Larry O'Hara and Joe Owens - some comments

why are people so obsessed with this shit?

Its like the wierdos people propping up other wierdos people with bullshit anecdotes about irrelevant morons.

Spineless twat.

I would say that the reason I personally take this stuff seriously is that I've been in a union where the role of the secret state has been blindlingly obvious. This is why I find Larry's stuff interesting (and why I continue to buy Notes from... without necessarily believing it all). [olden days anecdote]I remember making a speech at CPSA national conference with the aid of a Sooty puppet (so I didn't get ruled out of order) about the links between the National Moderate Group & the secret state. "What was that, Sooty? Do you mean to say that the National Moderate Group's election propaganda was paid for by MI5?"

IT's a first time poster attacking someone on the scene wraeth. I don't think they'll listen to your advice.

awr. they just must of heard of Larry and Joe out the blue and decided to post. I is so evil

honestly, is that a true story? I'm not dunk or stoned but am really tired so maybe I'm extra gullible right now?

Yes.

I still got ruled out of order, on the grounds that Sooty didn't have delegate credentials. You had to be there.

As for the stuff about the old CPSA (now part of PCS) right wing, it's documented in Robin Ramsey's Lobster magazine, and partly in the revised edition of Seumas Milne's The enemy within, IIRC. I suspect the reason that the security services were so interested in the union was that we had members in the Ministry of Defence. This was also the time of the union ban at GCHQ (when we didn't have the right to be spied on by our trade union comrades ).

no actually i don't find it weird at all.

Look at it this way. Both owens and the MWATB stalwarts, LLETSA, Chuck et al, propogate the 'its all over' hegemony, both of right and left. Despiute the fact that Owens is still a racialist, and MWATB is still predominantly socialist, there respective dismissal of their former political activity brings them together.
And to be fair, they both loved the 80's and have respect for each other as old enemies, in that slightly tragic way men do (which is odd, cos a lot of the IWCA brigade on there were actually in the swaps, not AFA/RA during the 80's - which is what you would have assumed).

Owens is also candid and likeable, if thick as a plank. Bouncers and assorted hard men can do this quite well as they have hurt enough people badly IRL to not get much of kick out of doing it verbally or on teh internets. A lot of his autobio is a bit whimsical - 'then we battered some pakis. I wonder what they thought of us, all shouting and hateful' (approx not direct quote)

I do wish people would go and argue with owens and o'hara where they actually fucking post though, this is the 3rd time we've had this silliness now.

Interesting original post. My comments are as follows

1) Although the poster does not say it, the anarchist bookfair meeting referred to was one where events in Leeds concerning Redwatch Mark I were 'discussed'. As it happens, a summary of those dodgy events in Leeds is available on-line here: [[url=Enter URL here http://www.borderland.co.uk/preview_005.htm]

2) I did not, of course, make the statement at that meeting this poster (Paul Bowman perhaps?) claimed I did. I am a life-long anti-fascist, and certainly not a journalist. I notice in particular the invention of quotes, as in me saying everything Owens writes is "the truth". This invention of quotes is characteriustic of Searchlight/their former satellite Leeds AFA. I say 'former' because of course it was dissolved by AFA nationally, who came to virtually the same conclusions regarding that branch as I had some years earlier (the link to Red Action's take on this/the National AFA proscription is in the footnotes to the above article).

3) The use of some genuine but highly selective and truncated quotations from my review convey, as they are intended to, a deliberately false and distorted impression of that review. Anybody who approaches my article with an open mind will come to a rather different conclusion than seeing this as "one of the most uncritical reviews you are likely to read". As to whether my characterisation of Owens is accurate or not, a legitimate topic for discussion--which the original post is not.

4) You say I do not have contacts in Liverpool--very amusing, but false. What do you want: their addresses & phone numbers, so they can feature in Redwatch/Searchlight?

5) Of course Owens autobiography is self-justification--aren't they always? However, if I may be allowed a genuine quote from my review, "the section on the modern BNP alone would convince many that joining it is a bad move indeed, and thus functions as effective anti-fascist propaganda, whatever the author's intentions" (p.43).

6) Given the original post is a misrepresentation of my review, and wilfully so, what are the motives? Are they, perhaps, not related to my review of Owens book at all, but something rather closer to home--the 19 page article on Redwatch asking pointed questions of various people/agencies, including MI5, Special Branch, the BNP & Redwatch themselves? Again, I call upon people to make up their own minds. Too much to ask? I fear it is, but hope it isn't...

Perhaps I should have been clearer: I don't mean make up their own minds about the adequacy of my review or not (in the greater scheme of things of little importance at all), I meant about issues such as Redwatch, fascism, the secret state etc--I accept most people don't care either way about those issues either, but trust that some people in society do, or should. Apologies for my imprecision--recovering from a very recent tooth extraction!

whilst i agree with it, it's a pointlessly offensive way of putting it by someone whol will never have to deal with the poeople they just insulted or the politics they will never engage with.

Whilst i couldn't give much of a fuck about the OP's nitpicking, and have not read Larry's piece, Joe Owens is not irrelevant to antifascists. The BNP have 55 councillors ffs, and are still an openly racialist party.

SORRY TO BE Y'KNOW, SPINELESS

fascists posting on leftwing boards are usually hilariously combative and illogical.

As we have pointed Owens genuinely took to debate, and was polite throughout. Look at boards like urban and even slightly conservative posters are whining on and trying to offend 'all you pinko's' etc.

there were hilarius brick walls of discussion at time tho, like when Owens claimed he ad cleared the reds out of liverpool in the point in the 80's when militant took liverpool

Tin hats for all involved I think.

shit i'm not in my 40's, however am i gonna live that one down? Exposed or what!

Get over to MATB with your fucking pronouncements on open bulletin boards about the posters there. Or haven't you got the bottle?