so what they're saying is, instead of paying out unemployment benefits, they're going to charge you for being unemployed, whilst fudging the stats some more. nice.
War is peace, freedom is slavery, etc
whilst i do see the deliciousness of 'compulsory volunteering' i'm not totally opposed to mandatory education to 18. The only problem i'd have with it would that it is mandatory under the current education system which is becoming increasingly sinister. I don't know, the arguments against making people go to school veer for me towards being being 'libertarian' in the american sense.
I know plenty of neets who need a kick up the arse.
Tacks wrote:
whilst i do see the deliciousness of 'compulsory volunteering' i'm not totally opposed to mandatory education to 18. The only problem i'd have with it would that it is mandatory under the current education system which is becoming increasingly sinister. I don't know, the arguments against making people go to school veer for me towards being being 'libertarian' in the american sense.I know plenty of neets who need a kick up the arse.
yes, but this is about mandatory volunteering - which is quite different, and will basically be (very) cheap labour for charities that are probably taking on some of the social responsibilities that the state has shed over the past 30 years.
Holy shit.
I see. Sorry i had this image of forcing all the lazy cunts i know into apprenticeships (which now i think of it, is pretty unlikely considering how hard it can be to get one - and the old apprenticiship system has also changed into something sinister).
Yes, that is completely fucked up. I have a deep hatred of charities since i read about the actual origins of charities in the uk, the Charity Comission for instance.
Tacks wrote:
whilst i do see the deliciousness of 'compulsory volunteering' i'm not totally opposed to mandatory education to 18. The only problem i'd have with it would that it is mandatory under the current education system which is becoming increasingly sinister. I don't know, the arguments against making people go to school veer for me towards being being 'libertarian' in the american sense.
Further education requires a certain ammount of interest in, you know, actually doing the course.
john wrote:
yes, but this is about mandatory volunteering - which is quite different, and will basically be (very) cheap labour for charities that are probably taking on some of the social responsibilities that the state has shed over the past 30 years.
Quite right I'd agree. Worth noting though that while the idea of fines for 16-17 year olds is new, compulsory volunteering was always one of the four New Deal 'options' resulting from JobCentre 'Restart' interviews for those over 17 (coming after the Tories cut dole for 16-17 year olds so it only applied to 18 years and up). This 'volunteer' labour was heavily used by some charities when New Deal was introduced in 1996. See http://www.afed.org.uk/online/newdeal.html which exposed the role of charities at this time.
In Nottingham it was commonplace to see vans of New-dealers being loading up in the early hours for those unlucky enough to get dry-stone walling as their voluntary activity (through a organisation called Spadework if I remember rightly!). To oppose this there were 'pickets' outside the high street stores of various charities including Barnardos - just one method of campaigning by the anarchist-inspired Groundswell network. This was done because these charities were not at all forthcoming that some of their volunteers actually weren't. As well as trying to embarass those that had shops in town, and to directly support those who had been 'volunteered', charities were also written to, to explain that they shouldn't carry on pretending New Dealers were volunteers. By doing all of this, the campaign actually succeeded in getting Oxfam to pull out of using New Deal labour. Voluntary sector coordinating organisations were also targetted because they were getting money to make the placements.
Anyway just to show you don't have to take this shit lying down.
For fun (and for a summary of the 4 New Deal options) see: http://www.geocities.com/ncajsa/twelve.html
I think this up to 18 stuff is crap. Some people aren't cut out for education beyond 13-14 - what they need is space to work out what they are going to do (TBH same applies to kids in education) and not being forced into skivvying for outfits too tight to pay the minimum wage.
I know several people who effectively left school at this age - school held nothing for them and they went off and worked or learnt things. I'm sure it'll play well with the 20,000 voters that New Labour and the Tories are scrapping over, but it won't help hardly any of the people it's allegedly meant to.
Regards,
Martin
Yes it's total crap. All that has happened is the state has realised cutting dole for 16-17 year olds (and making it almost impossible to get benefits for any length of time if you are older), something designed to make people who don't stay on at school get a crap job, hasn't worked. Now the axe is coming down as compulsory education & work with threats of fines and prison (effectively criminalising you if you refuse to study or work) . Workfare aspects of this including forced voluntary work need to be vigorously opposed on principle but as it's only going to affect certain ages (who are already scapegoated and portrayed as a waste of space) it won't be easy.
