Just WTF Corbynistas and Trots ???

Right I haven't blogged for a while as to be honest couldn't think of anything I particularly wanted to blog about but recent events have been winding me up a tad and there are a few things I would like to get off my chest.  As we all know the post #Brexit referendum fallout has precipitated a leadership election in the Labour party as indeed it did in the Tory Party before.  While the Tories managed to achieve this somewhat bloodlessly Labour seem intent on tearing themselves to pieces over it to the extent that it looks like it is becoming an existential threat.

As part of this leadership election process the respective candidates Owen Smith and Jeremy Corbyn have been taking part in debates, meetings and rallies as part of the hustings process.  All very well and good. If we must have a leadership election, which by the way I don't think that we should, then these are the sort of events the candidates should be having.

Last Friday Jeremy Corbyn organised events in Merthyr Tydfil and Swansea the town of my birth and where I still have lots of family and friends and the city where I currently reside. From my contacts on social media I could see that the Merthyr event had gone well with a carnival celebratory atmosphere.  With that information in mind I looked forward to attending the evening event in Swansea.

I was not disappointed. There was an excellent turnout and a great feeling to the event. Lots of old friends and comrades were there such as Phil White, Tyrone O'Sullivan and @llanelliriots so it was great to catch up with some really good people who for years gave been grassroots activists in the area. Both Tyrone and Jeremy Corbyn spoke at the event.  Both are leaders in their own way but they both talked about that this election and socialism in general is not about leaders but it is about mutualism and establishing a grassroots movement that takes everybody in the community along with it.

My mate Tyrone :-)

Unsurprisingly for such an event a number of us who were attending stared to Tweet and post on social media as to what a positive experience it was. Oh if we did !! As soon as our tweets and other postings went out they started to climb out of the social media woodwork. The doubters, the naysayers and the downright nasty and offensive, who mostly hide behind anonymous twitter accounts.  They had comments like "they are all just a bunch of commies and Trots" or they are a "cult" following their "great leader". At the very least they were saying "we had rallies like this with Michelle Foot in the 1980s and that didn't bring us electoral success."

 Now I am long enough in the tooth and thick skinned enough to expect such sneering from Tory supporters or those not sympathetic to Labour but many of these detractors claimed to be Labour??!! This is what was quite simply beyond me.  It was a good event where like minded people were able to come together and share ideas.  I heard some very good discussions going on on the night and it was great to have the opportunity to take part. I'm not saying that such events in themselves are going to win the general election for Labour and anyone that does is simply deluded but what planet of negativity are people on who simply decry such events and mock and deride those who attend? Anyway, it was not a general election focused event it was a Labour leadership event primarily aimed at those who are already Labour supporters.

If you ask me socialism is about, mutuality, fraternity and solidarity, it is about realising that the greatest strength of the human race is its ability to act as a society not just as a collection of individuals pursing their own interests. If people feel there is no value to us all coming together and sharing ideas and thoughts then I am sorry but in my eyes they are not socialists.

Remember the Children of Oradour-sur-Glane

I do not normally watch the “topical debate” TV which is on on a Sunday morning but this morning for some strange reason I did.  Tony Blair was on the programme, the former Labour Prime Minister of the UK.  While not a massive fan of the man due to his Iraq  policies and various other reasons he is probably the Labour Prime Minister that I have had the most time for during my life time and when the interview came round to the topic of the European Union I found myself agreeing  with everything he said.

As I have said before many in the UK unfortunately are reluctant Europeans and we have suffered for it in the past and unless we change our attitude toward The Union I fear we will suffer for it in the future. There does seem to be in the UK very little stomach for the European project with the general feeling “what’s in it for us”.

I would have thought that one very quick look at history might at the very least give a hint as to what use the EU has been to the people of Europe.  Just cursory look through the pages of wars in Europe (http://bit.ly/WBy0PE ) would show that post 1945, particularly Western Europe, has been relatively conflict free.  From its nascent beginnings at the post war 1948 Hague Conference surely this co-operation between the nations of Europe has contributed to this long period of relative peace.

Europe the continent has produced some amazing achievements, but the blight of the continent has been conflict and war. Throughout the various European countries towns like Pisa, Arras, Exeter, Swansea, Coventry, Dresden and Berlin, among others,  have paid a terrible price not just in the precious lives of their inhabitants but also in the destruction of culture, history and the ethereal soul of those communities that many are still struggling to recover from.

While it is true that  towns on the UK mainland such as Coventry, Plymouth and London experienced extensive bombing and human misery but many towns and cities of mainland Europe experienced the sheer trauma of occupation and often the accompanying atrocities. If in any doubt just think what happened in Oradour-sur-Glane and that was just one town in one war.  The history of European war is unfortunately littered with such stories.