points out that it possible for any outrage to be justified on the basis of an extract from the ‘holy’ book of Islam – the Qur’an. A book which she argues needs questioning by all Muslims. In chapter three entitled ’When did we stop thinking?’ She argues that  mainstream Muslim’s consider they and their religion are the ‘good guys’ and she then states;

“Then I’ll accuse us of covering our asses. For all our denunciations of Islam’s fringe sickness, Muslims studiously avoided addressing the paralysing sickness of the entire religion – the untouchability of mainstream Islam.“  

Chapter 3 introduces two aspects which I consider are problematic. The first aspect is a reference to the alleged ‘golden age’ of Islam between 750 and 1250 of the Common Era in which tolerance and independent thinking flourished. I am very sceptical of such looking back to so-called ‘golden ages’ for two reasons. First, this golden glow can be a result of a high degree of intellectual selectivity with regard to the historical record. And of course, this ‘record’ itself is a selected product of an ancient intellectual elite. Second, these ’ages’ are often so far in the past that they invite reactionary and inapplicable pre-industrial outlooks rather than progressive ones.  In this regard, the myth of the Golden Age’ of the Caliphate is probably what is motivating many modern Islamic fundamentalists such as ISIL to try to replicate it in the 21st century.

The second problematic aspect of chapter 3 for me is a selective and supportive reference from  the Jewish religious scholar Maimonides ‘Guide to the Perplexed’. Now in my opinion, this particular document is more likely to further perplex the reader than guide them in humanitarian directions. However, it is absolutely clear about sentencing to death any Jews who transgress ‘divine precepts’ (see for example pages 348/349 of this ‘perplexing’ guide) and within two-score pages of Maimonides internecine sectarian nastiness, we read of non-Jews;

“The people who are abroad are all those that have no religion, neither one based on speculation nor one received by tradition…..I consider these as irrational beings, and not as human beings; they are below mankind but above monkeys, since they have the form and shape of man, and a mental faculty above that of the monkey. …those who posses religion, belief and thought, but happen to hold false doctrines…These are worse than the first class, and under certain circumstances it may become necessary to slay them, and extirpate their doctrines, in order that others should not be misled.” (Maimonides, ’Guide to the Perplexed’. page 384. Emphasis added. RR)

To my mind the career of someone who seeks to guide fellow religionists in these kind of directions is not something I would choose to admire, let alone classify the man as a genius – as the Muslim author of this book does. The rest of the chapter covers some more of the problems with Islam before we encounter chapter 4 and her visit to Israel. It becomes clear in this chapter that the author admires the openness of the Israeli state and contrasts this with the conformity of Islamic opinion among  Palestinians. She writes;

“Israeli society endows citizens with the permission to inquire and accumulate experiences. Here a feminist can sue the government for equal access to the Western Wall. Here, a teenage girl can conceive of leaving her yeshiva without stigma. Here, too, a Hasidic boy can zip around on an emblem of consumer cool. Here then, a people will witness their potential to be many things at once, reflecting the multitudes of God Himself.” (Chapter 4.)    

Apart from belief in a mystical, invisible male entity known as god, what she recognises and admires in this extract are actually not so much the products of Israel and Zionism, as the products of relative economic well-being. These are all available in most of the advanced capitalist countries!  And of course in Israel, these ‘freedoms’ are only fully available to Jews. To negatively contrast this fully military protected openness and these choices, with a people under brutal occupation  – will not significantly help her case for assisting an Islamic reformation – at least not in the occupied territories of Palestine and Gaza. For living under brutal occupation requires a high degree of conformity in order to exist within it and to resist it.  Nor will her regurgitation of much of the Israeli narrative surrounding the Nakba of 1948, help her cause. Whilst much of what she says about Islam in Palestine is undoubtedly true, it needs to be mediated by the fact of occupation and the lack of even basic economic and social freedoms.

Chapter 5 among other things, deals with the disgusting lack of support for Palestine by other Muslim countries, both historically and contemporarily. In this chapter she also includes the fact that many among the Muslim elite in this region of the world supported the national socialist (Nazi) Hitler in his later aggressive Imperialist expansion during the Second World War. A word of caution here. This tragic allegiance of working people and intellectuals to a secular version of militant patriarchy which became known as Fascism, was not a feature unique to Palestinian, Arab and other middle-eastern peoples.

It was replicated throughout Europe and deserves much more sensitive and analytic treatment than raising it, as Zionists often do, as a disparaging put-down to Palestinians. How and why many middle-class and working people, impacted by the 20th century crisis of the capitalist mode of production, backed secular versions of militant patriarchy (ie Fascism and Stalinism) is a complex issue, requiring understanding rather than just revulsion.

There is much more than this in chapter 5 which apart from other important things, goes on to indicate the hope of many Muslims, particularly young Muslims that America will help them achieve democratic reforms in the Islamic countries of the world. However, speaking to other Muslims, the author notes that the ‘cancer begins with us‘ and argues that Muslims have been taught ‘to imitate the power dynamics of an Arabian tribe‘.  She notes that mainstream Islam has been colonised by desert Arabia and it is this that Muslims need help to reform. This colonisation of Islam by the Arabian founders and the ‘privilege’ this creates is part of the theme for chapter 6, ‘The Hidden Underbelly of Islam‘.

In chapter 6 she argues that when Arabs claim privilege to set Islam’s agenda this reveals how ’intimidation has displaced intellect‘. She asks why, even at the (supposed) height of Islamic tolerance, have Muslims treated certain people as inferior, and can the norms of the desert be dislodged from Islam? She notes that whilst Saudi Arabia’s oil money has for decades helped spread hard-line Islam these habits have a much longer history. If the early spread of Islam carried with it the ethics of tribal paternalism was this not grafted onto the religion, she asks? From the Sunni perspective of Saudi for example, Shia Muslims are ’heretics’ or closet Jews.   This chapter ends with what the author considers three challenges that might represent a way forward. Thus

“The road forward, it seems to me, must try to tackle three challenges at the same time: first, to revitalise Muslim economies by engaging the talents of women; second , to give the desert a run for its money by unleashing varied interpretations of Islam; and third, to work with the West, not against it.” (Chapter 6)

The above three challenges are condensed at the beginning of the following chapter (Chapter 7) as; ‘God-fearing, female-fuelled capitalism might be the way forward to start Islam’s liberal reformation‘.  This formulation in one form or another indicates the recurring weakness in her presentation of how to initiate the much needed reformation or de-politicisation of Islam. A substantial part of the motives of Islamist opposition to the domination of American and European capitalism and their puppet regimes, is caused by its effects upon the lives of white and blue-collar Muslims. Despite its proliferation of desirable gadgets, many millions of Muslims detest the exploitation and injustices of American and European capital and its foreign investment. God-fearing or not, they are not going to work with the west to pursue its neo-liberal economic devastation of their lives.

Sadly, missing from the authors understanding is a recognition that the globalisation of capitalism has created a global proletariat, much of which is surplus to the labour requirements of international capital. This fact together with the need of capital for international markets and guaranteed sources of raw materials has introduced the latest phase of the capitalist mode of production. It is not possible to re-vitalise economies by micro-enterprise loans or engaging the talents of anyone, women or men. Capitalism has been vitalised for so long it has again reached a stage of relative over-production. Besides this, economies are not Muslim, Christian, Jewish, Hindu, Buddhist or any other mystical form erected upon them.  In the modern world economies are industrial, global and capitalist no matter what religion the regional or national population adheres to.

Nevertheless, after acknowledging a different view from Tasmin Nasrin, in chapter 7, she makes a wider appeal to non-Muslims suggesting that the interpretation of the Qur’an has become everybody’s business. Operation Ijtihad, the title of chapter 7, is a call for an open critical dialogue within Islam, but she invites non-Muslims to take part. In chapter 8 (In Praise of Honesty’) she asks are non-Muslims censoring themselves?  Undoubtedly they are. In fact the climate of political correctness, multiculturalism and cultural diversity has almost completely gagged people from commenting negatively about Islam. In the professions of civil-service, local government, teaching, and many other economic activities, negative comments upon Islam can be job and career threatening if not life threatening. She addresses this problem.

“Muslims exploit Islam as a shield, and that’s destructive too. It protects Muslims from self-inquiry and non-Muslims from guilt. ‘You have no right to question my religion’, the shield-wavers often sermonise to non-Muslims. ‘You’ll never understand Islam’.”…Note to non-Muslims: dare to ruin the romance of the moment. Open societies remain open because people take the risk of asking questions – out loud.”  (Chapter 8)

Non-Muslims are doing the world no favours, she argues, by pushing the moral mute button as soon as Muslims start speaking. The final chapter entitled ‘Thank God for the West’ she describes the plurality of the west, particularly North America, and the role this played in saving her faith in Islam’.  This is an interesting admission for to my mind there is a constant contradiction throughout the book. The author displays a very analytical brain and well-honed crap detectors in relation to much (but not all) of the mythical  material of religion, but not at all concerning the foundation of all Abrahamic religions – the myth of an invisible, eternal, all-powerful, male entity.

It reminded me of a thought I had on reading a history of Martin Luther’s and his repeated emphasis on faith. ‘Faith! The decision not to use ones critical faculties to question the founding premise of religion – the existence of a male god. This leaves one’s critical abilities free to be developed and honed in criticising unwanted aspects of the religion and at the same time defend the central myth by sophisticated detail and sophistry.

