Most Jeremy Corbyn supporters are not ideologues; the rest are liable to resort to turn on each other, writes Adrian McMenamin
The time for holding illusions about where the Labour party is and where it is going are well and truly over.
Even if you still thought that the victory of the three Momentum candidates in the National Executive Committee byelections was just a blip, the decision of the new majority to remove Ann Black as chair of the NEC disputes committee and then to minimise action being taken against a number of figures accused of antisemitic behaviour, ought to have disabused you.
Labour is now a party of the far left. The victory of the Corbynistas is not absolute, but it is certainly convincing.
This does not mean that it cannot get worse for Labour’s social democrats: it can and it probably will.
There is plainly no prospect of the current leadership ever voluntarily getting a grip on the antisemitism issue even though, in the end, it really would not require much effort. The point remains that the problem is not that almost everybody in the Labour party is an antisemite, but that almost all the antisemites are now in and around Labour.
Jeremy Corbyn will press on with his support for a hard Brexit. The unknown factor here is the trade unions, who may eventually decide that they have had enough of the Labour leader’s incoherent rambles on this subject and start to kick some people – especially him – up the backside.
Foreign policy and defence will be about opposing the United States as the world’s greatest evil, while economic policy, such as it is, will be about state ownership as the answer to every economic problem, with ever higher business taxes on anything not nationalised. If you think that is an extreme caricature, ask yourself this: which sector of the economy would Corbyn think it wrong to extend public ownership in?
What can we do about it? The first thing is to indicate we are opposed to this and to state why. Brexit might be the easiest example to create a dividing line, in policy terms, but that does not make it any less important.
Morally we all have a duty to bear witness against the racists who have seeped into our ranks. There can be no compromise.
The nature of the far left is that it will eventually turn on itself. Deep in the Corbynite core the endless search for people to hate and blame will switch inwards.
Most Corbynistas are not ideologues: Corbynism is a very postmodern, almost politics-free, lifestyle choice for many of them. It is a badge of virtue, not a commitment to action. That is why, for instance, some fail to see the contradictions between sending their children to private schools and supporting a party leader who not only wants their favoured form of education abolished, but who opposes anything other than a regimented state monopoly.
So when the implosion comes many, perhaps most, will be bewildered and will be quick to drift away. Some will double down on the far left, or like the British communists who responded to the denunciation of Joseph Stalin in 1956 by joining Trotskyist parties, seek alternative extremisms. Others, though, will be trying to understand why they got it wrong and consistency now will be important when that moment comes.
Or, rather, if it comes. Because by the time of the implosion there may simply be nothing left.
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Adrian McMenamin is a Progress columnist and is the former chief press and broadcasting officer for the Labour party. He tweets at @adrianmcmenamin
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Photo: Youtube
The fundamental property of Corbynism is that it acts as a credible electoral challenge, not like the milksop complaisant Milliband era,
The venom with which a certain faction within the party attacks Corbyn makes one wonder about their hidden agenda.
When well supported by rich donors its much easier to stay in opposition – all the perks of an MP with none of the responsibility of Government .
You will note that Corbyn Labour is financed by an active membership.
It is the duty of every non-Marxist Labour supporter to do their utmost to ensure a heavy defeat for Labour at the next election. Fortunately, the current party of Hamas-hugging snowflakes are themselves helping enormously in that task. A further period of opposition will drain the Marxist swamp, and without question, be eminently worth the pain.
A very interesting perspective. I suspect Adrian is quite right about the idealist, not ideologue point. That is why I am convinced that he is right about an inevitable implosion. But that could well be a long time in the future .It is very important that orthodox Labour people stick together,keep calm and use the period of internal opposition to show newcomers that we are socialists-but not of the variety that the Hard Left exemplify. In CLPs we need to lead the way and resort to positive motions so that people see that we agree with them,most particularly over Brexit. Brexit is Mr Corbyn’s Achilles’ heel. 87% members voted Remain and believe in SM. In time people will come to see that he is letting the membership down.
