THE GENERAL ELECTION (ZOOM)

THE GENERAL ELECTION (ZOOM)

In May a Welsh politician tabled an amendment to a Bill .The amendment did not move forward. It would have ‘made it a criminal offence for a politician to deliberately mislead the public.’

https://nation.cymru/news/ban-on-politicians-lying-law-shelved-despite-cross-party-support/

One would have to be cynical to the nth degree to even think that during this past few weeks has been politicians and would be politicians would ever stoop to speaking/publishing anything which was not of the utmost veracity. Politicians telling whopping fibs in their pursuit of election and power? Really sir, do you takes us for fules? British democracy is the best in the world and Britain’s leaders are the most fervent in upholding Truth, justice and the Capitalist Way.

For the record, there is only one political party which has laid the unvarnished truth in front of the electors and that is The Socialist Party.

The below is from the From the July 2000 issue of the Socialist Standard July 2000. It’s titled The Lying Game.

Our rulers have a long and inglorious tradition of lying to stay in power. Our only defence against this is to understand the basis of this lie machine.

Just ask anyone, they’ll tell you. “Of course the press lie,” they’ll say, and whip out the latest tabloid, and show you proof incontrovertible that there are porky pies in the Currant Bun It’s so obvious that the media are liars that one paper—the Daily Sport—can trade off on its pastiche of the press, telling blatant and obvious lies, wherein the pleasure for the reader lies precisely in spotting that it’s all false.

It is, though, precisely through reference to the blatancy and flippancy of the so-called “yellow press” that the power of media propaganda lies. That the tabloids’ allergy to accuracy is passed off as playfulness in the face of the grim-faced puritanism of the “serious” media and apparent attempts to impose any agenda on them, means that the reputation for honesty and accuracy of the broadsheet and broadcast media is maintained. Yet, it is precisely through the “serious” media that many of the lies that sustain the system are promulgated.

A simple examination of the modern media suffices to demonstrate that propaganda is the norm, not the exception. You just have to look at who the media are to begin to understand that they have a material interest in going out of their way to defend the current system. The media is composed of capitalist businesses, selling their news, dependent on the markets; and—more specifically—they are dependent upon selling advertising (i.e. getting money from other capitalists) in order to keep operating. A careful glance at, say, the Guardian would demonstrate just how much page space is given over to advertising in proportion to the space given over to reports. Freedom of the press belongs to those who own the press, and capitalists own the press, both individually through media firms and collectively through advertising. The threat to withdraw advertising income from firms that incur the displeasure of the capitalist class means that the media firms have a direct interest in avoiding certain controversies.

This situation pertains, even in the supposedly non-commercial BBC, since it exists in competition with the other news providers, and is subject to similar funding threats as well as political pressure, the ending of the licence fee, or the appointment of governors, for example. The model for government intervention in the culture industry is “the arm’s-length principle”, thus the BBC, and various arts boards are given grants and are nominally independent, but, they are capable of losing funding, or being otherwise pressured if they get too much out of control. This “arm’s-length principle” is in effect the way that the whole capitalist class relates to the media, preserving the appearance of neutrality and objectivity, whilst retaining ultimate control.

Researching and gathering information requires lots of time, patience and diligence, something which adds to a media firm’s overheads—thus cutting into profits. The pressure to lower costs, to churn out copy on time, means that media firms cannot waste much time independently searching out and verifying information. Thus they are heavily dependent upon publicists (like the ubiquitous Max Clifford) and public relations officers of both the state and other firms to provide them with newsworthy items. Capitalist institutions collectively spend billions of pounds per year on public relations and media management.

The relationship to official sources can be seen in the build-up of the Zimbabwe story, which began with news stories reporting comments by Robin Cook and Peter Hain expressing their concerns about conditions in Zimbabwe. These comments, highlighted, no doubt, by so-called “spin doctors” meant these concerns became a top news item. In contradistinction, the fact the Cook did not give the story of the British government negotiating Foday Sanko into coalition with the Sierra Leonean government last year, meant it did not make the news. The same holds true of the collapse and invasion of the Democratic Republic of Congo, and the bloodbath of the Eritrean-Ethiopian war: without being placed on the official agenda by the powers-that-be these stories have only been given footnote treatment in the British media. Even the collapse of liberal-democracy from the military coup in Pakistan has been consigned to acceptance.

