A Small Bit Of Riot Stuff: A lot of Economic History

So yeah London and some other cities got into a bit of a scuffle with themselves lately, funny stuff that, anyway here is my bit on it, or rather my bit on what other little bits have said with a caveat of my own views on the matter.

So everyone has been rather dickish about these riots, calling for moderation in considering the implications and causes of the riots, and some right wingers have done the usual press buttons of how evil and scummy it all was.

So, firstly with the right: Grow the fuck up, almost everything in society comes down to basic matters of culture and the economy, if it did not then why the fuck would we devote any time fretting about it, this was obviously in part due to socio economic conditions and a vacuousness of any defining code other than consumerism, consumerism allots no room for self decency or the rule of law, its about getting what satisfies you, simple as. As for economics, well, a massive crash caused by unrestrained financial capitalism that has ruined the lives of many followed by austerity cuts that will make the ability to gain those Material goods all the harder? I am not saying riots are the necessary outcome but did you honestly not see some degree of social unrest? Honestly its like you think you can fuck over people endlessly with no negative connotations and that all arguments against your beliefs are all wedged in your failure to properly present rather than the possibility of some deeper flaw to your economic beliefs. You made this problem, stop propogating such wild forms of capitalism if you want any kind of responsibility in society because capitalism, the rule of self aquisition of rescources has a odd manner of universalising itself.

As for the Left: I don't have too many problems, obviously, i am one of you, but yes we don't have to condone the rioters but to stop this happening we must address certain conditions. But there is one thing that is pissing me off, a lot of self styled "radical centrists" (often liberals who want to sound all like they are above the partisan divide) go on along the lines of: "Yes both the left and right have elements of truth in them, I mean socio economic conditions but its not the whole truth...." and this is beginning to get wearing. Because ultimately there isn't anything else, there links to all of this the underlying route of capitalism and how it has remade society in its image over the last couple of centuries in particular, excluding blips.

So firstly economics: This is the be all and end all because scarcity and the concentration of resources define all societies and political systems and this has been the case since the inception of the human race. All our societies gravitate around the needs of the economics of the time. Firstly the tribal system was basically communist because there was no real capital, there was no reason for one member to establish any kind of private property simply because there was nothing to have a stake in that would outweigh the advantages of mutual-ism. I could hoard my berries i collected, or the hut i built for the summer, but where was the use in that? That hut was only there for the summer until we moved, and i would have to devote my time not to just berry foraging but hunting and weaving and all the other tasks which would probably result in me getting less overall as a result, nothing required vast amounts of time to make and there was next to no complexity so as long as everyone had a role there was no point in making artificial barriers that would only delay the rate of resource distribution.

Agriculture changed a lot of this, and from it we can see how powerfully societies diverge here due to simple economics of geography. Firstly this is were we first need a sense of private ownership: Crops take months to grow, and they require start-up investment: House, Granaries etc. They also required a greater division of labour as farms required all manner of tools and items to improve productivity, like shovels and rakes and pots for an increasing variety of products. And this created a greater division of labour as metal was needed on an increasingly large scale and concentrations of artisans were needed for the construction of goods needed for farming, all of this were tantalising targets for the groups that were still tribes and so eventually the farming communities required protection and so we see an increasing size of the population not directly working for the means of their own survival. Private property then was not created as a matter of nature but as a need to ensure that the scarce resources of our system were managed efficiently: Or at least more efficiently than doing nothing.

As early as this we see common scenarios in distant but geographically similar societies. Major agricultural societies based along large fertile rivers like the Nile and the Yellow River became increasingly controlled by a group of bureaucrats who managed massive operations of irrigation, which in turn required massive projects to create supporting transport operations for both goods and labour and many other specialists like doctors. In these societies the bureaucracies elevate themselves to the position of godlike figures as a means of cementing their rule with alarmingly similar religions though these cultures have no direct knowledge of one another. Meanwhile areas like Greece where fertile, open land was more spread out religion was more of a guiding philosophy and the elites became competitive, because these areas were harder to control than concentration fertile regions. We see this as time goes forward, China developed a Celestial Empire vision, their leader is God, and he politically controls the country with a totalitarian fist, which is in turn used to fund massive projects such as the building of the Yangtze canals and Great Wall, both important in different ways. Meanwhile in Europe what developed is a large amount of regional strong men in almost constant competition with one another, they too have a Leader as an almost living god, the Pope, but his power is far more discreet and is often put into repute should certain leaders become too strong. Yes there were churches in every town, but there were many heretics, like the Duellists in South France where I am currently based and later on Reformists and Protestants. All competing philosophies that put challenge to the central authority. Out of this China became a very strict hierarchy system with bureaucrats and the emperor at the top strictly managing the regime. Europe on the other hand developed into a flowing mess of Duchy's, Kingdoms, Dietetics, Principalities, Procterates and Merchant Republics. All with different competing elites that created many small towns and forts, very little standardisation but a lot of laws and pledges and guarantees to one another as a means of creating trust, as trust is essential for any kind of transaction to take place. There is nothing more telling than marriage in this system, as often it was used as a monetary transaction with dowry's,.

