Comment on Half-a-million members sign up to new left-wing party founded in Britain
echodot@feddit.uk 5 days agoI don’t think Corbin should have been ousted but at the same time he literally to smear him with.
What concerns me about him is he thinks that having principles is enough, he thinks that if he truly believes in something that’s the end of it and no more thinking about the matter is required. Righteously or wrongly, if you want to make an impact in the political world you have to play the political game, and part of that means limiting your exposure to smear campaigns.
javiwhite@feddit.uk 5 days ago
The material he gave them was campaigning against Zionist activities in Gaza way back in the noughties; before all the genocidal stuff happening now, and his defence was anti-zionism </> anti-Semitism… which I think in today’s light is a very obvious statement, but back in 2019; the average person wasn’t aware of what was happening in Gaza, and so the papers ran with the antisemitism angle.
I get what you’re saying about playing the game; he could have been dishonest and claimed that the parties issues with Israel’s warmongering was actually antisemitism, apologised and given an empty promise about change, to which no-one would bat an eye (a politician lying is a politician breathing etc…), but that’s the exact problem with politics… Corbyn was a breath of fresh air in an otherwise toxic environment; unapologetically honest, and cantankerous when it comes to people pussy footing around an issue, and this is exactly why the media dogged him so heavily… they couldn’t buy him, and he was gunning for their owners hoarded wealth. If it wasn’t the anti-Semitism angle, they would have found something else to try and beat him with.
Even now, he’s attempting to force the UK to address the ongoing British involvement in the Gaza genocide; ofcourse the Tory lites rejected any investigation, which in itself is reminiscent of Blair’s labour and Iraq.
echodot@feddit.uk 5 days ago
It’s not just that it’s everything that he does.
At some point he was asked if he would fire nuclear weapons in the event that we were attacked with nuclear weapons. It was a stupid question, and one that’s easy to answer, just say yes. You don’t need to think about it, you don’t need to analyse the hypothetical situation, just say yes you would, and move on.
But he turned it into this whole thing about whether the ends justify the means. Obviously he has a point, but that news conference wasn’t the time or place to have that discussion. The time to have that discussion is after you’re already in power, otherwise it’s pointless and refusing to give a straight yes or no answer just hands the media another weapon to hit you with. As they can say you’re indecisive.
javiwhite@feddit.uk 5 days ago
Yeah agreed, that was a question clearly posed to rile up the moderates in the party, knowing how he would respond with his hardline anti-war stance.
Whether or not I agree with the statement, I judge his character higher for that response; unapologetically honest, to a fault even, and stood by his beliefs. That is definitely evidence of him being a poor politician; had he less integrity, he may never have been ousted… But equally, with less integrity; he’d probably end up just another Blair clone like Starmer.
It’s no different with the Ukraine Russia situation. Corbyn is calling for de-escalation rather than war with Russia; which will inevitably be spun into Corbyn being Pro-Putin in the media rather than anti-WW3. Sure he could keep his mouth shut, and play the game, but why should he? The country is tired of politics. “Nothing ever changes”, “they’re all the same” are common complaints citizens have… So maybe we should stop voting for people based on their capacity to be dishonest, and instead look at the people who seem to have some integrity.