Be Excellent To Each Other

I forgot that the American civil rights movement in the 50s and 60s was just people handing out flyers asking politely for people to listen to them.

Does anyone have any opinions on Owen Smith? He currently comes across as a bit of a blank canvas.

Relatedly, some of my friends who recently joined Labour will be pleased the High Court has re-enfranchised them.

I wouldn't say he's my preferred candidate, but it could be a step in the right direction..

He's going to lose hard. Corbyn sewed up the NEC elections yesterday, I'd say Momentum has a very firm grip on the party now. Enjoy your twenty years of Tory rule.

It will deffo keep this topic active for next 20 years...

Fascism will knock on your door in a crumpled linen suit pretending to be your friend...

Except for viewers in Scotland.

Yeah, I only caught that on the news this morning. That side of it had passed me by (too busy watching canoeing, shooting, and diving).

Still, if I need a PhD topic, theses on 'the strange death of Labour Britain' or 'must Labour lose' will be in vogue again.

Hmm...wonder if Sadiq Khan will commit to running for mayor again in 2020 or if he'll suddenly become available for work just after the general election (assuming we don't go early).

Think you need to look up the definition of fascism, buddy.

Are you off, then?

Corbyn's desire to impose direct rule over the oversea territories and prevent them being rax havens is pulling the corporate under control of the state to a degree. Auditing businesses and setting wages of workers is another hallmark of classical fascism. As is his desire to pull medical reearch back uder state control to make the company a servent of the state.

There has also been the opportunity to appeal to many groups at once which has been taken pro.isumg a deconstruction of the social order and a rebuilding around something dynamically new with opportu ities for some ti move forward and this applies to the nation state as well.

There's also a leader backed up by a group not averse to strong arm tactics which is implicitly condoned.

So, yeah. I checked, buddy.

Some social professor has probably decided it means "cheese", or something.

Think you've been reading too many spin doctor blogs

At least the trains will run on time.

Has he yet decided that Venezuela is perhaps not the ideal to aim for?

I'd be significantly more likely to vote Labour with Sadiq Khan as leader than either of Corbyn or Smith.

http://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/Fascism.html

There's some references there.

"Fascism is socialism with a capitalist veneer" - so, not socialism then.

Also you do realise the implications of comparing a modern leftish politician with a regime that wanted to exterminate all Jews, right? It's tone deaf and insulting.

I was doing nothing of the sort.

I was saying that it is perfectly possible to view the policies as being in line with facist doctrine. Which was the discussion we were beginning to have.

State control of assets is a tenet of historical fascist regimes, yes. Also communist ones, and historical British labour politics.

As a comparison it's not a lot better than saying boxing involves punching people in the face, and so does domestic abuse.

I'm not even sure what it means nowadays. Isn't it just something you say when you want to call someone names rather than anything that is usefully descriptive in any way?

I would argue that the key tenet of fascism is authoritarianism, and if you're looking at any part of the Labour Party that tried going that way, it was the centrist Labour Party of the 2000s with Jackie Smith at the top of the home office.

ID cards for everyone!

Yeah, it is often used to describe politics someone doesn't agree with (whether left or right) which is why I challenged it, as fascism is a purely far-right ideology.

Quoting Wikipedia:

"Government control of business was part of Mussolini's policy planning. By 1935, he claimed that three-quarters of Italian businesses were under state control. Later that year, Mussolini issued several edicts to further control the economy, e.g. forcing banks, businesses, and private citizens to surrender all foreign-issued stock and bond holdings to the Bank of Italy. In 1936, he imposed price controls."

That sounds pretty socialist to me. Was Mussolini not a fascist, then? Clue: he quite literally defined the term, so I think he was.

(An attempt at a real answer: I think it's more helpful to think about fascism in terms of two dimensions of political ideology: social policy as authoritarian vs libertarian, and economic policy as capitalist vs communist. The word "fascist", for most people, has come to mean any extremely authoritarian position, regardless of where the person being discussed sits on the other axis.)

That sounds more communist than socialist, but I'm splitting hairs here - I broadly agree. My point was I think it's a politically-loaded term, not one just based purely on economics.

I don't agree with all of this but in general this is a pretty good representation of how I feel politically at the minute.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... CMP=twt_gu

No; but (apart from not being a houseowner) I'm likely to personally benefit from twenty years of Tory rule so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ I guess

Me too, doesn't mean I have to like it.

I don't like it either, but the people who think Corbyn have a chance have prevailed. So now either I'm wrong or I'm not. Either way, there's nothing I can do other than watch it play out.

So who's that post aiming to be smug towards? Those of us who won't benefit? Those who will outright suffer? Those who might suffer but 'deserve' it because they voted for the wrong party, or supported the wrong leader? I'm genuinely curious, because though I know there are those that can be a bit lofty at the thought of the politically induced future of others, I kind of hoped that didn't include you.

No-one. I'm not smug. I'm depressed and resigned. Those of us who think Corbyn is bad for Labour and for the country have lost the argument. We've gone from Conservatives considerably tempered by coalition to Conservatives somewhat tempered by a semblance of opposition to untrammelled Conservative rule. If May called a snap election tomorrow she'd probably walk way with a 75-100 seat majority. We're going to get grammar schools back, now. It's a fucking disaster.

'Enjoy your 20 years of Tory rule' and pointing out that you will personally benefit comes across as smug. Not smug because you will benefit, but smug in a 'well, you bought this on yourselves' kind of manner. Schaudenfreude, if you will. I'm glad to hear that's not how you feel, but the communication you're putting out might suggest otherwise.

Not to derail, but what's wrong with grammar schools? Genuinely interested, as I went to one, and I had no idea they were a 'bad' thing.

So was Corbyn! Are you Jeremy Corbyn?

They're not a bad thing if you went to one

There's a strong argument that grammar schools get the best teachers and the most funding, so whether you get access to a quality education is then decided on your performance in one exam at age 11. And there's also a strong poverty correlator there - people from poorer backgrounds tend to do significantly worse at the 11+ than the more well off.

I also went to a grammar school, Gloucestershire was one of the few councils that never got rid of them.

I have read about the return of grammar schools and been a bit confused. Where did they go? I live around the corner from one now, and have lived close to them in many towns and cities. I wasn't aware that they had ever disappeared?

They completely stopped the opening of new ones in 1998, but some existing ones kept going. I think there are a couple of hundred in the UK in total. Some areas have none, some have kept theirs.

Also, we used to love playing the local grammar at rugby, as they were rubbish and we were able to trample their bloodied bodies into the mud 'neath our iron-shod boots.

Fuck it, this thread will do.

I know what "cis" means, but what's a "woke cis dude"?

Northern Ireland never got rid of their grammar schools. I know that correlation doesn't necessarily mean causation, but here's a graph.

Woke I think means 'is aware of their inherent privilege' or similar

We've got a power cut. I know that doesn't suggest a hippo is to blame, but here's a hippo.

Disappointingly, Urban Dictionary is blocked at work ('adult/mature content'). Not a term I've come across, but then other than the arms company I don't know what 'bae' is either.

Yeah, it's an AAVE term.

http://www.ibtimes.com/what-does-stay-w ... nt-2374703
http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=woke

So you're not allowed to use it. Is that right?

I personally don't use it, no.

But can you be it even if you can't say it? Do you think you are it?

I believe the tweet in question that Grim... was referring to was said ironically anyway, as it was calling out behaviour in supposedly socially-aware men that is anything but.