Gordon Brown has slammed a militant group, Islam4 UK, who plan to demonstrate against returning murderers (troops)in Wooton Basset. Such statements (see: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/jan/04/wootton-bassett-islam4uk-parade-troops) are of course to expected from this savant of the bosses. Also to be expected is the hysteria amongst some sections of the left, who greeted the news that the British fascist English Defence League were planning a counter demonstration in support of Imperialist butchers, with undisguised horror. Individuals from groups such as the Alliance for Workers Liberty are joining facebook groups condemning what is described as 'Islamo-fascism' in the non Marxist parlance of this third campist outfit.(http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=231086644930&ref=mf).
How should communists approach anti-Imperialist resistance by groups which have reactionary social platforms and which are not part of the working class, although having the allegiance of important and fighting sections of the class? Islam4UK seem to have the ear of a small but militant section of mostly poor/working class Asian and Muslim youth. To simply condemn the righteous anger of these oppressed groups - anger at both Imperialism and the effective neo-colonialism they face within Britian - is the politics of the playground. Opposition to the Trotskyist and Leninist understanding of the anti Imperialist united front is the foundation stone of what communists have come to know of as third campism - that is, the refusal to defend colonial countries/oppressed groups from attacks by the bosses and their fascist adjuncts. The rationale for this is that such groups/regimes have anti working class politics. The real cause of this effective support for Imperialism, and in this case the fascists, is the housebroken form of socialism these groups espouse, riddled with bourgeois morality and liberal, as opposed to a Marxist understanding of how to best defend the oppressed and defeat the bosses.
All communists who can should attend the demo against these butchers of Iraqi and Afghan peoples, making the case with secular, socialist and anti Imperialist slogans. If the reactionary leadership of Islam4 UK attempted to split the demo and attack our side then more power to us in appearing as the best defenders of oppressed peoples, seeking unity with all those fighting Imperialism. We may even make inroads to the people attracted to what amounts to the anti Imperialism of fools. Anybody attending as a third campist, effectively ignoring the march of the bosses troops, is siding with them and Messrs Obama, Brown, Patraeus et al.
This quote from Trotsky, taken from a discussion concerning the importance of communists being the most implacble fighers against Imperialist tyranny has much to credit it today. If we extend the last line to include the absurdity of reducing world antagonisms to the struggle between democracy/secularism and fascism/Islamo fascism and us socialists, then we are on the way to understanding how we should approach the likes of this planned demo.
"I will take the most simple and obvious example. In Brazil there now reigns a semifascist regime that every revolutionary can only view with hatred. Let us assume, however, that on the morrow England enters into a military conflict with Brazil. I ask you on whose side of the conflict will the working class be? I will answer for myself personally—in this case I will be on the side of “fascist” Brazil against “democratic” Great Britain. Why? Because in the conflict between them it will not be a question of democracy or fascism. If England should be victorious, she will put another fascist in Rio de Janeiro and will place double chains on Brazil. If Brazil on the contrary should be victorious, it will give a mighty impulse to national and democratic consciousness of the country and will lead to the overthrow of the Vargas dictatorship. The defeat of England will at the same time deliver a blow to British imperialism and will give an impulse to the revolutionary movement of the British proletariat. Truly, one must have an empty head to reduce world antagonisms and military conflicts to the struggle between fascism and democracy. Under all masks one must know how to distinguish exploiters, slave-owners, and robbers!"
http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1938/09/liberation.htm
No comments:
Post a Comment