What I am trying to get at here is that most of society is largely based upon how our we get our daily bread, and everything else. In the beginning of our history we were at the mercy of our surroundings and so our systems developed accordingly. Its not perfect, but there are historical trends. China never expanded that far south, North or West because all those positions were hard to navigate and consequently became impractical to a centralised authority to govern. We live in an age of course where we have many tools and a lot more hindsight and knowledge to construct our society in a way that is better than the bare minimum of what we are given, and we should certainly aim to do so. But what we have to understand is that anything that occurs within society is a product of the economics of our society firstly, and all other consequences follow accordingly.

We modelled our resource management on a system of supply and demand that we believed could be managed by market forces, which would always balance themselves out. This belief has lead politicians and many people to believe then that what is moral is to simply give the people what they ask for, and what they ask for is always where their money, or their time is. This has lead over time to a rush to the lowest common denominator. You want to know why some riots happened? Its because systems don't balance themselves out in the end, people get richer because some people were smart enough to exploit a free system and then passed that money down to their children who weren't nearly as smart but got a brilliant education and a lot of high level contacts to ease them through life and keep their wealth tap strong. It happened because we catered to the worst excesses of human kind, greed, and populism and vitriol that is spouted out from tabloids  and advertisements and shitty comedy films every day. Are we so surprised to find out that people then act in a base and greedy way?

You get what you give I suppose.

Class and the lack of.

As i have made my way through the political blogosphere i have begun to notice certain things. Most importantly is how terribly middle class it is, oh sure, there is a left right divide, and there are some really smart people out there who knows where it is at, but when it comes to class, and all those areas that surround it, there is a genuine lack of real knowledge by experience.

Oh the right i grant its ridiculous, i mean most of those people have never seen a poor man, and those who have, have probably seen the extreme rural poor of South America or Africa, and this tends to mean they over-right the grievances of the poor at homes for they often do not realize the bleakness of estate existence and the strange kind of intelligence that it brings.

On the left however it is almost as bad, these people are not anti poor, but they certainly don't know what it is like to be in that position most of the time. Claiming benefits one day is not enough to understand it, because its not just about having poor income which too many people on the left fail to understand. This is worrying because it reduces our arguments firstly to abstract, and when things become abstract there is almost no point in arguing over it intellectually because all arguments can quickly become esoteric.

I am not much better, i am of middle class stock, but i lived in small houses most of my life, and i went to a proper state school, one that wasn't on the up but a ten year slump, and one which has spawned a lot of amazing music because of its heavy mix of working class kids, second generation immigrants and a sprinkling of the white middle classes, i but a lot of that cultural mixing for the successes of Hot Chip and the XX in recent years. I genuinely became friends with working class people, for many years, and although it might seem matter of factual to many, i still think it might be worth putting up a bit of what i learned.

1. Everyone knows people one way or another, i met people several estates over who could make links to friends of mine, the whole "say my name and they wont touch you" stuff actually worked. There is a huge emphasis on who knows who and because of this an estate is a highly socialized environment, as i suppose you may expect from such a lifestyle, but while middle class friends might have friends of friends that you can herald too, it is not the same as the smaller world that are these estates.

2. Look them in the eye and be honest, unless you don't know them and your on the street in which case avoid all contact. Okay first part. The whole middle class trying not to notice stuff has a major inferiority effect on a lot of people, it makes it look like you think your better than them, and almost all working class people believe that a little bit, they do feel inferior. And if you handle matters badly you will get words. So first things first, if there is some nicety you don't want to bring up with someone just say it, because they can tell your thinking something that isn't too nice and not talking is treating them like an idiot. On the other hand if this is someone you don't know on the street, don't make eye contact, especially if he is in the 13 to 19 bracket as it feels to them like your seriously disapproving of them. And there is a good chance that its gonna make them react, badly.

