Black Dwarf July 7 1970 Page 2 Underground Press Conference: a Solipsistic Cricket Match

B L A C K DWARF

Established 1817 Vol 14 No. 36 7th July 1970 Price 2/- Black Dwarf July 7 1970 page 2 Underground Press Conference: a Solipsistic Cricket Match. By John Hoyland & Jane Nicholson the film companies, have understood that a new discussed at the conference: The Joinson Memorial Hall in Manchester stands product can be given an up-dated and “avant- The question of the relationship of the papers to in a grassy plot surrounded on 3 sides by blac­ guard” image if it is pushed through the under­ their readers was not discussed. The concept kened terraced houses and on the 4th by a gaso­ ground press. Particularly as far as the American “underground” itself was not discussed. What the meter. On Saturday 20th July, this was the scene companies that advertise here are concerned, all underground stands for, who are the people who of the first ever Underground Press conference, the underground papers are regarded as more or comprise the underground, what are the long-term called jointly by OZ and Grass Bye, the Man­ less the same. And as the actual papers don’t seen intentions of the underground, what is the politico- chester underground paper. Unbilled stars of the to be very conscious of themselves as distinct en­ social role of the underground, what is the relation­ occasion were a group of astonishingly scruffy tities (it’s often a question of different lay-out ship between the underground and other young skinhead kids, who attacked the hippies physically more than anything else) co-operation over attract­ people, other older people, the revolutionary move­ at the level where it hurts most, jumped up ing this advertising seemed a logical step. ment, the third world, Marxism, etc etc etc—these and down on the roofs of their cars, and brought Virtually all the papers at the conference had things were not discussed. The differences be­ the conference to a halt by chanting “we shall not serious financial problems. These were attributed tween British underground papers and American be moved” in the doorway. They were finally in­ at least in part to the difficulties of distribution. underground papers was not discussed. The re­ vited into the hall to eat up all the food, and had a (The question of the loyalities and the actual lationship between underground entertainment marvellous time because of the friendly and tole­ make-up of the readership was not dealt with). So and “straight” commercial entertainment was not rant way they were treated. various ideas about combining over distribution discussed, though at one point it was acknow­ In the only ideological statement of the day, were put forward. Then the conference discussed ledged sadly that the underground couldn’t put on Felix Dennis, of OZ, reminded the conference that ways of attracting more advertising. This led such a good rock-show as the Bath Festival. (The in America people were shot to death by the quickly into the area of promotion and PR. fact that virtually everything that the under­ police, while in Britain kids like these had nowhere Somebody complained that one of the difficulties ground does is rapidly appropriated by big busi­ to play—but it was all part of the same problem. of producing an underground paper these days ness was also not discussed. ) The most significant thing about the conference was that there wasn’t much to write about. Per­ At one point it was mentioned that CBS helped was the number of papers represented there. haps they could get together to put on various pro­ to subsidise the American underground papers by There were some 15 of them, including IT, OZ, motional activities to “sell” the underground to extensive advertising for several months. Then, a Grass Eye, Time Out, Friends, Resurgence, Zig- the public, and at the same time get something to sufficient demand for CBS’s “underground” music Zag, and Black Dwarf. The total number of people describe in the papers? This led to the usual fan­ having been built up, and a sufficient profit at the conference was more than 50, even though tasies about putting on rock concerts, producing assured, CBS suddenly pulled all its ads out of many papers had either not been invited, or television shows etc. —prompting Howard Frazer, every underground paper in American. Now CBS hadn’t been able to make it. That there are so of the Night Ferry distribution group, to comment is advertising heavily in the British underground many independent papers appearing now is less afterwards that most of the people at the con­ papers (why? and for how long? ). The implica­ important than the fact that they are willing to ference “seemed totally committed to the tions of this were not discussed. come together and discuss their common pro­ spectacle. ” IT, the oldest and recently the most committed blems. Such a conference would never have been The fact that this first-ever meeting of the under­ of the underground papers, came to the con­ held a year ago. ground papers confined itself exclusively to discus­ ference against a background of falling circula­ The meeting convened itself four hours late, un­ sing business and public relations might seem tion, huge debts, a killing legal battle on an ob­ convened itself for some macrobiotic food, recon­ pretty strange. But what was really startling scenity charge, and some of its key staff leaving vened itself again and then terminated in a ran­ about the conference was that it became clear to start other (more commercial) ventures. IT has dom but fairly effective way. There was a com­ that underground papers have virtually no commit­ had problems before and has battled its way munity of interest there, and this allowed for a tment to their own copy. This was expressed most through them. Probably it will manage to do so pleasant vagueness in the way the meeting was sharply (albeit unconsciously) by one of the repre­ again, but the fact that its problems were not dis­ run. Unfortunately it also made for cosiness and sentatives of Friends, who said that if their paper cussed at this conference was amazing. complacency. was given a million pounds and consequently The question of the underground’s reaction to The first session of the conference dealt largely didn’t have the continual hassles to get the paper the potential racism and the repressive “law and with the proposed weekly paper that the OZ group produced each month, the paper would probably order” aspirations of the newly elected Conserva­ hopes to bring out in November. This paper, which collapse because they wouldn’t know what to do tive Government was also not discussed—this, de­ is intended to act as a “unifying news vehicle” for with it. spite the fact that the law is at present descending the underground, ie to be called INK. The present Most of the underground press have little to say on OZ. OZ will no doubt respond to this in the idea is for it to appear in tabloid form like the that they actually think, or believe in. They con­ same way that IT is responding to the obscentity Daily Sketch. It hopes for a circulation of 100, 000, tinue to propogate a style of freedom, in which the charges it is facing—by organising a benefit con­ and it is apparently going to be indistinguishable revolutionary, the reactionary and the completely cert. The underground’s stock solution to every from the bourgeois yellow-press except that it will meaningless jostle side by side. It must be added problem it faces seems to be to get some more contain “The Truth”. that this has a positive aspect. The editorial and bread. Felix Dennis explained that OZ’s increased ideological freedom that the papers proclaim The people who write for the undergound press sales were directly related to how sensational means that genuinely revolutonary voices can be regard themselves as revolutionaries. How can their issues were. If they could be consistently sen­ heard in the columns of the underground press. they be revolutionaries when, even taken at their sational with their lead stories in INK, they may The excellent and cool-headed Time Out, for very best—at their most vital, at their most idea­ break the 30 to 40 thousand sales barrier, and get example, carries a regular “Revolution” column listic, at their most imaginative, at their most through to a six figure circulation. He added that that is offering a considerable service to the Left. critical of bourgeois society—they do not take the he hoped the paper would act as a kind of news In the same way, it is possible for revolutionaries trouble to find out how this society actually service for the underground, to the extent that to write in the other papers—at the moment any­ works? How can they be revolutionaries when people would use the paper as a community news way. This opportunity should not be wasted. The they do not take the trouble to find out what are service, and would feed information back into the underground press keep their pages open for us. It the different forces operating within society, and paper from their areas. is in part a criticism of revolutionaries that their how these forces interrelate, and where the real A number of other new papers were also men­ voices are not heard there—as clearly, concisely locuses of power lie, and where the real sources of tioned. It seems there is going to be another pop- and frequently as possible. new forms of power lie, and how this new power paper called Strange Days, which will be like the “Clearly” and “concisely”—these words are can be applied, and how the forces of social music-section of IT only simpler and easier to chosen deliberately. The underground press has a change can be developed to the point where a understand. There is also going to be a comic standard reaction to the Black Dwarf—that it is new society is created to replace the old? series modelled on the great American R. difficult to understand (that it is obscure) and that To make revolution is to change society. You Crumb’s comics, and to be called Cyclops. There it is full of jargon. This seems an appropriate cannot change society without understanding are also several plans—as yet not clearly formu­ moment to reject emphatically this accusation, society. You cannot understand society without lated—for a political weekly. How the hell all and to turn it back on the accusers. Anybody who thinking.... these papers are going to exist together was not has ever read OZ or IT knows only too well that A solipsism is a statement that attempts to ex­ gone into very much, though it was claimed that these papers are ten times as obscure and as tor­ plain itself merely by repeating what it said in the INK and Strange Days would act as stepping tuously written as the Black Dwarf, and that they first place—it is a kind of closed circle that stones to IT and Friends. are absolutely riddled with a jargon which is the doesn’t get anywhere. The day after toe confe­ The second session of the conference dealt with more contemptible because it so frequently means rence toe people who were still in Manchester possibilities of co-operation between the papers. virtually nothing at all. If you compare phrases went out to a local park for a cricket match. When Up till now the underground papers have been con­ like “getting it together”, “hype”, “plastic”, etc we left toe match toe Greasy Bear World Beaters cerned in producing rival papers with rival sour­ etc etc with a word like “bourgeois”, what emer­ were ahead of toe Grass Eye All Stars by 45 runs ces of advertising revenue and rival distribution ges is quite simply that the former words merely to nil. This might have something to do with toe outlets. But with three years’ experience of consis­ suggest vague feelings of approval or disapproval, fact that for a lot of toe time toe Greasy Bear tently similar rises and falls in distribution and while the latter actually describes something real. World Beaters were both batting and bowling. It advertising revenue, it has begun to appear that (It’s obvious to any-one with eyes in their head was fun at toe cricket match, but it suggests toe the underground might now be marketed as a that the bourgeoisie exists—that Britain is a class more serious thought: is toe underground batting package deal. This may explain why it was almost society—just open those eyes!) and bowling against itself? Is toe underground a exclusively the business managers and adverti­ This point relates very closely to what was so completely solipsistic movement? Or is it capable sing managers who decided to come to con­ abysmally bad about this first-ever underground of engaging with toe rest of society in a real, ser­ ference, not the editors. press conference—the almost unbelievable lack of ious and revolutionary way? Looked at from this Co-operation between the papers has been hel­ thoughtfulness and seriousness that it revealed. point of view, th e first underground press ped along by the attitude of the straight commer­ This can be understood most clearly if we con­ conference was a start, but not a very prom isin g cial world. First the record companies, and now clude by listing some of the things that were not one. Black Dwarf July 7 1970 page 3 The nudes of Keele, upon whom the bour­ examples). geois of Staffordshire and Fleet Street The conjunction of these symptons plus have recently been concentrating their the apparent impotence of normal student Got Them by theTestimonials venom, are merely the expression of a sanctions (due to inability to strike etc. ) couldn’t-give-a-damn attitude in a parti­ led to: burning of a section of the Keele The present doctors pay dispute has give evidence) the BMA advocated a 40% cular context and hot weather. For the Registry, several nights of painting, glue­ exposed the splits and tensions within increase for Consultants. This was a bit Keele authorities, however, the resultant ing of strategic locks, damage to the Re­ British medicine. The profession has much even for Kindersley who suggested loss of £20, 000 from a local council was gistrar’s house and threats of other more always been divided between Consultants, that 30% plus more merit awards would the last straw. serious damage. Though uncoordinated, GPs and junior doctors, and the rift bet­ do. Imagine the fury of the BMA when the For two years, in face of continual— these acts were a political reaction to the ween these sectors expresses a more government cut their increase to a mere and increasingly radical—student hostility failure of the Left to provide a credible fundamental contradiction between 15%, and at the same time split the pro­ they have maintained a totally intransigent mass alternative to liberal impotence. Al­ doctors as a middle class self-interest fession, the other way this time, by attitude. The particular institution (hyper­ though condemnation of administrative group, and their role in serving the offering the junior doctors all of their liberal mini-Oxbridge) the particular situa­ terrorism was universal among students community. 30%. Kindersley and Co, as befits their tion (small, isolated with a four year there appeared little to be done. The theo­ In 1947 when the NHS was founded, political associations resigned en bloc, and course) plus the continual presence of a retical implications of applying various the then Minister of Health Bevan met the BMA issued a shrill cry to strike, revolutionary Left (fairly small but relati­ sanctions, and their purpose have rarely with violent opposition from the British asking the junior doctors to give up their vely articulate) has meant that continual been thrashed out. In our case, we saw our­ Medical Association (BMA). He dealt ‘blood money. ’ attrition has borne results. Over the last selves as acting so as to prevent the future with this using classic divide-and-rule The last five years has seen the junior two years a growing number of students use of reprisals by the universities, by tactics by buying off the key leadership: doctors turn against the BMA as they have here have passed from the system-as-un- attempting to establish the credibility of the Harley Street Consultants. They were formed their own organisations the Junior fair-by-its-own-standards criticism (i. e. our sanctions. Nevertheless, the situation given part-time contracts so they could Hospital Doctors Association and now the liberal) to an openly revolutionary one. at the end of term is one in which we have continue their private practice; they were Junior Doctors Section of the Medical There is now a large minority (say 300 out learnt much, confirmed the existence of a allowed to continue running their teaching Practitioners Union. They are now the of 1700) for whom any number of seats on revolutionary left with a large minority hospitals independently; and they were best organised, most militant section Senate or liberal rules can make no following, and prepared the base for less handed over a large lump sum of money to within the profession. It is not hard to see difference. spectacular but equally subversive acti­ be distributed at their own discretion as the reason. Junior Doctors are so over­ Altogether seven students have been vities next term. ‘merit awards.’ Typically, Labour fell over worked that when the BMA recently suspended this term. Three were victi­ Someone wrote: “It is easier to shock backwards to accomodate' its enemies, and negotiated overtime pay for them they saw mised following a sit-in and another four the bourgeoisie, alas, than to overthrow ignored and alienated its potential support to it that it started each week after 102 on trumped up noise charges(! ) Eighty it’’. Comrades at Keele are finding that in among GPs and junior doctors, 60% of hours of duty. In the past the patronage students missed a minor First Year exam fighting for a university where we can edu­ whom had voted for the NHS against the that consultants exercised over the Juniors (out of 400). Droves of students have cate ourselves and aid the struggle (parti­ leadership’s line in the BMA’s been leaving Keel’s much vaunted First through their testimonials ensured that the cularly of the working class) outside this is referendum. Juniors accepted their allotted role, and, Year realising it is a fraud. Several attem­ certainly true. Freaking the bourgeois uni­ During the 1950’s discontent grew like apprentices, put up with gross pted suicides culminated in a death last versity may be useful (it has been); revolu­ among the rest of the profession who had exploitation. Now the growth in numbers week. Academic victimisation for political tionary socialists must act beyond this. been left out in the cold and the GPs were reasons is small but increasingly signi­ of Juniors, combined with the small num­ the first to organise themselves. Through bers of Consultants, has broken their ficant (we have several irrefutable FROM A KEELE MILITANT their pressure came the Royal Commision grip. So it is no surprise that the BMA, on Remuneration which proposed, large who have never themselves shown the increases in GP’s salaries, and the slightest interest in improving the establishment of a ‘review body.’ conditions of junior doctors, should have The Conservatives set one up, a to turn to them in their hour of need supposedly independent, body of seven dis­ (need for another £750 on top of the £750 tinguished men to decide on doctor’s they were offered). salaries. The chairman Lord Kindersley is The result has been a hearty snub for a director of Rolls Royce, Layards Bank, the BMA with junior doctors throughout the Royal Exchange Assurance Company, the country voting against them. and the Bank of England, well suited to As always in our society the language of take a balanced view of the financial cash conceals the real issues. Underlying needs of doctors; three others out of the this dispute is the problem of overworked seven have been prospective Tory junior doctors providing an inadequate ser­ candidates. Kindersley and his crew have vice to patients in under-equipped looked kindly on the profession, providing hospitals without proper community generously for Consultants and GPs over support, alongside a growing and largely the years and now, at last, as they have clandestine private sector. If the Tories emerged from their attitude of feudal serf­ give their blessing to this process, they can dom and