Comments for zetkin.net

Comment on McDonnell must not withdraw: Diane Abbott is a fake left. by Mellie

Mellie — Sun, 06 Jun 2010 15:40:21 +0000

“On Abbott, I call fake left.” And I call your article ultra-left.

McDonnell isn’t a serious left candidate – he’s too narrow. Abbott has more support and broader politics.

Comment on McDonnell must not withdraw: Diane Abbott is a fake left. by Diane Abbott: fake-left and shyster « Shiraz Socialist

Diane Abbott: fake-left and shyster « Shiraz Socialist — Wed, 02 Jun 2010 15:46:16 +0000

[...] nomination. Compare Abbott’s voting record and McDonnnell’s. (Thanks to Zetkin.net for the interesting article which points this [...]

Comment on McDonnell must not withdraw: Diane Abbott is a fake left. by Chris Paul

Chris Paul — Fri, 21 May 2010 13:08:34 +0000

WHY is McDonnell the candidate of the left, again? The job he’s going for requires the uniting and leading of some 250 people, around 95% of whom he has persistently dissed either as established MPs or as little better than Tories by type, class, background, new Labour adherence etc etc.

Even the 50 or so softer rebels – absolutely critical in bargaining with Blair’s people – are denounced and disdained by McDonnell and his people. This is not a good platform to build on. Even those aching for a contest last time could not bring themselves to vote for him in sufficient numbers.

I supported John strongly last time round in pursuit of a contest and against the claims of Meacher. Rentier and conspiracy theorist and speaker of Latin to civil servants. Wrong wrong wrong. But as I argued at the time we need to be seeing a coalition built out into the middle of the party. It may be that all the other four 40-ish men in suits are in the right wards 130 comrades and colleagues.

So why are not one but two candidates in the hardest left 20 comrades in the PLP? With one of them in the left-most three? At least Ms Abbott can reach out towards the centre, partly because she is that smidge less left in theory and smidge-plus less left in practice.

I don’t think John should have assumed and presumed himself to be the candidate of the left, not even the left of the left. Think it through. He should be supplying some oomph and his 20 noms to someone at least 20 and possible 50 in from the leftmost point in the party. Requiring some policy leverage in exchange. Actually have a chance of achieving by achieving better scores than 1/8 in PLP in both CLPs and affiliates.

If he does get the PLP noms he’ll be lucky. While his might transfer to Diane if both get on the ballot the opposite would not be true for many. They’d go to E Miliband or A Burnham I think, in the ansence of a woman from the centre.

There ought to be women plural on the ballot. The LP has measures to produce more equal outcomes at every other level of our party. In their absence socialists should join the dots themselves.

I wouldn’t have picked Diane myself but still think it’s good that she’s having a go. In an ideal world someone from the centre will also give it a whirl. There are enough noms for seven candidates if they are meted out carefully.

Comment on McDonnell must not withdraw: Diane Abbott is a fake left. by gwenhwyfaer

gwenhwyfaer — Fri, 21 May 2010 12:52:02 +0000

If you want to know exactly how your party escaped from you and ended up in the lap of the right wingers, go and reread all the above. You have let the perfect be the enemy of the good, and you have lost every last shred of power you ever had as a result.

Comment on McDonnell must not withdraw: Diane Abbott is a fake left. by » The differences between Diane Abbott and John McDonnell | Liberal Conspiracy

Fri, 21 May 2010 12:27:28 +0000

[...] time it’s Abbott who is being accused of being fake left, despite the fact that she backed McDonnell’s campaign last time around. I don’t think [...]

Comment on Object AGM by Thank you Terry Eagleton « The Fourth Dimension

Thank you Terry Eagleton « The Fourth Dimension — Fri, 09 Apr 2010 07:33:15 +0000

[...] Sofie Buckland at Zetkin.net) (Impossible Girl: weren’t you the one who was at that anti-Bindel demo, and someone from the [...]

Comment on Our Authenticity and Theirs by Thierry Schaffauser

Thierry Schaffauser — Thu, 21 Jan 2010 03:53:17 +0000

Thank you very much.

Comment on #UKsnow by Dan

Dan — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 10:15:39 +0000

The snow in the UK has been all over the news here in Germany. This feels faintly ridiculous.

Comment on Chris Addison is wrong – Identity Politics, Self-Organisation and SUs by EdM

EdM — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 13:29:47 +0000

A quick post, just to say – excellent blog, excellent post. I think that the most important part of this post is that penultimate paragraph, and I couldn’t agree more. Mens’ societies aren’t in principle a bad thing, but what idiot professional contrarians and swill-brained liberals ignore is what they actually represent as real social facts. Any proto-fascist toff could set up a misogynist campaign group under any name (like, “Conservative Futures” f’r example), but I think what makes Mens’ Societies special, and gives them their particular, weird danger is the way they play off the complete political disintegration of women’s groups on campus, mirroring it. I hadn’t really thought about Men’s societies from that angle before – but it is almost as if Men’s societies are trying to run a campaign against women’s officers by parodying women’s societies’ spiral into soft, support-group wishy-washy politics. It would be much, much easier to knock this Men’s Society rubbish on the head if campus women’s campaigns remembered why they exist.

Comment on Chris Addison is wrong – Identity Politics, Self-Organisation and SUs by a

Mon, 14 Dec 2009 14:26:48 +0000

So you, outside the would-be group, think they have no worthy cause to campaign for, and thus conclude that to deny them support cannot possibly be discriminatory.

How would you feel if someone said the same thing about feminism? Would you even take them seriously? “I, a non-feminist, cannot see any issue feminists need to campaign about, so telling them to get bent is not sexist. Case closed.”