Situational Politics Returns

[cronus]

https://www.spectator.co.uk/2018/07/how ... d-history/

How situationism changed history
While the situationists were playful, they were not playing around, especially not in 1968
Fluke Haines

Unless you have been sleeping under a barricade or a pile of Molotov cocktails it will not have escaped your attention that we — that is, a few broadsheets and BBC4 — have been having a good old think about the events of 1968. When student rioting brought France to its knees and the revolution didn’t quite happen. The Independent helpfully reminded us that Sgt. Pepper’s was released ‘around about then’, and that Lady Chatterley’s Lover was banned (also ‘round about then’). It is highly probable that Philip Larkin was mentioned. Over on BBC4, Joan Bakewell did a slightly better job of framing the whole caper. Daniel Cohn-Bendit got his props, as did the enragés. Of course the BBC dug out that footage of the hippies holding hands and dancing around
a tree, which has been used only slightly more than its footage of the Sensational Alex Harvey Band on The Old Grey Whistle Test. Joan didn’t make too bad a fist of it really — that is, if you like your soixante-huitard insurrectionary slogans dished out to you in the voice of a jolly hockey sticks head girl, whose every intonation purrs ‘I invented the middlebrow’. What all the coverage missed was the most interesting and perhaps most prescient ‘presence’ throughout the Paris riots — that of the situationists.

The Situationist International (SI) was formed in Switzerland in 1957 and led by the fabulously chippy, overtly intellectual, and very French Guy Debord. Two avant-garde groups, the International Movement Towards An Imaginist Bauhaus, and the London Psychogeographical Society, pooled their not inconsiderable avant-garde chops, and before you could say ‘Constant Nieuwenhuys’ (briefly a situationist) the SI was born.

(continued, at least until someone points out what is real and not?)

[laklak]

I remember 1968, that was 2 years BH (Before Hallucinogenics). Most stuff after '70 is a bit hazy, but I do remember "Ho Ho Ho Chi MInh, You know the Left is gonna win!" and "Hell No! We Won't GO!", and my personal favorite, "Dick Nixon before he dicks you!"

Good times, man, good times.

[Jason]

Anti-state communists? Where could I find some of those?

[cronus]

Heavy in London today. And now the mob of people have tasted the power unity so like a dog and blood they'll want more. Interesting few years ahead, around here?

[Rum]

I'm not sure why this has been posted. 'Situational politics' and radical anarcho socialist action were the products of ideology and of a time. I was briefly one of those guys - on the periphery anyway - and mixed for a short while with some of the French activities - a small group of who fled Paris at the risk of arrest and dossed on some of our floors for a while.

These were people inspired by Marxism - an idealized version that tended to ignore the reality of life in states like the USSR. The ones I met believed in violent revolution and the inevitability of history. They scared the crap out of me because (I realised very quickly) they were ranting as if they had themselves been brainwashed. Certainly their ideology blinkered them.

There is no popular movement - in Europe anyway - like it any more. Sure there are radicals but the movement back then was the crest of a wave of a much bigger swelling of anti establishment feeling than you find pretty much anywhere in the developed world these days.

Paradoxically a lot of the 'revolutionaries' were the offspring of middle class parents who, when the fuss was all over, gave them nice comfortable jobs with fat salaries. Today young people struggle to get a job that covers the basics. Oddly enough that seems to make them less, rather than more, radical.

[Jason]

It's possible that some might be inspired by their people power and radicalize, but for most people I think they'll feel a renewed hope and trust in their fellows and be more willing to engage with the proper democratic outlets in their desire to see change happen.

[cronus]

I'm not sure why this has been posted. 'Situational politics' and radical anarcho socialist action were the products of ideology and of a time. I was briefly one of those guys - on the periphery anyway - and mixed for a short while with some of the French activities - a small group of who fled Paris at the risk of arrest and dossed on some of our floors for a while.