The final section of the book ‘Confessions and Reflections of a Muslim Refusenik’, outlines some of the responses to her book, but the final extract I choose to quote is one from the final chapter. In many ways this encapsulates what I have understood as the essence of her message.

“We in the West can be the harbingers of this transformation. We can do so not merely by condemning Islamo-fascists, but by refusing to become Islamo-fetishists, those who stoke the Muslim inferiority complex by leaving the heavy lifting of change to somebody else. We need to depose our own victim mentality.” (Chapter 9)

The book is well worth the read, despite what I consider its flaws and shortcomings. I would urge others to engage not only with the book but with the issues she deals with and in the courageous manner she exemplifies. A final word.  The author cannot be criticised too harshly for seeing liberal capitalism as the only alternative to fundamentalist totalitarianism.  She, like many other workers and intellectuals, understands the horrors attendant upon the so-called anti-capitalist theory and practice of Bolsheviks, Stalinists, Maoists and their imitators and rejects this dogmatic and sectarian perspective.

The lack of a strong and genuine revolutionary-humanist movement, emerging from the ashes of previous failed anti-capitalist revolutions, is not her fault or the fault of the working classes. This failure is the responsibility of those within the anti-capitalist movement who have not conducted their own reformation with regard to the 20th century theoretical distortion of the 19th century revolutionary-humanism of  Marx and others. To tweak her Chapter 3 challenge to Muslims for us anti-capitalists: ‘Anti-Capitalists have studiously avoided addressing the paralysing sickness of the entire movement – the untouchability of  Bolshevism’.  We have our own ‘reformation’ to conduct.

Roy Ratcliffe (July 2014)

Posted in Critique, Fundamentalism, neo-liberalism, Palestine, Patriarchy, Reformism, Religion, Revolutionary-Humanism | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

MILITANT PATRIARCHY AT WAR – AGAIN!

Posted on June 27, 2014 by stutteringsteps

The recent advances by the armed forces of the Islamic State of Iraq and al Sham (ISIS) further into Iraq and the subsequent skirmishes, has at last demonstrated what has long been clear. It is that militant patriarchy in the form of various religious movements has achieved a high profile resurgence in many parts of the world. Islamic, militant patriarchy is not the only religion currently manifesting this form of sectarian violence in order to re-assert its dominance over, and control of, women and those men who it considers heretics, non-believers or lesser beings.

There has also been a counter-reformation within Judaism (Jewish Zionism) and Christianity (Christian Zionism), both of them have re-asserted forms of patriarchal domination and their alleged sectarian pre-eminence over other forms of belief. Hindu radicalism and Buddhist extremism are also becoming more aggressive in and among the communities adhering to these alternative patriarchal ideologies. The common denominator in all these disparate fundamentalist ideologies and militant movements is the continued domination and aggression of men.

However, the Islamic form of militant patriarchy as exemplified by the Taliban, Boko Haram, and now the Sunni Islamic State of Iraq and al Sham (ISIS or ISIL) are the most recent to demonstrate that their ultimate purpose is not merely to intimidate or terrorise as individuals and sects but to directly govern, land, resources and people.  Facing them in battle over the land and resources of Iraq are a different group of Shia patriarchs organised by the puppet Iraqi state government. The latter being promoted to power after the invasion and occupation by Christian patriarchs of the US, UK and Europe.

What we are witnessing in much of the middle-east is an ongoing struggle between one set of elite religious males against another, both sides backed by other male-dominated elites based elsewhere – in Iran, Saudi or the west. Each side has its own version of patriarchal ideology which justifies its actions and is used to recruit rank and file troops largely of working class composition. On the 100th anniversary of the commencement of the brutal First World War, these working class troops are again being recruited  to become the perpetrators of murder against each other and to become used as cannon-fodder in the struggle for supremacy by one sides elite males over the other.

A clash of fundamentalisms.

The media framing of these struggles as being between democracy and terrorism misses the essential social and economic foundations of this war of patriarchal fundamentalisms. It is undoubtedly a fact that on the ground two forms of Islamic religious fundamentalism, Shia and Sunni are again at war with each other in Iraq, but there is more to it than this. Incidentally, these recent events in Iraq suggest that what is actually happening is a Sunni uprising against a pro-USA Shia administration, led or facilitated by the militant patriarchs of the ISIS.

Moreover, these different Islamists are not the only fundamentalists involved in Iraq. It is almost universally acknowledged that these ancient patriarchal religious tensions were transformed from simmering to boiling point by the  fundamentally aggressive invasion of Iraq by the allied forces of the US, the UK and Europe in 2003.  The latter three being poised to aid – in one form or another – the Shia side of this patriarchal struggle.

It is generally overlooked in the current media simplification and distortion that these western capitalist elites who ordered the illegal invasion of Iraq, namely Bush, Blair (and perhaps) their supporters, were also ‘born-again’, male, religious Christian elites. Moreover, these two figure-heads were the leaders of completely male-dominated states which were universally committed to a form of economic market fundamentalism known as neo-liberalism.  Their subsequent replacements in the US, UK and Europe are no less religious, no less neo-liberal and no less patriarchal.

What is being consistently ignored in mainstream media focus on terrorism, is that western, neo-liberal elites are just another form of male-led market fundamentalists who themselves, routinely orchestrate mass killings, torture and pillage – in the name of their own form of deep seated ideology. For some time now the obvious result has been that the male neo-liberal fundamentalism (of Anglo-Saxon and Christian origin) in the west has found itself being confronted in Iraq by two other brands of male fundamentalism (both of Arabic and Islamic origin.).

Typically all three sides in this aggressive male-centred competition for elite control and governance over people and resources, deny committing atrocities against each other and harming those who get in the way. Yet it is in the nature of patriarchal fundamentalists of all types to do exactly that. Collectively deluded, fundamentalists of all varieties imagine they have the right (divine, economic or intellectual) to direct the progress of the whole of humanity along the lines they designate.

The historical and contemporary record indicates that when they have sufficient power and armaments to attempt this, male fundamentalists of all kinds rarely hesitate to spill blood – innocent or not. God, religion and the needs of the market are the ideological fig-leafs of legitimacy for those elite men who seek to govern and exploit the rest of us.

A Renaissance of religion.

After the Second World War it was arrogantly assumed by the victors, that the partly secularised Anglo-Saxon male-dominated capitalist west would be the economic and political model the rest of the globe could be persuaded to follow. Having superficially relegated religion to the private spheres of life during the early development of capitalism, the male political elites left intact and supported the main structures of religion precisely because it left intact and inculcated the social characteristics of gullibility, deference and above all – male domination. The capitalist mode of production was a continuation of patriarchal rule under a new economic mode.

Not only that, but the Abrahamic religions in particular, by promoting the myth of an invisible male super-being, conveniently appears to give divine sanction to the continued domination of society by men – whatever the given mode of production or form of governance. The capitalist elites in the West have therefore used and supported all forms of religious ideology (Christian, Judaic, and Islamic) for the purposes of justifying their hierarchical rule and furthering their global expansion of exploitation and control.

Consequently, these pro-capitalist elite males have turned a blind eye to extreme patriarchal practices previously eliminated in Europe. Female oppression, genital mutilation, arranged marriages, child brides etc., have been tolerated as acceptable cultural diversity. This accommodation was done in order to gain support and compliance from religious elders in the countries of Europe and from religious patriarchs who govern foreign countries. This way cheap immigrant labour was imported into Europe which brought with it new voters for politicians who turned a blind-eye to ‘cultural’ oppression. All this modern so-called ‘politically correct’ accommodation to cultural patriarchy and oppression was (and continues to be), in order to gain re-election, access to compliant labour, material resources and markets.

Western elites have also funded and promoted religious fundamentalists in order to destabilise rival governments and those foreign elites who refuse access to resources that the capitalist mode of production needs. The result of all this support for religious forms of patriarchy is that the rights of Women, Children and non-believers have failed to advance in many parts of the world and have been eroded or abolished where they were once established.  In many places the freedom to criticise religion has also been restricted either legally or by fear of physical harm to the critic. Contrast this 21st century reality with the following written in the late1950‘s.

“After the Reformation and the Renaissance, the forces of modernisation swept across the globe and secularisation, a corollary historical process, loosened the dominance of the sacred. In due course, the sacred shall disappear altogether , except possibly in the private realm.” (C. Wright Mills. The Sociological Imagination. Quoted in ‘God is Back. J Micklewait and A. Wooldridge.)

A continuation of Patriarchy.

How wrong that opinion turned out to be! Perhaps it would have been wiser of Mills to avoid prophesising the demise of ideologies which had been in existence for thousands of years and which most men continued to have a vested interest in perpetuating. Of course the meaningless abstraction used by Mills, ‘the forces of modernisation’ also served to obscure more than it revealed. These forces were capitalist economic and financial forces of exploitation sweeping ‘across the globe’ and were backed up by armed bodies of men in military uniform.  Interestingly Mills was formulating these words just after a World War against another form of militant patriarchal fundamentalism this time known as Fascism.

