Britain now is more and more like Britain in the 1980s. The tory government up to their usual bullshit. Privatisation of any last remaining thing, pressing the least well off further into poverty. Last night listening to BBC Radio 5, (Pienaar's Politics), a "venture capitalist" said that to beat the recession it needs to be easier to 'hire and fire' employees. Not even challenged. Same old, same old.
We need to stop these plans. Ancient forests like the Forest of Dean and Sherwood Forest are national treasures — once they’re gone, they are lost forever. A huge petition will force the government to rethink. If we can prove how strongly thousands of us are against this, we can make them back down.
Help build the pressure before it’s too late. Add your name to the “save our forests” petition: http://www.38degrees.org.uk/save-our-forestsThe Forester newspaper, in association with The Forest of Dean and Wye Valley Review, is launching a petition to send a message to Government ministers wanting to sell our woodlands to private concerns: Hands Off Our Forest.
Sign the petition here: http://www.theforester.co.uk/saveourforest.cfm References:
Also back in print in a new, extended edition is the pamplet from The Thomas Spence Society, The Hive of Liberty, The Life & Work of Thomas Spence (1750-1814). Edited by Keith Armstrong, with an introduction by Professor Joan Beal and a new essay by Malcolm Chase. It is available directly from The Thomas Spence Society.
John E. Archer – 'By a Flash and a Scare', Arson, Animal Maiming, and Poaching in East Anglia 1815-1870 Breviary Stuff Publications, ISBN 978-0-9564827-1-6
‘By a Flash and a Scare’ illuminates the darker side of rural life in the nineteenth century. Flashpoints such as the Swing riots, Tolpuddle, and the New Poor Law riots have long attracted the attention of historians, but here John E. Archer focuses on the persistent war waged in the countryside during the 1800s, analysing the prevailing climate of unrest, discontent, and desperation. In this detailed and scholarly study, based on intensive research among the local records of Norfolk and Suffolk, Dr Archer identifies and examines the three most serious crimes of protest in the countryside — arson, animal maiming and poaching. He shows how rural society in East Anglia was shaped by terror and oppression in equal measure. Social crime and covert protest were an integral part of the ordinary life of the rural poor. They did not protest infrequently, they protested all the time. Read more…
Roger Ball – Tolpuddle And Swing, The Flea And The Elephant
Bristol Radical Pamphleteer #12
Andrea Button – Bristol's White Slave Trade, Indentured and Enforced Labour In The 17th Century
Bristol Radical Pamphleteer #13
No Quarter 5
Includes A Somali Pirate Story by Jordan Zinovich (with Hans Plomp), an interview with Gabriel Kuhn, author of Life Under the Jolly Roger, Reflections on the Golden Age of Piracy, Anarchist Commune at Nootka in 1911? by Larry Gambourne, A Couple More Things About New Hazelton by David Tighe, John Oswald: Atheist, Vegetarian, Revolutionary by N. N., Somali Pirates by Peter Lamborn Wilson, book reviews, and a reading list, all interspersed by some nice black and white imagery. Read more…
Last weekend I went along to the Tolpuddle Martyrs Festival. (For those who have never heard of the Tolpuddle Martyrs: "On February 24th, 1834, six farm labourers from Tolpuddle [Dorset, UK] were arrested on a charge of taking part in an ‘illegal oath’ ceremony. The real offence was that they had dared to form a trade union to defend their livelihood. For this they were sentenced to seven years’ transportation to the penal colonies of Australia. The sentences provoked an immense outcry, leading to the first great mass trade union protest. The campaign won free pardons and the Martyrs’ return to England. It was an historic episode in the struggle for trade unionists’ rights in Great Britain.")
Of particular interest to me were a couple talks delivered by the Bristol Radical History Group, which were perhaps the most controversial thing there. These were about the large scale Captain Swing riots "that swept across the south of England 3 years before the events in Tolpuddle." These were controversial in the sense that they were carried out by the so-called ignorant rural peasants. As the speaker pointed out, whereas The Tolpuddle Martyrs were innocent, the Swing Rioters were guilty and they were defiant in their guilt. They recognised their rights as people, despite what the law and the law-makers would have to say on the matter. It is the innocent/guilty polarity, (amongst other reasons), according to the speaker, which means that today many have heard of the Tolpuddle Martyrs but few have heard of Captain Swing, despite the Captain Swing riots being a much larger movement involving a far greater number of people, and being a far bigger problem for the authorities. I agree. The talk was titled 'The Flea and the Elephant', the flea being Tolpuddle, the elephant Captain Swing.
