Workers' Power 2011: National conference of the Workers Party
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4 Replies to “Workers' Power 2011: National conference of the Workers Party”
I’m looking for an alternative party to vote for in the 2011 election. Though I like most of your policies, I am confused by the by-line in this poster “Maori Oppression”. I presume you mean the oppression of the country *by* Maori rather than the reverse. Treaty claims are absolutely necessary to address past wrongs but the result has been a burden on all New Zealanders (Maori included) through the tax take and the need to pay reparations to iwi. The inequalities expreienced by Maori today reflect those of other New Zealanders- the rich Maori Trusts are witholding the help treaty payments could give to their own people- the same as all Kiwis suffer under the heel of a heartless government. I have seen Maori culture diffused almost through the country in a manner that oppresses other cultures. I have seen non-Maori women oppressed by Maori tikanga because they are women. All citizens in this country are New Zealanders and no one culture should be forced on another. To do this is oppression. To suggest otherwise is offensive to non-Maori New Zealanders and a slight on the history of the country which is much less ‘cut and dried’ as many have been led to believe. Be wary of politicised History on both sides and read the primary documents before making party policy relating to past events.
Hello
I can’t resist giving you my two cents.
I haven’t blogged for some time but I’ve been thinking and reading. A while ago one of your posts was explaining to some youth about the workers party and marxism and among the comments was some thing like a shining light will come down and the world will see the evil capitalists and all revert to loving marxists but I couldn’t see at what point a democratic system would allow a marxist revolution to take place. This bugged me so I put my considerable brain power to seeking an answer to this question ‘how to create a marxist revolution in a democratic system.
My answer is to surrender.
At present the entire thinking space has been captured by the capitalist idea. Every argument put up is against a capitalist backdrop or frame. When a unionist fights fights for more pay or a left politician defends the working class it is within a framework of capitalism. The unionist will say we are more productive so we deserve more pay or the politician says we must provide a net for those who fail or fall from the capitalist ladder or treadmill, but each of these are just prolonging the existence of the capitalist structure.
By fighting for more pay the unionist allows the worker to just keep going against the rising cost of living and the politician keeps the unwanted from starving but at the same time, even though the unionist and left politician are preventing social and economic collapse they are blamed by the capitalist for inhibiting growth. The same growth that is supposed to pay for pay rises and welfare in the future.
This is why I think surrender is the best option. If the day after the election and Don Brash is the owner of 5% and National 50% then every worker on a collective contract and every left leaning/socialist politician and unionist should surrender.
They should hand over their collective contracts or give up their seat, those in the media and in environmental defense groups should do the same. It should be a total surrender as the war has been lost.
At that point all those who surrender would become prisoners and give up their freedom and opinion. The right would have total victory with no opposition left, anything they wanted to do they could. It would be like an army with it’s prisoners, any order the workers were given by their bosses they would do, any story the government wanted told the media would tell.
This could be taken to an extreme with people charged with crimes asking the prosecutor in court how to plead. At every point the prisoners would ask those in charge how to act.
This does not mean the prisoners would stay inactive, like any prisoner of war camp escapes would be made, most likely to australia, but the most important thing that would be done would be to document who robbed who and who destroyed the environment for their own gain. This will be of value latter.
With no opposition there would naturally be no democracy any elections would be amongst like and any person or party who stood up to represent the worker or environment would be treated like a traitor working for the guards.
No democracy would initially suit certain people like Don Brash and Jerry Brownlee as they oppose it anyway. The country would be their’s to mold, their friends could act as they wished. They could fire workers at will, cut their wages and push woman and children out into the work force and into poverty. They could sell all the state assets and land to the highest bidder or their friends and live their dream of an economy unencumbered by the fiscal drag of welfare or unionism.
Naturally though capitalism eats it’s children (think of the period from 1990 to 1999). In it’s pursuit of it’s eternal 8% it would demand more pay cuts, more sacrifice, coal and water, trees and national parks and in the end there would still not be enough for welfare or pay rises no matter how high the GDP growth.
In the past the right would blame the unionist or environmentalist for the economic problems and want more personal responsibility for the crime and violence. Finally a left leaning government would be re-elected who would patch up the cracks to the point where the right could take back power and again save and prolong the capitalist system but in this prison there would be no left, no-one would save the right no-one would save the capitalist
So there you have reached the point where democracy has long gone, people are escaping for other countries and the gap between the rich elite and the rest has grown to the scale of lets say Egypt or Syria. At that point when the people rise up with only the idea of change would you have any hope of injecting marxist though into the tiny space of hope that people have.