Plus, to counter the little dictators on this thread who are only one step away from advocating National Service
, it's easy to forget that the present anarchist movement owes a lot to a vibrant dole culture that existed before it got taken away by Thatcher, when you could get all your rent paid as well as dole money each week, leaving plenty of space to do interesting things. When New Deal came under Labour a lot of anarchists I know managed to steer themselves into education (like IT courses) as least worst option rather that get shafted by workfare or voluntary work but at least there was an illusion of choice if you played the game right.
little_brother wrote:
Yes it's total crap. All that has happened is the state has realised cutting dole for 16-17 year olds (and making it almost impossible to get benefits for any length of time if you are older), something designed to make people who don't stay on at school get a crap job, hasn't worked. Now the axe is coming down as compulsory education & work with threats of fines and prison (effectively criminalising you if you refuse to study or work) . Workfare aspects of this including forced voluntary work need to be vigorously opposed on principle but as it's only going to affect certain ages (who are already scapegoated and portrayed as a waste of space) it won't be easy.Plus, to counter the little dictators on this thread who are only one step away from advocating National Service
Aaaaaaaaaaaaah!
i can't reply to that without exposing my deeply conservative vews 
little_brother wrote:
Yes it's total crap. All that has happened is the state has realised cutting dole for 16-17 year olds (and making it almost impossible to get benefits for any length of time if you are older), something designed to make people who don't stay on at school get a crap job, hasn't worked. Now the axe is coming down as compulsory education & work with threats of fines and prison (effectively criminalising you if you refuse to study or work) . Workfare aspects of this including forced voluntary work need to be vigorously opposed on principle but as it's only going to affect certain ages (who are already scapegoated and portrayed as a waste of space) it won't be easy.
opposing anything on principal is pretty useless though - like on ID cards and surveellance in general. We have to find a way of creating a productive, rather than just reactive, resistance to things. That's a general point, in know. I don't really see what saying 'this is really shit' does, when the bottom line is there are lots of people that do need jobs or some kind of useful activity, for their own sake. Nobody 'owes society' (read - the state) anything, but its not going to help them to get trapped on the dole at that age (or any age). Its not going to help anyone around them either.
little_brother wrote:
Plus, to counter the little dictators on this thread who are only one step away from advocating National Service:), it's easy to forget that the present anarchist movement owes a lot to a vibrant dole culture that existed before it got taken away by Thatcher
surely these things are shit though? The bad bits we'd rather not have? A lot of people did and still do amazing work supported by the dole, but this is a tiny fraction of useless anarcho hippies who just went on a crusted up jolly. And what proportion of people on the dole are using it to contribute to class struggle exactly? Political dole activism is not even a slightly significant part of people on the dole.
little_brother wrote:
when you could get all your rent paid as well as dole money each week, leaving plenty of space to do interesting things.
Dependence on the handouts of the state. Great if your a sussed out anarchist communist with an analysis of the state maybe, debilitating and disempowering to most people. Massively divisive as well, with people who work hating dolies and losing sight of who is actually fucking them over.
I have a bit of a question on that count too; considering the rich pay no taxes, and the government actually taxes the lowest incomes the most (proportionally), would it not be true that working people are actually paying for dolies after all? Rather CRASS types saying 'here's one £25 they can't spend on missiles'?
Like crime and immigration, the dole is an area i feel anarchist have to seriously think about if they are to convince people they live on the same planet as them. I'm not proposing an answer, but i we appear to deny that working class people have any faults and all actions of the state against them are unjustified. The state itself is unjustified, but a lot of the social role it plays is appreciated or seen as neccessary by working class people - we can't just criticise if we have no suggested alternative. For example, the IWCA policing approach, where they attempted community policing, is far better the a million FUCK THE POLICE rants.
Tacks in almost talking sense shock.
To be honest, whenever anyone starts talking about the history of British anarchism as a means of continuing its traditions and practices, I tend to think: fuck its traditions, British anarchism has achieved less than fuckall and what we really need is a radical change in revolutionary praxis. That's no offense to comrades who have been involved all their lives, but a quick panorama of the country in 2007 and I think they'd be hard-pressed to disagree.
Alan wrote:
Tacks in almost talking sense shock.
That's a bit unneccessary. Particularly considering the rest of your post is an utterly predictable whine about how shit anarchists are. There was me thinking you might have something to say about politics.
Don't cunt me off.
To put things back on track - i'm not a fan of the idea of "a radical change in revolutionary praxis". I actually think there are more than enough lessons from recent history alone that can point as back to relevance and productive activity - i don't think the failure so far is because we need a complete change of ideas and embrace some completely new and as yet unknown approach. That strikes me as a bit academic. I think there has been limited success in lots of projects, but the failures overall are actually pretty circumstantial, and similar things should be tried again. As a syndicalist i assume you agree..?