formed their own organisations, only accelerate the increasing the Junior Hospital Doctors. radicalisation of young doctors—and the The recent furore follows the latest Consultants will get their rise. Review Body report. In their evidence to it (and they are the only body allowed to By a Junior Doctor. TENANTS LEADER DIES AFTER ATTACK ON FRIEND Councillor Doug Watts, one time Vice- Chairman of the United Tenants Action Committee, died recently of a heart-attack which was almost certainly caused by the shock of seeing his friend Alderman Bill O’Dell beaten up by a fellow-Alderman from Tower Hamlets Council. The incident occurred on April 4th at the Burdett estate in the East End. Bill O’Dell a long-time fighter for the tenants, had resigned from the Labour Party pre­ viously, and was standing as a “Rent Rebel” Candidate in the GLC elections. He was being supported in his campaign by Doug Watts, an old friend and like him an old-age pensioner. The two were sitting in a car addressing a meeting through a microphone attached to a loudspeaker equipment on the car. Suddenly Alerman Rackley, who lives on the Estate, pushed through the crowd with two companions. Bill O’Dell told the Black Dwarf what followed: “Rackley pulled me out of the car by my tie. Then he roughed me up. He wreck­ ed my equipment, and I ended up with a black eye. ” Doug Watts, who had only a week before discharged himself from hospital THESE are pictures after a heart-attack, was no stranger to the o f th e N u d e S tu d e n ts Affair that you read hostility of reactionaries—even re­ about in yeeterday’s newspapers. actionaries like Rackley who were in his They were taken own party. But the sight of his friend on the campus of K e e le University, being treated in this way was evidently too Staffs, after 20 stu­ much for him. Two hours after the in­ dents stripped off to s u n b a th e . cident he suffered another heart-attack, Shocked onlook­ and was taken immediately to hospital. A ers called the police, FESTIVAL OF THE and the student* put week later he died. their clothes on. DEPRESSED Blonde sunbather Bill O’Dell told the Black Dwarf that Rosie M archam , one aspect in particular had made him aged 23, said: “ when it's hot we angry about the tragedy. After the funeral, In a protest against the General occasionally do go n u d e . " Mrs Watts put a notice in the paper about Election 200 supporters of A university her husband’s death. She received many official said no de­ CRAP (Campaign for Revolu­ cision had yet been messages of sympathy and condolence, made on whether including messages from most of the tion against Parliament) shuffled a c tio n would b e taken against the Tower Hamlets Councillors. Noticeably ab­ round the City, chanting and s tu d e n ts . sent from the list, however, was Alderman playing music. The festival Rackley. attracted little support. Black Dwarf July 7 1970 page 4 EDITORIAL W ilson fails in bid The result of the General Election 1970 presents the left with a golden sour. But what alternative? What but difficult opportunity—to break ‘ideas’ could he have put forward once and for all the hold of the Labour without losing credibility? What alter­ Party over the working class. native did the Cabinet have, given Labour fought the election on the that they have no policies, but to premiss that class politics was no lon­ follow Wilson? Labour’s Election ger significant, and the whole Party Campaign was not an accident, in its accepted this without criticism. It very nothingness it fullfllled the attempted to turn itself into a historical destiny of Social Demo­ ‘national’ Party by evacuating the cracy. In this sense Wilson’s cam­ last traces of socialism from its paign was the most honest and sin­ policies, and went to the country like cere political manouver he has ever a prostitute, with nothing more to performed. offer than itself. Nonetheless, whole sections of the The weakness and feebleness of British left still voted for Wilson and the Conservative opposition seemed his clique. Some of them voted under to give Labour a victory it had done the impression that the Con­ nothing to deserve. But Labour out­ servatives would introduce a strin­ did itself to prove that it could be gent, semi-fascist regime of racialist even more wretched than Heath and terror and repression against the the Conservatives. working class. But as some of the Labour did not lose because it was contributors to our debate on voting inexperienced, because it was unpro­ Labour in the pre-election Black fessional, because it was badly led, Dwarf pointed out, this will not be or because the Conservatives had a the case. better programme or more money- The victory of the Conservatives is all excuses that have been used in a move to the right, but it is a move the past. Wilson’s very skill at the already presaged in the development Parliamentary game deprives of the Labour Party. From the very Labour of these time worn excuses begining of the Labour Government and dramatically underlines the when it refused to devalue in 1964, fundamental political and ideological from the very model of Wilson’s weakness of Labourism. personal aspirations (Macmillian), it Harold Wilson, self-seeking and was crystal clear that the nation self- regarding, has been publicly Labour wanted to lead was a and deservedly humiliated. Obsessed Conservative one. with trivia, his incessent calculations But Wilson failed in his bid for Tory made his opportunism appear to be a leadership. Now there is a true blue strategy. His onanistic manipulation administration in office. It will of the media seduced the press and impose cuts in the social and television, and of course, himself. educational services, it will profit Dizzy with success he was successfu l ministration that laid the basis of the defeat, the low turn out, the ‘house­ speculators and businessmen, it will at nothing, and his failure was in­ ‘welfare’ state—is that it had three wives’ voting for Heath, racialists help South Africa, even if, with trinsic to his entire politics. It is a reforming years and then lost its voting for ‘Powell’ are not reasons aplomb, it builds more houses than continuation of Wilsonism to blame nerve. It is now clear that the but consequences. They are the Labour, and directly assists the very the defeat on tactical misjudgments Labour Party has never recovered ballot, and so they remain to be poor) now that Labour has ceased to or his personal quirks. this nerve, and that it never will. explained. be socialist the Conservatives can If Wilson has failed how much Through the long years of the fifties, One fundamental reason stands out— safely increase welfare when they more so have the discomforted of Conservative prosperity, of the the bankruptcy of Labour. Its want to). The Conservatives will put labour leaders who had so little internicine splits and betrayals, administration was one of the utmost through Trade Union legislation, belief in their own intelligence and Labour’s leaders became convinced nullity. What did it do on its own ini they may even engineer a boom, but powers that they surrendered their that they were a permanent oppo­ inititive? A record of non-events. The they will not in any crucial political Party to his narrow calculations? sition. Like drowning men they grasp­ National Plan (that was scraped), respect alter the relationship of the Gone from the Foreign Office is the ed in desperation at Wilson’s rhetoric Incomes Policy (that was working class to the State, any more depleted absence Stewart, who of technology, and scraped in to temporary), Sanctions on Rhodesia than Labour would have. trailed after American imperialism victory over. Lord Home. Then, as (they’ve not been enforced) Trade The new Conservative government and ensured that in a time of crisis they reformed the structure of Union legislation (that was with­ must be seen in this light, without and international turmoil Britain had British industry, and reversed the drawn), the nationalisation of Steel crocodile tears for the epigones of nothing to say. Gone, the bland balance of payments deficit, the (that was left over from 1951), the Attlee. The right-wing policies of Jenkins. About to lead us from one opinion polls tolled out the message: abolition of prescription charges Heath and his cabinet are not an economic crisis into another, he can they were heading once again for (that was renaged on). What is left? excuse for wailing lamentations, return to his studies of bygone Parlia­ opposition. With their task done, they SET, IRC, and the invasion of even though Heath (like Nixon a mentarians. Gone, the thugish have indeed found themselves back Anguilla. All the rest (devaluation, loser who won) has in Enoch Powell Callaghan, with his leering smile, an on the familiar benches, a chastened Ireland, long term withdrawals from his Spiro Agnew. Powell, who archytypal excrescence of British and defeated party.: East of Suez) were forced on them. attacks the media while staring into Labourism. Gone the bloated visage The traditional Labour supporter The marginal but important reforms the TV cameras, is the man who of Healey, with his unbroken record will try to put the defeat down to that have liberalised social life— blasts the students, the workers, the of imperialist military policies in the tactical errors. The election should abolition of hanging, homosexual law foreigners and the liberals. Like so called Ministry of Defense. Gone have been a week sooner; it should reform, legalisation of Abortion etc— Nixon, Heath keeps a distance on his the opportunist Barbra Castle, who have been in the Autumn or in the have gone through as free votes. Agnew, and picks up the benifits. took on the most viscious betrayal of spring of next year; the Labour This fundamental political failure For Blacks, as in the States, the the workers by the labour govern­ machine didn’t have time to get into of the Labour administration under­ existence of a figure like Powell in ment. action and, most damning of all self- lay the election campaign. Wilson the ruling Party gives ground for Nerve criticisms, the manifesto should have put himself forward on a person to fear. It also gives the prejudiced and The often repeated story of the 1945 had a few ‘ideas. ’ person confrontation with Heath. He the openly racialist, the Paki-bashers Labour Government—the Attlee ad­ The electoral structure of the seemed to win but victory turned and the National Front, more C.P. The morning after. stead, public activity hinges on a few solution from the Erith factory What happened to the Com- offer something that differs from individuals. Even so, the Party still branch at the last C.P. Congress to munist Party in the election? We Wilsonism even if only quanti­ lost votes in those areas where it is discuss the ‘British Road’, called for are pleased to carry this short re- tatively. A qualitative difference (comparatively) strong and active. the rejection of the ‘British Road’ as port on the Party's misfortunes such as would be shown by raising The lack of success cannot, there­ predetermining a parliamentary tran­ by one of its revolutionary mili­ the demand for socialism, is utterly fore, be put down to just a lack of sition to socialism and so betraying tants. For obvious reasons he has beyond the Labour Left, and was consistent work. Nor can it be put the interests of the working class. It to remain anonomous. mentioned only in passing by the CP down to, as some inside the Party was defeated by 350 votes to 9. The Communist Party has been hit in its election material and right at will claim, a misapplication of tac­ Since that time (1967) there have by galloping inflation. It appealed for the end of the two election broad­ tics. The tactics themselves were been new currents in the CP taking £40, 000 for its General Election Fund, casts; whose feeble content was only determined by the overall strategy of up the question of a revolutionary and rather fewer than this number of matched by their feeble pre­ the Party’s guiding document, the strategy. The tasks before them, votes were cast for its 58 candidates; sentation. ‘British Road to Socialism’; in the among others, are to challenge toe an average of about £1 per vote—a Bert Ramelson, in his encounter light of the Party programme they ‘British Road’s’ concept of an elec­ seller’s market. with Tony Cliff some months ago, were quite correct. toral alliance embracing the Labour The C.P. ’s vote in the election drop­ seemed, in his summing up, to The sharp decline in the Party’s Party, (th e kiss-of-death method of ped 40% (just as it did in the recent equate electoral with political work; vote must be seen for what it is, a de­ artificial expiration), and th e present local elections). The drop provides when he defended the Party’s policy feat. A defeat that calls into question concept of ‘Left unity’ (leading in an interesting trend for the Party’s of contesting elections on a wide the entire strategy of ‘The British practice to tailism). headquarters in King Street. Steady scale. In many areas the election Road. ’ Revolutionaries in the Com­ A new concept of united front work declines in Party membership and (and election work in general) was munist Party must not flinch from is needed, not geared to a debilita­ readership of the ‘Morning Star’ (in and is still seen by the majority of this. The question has been raised be­ ting electoralism, and based on a small—almost microscopic—print ‘In­ CP members as a substitute for con­ fore, but since no theoretical ana­ more rigorous analysis of toe Labour corporating the “Daily Worker” ’) sistent political work among the lysis of an anti-revisionist nature has Party. At present toe CP supports provide other similarly in­ people. A vicious circle is set up been made of Britain from within the toe Labour Party, but has forgotten teresting figures. when the Party vote falls; enthu­ CP for more than a generation, no toe second part of Lenin’s advice— The CP went into the election do­ siasm and morale within the Party alternative strategy has been put for­ ‘as a rope supports one who is han­ ing the job that the social-democratic falls and there is less inclination on ward. So anti-revisionist challenges ged’. In toe interest of toe working Left of the Labour Party is too in­ the part of many members to do the have been defeated with ease. For class, never did toe Labour Party competent to do for itself; that is to hard political work required. In­ example, a somewhat negative re­ more deserve hanging. Black Dwarf July 7 1970 page 5 for Tory leadership.

confidence. even the imposter who changed his So as usual, without a moments name to Edward Heath. Nor was this thought, the British left responds by a straightforward move to the right. “taking up the fight. ” This time In Mid-Ulster the one left extremist against the “Tories. ” By so doing it Bernadette Devlin trounced her helps to reproduce the parliamentary opponents. But the CP’s vote dichotomy—and so benefits Labour. slumped. This “fight” is a political trap. The The contrast between the CP’s main enemy is the British State. The performance and Bernadette’s is a Party which blocks the working class historic one. For Bernadette is the from seeing this, which blocks the first of a new generation that has working class from starting to take experienced mass struggles, and has political power into its own hands, is confidence in the militancy of the the Labour Party. working class; no letters protesting The question of the lefts strategic against her jail sentence need be response to the change in govern­ written to The Times! Against this ment is of the upmost Importance, the Communists stand|condemned. And and we will be pleased to publish condemned with them is the entire discussion on it. For an odious wave strategy of trailing the Labour Party of sentimental attachment to the and hurling abuse at the Labour Party has swept the left. Conservatives. Already those on the Black Dwarf Veneer collective who refuse to vote Labour Only two men give the CP’s policies have been challenged—did they a veneer of plausibility: Scanlon and really mean it? Don’t they really pre­ Jones. fer Labour? If there is one outstand­ Now the ‘left’ union leaders are ing feature of the British left it is negotiating with the Conservatives that it is a glutton for punishment. and we can expect rotton com­ Within hours of the defeat of the promises and fake rhetoric over the wretched and reactionary Labour anti-Union legislation. We need not administration the left was singing fear denouncing them as lackeys of its praises. Only relatively of course, the Labour Party when they reach but that makes no difference. The their agreements. For there is no men who renaged on every socialist need to fear isolation from the principle cannot be fondly appre­ Labour Movement by attacking its ciated by genuine revolutionaries. political structures root and branch. And if we all know that they are not On the contrary such an assault is Socialists, if that goes without say­ vitally necessary. Class conscious ing, then why mourn their passing workers have already shown an any more than that of the Liberal extreme reluctance to support the Party (also ‘marginally better’)? Labour Party, and in the absense of Sentimental attachment to a Party of a critique from the left, one that is betrayal is the wide open road to yet Twenty years later Wilson, who was innate suspicions of the working firm and clear and militant, one that another epoch of defeat and one of the ‘left’ cabinet ministers class and will greatly assist does not fear the Conservatives, nor isolation. who resigned from Attlee’s govern­ Socialists in demonstrating the class flinches from the destruction of Just as it is the Labour Party ment, is leading the Party, with the nature of international capitalism. Labourism, many of these workers which must be attacked and ‘mantle’ of Bevan around his Fear will have no other way of expressing smashed, so within the Labour move­ shoulders. Twenty years later it is "The only serious threat to the left their fundamental dissatisfaction ment this debate must be taken up the Communist bloc which is divided, then, in the immediate future, is its than by moving to the right. by militants so as to strike down the while genuine Marxist currents are own weakness and lack of The new conjuncture Labour ‘left. ’ For the immediate making revolution across the world. confidence. This was vividly re­ The Election has shown that at the situation is an extremely favourable Most important of all Vietnam has vealed by the fear of Labour national level the Labour Party is one quite unlike 1951 after the defeat smashed the ideological barriers of returning—as has happened—into totally and utterly bankrupt, that at of the Attlee administration. the Cold War. ‘opposition. ’ For when Labour is in the level of local organisations it is The Cold War Thus the potential political relation­ power the left can attack the leader­ feeble and emasculated, that its in­ Then the Labour Party was openly ship between the left and the Labour ship without attacking the Party. ternal ideological life is now zero, split and contained a vivid rhetorical Party is reversed. There is no This reluctance to attack the that the allegiance of the working ‘left’ leader in Anauran Bevan. Mean­ credible political left inside the Labour Party has deep historical class to it as a class had been dis­ while, Stalin ruled in Moscow and Labour Party. There is no monolithic roots. For the last thirty years the located. This tremendous movement British troops fought in Korea. The Stalinist organisation blocking great, majority of working class is occuring at the same time as an Korean war consolidated the Cold development on the left outside the militants have been active within the unprecedented avalanche of wage War, the essential ideological struc­ Labour Party. And this favourable Labour Movement whilst the mass of demands, many stemming from sec­ ture which kept the socialist left both conjuncture on the left is combined the working class have been tors that have been dozey and pas­ anti-communist and contained within with a crisis on the right, for unlike politically passive. Trapped in a sive for decades. The highest peak in the Labour Party. Within this con­ 1951, instead of a boom, the Con­ defensive dialogue with Labour, industrial militancy since the text the combination of Bevan and servatives are faced with an deprived of the experience of mass General Strike in 1926 has coincided Stalin stifled the development of immediate prospect of an American- action, every traditional instinct with the decline of the working class’s revolutionary Marxism, whilst the led world recession, with conditions furrowed in the earnest brow of traditional allegence to Labour. This Korean boom which the of near Civil war in Ireland, with a British Socialism still points to double movement is not a co­ Conservatives inherited, demoralised potential war of intervention in the another dance of death with Labour. incidence. The Labour Party has the massive Labour following Gulf and with a mass of liberals itch­ Nothing typifies this extraordinary imprisoned the workers of this already disheartened by years of a- ing to mobilise over Africa. Only trance better than the Com m unist country and now, as they begin to political bureaucratic austerity. entry into the Common Market offers Party of Great Britain. There was sever their allegence to that Party, Twenty years later there is still an the Conservatives positive potential one stark statistic in the election: above all at the level of political imperialist war in South East Asia, propoganda and possibly economic every extremist did well. Enoch organisation, their own potential for but of a quite different character. respite. Yet even that will raise the Powell, Mad Mitch, Ian Paisley, militant self-organisation is released. S. N.P. W ell,it was worth a try. At a public meeting in a church hall cular time, with no class or economic and some form of profit-sharing pros­ Liberals. Plaid Cymru or S.N. P. during the last election, a tweedy S. basis whatsoever, against the drift of perity were to be enjoyed by all. All Secondly, the debating-society, issue­ N. P. lady got up and announced to European capitalism, against the this in spite of the fact that the less context between the two major an amazed audience of fishers and immediate economic interests of the S.N. P. tends to be lead into battle by parties has, very properly, given crofters that she had seen wild ani­ Scottish working-class, was doomed medium-sized capitalist, and its them the impression that something mals being captured by firing to remain idealist and impotent. chairman, Wolfe, is one of the most important, something profound, anaesthetic bullets into them—on the They did however, attract two unloved employers in Scotland. something to do with the quality of television programme “Daktari”: totally different kinds of supporters. Why was their incredible energy, living, was not being discussed? would it not be possible, she asked, One lot, the middle-class eccentric their political involvement, their They were not sure—but patriotism for our policemen to be provided ladies and their canny menfolk with enthusiasm, and their imagination, was there and was different—so they with these anaesthetic bullets to fire an eye to becoming bigger fish by channeled into this futile, un­ went for it. at criminals? When the laughter had making the pond smaller, can be dis­ principled party of idea-mongers? Now the S.N. P. have, inevitably, died down and the speaker (NOT missed as vagrant Liberals, out of For two reasons: firstly: most of been ignominiously defeated in S.N. P. ) had politely rejected her, the touch and/or opportunist. But the se­ them refuse to support the Labour Scotland, these young people are in lady got up to say, indignantly, well, cond kind of support is much more Party because they have been edu­ no-mans-land. Which way will they anyway, it was an idea. important and symptomatic. The cated to dissociate themselves from jump? By their class characteristics The Scottish National Party itself S. N. P. managed to invoke the the working-class, —they belong to and interest, they could easily move is, in essence, a collection of ‘well vigorous, almost frenzied support of that rising new sub-class of mini­ to the far right. On the other hand, anyway’ ideas. There are the obvious thousands of bright, intelligent, meritocrats to whom a cloth cap is a they know something is wrong. They jokes—such as the gans of “cri­ romantic idealists between the ages of joke, and socialism either something are not stupid. Can their intelligence minals, drunks drivers and laya­ 14 and 21; they, by and large, saw that happens in Russia or an excuse and their “idealism” ever be put to a bouts” who were to be employed to themselves involved in a kind of for raising the cost of living. They better use than chasing bright ideas drive more roads through the National Liberation Front driving expect certain safeguards from the tossed up in front of them by a lot of Grampians, and the idea of a out English and American capitalism state, and at the same time demand opportunist tartan Tories? Or have nationally “pure" Scottish from their native glens, following in the freedom to exploit the rest of the anaesthetic bullets of a bourgeois capitalism (you must be Scottish to the footsteps of Robert Owen and society as ruthlessly and reward- education, the capitalist invest in Scotland, take away your Keir Hardie (who actually advocated ingly as possible. They reject Labour “information” media, and the foreign gold). But apart from these separatism at one time), and creat­ and Conservative ideologies alike be­ acquisitive instincts of a competitive and many similar, the whole notion ing a land where social justice, cause they need to assert themselves society already done their work? of invoking kilt-power at this parti­ poetry, folk-song, the countryside, as different: so they become Young James McCann Black Dwarf July 7 1970 page 6 share market value. A particular feature of the Markets was the leap in shares of Hotel and service industries (from Trust Houses City to Rank Organisation) spectacular ‘And there came advances in oils, and huge leaps in the property sector, which reactions were probably not unrelated to the Bubbly. Conservative’s attitude to Selective unto Westminster...' Employment Tax, their policy as regards Rhodesia, and the wide­ spread belief that Capital Gains Tax, the bug-bear of property developers, will be subject to revision. One thing is certain: the City had not been expecting a Tory win. In the On the morning of June 19th.—the days before the election, the Index day after grinning Ted and his motley had dwindled downwards, further de- crew had made their election coup—I pressed by the withdrawal of really was outside the Stock Exchange at big money to the sidelines, until the (A Paisley Election Meeting, Ballycastle, for the coming meeting. The march wound 9. 00 a.m. The surrounding streets, result was known. The Evening which normally do not hot up until North Antrim. ) its way round the residential streets, down Standard Poll, on election day, “Let us begin this election service with a the shopping centre, and, the bands fell well passed 10 a. m. were choc-a-bloc brought things flickering to life, but with hysterical pin-stripe suits, beserk song. ‘Oh God, our help in ages past... ’ ”, silent as they marched past the war the bears were out during the week thus Paisley, booming, started his election memorial, back to the green for the bowler hats and, despite the early before the election, selling for all they speech. His arrival had been preceded by morning sun, jubilant brolleys every­ speech of the evening. were worth Stock which they had not that of two drummers with huge Lambeg The bands were made up of youngsters, where being flourished at arms length. got, hoping that they could buy it drums, one of them with a gaudy portrait The whole place was ten times more and many of them had a slightly weird back after a Labour victory at a very of the Doctor himself, and the motto “Our Bosch-like appearance, particularly as the beserk than when there is a change in much reduced price. Defender, ” inscribed on the front. The the bank-rate, and that’s saying procession wore on and they got tired and something. They were probably the only drummers began a slow, thundering beat slightly high on their sounds. The Lambeg people in the City who got their which resounded through the whole town drummers were older and were a confused Unfortunately, the visitors gallery and drew the population to the green on in the temporary Stock Exchange fingers badly burned by the result. team taking it in turns to beat the drum, Of course, this feverish trading was the sea-front where the meeting was to be or wipe the drummers brow. Paisley him­ building was brimming over with held. After a while a convoy of about 50 eager investors so it was impossible to a case of over-reaction, and the very self wore an air of deceptive, paternal actually see what went on inside when next day the F. T. Index slipped back supporters arrived, led by a battered van mildness, often looking like a man with an trading began at ten o’clock, but just again—it will probably level out at with an accordion band, driven by artificially solemn mask. As many of the hanging around outside, listening to around 340 for the time being— Paisley’s pale and docile locals were sitting in their first-floor because even the City cannot expect a batman, his brother-in-law, windows overlooking the streets, he would the conversations of the huddled the Rev. Begs. groups of ecstatic jobbers and ebullient Tory Government to wave the magic occasionally give them a stilted wave or a brokers, it was not difficult to get the wand, and put everything right in DRUMS AND FLAGS paralytic smile, which opened up the general impression. Wall Street of whose markets the lower half of his mouth in a bullock-like English Stock Exchange is usually Finally, after this careful buildup, Paisley yawn. When he was about to start his little more than a mirror. himself arrived in a saloon car, gaping meeting, and the crowd got in the way of frog-like out of the front window, and his loud-speaker van he moved them aside Why does the City jump for joy at proceeded to organise his followers for a with a great show of pseudo-pastoral the thought of Tory government? The march round the town. Paisley stands out gentleness. His show of reassurance and broad answer is simple. It knows that in a crowd partly because he is a bit taller gentleness is one side of his appeal to a in “Heath’s team, ” it has a body of than the average, but also because his Protestant working class who feel they men and women whose aims and ambi­ clothes and hair have that distinctive level have been sold out by the Unionist tions are not incompatible with its of minimal neatness that accompanies a leaders. own. If there is any real difference bet­ certain degree of celebrity. The procession ween the Labour and Conservative was led by three Lambeg drummers, and A N HONEST DEALER IN Government, it is in their approach to three flags— the Ulster flag with the Red PROTESTANT UNITY financial Capital, and Wilson was Hand emblem, a plain Union Jack, and notoriously relectant to admit his debt another one with “No Surrender” written He began his speech, after the song and to 'the City, not only playing down the across it. Next came Paisley himself, with the prayer, by announcing that he was a contributions of “Invisibles” to the bent shoulders, followed by his aides and truthful man, and that contrary to the export figues, but, on at least two an old woman holding a tape-recorder to official Unionist denials, there had been occasions, castigating the bankers, catch his every word. Behind this van­ an electoral deal between himself and the openly and publicly for their refusal to guard flowed about 500 people, and two Unionist Party in three constituencies co-operate with his economic policies. bands: an accordion hand, and the where a split Protestant vote would have Although 1968 and the first few “Young Conquerors: Shankhill Road let a Catholic in. He challenged weeks of 1969 saw an almost unpre­ Flute Band. ” There was no co-ordination Chichester-Clark to ask him, Paisley, to CITY DWARF between these different musical outfits, name the Unionist officials who had cedented boom in shares, the City was and the main purpose seemed to be to Down in the pubs off Throgmorton always mistrustful of the Wilson negotiated the agreement. He then went administration, but with Heath in it attract the population by a confused on to attack his Unionist opponent Henry Street at lunch-time, the members of cacophony, and to generate enthusiasm the Stock Exchange were falling over can look forward to the remedying of Clarke. Henry Clarke had spoken in to buy each other drinks. They were many of its specific grievances. shouting and yelling, laughing, cheer­ ing and singing as if Utopia had If the 1971 budget includes a suddenly descended on them from out reduction, or at least a modification of of the blue, and I suppose, for them, Corporation Tax, and adjustment of it had. Capital Gains Tax, the abolition of S. E. T., the restoration of tax relief for A quick visit to the Financial Times loan interest, and a lowering of direct, building showed that the Index was personal taxation through the im­ up a staggering 23. 5 points—a bigger position in some shape or form of jump than that caused by the Value Added Tax, the Stock Market declaration of peace in 1945, the is likely to jump for joy again, and if the international economic situation is announcement of withdrawals of more amenable, the first two years American troops from Viet lam, or the settlement of the Cuban missiles of the Tory administration are likely affair—in fact the largest jump ever to witness a rampant bull market. recorded in a single day in the thirty There are other factors too: the five years of the the existence of the Tories are pledged, in no uncertain F. T. Index. fashion, to the abolition of the Land Commission, and it is probable, or at The big pension funds, and unit least possible, that moves will be trusts, who have, much to the chagrin made Ian Smithwards—both moves of the Market, been lying low in will be welcomed by the City. Share recent months, were out in force buy­ tipsters are already pointing to ing with a vengeance. Up shot the Rhodesian Bonds as the one thing cer­ Government Stocks, too, with £1 tain to climb under the present added to War Loan, which rose to Government. £37. 10s. There are other more menacing factors, such as the alliance which has The afternoon saw heavy profit always existed between Powell’s purist taking, and quick, sharp selling of Capitalist economics and the many of the shares that had rocketed racketeers of the City. Earlier this in the morning, but, nevertheless, the year, when a group of stock-brokers Index ended some 17.1 points up at staged a demonstration on the floor of 351. 7, and more than £1000m. had the House in favour of the Rhodesian been added to the value of shares Government, one saw the point at quoted on the market in a single day. which the two dominating aspects of Further confidence came from a 26 Powellite ranting come together. point leap in the pound on the foreign Everyone in the City was cele­ exchange markets and it ended at brating after the election; in one 2.4002 U. S. dollars. Champagne drenched directors office, I was told “not to worry” how much I ICI, for example shot up 4s. 4 1/2 to drank, because “The Tories will soon 49s. 6d. in the morning, and even be allowing tax free entertainment though it fell back to 47s. 9d. during expenses for businessmen again, afternoon trading, nearly £50 million because they know what they are had been added to the company’s about. ” PERCY INGRAMS Black Dwarf July 7 1970 page 7

favour of the disbandment of the B this populist demagogy corresponds to a Specials. He remained silent during the political truth. The Unionist Party rests on pre-Christmas Ulster debate in an alliance of the Protestant ruling class Westminster—“He must have had trouble and the Protestant proletariat and far­ with his false teeth”—and in the post- mers. That alliance no longer protects the Christmas Ulster debate—“He probably workers and farmers and Paisley’s appeal still had indigestion from his turkey. ” He rests precisely on this developing class and “Major Chee-Chee, ” were traitors to split within Unionism. This is the funda­ Unionism. “Mr. Henry Clarke does not mental reason why the official Unionists stand for justice. He stands for Landlord- are unable to fight back, and why they sim. He would walk on the Protestant came to deal with him. His policies are working class. ” Clarke had even gone so theirs, but his are more blatant and reject ... while Bogside far as to “defile the flag” by printing the formal co-operation with Westminster election posters with a cut-out of his “big- and Dublin required for the political and head” imposed over a Union Jack. economic survival of their class position. Paisley then went on into a more Paisleyism, manipulating the memories general tirade calling for the return of the of former crises (“remember 1960”) is a fought the State B Specials, law and order and end to the defensive reaction to the decay of this toleration of law-breakers like Bernadette sectarian protestant bloc. As such he has Devlin. He stood, of course, for equal clearly got limits. Such categories as he voked into an attack on the British troops, and treatment of Catholics but this had to be a uses are enough to express a solidarity, Special Report bigoted republican-led sectarian fighting, better “justice based on righteousness. ” but not to resolve the problem. You can’t armed and more deadly than any time since the The only specific political proposals he be “loyalist” to a Westminster that war, breaks to the open in Belfast. For Bernad­ ette, this third escalation is a defeat. Much of made were for helping the motorist by betrays you, and “our province” cannot Bernadette Devlin is not in Armagh jail for cutting taxes on petrol, government aid to survive on its own. His uncertain attempts the responsibility lies on‘Catholic’ shoulders, as breaking the law or for resisting the law, she the Irish working class again divides against itself. small farmers and a rise in old-age pen­ to inject a bit of economics into his has been jailed for fighting the law. Even sions. He seemed curiously unsure of rhetoric shows that he is aware of this It will ensure a period of reaction that will make ‘worse’, for inflicting a partial defeat on it, when her own jail sentence seem mild. these less uniquely Protestant demands, as limit but unable to surmount it. - she helped the Bogsiders beat back the Royal For now the imperialist government in West­ if he could not feel their relevance but British observers have handled Paisley Ulster Constabulary last August. minster, and on this there is no difference bet­ knew they were felt to have some in the (and Bernadette Devlin) in terms of the Bernadette has played a central role in the ween the two parties, has decided to use force wide world beyond his loyalist horizons. racialist anti-Irish stereotypes that date three stages of the development of the ‘Ulster to break the extremists and enforce British from the pre-1921 period but were crisis’. Fifteen months ago in April 1969 when domination. ’‘MY FRIEND, YOU ARE A FOOL" revived again in 1968. They are either she was elected to Stormont, she became the Not that reforms will be forgotten. In a stri­ terrified of him or else scorn him as a political expression of the Civil Rights movement king editorial called ‘The Fever of Ulster’ The His speech concluded, Paisley offered to buffoon and an upstart. When the Antrim A Connolly socialist, a Catholic Unity candid­ Times has outlined British policy and the strat­ results were delayed by a hitch in count­ ate, a student at Queens, a girl - this extraord­ egy behind it (June 30 1970). Reforms, it says, answer questions. The first one received inary combination produced the youngest ing, the BBC radio commentator are necessary, not because they are needed, but the crushing reply: “My friend, you are a member of Westminster’s Parliament. This because: ‘The faction of the IRA that is formen- fool. ” The next, on the Common Market, Hardiman Scott went on about how “This originality reflected the new development of the ting violence now has its own gunmen and the led Paisley to say that he was against the is all very Irish”... In fact Paisley cannot Catholics in the North. The attachment for teenage mobs to play with. The much broader Common Market because” it would be the function in Westminster like he does in Bernadette, that is so deeply felt, is based on section of the community that joined in or sup­ end of Ulster’s Constitution. ” After a few Ulster. His rhetoric and his appeal lies in hope, that she represents a new and therefore ported civil rights agitation are hot yet its pawns. more desultory and easily deflected asserting his authority over an audience bearable future. It is of crucial importance that they do not be­ queries Paisley called for an end, and who respond to his cultural and The day after her election to Parliament was come its pawns, that they are not given cause to “Three cheers for the bands, the Lambeg ideological outlook because they share it. announced, rioting broke out in the Bogside. It abandon their strong interest in the preservation began from trivial incidents, and swiftly escala­ drummers and the police. ” God Save the Even in Stormont his first speech was of the peace in favour of the view that what ted to barricades and police brutalities; and it they regard as their rights can only be won by Queen was then sung, and as all attention unsure and dull. The timid quakings of was then that the RUC invaded Sam Devenney’s was focussed on the chanting Paisley, his bourgeois commentators here are con­ armed rebellion.’ house, beat his children and murdered Deven­ On the other hand if ‘...for weakness of will or heavies beat a boy in the crowd who had sequently unfounded. Paisley will not ney himself, (see the article by Bernadette in for any other reason, the United Kingdom Gov­ asked a hostile question earlier on. unduly disturb the trivial and inebriated Black Dwarf No. 33) Apart from the interviews ernment might be tempted to pull out... Armed Paisley’s rhetoric, and the way he ranks of the House of Commons. Bernadette Devlin’s first task as a newly elected subversion would cease to be a futile and crim­ organises his rallies, aim to evoke a MP was to go and see the Devenney family. A inal throw that it is now recognised to be by the familiar and parochial past, using that fact which helped ensure that for her a seat in overwhelming majority of people in both parts curious jumble of religious and military Parliament was linked to a determination to of Ireland: it would become the violent means HE STANDS ALONE fight file RUC., by force if necessary. to a realisable objective.... ’ symbols that goes to make up Orange cul­ The second moment when Bernadette takes ture. At the same time he is blatantly What conclusion does the Times draw from the centre of the decrepit stage of Northern this? As well as reforms, ‘Harsher tactics by the agressive and defiant of political polite­ In Ulster his strategy is not to supplant the Irish politics, was in August. Reinforced herself official Unionists. First, he himself can troops in the face of rioters would be justified. ness. His attacks on his opponents are by her knowledge of what had happened in Verbal reassurances now require the backing of evocatively physical—Henry Clarke’s only work alone. His allies are insigni­ April, her presence in the Bogside helped ensure action.’ As one such reassurance was that petrol false teeth, Bernadette Devlin “with or ficant men and his fellow-candidate massive press coverage and forced a degree of bombers would be shot, this is an open instiga­ without her appendix, ” and “Major Chee- Beattie was defeated in Belfast. Allies who restraint on the police, and above all helped to tion to the British Army to open fire. Chee, the back of whose ugly neck I have do appear to deny his supremacy, like the keep up the morale of the Bogsiders themselves. The ruthlessness, and seif interest of the ruling to look at three days a week in the clown Maj. Buting, are thrown out. This is When, battered and exhausted file RUC admitt­ class are contained in these quotes. Reform and one limit on his creating a party. The ed defeat the situation of the Ulster statelet was repression are both necessary and in both cases Stormont Parliament, ” On both occasions transformed he was elected (to Stormont, and then to other is that he doesn’t need to. He the reason is the same. To prevent the masses The British sent in their troops, and used the from taking their Own command of history. Re­ Westminster) he made victory speeches organises separately to move the Unionist opportunity to push through reforms, in a last Party itself. He makes pacts with them forms are necesssary because otherwise the peo­ that rejected the formalities of the usual attempt to turn the North into a modern ‘Dem­ ple in Ireland may be forced to take open action. victor’s address. In the Bannside, after say­ and they pursue Paisleyite policies in their ocracy’. The ‘B’ specials were abolished, a cent­ Whilst the ultimate will to control the North ing “this is not the place to comment on election campaigns. None of the Unionists ral housing authority established, etc. etc. But must be shown, otherwise the people will nat­ the signicance of my election, ” he in the election talked about reforms. these reforms were pushed through to ensure urally take the opportunity to throw the British launched a vigorous assault on the Paisley has altered the relative weight the preservation of the reactionary one Party out. Unionist Party, the and of the different classes within the Unionist political system that existed throughout the This double strategy of concession and ruth­ Belfast Telegraph North’s fifty year history. the “traitor O’Neill” who had held the bloc to preserve its traditional policies, lessness is not the product of unbelievable sche­ “old-fashioned traditional Unionism” as The jail sentence that Bernadette is now serv­ ming and shrewdness. It is two prongs of a well seat before him. When the recent result ing, comes from charges laid against her for the was announced, he proceeded to thank he calls it. But in so doing he has under­ honed fork, that has borne the British ruling fighting in Bogside last year. Her sudden arrest class through an imperial epoch, a weapon that not the returning officer or his mined the effete clique of landowners and on the road to Deny turns the spotlight onto businessmen who run the Unionist Party. serves one overriding imperative: keep the masses constituents, but “the God I serve. ” He her for a third time, and again at a moment down! and that serves a single collective and: then went on to belabour Henry Clarke It will take a long process of propaganda when the North is in convulsion. The result of class rule. whose 20, 000 majority had disappeared and revolutionary organisation to tame her appeal and the decision to sentence her were Bernadette has been jailed for the same reason and to say that the people of Antrim now this determined Presbytarian bullock. For delayed until after the results of the General that reforms are in progress and ruthless repress­ had a “representative of the people. ” to do so means winning the Protestant Election. In part because putting her down if ion on the way. For she represents the possibil­ working class to the socialist policies that she had been defeated would have ensured her ity of a people in arms. In contrast to the sect­ HIS CLASS RHETORIC alone can resolve the social and economic final humiliation, in part because to sentence arian fighting in Belfast, the Bogsiders rose to her during the campaign would have guaranteed confront the British. Already they have staged difficulties that Paisleyism expresses- her success. Paisley openly appeals to the “Protestant the United Kingdom’s first, if limited, proletar­ Immediately after the new government is re­ ian insurrection. Only this can liberate Ireland, working class” and to “the people, ” and FRED HALLIDAY. turned to power in Britain, the Bogside is pro­ and Britain, from rule by Whitehall Black Dwarf July 7 1970 page 8 Black Dwarf July 7 1970 page 9 by Mike Rosen.

But then the very division of life into work (which is good for you but boring), and leisure (which is pleasurable) could only grow out of a society organised along these lines. Passive man is very much in demand. He asks no questions about the division of his life and labour, and he accepts tile fragmentation. Education is for him a short term phenomenon, and its here in the for­ mative years that the great work ethic is laid Guided by the firm logic that the really worth­ down. The ethic states that unless a child is while thing about banging your head against a compelled to do certain kinds of work he will wall is that it’s great when you stop, 99.9% of us never be convinced of the need for it, and leisure carry around that hopelessly romantic crutch: becomes a breather, fixed, between work spells. somewhere there is a place where I could get Such an atmosphere is the ideal breading away from it all. ground for “I’ve got to get away from it all”, and There is no escape from the myth that you can it was Mathew Arnold, the Nineteenth Century’s escape. But like all the major crutches and Chief Inspector of Schools, who mused that it placebos that we surround ourselves with to ward would be fun to be a gypsy cruising about without off visions of personal and/or worldwide holo­ a care in the world, just glancing at the odd book causts they are worth a bit of thought before lobb­ every now and then. ing into the dustbin. For a start, just where the hell is this place that Your head and the system everybody gets away to and who or what is the ‘it all’? The British Travel Association don’t have There are two crucial points here: 1) It is obvious information on ‘it all’ but they do know that gett­ nonsense that one leaves anything behind. Instead ing away for 60% of British humans means away you bring the whole lot with you: the great howl­ from Britain, for nearly a third of them it means ing wizzing machine in your head that assessed Spain, and for a third of them, Spain means and chose that particular kind of holiday at that Majorca. So what has this consensus of the consen­ particular time. Any new set of friends and sus of the consensus place got? For a start “it’s a relationships that may be attempted during the happy holiday paradise where long peaceful days hols can only come from the basis of the way you fade lazily into warm nights with stars twinkling operated before. in cloudless skies. ” Or in brief, “bustling resorts, 2) The very financial system that you enter into tiny villages with white-washed houses, long stret­ with such glee as being the means for getting ches of golden sand, dotted with palm-umbrellas away is in itself only another parallel institution to to shade sun-worshippers, all form part of the de­ the one you work in. (Short of going to China, I lightfully gay kaleidoscope which is Majorca. ” It’s suppose) This perhaps is seen most clearly at a worth remembering that “farmers with their place like Butlins with its armies of badly paid slow, clopping donkeys wend their unhurried ways pleasure dispensers playing reveille and bingo along green-hedged lanes” and that it was pro­ over big brother speakers all day long. bably some out-of-work arts graduate who picked As it stands at the moment one of the immediate up a fiver or two to write this shit for Benson Pub­ prospects held out to workers is Butlins. Built as lic Relations Ltd. (ref. ‘Lyons 1970 Holidays, palaces of fun out of green timber, giant replicas Champagne Jets to the Sun from 29gns’) The key of fun-birds and beasts dangling from the ceiling to the thing can be found of course encapsulated in of the swimming pools, every minute of the day a a photo of sand bums and tits where you know potential competition of bubbling babies and that your sun-tan is there for the asking on the By the time we get round to fully fledged stink­ glamorous grandmothers—it looks like hell. It is in sands of Arenal’s inviting beach, (not Arsenal) ing capitalism then master and worker are in fact not far from the prospect of prototype passive open conflict over that same period of rest and man. What makes Butlins not simply bearable but The main chords Getting a bit celebration. Here is the way nineteenth century actually a giant success is that try though the farm labourer expressed it in a song abut the little chaps in their red blazers do to organise your In actual fact the job of selling holidays is a ser­ The next thing that’s great about getting away is rural labour markets or “Terms”: life into an endless stream of bubbles and fun you ious business and obviously a potentially lucrative that it should hold out the possibility of getting a ‘The Harvest time when it comes round can actually make off to the snooker room. Butlins one. About £990 millions were spent on holidays bit. But who’s going to get a bit of what? English They’ll grudge you sabbath rest seems to offer moments of companionship to (including travelling to and fro) last year. But girl with swarthy Latin? To be fair, it’s not They’ll let you to the worship people who never forget it. A second potential of quite apart from the financial issue (and the vast exactly recommended in the brochures. English But they like the working best holidays is obviously discovery. “Woburn Abbey 'conning swindling machine that it is) you can hear bloke with local maiden? This is seen as a possi­ The dinner hour it vexes them radiates the art history and tradition the elegance just in the extracts quoted most of the main bility. The holidays posters of the world are And then to us they’ll say of a bygone age”, as the Duke puts it—“see the chords of the summer hols sound. Why do long mostly bikini adverts in disguise. But of course Come on my lands you’ll get your rest Great State Bedroom (Queen Victoria slept peaceful days fade, why should it interest me that the real possibility of your stay in our air-condi­ one composed of many cross-currents. For When lying in the clay’ there) and Monkeys swinging in the trees” (did the villages are tiny but the resorts are bustling tioned hotel should be the chance of knocking off example, on April 1st the church was either un­ By the time we reach today the situation is even she do that too? ) and what have farmers and donkeys got to do with one of your fellow fun-seekers. In actual fact, able (at the highest level) or unwilling (at the further complicated. As we can see from the song, So is it all doom and grudders and the only solu­ it? The crucial contradiction that all brochure though lying about all day in the sun gets your best equals it costs more operates as the magnet lower levels) to prevent what was effectively an the right of the working classes to have a break tion to stay at home and brood on all those idiots readers have to face up to and then conceal is (1) gonads going it also makes them too hot (and blis­ to the consumer. When it applies to fridges, this is annual cultural revolution in which pre-christian from suicidal labour was not freely given. Every frolicking on the beach while you have seen, cry­ that the getting-away-from-it-all syndrome carries tered) to handle. in the short term tolerable but as it moves more cults rose to the surface and inverted the Christian minute’s break from the production line has had stal clear, through the whole grisly conspiracy? with it the rural idyll in all its gruesome glory Actually the commercial relationship—rather and more towards an assessment of experience it­ order and there were orgies on the altar and lords to be won by industrial action and yet any analy­ What are the pointers towards a life where work alongside the fact (2) that because he is a stinking than physiological—between sun and sex for the self the fouler it gets. The name ‘Package Tours’ of misrule and so on. In fact one of the great sis of the consumer state can reveal that man’s versus unwork does not exist? This after all is capitalist he has to amass his clients into profit­ white anglo-saxons is a study on its own. Obviou­ is accurate. If fucking could be bottled, the Pope myths that Christians consistently get away with leisure time is a gold mine for the exploiter. (It what the great hippy freak-out is all about. All you need is love, and all you need to do is get away able fun-loving clusters. So on your holiday you will sly the sun is Majorca’s main natural resource couldn’t stop them marketing it. is the idea that there was this integral ball of ideo­ must be, because they print all the prices in the be virtually alone and at one with Nature, enjoy­ given that it has now become a central summer logy called Christianity that rolled across the brochures about a millionth of an inch high. ) So and do it. preoccupation of the pasty-faced Caucasian. I can Back to the beginning world wiping out all indigenous r eligions, and that we’re face to face with chestnut: have the working The only snag about this is that someone has to ing the solitude of an empty landscape sharing the produce the great heaps of technological gunge pleasure of living with happy swains (elsewhere remember the sadistic delight I used to enjoy this situation lasted until for some mysterious rea­ classes yet again ‘conspired’ to bring about their when the girls at school came back from their six The two concepts that lie behind the original son (eg nationalism) things got a bit steamy round own oppression? And isn’t it in the capitalist’s inte­ that make all the great sounds needed for the exer­ referred to as labourers, peasants etc. ). And at cise. And hell—you need a fridge. But is there a one and the same time be part of an amazing gay day fry-ups on Rimini beach. At the time it see­ notion of a holy day are rest and celebration. the renaissance and Luther announced that he was rests anyway to have a bunch of beaming happy crowd of fun-seekers enjoying Whitbread’s Tan­ med to sum up the absurdity (not to say tragedy) Nowadays these rests between periods of labour a turd in the world’s straining arsole. workers back in the office and shop refreshed by resolution of the problem of 1) trying to turn un­ work into antiwork, 2) leading a sufficiently inte­ kard, non-stop light music and the twinkling lights of the holiday biz. For them it meant working are only real “rests” in our consciousnesses, The medieval idea of a holyday, contained with­ their ten days on the beach? every Saturday at hairdressers; months of bro­ which assume that labour is dull, albeit necessary, in it 1) the idea of time off (as given by master). grated life for the sake of sanity, 3) and having a ‘ of cars skidding in the donkey shit. good time? The problem lies in part in coming to It’s an old problem facing the imperialist chure swatting (though god knows what minutiae and that it is possible to fragment both our lives 2) time one, to perform the Christian duties—and Get away with you abroad. He wants to enjoy the natives and enjoy of criteria operate between the sun-soaked sands and ourselves into periods which are more or less 3) time on, on the residual indigenous rituals. terms with anti-work. This the hippy philosophy himself. As all his sensibilities belong to the of one beach and the sun-drenched sands of an­ self-expressive, more or less “the real me, ” and To suggest however that this produced any con­ There has been a struggle by workers to win holi­ never does. Anti-work for them is simply just not mother country with its assumptions of deluxe liv­ other); months of fantasy about lonely but mature so on. In primitive, non-exploitative societies, how­ fusion in the minds of the practitioners would be a days for themselves because work as specified by working and letting the juice pour in. Somewhere ing, private-property-acquiring and ‘herrenvolk men who would introduce them to pleasures they ever, the concepts of rest and celebration are lin­ misrepresentation. Rather what occurred were capitalism is for most, intolerable, whilst an ex­ along the line a marxist has to see his job as ima­ gining a system in which work is the self-fulfilling status, ’ he can’t let himself shed these and envy didn’t know existed (I think that was the phrase); ked with each other and with labour itself. Cele­ constant attempts by the catholic hierarchy to put pression of that position is obviously an implied the life