These were people inspired by Marxism - an idealized version that tended to ignore the reality of life in states like the USSR. The ones I met believed in violent revolution and the inevitability of history. They scared the crap out of me because (I realised very quickly) they were ranting as if they had themselves been brainwashed. Certainly their ideology blinkered them.

There is no popular movement - in Europe anyway - like it any more. Sure there are radicals but the movement back then was the crest of a wave of a much bigger swelling of anti establishment feeling than you find pretty much anywhere in the developed world these days.

Paradoxically a lot of the 'revolutionaries' were the offspring of middle class parents who, when the fuss was all over, gave them nice comfortable jobs with fat salaries. Today young people struggle to get a job that covers the basics. Oddly enough that seems to make them less, rather than more, radical.

Was involved in Militant in the 80s, sort of flattened second wave to the late sixties. Can appreciate what you are saying but never under-estimate silence in a political landscape. Deep seated emotions have been contained for many years with regards disingenuous Tory policy and unending cuts across the entire state. Including the military who still have not forgotten the sell off with the harriers, refitted with 700 million of kit, and throwing all eggs into one hubris driven militarily useless aircraft carrier fleet etc...country is a seething powderkeg in some quarters and other quarters wouldn't take much to get the same...

[Rum]

The military? You aren't suggesting they are disgruntled enough to mutiny are you? Or are you justy jumbling up ideas as ever. The military will do exactly as they are told including pout down an civilian rebellion if it ever came to that - which it won't in the foreseeable future.

The civilian population may pop now and again - spontaneous outbursts, badly directed with no political motivation. There is not a hope of any sort of radical rethink of our politics coming off the back of any sort of popular revolt or uprising.

[cronus]

The military? You aren't suggesting they are disgruntled enough to mutiny are you? Or are you justy jumbling up ideas as ever. The military will do exactly as they are told including pout down an civilian rebellion if it ever came to that - which it won't in the foreseeable future.

The civilian population may pop now and again - spontaneous outbursts, badly directed with no political motivation. There is not a hope of any sort of radical rethink of our politics coming off the back of any sort of popular revolt or uprising.

You are up in the hills. Nothing happening from the years of grace and that vantage.

[Rum]

The military? You aren't suggesting they are disgruntled enough to mutiny are you? Or are you justy jumbling up ideas as ever. The military will do exactly as they are told including pout down an civilian rebellion if it ever came to that - which it won't in the foreseeable future.

The civilian population may pop now and again - spontaneous outbursts, badly directed with no political motivation. There is not a hope of any sort of radical rethink of our politics coming off the back of any sort of popular revolt or uprising.

You are up in the hills. Nothing happening from the years of grace and that vantage.

If you mean I am privileged then yes I am. I'm exceedingly lucky. But I spent my working life dealing with and hopefully occasionally helping people who were shat on by the system.

Before I got promoted to the appropriate level of incompetence I used to visit homes where dog shit was scattered on the floor, literally, where nappies were not changed for several days at a time, where people spent their benefits on drugs rather than food and all manner of dreadful life circumstances.

It is people like that who are the 'waste product' of society, people who have low expectations, little education and next to no hope.

So don't tell me I'm out of touch.

The sort of revolt you are talking about only comes when there is someone in the vanguard. As things stand capitalism has managed to make the people I'm referring to simply expendable and to rig it so that governments - in particular Tory ones - see them as victims of their own weaknesses - the 'undeserving poor'. People like that are truly beaten in my view and I see no prospect of any sort of vanguard coming along any time soon and inspiring them to overthrow the system of which they are victims. If you think there's a groundswell of rebellion in the air I'm afraid you are sdly mistaken.

[cronus]

Thinking is a true, a decade ago. Things are changing. You only have to consider the 'quiet revolt' against plastic and half of young people want electric cars? There's a new vanguard. Quiet and stealthlike at present. History suggests that'll change. Won't take much genuine austerity post-Brexit for the calculus to change from progressive to social change to radical power grabbing....like before. Whether it'll succeed or not might be open to debate - gonna happen a near certainty.