Quote:
To be honest, whenever anyone starts talking about the history of British anarchism as a means of continuing its traditions and practices, I tend to think: fuck its traditions, British anarchism has achieved less than fuckall and what we really need is a radical change in revolutionary praxis.
Well I didn't say anything about continuing traditions as they were. What would be the sense of that, when its nigh impossible to live on the dole for any length of time without getting hassled by state functionaries. It was more of a historical reminder ...
Anyway I think we should let the 16-18 year olds people who are going to be facing these latest waves of state attacks be the judge of whether they feel 'dependent'. 16 and 17 yr old don't get any dole so that's irrelevant to them anyway.
Anyway my first post was not about the movement. It was about taking charities to task and I mentioned tactics that had worked when they were tried before. I presume 'the button' thought compulsory volunteering was a bad thing or it wouldn't have been posted. I haven't seen anyone else on this thread offer any practical suggestions. Whether anyone gets of there arses to do anything about these latest attacks on young(er) working class people remains to be seen - hopefully they will manage to subvert it themselves at the very least - it's good to see charities are as sensitive about there role in coercion as they were 10 years ago.
Tacks wrote:
Alan wrote:
Tacks in almost talking sense shock.That's a bit unneccessary. Particularly considering the rest of your post is an utterly predictable whine about how shit anarchists are. There was me thinking you might have something to say about politics.
Don't cunt me off.
Steady on there Matron...
Quote:
To put things back on track - i'm not a fan of the idea of "a radical change in revolutionary praxis". I actually think there are more than enough lessons from recent history alone that can point as back to relevance and productive activity - i don't think the failure so far is because we need a complete change of ideas and embrace some completely new and as yet unknown approach. That strikes me as a bit academic. I think there has been limited success in lots of projects, but the failures overall are actually pretty circumstantial, and similar things should be tried again. As a syndicalist i assume you agree..?
Don't pigeonhole me as a syndicalist, when you know that's a de facto insult on here.
In a period in which anarchism is largely subcultural retreat and anarchist activity is rated by many of its participants in relation to how much scuffle there is with the police, and fresh ideas are thought to be Bash the Rich (and of course, I don't need to mention the rest of the left, we all know why they're wrong), I think a change in ideas is greatly necessary. For all his pomp and absurdity, Raw is right when he says the Libcom current is in the minority in terms of its understanding of libertarian class struggle (anarchism in layman's terms, but I wouldn't wanna ruffle the feathers of the "non-anarchists" on here).
Whenever someone starts to harp on about anarchism's rich history alarm bells start ringing in my head. This theory has had fuckall influence on the world today...even the examples we hold up as successes (ie Spain) were in reality huge failures (and not just cos of bourgeois forces).
little_brother wrote:
Anyway I think we should let the 16-18 year olds people who are going to be facing these latest waves of state attacks be the judge of whether they feel 'dependent'. 16 and 17 yr old don't get any dole so that's irrelevant to them anyway.
Regardless, the dole in general then. Surely i have said something hugely mistaken?
I know several very committed militants who lived off the dole and try to stay on JSA as best as possible. They put far more time into action than most people ever would for a job. This doesn't mean that there is anything politically useful in being on the dole. I'd defend people against cuts on the grounds that it's an attack on living conditions and that the government requires people to be unemployed.
Quote:
yes, but this is about mandatory volunteering - which is quite different, and will basically be (very) cheap labour for charities that are probably taking on some of the social responsibilities that the state has shed over the past 30 years.
I think john hit the nail on the head, although I'd take out the 'probably'
Alan, be aware i know absolutely fuck all theory. When i say 'syndicalist' i mean someone in favour of syndicalist unions being set up, i have no idea what Alberto Mondotruffle said about it in he seminal essay etc.
Anyway comrade, christ why worry about anarchism in the UK in general? Surely by now you couldn't give a fuck what the majority of 'anarchists' do? I'd worry about tactics - 'praxis' if you prefer - and actually existing struggles.
There's more than enough to be getting on with imo.
jef costello wrote:
I know several very committed militants who lived off the dole and try to stay on JSA as best as possible. They put far more time into action than most people ever would for a job. This doesn't mean that there is anything politically useful in being on the dole. I'd defend people against cuts on the grounds that it's an attack on living conditions and that the government requires people to be unemployed.Quote:
yes, but this is about mandatory volunteering - which is quite different, and will basically be (very) cheap labour for charities that are probably taking on some of the social responsibilities that the state has shed over the past 30 years.I think john hit the nail on the head, although I'd take out the 'probably'
What social responsibilities are we talking about? Dry-stone walling? Seriously though, I'd be interested to know which state functions charities might take over as a direct result of this scheme? Or was john just meaning that they will be asked to police the unemployed when previous this was done by DSS (or whatever its called now!)?
madashell wrote:
Alan wrote:
Don't pigeonhole me as a syndicalist, when you know that's a de facto insult on here.Weren't you in SolFed before you went abroad?