of the “flower-bedecked fisher-folk. ” Quite the careful choice of every garment, bangle and brations preceded or terminated the collective down the pagan rave-ups, and to persecute back­ threat to the order. The reasons why it is intole­ permanent activity of man. This may mean that what any individual does, would have to be diver­ the contrary: the fact that it is an illusion that he body-servicing implement to cover all six days achievement—the hunt, harvest etc. In the primi­ sliding lower clergy drawn in to the churchyard rable are not simply because it is dirty, cancer- inducing, back-breaking and gene-distorting. The sified. It may mean that the notion of a holiday of is envying their lives reinforces his original out­ and so on. It seemed then and now a peak in tive situation the “rest” period was in fact taken dances. Certain kinds of songs were banned, dan­ surrendering one’s personal resources of self up with the labour of art-religion: i. e., placing the ces were forbidden and so on. When we remember jor referred to as ‘your’ job is in fact someone “getting away from it all” ebbs away into the idea look. A classic historical case is that of Cecil else’s job—the bugger who buys it. You don’t play of simply going somewhere else to work. And it Sharp the folksong collector who went to the Appa­ organisation to the bastards. A yearsworth of work that had to be done into its position in the that the priest John Ball wrote “When Adam del­ Pearl and Dean compressed into a week with all cosmos. You couldn’t get away from it all—you ved, and Eve span, Who was then the gentle­ a part in controlling or organising it. You are un­ may also mean the revival of festival and lachian Mountains in the US during the first world aware of how it is integrated with other tasks celebration. war. On the one hand he was bowled over with de­ those bad colour one minute films about Torrino’s were part of it all.... man? ” in 1381 (The Peasant’s Revolt) and again and its suburban continental cuisine. And under­ With exploitative societies you have the growth that the mystery plays ran simultaneously with needed to complete, distribute or market the Freetime is not free so long as it is time given light at finding a community whose folk culture product of your labour. The ideal subject of Capita­ by the people who make you unfree. Freetime is had survived the industrial revolution and on the lying it all was the implication that the satis­ of an awareness of two tasks: one for the master, folk festivals then we can see that the notion of a faction of a holiday depends on how much you and one for the self. Thus; the concept of the holy- holyday was already by this time quite a complex lism is a totally passive man. It’s an invitation to in­ not free so long as the people who make you un­ other fulminated widly about the conditions in the sanity. Its also an invitation to taking a holiday. free can use it for profit. hotels, railways, and lodgings of the area. spend. In this berserk society the equation that the day during the medieval period must have been of celebrations, and escapes. Black Dwarf July 7 1970 page 10 The Middle East no: 2 communique This is the latest military communique FRED HALLIDAY issued by the Popular Front for the Liberation of the Occupied Arab Gulf, as published in the Beirut Marxist- Leninist weekly, al-Horria. It should be borne in mind that communications in­ side Dhofar are extremely bad, and it can take up to a month for news to get from one end of the front to the other. On April 29, 1970, at 6 o ’clock in DHOFAR the morning the British imperialist enemy launched an attack, in a vain attempt to break the encirclement o f June 9 1970 was the fifth anniversary his forces along the Red Line at al- of the outbreak of guerrilla war in Hasl, which the People’s Army of the Dhofar, against the rule of the Sultan PFLOAG has sustained for about two of Muscat. A recent article in the months. The attack came from the Economist (June 6) confirmed that north, from Hajlit camp in the desert “the Sultan’s forces have lost control area, and it consisted o f three mobile of the whole Dhofar area and now are detachments, which were supported by holding defensive positions along the a group of British RAF planes, long- coastal strip. ” It went on to say “The range heavy artillery, infantry and Sultan’s answer has been to increase armoured cars. After it had advanced his own defense forces. He will make about five kilometres to the middle of a determined effort to crush the re­ the Hamrir pass, our heroic forces bellion before the British withdrawal struck back, and engaged with it in a from the Gulf next year. It is unlikely number of battles which lasted 35 to be successful. ” The same article hours. Then the enemy forces re­ also said that UK “involvement is treated, with the following losses: doing untold harm to British prestige 1) 100 mercenaries killed or wounded, and influence elsewhere in the Heath greeting the most reactionary ruler in the world. including four British officers. peninsula. ” 2) 8 Bedford military vehicles There have been other reports destroyed. recently that the Sultan, on the advice suppress oposition in the Gulf which Secretary, recently announced that US 3) One battery o f field artillery of his British Defense Secretary they are to leave in 1971. But the ships would soon be moved from destroyed. Colonel Hugh Oldman, plans to revolution is firmly established, and Indo-China to the Gulf area, and the 4) One Hawker Hunter plane hit. double the number of troops, and a the military forces are closing in on Conservatives are likely to step up aid Our forces returned safely to base, communique from the liberation the capital, and building up for the to the Muscat Army. Such a sharpen­ but the enemy’s savage attacks killed forces mentions attacks that point to a definitive blocking of the Red Line ing of the conflict will increase the many o f the livestock belonging to our desperate counter-offensive by the road. revolutionary pressures in the Gulf defenseless compatriots. Sultan. Melvin Laird, US Defense area as a whole. On May 4 1970 one o f our regular Since the capture of Rakhyut town units penetrated an enemy post on the in western Dhofar (August 1969) and Red Line and opened fire with light of Sadh in eastern Dhofar (March and medium weapons. The fight lasted 1970) the fighting has concentrated for 14 minutes, and 5 o f the enemy’s on the road linking the capital Salala troops were killed or wounded. to the desert in the north. The sultan On the same day another fighting is still able to control the desert, since unit of the People’s Army ambushed a there is no cover or mountainous convoy o f enemy vehicles moving along terrain to protect the guerrillas from the Red Line. When the vehicles came air attack. This road is called “the near to the ambush our forces suddenly Red Line, ” by the Popular Front. attacked with a torrent o f rapid auto­ Both the Shah of Iran and the matic fire. The clash lasted for ten Sheikh of Bahrein have called for the minutes, and the enemy lost one o f his deposition of the Sultan, and the trucks, in which everyone was killed or British are pressing for him to allow wounded. Our own forces returned to his son Qabus, educated at Sandhurst, base safely. to take the throne. The Times re­ Long Live the Revolution of June 9, ported on June 18 that the Sultan had carried out by the command of already resigned and was about to go PFLOAG! into exile. Long Live the Fighters of the People’s There are two reasons for Liberation Army and o f the Popular continued, even increased, British Militia! backing for the Sultan: they want to Hold High the Banner o f Organised hang onto their base on the Sultan’s Revolutionary Violence against island of Masira, and they want to Imperialism, Zionism, and Reaction!

June 6 at a guerrilla’s funeral in the Matzpen article on Arab Revolu­ Habbash greater leverage, but Iraq Zerka, near Amman, and fighting bet­ tion printed in Black Dwarf last year wants to keep Hussein as a puppet ween guerrillas and beduin spread to (June 14, 1969, no. 19). They have and impose a cabinet of bourgeois JORDAN the capital. Although al-Fath and also openly supported the Dhofari politicians sympathetic to the Hussein announced a cease-fire on struggle, and have close tie's with anti- guerrillas. The other Arab states are 200-300 people were killed in June 9 the two self-proclaimed Baathi forces in Iraq. They have all behind Hussein, and are try ing to Amman, Jordan, in a mid-June out­ Marxist-Leninist groups, the Popular called for a democratic and socialist build up al-Fath as a stabilising force. break of fighting between King Front (PF) and the Democratic Front Palestine with equal rights for Jews None of the guerrilla groups is pre­ Hussein’s beduin troops and (DF), refused to accept it until and Arabs. But the DF are also the pared, or willing, to clash openly with Palestinian guerrillas. This is not the Hussein sacked his key advisers— weakest of the groups, and hence the the Arab regimes now by bring first time there have been such from the command of the Army Sharif most exposed to attacks from the Hussein down, nor do they want to clashes, though they have never been Nasser himself; General Keylani, right. They claim that one of their remove the mild buffer between so bloody. Up to June 1967 Hussein Minister of the Interior; and Colonel military cadres, Sahel Ghazal, 'was themselves and Israel that Hussein tried to suppress the guerrillas—at Shaker, Commander of the Amman shot by Sharif Nasser early in June, provides. Even Hawatmeh appeared that time only al-Fath. After the June garrison. The PF held a group of and when the fighting occurred last at a press conference on June 15 with defeat he had to let them operate, but European and American tourists host­ February they felt forced to put their Arafat and declared: “There are on a number of occasions (February age in the plush Intercontinental name to an al-Fath communique several phases in a liberation move­ 1968, November 1968, February Hotel until these demands were met. calling for an “Arab Palestine”—a ment... We must now all unite to meet 1970) fighting broke out: the king Later in the week they were. chauvinist slogan. the conspiracy which aims to liquidate claimed that he wanted to limit the The PF on the other hand, led by the Palestinian revolution. ” Both the carrying of arms in Jordanian towns, T H E SPLIT the Christian Dr. George Habbash, DF and the PF joined a joint the guerrillas said he wanted to liqui­ have received backing from Iraq. Palestinian-Jordanian Co-ordinating date the resistance, and come to a These events provoked a major split Using a Marxist vocabluary they have Committee designed to settle “peaceful settlement” with Israel. A in the guerrilla movement. Both denounced al-Fath for being a petty- questions at issue. They are all similar process has been ocurring in Hussein and President Nasser singled bourgeois organisation and until last therefore trapped in the politics of the Lebanon. Both there and in out al-Fath for praise and attacked the February refused to participate in the manoeuvring for influence behind the Jordan a reactionary pro-western DF and the PF for adventurism. The co-ordinating committees of the facade of Hussein’s rule. regime has been unable to wipe the DF leader Nayyef Hawatmeh had call­ guerrilla movement. To win support The US were very upset by this guerrillas out, but has tried to prevent ed for the dissolution of the King’s from al-Fath, they engaged in a series fighting and alerted the 6th Fleet and them from undermining their own fra­ special anti-guerrilla militia, and of spectacular actions, some of them the 82nd Airborne Division in pre­ gile structure. Hussein replied by accusing (shooting up air-liners, attacking paration for an invasion under cover Hussein in particular has had Hawatmeh of provocation. But the school buses) were totally of removing US civilians (as in Santo- trouble with his army, and has had to public positions adopted by the indefensible and have played into the Domingo in 1965). The Russians restrain the virulent anti-communists different groups may not necessarily hands of Zionist propaganda inside were equally angry, and Pravda in charge of it and recently he raised be an accurate guide to what is really Israel and in Europe (“they are all accused the DF and the PF of being the pay of his crack troops. The chief going on. The DF (which split from cut-throats and terrorist” etc. ). They “American agents. ” advocate of a tough line against the the PF in February 1969) has have adopted a verbally revolutionary These events illustrate the fragility Palestininians was Sharif Nasser bin attacked the “petty-bourgois” regimes position, and are clearly willing to con­ of Hussein’s position, but they also Jamil, Head of the Army and of Egypt, Syria and Iraq which give flict with Hussein, although how far show the guerrillas are split among Hussein’s uncle. He amassed himself a support to different guerrilla groups they go may be limited by their themselves, that the left is still unable fortune by organising the smuggling of (al-Fath, as-Saiqa and the PF association with Iraq. They have not to break with the Arab regimes, and arms and hashish and recently built respectively) and they have gone yet converted their verbal profession that their revolutionary aims have himself a luxurious £400, 000 house furthest towards an alliance with the of Marxism into a fully revolutionary still to find an effective, and inter­ on the outskirts of Amman. progressive Israeli Matzpen group; practice. nationalist, strategy to fight Zionism The latest outbreak occurred on they reprinted in their own magazine However the recent events have given and Arab reaction. Black Dwarf July 7 1970 page 11

On May 17th. this year, the South invited the South African airforce to tesi- facturing firm, African Explosives and Kaunda is well aware of the danger, and African Minister of Police, Mr. S. L. fly the plane. The British ship-building in­ Chemicals, part of which was recently has just ordered a £7 million missile Muller made a remarkable statement dustry is confidently awaiting orders of taken over by the South African Govern­ system from Yugoslavia—but neverthe­ about the extent of guerrilla activity in some £200 million for frigates and ment, began as a joint venture in which less, Zambia remains highly vulnerable. Southern Africa. Speaking at a meeting in destroyers from South Africa—equipment ICI held 42% of the shares. Now it makes Tanzania remains even more exposed Johannesburg, he told his audience that a that South Africa wants on grounds of anti-personnel bombs and the riot gas and from the sea, where S. African owned very large number of his men were at that ‘fleet standardisation’—many of the ships bullets which in February wounded five British built frigates could easily shell time engaged on South Africa’s nothern in the S.A. navy have British African children in a riot in Daveytown Dar-es-Salam as part of a ‘small-scale borders in what he called ‘near warfare specifications, so that supplementary African township, near Cape Town. police action.’ And just this possibility— conditions.’ This, he admitted, made grave equipment from Britain is cheaper, and Overall, the new arms supplies from with the Conservative government remain­ and worrying demands on South Africa’s much easier to obtain. Finally, South Britain will make an important ing strictly ‘neutral’—is being taken 40, 000 strong police force, which, in any Africa will be wanting a number of British contribution to South Africa’s defence seriously in South African press and case had to deal with the highest crime helicopters. capabilities. In 1968 and 1969, the South political circles. rate in the world. It is this police force, African military forces held two large Those who stand to gain along with South Africa’s Army, Navy and scale military exercises. In both, light ’External’ defense Who stands to gain most in Britain from Airforce, that the new Conservative bombers were used, (Buccaneers and these deals? According to the ‘Times Busi­ administaration in Britain is about to re­ All these will be justified as ‘arms for Canberras), together with French heli­ ness news’ it will be Hawker Siddley— arm. external defence. ’ In the same way, copters. This is exactly the type of equip­ with an estimated £100 million in con­ Conservative policy on Southern Africa France justified her breaking the UN. ment Britain will sell. Neither of the tracts for Buccaneer, NIMROD and is very clearly defined. First South Africa. embargo over the past five years. But of exercises was ‘anti-submarine’—(this is SEACAT missiles. One of 11 direcotors of Douglas-Home has committed the Tories the South African airforce’s 36 Mirage jets what the Tories claim the equipment will bought from France, eleven have ended be used for)—both were miles from the Hawker Siddley is Sir Halford Walter Lup- to renewing arms sales to the Vorster ton Reddish, President of Rugby Conser­ regime for so-called external defence. up in anti-guerrilla operations in coast, and as the chief of the armed forces vatives, and director of the Economic More than that, he has said that in power, Rhodesia, together with 7 o f the 16 said at the time ‘the aim is to give our League which gave some £100, 000 to the ‘Super-Frelon’ helicopters. They are all on troops anti-terrorist training. ’ the Conservatives would take steps to Tory party to fight the last election. Br. loan to Rhodesians in support of the What is more as military co-operation make special military arrangements for co­ firms with S. A. subsidiaries altogether operations carried out by 4, 000 between South Africa and Portugal grows, operation between South Africa and gave the Tories £300, 000 to fight the Rhodesian troops and an estimated 5, 000 it would not be surprising to see these NATO. Anthony Barber, the Tory Party General Election. Another director is the Chairman, said on a recent visit to South South African army and para-military British aircraft being used against libera­ Rt. Hon Lord Shawcross of Friston, who police ground troops. And according to tion fighters in Angola and Mosambique, Africa that under the Conservatives, is also a director of Morgan and Cie Britain would treat South Africa as an French newspaper reports, the South adding to the British weapons used there (South Africa), the ‘Times’, Thames Tele­ Africans are also experimenting with a by the Portuguese who receive them ally. What that means is that, although vision (remember the recent row in Britain will recognise that South Africa is new French helicopter against the under NATO defence agreements. (The Thames boardroom over whether or not to illegally occupying Namibia (S. W. Africa) Zimbabwe comrades. British weapons, South' Africans have sent at least three show a documentary fiercely condemning she will do nothing to help ending that too, have been used against SWAPO battalions of troops of the TETE province Apartheid?), and Birmingham Small Arms occupation. There will be an attempt at a comrades in Namibia—as far back as two. of Mosambique) The same is true, of Co., (which gave £4, 000 worth gifts to compromise with Smith in Rhodesia, and years, ago the ‘Daily Express’ carried course, of S. W. Africa. political organisations last year). And one as the Conservaties confidential document reports of a British, helicopter being shot Already, South African aircraft have man who’s going to be very much involved puts it there will be a ‘friendly re-examina- down in ‘anti-insurgent operations’ there. been seen flying high reconnaisance mis­ in formulating British policy in Africa is tion with Portugal of ways and, means of In addition to this, British firms have sions over Zambia (another possible use Lord Carrington—the new Minsiter of De­ utilising the Anglo-Portuguese alliance to been investing freely in South Africa’s for NIMROD???). And Dr. van der fence. Until very recently he was a establish mutually valid defence arrange­ domestic armament industry (small arms, Merwe, Chairman of S. A. ’s National director of Barclay’s Bank (thought to be ments in the Southern Atlantic. ’ ammunition, chemical and biological wea­ Party’s Foreign Affairs Committee, has not without some interests in