3. Arguments are fleeting. Obviously don't make anything an issue of respect or such, but remember that at times it might be better to get a bit loud and proud with this person. Its not that it will necessarily resolve the issue but they might get a bit of respect for you and its not gonna be held as a grudge anyway. So if its going that way over something silly, don't back down because you look like someone who doesn't deserve respect and push on because it wont be held against you later. So long as you don't go around looking for fights.

4. Be direct. All that word play bullshit from the middle class way of doing things doesn't count for shit here. You may as well say exactly what you think, how you think. Anything else just sounds like waffle and if there is one thing we learn from politics is that the public hate waffle.

If anyone for any reason comes across this i hope its of some help next time your down the Ash Burton estate, and remember, if any group starts giving you trouble, say Conor knows you.

Phone Hacking

The News of the World Phone Hacking Scandal is in many ways a symptom of the rise of market based negative liberty, the idea that the public show what is in their interest by putting their money in it. This is probably a much more genuine feeling within these boardrooms than we might wish to think, and it is to be expected considering the trend of business elites (though other groups are guilty.) to recast themselves as public servants by offering the public what they want. In many ways this is the final destination of Hayek's theories, all our desires are fulfilled by the invisible hand of the market.

While the actions committed could be considered horrific we must understand that these are corporations, and it is the duty of the corporation to maximise profits, if doing such low things were what was necessary to sell papers, then that is what it must do. We should not expect anything more of them, not until either those founding laws are changed or we move to a different style of economy. But remember if a company has to choose between breaking human lives and losing money, they will take the former, it is what they are supposed to only care about after all, anything else is a deviation from the expectations of the shareholder, which leads them open to a tidal wave of lawsuits. 

What might be most telling about the whole affair is how the Right have sought to turn this into Lefty bitching, which considering the range of phone hacking scandals is a rather disgusting move on their part, I think it suggests that other tabloids have been involved in similar illicit activity and there is genuine fear that they might get uncovered, I speak on this because I remember talking to a more conservative friend of mine, who talks while half laughing about his work with the conservative party. - "It is all one big gentlemen’s club, they cover each others backs, but the moment it gets impossible to deny, it all becomes fair game."  I think we are hitting a part where this one exposed secret might leak onto a few others if the Right are already getting so riled up over Murdoch bashing as they seem to be forgetting that this company in fact ruined scores of lives for no reason other than short term profits.

Still, we cannot expect any different from them, the sooner we realize this the sooner we can move on to getting something genuinely better, and i do not mean some kind of peer review system, the masses of corporate atrocities of the last few decades, are showing increasingly that the corporation is not some divine instrument of our holy market, merely a psychopath whose only thought about you is how to get you to give them more of your money.

Media and Politics: Mutual Problems

I may be an egalitarian along economic principles but in terms of social interactions I am all about equity. By this I mean that in public debate, from governance to science, such matters cannot be subjected to the tyranny of the majority. While it is necessary that everyone is both involved and contributing to society, and we should all have an equal say come Election Day, we should not simply go with public preconceptions, it is that thinking that has lead to the stagnation of western civilization as we know it today.

The Press by the 1960's was a force of morality; the reporters put a moral to their story as they tried to make sense of what was occurring in the world for those at home. As the 60's progressed many new entrants to the field of journalism were believes in the core values of the 60's and sought to change the world is showing the injustices abroad to spur domestic audiences into action. A good example of this would be the Biafra civil war in Nigeria where the Starving African motif was developed and has since been used to spur the aid campaigns for decades. What began was a moralizing the world were there became good (War Victims and Rebels primarily) and bad (Western Backed dictatorships and general totalitarianism).

As for the Domestic front, well by the 70's the same basic moral system was developing as a narrative, a slew of expose's on various old established institutions (Unions, Police forces, Hospitals and businesses) began to show that while many of these vanguards to society were supposed to look after us, some were, and many could be greedy and self interested, putting us at risk.  Though done with the best interests, what this would gradually create was a kind of pseudo egalitarianism and appraisal of individuality that would erode the ideals of the welfare state but more importantly serve to ultimately paralyze both Journalism and Politics as a force for good.