[laklak]

Keep the cheap lager and rollups coming, give them a few more quid for each sprog they pop out, throw some footie and fruit machines at them, and they'll happily sit and rot in the dog shit. S'truth, as unpalatable as it might be. The system is designed to do exactly that with those either unfortunate, unlucky, unintelligent, or unambitious enough to pull themselves out of the mire. They're the lumpen proletariat and Marx was right, they simply aren't up to revolutionary snuff. Mao thought they might be useful if "reeducated", but with hindsight that didn't work out so well. The underclass is, and probably always will, be with us.

[cronus]

Keep the cheap lager and rollups coming, give them a few more quid for each sprog they pop out, throw some footie and fruit machines at them, and they'll happily sit and rot in the dog shit. S'truth, as unpalatable as it might be. The system is designed to do exactly that with those either unfortunate, unlucky, unintelligent, or unambitious enough to pull themselves out of the mire. They're the lumpen proletariat and Marx was right, they simply aren't up to revolutionary snuff. Mao thought they might be useful if "reeducated", but with hindsight that didn't work out so well. The underclass is, and probably always will, be with us.

Corbyn and Momentum...no hope without them, not much with. One thing is certain. This country is overdue a proper rebellion of the heart. Supposed to be a youth uprising every thirty years or so here. And change is in the air, palatable. No one in the crowd can afford or dare risk moving out of their lot in life, social and literal mobility is at a near standstill since 2008, luxury for Tory MPs who mostly comprise landlords, country is a pressure cooker though. Doesn't need to be a successful revolution to scare the powers witless and keep the lumpen prols/ precariots ideal of the good life going, and moving forward a league or two - even if it appears a goodlife in squalor to some.

[Jason]

I'm not sure why this has been posted. 'Situational politics' and radical anarcho socialist action were the products of ideology and of a time. I was briefly one of those guys - on the periphery anyway - and mixed for a short while with some of the French activities - a small group of who fled Paris at the risk of arrest and dossed on some of our floors for a while.

These were people inspired by Marxism - an idealized version that tended to ignore the reality of life in states like the USSR. The ones I met believed in violent revolution and the inevitability of history. They scared the crap out of me because (I realised very quickly) they were ranting as if they had themselves been brainwashed. Certainly their ideology blinkered them.

There is no popular movement - in Europe anyway - like it any more. Sure there are radicals but the movement back then was the crest of a wave of a much bigger swelling of anti establishment feeling than you find pretty much anywhere in the developed world these days.

Paradoxically a lot of the 'revolutionaries' were the offspring of middle class parents who, when the fuss was all over, gave them nice comfortable jobs with fat salaries. Today young people struggle to get a job that covers the basics. Oddly enough that seems to make them less, rather than more, radical.

Was involved in Militant in the 80s, sort of flattened second wave to the late sixties. Can appreciate what you are saying but never under-estimate silence in a political landscape. Deep seated emotions have been contained for many years with regards disingenuous Tory policy and unending cuts across the entire state. Including the military who still have not forgotten the sell off with the harriers, refitted with 700 million of kit, and throwing all eggs into one hubris driven militarily useless aircraft carrier fleet etc...country is a seething powderkeg in some quarters and other quarters wouldn't take much to get the same...

I considered joining the Militant after 9/11, but I saw the error of my ways and now I fight for Truth and Justice, not Wealth and Commerce!

[Rum]

Thinking is a true, a decade ago. Things are changing. You only have to consider the 'quiet revolt' against plastic and half of young people want electric cars? There's a new vanguard. Quiet and stealthlike at present. History suggests that'll change. Won't take much genuine austerity post-Brexit for the calculus to change from progressive to social change to radical power grabbing....like before. Whether it'll succeed or not might be open to debate - gonna happen a near certainty.

Wanting an electric car is about the most middle class aspiration I can think of. Laklak is right I’m afraid for now. Beer and reality TV - our equivalent of bread and circuses and just enough money to buy them keeps the potentially dangerous underclass politically dumb. At least for now.