Startling evidence that 'Stop the War' don't want to stop anything

really news. who plans themselves that far ahead anyway?

Bollocks to articles like this. You might be taking a pop at their political ideology, or you might just be a troll. But either way, StW has had a bloody good go at raising the profile of the war despite substantial public apathy, and despite the media essentially allowing the govt to consider the initial marches 'optional' from a democratic perspective. The anti-war movement in this country has had a lot of hurdles to jump, and most of them are presented by a selfish public who just don't seem to care how many people with foreign-sounding names 'we' slaughter abroad.

Needless to say there is still anti-war activity going on - it is just not represented on this calendar. Maybe the calendar is not even in widespread use? In any case, perhaps the author of this crappy attack should publish *their* calendar, so we can see how busy they over Iraq?

Unless you can point me to someone who's organising demos 12 months in advance, this mean fuck all.

Sure, they're a bit of a joke, but not for failing to have their calendar filled up for 2009. Mine's only filled until Christmas - doesn't mean I'm not going to be doing my job after that.

Maybe the Stop the War Coalition is a trot front or something; I don't know.

But I think it's petty and stupid to write articles like this. I guess you have nothing else to do but criticize what other people are doing?

How about you cut out the negativity and start writing some positive articles about what you are doing?:

Tue 16 Dec: wrote stupid article slagging off Stop The War Coalition.
...
what else?

G20 in london on april 2nd should be on everyones diary

the swp are part of the opportunist left who believe they can bring change via joining the labour party and reforming it from the inside
this is at a time where there own leadership is in crisis of a split this is pathetic

the swp should just finnish

labour is NOT going to change by people supporting them

the swp have had anarchists hoyed off demmos for being anti labour

take the black block man they said we were out of order cause we were there to criticize labour at THE LABOUR PARTY CONFERENCE

all i say to the middle class snobs at the swp GET A LIFE LOSERS

I don't think it's so bad to humorously point out the manifest deficiencies of StW. It's not been an effective opposition - for instance it's failed to take on direct action, and failed to support those who have. It's an opposition the Government and military have been comfortable with. Marching from A-B has not threatened the war machine. Listening to usual suspects giving speeches has not troubled the war mongers.

StW has been elitist in my view, without the capacity for real dialogue with others in the anti-war movement, or even those who attend their "actions". Whenever the marches got active and confrontational, it was despite StW, who mostly seemed to be helping the police to make sure the marches fizzled out.

I don't think anyone who has been reading Indymedia for the last few years can ignore the wealth of feedback and constructive criticism of StW - which they of course, fail to engage with.

"StW has had a bloody good go at raising the profile of the war despite substantial public apathy, and despite the media essentially allowing the govt to consider the initial marches 'optional' from a democratic perspective. The anti-war movement in this country has had a lot of hurdles to jump, and most of them are presented by a selfish public who just don't seem to care how many people with foreign-sounding names 'we' slaughter abroad."

The so-called anti-war movement consists of a bunch of skunks and opportunists who have used the Iraq conflict to push a sectarian, quasi-racist agenda. This climaxed this year when a raving drooling anti-semite who runs propaganda activities for the extreme-right wing, nazi-saluting Hezbollah was invited to speak at their rally and then go on a national tour. Unsurprisingly, people stayed in droves.

Interesting how you blame the public for StWC's failure to facitilitate action against an incredibly unpopular war. I mean, how hard can it be? As for "criticism" and "negativity", unfortunately for the likes of you we still just about live in a democracy and so we can still criticize who the hell we like.

The StWC is dominated by the SWP...and a bit of the old Labour left. I heard somewhere that the SWP had been infiltrated by MI5 back in the late 1970s and 1980s and nobody had ever uncovered who these infilitrators had been. Well, perhaps it is no surprise that the StWC is so elitist and non-grassroots (e.g. non-controllable)? A useful means of finding out about concerned activists and recording their movements while hindering them from any useful organising..... personally I'd stay away from them. Anyone can organise an anti-war demo, it doesn't take too much to do it on a local level.

full of infiltrators from the Judean People's Front, I reckon!

@William Greaves - mostly agree with that. I am not a member of the SWP, but do support StWC; however I would like to see direct action replace the A-B marches, which I agree have proved ineffective.

But @outsider, your response is riddled with errors. There can always be debates about who StWC ally themselves with (and I am not stopping you) but you can't honestly believe that ordinary members of the public have stayed "in droves" because of this issue. Really, they have stayed away (a) because the massive initial demos were ignored by the government, and (b) apathy set in, and people started to think that 'ending the war' is a hopeless task. Suggestions that the majority of the population have analysed who is politically allied with who is a heap of crap.

Your second substantial error is to suggest that organising action against the war would have been easy. If this were the case, a new group would have popped up to have done it. As it happens, though we have had fine activists at Derry and Brighton taking direct action, and elsewhere too no doubt, no-one has stepped up to the task nationally. If it was genuinely easy, then someone would have done it already.

You are right that most people in the UK are against the Iraq invasion/occupation, but only in "soft" polling terms. They are not furious, and they should be, which is why I am right to blame them for their apathy. I am not putting StWC on a pedestal; I am just recognising that with such a pliable populace, anyone undertaking anti-war organising is fighting an uphill struggle.

Lastly of course you can criticise anyone you like - no-one's stopping you. But if you support crappy attacks like this "article" then you can expect to get some criticism in return.