Grassroots social justice

Occasionally you happen upon a house like this, where the tiny frontage is used for awareness-raising, communication and the creation of opportunities to get involved - leaflets to take, notices to read, petitions to sign, plants to buy, a box for donations. One person in one space quietly driving their take on democracy and human rights.

Comments

[Paul Evans]

Not sure that we share a definition of 'quietly' here Kevin ;-)

Reminds me of The Road to Wigan Pier (quoting selectively):

"The typical Socialist is ... typically, a prim little man with a white-collar job, usually a secret teetotaller and often with vegetarian leanings, ... In addition to this there is the horrible—-the really disquieting—-prevalence of cranks wherever Socialists are gathered together. One sometimes gets the impression that the mere words ‘Socialism’ and ‘Communism’ draw towards them with magnetic force every fruit-juice drinker, nudist, sandal-wearer, sex-maniac, Quaker, ‘Nature Cure’ quack, pacifist, and feminist in England.

One day this summer I was riding through Letchworth when the bus stopped and two dreadful-looking old men got on to it. They were both about sixty, both very short, pink, and chubby, and both hatless. One of them was obscenely bald, the other had long grey hair bobbed in the Lloyd George style. They were dressed in pistachio-coloured shirts and khaki shorts into which their huge bottoms were crammed so tightly that you could study every dimple. Their appearance created a mild stir of horror on top of the bus. The man next to me, a commercial traveller I should say, glanced at me, at them, and back again at me, and murmured ‘Socialists’, as who should say, ‘Red Indians’. He was probably right-—the I.L.P. [Independent Labor Party-jj] were holding their summer school at Letchworth. But the point is that to him, as an ordinary man, a crank meant a Socialist and a Socialist meant a crank.

.... This kind of thing is by itself sufficient to alienate plenty of decent people. And their instinct is perfectly sound, for the food-crank is by definition a person willing to cut himself off from human society in hopes of adding five years on to the life of his carcase; that is, a person out of touch with common humanity."

[Kevin Harris]

Thanks Paul. Much as we might admire him, this is a fine example of how value-ridden Orwell's writing could be. Where for example does the phrase 'dreadful-looking old men' come from? Doesn't he make you want to ask 'Who do you think you are, pronouncing on people like this?'

[twitter.com/TheOdikro]

I think that socialism has its own poachers. I think this has been the case right from the beginning. Almost everyone who senses a contradiction with the official society is driven to its most effective alternative: socialism.

Karl Marx himself saw the kind of interpretations being put on his writings even before he died and cried out, "I am not a Marxist!" That does not mean that everything is right with the system, all its critics cranks!

You do not expect rebels against the system to be all dressed up like some banksters from the City! By the way when did the appearances begin to matter more than social justice?

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Nana Akyea Mensah, TheOdikro.

ana Akyea Mensah

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