S. Africa) It’s quite clear that, if nothing else, all pons) ever since it was set up in the arly suggested pre-emtive strikes on Israeli and Hambros Bank, which has large hold­ this will give a strong moral boost to the 60’s. In particular, the munitions manu­ finest against Zambia and Tanzania. white racialist regimes of Southern Africa: ings in Hawker Siddley. In opposition, the chief Tory advisory in fact, it means much more than that. For body on defence and foreign policy was the liberation movements it represents a the Conservative Commonwealth and significant shift in the strategic arms Overseas Council. At a major meeting in balance: for countries like Tanzania and Zambia which have been directly involved February the Council driew up a long in supporting the guerrilla movements, it confidential document ‘OVERSEAS ISSUES FACING THE NEXT CONSER­ is a very real threat. VATIVE GOVERNMENT’. Chairing the Labour add their bit whole Council was Sir Frederic Bennett M. P. —a member of the Rhodesian bar Not that this is a complete reversal of and director of Kleinwort Benson Europe Labour’s policy in government. Over the (South Africa). (Reginald Maulding is a past six years, Britain has sold to South director of Kleinwort Benson). Specialis­ Africa 16 Buccaneer jet fighter/bombers, ing on Southern Africa was Mr. Ian Lloyd a number of HS-125 twin jet aircraft, MP, who was a member of the South Afri­ £400, 000 of motor chassis for armoured can Board of Trade and Industries until cars and lorries, spare parts for Buc­ 1955, and who contributes regular articles caneers, Canberra bombers, Shakletons, to the SA Journals of Economics and ammunition for South Africa’s Centurion Industrial Economics. The whole argu­ tanks and 4.5 inch shells for British-made ment of the document is that with the frigates. And South Africa is now Suez Canal effectively in Russian hands, manufacturing under licence from Rolls Britain must guard the Cape sea route. Royce and Hawker Siddley, jet engines And so..... for the Impala aircraft and for the Italian The fact is, of course, that the ‘Soviet Aer, Macchi MB 326 strike trainer. threat’ and the Simonstown agreement are just Red Herrings in the Indian (??) But, despite the fact that Labour’s Ocean. The only threat to Capitalist invest­ ‘arms embargo’ was anything but water­ ment in Southern Africa as well as to the tight, the South Africans have scarcely great economic potential there—large been able to conceal their delight at being quantities of Iron ore and oil have been able, once again, to buy British weapons. found in Angola, and large amounts of Over the past five years, the bulk of South Uranium to the north comes from within Africa’s defence equipment has been the countries. The Conservative Common­ supplied by France, but it’s known that wealth and Overseas Council show in their Vorster has been very worried that France document that they know this. That is why might at any moment enforce a full scale they are proposing to re-arm S.Africa, and embargo, as De Gualle did previously on to revamp defence treaties with Portugal Israel, thus leaving South Africa with a For they know that in order to survive, completely inadequate defence system. So, they must keep open every source of raw Britain is going to be asked to supply materials, every potential market, and some £300 million of equipment over the every possible region in the world for sur­ next year. South Africa wants Hawker- plus investment. Siddley to supply the aerial reconnais­ The internal repression in South sance ‘Nimrod’ plane. Packed with Africa—apartheid; the relations of pro­ sophisticated electronic equipment, this is duction there— capitalism; and its essen­ ideal for locating enemy submarines, or tial international support— imperialism, to­ guerrilla troop concentrations. She also gether form a trinity of reaction. This in wants more Buccaneers. Speaking in turn supports and supplies the. ruling Salisbury, Rhodesia, the South African classes in Britain and Europe. The Conser­ Defence forces’ chief recently said of the vatives will do everything they can to help Buccaneer ‘It is an excellent plane for break the liberation forces that threaten counter-insurgency operations. ’ The them when they threaten the regime in Buccaneer is supposedly a naval aircraft South Africa, We in Britain must confront ‘for external defence only. ’ The South the Conservative’s imperialist policies, African Defence Ministry is also very oppose and smash them. Only a rigorous interested in the Jaguar supersonic strike hostility to capitalism itself can drive and plane. This is an Anglo-French project, inform this struggle, which is the shortest and reports from France say that the and surest road to the liquidation of French manufacturers have already apartheid. Black Dwarf July 7 1970 page 12 Italy: CAPITALISM Complexities o f the Parliamentary SMELLS Pollution is a field that has all the society can be seen from the fact The composition of these societies Road. ingredients of a major non-issue. An that the 6 1/2 million tons of sulphur is almost entirely derived from unchallenged expert in non-issues, dioxide emitted from the chimneys upper and middle income groups and the Duke of Edinburgh is opening of British industry (giving acidic the recent controversy over the site conferences on pollution and behind rain, harmful to vegetation and for London’s third International air­ The Italian regional elections have finally the scenes a motley array of techno­ housewives’ washing) could be port shows how unrepresentative been held—twenty years after they were crats, retired majors and rural eliminated. This will not happen, they are. As the various discussions due. The predicted results have led Jo Tories are fighting for the nation’s however, until speculators have continued it became clear that the Communist (PCI) and Social-Proletarian purity. Messrs. Wilson and Nixon pushed the world price of sulphur fact that the airport would create (PSIUP) majority in one region and a pro­ fresh from their rural preservation high enough for it to be extracted employment was only of minor con­ jected Socialist/Communist coalition in schemes in Nigeria and South-East from the sulphur dioxide and resold cern for them, whereas trade unio­ two others. The results are less of a Asia have had us all agog with their at a profit. nists thought differently. menace to the ruling class than they might grandiose schemes for a cleaner Naturally the working class suffers Another point about the societies is have been in 1948. But they still pose world. The similarity between parlia­ most from pollution because workers that they are all orientated to tradi­ problems—for the Left as well as for the mentary elections and detergent are much more likely to live near fac­ tional methods of activity—the peti­ Right. advertisements (Wilson versus tories that pollute. In Billingham tion or tea with the Minister. They The results were interpreted by the Heath: Omo versus Daz) is becom­ dominated by ICI—the chemical wor­ have never disturbed the wheels of in­ Bourgeois press as a victory for the ing even more marked with each poli­ kers have to contend with company dustry. “centre-Left, ” the coalition of Christian tical party promising a cleaner towns, and an inescapable company Democrats, Socialist, Social Democrats Britain! air. In Japan, the schoolchildren who MAKING THE BEST OF IT and Republicans which has constituted the The basic fact about pollution live in the Yokkaichi petro-chemical national government of Italy for the past (ignored by most liberal criticisms) industrial town have to wear masks Recently there has been a stirring six years. But the situation is not so clear is that it represents an often delibe­ to school to protect themselves from of interest in pollution from the Left cut. rate attempt by industrial concerns the fumes produced by the factories (See Red Scientist NO. 3 and BSSRS The losses on the left were mostly due to pass their cleaning costs to the that their parents work for! Newsheet No. 7) but it is sad that to the abject tailendism of the Social-Pro­ community at large. One sewage many socialists fail to see the poten­ letarians (PSIUP), who have hitched their plant at Plymouth, for example SO DO BUREAUCRATS tial of the pollution issue. Of course wagon so firmly to the Communists that gives unofficial instructions to its Nixon has used the pollution issue as they have lost their potential as a radical employees to discharge raw sewage Most pollution could be eliminated a diversion for the anti-war move­ left opposition. Many PSIUP supporters in into the sea if the plant is over­ in a planned economy as waste pro­ ment, but this does not mean that fact seem to have followed, whether con­ loaded, in spite of the fact that this is duced by one industry can often be pollution has no revolutionary sciously or not, the line taken by the prohibited. Now industry has recog­ used by another. In the Soviet Union, implications. After all the US anti­ Student Movement and left groups, and nised how dangerous pollution is to however, planning is organised with war movement has been diverted in­ abstained. Meanwhile, within the Centre- its reputation and last year com­ bureaucratic ineptitude and often to massive ‘peaceful’ rallies with Left, it was the minority parties who made panies like ICI ran television major projects are allowed to despoil- radicals being prevented from speak­ gains, largely at the expense of the commercials to clean up their ate. One of the worst examples of ing, but this does not mean that Viet­ traditional Right. Two points stand out: image. this was the construction of a wood nam should now have no significance one, the Social Democrats have picked up When industry talks to itself it is of­ pulp factory on Lake Baikal (an enor­ for the revolutionary left. the support of reactionary voters and are ten more frank than its publicity mous freshwater lake in Eastern Sibe­ The existing anti-pollution societies confirmed as a new part of the Right, the hand-outs. In a Pollution Supplement ria) whose waste is killing many have little concern for the urban rallying-point of reactionary anti­ in a weekly magazine called In­ rare species of plant, shellfish, fish working-class areas where socialists communism; the other, the surprising dustry Week (owned and published and animals. From the fuss could work against pollution. Neigh­ resilience of the old Socialist Party, by the Confederation of British Indus­ the Press has been making about bourhood organisation against pollu­ formerly the great mass party of the work­ tries) we find in the issue of Decem­ pollution one would think that they tion enables us to link opposition to ing class but in steady decline since ber 5th 1969 this revealing comment: have been on another—and cleaner- pollution, not just to the quality of 1948. The key questions posed by the “Industrial concerns exist not to world since the Industrial Revolu­ life, but to identify local firms as election concern the Communist Party. serve people, but to make profits. As tion. The River Irwell has been the class enemies for more than just the Firstly what advantage will it draw from this entails that the greatest return sewer for the Lancashire industrial people who work in them. A neigh­ its outright victory in Emilia-Romagna should be extracted for the minimum complex since the earliest bourhood campaign allows different and its probable position as leader of a investment, the attitude towards pol­ industralisation and its fate is typi­ sections of a working community to Left-coalition in Tuscany and Umbria? lution control is that it is money cal. The Observer Business Supple­ play their part, for activities can ex­ Will the Communists be as modest (or as spent without return. ” ment of 1st February 1970 had an tend from picketing to housewives reformist) in their ambitions in regional If one looks at information pro­ excellent article on the Irwell show­ blocking firm’s telephones with com­ administration as they have been in the duced by the Alkaline Inspectorate ing how it was polluted by industry plaints. It is important to note that in municipalities they control? Probably. The (a Government body) one sees that on its banks and the author pointed industrial areas pollution is not just regions they have won are not those in the amount spent by 10 big industries out that if you fell in you would be a matter of aesthetics; for many which the industrial working class is on pollution control in the decade taken to hospital for a stomach working people contact with cad­ strong, and their diffuse social base is not 1958-68 is only a tiny fraction of pump-out. It is interesting to note mium, mercury or asbestos fumes such as to give them the necessary militant their total investment, while experts that there is a small pamphlet in the can be lethal or at least cause severe support for a confrontation with the have suggested that 10% is a reason­ archives of the Manchester Refe­ suffering. central government. The strong showing able figure. Shell Chemicals estimate rence Library on the pollution of the Science students are beginning to of both Socialists and Social Democrats in that they have spent between £6 and Irwell written at the beginning of join the revolutionary left and the •the election is likely to strengthen the £10 million on pollution control at this century! It seems that no notice issue of pollution is one that could hand of the mostly overtly reformist wing their £100 million Carrington plant. is being taken of even contemporary have a direct importance for them. of the PCI, whose strategy has always Comparing this with a maximum warnings, for only recently the Man­ The trouble with such issues as germ been to attempt to woo away the Socialists fine for pollution offences of £100, we chester Ship Canal (part of the warfare is that they can be viewed and the left of the Christian Democrats can see why many firms do little to Irwell) caught fire (!) killing a num­ as exceptions to the “decent” uses of from the Centre-Left and to avoid too stop pollution. The last Government ber of people. science. Pollution, however, is a fea­ sharp a provocation to the Right. issued a White Paper on the En­ There are six main groups in this ture of all capitalist industry and a The prospect, then, is that the long war vironment suggesting that fines country agitating about the environ­ fight against it need not be diverted of attrition between Communists and should be raised, but they still will ment, nearly all of them with a to moralism, but can lead to an Christian Democrats will continue for bear absolutely no relation to the sprinkling of titles to grace their note- analysis of the exploitative nature of damage caused. paper. One is tempted to think that our society. some while, with a strong possibility of an David Aron eventual Communist victory. This is a pros So B ritain is littered with many of their members join on the pect which fills many sections of the Left examples of where non-socialised in­ assumption that conservation is inte­ * Red Scientist No.3 Available from with dismay. The able manoeuvres of the dustry has passed its costs to the grally linked to conservatism. Some Martin Thomas, Dept, of Mathe­ PCI and its Trade Union allies have blun­ community in the form of slag of the groups do some quite useful matics, Manchester University, Man­ ted the edge of the class struggle in the heaps, smog and polluted waters. work, but others have very undesir­ chester, 13. Price l/-p. p. interests of a sophisticated inter-class bid The Alkaline Inspectorate survey able undertones. The ‘Conservation BSSRS Newsheet No. 7. Available for parliamentary power, and the militant | showed that the cost of air pollution Society’, for example, has an almost from British Society for Social Re­ activity of last autumn has been absorbed by the 10 industries was £350 million hysterical desire for population sponsibility in Science, 42, Great into economism. What the elections show per year. The irrationality of our control. Russell St, London W.C.l. most clearly, however, is that the parliamentary shufflings are not a directi reflection of the development of forces within the country. So if the extra-parlia- | mentary left can get beyond the stage of only opposing the economism of the PCI with its own brand of maximalist economism, and if it can gain a strong foot hold in the industrial centres, then it can use Communist strength as a shield behind which it would be possible to develop its own forces; provided of course, that the groups can handle their differences without unnecessary self-destruction. In short, it is not bad that the PCI may gain from the present situation provided the revolutionary forces can also consolidate strength and positions. NANO NERO Sea gull killed by oil. Black Dwarf July 7 1970 page 13

Cop-Out

MR. DYLAN’S SELF PORTRAIT by Andy Chester

Bob Dylan cast such a spell over a once more in tune with a mass radi­ whole generation of young North cal social base. This relationship was Americans—all those whose political necessarily a changed one. Liber­ and musical consciousness was for­ alism—an essentially idealist ideo­ med during the 60’s—that it’s no won­ logy—can kid itself that music and der he has become an object of ves­ politics become one when political— ted interest. First it was the ‘new and sub-political! —demands take left’ of the civil rights movement, over the lyric: ‘if god’s on our side then the heads of the acid explosions, he’ll stop the next war’. After all, that sought to make capital out of liberalism is a protest addressed to him. More recently Dylan seems to the powers that be. Revolutionary have been officially adopted by the politics, which recognises political U. S. ruling class. power as an object to be fought for, What degeneration! In 1962 the guy cannot delude itself that its aims will used to raise money for freedom be realised through a dialogue with riders. In June 1970, with a million the ruling class. So it can accept that students on strike after Cambodia music is not merely an instrument of and Kent State, he’s photographed political agitation; music is already dressed in academic gown and re­ related to politics when it expresses, ceiving an honorary degree from the in its own language, a’ common Dean of Princeton University. social/cultural base. This is why Dylan’s career might seem one Dylan’s music remained so impor­ great cop-out, but after all, he only tant, not just to the acid freaks on claims to be a musician. Does bad the fringe of the student movement, politics necessarily mean bad but to vanguard fighters in the anti­ music? In Dylan’s case particularly, imperialist struggle, as the move­ the left politicos have a lot to answer ment made the painful transition for. Back in 1964 when Dylan swit­ from reform to revolution; from Pensive and beardless, the early Dylan. ched from protest to surrealism and Berkely to Chicago. It was no used the country-and-westem idiom And below Dylan 1970, at Princeton be­ teamed up with an electric band, gimmickry that led the RYM 1 fac­ without collapsing into it. He wrote a ing honoured with a Doctorate in Music these would-be mentors were un­ tion at the 1969 SDS convention to set of songs around the populist for giving "authentic expression o f the dis­ animous in condemnation. But choose the ‘Weatherman’ title for theme of morality, but gave them a turbed and concerned conscience o f young Subterranean Homesick Bines, which their position paper: this was their surreal twist: Frankie Lee and Judas America so shocked the campus liberals at world of cultural reference. Dylan Priest play out their archetypical Newport ’64, was not only a mam­ certainly rejected the movement in moral tale against a kaleidoscopic and Maggie’s Farm, but also of love moth musical advance—all sixties 1964—‘I was so much older then, I’m landscape that shatters and re­ songs like One Too Many Mornings rock derives from it—but also ideo­ younger than that now’—but his sub­ combines the elements of real social and It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue, logical dynamite. ‘Protest’, the bas­ jective consciousness shouldn’t be relations. On Nashville Skyline, this can now actually write, and sing: tard musical progeny of popular confused