It is only at the exact point where people want change and change happens that you have any chance of creating your marxist state. Democracy would still not exist in the form it does now for if the coin toss falls in your favour the new democratic state that emerges could form in the newly created marxist space with ideas framed by your marxist ideology.
So there you have it. My blue print for a Marxist revolution within a capitalist democratic space. You must first surrender not because the oppositions ideas are better or that you doubt your own but like a New Zealand soldier surrendering to the Nazis when they were surrounded or out of ammunition. They gave up as the physical battle was lost not because they accepted Nazism.
Any attempt through the current system is nothing more than a bandage stopping it from bleeding to death from it’s cannibalistic tendencies.
So surrender and let it die.
Very christian if I say so myself, p.s. you should read Brash’s 2025 report from a capitalist space there are some good ideas combined with the tax reform committee that could cause some trouble for the right.
Cheers
from person trapped in the no space between left and right
WTF – So the jews, gypsies and Jehova Wittnesses were right to surrender first their liberties then their lives to the nazis’ ? Were the socialists, communists and anarchists were wrong because they opposed first capitalism and then fascism publicly intill it was illegal to do so and privately untill their deaths?
That is no “…blue print for a Marxist revolution within a capitalist democratic space. Funny you bring up the christian concept of surrender makes me wonder wether it the revelation or the revolution you are waiting for. The history of humanity is the history of class struggle, so when revolution succeeds in true social and economice emancipation history is over.
Kind of like your christion concept of the second coming of christ, end of the world that is why today many christians delight in earthquakes, wars and reumors of wars, plages and moral abdonomations because that it prophesized to happen just before their redeemer returns to save the believers,kill and torture those who did not believe for all eternity.
Perhaps this is why so many churches pursue such a conservative political line because they want capitalist exploitation imperialism and war because it brings the world closer inline with end of the world prophesy so they can finnally stop feeling so pissed off at socialists and they can live in heaven knowing that the believers of ‘both individual and collective salvation of man is through the working class’ are burning in hell beneath them a bit like the jews and communists in hitlers gas chambers.
In fact intill the decline of fascism many christians probably thought nazi germany was heaven on earth because there was law and order, no unions, no protests, no one who questioned the infalability of their hitler god and they obeyed (surrenderd to) his commands lest the be like those whos seeds were sowen by the devil (Marx?) and burned in the hellish gas chambers.
Seriously though when I studied bourgios political science even they taught that the old theory of revolutions occuring only when life is as miserable as possible is not the case. A revolution is more likely when large networks exist within the working class and the people expect or even believe that things are going to get better continue to improve but they dont. Which is why all the talk about raising our horrizons often I assume alot of you did not know that.
Parliament is not the way to achieve democratic socialism. Socialist stand for parliament that they may get a platform to spread there views further not to participate in the capitalist administration of a capitalist economy.
Rather socialist create or join and built the institutions of the working class and it is through these workingclass institutions that the democratic revolutionary transformation would take place. Yes a bourgios parliamentary majority tho possible is unlikely.
However you must give up illusions of democracy eminating out of bourgois institutions because what class does this institution represent?
Who formed the New Zealand parliament and under what conditions? Who do MPs give their oath to? And what types of institutions and nations has this parliament made long term capitalist oaths, treaties and agreements?
However you are right about many reforms put foward and fort for do ammount to a bandage on the system but workers fight back because they need to stay alive intill others agree. Just surrendering so other people will see how bad things are would not work. As for ammunition well the pen is mightier than the swoard and the marxist educated worker is mightier than the isolated worker educated or or not but traped within the confines of bourgios thought and capitalist reality.
The Unions have traditionally focused too much on wages alone but that is precisely why capitalism permits them to exist as a tool to ensure that capitalists pay just enuf so that the more skilled workers wont all quit and the less skilled earn enuf to survive and still be physically and mentally able to work.
Whats different about the WP and Unite is that they fight for working class solidarity. I dont know that much about Unite but I like what I see and hear and was impressed by their organiser I met half a dozen years ago not long after Unites inception.
Unionizing the un unionisable. The teenagers, part-time and fast food workers.
So if Unite has already achieved the impossible…
…imagine what would happen if that spirit were to take seed in the engineers, FSWU and the yet to be developed working class institutions. If that were the case the only surrender you would be talking about is that of the last vestiges of capitalist and criminal nazi(gang) counter revolution.