How this occurred was largely by politicians and journalists being consumed in their own fire. Firstly the rise of the New Right, now there are many forces at play here, such as Evangelical Christians and the Lower Middle classes depending on country. But I would say what largely triggered this was the resurgence of classical liberalism under the guise of modernity of Neoliberals. It is basically the same thing as classical liberalism never mind the guff, it’s about equity over equality, of there being no more than the individual and powers (And I mean all powers but mainly state in this context) must be limited to ensure the liberty of the individual. How did it come back? Reagan and Thatcher, both cast themselves as political outsiders, untainted by the establishment who were going to come in and liberate the creative’s in our society so that their work could better everyone. I won't go into the fallacies of that today, but the point here is that it was a throw back of the 60's, tearing down the old institutions so that power would be wielded by the forces of change, which were driven by the promise of reward of the sweat of their own brow.

The Right were then in part lucky and in part just impressive in a dark, depressing sort of way. This was a potent combination that would tap into the aspirations of many skilled working classes and many more artsy middle class left voters who had been educated by the same ideas that came from the 60's. This was followed up in England by the selling off of council homes which made a lot of the working classes wealth holders for the first time as they bought their homes cheap but could sell them for a much higher price as the market readjusted. Meanwhile the Unions were defeated, old press moguls were forced out while new more aggressive business types moved in like Murdoch. Both Thatcher and Murdoch despised the idea of elitism and saw it as nothing but self serving cliques disguised as public servants. Though no hard time can be pinned down I would say that as we neared the end of the 80's what we had seen was a beaten system, the state had been thrown into disrepute first by journalists then by oligarchs and ministers. Since then, people have had increasing lack of faith in politicians, the Oligarchs of Neoliberals have steadily grown more unpopular and now in light of the Phone Hacking Scandal we begin to see the last vestiges of respect for the journalistic establishment (At the very least on the tabloid side) worn away. Still, to understand why it has taken 20 years for this to occur, well, it was simply a longer journey, but I still cannot help but feel that as it is they who report the news it is also they who can paint themselves in the best light.

The Long Journey starts with the death of morality in journalism. The Rwandan Genocides are where the moral vision of journalism came crashing to an end, this was a situation where both groups within disgusting fault, Hutu and Tutsi had both engaged in a disgusting genocide conflict that had wrought untold destruction on Rwanda and general instability on the region. In this mess, there became no way to moralise and without such a narrative to follow the Journalists began to loose their power. When they lost their power, the same virus of individual freedom began to take hold.

You see while Neoliberals holds many factors akin to that of Classical Liberalism, it probably holds more in similarity with that of Isaiah Berlins Negative liberty only held in an absolutist manner. You see when it turned out elites were all allegedly self interested and the Individual was raised above all else all that then mattered was satisfying one’s self interest. The game became an acceptance that everyone was basically greedy and so we needed to strike a balance of mutual self interest, everything became a transaction, I mean today what we hear about hospitals is often rather eerie. Patients have become consumers and Doctors have become providers, they are now selling a service, the Doctor has no elevated status as a healer, he is just another provider.

The Individual has become the consumer, the consumer only wishes his needs be satisfied, but he alone will decide what he needs, and he is his own small god. This is truly a disastrous thing to happen in the modern age for us, because while I do not believe you need overarching authority to be a moral person I do think that when people are never challenged on their preconceptions you get stagnation. Right now we have so many ineffective policies that are just impossible to resolve by a matter of rational discourse, take Drugs policy, it is no more than a money trap, most experts agree that many drugs are not nearly as harmful as public preconceptions have of them and even those that are not are not being dealt with by a "war" on drugs. Yes we go on, with cross party consensus. We are spilling billions into a campaign that is not even getting results and no-one questions it, because that would go up against peoples wishes. Journalists have almost utterly given up in offering real opinions, most of journalism now is rigid left right biases and even those are contradictory positions to hold in many ways, you certainly can't deviate from the mean.

I suppose the final destination of this has been the stat isocracy we have today. Ultimately the real political power is in statistics companies as they monitor public opinion to which politicians will act accordingly, which I reiterate is a bad thing, many people were deeply against decriminalising homosexuality in the 1970's but in the face of this Roy Jenkins still did it, and it was the right thing to do, very few would dispute that today. But without people brave enough to do the right thing we will be stuck in a world of sophistries, where what is important is how something is conveyed not how correct something is. This is why above all we need equity in ideas, without the brightest in their fields being listened too we will end up with a lot of very flawed preconceptions that may have no bearing on how our society actually operates.

Phew that took a while, thanks for bearing with me on this; I wanted this to be out before I did anything more relevant to what is going on today as it can act as a reference point to future articles.