Private Eye (2 June), in uncovering a significant aspect of the Sierra Leone story—that the Sierra Leonean army is equally as murderous as the RUF—makes a significant observation: when the embarrassing story came to light, the government reacted by “burying the story by ensuring the non-availability of official spokesmen or ministers”. Without official documentation, and without the opportunity for “balance” the news media did not run with the story. The power of the information providers to withhold both data and access provides a key strategy in their control of the news media.

These international stories help highlight the way in which the supposedly “free” press follows the line of their masters. Are media in France or Germany putting the Zimbabwe story as their lead news item? Undoubtedly not, because Zimbabwe is not an area of their concern, so they do not focus on it so intently. Hence while thousands die each year in Laos from bombs dropped by America in the 1970s, while thousands are slaughtered in Colombia—all without a single comment in the media. The murder or beating up of a single farmer in Zimbabwe is top of the six o’clock news, complete with tearful interviews from the victims and their families. Along with that, every news report of the killings in Zimbabwe lists the number of white-skinned farmers first, and then relegates the murdered black-skinned MDC supporters to a footnote on that figure.

This highlights a classic manoeuvre on behalf of the media—the selection of worthy and unworthy victims. Two months back, people facing starvation in Ethiopia were presented as, again, the worthy recipients of the West’s largesse and charitable concern, yet, when people starve and die in Iraq—as a direct consequence of the policy of the Western powers—their story does not make the news headlines. Acting to help worthy victims, and punish “bad guys” serves our masters’ ends in that it helps them justify and thus mobilise for their interventions.

A part of the response of the British media to the Zimbabwe story owes itself to older forms of class rule, in that the editors of the newspapers, or their staff, have friends or relations living in Zimbabwe who went over to administer colonialism. These personal relations give further impetus to placing the story up the news agenda.

The control of personnel is in fact another key factor in ensuring the capitalist control of the news agenda. A glaring example of this in practice was evidenced by the Mayday riots in London this year. Almost inexplicably the BBC sent along Nicholas Witchell, their “Royal” correspondent, to cover the events. Obviously, anyone who gets the “accolade” of being a royal correspondent is sufficiently tame to serve their masters’ interest with gusto, as indeed, Witchell did in his reportage of the day. The very fact that he was moved from his usual brief to cover what was, in effect, a small protest (with only 5,000 or so people present in Westminster) clearly indicates the propaganda intentions of his editors.

In the days leading up to the protest the media ran scare story after scare story, about the police being prepared for massive violence, about the army being on standby (and these stories were spread by the “respectable” media, such as Radio 4’s Today programme). It was clear that the agenda was worked out in advance, and carefully prepared.

The behaviour of reporters at the scene gives other indications how the media coverage was an a priori agenda. Camera folk were seen hunting out any grungy-appearing anarchist who’d overdone the drink and was being sick. The Channel Five reporter described largely peaceful events as “simmering all day”, in flagrant contradiction to the experience of the vast majority of people attending. Indeed, the media as much as possible pushed the line that the police were merely responding to the thuggery of the protesters; repeating time after time that the riot suits only came out after McDonald’s was trashed; whereas eye-witness reports from Trafalgar Square note that police there were waiting in riot gear, and could not have got changed after the vandalism began. It was clearly in our masters’ interests to maintain that the police response was a reluctant intervention, and that the blame lay on the protesters.

The disorganisation and the non-accountable actions of individuals in trashing the shop and vandalising the statues represented a gift to the media so they could ignore the point of the demonstration and push home their masters’ line and scare people into accepting more control. Spectacular dissent failed dramatically because the protesters had no means of controlling the social and political context into which the protest was placed by the propaganda system.

The mandarins of the state and their commissars in the media occasionally and inadvertently admit the importance of media structures. During the Kosovan war, they were forced into openly having to bully John Simpson for his reports from Serbia for falling out of step with the official line, while every other reporter placidly accepted the daily dole of information from Jamie Shea. Further, by attacking the Serbian broadcasting service, and claiming it as a legitimate target of war, the powers-that-be revealed their true and thorough understanding about the role of propaganda. The event was not without precedents, as NATO forces in Bosnia-Herzegovina seized a Bosnian-Serb television transmitter (see Socialist Standard, January 1997) because it was broadcasting “enemy” propaganda.