The Bristol Radical History Group have put on many events, check their website for details of upcoming events. They also publish a series of pamphlets, three of which I picked up whilst I was at the festival:
We Come For Our Own And We Shall Have It, Smuggling In Poole And Dorset
Yesterday's To-morrow, Bristol's Garden Suburbs
Nicotiana Brittanica, The Cotswolds' Illicit Tobacco Cultivation In The 17th Century
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No Quarter #4
Issue number 4 of No Quarter, the publication sometimes described as "a zine about radical history", has been released. This issue contains The "Illegalists" by Doug Imrie, reprinted from Anarchy: a Journal of Desire Armed. Illegalism is the anarchist philosophy which embraces criminality as a method of reappropriation of wealth. This article is primarily concerned with the actions of French illegalist Marius Jacob and his band of illegalists who were active between the late 1800s and early 1900s. Following on from this is Why I Was A Burglar by Alexandre Jacob, (reprinted from Fifth Estate, #370), where we can read a personal account of an illegalist. Also in this issue is an interview with a founding member of Past Tense and the South London Radical History group on his motivations and experiences. This is followed by two pieces on Anna Trapnel, seventeenth century Fifth Monarchist prophetess and Roger Crab, seventeenth century hermit, ethical vegetarian, and political writer, (besides other epithets). The life of Franklin Rosemont, poet, artist, historian, street speaker and surrealist activist, who died shortly before this issue went to print, is heralded. No Quarter #4 finishes up with a review of Anja Kirschner's 2008 film, Trail of the Spider and several book reviews. |
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No Quarter #4.5 The Politics of Carnival
This half-issue of No Quarter was produced in a limited edition as a fundraiser for the 2009 Calgary Anarchist Bookfair. It contains an audio CD which has an eclectic mix of music which relates to No Quarter's areas of interest. It seeks to promote carnival as subversion, as a coming together of the people under their own rules and their own organisation, as opposed to carnival as social control. From a British perspective you might illustrate that by saying that it is juxtaposing the free festival scene of the late 20th century with Glastonbury festival as it is now. Its packaging is such a good solution and shows the innovation needed by small scale fanzine producers. |
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No Quarter Pamphlet Series #2 : Trevor Bark – Crime Becomes Custom, Custom Becomes Crime
Author's abstract: The British Marxist Historians (BMH) were involved in the study not only of protest and social movements, but of what was and was becoming crime. The enclosures, the change from wages in kind (perquisites) to the wage form itself (Linebaugh 1991), wood gathering, nutting and so on that were previously peoples custom were criminalized and fought politically by the disposessed. Thompsons 'moral economy' theses was based upon the study of bread riots, and this in turn became part of what is known as the social crime debate (Douglas Hay et al, 1975) Rather than economic crime and protest being central to the poors' lives, crime became marginalized and left to the professionals or a marginalized lumpen element in the Fordist era. Into the late modern era we have seen the growth of crime often linked to high unemployment and 'flexibility', and the growth of social movement protest. The themes of the BMH about a militant participation in the present, a political Marxism, and reconstructing theory are important ones. To that end we involve ourselves in the social movements, whether that is a rediscovery of the mass tobacco and alcohol smuggler, other informal economic activity in the city, or the emerging anti-capitalist movement. I am presenting a case for the development of the social crime concept by testing whether the key characteristics can be found today, and also politically reassessing the nature of crime itself. Originally (Hay et al, 1975) said it wasn't possible to distinguish between 'good' criminals here and 'bad' criminals there, and this all blurred into the labouring poor; Linebaugh (1991) notes payment of wages was often years behind. The distinction between the respectable/unrespectable, non-deserving and deserving poor manifested itself in the political development of the Labour movement and Marxism, and can be found within the anti-capitalist movement. Following "No Logo" and its emphasis on the trademark brand names in the shops I will present analysis about shoplifting and whether the politics of part of the anti-capitalist movement has had any effect on shoplifters choices. I will ask the question about how you go about destroying the brand most effectively, and outline the liberalism found within "No Logo". 'Crime' is now a central feature of the social movements large manifestations and also for a significant section of the general public. |
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No Quarter Pamphlet Series #3 : Omasius Gorgut – Poor Man's Heaven, The Land of Cokaygne: A 14th Century Utopian Vision