These ‘forces of exploitation’ were, ‘in due course’, bound to be opposed in one way or another, and not surprisingly given the social hegemony of patriarchy, all those oppositions were led by male-dominated parties and movements.  This was not the first time Christianised, Anglo-Saxon, capitalist male elites had been opposed by other male elites. Fascist type authoritarianism in Italy, Germany, Spain and elsewhere were all right-wing patriarchal movements opposed to the Anglo-Saxon form. The so-called communistic ‘left’ oppositions to European and North American male-dominated capitalism as they emerged in Europe, Russia, China, Cuba, and the Eastern bloc, were also hierarchical male-dominated parties and movements, with predictable outcomes.

So when we are invited to take one side or another of these male fundamentalists ideologies as they battle it out (and we frequently are) workers should exercise extreme caution.  We need to remember that not one movement dominated by men to oppose other elite men has ever ended hierarchical exploitation of labour nor freed women from subordination. With the exception of the Women’s Liberation Movement of the mid-20th century, patriarchy has been an unchallenged given. Religious, social, family and political control by men remains a dominant material relationship perpetuated since the ascendancy of patriarchy over matrifocality.

Even many contemporary anti-capitalists remain unapologetically attached theoretically and practically to hierarchical forms of organisation and the domination of these by elite males.  Many on the left still wish to be led by a charismatic male or become one themselves – within a male-dominated organisation of hierarchical structure. In other words much of the left wishes to perpetuate yet another patriarchal form which like every other promises to be better than all the others when they are elevated to power – whether by popular vote or revolution. Check out Lenin, Stalin and Mao’s record in the case of the latter.

Ideologies (fixed systems and dogma) are a part of the soft power used by males. Those ideologies which dominate, have many strands and these are woven into patterns of views by those who subscribe to them. Views and patterns that focus attention and opinions on the issues most favourable to their own perceived needs.  Rarely will any of the current ideological positions, left, right or centre, identify patriarchy as being at the centre of their own continued existence. But the essence of their patriarchy reveals itself most starkly in the general day to day status and treatment of women and ‘others’ particularly during the ‘hard power’ of militarised aggression.

A challenge to Patriarchy.

Trapped inside its own paradigm, the best that bourgeois ideological criticism can produce within its patriarchal framework is to distinguish nuances among ‘good’ leaders and ‘bad’ leaders of various left, centre or right leanings. For example even on the revolutionary left Lenin is often summed up as a ‘good’ Bolshevik leader with perhaps a few flaws, Stalin a ‘bad’ one, with a few positive characteristics. However, this (often intricately) nuanced ‘best’ is not much of an advance over Feudal critics who could only distinguish between ‘good’ kings and ‘bad’ kings or earlier still in tribal religions the critics who merely distinguished between ‘good’ shepherds and ‘bad’ shepherds. The almost universal  desire for a charismatic, intelligent, benign male leader indicates how deep patriarchy runs even on the political left.

The opportunity to escape this intellectual and organisational prison of patriarchy and dualism came with the development of the revolutionary-humanist perspective. Much of this perspective was developed by Karl Marx. His viewpoint recognised the need for a revolutionary transformation of the mode of production linked to the re-humanising of society. A future society freed of all forms alienation within and domination over human communities. This re-humanisation involves the criticism and serious rejection of patriarchal ideas and characteristics. Just as the unequal mode of production would have to be revolutionised so to would all material relationships among humanity – including within the family. As Marx noted;

“….the unequal distribution, both quantitative and qualitative, of labour and its products, hence property: the nucleus, the first form, of which lies in the family, where wife and children are the slaves of the husband. This latent slavery in the family, though still very crude, is the first property,..” (Marx German Ideology. My emphasis RR)

The essence of this implies a challenge to those men who identify with this particular revolutionary tradition not simply to be anti-capitalist, but to be simultaneously anti-patriarchal – with all that this involves personally and organisationally.  It is not enough to be just pro women’s liberation, that is a necessary but far from sufficient position to adopt. Men need to transform themselves and thus transform the way they relate to others – including transforming their decisions of who to support or oppose.

To facilitate any revolutionary economic and social transformation the task for revolutionary-humanists is to challenge and change the mode of production and the dominant material relationships inherited from previous modes. The dominant material relationships of  21st century society are still class-based and patriarchal. The change needs to begin now. Marx again.

“…the relation of man to woman is the most natural relation of human being to human being. It therefore demonstrates the extent to which man’s natural behaviour has become human or the extent to which his human essence has become a natural essence for him, the extent to which his human nature has become nature for him.” (Marx 1844 Manuscripts.)

Roy Ratcliffe. (June 2014.)

Posted in Critique, Fundamentalism, neo-liberalism, Patriarchy, Revolutionary-Humanism, Sectarianism | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

EDUCATION AND VALUES.

Posted on June 15, 2014 by stutteringsteps

The recent controversy in the (as yet) United Kingdom concerning education in the city of Birmingham has much wider implications than this one city.  The questions of what values in the 21st century need to be part of a schools ethos are of global significance.  The attempts by religious conservatives of whatever denomination to restrict education to those sections of society and areas deemed important or supportive to their own preferred theological positions are on the increase globally.  This is leading in some places to a fiercely contested war of words about what values should be taught in schools. Elsewhere, there is an actual physical war with many casualties, taking place over who should be educated and what kind of education is appropriate.

In Pakistan and Nigeria to take two topical examples, Islamist fundamentalists have physically targeted schools and women pupils in particular.  The shooting of Malala  Yousafzai in Pakistan and the kidnap of the Nigerian school girls and destruction of schools, by Boko Haram are just the extreme end of a wide spectrum of challenges to education of a non-religious, secular form.  At a less, extreme level some Christian, Judaic and Islamic communities are not only challenging secular and inclusive curriculum’s but are campaigning (often successfully) for a curriculum biased toward their own sectarian ideologies.  A battle against teaching ‘Evolution’  has a long and continuous history in the US. The recent complaints and controversy in Birmingham, England around a number of schools preferring a distinctly Islamic bias has also prompted a renewed debate on ‘values’, particularly ’British values’ in education.

British values!

A considerable number of high-level politicians, educators and media pundits have this month (June 2014) called for British Schools to reflect British values without making clear what these values might be.  Apart from such vague wooliness, this call is a typically nationalistic response by the British pro-capitalistic elite which completely fails to understand what is really being suggested and what is at stake. For example, British values emanating from its bourgeois elite are bourgeois values. Bourgeois values include racist, sexist, chauvinist, elitist, colonialist, imperialist, capitalist, individualist and militarist values.  These are values by which the British Empire was imagined and constructed – and which should be vigorously contested. This call also fails to understand that these particular values are not just British, but Anglo-Saxon bourgeois values. As such these same values are similarly at work in every other capitalistically ‘advanced’ country of Europe and North America.

In addition these British pro-capitalist elites, economic, political, financial and intellectual who are advocating a ‘British’ variant of Anglo-Saxon bourgeois values in schools often exhibit deceitful, oppressive,  exploitative, greedy and corrupt practices emanating from the above noted bourgeois values.  Indeed, it is against many of these dominant bourgeois values, that post Second World War education in the UK, attempted to push back against.  From the 1960’s state education in the UK introduced more internationalist, egalitarian, anti-racist and eventually anti-sexist ideas and practices. For a while, a few small ‘flower-power’, ‘make love not war’ humanist stuttering steps were taken. Parts of the enlightened educational establishment even became critical of the history of British colonialism and imperialism, albeit in a much watered-down form.

Enlightenment values.

Some elements of this post-imperial, post-war ‘enlightenment’ was echoed in the educational practices of many other countries belonging to the Anglo-Saxon bourgeois tradition, (Europe and North America) but never as a total alternative to dominant bourgeois capitalist values. It must also be noted that since the Thatcher and Reagan era, western education in general has been progressively tweaked to return to and impart bourgeois values of aggressive individualism, materialistic self-advancement, competitive enterprise and business studies. It cannot be surprising therefore, that many people originating from countries and cultures which previously suffered (and many who are still suffering) from British and American Anglo-Saxon invasive bourgeois values do not wish to have these rammed down their own throats or daily imparted to their offspring.

Many of these new immigrant workers – along with indigenous workers are also only to well aware that the above-noted ‘values’ have led Britain, Europe and North America to annex land and resources, conduct military invasions, condone routine tortures, and continue selective bombings of foreign communities. The lack of consistent ‘humanist’ secular values permeating and guiding the actions of the elites in the countries of Europe, UK and North America problem has been reflected within the educational establishments of all these countries. Europe, the cauldron of the 14 -17 century Renaissance, 16th century Reformation and 18th century Enlightenment has in the 20th become the arena for new forms of authoritarianism and the scene of a religious counter-reformation. North America the recipient of this European break from religious dogma and reactionary authoritarian governance has similar problems.

Not surprising then, that there is an anti-establishment mood creeping through the ranks of all those not part of the elite. A mood which would prefer an alternative set of values to those currently in vogue. Given the ruthless and exploitative nature of the capitalist mode of production and its bourgeois values and the lack of a consistent humanist alternative, it is not surprising that this ‘value’ challenge is being spear-headed by religion. Thus an influential number of Christian, Jewish and Islamic thinkers have looked to the ‘fundamentals’ of their religions and promoted them as an attractive alternative to secular capitalist values.  And in the absence of a serious study of religion, both in regard to its scriptural texts and its historical practice, this can appear on the surface to offer a benign prescription for the conduct of human affairs.