Our rulers have a long and inglorious tradition of lying to stay in power, and our only defence against this is to understand the basis of this lie machine, and to work to expose their lies as often as possible. They tell different lies in different circumstances, and set different agendas according to the intended news audience they anticipate. Our interest lies in exploiting the divisions between the divergent interests of different groups of capitalists, and showing the contradictions involved. Thus our best weapon against the lies of our masters, is to understand that we the workers of the world have a common interest, and to stand shoulder-to-shoulder, sharing information between ourselves, deliberately and consciously working for our liberation without borders.

Pik Smeet

The below is from the Socialist Standard May 2009. SOYMB doesn’t consider it to be boring. Boring is what occurs in a few days time when capitalism once again demonstrates that not enough of the working class understand, and want, socialism. An educational dialogue explaining the workings of modern capitalism and rebellion, based on genuine events.

Scene: An alternative bar in North London. Cool movie posters plaster the walls. Electronic music pumps out unusually quiet from speakers – it is a week day evening.



Enter Pik Smeet, wearing broad brimmed hat, trying to look like a Puritan. He approaches the bar, buys a bottle of cider, and sits at his chair of many years usage. After him, come two middle-aged male punks, spikey haired, leather-clad with tattoos and chains strewn around their bodies – back from smoking outside. They sit around the corner of the bar from Comrade Smeet.



Punk 1: …So, my boss says, when you’ve got all the money in, that’s it, you can go home.

Punk 2: Gah! Like I need another reason to hate you – easy street.

Punk 1: Yeah, I hate me too. We own market places all over London. Go round, collect the cash, nice little job.

Punk 2: Bet you get a stack of griping from all the stallholders.

Punk 1: That’s why I don’t hang around after I’ve picked up the rent.

Punk 2: Too right. You have many places?

Punk 1: Yeah, Camden, Oxford Street, Piccadilly Circus. All over the joint. Going to be more now, we’ve just bought out a former Woolworths store, now they’ve collapsed.

Punk 2: Oh, really, what you going to do with that?

Punk 1: Well, unless a big firm comes along and makes us an offer, we’re gonna turn it into small units. You make more money breaking big stores up into units, see. Could get you a place if you fancy one.

Punk 2: Well, I’m only interested as a customer.

Punk 1: Ah, well, then, you’ll like our night clubs. They’re good money too – we have a chain of clubs, you know the ones, one near Farringdon.

Punk 2: Oh, them – the strip places?

Punk 1: Well, call them night clubs, but, basically, well, they’re brothels. Then, that’s where the money is.

Punk 2: Yeah – you should try working in making porn films, I make good money shooting them.

Punk 1: Well, I used to, but I got out because the money isn’t there any more. And, y’know, that’s why you do it, I mean, it’s fun, you get to travel the world, but the bottom line is the money. If you’re not making any, there’s no point doing it.Punk 2: You reckon?

Punk 1: Yeah. You see, America – yer biggest market, y’know, they won’t allow you to import films any more. And you can’t get a visa to enter the states and shoot the films. That’s it, no point being in the game any more.

Punk 2: Well, I still make good money – hand over fist – I think you should have stuck with it, mate, it’s a good game – so long as it’s not the only thing you can do.

Punk 1: That reminds me – one girl, we were driving her round London, showing her some sites, got to Trafalgar square, I said “And that’s Nelson’s column” she said to me “Who?” I mean, totally dumb – nothing else she could do that be in the business.

Punk 2: Was she English?

Punk 1: Perfectly, girl next door. The quality product, not one of your Eastern European girls.

Punk 2: Ooh, the very thing. Mind you, when I was living above the brothel your English birds would last until lunchtime, and when there wasn’t plenty of food forthcoming, they be off out the door. Least the eastern birds have to hang around.

Punk 1: On our shoots we’d have about four hundred quid a week to just send out to Sainsbury’s for food. We were a big crew, so, you know, we’d all need feeding. Twelve hours a day we were doing – a laugh. I know, half hour bursts of work, but we were there for the whole long day. Great fun.

Punk 2: Have you tried flogging your stuff over the internet?

Punk 1: That’s just it – who wants to pay forty quid for hardcore pornography when you can download stacks of it for virtually nothing.

Punk 2: Well, you get to control your own business, from beginning to end – production and distribution – everything except the credit card payments – you need someone else to do that –

Punk 1: Usually from Russia.

Punk 2: You have to be careful with them, but, yes, the Russians can helps you with the financial side of things.