"In most if not all the corners of Europe, in their mythologies, folk tales, popular songs and festivals, the poor of the Middle Ages dreamed up a land where their sufferings were reversed, where people lived in harmony and plenty without having to work. The lives of the poor in medieval times were viciously hard – oppressed and exploited by the rich and the church, terrorised by their hired soldiers, forced to work all their lives without hope of any change in their situation. On the one hand they were told constantly by the Church that they could not expect and should not dream of a better existence in this life; on the other that a paradise existed for them somewhere in another. People were also “much more directly aware than they are today of the tyranny of necessity, the essential hardness in the nature of things. Man was so far from being the master of his environment that he was always prone to feel that it was his master. He depended on the weather not only because bad weather is unpleasant, but because a bad season might mean absolute famine. And, under the very best conditions, long hours and a bare living were still a necessity from which he could see no possible way of escape.” (A.L. Morton) Not surprising then that their frustrated dreams should create a place where everything was free, where life was easy, where the weather was always fine, where all desires came true – and where the rich could never hope to come. Their dream of a Utopia of the poor appears as the English Cokaygne and the French Coquaigne, as Pomona or the pagan Island of Apples, where “all is plenty and the golden age ever lasts. Cows give their milk in such abundance that they fill large ponds in milking. There, too, is a palace all of glass, floating in the air and receiving within its transparent walls the souls of the blessed." (Baring-Gould) It is the Irish Hy Brasil, where "milk flows from some of the rivulets, others gush with wine". In medieval German legend it is Scharaffenland, or Venusberg, the mountain of delight and love, where Lady Venus held her court, leading a fantastical life of pleasure in the company of carefree spirits of the air, together with fair nymphs of woodland and water, and heroes seduced there from the world above. In Holland they imagined Cokaygne as Luikkerland, where “All you loafers always lying about, Farmer, soldier, and clerk, you live without work, Here the fences are sausages, the houses are cake, And the fowl fly roasted, ready to eat.” The dream is expressed as the Country of the Young, as Lubberland; as the Poor Man's Heaven and the Rock Candy Mountains. These fantastic lands shared the same characteristics: an earthly and earthy paradise, an island of magical abundance, of eternal youth and eternal summer, of joy, fellowship and peace. “Brueghel painted it in a picture that has many of the most characteristic features: the roof of cakes, the roast pig running round with a knife in its side, the mountain of dumpling and the citizens who lie at their case waiting for all good things to drop into their mouths… It is the Utopia of the hard-driven serf… for whom the getting of a bare living is a constant struggle.” In 14th Century England, this image of a free earthly paradise emerged in a popular song, The Land of Cokaygne. Many versions existed, varying from area to area; and it was anonymous, a product of many minds, an expression of the subversive desires of a class." This text is an updated version of that originally issued by Past Tense. |
| Further information on No Quarter publications can be found on the No Quarter website: anarchistpirates.blogspot.com | |
It is said that public confidence in politicians is at a very low ebb following the Telegraph's leaking (and subsequent reporting by most newspapers) of the majority of politicians' questionable expenses claims. Claiming for second homes, piano tuning, clearing of a moat (£2,115), an ornamental duck house (£1,645), swimming pool maintenance (several claims), mortgages that don't exist (£15,000+), double-claims for council tax, a trouser press (more than one claim), home cinema system, removal of wisteria, trimming hedge around "helipad" (£609), leather rocking chair (£1,200), food, toilet seat, eye liner, biscuits, and so on, and so on, ad nauseum.
Politicians from all the main three parties have been exposed. Most give the appearance of being humbled in the media now that they have been found out, however, some, (the Tory gentry, as you may imagine), have appeared indignant that they should have to answer to the lower classes. An example of this is Anthony Steen, MP for Totnes in Devon, who claims that we are all just jealous of his million pound home: "I've done nothing criminal, that's the most awful thing, and do you know what it's about? Jealousy. I've got a very, very large house. Some people say it looks like Balmoral. It's a merchant's house of the 19th century. It's not particularly attractive, it just does me nicely." What is surprising, or perhaps unfortunate, is that it takes something like this exposé in the media to lower the public's confidence in MPs when just a quick browse through history will show that they have been stealing from us for years. Most people would face fines or imprisonment for theft, but these MPs just give an apology, pay a little back and feel exonerated. There have been heated, angry public debates where politicians are confronted by their constituents, resulting in some MPs being in denial about the feelings of the people whom they are supposed to represent. One wonders if this could be the spark to ignite the summer of discontent of which there have been murmurings of in the press. There is a long history of social protest in the UK, as you can imagine (if you don't already know). Let us take the act of incendiarism as an example and quote from John E. Archer's 'By A Flash and A Scare', where he asks Why Incendiarism?:Following on from the previous post, it is worth noting a recent news item which has revealed that, on average, in England and Wales a parent is sent to jail every two weeks for their child's truancy. There were 10,000 prosecutions in England alone in 2007.