Incidentally I remember Adrain in Barnet LP way over 30 years ago. He is in it for the long game-as am I.
The number of reds I have under my bed is incredible.
I suppose the majority of Labour Party members do seem ‘hard left’ to Adrian but that is because he is rather far to the right in Labour terms. I fear they are projecting their own past behaviour on to the new majority in the party. After all the progress dominated party on the 1990 – 2010 spent its time deselecting MPs, forcing right wingers on constituencies and creating a machine politics. Since that is the only form of politics Adrian can conceive of he believes the new majority will behave the same.
Adrian, don’t worry. We, in the new majority are fair minded and decent. we accept that progress supporters will take every opportunity to undermine the party by providing the anti Labour press with quotes. And that you will say criticism of the extreme right wing Israeli government is anti Semitism. You know it’s not true but it is a useful stick in your increasingly extreme attacks on the new majority.
Your position would have more persuasive power if you occasionally criticised the land seizures by Israel, the arrest of adolescent girls by the Israeli army or the movement of the US Embassy to Jerusalem
It’s the same pattern every week. I write the column and then some Corbynista comes here and, by way of attacking me for it, proves my point for me.
This week is special though, someone comes here to say that opposition to racism is only credible if I condemn a foreign government’s policies. In fact, two foreign governments’ policies.
So let me be clear. Nothing the Israeli government, or the US government for that matter, does can ever justify antisemitism and, by definition, the only people who think otherwise are antisemites.
Presumably you write in the same way every week and get similar responses to those shown here. I don’t see much in the way of “attacking” I see people disagreeing with you. You appear paranoid. Why are you son afraid of debate? Is it because you know you are in a minority? Or that your viewpoint is so fragile that unless we all applaud you it might fade away?
Your comments regarding opposition to racism are muddled I think. I didn’t see anything that suggested that you must condemn a foreign government to be credible. I think the point being made was that the writer had seen no evidence of anything from yourself that might indicate any concerns about Israeli actions. Sadly there appears to be a mischief making minority who are all to ready to shout antisemitism at anyone criticizing Israel as a country. The confusion regarding those who do condemn Israel is largely manufactured by those with another agenda. If you are not able to separate criticism of the state of Israel from anti semitism or any other form of racism then I suggest you refrain from further comment.
The question is why you stay in a party which you so clearly have no sympathy with and write articles like this about – to bring it into disrepute.
Eventually you will grasp that the sort of centrist party you want is not and never will be Labour again. You are welcome to stay with us. But pipe down on the claims of anti-Semitism. Such false accusations might not go down well with a disputes panel which actually suppirts party policy and expects the membership to as well.
“Pipe down with the claims of antisemitism”
No.
Gary Younge wrote an article in the Guardian this week in which he wrote:
“One of the biggest mistakes the critics of Jeremy Corbyn, the Labour leader, made from the outset – and there are many to choose from – was that his victory was about him. They refer to “Corbynites” and “Corbynistas” as though there were some undying and uncritical devotion to a man and his singular philosophy, rather than broad support for an agenda and a trajectory. If they could get rid of the king, went the logic, they would reinherit the kingdom. With a new leader normal service could resume. Labour could resuscitate its programme of milquetoast* managerialism, whereby it was indifferent to its members, ambivalent about austerity at home, and hawkish about wars abroad”.
Rather sums up Adrian’s musings.
Progress is now more reactionary than most of the Conservative Party, whose right-wing PFI-frenzied zeal is sadly more palatable to them than the party they claim to call home.
Corbyn added 3 million voters, most of whom had never voted before, and is making the party accountable to and funded by its members. Many in the party – including the millions who marched against the Iraq War in the early 2000s – were deeply unhappy with the way Blair, Mandelson and Campbell pushed the party between 1997 and 2010, but nevertheless we did not blow holes in the boat – we argued and campaigned to be the party’s conscience and made the best we could, happy at least that the country was beyond the grasp of the fouler elements of the Conservatives.
The press campaign against the current leadership by elements within its own party is shameful, craven and self-serving and will come to nothing.