Religious values.

However, not far below the surface of all religions lie a malign substrata of thinking and barbaric practices.  This is not the place for a detailed resume of the malign sections of the various religious so-called ‘holy’ texts, nor for a condensed history of religious wars and atrocities. That material exists elsewhere, (some on this blog. See for example Religion versus Women’s Rights’; Religion is Politics’ and ’Fundamentalism’). However, in addition to the points made in the second paragraph of this article, a brief reminder of some of the horrific 20th and 21st century problems caused by religion is in order.  The Catholic/Protestant divide; the Sunni/ Shia divisions, indicate that whilst religion may not be the only ingredient causing the bombing of innocents, the torture of captives or the beheading or rape of men women and children, the religious beliefs of these believers are insufficient to prevent such atrocities.

If we take only the three Abrahamic religions, Judaism, Christianity and Islam, then practically everyone is aware that each one is based upon ideological rejection of the others viewpoints.  Each religion has its own sectarian textual values which logically exclude admitting equal validity for other religions or non-believers.  Yet, if we are not to enter into a state of denial, or misplaced political correctness, we need to recognise the following. Religious beliefs and religious texts do in fact provide believers with authorised permission to be incredulous, intolerant, aggressive, homophobic, sexist, patriarchal and murderous. The Old Testament, the New Testament and the Qur’an all give instances and examples of when and why it is permissible to discriminate against, hurt or kill other people on the basis of their religious ‘values‘.  Of course not all believers will wish to do any of these things and many will not want to make the connection between these acts and their religion.

Yet when many contemporary extremist Christians, Jews and Muslims in the west, the east or the south, do exactly that, they also consider they are being true to their religion. When Pastors, Priests, Rabbi’s and Imans bless, excuse or justify such acts, (as some do), this merely confirms that religion in the future, as in the past, cannot be a source of ‘values’ which view and treat all human beings equally.  Indeed, we cannot expect these religions (or any other) to do so. These three religions and their values in particular were imagined, created and developed 2000 years ago on the basis of tribal and localised communities of the ancient world. This period was well before the advent of intensive international communications and world trade. Since in the 21st century, it is abundantly clear we live in a global community something more inclusive is needed for now and the future.

Humanist values.

Bombarded as we are from childhood by the multiple outlets and sources of dominant bourgeois ideology and its diverse analogues in the religious realm, it is difficult for people to clear their minds of one or the other or even both. For many individuals and communities, their religion has been incorporated into their form of identity.  Nevertheless, it is clear that in a global society of interdependent humanity, the only values which make real sense for now and the future are values based upon the common humanity of all communities of human beings.  That is to say humanist values. These are the only ‘values‘ ideological free from nationalistic or sectarian difference, dogma and malice.

Such a humanist perspective is nothing really new, for it is partially embodied in formal and informal international relations. The terms, ‘Crimes against Humanity’ ‘Humanitarian Aid’ and ‘Violations of the laws of Humanity‘ only exist in common and formal international use because of the 20th century need to transcend religious and nationalist prejudices. Crimes against Humanity were described by paragraph 6 of Article 6 of an International Military Tribunal after the Second World War as those which involved;

“Murder, extermination, enslavement, deportation, and other inhumane acts committed against any civilian population, before or during the war, or persecutions on political, racial or religious grounds in execution of or in connection with any crime within the jurisdiction of the Tribunal, whether or not in violation of the domestic law of the country where perpetrated”.

Of course for the international bourgeoisie, this recognition of humanity was little more than necessary rhetoric after the defeat of the Nazis in World War Two, for they continued to commit and allow the perpetration of such crimes. But the fact that the concept of a common humanity was necessary then and has remained so since, indicates the concept was the only really inclusively valid one to use in our global intercourse. The class nature of the bourgeoisie elite means in general that they do not subscribe to any full degree of equality among human beings. This is because the economic system they control and benefit from is based upon inequality. Their system would end if economic equality was introduced.  For this reason other forms of inequality, such as gender, race and sexuality were (and are) also tolerated by them and have to be fought against by those who suffer from them.

So the adoption of humanist values, although partial, is nothing new. Fully developed, they should have been and should still be, the transformative basis for global society in general as well as the education values for all pupils in all schools in the 21st century. More teachers and educators promoting humanist values are sorely needed in our schools and colleges. Less teaching bourgeois or religious sectarian values. Of course, humanist values will not by themselves create sufficient equality among human beings for as noted, there remains class differences which arise from the bourgeois ownership of the main means of production. However, the adoption of humanist values by individuals, communities, particularly by the working and remaining peasant classes, does offer the possibility of overcoming the divisions among them based upon nation, race, gender, sexuality, age, disability and religion.

In addition, humanist values adopted and consistently upheld will also ensure that any future revolutionary transformations, brought about by the partial or large-scale collapse of capitalism, will be conducted with these values to the fore – informing the practice of those revolutionary forces. The concept of revolutionary-humanism embraces both these challenging potentials – overcoming divisions and transforming the mode of production. It is also a concept which has the potential to overcome the  sectarian political divisions standing in the way of solidarity among present day anti-capitalists.

Roy Ratcliffe (June 2014.)

Posted in capitalism, Critique, Fundamentalism, Religion, Revolutionary-Humanism | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

FINANCIAL POWER & POLITICS.

Posted on June 13, 2014 by stutteringsteps

Like any other sector of bourgeois capitalist societies, the political class can and often does develop its own discrete interests and evolutionary path.  At times these political sectors can depart from the interests of the capitalist system as a whole, but ultimately they are dependent upon capital. The same is true of the military sector, the judiciary, the intelligentsia and the state bureaucracy. These sectors, together with the political class, are component parts of the capitalist mode of production’s ruling elite.

However, in times of crisis, whether this is caused by severe economic, military, diplomatic, legal or ideological transformations, the elites in these separate sectors can begin to fall-out or in extreme cases collaborate to save the system.  Alternatively, as now, one powerful sector can further exert their sectional domination over the others – to the detriment of the system as a whole.

Since the dawn of the 20th century, one particular sector of the capitalist mode of production has, apart from brief periods, consistently managed to exert its particular interests over all the others. That sector is best described by the term ‘finance-capital’.  Finance-capital is a term which covers all those activities which involve – in one way or another – the investment of the money form of capital (or its paper equivalents) directly for interest or added monetary-value return of that investment.

The largest parts of this now dominant sector include banking,  trading in shares, currencies, bond-buying and selling, loan creation, hedge-funds, investment banking and the more recently expanded trading of derivatives of various forms. The most recent example of the detrimental domination of this sector over all others was the financial crash of 2008 and the monetary policy decisions implemented afterwards.

The deficient media narrative.

Although the 2008 financial crash was covered extensively everywhere, its connection with the economic and political system was not fully explored or sufficiently understood by the dominant media outlets. Not surprisingly therefore, what is still missing in many of the mainstream narratives is a full understanding of the economic and financial motives which are driving the current crisis deeper and increasing radicalisation of both left and right political tendencies.

In the popular media, finance and economics have been separated from politics and shunted to the periphery of commentary, whilst politics is given prominence and occupies centre stage. Yet it is the economic and financial crisis which continues to underpin the major developments currently taking place and it is the needs of ‘finance-capital’ around which all else now orbits. The fact that there continues to be a massive over-production of finance-capital in the USA , UK and Europe does not explain everything which is currently happening politically but it does explain many things.

As noted, finance-capital is the form of interest-bearing capital which for much of its time exists outside of the main processes of capitalist production.  It exists in the forms of vast amounts of money in various forms, the owners of which are constantly seeking profitable places to successfully invest it. Even after the destruction of the Second World War, for example, industrial production outlets only sufficed to satisfy this insatiable demand for a short period of time, before further opportunities were sought.

With the collapse and break-up of the state-capitalist countries of the former Soviet Union, late 20th century finance-capital had a new part of the world to exploit. Finance-capital surged into many of these countries buying resources, making deals and setting up businesses, until this source dried up. With a few exceptions this ‘investment’ sooner or later, produced vast profits and thus only added extra digits (from billions to trillions) to the pool of finance-capital seeking new outlets and opportunities.

Apart from other problems, this excess of finance-capital in the past has caused ‘bubbles’ in one sector after another, as the owners of it competed with each other to purchase and sell favoured commodities, equities, bonds, and businesses. The last such speculative ‘bubble’ burst in 2008 and yet the size of this pool of finance-capital has not only recovered since then, but has continued to grow and is now fuelling new ones as well as global interference.

The magnitude of this sector is therefore even larger than before and is increasing rapidly – with all this it implies – including the inflation of new bubbles and further deflationary collapses in the future. It is important to understand that the finance-capital elite are powerful and ever restless in pursuing new ‘investment’ avenues. New  financial ‘vehicles’ and potential sectors are constantly being sought – legal or otherwise – as the banking crisis revealed.

Finance; The  power behind politics.