So what, that determines my politics now? And incidentally, enough with the term "syndicalist" in reference SF, since on here it tends to refer to the politics of organisations that the IWA (for better or worse) is incredibly hostile towards.
Tacks I'm not much of a theory buff either. In fact, I tend to lean towards an analysis based on personal experience, with theory only useful in as much as it illustrates, highlights and clarifies personal experience. Actually that's more complex than necessary, the truth is I don't have that much time to read dense theory texts cos i have a fuckload of reading in Spanish to do, and I feel that I often learn more from a good conversation and a change of environment. Read my post and I think you'll find it's not too densely theoretical.
Tacks wrote:
Like crime and immigration, the dole is an area i feel anarchist have to seriously think about if they are to convince people they live on the same planet as them. I'm not proposing an answer, but i we appear to deny that working class people have any faults and all actions of the state against them are unjustified. The state itself is unjustified, but a lot of the social role it plays is appreciated or seen as neccessary by working class people - we can't just criticise if we have no suggested alternative. For example, the IWCA policing approach, where they attempted community policing, is far better the a million FUCK THE POLICE rants.
This is part of a bigger discussion, but no, I don't agree - let's have more utopian vision, especially at a time when being political at all can make you feel like you are on a different planet, as you put it, and while a wartime mentality is being fostered that is encouraging people to see anyone who won't conform (or who are different) as a threat, young people and immigrants being the easy scapegoats. The rich and powerful who run the world do owe them (and all of us) a living because they've been taking it for free for centuries, especially from countries where people are fleeing from poverty or for their lives. If the rich don't pay taxes so much worse for them - we'll just have to reappropriate the bastards directly. Overall suggested alternative - revolutionary change.
It was Thatcher (and Tebbit) that got people to hate 'doleys' while at the same time were running monetarist policies that created unemployment. Before these attacks, getting benefits for not having work was considered a right. Hard to go back but if anarchists organisations can't help people see how this happened 20 years on, and see who the real enemy is, then we really will have been beaten.
little_brother wrote:
The rich and powerful who run the world do owe them (and all of us) a living because they've been taking it for free for centuries, especially from countries where people are fleeing from poverty or for their lives.
tacks wrote:
I have a bit of a question on that count too; considering the rich pay no taxes, and the government actually taxes the lowest incomes the most (proportionally), would it not be true that working people are actually paying for dolies after all? Rather CRASS types saying 'here's one £25 they can't spend on missiles'?
I'm sugesting that the dole is not being paid by the rich, whether they owe us a living or not.
little_brother wrote:
It was Thatcher (and Tebbit) that got people to hate 'doleys' while at the same time were running monetarist policies that created unemployment. Before these attacks, getting benefits for not having work was considered a right. Hard to go back but if anarchists organisations can't help people see how this happened 20 years on, and see who the real enemy is, then we really will have been beaten.
So again, our only option is to propagandise and explain the world to people.
There are a million other religions for people to join, why join our worldview? Cus without practical application, thats all it really is.
Tacks wrote:
Young people, immigrants, drug addicts, dole dependants - all just scapegoats. People who don't see that need to be more utopian in their thinking.Hmmm!
Of course they're scapegoats! And I think you know why really.
What exactly are you arguing here? I mean, noone's defending your friendly neighbourhood crackhead here, but to write them off lumpen when actually they're just a product of a fucked up environment is ridiculous. I'm not saying they're angels, but then I'm not saying their class/social position makes them evil either.
little brother wrote:
What social responsibilities are we talking about? Dry-stone walling? Seriously though, I'd be interested to know which state functions charities might take over as a direct result of this scheme?
I'm not sure I meant that there would be new functions - more like charities are increasingly seen as the best way to provide social functions that the market doesn't provide, whereas earlier they were seen as state responsibilities
jef costello wrote:
Charities are being asked to take over social provision of housing, care of the elderly and a raft of other things.
this was the kind of thing I was talking about.
tacks wrote:
Young people, immigrants, drug addicts, dole dependants - all just scapegoats. People who don't see that need to be more utopian in their thinking.Hmmm!
I don't understand this - are you saying that immigrants aren't being used as scapegoats at the moment?
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