The Unbearable lightness of being a lefty

These days its rather depressing being a staunch person of the left. I wouldn't call myself a radical, because for me the distinction between radical and moderate is all process and i argue that progress comes from peaceful process, though at times violence is excusable like the Cuban, American and current Libyan revolution (though not so much intervention) but what i am is definitely an ultra lefty. Ultra liberal on matters of legality and staunch socialist on all matters economic (that being totally committed to equalization not an all things must be nationalized type socialist.) And looking at Britain there is not much to say that is good.

Oh i am not saying British people are right wing by any means, any country you take will have the same dividing line of people its just it comes out in different ways due to the PR abilities of whatever parties and special interest groups are prevalent but generally its a clean line. Also the recent Assembly and Council elections show that if anything most people support a left wing agenda, and a report launched several months ago showed that although people support the state less (probably due to their distrust of politicians) they support progressive taxation and equality all the more, a clear majority in fact. I also suspect that the Conservative's would have outright lost that election is the Lansley Reforms, the Forest Sell off and the rate of deficit reduction had been clearly spelled out. The problem then, lies in our politicians, and to a lesser extent the movement in general.

Right now voters have the right to choose the right wing nut jobs that are the conservatives, the right wing Social conservatives that is the Labour party (Or so most of their policies would indicate), the "whothefuckknowsbutmainlyrightwing" party that is the Liberal Democrats that put an emphasis on civil liberties. Then you have the small parties, but like what? The borderline fascist UKIP, which don't say that of course but run on the same basis of work for the English, conservative values and emphasis on law and order. Granted, you have the Center left, the all powerful center left of!... The Greens, with their one MP. Now granted, Labour are a left of center organisation, i believe they are made up of people who mainly desire to redistribute income and raise the living standards of the poor and made some gains in the last parliament, but really its not much different to the 1950's Christian Democrat party of Germany, which i will say really did raise the living standards of Germany in their time, but it was hardly a drive for equality, it ran on the same values of flexible Labour markets at low costs, civil liberties assured but tough law enforcement to follow with a supportive but ultimately deferential state.

So why is such a leftist party, that on the ground (as i know too well) is staffed mainly by strong willed socialists committed to the support of the working men and women of Britain so right wing in its policy. Well a big part of it is fear, and a small part is luck on part of the Blairites.

In 1993 Niel Kinnock lost an election to consternation and surprise of the country, in many ways this was down to the heavy attacks levied out by the Murdoch media, and too bold an emphasis on taxes, i will not deny that you cannot win an election, especially after 10 years of conservative rule with heavy virtue of selfishness propaganda pushed on people and expect to win on a policy of tax and spend. Still, the signal inside the party was to keep forcing forward the modernization programme, they had to put massive emphasis on justifying their financial credibility as well, what came about was the Blairite doctrine. Now that certainly assisted in propelling Labour in with a massive landslide, but i feel that Niel Kinnock could have won in 1997 with a reduced majority, since a lot of the victory of 1993 was down to stable economics and a victory over a  tyrant in Iraq for major, in 1997 Black Friday had destroyed his economic credibility, half his cabinet had been routed out as sex fiends while running on effectively a family values campaign and the effect of victory in Iraq had dwindled by now. Certainly Blaire's charisma and program had helped get votes, but only in the short term, they did not loose votes in 2001 because of being left wing and introducing taxes, Ian Duncan Smith touted there leftwingishness all the time and still had a massive defeat, the only losses were to the Lib Dems and to people not voting, quite frankly Labour lost more because they were not being left wing enough. This had continued to date, sure, conservatives have picked up a few seats here and there, but their core voter base has been destroyed, very few people regard themselves as conservatives, and this has not changed since 1993 really, that win for the conservatives was a fluke. I mean ask yourself, why didn't the Conservatives win an outright victory in 2010?  They had everything going for them, an umpopular Prime minister with no stage appeal, a disillusioned electorate and not to mention a financial crash falling on Labour. That election was handed to them on a plate and they still lost, the Clegg effect can't even be accounted for because by the time of election day Cleggmania had been blasted into the ground by the Conservative press, their national vote share barely rose and their actual number of seats decline, too the Conservatives!

As the current electoral cycle goes it appears that the Conservatives are going to be the wilderness party from now on, sure they have the money, but they don't have the winning argument, they are going to now be getting in measured on the short comings of Labour, not the other way round. Now that the ghost of communism has vanished there is very little actual fear around left wing politics, people want financial systems to be heavily regulated, most want equality and the evidence is only stacking up in favor of Left wing ideas like you know, not letting capitalism run amok? The only problem now lies in our main left wing party.