It is also important to recognise that the elites who control this restless and needy finance-capital sector are able to exert exceptional power over the political classes. They do this by means of donations, stipends, consultancies, board-room appointments, promises, threats and of course persuasion. Anyone who doubts the power financial elite exert over the political and governmental elite has not researched the amount of ‘lobbying’ money which is utilised to persuade or pressurise those governing to adopt policies and practices advantageous or favourable to their pursuit of profit. In this objective they are able to ally themselves from time to time with other sectors of big-business and of course powerful military elites – when and where their interests overlap – which they often do.

It cannot have escaped most peoples notice that one of the more favourite sectors for finance-capital to ‘take-over’ has been via the privatisation of public sector resources. Huge profits have been generated from this source within many countries. However, this opportunity has now been almost fully exploited in most of the advanced countries of Europe and North America. There is very little else left except health and education to privatise in the modern welfare-state nations. Hence the pressure is on from this most financially powerful section of the capitalist class in the USA, the UK and Europe to move into other countries, buy up their public and private companies and services on the cheap, reduce costs and make extra profits.

So if anyone is puzzled by the seemingly blind rage the dominant elites in west have routinely got into over having their acquisitive aspirations frustrated in Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Syria and now Ukraine, one only need bear this in mind. It must be exceptionally frustrating for these elites if money has been spent in anticipation of getting hold of valuable assets at a knock-down price, only to have the prizes slip out of their grasp.

If one adds to the pressing needs and desires of the finance-capital sector for such investment opportunities, the satisfaction accruing to the military-industrial complex the pressure to interfere in other countries can also be considerable.  The military elite themselves can rarely resist a political prompting to invade a country or supply an indigenous regime with weapons of social control, such as in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Egypt and now Ukraine.

The pressure exerted by the financial sector and the convergence of its ‘special’ interests with those of the military and big-business, would be hard to resist if the political class were not so inter-dependent upon the finance, industry and military sectors.  However, they are so inter-dependent and it would take a revolutionary transformation of the mode of production to prevent further political and military interference in other countries. Since that is not an immediate possibility, we can expect even more of the same.  Bearing in mind all the above, it becomes obvious what socio-economic and powerful financial force is really behind what is ‘politically’ and militarily going on in many parts of this now dystopian world.

Nor can it be surprising that this decades old aggressive interference by western pro-capitalists and their ‘puppet’ proxies has produced armed resistance. What may be surprising to some, however, is the current form of this armed resistance – religious fundamentalism. The relative successes of religious fundamentalism, previously in Iran, then in Afghanistan under the Taliban, later in Syria and now in Iraq with the Isis (Islamic State of Iraq and Syria) may also seem shocking.

However, what should not come as a surprise is that these armed sectarian religious zealots would have been able to recruit radicalised young active participants from the heartlands of the advanced countries whose elites have been behind the various invasions, incursions and interference. That latter reactionary development however, is a subject for a further article.  [Meanwhile see  ‘Fundamentalism’ and ‘The Importance of Theory’.]

Roy Ratcliffe (June 2013.)

Posted in capitalism, Finance, Fundamentalism, neo-liberalism, Politics, Religion, Sectarianism, Ukraine. | Tagged , , | 1 Comment

LEGITIMACY and AUTHENTICITY.

Posted on June 5, 2014 by stutteringsteps

Over recent weeks there has been a torrent of claims and counter-claims by various pro-capitalists and their supporters of what is authentic and legitimate with regards to community self-organisation and voting in elections or referendums. For example, Spain’s Government declared a vote for independence by Catalonia would be illegitimate. In another well publicised case, the interim un-elected Kiev government in the Ukraine declared itself an authentic government and the improvised worker-led referendum in the east of Ukraine as illegitimate. Not surprisingly, in the latter case, the Anglo-Saxon capitalist cabals of North America and Europe were quick to echo and amplify this assertion and collude with its self-serving perspective.

This publicised declaration was followed by Kiev’s own electoral procedure which ignored the fact that the elite there had alienated and were alienating even more of its citizens in the east. Its organisation (or orchestration) of military and air-born bombing attacks upon the dissident east, was presumably seen as a ‘legitimate’ way of dealing with such opposition. In fact the Kiev elite was increasing its illegitimacy in the eyes of everyone except the elites and their most die hard supporters. Kiev’s actions were actively driving eastern Ukraine people even further away from reconciliation with itself. The ‘state’ in Ukraine as in Syria, Turkey, Egypt, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Thailand etc., is being used increasingly to engage in open warfare against its own citizens, whilst claiming to act legitimately.

So in the name of legitimacy and authentic governance the Syrian government barrel bombs whole communities, the Ukraine government shells community schools, public buildings and hospitals. Egypt condemns thousands to death without due process,  imprisons further thousands for protesting along with news reporters for reporting this.  Once again these symptoms and many others too numerous to mention here, indicate that there are no limits to what the elites in control of states, will go to in order to hang onto power. In the past they have preferred to institute civil-wars or even start foreign wars in order to prevent or deflect opposition to their rule. Historically, pro-capitalist elites have turned to authoritarian fascist and proto-fascist remedies in order to deny their populations a remedy to oppression, exploitation and social injustice.  In the 21st century many are again doing the same.

Even in countries, where the war against its own citizens has not yet been militarised, such as Europe, US,  and much of South America, there is nevertheless a relentless war of austerity, low pay, zero hours and unemployment taking place. This economic war is directed primarily (but not exclusively) against the white and blue-collar working and unemployed citizens of this section of the world. Is that really a legitimate way of solving the current crisis? I don’t think so. Not surprisingly in response to this unremitting class war, there is growing resistance and increasing questioning  of the ruling elites.  Many citizens in most (if not all) of the countries in the global village are starting to resist. Predictably it is this resistance and questioning which is being labelled as illegitimate and unconstitutional no matter what form it takes.

Alternative criteria for judging legitimacy.

Protesters and separatists are being re-classified by state elites as illegitimate terrorists or extremists and are targeted as such. Yet in all these cases it is the bourgeois and pro-capitalist states and their political classes whose authenticity and legitimacy is increasingly being questioned.  Typically the political and state elites view this the opposite way around. Of course, legitimacy and authenticity can only be really judged against some particular criteria and one obvious yardstick in this case is; who caused the crisis? It is certainly not the working classes throughout the world who are causing unemployment, reductions in public services, banking failures, sovereign debt problems, increasing global instability and irreversible ecological destruction.

In more general humanitarian terms there is also another yardstick. The criteria to judge the legitimacy of a mode of production can be (and in my view should be) by  how well it serves the vast majority of its citizens.  Ideally a mode of production should allow for the safety and well-being of all the members of the society adopting it, whether they be young, old, black, white, male or female or incapacitated.  Indeed, at the rhetorical level this much is admitted by the ‘liberal’ upholders of the capitalist mode of production, but of course, the reality is a long way from the rhetoric. A very long way! Indeed, except for the very poor and exploited, (who know all to well how the system works against them) the liberal rhetoric of professed intentions serves to direct attention away from seriously considering the reality. Until that is, reality can no longer be ignored.

The present crisis means it can no longer be ignored. The structural fact has to be recognised that the competitive drive for profits improved production methods and over a number of decades, reduced the need for workers, once again creating poverty and unemployment in the heartlands of the most advanced capitalist countries. These improved methods of production also increased the need for markets and raw materials, resulting in further commercial and military wars which devastated communities world wide. Each side in these barbaric capitalist competitions for domination of trade and finance naturally claimed legitimacy and authenticity for their campaigns, because the logic of the capitalist mode of production requires ever more control over human and material resources. To survive it can do no other than to continually expand its theatre of operations.

So stripped to its bear essentials the current five-fold crisis of the capitalist mode of production and its entire history to date reveals that the system itself is incapable of ensuring the safety, the well-being of the majority of the citizens subject to it and the elites who control it. From its inception, the capitalist mode of production has produced vast wealth for a minority and vast amounts of poverty, oppression and injustice – which its supporters spread across the world.  Even the advent of the 20th century welfare-state did not eliminate such negative conditions except in some advanced countries, particularly in Europe and North America.  And as the crisis deepens, even this brief oasis of job security and welfare provision for a privileged few in Europe and North America is being steadily removed.

Judged from the point of view of the pro-capitalist elites and their privileged supporters, serious protest and struggles against their system is unauthentic and/or illegitimate. As a consequence of this pro-capitalist point of view  anything the elite supporters of this system do to uphold this mode of production whether this involves, contradictions, lies, deceit, individual killing, torture,  mass murder or turning upon its own citizens is legitimate and authentic.

However, judged from the standpoint of the welfare and well-being of the vast majority of the worlds population and the very fabric of the global environment it is the upholders of capitalist mode of production whose actions are illegitimate.  In promoting, sustaining and defending a mode of production which like a cancer is consuming the healthy tissue of the planet and stunting the lives of those – the vast majority – who are suffering from its multiple symptoms, they cannot be judged to be authentic representatives of humanity and its future.

This is a detail which is partly (and often confusedly) reflected politically in the many of the current mass protests and the low voter turnouts in bourgeois elections. The current global radicalisation which is taking place on practically every continent is implicitly anti-capitalist – even if it is not as yet explicitly so. What ordinary people moderately aspire to cannot be achieved under the capitalist mode of production. Nor can it be realised on the basis of separate, nationalistic or religiously inspired activist struggles. Workers of the world will have to unite to revolutionise the mode of production along non-sectarian and humanist lines or remain slaves to a system heading for self-destruction.