Was your post a joke? I have taken anti-depresents in the past when I thought things were as lost as you seem to Kiki
I’m looking for an alternative party to vote for in the 2011 election. Though I like most of your policies, I am confused by the by-line in this poster “Maori Oppression”. I presume you mean the oppression of the country *by* Maori rather than the reverse. Treaty claims are absolutely necessary to address past wrongs but the result has been a burden on all New Zealanders (Maori included) through the tax take and the need to pay reparations to iwi. The inequalities expreienced by Maori today reflect those of other New Zealanders- the rich Maori Trusts are witholding the help treaty payments could give to their own people- the same as all Kiwis suffer under the heel of a heartless government. I have seen Maori culture diffused almost through the country in a manner that oppresses other cultures. I have seen non-Maori women oppressed by Maori tikanga because they are women. All citizens in this country are New Zealanders and no one culture should be forced on another. To do this is oppression. To suggest otherwise is offensive to non-Maori New Zealanders and a slight on the history of the country which is much less ‘cut and dried’ as many have been led to believe. Be wary of politicised History on both sides and read the primary documents before making party policy relating to past events.
Hello
I can’t resist giving you my two cents.
I haven’t blogged for some time but I’ve been thinking and reading. A while ago one of your posts was explaining to some youth about the workers party and marxism and among the comments was some thing like a shining light will come down and the world will see the evil capitalists and all revert to loving marxists but I couldn’t see at what point a democratic system would allow a marxist revolution to take place. This bugged me so I put my considerable brain power to seeking an answer to this question ‘how to create a marxist revolution in a democratic system.
My answer is to surrender.
At present the entire thinking space has been captured by the capitalist idea. Every argument put up is against a capitalist backdrop or frame. When a unionist fights fights for more pay or a left politician defends the working class it is within a framework of capitalism. The unionist will say we are more productive so we deserve more pay or the politician says we must provide a net for those who fail or fall from the capitalist ladder or treadmill, but each of these are just prolonging the existence of the capitalist structure.
By fighting for more pay the unionist allows the worker to just keep going against the rising cost of living and the politician keeps the unwanted from starving but at the same time, even though the unionist and left politician are preventing social and economic collapse they are blamed by the capitalist for inhibiting growth. The same growth that is supposed to pay for pay rises and welfare in the future.
This is why I think surrender is the best option. If the day after the election and Don Brash is the owner of 5% and National 50% then every worker on a collective contract and every left leaning/socialist politician and unionist should surrender.
They should hand over their collective contracts or give up their seat, those in the media and in environmental defense groups should do the same. It should be a total surrender as the war has been lost.
At that point all those who surrender would become prisoners and give up their freedom and opinion. The right would have total victory with no opposition left, anything they wanted to do they could. It would be like an army with it’s prisoners, any order the workers were given by their bosses they would do, any story the government wanted told the media would tell.
This could be taken to an extreme with people charged with crimes asking the prosecutor in court how to plead. At every point the prisoners would ask those in charge how to act.
This does not mean the prisoners would stay inactive, like any prisoner of war camp escapes would be made, most likely to australia, but the most important thing that would be done would be to document who robbed who and who destroyed the environment for their own gain. This will be of value latter.
With no opposition there would naturally be no democracy any elections would be amongst like and any person or party who stood up to represent the worker or environment would be treated like a traitor working for the guards.
No democracy would initially suit certain people like Don Brash and Jerry Brownlee as they oppose it anyway. The country would be their’s to mold, their friends could act as they wished. They could fire workers at will, cut their wages and push woman and children out into the work force and into poverty. They could sell all the state assets and land to the highest bidder or their friends and live their dream of an economy unencumbered by the fiscal drag of welfare or unionism.
Naturally though capitalism eats it’s children (think of the period from 1990 to 1999). In it’s pursuit of it’s eternal 8% it would demand more pay cuts, more sacrifice, coal and water, trees and national parks and in the end there would still not be enough for welfare or pay rises no matter how high the GDP growth.
In the past the right would blame the unionist or environmentalist for the economic problems and want more personal responsibility for the crime and violence. Finally a left leaning government would be re-elected who would patch up the cracks to the point where the right could take back power and again save and prolong the capitalist system but in this prison there would be no left, no-one would save the right no-one would save the capitalist
So there you have reached the point where democracy has long gone, people are escaping for other countries and the gap between the rich elite and the rest has grown to the scale of lets say Egypt or Syria. At that point when the people rise up with only the idea of change would you have any hope of injecting marxist though into the tiny space of hope that people have.