This is all part of New Labour's target, launched in 1998, to cut truancy, which includes pouring millions of pounds, (over £800m), into the initiative, giving the police new powers to drag kids back to school, hefty fines and imprisonment for parents, paging and text messaging of parents, electronic tagging of parents, withdrawal of child benefit for truants' parents, spiked security fences tipped with paint which marks pupils' uniforms if they try to climb in or out, swipecards for pupils, fingertip scanning of pupils, informing travel agents to warn parents of the dangers of term-time holidays, and so on. Does it work? In 2008 truancy rates in England reached their highest level since 1997. If school days are the best days of your life, go and see a psychiatrist!Who Cares about the White Working Class? is "a new study on the white working class and ethnic diversity in Britain"1 published by The Runnymede Trust, an "independent policy research organisation focusing on equality and justice through the promotion of a successful multi-ethnic society."2
"The essays in this volume all point to the paradoxical and hypocritical ways in which the ruling classes speak for the white working class on the one hand, and how they speak about them on the other. Whereas middle class commentators are happy to defend the white working class interests against the onslaught of politically correct multiculturalism, they will simultaneously deride and riducule the feckless and underserving poor, who have squandered the opportunities gracefully given to them by the state, and therefore righfully be left to wallow in their own poverty."3
The study has been prompted by "a recent emphasis in the media and by other commentators on the segragation of, and competition between, ethnic groups [which] has suggested that white working class communities may be losing out in the conflict over the allocation of scarce resources. … [It] shows that … the most disadvantaged working-class people of whatever ethnic background, roughly the poorest fifth of the population, are increasingly separated from the more prosperous majority by inequalities of income, housing and education. By emphasizing the virtues of individual self-determination and the exercising of 'choice', recent governments have in fact entrenched the ability of the middle and upper classes to avoid downward social mobility and preserve the best of life's goods for their own children. Moreover, the rhetoric of politicians and commentators has tended to abandon the description 'working-class', preferring instead to use terms such as 'hard working families' in order to contrast the the virtuous many with an underclass perceived as feckless and undeserving. … life chances for today's children are overwhelmingly linked to parental income, occupations and educational qualifications — in other words, class. The poor white working class share many more problems with the poor from minority ethnic groups than some of them recognise."4
The media's skewed portrayal of the white working class, e.g. the BBC's White Season and Channel 4's Immigration: — The Inconvenient Truth, is exposed as fallacy, "the white working class are habitually pitched against those of minority ethnic groups and immigrants, while larger social and economic structures are left out of the debate altogether. … The media's efforts to acknowledge and discuss white working class grievances has excluded issues such as the legacy of Thatcherism and deindustrialisation, or the rise of the super-rich under Labour. Instead, there is a fairly consistent message that the white working class are the losers … while minority ethnic groups are the winners – at the direct expense of the white working class."5
"The white working classes are discriminated against on a range of different fronts, including their accent, their style, the food they eat, the clothes they wear, the social spaces they frequent, the postcode of their homes, possibly even their names. But they are not discriminated against because they are white."3
"When commentators argue over the neglected interests of the 'white working class', the comparison to other groups is always in terms of their ethnicity, with Bangladeshis in Tower Hamlets, or Pakistanis in Oldham. The distinctive social position of these groups is presented in terms of their ethnic identity, as cultural or religious difference, rather than by the very marked class inequalities that they also experience. This exaggerates the differences between ethnic groups, and masks what they hold in common. By stressing the whiteness of the white working class, the class inequality of other ethnic groups also slips from view. This sidesteps the real issue of class inequality."6 Of course, this is how the game works for the ruling classes: divide and rule. It always has. For example, see the employment and vagrancy laws, first in the UK, then later in the colonies, bending workers as far as they will go before they break.*
"The rising significance of education in British society has not undermined the role of class; instead it has opened up new avenues for class competition and disadvantage. … despite the meritocratic values7 of British society, high social position still helps to 'insure' against weaker educational performance, and numerous studies show that if we compare lower achievers, those from more privileged backgrounds have much better careers than their less advantaged peers. … the fact remains that it is often harder for privileged children to fail than it is for disadvantaged children to succeed."6