R. Ratcliffe (June 2014.)

Posted in Anti-Capitalism, capitalism, Critique, Economics, neo-liberalism, Revolutionary-Humanist theory, The State, Ukraine. | Tagged , , | 1 Comment

War is Murder.

Posted on May 26, 2014 by stutteringsteps

This US Memorial Day Remember War Is Murder.

Re-blogged from Earth Meanders by Dr. Glen Barry, http://EcoInternet.org/  May 25, 2014

This Memorial Day, as America lionizes the bravery and sacrifice of its soldiers, try if you can to step aside from jingoistic nationalism for a moment and think freely. Recall that stripped of ritual and pomp, war is the killing of other human beings for political and economic gain. America has proven particularly adept, by some estimates being at war all but 20 years of its nearly 240 year history.

In war brainwashed young men (and now women) of one tribe hunt down and kill the indoctrinated from another tribe to serve the interests of rich old men. It doesn’t matter under the banner of which god, arbitrarily delineated nation, or the rhetoric used; war is murder. Bodies are cut and blown apart, homes destroyed, families ripped asunder, women raped, and the land, water, and air plundered as the wealthy declare a respite from the laws of humanity to further their own enrichment. This is war.

This is not to suggest that humanity never has to fight to stop the march of one mad man or another, or to stop some over-consuming nation from wantonly stealing resources. We may yet have to fight to overthrow the oil oligarchy’s hold on our economy and destruction of our biosphere.

The manner in which we glorify soldiers and war – covering up the brutal nature of war, and the profound suffering it causes – does a grave disservice to those killed, those aggrieved who will start the next war, and those who blindly followed orders. Young naïve men go to war believing falsely that a nation can absolve their acts of murder – and remain forever traumatized as a result.

In this regard there is little exceptional about America except the size of our egos and willingness to kill any and all that get in the way of our over-consumption and delusions of grandeur. We are like Rome, who despite her legions fell because of the rot from within, and we will meet the same or worse fate if we continue to celebrate war and murder.

Expenditures upon standing armies are obscene. America’s spends over $600 billion a year on war – more than most other major nations’ expenditures combined – a diversion of societal resources that directly murders scores more whose food, shelter, education, and jobs are taken from them to finance the murder of other similarly poor people. It is the poor that provide much of the cannon fodder to the killing machines, their awful task of murdering others ennobled with grand rhetoric. To the victor goes the right to write history, seeking to justify with self-righteous words acts of vicious bloody murder.

War murder is a business, a growth industry that benefits the military-industrial-congressional complex (how the term was originally conceived by that commie pacifist General Eisenhower), and has propped up Western economies for decades. Rather than using the limited resources of Earth to produce goods and services that meet human and all life’s needs, war-mongers wantonly consume fossil fuels, minerals, food, and human capital to systematically kill other human-beings.

The cost of one air craft carrier, a floating city able to rain down death anywhere at will, could bring water systems to the entire world, saving 3,000 children a day from needless death. A few more foregone ships could end poverty as we know it for the 2 billion human beings that live on less than $1.50 a day.

Until the early 20th century, armies mostly demobilized between conflicts. Now capitalist economies are built upon the systematic stealing of resources, killing those who happen to live near and claim to own our resources and object. The rich liberal democracies (which are in fact neither) must wage perma-war to artificially maintain their high standards of consumption. Ever more grandly, wars are constantly waged under false pretexts and outright lies – look at the Iraq weapons of mass consternation, the Gulf of Tonkin fabrication, and President Obama’s reign of drone terror.

No amount of jingoism obviates the fact that veterans are murderers and they and their enablers are war criminals. America’s recent decade plus of war has been in violation of the 1996 U.S. War Crimes Act (penalties which can include death), the international Third Geneva Convention of 1949, and the 1987 UN Torture Convention. It is not OK to invade sovereign nations that pose you no threat, to kidnap and torture suspected enemies, to murder remotely with drones at will, or to spy upon and assassinate American citizens.

And it is not just W, Condi, Rumy, and Bama that are guilty of war crimes. The Uniform Code of Military Justice makes clear soldiers have an obligation and a duty to only obey lawful orders; and indeed, have an obligation to disobey unlawful orders. These include Presidential orders that do not comply with the code, the constitution and international law. Further, it was established by the U.S. at the WW II Nuremberg war trials that “following orders” is not justification for war crimes. Nearly every American that has served in the past decade has been involved in the carrying out illegal acts of murder under the constitution and international law.

The oil oligarchy are the latest rulers to indoctrinate American young men and women to go forth to strange and exotic new lands and kill the people that hold our resources. At one time after WWII America took the lead in disarmament and establishment of international law to avoid war. Now since we were hit by a small band of criminal terrorists, we feel justified in waging perma-war.

Over a million people, mostly innocents, have been murdered to avenge the few thousand tragically lost on 9/11. Has America gotten revenge yet and can the perma-war stop? It is time to regain our humanity and take some calculated risk to end war murders.

And let’s push back against the creepy Orwellian justification for America’s war binge. We are not hated for our freedom, and you can’t wage war on terrorism (which is a tactic). Mostly we are hated because we have occupied holy lands of other peoples, we arrogantly presume that all Earth’s resources are our own, and we speak grandly and pompously of liberty and opportunity as we deny it to others.

President Barack Obama’s drone perma-war is terrorism, traumatizing innocent populations, and murdering thousands. It is well past time for the U.S. to stop drone terrorism worldwide, to subject our war-making to the International Court of Justice like most other nations have, and to begin the process of international negotiations to demobilize our war machine in a manner where we and all nations can be reasonably assured of security.

Future acts of barbarism will have to be responded to differently, through the criminal justice system, and without militarizing our entire way of life.
Earth is running out of resources to fuel exponential growth of industry and population. As ecosystems continue to collapse and inequities rise on a globalized Earth, humanity’s propensity for killing their foes is bound to reach a whole new level of sheer madness. As each nation seeks drones, nuclear weapons, and authoritarian means to spy upon our every thought, we can never again live peacefully and justly.

We are one human family on an increasingly fragile Earth. As abrupt climate change and ecosystem collapse continue to intensify – and the few hundred mega-rich won’t be able to exponentially grow rich any longer, the bourgeoisie realize their standard of living is going down, and the billions of poor demand their piece of the pie – perhaps it would be best if there weren’t any stray nuclear arms and the billions of pieces of conventional weaponry lying around.

Coming decades are going to be wrought by climate famine, water shortages, and diminishing access to resources to fuel over-consumption and an even greater failure to meet basic needs of many. It is time to pursue global military demobilization – with a residual international police force, and an emphasis upon fairness and justice – as a top priority, if together we are to survive much less thrive.

This memorial day dare to dream of peace. And work for demobilization and caring for our wounded warriors – who despite having followed illegal orders, in many cases because they were indoctrinated with our tax dollars to hate and murder – need our help to mend their minds and bodies. Help them be whole again, including shedding the indoctrination that justifies their murders, and ensuring this murderous war mayhem ends once and for all.

It is time to embrace pacifism in all but the most unusual and desperate instances of self-defense. And perhaps we should be fighting, if at all and as a last recourse, those in the oil oligarchy and elsewhere who destroy the Earth and the human future, instead of poor people trying to hold onto their autonomy.

As one who has served honorably myself and worn the Army uniform, I call for a truthful and loving caring for veterans, forgiving their mindless killing, and helping all those that have been victimized by war murders to use their experiences to banish state sponsored war once and for all. Then we can get on with saving our deteriorating ecosystem habitats together, and ensuring the basic needs of the entire human family are met. Together we must commit to never again celebrating war murder, someday soon taking a day to memorialize senseless acts of love, peace, sharing, and kindness.

Discuss and link to this essay at: http://www.ecointernet.org/2014/05/25/this-us-memorial-day-remember-war-is-murder/

Posted in capitalism, Economics, Nationalism, neo-liberalism, The State, US military atrocities | Tagged , | 1 Comment

‘THESE THINGS HAPPEN!’

Posted on May 15, 2014 by stutteringsteps

The response by Turkey’s President Erdogan, to the recent mining disaster in Soma Turkey, amounted to nothing more than a blasé ‘off-hand‘ remark; eg ‘These type of things happen all the time’. Such a complacent and blatant disregard for the tragic loss of life suffered by the miners and their families highlights the typical attitude of the pro-capitalist elite and their capitalist paymasters in industry, commerce and finance. At Soma over 750 miners were below ground on 13 May and at the time of writing, only 368 have been rescued. It has been announced that 274 have been classified as dead and that leaves 146 still missing somewhere within the shafts and twisted tunnels of this capitalist owned coal mine.  Indeed, despite his overt callousness, Erdogan is correct; things like this – and many others – happen to workers all the time under the capitalist mode of production.

To the capitalist class and its political mouthpieces, working people are nothing more than disposable instruments whose primary functions are to provide labour-power for capitalists to exploit and to register their votes on election days for the political class. The welfare, health and safety of working people comes way behind the greed for profit of those who own, control and benefit from the investment of capital in industry, commerce and finance. This recent industrial tragedy is just the latest civilian disaster in the long war of the global capitalist class against the global working class.  It is a class war in which in the 21st century, assaults on working people are still taking place on many fronts; in the home, in the shops, in the streets and at work in industry, commerce and banking.