with the objective meaning tension is resolved in favour of the ‘For me there is no other damsel, front liberalism, could not be the of his music. The charge that Dylan straight, and Dylan stands at the than my blooming bright star of music of a revolutionary anti-capita- copped out in 1964 only reflects the edge of the abyss. He has only one Belle Isle’, while the string section at­ list movement. How much more sub­ limitations of his accusers. card to play to save himself from tests to his sincerity. Secondly, versive is Ballad of a Thin Man than banality. It is perhaps the most start­ though the use of female choirs, The Lonesome Death of Hattie DYLAN’S THIRD PHASE ling and unexpected fact of Dylan’s string orchestras, brass etc. does not Carrol, or Desolation Row compared career that he should have ended up in itself go against artistic integrity, with Masters of War. The new free­ How then does Dylan come to be relying first and foremost on his the striking fact is that almost every dom from the narrow demands of where he is in 1970, and what is the qualities as a vocalist. track on this double album is a pro­ political expediency was itself a step meaning of his most recent records? Make no mistake—Dylan’s singing, duction whose true author is not Bob forward. Music cannot do the work Self Portrait is the culmination of previously remarkable for its functio­ Dylan but the country music in­ of politics, though it can complement Dylan’s third phase, the process first nality, is now what he wants you to dustry. For the first time in his re­ politics—real politics, the expression evident with John Wesley Harding. It listen to, what he demands to be cording career, Dylan has lost con­ of class forces—at its own level. confirms the direction of his sub­ judged by. His lyrics used to be de- trol of the medium to C. B. S. The sequent development. The main livered in the literal sense: words tragedy is that he abdicated this con­ MUSIC AND MASSES determinant of this new departure thrust at the audience whose aesthe­ trol voluntarily. Thirdly, Nashville was undoubtedly the ideological re­ tic value depended on the tensions be­ Skyline, for all its contrived in­ In time Dylan, in his second phase fuge Dylan found in American popu­ tween their meaning, the tone and nocence, was saved by the sense of (from Bringing It AD Back Home to lism. Culturally, he rejected the city cadences of speech itself, and the in­ humour and self-irony that had mar- Blonde on Blonde), found himself for the country, acid for alcohol, strumental backing. Their function ed Dylan’s music from the start. surrealism for naturalism, and be­ now is to support a vocal line con­ Self Portrait shows Dylan finally tak­ came a moderate man—all this ceived as an aesthetic object in it­ ing himself seriously, and this in­ following his accident in summer self. Compare Like a Rolling Stone vests much of the record with an 1966, which cut short almost two from Self Portrait (live at the Isle of aura of living death. years uninterrupted touring with The Wight August 1969) with thè record­ The Isle of Wight concert was in Band. This trauma didn’t lead to ing on Highway 61 Revisited. Dylan many ways Dylan’s finale as a crea­ immediate musical disaster; witness has learnt to sing beautifully, there tive musician. The messianic setting the superb set of songs (Tears of is no question of that. His model is of an open-air festival could not have Rage/Down in the flood/I shall be obviously the smoothly shaped vocal been more favourable. Dylan sang a Released etc. ) Dylan wrote in 1967 lines of early Presley (1954-56), but retrospective cross-section of his and recorded with The Band on the even if he could match Presley— work and, in harness with The Band, pirated ‘basement tape. ’ But Dylan’s which he can’t—there is no artistic he all but succeeded in welding this new-found rural traditionalism made value in repetition, and this attempt varied material into a new artistic it impossible for him to start touring to return to a primordial state of unity around his new vocal style. At again, and this, increasing distance musical bliss is inevitably forced and least it seemed so at the time. But from social reality (live audience) al­ false. finales are unrepeatable. Dylan’s lowed his populist ideology to run self-portrait in 1970 is that of a pathe­ amok in his music, and eventually OUT INTO LIMBO tic and isolated figure, drifting off in­ turned him into that sorrowful figure to the limbo that Presley left for in of the star, whose isolation from the About Self Portrait itself there is 1957. Dylan’s demise is not yet fatal. discourse of the masses—the fount of little that can be said. Firstly, I doubt whether we shall yet-a-while all artistic creation—dooms him to a Dylan’s new songs have degenerated find him playing at the International descending spiral of repitition. into almost unmitigated vacuity. The Hotel, Las Vegas. But that is the in­ In John Wesley Harding Dylan still author not only of Tombstone Blues evitable end of his present road. Black Dwarf July 7 1970 page 14 Sally Fraser

DAVID TRIESMAN for the demonstrations called for February and March. sponsers and have made the walk for Oxfam. No one Some of the so-called tribes in the Soloman Island believe The groups became tight-knit and relatively efficient. that given certain propriscious signs, like the coincidence needs reminding that the crucial error of the left in this They maintained wide networks of contacts inside their country was in the eighteen months that followed October of particular events with the rising of dead ancestors, the Universities and between each other. Speakers got round coming of a new age, a millenium, will surely follow. 1968. Militants were active and desperately exposed in a the country to meetings which were organised, and the few colleges, notably the LSE and Essex. Elsewhere there They believe that ships will appear in their harbours, level of political discussions rose astronomically. That is bearing all the materials which the white settlers formerly was so little happening that even those who claimed that to say, there were organisations in continual existence what was needed was quiet work with Trade Unionists owned, the materials from which they will make their new which were capable of recruitment, political education world. I don’t know whether Daniel Read, who wrote never claimed they were actually doing it. and organisation of the other people actively interested. It is amazing that Daniel Read didn’t feel it necessary Debacle in Grosvenor Square (Black Dwarf May 25th) is With each demonstration, each being tougher than the a Soloman Island Cargo Cultist, but he shares their per­ to link the word ‘debacle’ with the 18 months of real last, more people were recruited and the discussions of debacle. No one is simply going to reappear on the battle ception of the world. what to do in a violent encounter became more concrete. field after that long knowing exactly how to hold a He imagines that the occurence of an alarming event in That may have been a fortuitous gain in terms of the conjunction with the awakening of the spirits of past ‘political demonstration’ at three days notice, how to strategic decision to build revolutionary organisation break police lines, where to attack police buses or the occasions, Cambodia plus the year of the Grosvenor throughout the country, but the effect was crucial to Square battles and the Paris Uprising, were capable of Grey-Green Coach Company. Its almost a religious belief understanding many of the events of British campuses that it was vaguely possible. I thought it was very sur­ giving rise to a vehement struggle comparable to the pre­ that year. The same people were in the forfront of the local conditions for building an ‘anti-imperialist’ movement. prising, given the level of the speeches, that as much organisation in many respects, and they used the same militancy as finally appeared took place. The horror of The revolution never simply follows a demonstration, and channels they had opened at the instigation of the VSC. although it is true that we all spend the evenings after one Cambodia and Vietnam, the GI dead, the Kent Four, can Without our realising it, demonstrations which started never substitute for our permanent organisation around in dispondency, we do so in the direct aftermath of the as the raison d’être for the groups became tactics which day, when subjective impressions of the event are closest the anti-imperialist fight. We nearly gave up the right to the groups used to consolidate, to show their political lead any such movement in the 18 months before the to the surface, and before we analyse what has been going solidarity with the NLF and to punctuate the struggles in on. For Daniel Read to reproduce that demoralisation demonstration; our revolutionary offences didn’t take the places where they worked. Local work against the place it. after having time to do some more constructive analysis during campus clowns of law and order was shown to be part of In this country there is little doubt that cultural simply adds his literary demoralisation to the general the national pattern. As a result of the potency of this con­ traditions have always acted against violent demon­ situation. The article is exactly what the movement frontation, the militants decided to concentrate on violent doesn’t want; ‘in Vietnam the NLF continue to fight strations, the determined attempt at objectives. When we demonstrations, quite correctly, because a real head of were on the way to over-coming that cultural hurdle, we against' imperialism’ but we aren’t the NLF, nor can their steam was being built up and the police could be were doing it by political means. To decide to fight, to struggle be immediately mirrored here. guaranteed to lose their cool very early in the pro­ use a petrol bomb and so on, right through to the decision We need to start at the begining. A demonstration can ceedings. - to stage insurrection, are decisions based on level of be called for a number of purposes. It can be an act of The whole build up worked through to October with political preparedness, not what we feel like on the day. solidarity with peoples elsewhere: it can be a means of ex­ the added enthusiasm engendered by Paris that summer. We were moving on to better and better political levels in posing something, of making public theatre of some There were probably more meetings, more discussion of 1968, with more anlysis and comprehension of the hidden or distorted fact; it can be a means to welding the the nature of imperialism, before October than at any pre­ necessity for certain sorts of action. This process is what participants closer together, a tiny element in a festival of vious time. October found people ready for tough action is meant by the development of courage. Courage is the oppressed; it is very rarely that it is the last step in with a high level of political militancy, but they were con­ political; when we lack politics, we lack courage. the seizure of state power. All these uses of demon­ vinced by the VSC leadership, already quite apparently For the BD article to simply dismiss these problems in strations situate them as nothing more than tactics. Even afraid of what the year had let loose, that a massive favour of having a look at one afternoon in May, is to the last is a tactic for taking the Party forward to the posi­ ‘march’ of solidarity, impressive by virtue of numbers lower the level of necessary discussion to straight-forward tion of being the vanguard of the dictatorship of the pro­ rather than politically motivated action, was appropriate. moralising. Like most moralists, Daniel Read only letariat. In that sense, we can only have certain limited There are times when that sort of demonstration may be demoralises. It is like an authoritarian parent taking his ends in view from a demonstration, and they must be valid as tactics, but that October was never one of them. child out for the day, finding that he doesn’t behave in seen in terms of a more general policy, a long range The myth of the Grosvenor Square ‘death-trap,’ the the way the parent wants, and then beating him, irrespec­ strategy. In this country we seem always to be confusing sudden eclipsing virtue of Hyde Park, were the language tive of the whole past history of the child and his possible the issue by making a tactic into a strategy. of fear. future. If our muscles are weak from lack of use, there’s So the real question comes to be what strategy we It doesn’t seem so surprising now that everyone went no point in self-flagellation because we can’t run a four- should be engaged in and then to see what role demon­ home, the groups of basic organisation broke up and the minute mile. What we must do is learn for the future. strations can play in the. Under those curcumstances very thought of another Grosvenor Square was so remote, There is no way that can happen if we limit ourselves to there is no possibility of having a ‘de-politicised’ demon­ as to be absurb. We wondered what the hell 1968 had weeping after each demonstration as though it ended the stration. In early 1968, in response to calls from the VSC, been for and we were prepared to sleep off the de­ world. Building is a vitalising process and every conscious in Universities and other organisations up and down the pression under the anesthetisation of the Sunday Walk in demoralization is a serious offence against this or any country, small groups set about the recruitment of people October. We thought we would have done better to get movement.

REPLY DANIEL READ should give the tradition and background of the succes­ fuzz. Not necessarily—peaceful demonstrations can be Demonstrations, the obession and vanity of the British sive attempts of the British revolutionary left to hurl itself very successful. The charge we levelled was that the Left, and its most miserable preoccupation. Every ‘demo’ onto the stage of history. But the suggestion that criticism demonstration was not political. Some of the militants is an excuse for endless schemes of petty tactics, sweep­ straight and simple only makes matters worse is a veneer there were angry enough to fight the police, and in re­ ing imperitives towards the masses and indulgent for the most negative of all possibilities—a demoralised sponse to the brazen escalation of imperialism, they had voyerism. The demonstration against the American in­ Left, silenced even from making public its dissatisfaction every right to be. But as a whole the demonstrators were vasion o f Cambodia was one o f a long line. David with itself. What way forward is there from that? aimless (with one exception, the IMG and VSC as we re­ Triesman is right to point this out. David Triesman does make some telling points. The ported, deliberately took over the leadership of the march But he is wrong to suggest that the demonstration origins of the Grosvenor Square Demos go back to the VSC to lead it into the Square via North Audley Street). Apart should not have been criticised. Nowhere does he defend battles in late ’67 and early ’68. However the ‘debacle’ from that the demonstrators shumbled into the square. the demonstration, it is true. He suggests instead that a that he insists on is not to be found in the eighteen David Triesman says we should not have expected critical analysis of it adds demoralisation to demoralisa­ months after the political failure of the October ’68 more. We demand more. Many of the demonstrators re­ tion, that only historical analysis and a practical alter­ march. The origins of that failure and its aftermath are to ject organisation and collective discipline, and still do. If native would justify our criticism. be uncovered in the period before the October march. they can rely on their political instincts, if the spontaneous This is salutary but still gets us nowhere. Of course the The Cambodian demonstration was a failure and we response of the most militant section of the left is collec­ only decisive and effective criticism is to build the said so. It seemed to Geoff Turner, whose letter was pub­ tive and combattive—then that might be a stronger and organisation and political direction that will ensure lished in the last issue of the Black Dwarf, that our criti­ more flexible weapon than full scale organisation. But successful, demonstrations. Of course a full analysis cism was that the demonstrators should have fought the this is not the case— is it? SCHOOL FREEDOM schools already have. Throughout to the laws of libel, obscenity etc. These demands are being publi­ their existence, SAU members have 2. The right to organise student meet­ cised in a number of different ways, DEMONSTRATE 12th JULY been victimised for merely trying to ings on school premises during firstly in Vanguard, the national exercise their rights such as publish­ school hours, during breaks and af­ magazine of the SAU, and secondly ing magazines in which they are able ter school without staff interference. through a demonstration which will We have received the following to criticise the running of their 3. The right to join a student union be taking place on Sunday 12th July communication from the Schools school, holding meetings on school and engage in political activity in­ at 2. 00p.m. starting at Camperwell Action Union. It has the Black premises to discuss the running of cluding the right to strike. Open Space, of the Old Kent Rd, and Dwarf’s full support: the school or on such issues as Viet­ These may not seem very revolu­ going to County Hall. Please help us "The Schools Action Union is at nam or Cambodia, or for expressing tionary, but they are to the highly by being on the demonstration and present engaged in a campaign their feelings against the dictatiorial oppressed school student and to the by fighting for the rights of ail school which is perhaps the most important authority of the headmaster (as the authorities. But more important, students. campaign we have launched so far, five members from Kingsdale were they lead on to the running of the For more information and copies and which is relevant to all school doing) school being in the hands of an elec­ of Vanguard at 6d each, please con­ student unions, not just the SAU. The Because of all these, it was felt to ted school council representing tact campaign could be called a "civil be imperative that we should fight students, teachers and all school SCHOOLS ACTION UNION rights” campaign, for we are fight­ for the following three demands: - staff, for it is only in this way that 160, North Gower St., ing for the rights which people out­ 1. The right to publish uncensored the headmaster will no longer be the London. N. W. 1. side the enclosed environment of the magazines and newspapers subject sole authority in the school. 01-387-5406. Black Dwarf July 7 1970 page 15