Punk 1: Y’ See, I mean, the technology is out there, anyone can make porn – and it’s the home-made look, with the girl next door, that really draws in the punters.

Punk 2: That’s what we’re good at doing – your punters want realistic-looking sex, and we do home-made look quite well. It’s a skill to achieve that look. That’s what we bring – technology is cheapening the production process, but we still add value through our skills.

Punk 1: Well, the value we add gets less all the time, I reckon I’m better off collecting the rent. Right, next fag.

Punk 1 stands up, on his shirt is sewn a badge with a picture of Karl Marx, over his heart. He pulls on his studded leather jacket, and goes out for a smoke.

Smeet (to himself): Well, that’s punk for you, rebellion within capitalism – non-conformity can be highly profitable. Reckon I’ll go home and write all this down – a little morality play full of symbolic resonances and the like.

Pik Smeet

A postscript to the article is the following discussion of its content at the recent Autumn Delegate Meeting of the SPGB, and the response by the writer on the Spintcom discussion list:



“Another example of an article was ‘Crassness’. Report of dialogue between punks. Apart from anyone else it’s boring. (May 2009 Socialist Standard). Makes a lot of assumptions. Moral is the punks are all stupid because they don’t understand the Socialist case.”



1) It was a genuine report of a real conversation, that I thought illustrated some of the failings of punk rebellion, viz.,



2) It in no way implies stupidity on their part – far from it, it implies that they know how to get on under capitalism, and make a quid or two. I can’t see how the implication of stupidity can be read into it, because the text makes no mention of the socialist case, at most the irony of the faux-rebel, who’s just spent ten minutes talking about collecting rent, living off prostitution and and pornography, wearing a Karl Marx badge, is mentioned.



3) The point was that the rebellion of punk is in no way anti-capitalist, but in fact ultra capitalist, in that being prepared to go into ways of earning money considered outside “normal” mores they are able to make a fine living.



4) It touched on how even the porn industry is subject to the cheapening of the means of production, and the cold hearted business case at the bottom of the industry.



5)The moral, if there was one, was that punk is rebellion within capitalism, and not a rejection of it.

I’m sorry that [the comrade] it boring, but it was only meant as a light piece, and was submitted with my expressions that I thought it only had an outside chance of seeing print. I should add, though, that boring was part of the point – here were two people in full punk regalier, and large swathes of their conversation – about collecting rent, retail opportunities, etc. could have been heard from any golf club bar room bore in slacks and loafers. That was my chief inspiration to write it down as soon as I ear wigged it.



That said, further incidents in the same pub, which I’ve blogged about else place, did lead me to thinking about submitting for a regular column of such stories entitled “As soon as this pub closes”…

Pik Smeet

https://socialiststandardmyspace.blogspot.com/2009/10/crassness.html

The below is from the Socialist Standard May 2009. SOYMB doesn’t consider it to be boring. Boring is what occurs in a few days time when capitalism once again demonstrates that not enough of the working class understand, and want, socialism. An educational dialogue explaining the workings of modern capitalism and rebellion, based on genuine events.

Scene: An alternative bar in North London. Cool movie posters plaster the walls. Electronic music pumps out unusually quiet from speakers – it is a week day evening.



Enter Pik Smeet, wearing broad brimmed hat, trying to look like a Puritan. He approaches the bar, buys a bottle of cider, and sits at his chair of many years usage. After him, come two middle-aged male punks, spikey haired, leather-clad with tattoos and chains strewn around their bodies – back from smoking outside. They sit around the corner of the bar from Comrade Smeet.



Punk 1: …So, my boss says, when you’ve got all the money in, that’s it, you can go home.

Punk 2: Gah! Like I need another reason to hate you – easy street.

Punk 1: Yeah, I hate me too. We own market places all over London. Go round, collect the cash, nice little job.

Punk 2: Bet you get a stack of griping from all the stallholders.

Punk 1: That’s why I don’t hang around after I’ve picked up the rent.

Punk 2: Too right. You have many places?

Punk 1: Yeah, Camden, Oxford Street, Piccadilly Circus. All over the joint. Going to be more now, we’ve just bought out a former Woolworths store, now they’ve collapsed.

Punk 2: Oh, really, what you going to do with that?

Punk 1: Well, unless a big firm comes along and makes us an offer, we’re gonna turn it into small units. You make more money breaking big stores up into units, see. Could get you a place if you fancy one.

Punk 2: Well, I’m only interested as a customer.

