Hello Holla Forums, 4/pol/ here
Don't worry this isn't a shitpost, I just have a question.
What is the consensus on the EU around here? I would have thought that an authoritarian corporatocracy like the EU would be an anarchist's worst nightmare.
Is my friend just retarded, or am I missing something?
seems to me that brexit was more good than bad, but i'm just one voice.
sounds like he is in fact retarded. what people call themselves means next to nothing 95% of the time, judge them based on what they do.
Good to know, strange to think we were once best friends
Perhaps they thought that each country in the EU fulfils a specific role, each one acting as a mega-syndicate to provide specific products for the rest of the union. In this case, your friend is definitely retarded and/or doesn't understand how the EU actually works.
I'm also curious about how one can merge anarchism and syndicalism without employing some sort of hive-mind or systematic indoctrination.
Personally, I was anti-Brexit, since the UK received a lot of support from the union in certain areas, such as better trade agreements, more funding for scientific research, and regulations to protect the environment. Also, while the EU is inherently capitalist, a gradual shift towards socialism would most likely be much easier with a strong economy, fewer distractions (in the form of environmental issues for example), and better overall international relations, which Brexit threatened to damage.
That's just my opinion, though.
Anarcho-syndicalism just means trade unions taking over.
Basically, think anarcho-capitalism but with labor unions replacing corporations.
Of course, this can take various forms, besides anarcho-syndicalism. Some simply want unions and the general strike to be a means to establish communism. Others want unions to be the government. Yet others, anarcho-syndicalists, want voluntary unions to "run" society. And, there are syndicalists who are fine with markets and in some cases even want something of a mandatory guild system to be established from the framework of unions, comprised of self-employed workers and cooperatives who still compete with each other market-wise. And, this doesn't mean that the guilds or unions have to have a monopoly, there are plenty of syndicalists who want to keep the state. I myself want to have republican confederation of direct democracies forming one branch of government along with the industrial federations. Essentially, it's simply a way to run an industrial society, by having different sectors and industries negotiating together and having workers own the means of production.
Also, that guy is a disgrace to syndicalism by the way. He probably got the term from Keklonia and a bunch of antifa-ggots.
Also, I am ardently pro-Brexit and in fact I think the EU should be destroyed. Then again, I am a nationalist as well as a syndicalist and a democratic-republican, so my views aren't exactly orthodox here.
We don't like the EU because it's one of the largest capitalist forces on the planet.
But we also don't see Britain leaving the EU as an inherently good thing for two reasons.
1. It's not like they're leaving because of said capitalist reasons, they will still engage economically with the EU and no doubt support many of their economic foreign policy.
2. The main people who were forcefully pushing for BREXIT were reactionaries who want to expel immigrants - Holla Forums isn't pro or anti immigrant in general, but racism and fascism are strongly linked and reactionary politics are the anti-thesis of leftism.
So in short, you will see differing opinions around here on the matter, but most don't feel particularly strongly about it.
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I have no live for the EU neoliberal torture rack but Brexit at this point just means Tories and Blairites can fuck the British people harder
Uncertain, it's still too early to determine what the outcome of Brexit will be and what it means for the workers.
I'm really glad the "dude, social media is brainwashing you maaaan" crew think this way, because we're already embarrassing enough without some of our whackiest members.
I'm not european so frankly I'm not that well-informed on the EU, but the project itself, even if some of the specifics are bad, is almost a quesiton of historical necessity at this point.
Continental markets, continental political structures and continental zones for the mobility of labor are the future, and are a much better framework for wrestling with global capitalism than the nation-state. Even if its driving force comes from financial and corporate powers, we should swallow their shit now and embrace it, thinking of the future.
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They already do if they know how to get in. Normies and crypto-normies have been trickling in for years, that's why we're on here and not on halfchan.
Holla Forums is worse since most Holla Forums user came straight from reddit.
Brexit was a good thing in the long run but you'll have to understand that many on the left oppose it because of its widely reactionary following. The EU is at its core a neoliberal establishment that benefits the wealthy and disadvantages the working class. Brexit had the support of the working class, but for all the wrong reasons.
Maybe he was thinking about the well being of UK instead of his politics?
I personally wanted a internal reform of EU like Corbyn said but since that will never happen Brexit is the next best thing.
Maybe he was thinking of the well being of UK instead of seeing everything through his political lens?