Don't let me get carried away though, it's hardly all the central parties role, politicians can really in the end only enable progress and goodness to happen, it requires more often than not the force of people to really make a difference and right now many have lost faith in politics to be a force for good in this world which is very dangerous. But conversely politicians do not do a good job and making people engaged, fact is both parties use the police like aggressive boot boys of the state which disillusions both committed protestors and regular folks who like to see their local police officers in a positive light, the consistent foriegn adventures only bring home the fact that we are the oppressors of the world, and to regular folks will only make governments seem uncaring in so quickly sending our boys off to fight for a pointless war, that sir is the gateway to the BNP and other far right groups. But there is a lot of guff and vitriol that tabloids tend to churn out that is often unfair, and i suppose that is the way.

Still, politicians, and especially those of the left need to get their act together. Ed Miliband, as much as i think has the right ideas, needs to actually start talking about those fucking ideas rather than turning the whole party into some kind of giant focus group. What he needs to do is start talking like a damn lefty, he needs to set a dialog of optimism that people can understand, and how hard is it to do? If i were a center lefty, which i am not but hey, lets pretend, here are oh... lets say 5 policies i could do to shape the future of Britain.

1. High Speed Broadband, welfare to work is a brilliant concept, the worst part of being off work is just that, even if you support one, you support them for long enough and as fine wine turns to vinegar these people become unemployable. Why not get these people laying the ground work for a high speed broadband system, most of the work is incredibly basic, it consists of trench digging and it would get these people out in the morning, it may cost something, but it will likely outweigh the social consequences of just outright not working and will raise their optimism so it could also strengthen buyer confidence.

2. Investment in Green Energy, not so much the whole thing right now. But why not invest in setting up tidal generators, they are far more focused in their positioning than most forms of renewable energy and could provide up to 40% of our energy when fully kitted out, not to mention the amount of long term and short term jobs this would create. I would also phrase this as an issue of national defense, we wont be held subject to Russia's monopoly on the oil pipes and we wont have to oppress the middle east every time oil prices go up, which means we can keep our boys back home.

3. Introduce a Robin Hood Tax, Very simple, place a tax on micro transactions between banks and use this to fund one and two, people hate bankers right now, might as well use it to achieve some good.

4. Encourage mutuals, If Blue Labour is to be the defining force for Labour in the next few years then i think the best idea would be to support local community business, you could do this with an investment bank, and that should certainly be encouraged, but i would rather suggest giving co-operatives a free corporate earnings tax, this way we could encourage small and medium sized businesses to turn into mutuals and as the wages for these tend to equalize far more than business we could pick up more of the earnings in income tax.

5. Propose total federalization of the United Kingdom. This one is radical, but i think it would be very popular among a lot of disaffected working men, and a lot in the North... well actually i think it would garner national approval, right now devolved institutions cannot collect their own taxes, it is set from Westminster. This means they cannot pursue their own agendas, and since Scotland wants to spend a lot more well, this causes resentment in the Scotland, but more importantly it causes resentment in the South where people feel they are paying for the Scottish excessive standards of living. This needs to be fixed, but there is something more important than this, England itself is more politically divided than ever, it was only by the 1980's and beyond that cities always vote Labour, and counties always vote conservative, a Unitary model was fine before then, because people's opinions where quite similar, but now we have clear cut political lines, this being the case, what sense is it for City people to be subjected to Heartland politics, and very much the same way round, People who live in the city tend to want state intervention, regulation and economic safety nets, people in the country tend to want economic freedom and a lack of regulation with a great aggrandizement of the self made man. If we were to properly federalize then we would not have a situation where the moment the government does anything 60% of the population are instantly pissed off excluding a few minor issues, if we give counties a greater degree of freedom then i think a lot more people would be satisfied with their politics as they could get what they are asking for.

These five represent strong center of left policies because they shows support for business with infrastructure and support for the poor at the same time, Green energies give us the option to be more moral in our foreign policy while taxing bankers will actually give the people of the country a sense of feeling that Labour is on the side of people not big business that looked so true by the time of the crash. Finally a federalization policy looks, and is a smart move, a lot of self styled intelligentsia swing voters would very much latch on to it, i am sure a lot of people, rather than seeing it as an attack on the United Kingdom would see it as a way of making our fucked up devolution system actually work, not giving disproportionate powers to anyone. From this you can build a massive narrative of the Left wing as being smart, responsible and caring all at once which is why Labour won in 1997.