England is the "most explicit example of the use of schooling by the upper classes to dominate the lower classes. … Adam Smith epitomised the English bourgeois viewpoint regarding working class education in The Wealth of Nations:
For Smith, as well as for the vast majority of the political, and intellectual élite at the time, the schooling of the working classes was always to be subordinate and inferior to that of the middle classes, designed to contain and pacify rather than to educate and liberate.8 When the English state schooling system was set up in the late 19th century the intention of the dominant classes was still to police and control the working classes rather than to educate them."9
All well and good, and to paraphrase a line from the introduction, this may all appear as truisms to you or I, even verging on the banal, but it is good that an organisation such as the Runnymede Trust has finally lifted the corner of the carpet and reported on what they've seen brushed under there. I welcome this publication, even if it does put itself well within the bracket of the middle class once again speaking about and for the working class — then again, the main body of readership will be the middle class, that is, I guess, its target audience. Mostly the essays are highly readable but, for me, it fell down in two places. One of these essays in particular made for nauseating reading indeed: the 8th and final essay. It starts with, "The remit for this chapter was to produce a contribution which translates academic thinking to non-academic audiences"10. An incredibly condescending read! Who did the author think he was writing for, the odd working class person who happened to come across the publication? If the difference between academic writing and non-acedemic writing is the dumbing-down for its apparently dumbed-down audience, then he did a great job. But, seriously, the main difference between an academic person and a non-academic person is the academic's ability to produce prose, but not his thought processes and his ability to understand and reason. This last essay was unnecessary.
Having said that, the report is, however, a stimulating read on the whole. If it works towards creating more solidarity and self-awareness within the working class, then it's a good thing.
Who Cares about the White Working Class? is available as a free PDF from the Runnymede Trust, here.
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1. http://www.runnymedetrust.org/
2. Who Cares about the White Working Class?, inside cover.
3. Kjartan Páll Sveinsson, Introduction: The White Working Class and Multiculturalism: Is There Space for a Progressive Agenda?, What Does this mean for Race Equality? — The Aims of this Volume, pp. 5-6
4. Dr Kate Gavron, Foreword, pp. 2
5. Kjartan Páll Sveinsson, Introduction: The White Working Class and Multiculturalism: Is There Space for a Progressive Agenda?, Class Re-emerges in Political Discourse, pp. 5
6. Wendy Bottero, Class in the 21st Century, pp. 7, 10
7. …or, rather, because of them?
8. So little has changed.
9. Diane Reay, Making Sense of White Working Class Educational Underachievement, A Brief History of the Working Class Underachievement, pp. 23
10. Danny Dorling, From Housing to Health — To Whom are the White Working Class Losing Out? Frequently Asked Questions, pp. 59-65
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Roger Wells - Wretched Faces, Famine in Wartime England 1793-1801
[2011] |
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Ralph Anstis - Warren James and the Dean Forest Riots, The Disturbances of 1831
[2011] |
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Bob Bushaway - By Rite, Custom, Ceremony and Community in England 1700-1880
[2011] |
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Malcolm Chase - The People's Farm, English Radical Agrarianism 1775-1840
[2010] |
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Henry Snowstorm - The One Day House
[the Wild Beast Records 2009] |
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Madlib Medicine Show No. 11 - Low Budget High Fi Music
[Madlib Invazion 2011] |
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Hypnotic Brass Ensemble - Heritage
[Choice Cuts 2010] |
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The Budos Band - III
[Daptone Records 2010] |
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The World Ends: Afro Rock & Psychedelia in 1970s Nigeria
[Soundway Records 2010] |
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Norman Douglas - Some Limericks
[Eclectics & Heteroclites 11 2009] |
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Georges Perec - Cantatrix Sopranica L., Scientific Papers
[Eclectics & Heteroclites 10 2008] |
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Ferdinand Céline - Semmelweis
[Eclectics & Heteroclites 9 2008] |
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Carlo Emilio Gadda - The Philosophers' Madonna
[Eclectics & Heteroclites 8 2008] |