Punk 1: Ah, well, then, you’ll like our night clubs. They’re good money too – we have a chain of clubs, you know the ones, one near Farringdon.

Punk 2: Oh, them – the strip places?

Punk 1: Well, call them night clubs, but, basically, well, they’re brothels. Then, that’s where the money is.

Punk 2: Yeah – you should try working in making porn films, I make good money shooting them.

Punk 1: Well, I used to, but I got out because the money isn’t there any more. And, y’know, that’s why you do it, I mean, it’s fun, you get to travel the world, but the bottom line is the money. If you’re not making any, there’s no point doing it.Punk 2: You reckon?

Punk 1: Yeah. You see, America – yer biggest market, y’know, they won’t allow you to import films any more. And you can’t get a visa to enter the states and shoot the films. That’s it, no point being in the game any more.

Punk 2: Well, I still make good money – hand over fist – I think you should have stuck with it, mate, it’s a good game – so long as it’s not the only thing you can do.

Punk 1: That reminds me – one girl, we were driving her round London, showing her some sites, got to Trafalgar square, I said “And that’s Nelson’s column” she said to me “Who?” I mean, totally dumb – nothing else she could do that be in the business.

Punk 2: Was she English?

Punk 1: Perfectly, girl next door. The quality product, not one of your Eastern European girls.

Punk 2: Ooh, the very thing. Mind you, when I was living above the brothel your English birds would last until lunchtime, and when there wasn’t plenty of food forthcoming, they be off out the door. Least the eastern birds have to hang around.

Punk 1: On our shoots we’d have about four hundred quid a week to just send out to Sainsbury’s for food. We were a big crew, so, you know, we’d all need feeding. Twelve hours a day we were doing – a laugh. I know, half hour bursts of work, but we were there for the whole long day. Great fun.

Punk 2: Have you tried flogging your stuff over the internet?

Punk 1: That’s just it – who wants to pay forty quid for hardcore pornography when you can download stacks of it for virtually nothing.

Punk 2: Well, you get to control your own business, from beginning to end – production and distribution – everything except the credit card payments – you need someone else to do that –

Punk 1: Usually from Russia.

Punk 2: You have to be careful with them, but, yes, the Russians can helps you with the financial side of things.

Punk 1: Y’ See, I mean, the technology is out there, anyone can make porn – and it’s the home-made look, with the girl next door, that really draws in the punters.

Punk 2: That’s what we’re good at doing – your punters want realistic-looking sex, and we do home-made look quite well. It’s a skill to achieve that look. That’s what we bring – technology is cheapening the production process, but we still add value through our skills.

Punk 1: Well, the value we add gets less all the time, I reckon I’m better off collecting the rent. Right, next fag.

Punk 1 stands up, on his shirt is sewn a badge with a picture of Karl Marx, over his heart. He pulls on his studded leather jacket, and goes out for a smoke.

Smeet (to himself): Well, that’s punk for you, rebellion within capitalism – non-conformity can be highly profitable. Reckon I’ll go home and write all this down – a little morality play full of symbolic resonances and the like.

Pik Smeet

A postscript to the article is the following discussion of its content at the recent Autumn Delegate Meeting of the SPGB, and the response by the writer on the Spintcom discussion list:



“Another example of an article was ‘Crassness’. Report of dialogue between punks. Apart from anyone else it’s boring. (May 2009 Socialist Standard). Makes a lot of assumptions. Moral is the punks are all stupid because they don’t understand the Socialist case.”



1) It was a genuine report of a real conversation, that I thought illustrated some of the failings of punk rebellion, viz.,



2) It in no way implies stupidity on their part – far from it, it implies that they know how to get on under capitalism, and make a quid or two. I can’t see how the implication of stupidity can be read into it, because the text makes no mention of the socialist case, at most the irony of the faux-rebel, who’s just spent ten minutes talking about collecting rent, living off prostitution and and pornography, wearing a Karl Marx badge, is mentioned.



3) The point was that the rebellion of punk is in no way anti-capitalist, but in fact ultra capitalist, in that being prepared to go into ways of earning money considered outside “normal” mores they are able to make a fine living.



4) It touched on how even the porn industry is subject to the cheapening of the means of production, and the cold hearted business case at the bottom of the industry.



5)The moral, if there was one, was that punk is rebellion within capitalism, and not a rejection of it.

