The town was very busy, and the comrades were assisted by a
nearby street trader who, unprompted, announced their presence over his
public address system. About 400 election leaflets were distributed around the
town centre and several items of literature sold. The party got a good reception, in some
instances quite enthusiastic. The weather was problematic, being very windy.
Later it rained and the stall was packed up about 3pm.
We were also out in Oxford, basically testing spots for a
regular stall for the rest of the campaign but, as in Folkestone, the weather
wasn't on our side. All the same, four of us gave away leaflets at two
different places, one in Oxford East in the morning, the other in Oxford West
in the afternoon as well as investigating the pitch at Cowley Centre where TUSC
hold a regular weekly stall. They seem to want to live off Bob Crow's
reputation as both of the leaflets they were handing out carried his photo.
Passing through the main street in the centre (Cornmarket)
from our first pitch to the other we were surprised to come across some members
of the EDL handing out leaflets for their planned protest next Saturday against
"Muslim grooming gangs in Oxford" proclaiming "Control
immigration from Islamic countries for a start". Nobody was objecting,
though there was a discreet police presence not too far away presumably in case
they did. Instead of trying to kick their heads in we gave them a socialist
leaflet. The only political discussion we had in Oxford West was with someone
who said they were going to vote tactically LibDem to keep the Tories out. Work
that one out if you can.
Next stall is planned for Thursday 9 April at 5pm in the
city centre
“The issue is
Socialism versus Capitalism. I am for Socialism because I am for humanity.”
-Eugene Debs
Working people must vote together as a united class in
support of the Socialist Party, the party that represents them as a class, and
when they do, the state will pass into their hands and capitalism will fall;
private ownership will give way to social ownership, and production for profit
to production for use; the wage system will disappear, and with it the
ignorance and poverty, misery and crime that wage-slavery breeds.
The Socialist Party has declared class war upon the
capitalists and their system. We say: Arise, you workers! It is in your power
to put an end to this system. Wipe out the wage system, so that you can walk
this earth free men and women! We only know that the principles of socialism
are necessary to the emancipation of the working class. The attitude of the
Socialist Party toward the trade union movement broadly endorsing and
commending it, but stopping there, and allowing it to manage its own internal
affairs is, without doubt, the correct one, as any interference or meddling
must result in harm with no possible hope of good. The Socialist Party beseech
you to get in touch with your fellow workers and to become conscious of your
interests, your powers and your possibilities as a class. You need to know that
as long as you are indifferent, as long as you are apathetic and unorganised,
you will remain exactly where you are. You will be exploited; you will be degraded,
and you will have to beg for a job. You will get just enough for your slavish
toil to keep you in working order, and you will be looked down upon with scorn
and contempt by the very parasites that lives off your sweat and unpaid labour.
If you are to receive respect you have got to begin by
respecting yourself. Rise up from your knees. Turn your back on the corrupt
Labour Party and the still more corrupt Tory Party— both lackeys of the ruling
class. We say a party is either a capitalist party or it is a workers’ party.
If a party serves the capitalist exploiter it is at the expense of his
exploited victim, and if a party serves the exploited worker it is at the cost
of his or her economic master. As long as you permit the 1% to own the sources
and means of wealth, the tools of production, they will be in power. You will
be in servitude. You will produce the wealth and they will have it under
whatever government you may have. They will do nothing and you will have that –
nothing. The plutocrats now in power cannot rule honestly. They must rule
corruptly. They are in the minority. They have not the votes of their own to
put them in power, but they have the money with which to control the
electorate. They have the money with which to corrupt the politicians and to
buy the media. They have the power to do this because they have the money, and
they have the money because they own the means of production and distribution.
In the competitive system the politician sells himself to the highest bidder,
the same as the worker does. Who is the highest bidder? The corporations, of
course.
The working class have not yet learned how to unite and act
together. The capitalists are perfectly willing that you shall organise, as
long as you don’t do a thing against them; as long as you don’t do a thing for
yourselves. You cannot do a thing for yourselves without antagonising them. If
you continue to support a system in which you are degraded, then you have no
right to complain. You must submit to what comes, for you yourself are responsible.
As individuals you are helpless, but united you represent an irresistible
power.
And those on the vanguard Left would have us believe that
because we have no “intellectual” leaders we would have no movement. They seek
to be our shepherds and we are their flock of sheep, fit only to follow these
self-appointed saviours into the land of milk and honey. They do the thinking
and you do the voting. The average person imagines that he or she must have a
leader to look to; a guide to follow, right or wrong; that without a leader we
are lost and we therefore instinctively look to a leader. You have depended too much on that leader and
not enough on yourself. The Socialist Party don’t want you to follow us. We
want you to cultivate self-reliance and independence so that you rely only upon
yourselves. As long as you can be led by an individual you will be betrayed by
an individual. That does not mean that all leaders are dishonest or corrupt.
Some are sincere but still ignorant of capitalism themselves. The blind leading the blind. Perhaps, the
most dangerous leader is not the corrupt leader, but the honest, ignorant
leader who is just as fatal to your interests as the one who deliberately sells
you out for a paltry bribe.
The Socialist Party propose that society in its collective
capacity shall produce, not for profit, but in abundance to satisfy all human
wants. We are not going to destroy personal possessions. We are going to so
establish a society where person will have all the possessions necessary keep
him or her in comfort. Most people have little or no property of any kind
today. The 1% have got it all. They have dispossessed the people and it is our
position that when we get into power we will dispossess them in turn. On the
7th of May, on polling day, the time has come for you to use your brains in
your own interest. Your vote is your voice. Make it heard.
Your Candidates in
May 2015
Bill Martin - Islington North;
Danny Lambert – Vauxhall;
Brian Johnson - Swansea West;
Steve Colborn – Easington;
Kevin Parkin - Oxford East;
Mike Foster - Oxford West and Abingdon;
Robert Cox – Canterbury;
Andy Thomas - Folkestone and Hythe;
Howard Pilott - Brighton Pavilion;
Jacqueline Shodeke - Brighton Kemptown.
1 comment:
Is that STRUUGLE as in apfel struugle?
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