It is only at the exact point where people want change and change happens that you have any chance of creating your marxist state. Democracy would still not exist in the form it does now for if the coin toss falls in your favour the new democratic state that emerges could form in the newly created marxist space with ideas framed by your marxist ideology.
So there you have it. My blue print for a Marxist revolution within a capitalist democratic space. You must first surrender not because the oppositions ideas are better or that you doubt your own but like a New Zealand soldier surrendering to the Nazis when they were surrounded or out of ammunition. They gave up as the physical battle was lost not because they accepted Nazism.
Any attempt through the current system is nothing more than a bandage stopping it from bleeding to death from it’s cannibalistic tendencies.
So surrender and let it die.
Very christian if I say so myself, p.s. you should read Brash’s 2025 report from a capitalist space there are some good ideas combined with the tax reform committee that could cause some trouble for the right.
Cheers
from person trapped in the no space between left and right
WTF – So the jews, gypsies and Jehova Wittnesses were right to surrender first their liberties then their lives to the nazis’ ? Were the socialists, communists and anarchists were wrong because they opposed first capitalism and then fascism publicly intill it was illegal to do so and privately untill their deaths?
That is no “…blue print for a Marxist revolution within a capitalist democratic space. Funny you bring up the christian concept of surrender makes me wonder wether it the revelation or the revolution you are waiting for. The history of humanity is the history of class struggle, so when revolution succeeds in true social and economice emancipation history is over.
Kind of like your christion concept of the second coming of christ, end of the world that is why today many christians delight in earthquakes, wars and reumors of wars, plages and moral abdonomations because that it prophesized to happen just before their redeemer returns to save the believers,kill and torture those who did not believe for all eternity.
Perhaps this is why so many churches pursue such a conservative political line because they want capitalist exploitation imperialism and war because it brings the world closer inline with end of the world prophesy so they can finnally stop feeling so pissed off at socialists and they can live in heaven knowing that the believers of ‘both individual and collective salvation of man is through the working class’ are burning in hell beneath them a bit like the jews and communists in hitlers gas chambers.
In fact intill the decline of fascism many christians probably thought nazi germany was heaven on earth because there was law and order, no unions, no protests, no one who questioned the infalability of their hitler god and they obeyed (surrenderd to) his commands lest the be like those whos seeds were sowen by the devil (Marx?) and burned in the hellish gas chambers.
Seriously though when I studied bourgios political science even they taught that the old theory of revolutions occuring only when life is as miserable as possible is not the case. A revolution is more likely when large networks exist within the working class and the people expect or even believe that things are going to get better continue to improve but they dont. Which is why all the talk about raising our horrizons often I assume alot of you did not know that.
Parliament is not the way to achieve democratic socialism. Socialist stand for parliament that they may get a platform to spread there views further not to participate in the capitalist administration of a capitalist economy.
Rather socialist create or join and built the institutions of the working class and it is through these workingclass institutions that the democratic revolutionary transformation would take place. Yes a bourgios parliamentary majority tho possible is unlikely.
However you must give up illusions of democracy eminating out of bourgois institutions because what class does this institution represent?
Who formed the New Zealand parliament and under what conditions? Who do MPs give their oath to? And what types of institutions and nations has this parliament made long term capitalist oaths, treaties and agreements?
However you are right about many reforms put foward and fort for do ammount to a bandage on the system but workers fight back because they need to stay alive intill others agree. Just surrendering so other people will see how bad things are would not work. As for ammunition well the pen is mightier than the swoard and the marxist educated worker is mightier than the isolated worker educated or or not but traped within the confines of bourgios thought and capitalist reality.
The Unions have traditionally focused too much on wages alone but that is precisely why capitalism permits them to exist as a tool to ensure that capitalists pay just enuf so that the more skilled workers wont all quit and the less skilled earn enuf to survive and still be physically and mentally able to work.
Whats different about the WP and Unite is that they fight for working class solidarity. I dont know that much about Unite but I like what I see and hear and was impressed by their organiser I met half a dozen years ago not long after Unites inception.
Unionizing the un unionisable. The teenagers, part-time and fast food workers.
So if Unite has already achieved the impossible…
…imagine what would happen if that spirit were to take seed in the engineers, FSWU and the yet to be developed working class institutions. If that were the case the only surrender you would be talking about is that of the last vestiges of capitalist and criminal nazi(gang) counter revolution.
Was your post a joke? I have taken anti-depresents in the past when I thought things were as lost as you seem to Kiki