I’m sorry that [the comrade] it boring, but it was only meant as a light piece, and was submitted with my expressions that I thought it only had an outside chance of seeing print. I should add, though, that boring was part of the point – here were two people in full punk regalier, and large swathes of their conversation – about collecting rent, retail opportunities, etc. could have been heard from any golf club bar room bore in slacks and loafers. That was my chief inspiration to write it down as soon as I ear wigged it.



That said, further incidents in the same pub, which I’ve blogged about else place, did lead me to thinking about submitting for a regular column of such stories entitled “As soon as this pub closes”…

Pik Smeet

https://socialiststandardmyspace.blogspot.com/2009/10/crassness.html

The below is from the Socialist Standard May 2009. SOYMB doesn’t consider it to be boring. Boring is what occurs in a few days time when capitalism once again demonstrates that not enough of the working class understand, and want, socialism. An educational dialogue explaining the workings of modern capitalism and rebellion, based on genuine events.

Scene: An alternative bar in North London. Cool movie posters plaster the walls. Electronic music pumps out unusually quiet from speakers – it is a week day evening.



Enter Pik Smeet, wearing broad brimmed hat, trying to look like a Puritan. He approaches the bar, buys a bottle of cider, and sits at his chair of many years usage. After him, come two middle-aged male punks, spikey haired, leather-clad with tattoos and chains strewn around their bodies – back from smoking outside. They sit around the corner of the bar from Comrade Smeet.



Punk 1: …So, my boss says, when you’ve got all the money in, that’s it, you can go home.

Punk 2: Gah! Like I need another reason to hate you – easy street.

Punk 1: Yeah, I hate me too. We own market places all over London. Go round, collect the cash, nice little job.

Punk 2: Bet you get a stack of griping from all the stallholders.

Punk 1: That’s why I don’t hang around after I’ve picked up the rent.

Punk 2: Too right. You have many places?

Punk 1: Yeah, Camden, Oxford Street, Piccadilly Circus. All over the joint. Going to be more now, we’ve just bought out a former Woolworths store, now they’ve collapsed.

Punk 2: Oh, really, what you going to do with that?

Punk 1: Well, unless a big firm comes along and makes us an offer, we’re gonna turn it into small units. You make more money breaking big stores up into units, see. Could get you a place if you fancy one.

Punk 2: Well, I’m only interested as a customer.

Punk 1: Ah, well, then, you’ll like our night clubs. They’re good money too – we have a chain of clubs, you know the ones, one near Farringdon.

Punk 2: Oh, them – the strip places?

Punk 1: Well, call them night clubs, but, basically, well, they’re brothels. Then, that’s where the money is.

Punk 2: Yeah – you should try working in making porn films, I make good money shooting them.

Punk 1: Well, I used to, but I got out because the money isn’t there any more. And, y’know, that’s why you do it, I mean, it’s fun, you get to travel the world, but the bottom line is the money. If you’re not making any, there’s no point doing it.Punk 2: You reckon?

Punk 1: Yeah. You see, America – yer biggest market, y’know, they won’t allow you to import films any more. And you can’t get a visa to enter the states and shoot the films. That’s it, no point being in the game any more.

Punk 2: Well, I still make good money – hand over fist – I think you should have stuck with it, mate, it’s a good game – so long as it’s not the only thing you can do.

Punk 1: That reminds me – one girl, we were driving her round London, showing her some sites, got to Trafalgar square, I said “And that’s Nelson’s column” she said to me “Who?” I mean, totally dumb – nothing else she could do that be in the business.

Punk 2: Was she English?

Punk 1: Perfectly, girl next door. The quality product, not one of your Eastern European girls.

Punk 2: Ooh, the very thing. Mind you, when I was living above the brothel your English birds would last until lunchtime, and when there wasn’t plenty of food forthcoming, they be off out the door. Least the eastern birds have to hang around.

Punk 1: On our shoots we’d have about four hundred quid a week to just send out to Sainsbury’s for food. We were a big crew, so, you know, we’d all need feeding. Twelve hours a day we were doing – a laugh. I know, half hour bursts of work, but we were there for the whole long day. Great fun.

Punk 2: Have you tried flogging your stuff over the internet?

Punk 1: That’s just it – who wants to pay forty quid for hardcore pornography when you can download stacks of it for virtually nothing.

Punk 2: Well, you get to control your own business, from beginning to end – production and distribution – everything except the credit card payments – you need someone else to do that –

Punk 1: Usually from Russia.