UNIQE H ISTORICAL Sitting in year after year(contd... ). M ATERIAL has been specially produced for the Lenin In Issue No. 34 we carried an It is worth looking at one of his all. Liberalism has been responsible Centenary year. examples both for its value in this for the failure of every revolutionary RECORDS attack by a political mili­ V.l. LENIN— Speeches tant on occupations as a argument and because it has been in­ movement in western Europe since sufficiently considered by the left. 1848. The continuing hegemony of recorded In 1919 and 1920 10” strategy within educational ‘‘The longest occupation to date— at capitalism and its institutions must LP. 22s6d institutions. Here we pub­ Hornsey— achieved precisely noth­ be ascribed to their ability to PAGES FROM V I. LENIN’S lish a reply to this by David ing, unless you count the melifluous recuperate anything short of revolu­ LIFE— Recollections of friends Page, a lecturer in General mumbles of sympathy from the cul­ tionary demands. This hegemony and fragments from works of tural establishment. ” But what hap­ rests squarely on the existence of literature and art. Set of two Studies at Hornsey College pened at Hornsey was not a tactic. liberalism as the perceived ideology 12" LP records in box. of Art. Page, whose con­ The vast majority of students were of the bourgeoisie. As an ideology it GOVORYAT NARKOMY tract has been terminated not committed, consciously and in ad­ is a form of false consciousness, rest­ (Narkomy Speaks): Lenin, at the end of this term, vance, to taking a certain step: ing not on theory but on a series of Krylenko, Lunarcharskii, etc. played a significant role in simply a large number of people in a abstract value judgements about the 10"LP. 22s6d meeting entirely accepted by the nature of society. Its immense power Ivanov: BRONEPOEZD 14-69 the Hornsey affair. authorities decided not to leave. lies in its ability to blind the mind to (Armoured Train 14-69) Set of 2 Like the puritan sects of religious his­ From then on it just grew, and can’t reality by creating a false 2"LPs in box. 60s. tory the left has an abrasive, some­ be compared with the highly conside­ community of ideals. AS a tool of the Lipovskii: V. times numbing, capacity to question red occupations at the LSE. Then ruling class it has been successful in MAYAKOVSKII— REVOLYUT- its own motives. Of course critical what is the nothing it achieved? Does containing the workers’ movement SIEI PRIZVANNYI (Mayakov- examination of the effect, or pro­ one judge in terms of the liberation by forming a common middle skii— Son of the Revolution) A bable effect, of this or that action is of individuals, the raising of con­ ground, by conditioning its members play. Set of 2 12" LPs in box. vital, but what does not help is confu­ sciousness, the achievement of con­ into accepting false problems and 60s. sion between theory and fact, and be­ crete political goals, or what false solutions. Mayakovskii: KHOROSHO— tween level and level. exactly? The very fact that it went Page’s liberalism must be seen in OKTYABRSKAYA POEMA The political militant who wrote on for 6 weeks made it a beacon its true colours as an ennervating (Good— An October Poem). Set about occupations in Dwarf 34 exhi­ which the other Art and Design col­ diversion from real issues. It is the of 2 10" LPs in box 55s bits characteristic confusions. The leges found it impossible to ignore. false friend of inadequate and un­ Shatrov, M: SHESTOE student left (he says) should not ex­ There was fierce discussion through­ certain pseudo-revolutionaries. Page I YU L Y A (6th of July) A play. pose itself unnecessarily, e. g. in out the sector. The staff and their is wrong if he thinks the bourgeoisie (M K H A T). Set of 3 LPs in box. occupations, and get clobbered: it union were radicalised along with incapable of fulfilling liberal de­ 90s should work away unobtrusively, the students, and the establishment mands. Over the last hundred years ANTHEM OF THE USSR and questioning the content of education; hurried away to do a rethink. When It has instituted a whole series of THE at the same time it should ignore the that comes out (The Summer- reforms in education, welfare and INTERN ATIONALE (Orchestr issue of academic freedom and leave son/Coldstream Report) in the work. There is little reason to I version) 7" 45 rpm. 10s. that to the liberals. There are some autumn, the argument will break out suppose that it will not go on doing REVOLUTIONARY SONGS (in serious contradictions here. Firstly, again. A whole process for making so. Liberalism is a jelly that absorbs Russian) by Soloists, if the left is to keep quite enough not people aware has been initiated. the force of anything short of total Ensembles and Choirs. 3 10" to be noticed it will not actually be Politically there were, it i s true, revolution. Revolutionaries can only records in box with booklet. there at all. Secondly, the Hornsey great losses. (Few people seem to avoid the deadly embrace of the 67s6d. affair was precisely an attack on realise that at Hornsey and Guild­ liberal Delilah by maximising their SELECTION OF SONGS OF educational content: this did not stop ford alone some 100 part-time and 15 demands. OUR COUNTRY (in Russian) it being smashed as a political plot. full-time staff were sacked or other­ Occupations must be accurately Soloists, Ensembles and Anyone who thinks that to ‘rebel wise disappeared in the last 2 years). situated in this perspective. Page Choirs. 3 x 10" records in box against their studies’ will not bring And yet this is a sort of strength: the claims that occupations are useful in 67s6d out the Inquisition had better think stubborn fight of the Guildford providing organisational experience FILMSTRIP again. Thirdly, the security of the sacked staff for reinstatement fol­ for militants, as a challenge to educa­ LENIN IN MOSCOW— Black & staff and student left on the campus lowed. It is likely that Surrey Educa­ tion, property and authority. He White, 65 frames. Deals with can only be guaranteed by these tion Committee will eventually have accuses me of an almost religious Lenin's activities between 1918 same weedy liberals and their ‘acade­ to capitulate to pressure from a coali­ purism in denying the efficacy of and 1923. Includes English mic freedom’. tion of educational unions (A T T I, occupations. My analysis was tough translation of captions. 14s6d Certainly the liberal concept N U T, NUS), and Trade Councils. precisely because it is the confusion BADGES academic freedom’ in practice And after Surrey, Haringey. A new engendered by liberalism that has Metal and enamel lapel badges camouflages a shoddy elitism: the weapon has been forged— clumsy, lead to the failure of occupations. portraying Lenin's head. 4 academically free are a minority perhaps, but potentially powerful. The drama of the occupation is a different designs. Each 1s6d. just large enough to produce the It is important to remember here play enacted on the stage of trained personal who can service and that half the students in full-time capitalism. It does not seek to smash maintain bourgeois society, and to education are not at Universities at this stage— the worthless property perpetuate the elite. But the crux all, but in authoritarian teacher train­ and content of bourgeois learning; it here is that there are two quite diffe­ ing colleges, or techs and colleges merely seeks to reform it. The rent things— liberal ideals, which stifled by parochial LEAs, where revolutionary left needs to preserve aren't despicable which are not defin­ ‘academic freedom’ cannot be preser­ a diamond hard edge to its theory to able and the miserable inability of ved because, under any meaning, it avoid being dragged blindly into con­ 66, Charing X Rd., London bourgeois society to fulfil these was never established in the first frontations based on false premises. W. C. 2. ideals. It is precisely by fighting for place. Certainly the sit-in is not al­ The response to the alienation of (open Saturdays 9. 30-6) an ideal and being disillusioned by ways the best tactic, but let us have these institutions seen in the fire- 39, Museum St., London W. C. 1. the reality that the liberal suddenly rather more clarity about objectives bombings at Essex, Keele and (Open Saturdays 10-4) wakes out of his sleep-walking. We and variable local conditions before Newcastle may be critised as pure should constantly encourage the we attempt conclusions. terrorism that ignores the problems A G IT P R O P IN F O R M A T IO N : will be ideal and point to the reality. David Page of mass organisation. But this re­ continuing as a political information Now for sit-ins/occupations. The sponse represents a deeply felt, sub­ centre during the summer months, in first objective is to generalisation— addition we wilt be maintaining a left Reply to David Page jective reaction. This romantic “bookshop” from 2 to 8 p. m. at 160 North all sit-ins are not one sit-in, some are nihilism with its rejection of liberal Gower St., London NW1 (01-387-5406) A appropriate and some are silly. Our David Page’s comments on my measures is the subjective motive sample copy of R E D N O T E S , our militant leaves out such positive article raise, yet again, the question force of the revolution. As Lefebvre monthly information newsletter, and the points as (1) a sit-in gives people a literature list, especially useful for of the place of liberalism in revolu­ states: the subjective revolt is now community organizers, are available brief but often vital experience of tionary strategy. Page supports an objective contradiction of s. a. e. running their own lives; (2) it en­ liberals in educational institutions be­ capitalism. Page’s gradulaism offers IS BOOKS: The most extensive range of ables them to create and experience cause of their educational and defen­ no real outlet to this violence: it revolutionary literature in London. Call, their own education, and (3) it is a sive role. He supports liberal ideas phone, or write (s. a. e. ) for full cata­ cannot unite it with an objective logue: 6 Cottons Gardens, London E. 2. 01- challenge to the property fetish and because they lead to a disillusion­ theory of social action. Despite 39-2639. the organisation of authority: there ment that may form the beginnings Page’s own undoubted committment IS BOOKS: Good prices offered for alt is a spiritual value in this challenge. of a revolutionary consciousness. his methods in practice at Hornsey books pamphlets, magazines of interest The draw-backs to sit-ins which he I attacked the use of liberal issues to revolutionary socialists. Left Book diverted the energy of the students Club editions urgently needed Phone or notes may be curcial arguments in as a means of raising consciousness into a maze of reformist goals. Most write 6 cottons E . 2. 01-739-2639. particular cases, but ‘the golden rule precisely because history shows this of them died of exhaustion some­ MAG’S WRITINGS: China Pamphlets, is that there is no golden rule. ’ to be the most dangerous tactic of where inside. Magazines, etc. Marx, Lenin. Discount: Post free. Lists (4d Stamp) From: D. Volpe, 114 Evering Rd, London N. 16. mags & papers little known but very valuable magazine, THE SPOKESMAN: Founded by one that can only be subscribed to—and Womens Liberation and the Bertrand Russell. Sum m er Issue now New Politics available. Includes Boramy & Caldwell ON THE BALL should be. 30/- a year, 20/- for students, from 14 SHEILA ROWBOTTOM on Cambodia; Murray & Wengraf on A little magazine, for subscribers only, South Hill Park Gardens, London NWS. From 127, Lower Marsh, SE1 Communications; Rowbotham on Revolu­ started publication this year. It is called, /6 plus 6d p&p tionary Love; Liggio on Japan; Boding- justifyably—Politics and Money, and ton on ‘il Manifesto’; Townsend & Field 1/3 off for a dozen or more. on Poverty. News, reviews, illustrations. each month it gives a politically informed FROM VIETNAM TO INDO-CHINA BRPF Publications, 45 Gamble St., economic analysis of a single problem; The journal of the VSC formerly cal­ Nottingham. 4/3d post free. such as the Common Market, or the out­ Office space available for left SOLIDARITY: (West London(; No. 4 look for Britain. led Vietnam has promptly and now out 10d pp or 10/- for 12 issues. Its first issue, now sold out, gave a rightly changed its name to Indo- wing printer or small group. Articles include: ‘Powellism’; Further general survey of the outlook for 1970 and China. Its first edition under its new Reply to P. O. Box 417, Black Education; Metal Box (acton) Vanishing in clear stringent language (though with an Dwarf, 36 Wardour St., W . 1. Voter Mystery; Expo’ 70 C.E.U. name has excellent piece on Laos Executive. Write M. Duncan, 15 Taylors one rather irritating archaicism) it pre- translated from Le Monde, an exten­ Green, East Acton, W.3. ducted the recession in the US economy, sive Vietnam bibliography, an TRUONG CHINH’S ‘Forward showed that the Nixon administration analysis of the press response to the Along the Path Chartered by could not avoid it because of its political Karl M arx' 3/- NGUYEN priorites, and spelt out the possible invasion of Cambodia, unmasking Black Dwarf the lackeys, and plenty of short GIAP’S ‘Vietnam Peoples War Printed by Larcular Ltd, 32 Paul St effects. Cautious and realistic, Politics London EC1 and Money explains in clear and simple items—a model of struggle and analy­ has Defeated U. S. war of terms problems that the bourgeoisie sis. Now it is going from duplicated Destruction’ 2/-. Pentrich Tri- Distribution Moore-Harness 11, Lever St covers over in the confusions of its own format into print, and needs finan­ continental, 63 Nottingham EC1, or phone 437. 9576. Road, Belper, Derbyshire. self-interests, while the Left all too often cial help. Subs, 7/6 for six issues Published by The Black Dwarf, 36, can only sh ot and posture. Neither facile from 182 Pentonville Road, London Posters, books and papers from Wardour St, London w1 nor pretentious, Politics and Money is a NW1 Korea, Vietnam and Cuba. Telephone 01. 437.9381 Black Dwarf July 7 1970 page 16 Sally Fraser Eton; 4th of June—see the wav the ruling class label their deckchairs. ANGUILLA—BRITAIN’S MOST EX­ humanity into ‘scientifically’ quantifi­ Red dresses or not, the homo­ BRITAIN RELEASES PENSIVE INVASION able and ‘objective’ terms”. sexuals had real grievances to beef POLITICAL PRISONER A week after Kent State and about. These were expressed with Inflation is world-wide, the cost of Cambodia, the psychiatrists had particular vehemence when one of The 1968 October 27th Dem o everything is going up, including the come to discuss business as usual. the psychs started demonstrating his seems to stay with us. Arguments price of invasions. An article on the But business as usual didn’t happen. shock treatment machines. This in­ about whether it was a victory or invasion of Anguilla has just appea­ The “shrinks” had hardly started volved showing slides of male nudes, a defeat for the Left continue. But red in the Financial Times. Their their agenda when a Women’s Libera­ during which the patient is given a there cannot be much doubt in the special correspondent applies the tion representative invaded the plat­ painful electric shock. Later he is mind of Tony Soares who had just very latest unit cost analysis. Balanc­ form and grabbed the mike. shown a slide of a female, and re­ completed serving a two year ing up the expensive logistics of get­ “I want to know what room the ceives no shock. gaol sentence for his part in the ting troops and police to the Carib­ women can have to meet together in, But the real target of the homo­ dem o. bean island and the money that Bri­ and I want to know now, ” she said. sexuals’ anger was Dr. Bieber, an He was accused of distributing tain is now investing in the develop­ The Chairman appeared not to “expert” on homosexuality. Shouted two leaflets (advertising the ment of the island’s roads and civic have heard. He called the next spea­ one of the homosexuals: “You are demo) which the prosecution buildings he concludes that the “cost ker. Another woman took the micro­ the pigs who make it possible for the claimed might have indlunced has probably been greater per capita phone: cops to beat homosexuals: they call people to riot (if the people had (about 6000) and per square mile “I don’t believe you heard, ” she us queer; you—so politely—call us rioted, which they didn’t). The (35) than for any other British com- said. “We want to know what room sick. But its the same thing. You parallels with the Peter Martin mittment oversead. ” Of course this we can have, and we want to know make possible the beatings and rape case are plain. Both men are includes the expense of subsidizing now. ” in prisons, you are implicated in the black and both of them were sen­ the islands economy so that another The women got their room. They al­ torturous cures perpetrated on de­ tenced to long terms of imprison­ invasion is not necessary in a few so got permission for Mario De sperate homosexuals. I’ve read your ment for handing out their opin­ year’s time. The islands only news­ Santos to read a Women’s Liberation book, Dr. Bieber, and if that book tal­ ions of roneoed pieces of paper. paper The Beacon has ambiguously statement to the conference. In it she ked about Black people the way it declared “The fact is that Anguillans said: talks about homosexuals, you’d be are grateful to our visitors for their “Women come to you suffering drawn and quartered and you’d de­ LIBERATION cheerful and practical help and we from depression. Women ought to serve it. ” feel they deserve a resounding pat on feel depressed with the roles society MEETING the back. ” puts on them.... Those roles aren’t “I never said homosexuals were With the development of the armed biological, they’re learned.... It star­ sick”, said Bieber. “I said they have struggle in Namibia (South West Africa) GAY LIBERATION ted when my mother threw me a doll displaced sexual adjustment. ” and the strengthening of the racist colla­ MEETS THE SHRINKS and my brother a ball. ” “That’s the same thing, mother­ boration between the new British Govern­ The shrinks found this hard enough fucker”, shouted the homosexuals. ment and the regimes in Portugal and In April of this year the Gay Libera­ to take, but chaos really broke out Pandemonium ensued. Homo­ South Africa, Namibia is of growing impor­ tion Movement invaded the National when Gay Liberation intervened. The sexuals started throwing paper aero­ tance. Until recently, there has been a ten­ Convention of the American Psychia­ homosexuals present had read all planes down from the balcony say­ dency for the country to be ignored, or to tric Association in San Francisco. about psychiatric theories on homo­ ing, “don’t fight us, fuck us. ” The be thought of as merely part of South They report that the main convention sexuality, and from their point of the chairman attempted to call order so Africa— a tactic which neatly suits the looked like a “refugee camp for view the psychiatrists “don’t know that a shrink called McConaghy apartheid regime, with their claims to Nixon’s silent majority”. It was 99 their elbows from their assholes” . So could read his paper. He was inter­ have incorporated the country into South percent white, straight, male, they grabbed the convention floor rupted by shouts of “vicious” and Africa, despite the condemnation of the middle-aged, upper middle class: microphone and started talking: “torture”. The straight psychiatrists UN and of progressive forces from all over “They are the insulated ones—sepa­ “We’ve listened to you long got increasingly up tight and en­ the world. rated in their immaculate garb, enough,” said a bearded homesexual raged. To counter the ignorance, and to stimu­ cars, country clubs, planes, expen­ called Konstantin, running around “They should be killed!” shouted late greater interest in Namibia, and in the sive hotels—protected from emo­ the hall in a bright red dress. “We’re one. struggle there, a Friends of Namibia Com­ tional involvement by a gibberishy fed up with being told we’re sick. “Give us back our air fare! ” mittee has been formed in London, follow­ vocabulary which translates We’re gay and proud. ” shouted another.... ing an initiative by the South West African Peoples Organisation, (SWAPO), which is conducting the liberation struggle in the SEX AND MEDITATION FOR THE GENERALS country. The Committee will seek to raise The Pentagon has begun the construc­ the level of consciousness about the situa­ tion of a $15, 000 paneled “meditation tion in the country, and to encourage the room” so that America’s Generals can raising of material support such as medical have an appropriate place to think supplies for the Namibian refugees. about the next world. Presumably, the The Friends of Namibia will be form­ rest of the five-sided building will con­ ally launched at a meeting on July 9th, at tinue to be dedicated to the destruc­ 7. 30pm in Conway Hall, Red Lion tion of this one. Our pictures, how­ Square, London, W. C. 2. Speakers at the ever, show that God is not the only meeting, will include Peter Hain, of Stop person that nation’s generals turn to the Seventy Tour, and also Moses Garoeb, when trying to escape from the diffi­ Administrative Secretary of the South culties of the Vietnam war. General West African Peoples Organisation, who is William C. Westmoreland, well known flying to England for a tour to help launch for his “search and destroy” strategy the organisation. in Indo-China under President John­ Further information is available from son, is here shown turning for comfort the Secretary of Friends of Namibia, Peter to fellow General Elizabeth P. Hellyer, at 54, Charteris Rd., London, Hoisington, director o f the U. S. WAC. N. 4 (tel/wk 01-799-3150)