Being a lefty today is infuriating because so few mainstream left wing parties insist on building a narrative to why they are doing this, and a narrative is always needed, you cannot argue on purely technocratic grounds because people will ultimately go with a gut feeling on most matters and invent their own logic to satisfy their choices, there needs to be more to being left wing, there needs to be a story, a heart.

The Legitimate Grounds On Protest

After the 26th of March there has been a lot of condemnation and well, ill informed drivel surrounding the whole affair, with pundits either condemning the whole thing as a no holds barred disgusting display of the anti culture doing its ogre like thing and smashing shit for the hell of it. Then we have a bunch of armchair social democrat's and liberals saying how they love peace but hate violence in protests, which is to me like saying you like people to protest the government just so long as it is a meaningless gesture that no-one listens too. Finally there are a few, just a few generally outside the pale of the mainstream who support violent protest such as Laurie Penny, at the end, all of these i personally find are wrong, but for different, rather double standard and ill informed reasons as is my nature.

Firstly, and what is perhaps most important, is that no-one seems to make clear on whether this is a moral, or a legal matter, whether the two are linked, if they are then what is the legal pale with so much overlap of rights and constitutional protections, and if not then what constitutes moral, or if violence serves any purpose at all.

Well then, what is legality:

"established by or founded upon law or official or accepted rules" - Even here we have a fucking massive issue, official or accepted, the fuck does that mean? I mean to be in possession of marajuana is an offense nowadays, but you don't need to be social scum to know that its actual use is not confined to a small minority in the country, a large number use it, and probably a majority of people have at least tried it, or condone its use. Right here we have an issue in that legality is not even always in sync with the law.

So then, what of the law, its big, its there and we all have to follow it, this then drifts into the realm of political philosophy, what makes a law legitimate? People such as Rousseau in "The Social Contract" suggested that for laws to be legitimate there had to be some kind of direct legitimization by the people to such a law, in effect then any law by the judiciary or the government cannot really be legitimate because in the end this was never put to the people, it was never accepted and therefore has no validation.

On the other hand, someone like Locke would argue that law is passively legitimized from the very act of living within a countries borders. The use of resources and taking advantage of a countries systems is in itself an acceptance of the laws and customs it abides by. I have a problem with this personally, as although a very good staple for not constantly bemoaning the state, and i am sure i have occasionally used it as a means of telling people to quit their bitching it doesn't account for the matter that we should for some reason have to abandoned everything that we have due to growing up in a country through no choice of our own. It's like saying charging 1000% more for water is certainly more desirable than having to go down to the Thames to fill up buckets and haul them back to the house, but just because this is marginally better does not make it not exploitation.

Finally, because i am not writing a 10,000 word essay here i come to Hobbes, who yes is outdated but comes up with a good point. In that if a government violates its social contract we have grounds to remove them. But what i think this can mean is that if they do something not promised, the gloves are off. Well then, here we have a scope for any kind of civil disobedience, against basically any government as no government has ever kept to its manifesto, not even the man who used it on a national level - Sir Robert Peel. Well our governments attempted restructuring and cuts, not to mention the total change of tune for the Lib Dem's gives a lot of justification to more violent action.

But that is not quite so fair is it? Department stores, banks and so on are not the government, and as sad as it makes me, this means there are no grounds for attacking shops and such because alas, they are not the violators of any social contract, in fact any selfish, bastardy action is totally in line with their contract which in most legal centers is to maximize profits... though perhaps i could get them on saying short term profits is not maximizing profits... bleh i will get to that another time when its not past 3 in the morning.

So then, i would personally go with saying that a Rousseau is untenable, Locke isn't fair, but Hobbes proposes a strong legal system for the two party dictatorship we live in today, and that quite simply if a government is not doing as we contractually agreed upon then we have a moral duty to take em out, or at least rough them up a bit. This however excludes attacks on private enterprise in this instance as they generally fulfill their contractual arrangements, we have them there to be money making pricks and that is what they do.

Still, legally then this does not remove the police and government structures as targets of such things, these are all instruments of the government, and as such are wholly permissible to be attacked in what ever desire we so wish to do. After all if an all powerful leviathan has violated the contract then we must do all within our power to remove it. Legally we can hope that they will see such an error and step down gracefully, but within the real world inequality creates a stall in such a legal process, in a country with such a power imbalance it can only be expected for a powerful entity to defend itself.