Punk 2: You have to be careful with them, but, yes, the Russians can helps you with the financial side of things.

Punk 1: Y’ See, I mean, the technology is out there, anyone can make porn – and it’s the home-made look, with the girl next door, that really draws in the punters.

Punk 2: That’s what we’re good at doing – your punters want realistic-looking sex, and we do home-made look quite well. It’s a skill to achieve that look. That’s what we bring – technology is cheapening the production process, but we still add value through our skills.

Punk 1: Well, the value we add gets less all the time, I reckon I’m better off collecting the rent. Right, next fag.

Punk 1 stands up, on his shirt is sewn a badge with a picture of Karl Marx, over his heart. He pulls on his studded leather jacket, and goes out for a smoke.

Smeet (to himself): Well, that’s punk for you, rebellion within capitalism – non-conformity can be highly profitable. Reckon I’ll go home and write all this down – a little morality play full of symbolic resonances and the like.

Pik Smeet

A postscript to the article is the following discussion of its content at the recent Autumn Delegate Meeting of the SPGB, and the response by the writer on the Spintcom discussion list:



“Another example of an article was ‘Crassness’. Report of dialogue between punks. Apart from anyone else it’s boring. (May 2009 Socialist Standard). Makes a lot of assumptions. Moral is the punks are all stupid because they don’t understand the Socialist case.”



1) It was a genuine report of a real conversation, that I thought illustrated some of the failings of punk rebellion, viz.,



2) It in no way implies stupidity on their part – far from it, it implies that they know how to get on under capitalism, and make a quid or two. I can’t see how the implication of stupidity can be read into it, because the text makes no mention of the socialist case, at most the irony of the faux-rebel, who’s just spent ten minutes talking about collecting rent, living off prostitution and and pornography, wearing a Karl Marx badge, is mentioned.



3) The point was that the rebellion of punk is in no way anti-capitalist, but in fact ultra capitalist, in that being prepared to go into ways of earning money considered outside “normal” mores they are able to make a fine living.



4) It touched on how even the porn industry is subject to the cheapening of the means of production, and the cold hearted business case at the bottom of the industry.



5)The moral, if there was one, was that punk is rebellion within capitalism, and not a rejection of it.

I’m sorry that [the comrade] it boring, but it was only meant as a light piece, and was submitted with my expressions that I thought it only had an outside chance of seeing print. I should add, though, that boring was part of the point – here were two people in full punk regalier, and large swathes of their conversation – about collecting rent, retail opportunities, etc. could have been heard from any golf club bar room bore in slacks and loafers. That was my chief inspiration to write it down as soon as I ear wigged it.



That said, further incidents in the same pub, which I’ve blogged about else place, did lead me to thinking about submitting for a regular column of such stories entitled “As soon as this pub closes”…

Pik Smeet

https://socialiststandardmyspace.blogspot.com/2009/10/crassness.html

A report taken from the Financial Times article notes that the EU is set to reimpose tariffs on sugar and egg imports from Ukraine to protect the EU bloc’s farmers from a flood of cheap goods Tariffs on Ukrainian exports of sugar and eggs are now likely to have additional costs imposed. Ukrainian oats have already had tariffs reintroduced.

‘The decision to limit Ukrainian imports follows months of protests by farmers. Agricultural workers argue that the EU’s policies are threatening their livelihoods. After the launch of Russia’s military operation in Ukraine, Brussels dropped all tariffs and quotas on Kiev’s farming goods for a period of one year to allow its agricultural products to be shipped to global markets.

Farmers in Poland, Hungary, Slovakia, and other neighbouring countries staged protests, complaining that they simply could not compete with cheap Ukrainian imports that were not subject to the same tariffs and regulations as EU-produced goods.’

The same news agency highlights a further Financial Time piece where someone from ‘ one of the largest global agricultural commodity traders’ opines that ‘The world is facing “food wars” as geopolitical tensions have triggered a rise of protectionism amid concerns about waning supplies.’

They commented that there was ‘ deepening food insecurity in poorer countries and a the cost-of-living crisis.’

Under capitalism food is a commodity and profit remains the name of the game.

The below is taken from the Socialist Standard March 1987.