Internal reform of EU was the most ideal but Brexit is the most realistic
The EU in and of itself is not a good thing. And leaving it could have been a good thing. However, we voted to leave on the basis of a campaign that said the problem with the EU was it was too leftist, and was holding muh entrepreneurial British spirit back, and the only thing we needed to do to fix the problems with the UK would be to strip away human rights, demolish workers' protections, kick out the foreigners and be a free-wheeling ultra-capitalist free state. The vote for Brexit was 52% of the population voting for that ideology.
Not only that, but those free market ideologues actually had no plan for how to actually do Brexit. Hence seeing them all scattering, shocked, once they realised they had won and would be asked to do what they'd promised, at least until they were dragged back into government by Theresa May.
Voting for Brexit and then having Brexit fail doesn't even mean these people will have their message tarnished by the failure. Theresa May was (at least publicly) a Remainer. Should Brexit fail to do anything they claimed it would do and simply leave everyone in the UK worse off and not have improved living conditions one bit, then they'll simply claim Brexit was not done right. And since it looks very like we'll simply end up with all the obligations they didn't like in the first place but none of the voting power within the EU, it's looking very much like they'd have a decent argument.
Corbyn nailed when he described his support for the EU as 7/10. It's bad, but it could be so much worse, and the right thing to do would be to try and fix it. Britain had the clout within the EU, with France and Germany it was one of the big powers that swayed voting. But it always used that power to support right-wing, pro-capitalist ideology.
EU is neoliberal obviously but I see that as preferable to a return to little england-ism and eagerly ripping up human rights and environmental agreements, it's true the uk sent more money to the EU than the reverse but we got most of it back and it was used for the poorest people in the UK, and for science, arts, culture, that money will just be pissed up the wall on top-rate tax cuts now.
And this is why the left needed to step up. Opposition to the EU (as the capitalist enterprise that it is) was traditionally leftist. Modern day sellouts that call themselves left but are neoliberal garbage suddenly went into full support-mode for it and told the 'base' that if they were left they too, should be in support of it, and anyone against it was against internationalism (already mudding the waters making it seem like globalism under capitalism is the same as the internationalist sentiment of socialism, when they're total enemies), leaving the only room available for opposition towards it - to the right.
It doesn't help that a few super rock-star like "academics" buy into this shit either.
Like Varoufakis:
jacobinmag.com
The face of the enemy that takes the position that you want is never going to turn into your face if you keep opposing it, having you take a stance you don't actually agree with, on that basis.
Brexit was a moot endeavor because the UK is no less cancerous than the EU.
The UK has a massive labour movement, wishing for labour to actually remember that it's labour… the difference between the elite sentiments as shown in the UK media and the people themselves is probably one of the biggest in the world, and that's not hyperbole.
UK population is incredibly socialistic. Their elites sold them out, and play an almost victorian era game of power to the disgust of everyone.
That Britain's elite is even more cancerous than the average EU beurocrat elite, is just even more a reason for the left to rise to the occassion… what's your solution? Leave anti-EU sentiments to the right, and play along with the EU and the neo-liberals? regardless of whatever bullshit rhetoric you might put forth, if in action that is the path you support point by point, you are a sellout. Simple as that.
Nothing short of direct action would really make a difference.
Theoretically the EU could be a good framework for a European socialist revolution, but it's not possible because the EU is neoliberal by design. It was literally founded to protect the interests of the bourgeoisie.
Look what happened to Greece and maybe Spain when Podemos gets elected and you know what the EU stands for - crushing socialism (to be fair it tries hard to crush nationalism as well).
What world do you live in? The UK is reactionary as fuck, second only to America maybe in the west
Only in the media.
No suprise there, they'll all go back to being liberal fucks in a few years.
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Yeah, and look how he's being treated. Yes it's a media hackjob, but not enough people are smart enough to see past it.
voted to Leave. Clear choice to me.
When the 'left' defends authoritarian, anti-democratic institutions such as the EU - it is no surprise that the working class flee to the likes of Farage. The EU is the cause of the far-right, not the solution, and it pains me that more leftists didn't take a stand against what is an indefensible institution.
100% with you there brother
Read something great about leaving via the left on DailyKos, of all places.
dailykos.com
From a socialist perspective I don't care about brexit one way or the other, but looking at it as a liberal would it seems like it was a pretty dumb move based on feels > reals. Also, many people voted for it due to immigration concerns, which to me looks of like lopping off your leg because one of your toes is smashed.
Then again I'm an American, so my opinion is both uninformed and irrelevant and I don't really care about Europe anyway.