Working class homes are under threat from high mortgage payments and rents; the cost of living at the shops is increasing, leaving many stark choices with regard to how much food and clothing they can afford. Protests by working people on the streets is being met by authoritarian police action. Draconian laws are passed which treat protest against oppression and injustice in the same way as real terrorists are treated. However, given the mining disaster in Turkey and the increasing IMF-led privatisations taking place around the world, for the purposes of this article I will consider the health and safety effects upon working people when they work for capitalist concerns in industry, commerce, and finance.

The routine injurious events at work which occur daily around the globe, are often classed by bourgeois investors, managers and academics as ‘accidents at work’ . But of course they are not really accidents. Accidents are occurrences which could not have been prevented by foresight and/or by implementing correct procedures. However, in the overwhelming majority of cases, ‘accidents’ at work could have been avoided had management and share-holders allowed workers to install safety equipment and maintain safe working practices. However, the pressure from management, and investors for profits mean that only the minimum ‘cost effective’ equipment and procedures are used. And even in these cases pressure to speed up and take short-cuts are constantly cranked up leading to preventable injuries and deaths.

Unsafe  Working practices.

When a capitalist concern argues, through its managers and directors, that fully adequate safety for its employees, or the public, is out of the question because of the expense, it is actually revealing much more than this. What is actually being admitted, is that setting aside enough of the surplus value (or profits) created for safe conditions of production, is out of the question, because the capitalist class wish to have that surplus value. It is an admission that they are not prepared to give up any more of it than they are forced to.  The number of times safety procedures are known but under utilised, because the owners of capital or their representatives, treat working people as cheap disposable commodities, would hopefully be few.  Not so!

The knowledge of how to avoid injury and damage to health is there, and the technological ability is there. What prevents these being used are the ethics of the capitalist oriented profit and loss account. The words “not economically viable” are used frequently to both mystify and bring to a dead-end any pursued line of inquiry which looks for blame in such circumstances.  Capitalist economics include the ethics and morals of knowingly and willingly exposing their work force to dangers. They are the morals of anti-social greed and represent the heartless and unrelenting social psychology of the capitalist class.  Let us look at just a few of the other general hazards and dangers to which working people are routinely exposed in the process of capitalist production.

Noise.  Many industries, particularly those involving the use of machinery, produce large volumes of noise.  Millions of workers suffer hearing loss or impairment as a result of years of exposure to excessive noise.  Even noise at levels of frequency and intensity which are not painful, including low frequency and ultra-sound, can over a period of time, kill or irreparably damage the delicate hair-cells in the inner ear. The vast majority of damaging noises could be eliminated in the workplace by soundproofing or silencing.  The technology is not space age but it would eat into the surplus value and so employers go – where they are forced to do something – for the cheaper solutions of earplugs or ear-defenders. These of course are often uncomfortable and can lead to additional problems for the wearer such as ear infections and skin irritation.

Vibration.  This is a hazard that again could be eliminated for it is most often the result of bad design, cheap manufacture or poor maintenance. Damaging vibration at work is dependent upon its frequency, its amplitude and its duration. This determines whether and to what extent vibration damages internal organs and the bone structure.  Spinal and lower back damage, for example, can occur among those who work on, or operate for long periods, heavy equipment such as earth movers and tractors, or other machinery which is actually designed to vibrate, such as pneumatic drills, compactors, jack hammers, drills hammers, chisels etc. Long-term damage to finger, wrist, elbow and shoulder joints including the painfully severe damage known as white-finger can occur for those who work with the latter category of tools. Of course a bad situation is made worse for those who operate such machinery in cold, damp, or wet conditions such as building and road workers.

Temperature.  Extreme heat or even exposure to very hot conditions for long periods can lead to loss of fluids and salts and the body’s self-regulatory temperature system can become destabilised, or even collapse, and in extreme cases death can occur. Workers in forges, smelters, casting processes, ovens, furnaces and many others such as office workers are exposed regularly to  oppressive conditions of heat and humidity.

At the other end of the temperature scale, millions of workers are forced to endure the effects of cold. Low temperatures create heat loss, and blood circulation is reduced, particularly to hands, feet and brain. In extreme cases unconsciousness and coma can follow, along with heart failure. Workers in these conditions, such as seamen, oil-rig workers, building workers and power cable workers are more subject to rheumatism, bronchitis, arthritis and heart diseases.

Radiation.  Radiation is a more common hazard than is often supposed. It is not just those who are engaged at nuclear power stations and in advanced war armaments production, who are in danger from radiation. Continuous exposure to high power radio waves for example, or the newly developed microwaves for heating and communications, are all potentially cancer-or tumour-inducing sources of radiation.  Electro-magnetic radiation, and Infra-red radiation sources are common in some industries, as are ultra-violet radiation sources.  Health workers, dentists and of course patients are all exposed to X ray emissions, but not as continuously as workers in industries which regularly use X rays and Gamma rays for inspection or other productive uses.  All radiation sources can cause skin damage, internal organ problems and tumours.

Metals. Even after the extremely dangerous molten stage of manufacture, metals remain sources of danger to those workers employed in their transport or further production. Badly designed stacking methods and lifting procedures increase the dangers. The sheer weight of metals in bulk can permanently crush or maim fingers, limbs and even bodies where safety procedures and equipment are inadequate.  And in many capitalist firms they are inadequate. The danger does not just apply to those metals which are commonly known to be dangerous such as lead which can cause poisoning, zinc which can also explode under certain conditions, or magnesium which can set on fire and produce toxic fumes.

Metal turning, welding and riveting even with common metals, create dangerous particles and fumes, all of which workers inhale. These substances can cause permanent damage to the lungs and respiratory system. The cutting oils that are used with metals also release fumes which can cause cancers and skin diseases such as dermatitis.  Jagged edges of metals that have been cut or drilled can cause also permanent and unsightly scars, dangerous infections, and even amputated limbs.

Chemicals. There are literally thousands upon thousands of hazardous chemicals used in industry, manufacturing and commerce, so this small section cannot list even a small selection of them and still have enough space to note some of their effects on the human body. We shall have to content ourselves with noting that they come in three basic forms; solids, including powders, liquids and gases all of which can be poisonous, corrosive, explosive or cancer inducing (carcinogenic).  Powders can burn the skin, get in the mouth, lungs and stomach; liquids, can also burn and permeate the skin and give off fumes which damage lungs and the respiratory system.

Not all gasses can be seen and not all give off a smell. Since they readily mix with air, danger can be present without anyone knowing. The lungs and air passages of working people are in the front line of the attack from gasses that have escaped and this is well before any explosion can take place.  Even an apparently safe and comfortable office building or banking building can often be a sinkhole of volatile organic pollutants from paints, varnishes, plastics and statically charged particles. Some people are more immediately sensitive to such contaminants, but all are effected in the long term.

This short list presents only the tip of an iceberg of hazards which daily face the working class as they enter the capitalist factories, mines, offices, shops and farms. Theoretically in the advanced capitalist countries, there are laws to place limits as to how much danger the workers can be placed in. But these are not universal. There are also, in most of the industrialised countries, factory inspectors who are employed to police the safety at work.  But as every worker knows these inspectors are understaffed and can only make few visits. These visits are also programmed in advance so the senior management ensure the workplace is cleaned up the day before the inspector arrives, and any dodgy practices are suspended until the visit is over.

To add to this problem of detection, the inspectors are usually from the same background as the managers/owners and so there is more often than not a cosy social bond. Where this exists it ensures that even blatantly dangerous practices, where spotted, are only ‘noted’ over a friendly coffee in the boardroom. This undoubted social bond rests upon the basic economic class interests shared between the owners and managers of capital, the state inspectors who are supposed to monitor the workplace and the judges who enforce the law. It is a bond that can all but neutralise the effect of any legislation.

Aircraft are routinely sent up into the skies with known problems and defects.   Ships and Ferries are frequently sent out to sea in known un-seaworthy conditions.  Many lives are lost in the process and many more put at risk because of the cynical pursuit of profit before all else.  In the case of Nuclear energy, where this deadly and obnoxious form of industry is partly or wholly, privatised, as in Japan, then the situation can (and has) become even more dangerous. In some cases cheap, untrained labour from groups of unemployed and homeless are employed to clean out the most hazardous parts of nuclear power plants.  This is just another way in which profits are maximised at the expense of safety for the employees and the large number of communities who live within ‘fall-out’ range – and that means all of us!

Under the capitalist mode of production, such practices can only occur by collusion (turning a blind eye) between capitalist management, pro-capitalist government inspectors and pro-capitalist justices departments.  It is a  collusion, which as noted before, is engendered by the fact that material conditions of all three social groups are directly dependent upon the amount of surplus value left over after all other expenses of production are deducted.  As a general rule the more surplus value that is set aside for safe production, the less there is for profits and government taxes.

Real safety and the removal of hazards by methods – which are scientifically known and technically available – would reduce investor profits and government income for highly paid civil servants and politicians. This leaves the consumers (and the communities adjacent to such hazards) subject to a yearly lottery of ill-health, death and injury. It leaves the workers to continue to endure the temperatures, noise, vibration, radiation and absorb the gasses, fumes, liquids and dusts.  Nor does it stop at the factory gate. What the employees don’t take into their bodies gets pumped or dumped into the surrounding environment for the rest of us to breath in and absorb.