‘Amid great publicity and jubilation the EEC has slashed more than £1 billion off its farm budget. It has done this by cutting future Common Market milk production by 9.5 per cent and reducing the minimum price guaranteed to beef producers by 13 per cent. “EEC conquers food mountain” was how the Daily Telegraph put it (17 December) and the junior Farm Minister in parliament. John Selwyn Gummer, described the cuts as “a historic step forward”.

The mountain at present consists of 1½ million tons of butter, one million tons of skimmed milk powder, 600.000 tons of beef, and 18 million tons of cereals. The British Agriculture Minister responsible for engineering the deal, Michael Jopling, was described as tired but triumphant after the talks. Calling the agreement an epic victory, he stated that the milk cuts alone would constitute “considerably more than the entire production of New Zealand”. The ministers of the other countries were just as jubilant and at the end of the talks they all celebrated with champagne.

What did they have to celebrate? Not a reduction in food prices, for it was made clear that the cuts would not make food cheaper. Not an increase in their popularity with the farmers, for despite the provision of compensation for loss of earnings, many will lose money or go out of business. What then? Well, not much, other than managing to agree among themselves. Because what posed as a victory actually represents a capitulation — a capitulation to the market. The market decrees that money and resources shouldn’t go into producing goods and services there isn’t a buyer for. And when governments — in this case the EEC governments through the Common Agricultural Policy — try to control the market or at least direct it along their own channels, the market will, sooner or later, channel governments back along its own no buyer no production path. This is what’s happened here.

But what’s wrong with market forces reasserting themselves? What’s wrong with not producing food for which there obviously isn’t a buyer? Well, there is another way of looking at it and it starts to show up if we look at two words that are often used to describe the EEC food stocks — “excess” and “surplus”. Are the stocks really in excess of people’s needs? Are they surplus to requirements? It’s true that if they were put on the market at the same price as already existing food, they wouldn’t be bought. But is this because people don’t need them? Or isn’t it rather because people haven’t got the money to buy them? Clearly many of the 30 million people on or below the official poverty line in the EEC don’t get all the milk, butter and beef they need — and some get very little indeed. The determining factor isn’t their need but the amount of cash they’ve got in their pockets. Seen in these terms, the EEC ministers’ “food coup” is an application of the fundamental economic law of the society we live in — the law that goods and services are produced to be sold to people who have money to buy them, not to satisfy the requirements of people who need them.

A solution to this might seem to be to distribute the “surpluses” free or at lower prices to those who can’t afford them. But within the market system this isn’t a solution, definitely not a long-term solution, as it would inevitably force the current prices down, cut profits and cause economic chaos with producers, suppliers and retailers going out of business and making their workers unemployed too. As Gummer said in reply to a suggestion in parliament that beef and butter in the EEC stores be given free to pensioners: “Those who usually bought butter would not buy it if it was given away” (Guardian, 19 December 1986).

For just such a reason, this “solution” is not applied in the Third World, where many people do not simply go short of certain things they need through lack of money in their pockets but actually die of starvation and disease for that reason. Food supplied to them “free” from the economically advanced countries would upset the home markets. So it happens only on a very small scale and usually during what are called emergencies. Actually there’s no country in the world that couldn’t satisfy the food needs of its people if production were not geared to the market and sale at a profit. As it is, much of what is produced in Third World countries (and indeed in others too) goes abroad in search of those who can buy it rather than stay at home for those who need it.

What emerges from this picture of unsatisfied needs among vast “surplus” is that humans have got the knowledge, the techniques and the skills to produce food (and everything else) on an absolutely massive scale but we’re not using them in the interests of humanity as a whole. Instead we’re channelling them through a system of production and distribution that isn’t geared to meeting those interests. It’s geared solely to finding buyers on the market with a view to making profit and this means starvation, misery and destitution for many, the bare necessities for others and for most of us in countries like Britain, a life in which, whether we’re in or out of work, we just about scrape by.

It seems a daft way to live when all we need to do is get together and organise the resources the earth offers, the technology we’ve developed and the skills and energies we possess, to produce everything directly for use without the obstacle of the market and the buying and selling system. Not even the rationing regime we choose to live under at present can hide the potential that exists for abundance. We need only look at the EEC food mountains and the surpluses in so many other parts of the world. The step we need to take now is to establish common ownership and control over those resources and technology and free access to the abundance they will be able to produce when we put our energies to work on them voluntarily and co-operatively. That is the real mountain we have to conquer.’

Howard Moss

https://socialiststandardmyspace.blogspot.com/2020/03/conquering-mountains-1987.html