So now, morality, the fuck is that? Does it exist? What is good and all that stuff. Well, i don't think we can really even point to anything in the philosophical world that says what precisely morality IS. Oh sure we have examples of how to be moral and how we react with it, but there is nothing to it in nature, and as Aristotle question was often answered by, what is the form of the good was really only answered with example. To argue about the essence of morality is to merely argue about definitions.

Well then, what can be argued? Well what humans want i suppose would be a good start. Selfish rationality? Oh go read some Ayn Rand, Faux intellectual blog you playground intellectual! As with all good things in this world we must firstly go to the world of Biology. It is general theory today that about 75% of our DNA is generally defunct, and many of the neurons in our brain turn off by the age of about 11. In those 11 years we develop most of our "software" processing power as human beings. Or to be more precise, what our parameters we have, if you learn a second language in this time you will find it easier to learn languages in the future, because that part of your brain is kept active, in the same manner those with a stimulating, friendly environment will probably grow up to emulate such characteristics. In fact before we are even born our body is rearranging a lot of its gene codes, if it detects high blood pressure levels from its mother, it will be more aggressive when alive, if starved of food, it will develop an ability to absorb more food. Which is why so much DNA is defunct. The point being is that Human beings are highly capable of living in all matter of societies, with different incentive systems and different mannerisms, our bodies are more than capable of adjusting to it. But surely there is a general drive towards some over arching good? Damn Skippy.

Naturally i wont dispute that people wont act in self interest in times of scarcity, I will also not dispute that people want the best for themselves. However what is "best" is never money, it might at times be resources but it is never actually a paper with a picture on it. I will take the Aristotelian path in saying that free of scarcity, worry and inequality people want more than anything to pursue "Eudamonia." the good life. A life of moral virtue and genuine strong, intimate social relations. How can i say any of this? Well i would look firstly at social tensions in countries with high disparity incomes, and those of lower disparity incomes and see firstly that countries with a more similar social gradient are more relaxed, and at peace with themselves, then what of the social side? Well if we look at small, socially compact tribes such as the Inuit when left to their own habitat often rate almost as high as the extremely wealthy american counterparts. So yes, extreme wealth while being wealthy among other extremely wealthy individuals away from the sights of poor people is certainly the most desirable outcome for a single person. But that is only sustainable to a tiny fragment, it cannot be applied to everyone. Ultimately then, any person who was coming into a world, with no idea of what position in the social hierarchy they would be in, would ultimately want a perfectly equal, socially homogeneous society as the only better alternative is a very unlikely outcome for them.

So, then, if this is what people should have to best enjoy life, then we should surely try and achieve it? If then, you can place yourself on the side of equality and fraternity then yes, you can ultimately say you are morally justified in your actions, and if a government has violated their contractual arrangements with the people then you are allowed to do anything within your power to remove or alter them, because their actions have made the social contract null and void which means ultimately all their legal systems are null and void.

There is one problem though, if we are abiding by societies laws most of the time, but do something against government here, then what are you saying? You want to beat up government because its bad but want all the support it gives you? That unfortunately cannot be done. If you attack the government, be it person or building, and are saying that the system has failed and must be resisted until it corrects itself then you are in the right, and if that government is pushing through a brutal austerity program when only "efficiency" savings where promised in the manifesto, and this is going to really hurt the poor and social structure then you are not only legally bound but morally bound in your actions. But if you are only out for a day, and you just want to throw a few bottles at cops, before retiring to your residence, then you are wrong, and you are going to have to accept punishment because ultimately you are demanding a state be in the wrong and uphold their social contract obligations at the same time. You cannot pick and choose the areas a state has legitimacy over, it comes down to one executive so they either are or not.

Still, in a democratic society public protest should perhaps be covered under the law, and damage sustained in that time should be covered by the government, but that is another massive issue for another time. For now I am saying that protest is great, but if your not planning on wholly changing the government for its abuses then stay within its own legal customs because you cannot have it both ways, even if you are morally right, because unfortunately a state is by no means moral, it's a rigid game that you either play by the rules or get out.

Finally, about those references, there are none, thats why this is ill informed drivel. Still, if you want to know about anything i discuss here, look it the fuck up. I am not taking any ideas here for my own, they are all others, i make no profit from most of this. And if you here something i am talking on well, your online aren't you? Look it up!

Still, if i do actually get anyone reading this site i will endeavor to start properly referencing my matirial, right now this is more of a place for me to get my thoughts properly straightened out which is really quite a lot harder than just thinking about it, there are loop holes here, and it will probably take me days to figure out everything here.