World calls time on UK plc
Charles Dance | 04.12.2008 16:16 | Social Struggles | Sheffield
The paucity of action on the part of liberal minded, left-oriented activists in the face of the very real economic and political crisis facing the UK is mind boggling. Whilst the BNP is out in force with its political machine providing recently buggered workers, savers and pensioners with plausible sounding explanations non-fascist activists continue to focus on the minutiae of social life.
a recent post featured a report of a demonstration outside RBS bank against its investments in EON´s new coal projects
this is what you could call business as usual on the part of campaigners who appear to have noticed the monumental shift in context that has taken place over the last 12 months. the plight of the financial sector and the formal economy are worsening on a daily basis- the patient is very, very sick.
however, i am yet to see any genuine evidence of a response on indymedia to these earth-shattering events. instead i see that one group of anti-fascists are arguing with another group of anti-fascists apparently oblivious to the need to develop a real alternative to the discourse of the BNP which is geared up to capitalise on the forthcoming collapse of the Brown government.
campaigners seem to be oblivious to the fact that the UK government has made commitments to underwrite the bad loans made by the banking sector, which will have the consequence that the welfare of UK residents will suffer a systematic decline. whether this takes place through the pain of hyper-inflation or austerity measures remains to be seen. but there will be pain. if anyone doubts this they can look at the threat facing California at present where public sector workers are expected to be dismissed on mass anytime soon or Harare where there has been no clean water through the pipes since Monday. All I'm saying is that it would be nice to see some activism against RBS and other banks in response to the handouts they have been receiving from the government.
for example it is only a matter of time before the entire UK banking sector will need to be taken under public ownership. it would be nice to think that some of us could perhaps begin to talk about a democratic platform for people to start advocating this so that public ownership can become a tool for redistributing wealth.
this for example would involve choosing not to lend money to EON for producing dirty power or to arms dealers for producing weapons but could be lent to businesses offering clean energy solutions
this is what you could call business as usual on the part of campaigners who appear to have noticed the monumental shift in context that has taken place over the last 12 months. the plight of the financial sector and the formal economy are worsening on a daily basis- the patient is very, very sick.
however, i am yet to see any genuine evidence of a response on indymedia to these earth-shattering events. instead i see that one group of anti-fascists are arguing with another group of anti-fascists apparently oblivious to the need to develop a real alternative to the discourse of the BNP which is geared up to capitalise on the forthcoming collapse of the Brown government.
campaigners seem to be oblivious to the fact that the UK government has made commitments to underwrite the bad loans made by the banking sector, which will have the consequence that the welfare of UK residents will suffer a systematic decline. whether this takes place through the pain of hyper-inflation or austerity measures remains to be seen. but there will be pain. if anyone doubts this they can look at the threat facing California at present where public sector workers are expected to be dismissed on mass anytime soon or Harare where there has been no clean water through the pipes since Monday. All I'm saying is that it would be nice to see some activism against RBS and other banks in response to the handouts they have been receiving from the government.
for example it is only a matter of time before the entire UK banking sector will need to be taken under public ownership. it would be nice to think that some of us could perhaps begin to talk about a democratic platform for people to start advocating this so that public ownership can become a tool for redistributing wealth.
this for example would involve choosing not to lend money to EON for producing dirty power or to arms dealers for producing weapons but could be lent to businesses offering clean energy solutions
Charles Dance
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