Unfortunately, more tragedies such as that at the mine in Soma, Turkey will occur as long as the capitalist mode of production continues. Indeed, disasters and misfortunes  will undoubtedly increase as the current crisis continues to unfold. The only answers in the repertoires of the ruling capitalist elites and their pro-capitalist supporters is for more production and cheaper means of producing. The investments needs of capital – even in the present five-fold crisis – is to increase production and increase exploitation for the worlds working class. These needs will take precedence over health and safety for working people and their communities, until production is taken out of their hands and placed back in the hands of the producers. Until then representatives of this class will continue to tell us ‘these things happen all the time‘.

Roy Ratcliffe ( May 2014.)

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CIVIL-WAR IN UKRAINE?

Posted on May 2, 2014 by stutteringsteps

In two previous articles, (Uprisings and Revolutions 1 and 2) the results of research into previous revolutionary transformations, listed five major stages of struggle in overthrowing a ruling political elite and five further stages needed to accomplish a post-capitalist form of society. It was suggested in these articles that whilst these stages did not unfold in a set linear pattern, nevertheless they were useful in deciding two things. The first decision being understanding at what stage any ongoing uprising or rebellion has reached and what still needs to be accomplished.  The second decision being how to more accurately characterise the situation at the stage it has reached.

The rapidly developing situation in the Ukraine presents us with an up-to-date opportunity to test the usefulness of that historical analysis. So here is a brief over-view of the events in Ukraine (and Crimea) as they relate to the stages identified in the previously-noted research on the general historical pattern of uprisings and revolutions.

Stage 1. Sufficient widespread anger/dissatisfaction among significant sections of the population, manifested in rolling strikes, widespread civil disobedience, public and private propaganda questioning the legitimacy of the system.

Most of these sub-elements of stage 1 were reached in the Ukraine between February and April. The initial protests at the Maidan demonstrated anger and dissatisfaction primarily within Kiev.  Pressure was placed upon the government and the protests escalated into armed combat. The government disintegrated, the President fled and an interim pro-European government formed with increasing right-sector activist support. This neo-fascist development itself created further anger and dissatisfaction and Stage 2 was therefore reached quickly – particularly in the Crimea.

Stage 2. The potential for collective action against the causes of dissatisfaction facilitated by close proximity, good communications and existing or new organisations capable of orchestrating these actions.

So Stage 2 type collective action promoted by the dissatisfaction with Kiev took off with incredible speed in the Crimea and was therefore swiftly followed by stage 3.

In the rest of Ukraine stage 2 dissatisfaction and action continued for a much longer, but still in a remarkably quick period, before it moved toward stage 3.

Stage 3. The actual development of collective action organised against the cause of dissatisfaction together with the establishment of co-ordinating centres for co-operative organisation and action.  

The co-ordinating centres in Crimea quickly campaigned for a referendum which then gained widespread support. This campaign was followed within a short period by stage 4 in Crimea.

In the rest of Ukraine, particularly in the East, a series of occupations by anti-Kiev citizens of city halls and other public buildings, during April 2014. In these places also the idea of a referendum was circulating and so stage 4 was commencing there also.

Stage 4. The dissatisfaction against specific issues needs to be expanded and permeate sections of the ruling stratum. A platform of demands or unifying slogan needs to arise or be created which focuses this discontent and rebellion.

In Crimea, the referendum campaign for separation from the rest of the Ukraine and association with Russia became the central unifying slogan and platform which evolved further and projected Crimea into a  stage 5.

However, in the rest of Ukraine stage 4 was extended and during this period talk of similar referendums circulated widely. During this period the Kiev interim government unsuccessfully tried to prevent such Crimea style referenda developments from taking place. However, within a few weeks the east of Ukraine also approached stage 5.

Stage 5. Sufficient armed/military strength needs to go over to the side of the oppressed and/or the oppressing groups military forces become sufficiently weakened or neutralised to allow the rebellion to take on the oppressors  and demolish their positions and organisations of power.

At this stage, many of the Ukraine armed forces in Crimea stayed neutral and others eventually joined the movement for separation as did many officials of the regional state of Crimea. The referendum was successful and Crimea voted to secede from Ukraine and applied to be accepted by Russia. This request was quickly ratified by Russia. By this ratification, the rebellion in Crimea was then over – at least for the time being. The pre-existing general socio-economic situation returned, but now under the wing of the Russian Federation.

However, elsewhere in Ukraine the anti-Maidan rebellion was still unfolding and maturing. Many Ukraine soldiers sent to re-capture public buildings in the east refused to follow orders and fraternised with local defence committees.  Stage five had been progressively entered by many cities and towns in the east and north of Ukraine. In late April, the interim Kiev government admitted its forces had been neutralised and it was too weak to enforce its will on the regions in rebellion. In these distant parts of Ukraine stage 6 was entered.

Stage 6. The armed and unarmed workers need to produce/choose their own co-ordinating organisations and spokespersons who see themselves as facilitators of the self-activity of the working people rather than a new elite leadership.

By the end of April 2014 stage 6 was either fully or partially operational in many cities and towns in the east of Ukraine. Self-defence groups and committees had been formed and elected spokespersons and erected barricades, taking over town halls, administrative buildings and police stations. At least one group had even stormed a TV station and demanded their views be expressed over the air waves. Unlike Crimea, there has as yet been no referendums in these regions of Ukraine and therefore there was no quick resolution to the  rapidly developing situation. (For a succinct appraisal of the economic situation and motives at work in the Ukraine see;  http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/23449)

Referendums for separation are detested by ruling elites, because this can lead to fragmentation and reduction of their tax base. It therefore reduces their potential incomes and privileges. Small countries can only support small and less remunerated bureaucracies, politicians and military elites. The officials of small countries do not carry very much prestige on the world scene, thus frustrating the career ambitions of political and military elites.  The regime in Kiev and its supporters in the US and Europe would prefer unleashing a civil-war rather than grant a referendum which took parts of Ukraine away from its sphere of exploitation.

Indeed, because this demand is being frustrated by circumstances and the Kiev government, stage 6 is now becoming transformed into a civil war.  The unleashing of right-sector and extreme nationalist forces along with military loyal to Kiev, upon local pro-referendum committees and building occupations, practically guarantees this outcome.  The attacks upon these pro-referendum groups (and the resulting deaths) who wish not to be ruled by the Kiev government and its policy of economically co-habiting with Europe, announced the onset of a civil war between the Kiev government and all those who are opposed to this outcome.  I would love to be wrong in this but as yet there is no obvious way to go beyond stage 6 to stages 7, 8, 9 and 10, (see below) and to a worker-led positive resolution to the underlying economic problems facing working people in the Ukraine.

The historic lack of a strong, non-sectarian anti-capitalist movement, means that in Ukraine – as elsewhere – uprisings and rebellions have little chance of becoming quickly transformed into anti-capitalist revolutions. Instead working people and the oppressed will have to go through many reversals and exit many cul-de-sacs whilst experience and knowledge are accumulated to such an extent that a post-capitalist worker-led social experiment becomes a sought after outcome to any uprising or rebellion. The current few non-sectarian anti-capitalists and revolutionary-humanists have a responsibility in evaluating past failures in that regard and in articulating this creative possibility within the current struggles.

In the meantime, workers will need to defend themselves from the coming attacks by neo-fascists and their paymasters among the neo-liberal capitalists in Kiev and the west. Many neo-Stalinist anti-Kiev activists and their supporters are already making desperate appeals for Russian forces to enter Ukraine to defend them from their own (?) national government and the right-sector. Since many of the anti-Kiev citizens of Ukraine are weaker in numbers and in armaments and since many are also Russian speakers it is perhaps only a matter of time, after many atrocities, before Russian forces are sent in to defend them from certain death. Thus escalating the tensions further. [See Ukraine Implodes!‘]

There are likely to be many such critical events (uprisings, rebellions etc.,) as the systemic economic, financial, social, environmental and moral crisis of the capitalist mode of production continues its downward spiral. Weak links in the global chain of capitalist economic relations will undoubtedly continue to appear. Ukraine is just the latest. Many may not even get beyond stage 3 (as with Egypt, Tunisia, Libya etc.), let alone as far as stage 6 as it has in some parts of Ukraine, before it becomes possible and necessary by a combination of circumstances and creative visions, to go beyond stage 6 and on to;

Stage 7. The existing capitalist state (its armed bodies of men, its bureaucracy, its power structures etc.) need to be captured, dismantled, demolished completely and existing elite political forms of organisation dissolved.  To be replaced by workers and citizen self-armed communes.

Stage 8. The new socio-economic system would need to be economically sustainable and organisationally maintainable from within the ranks of the producers themselves.

Stage 9. Decisions on production and the amount and type of surplus-production need to remain with the producers organised in their local, regional and international collectives. Armed defence of the new system would need to be by the workers and communities themselves.

Stage 10. Any necessary planning and co-ordination of production and exchange should be based upon a negotiated community across model, rather than a centralised top-down model. Delegates to planning bodies would need to be elected for their ability and be revocable.

Roy Ratcliffe (May 2014.)

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