What Shall We Change?

We know of millions of fellow workers who have been suffering from capitalism all their lives, and yet, so powerful are the uses of advertisement, they are convinced that capitalism does not exist and that poverty is an act of nature.

Capitalism is based on competition. The means of production are owned exclusively by a section of the community; those that are dispossessed must sell themselves to the owning section in order to live.

The owning class give those who sell their life force to them sufficient to keep going as producers of commodities which become the property of the owning class as they are brought into being.

Commodities are articles produced for sale, for profit. The latter cannot be realised until the commodities are sold.

To sell you must find a buyer. The only portion the worker can buy is that equivalent to the wages he receives; all over and above this amount must be disposed of elsewhere.

Markets are found abroad which temporarily relieve the situation, but as the productivity of labour increases, and more and more countries are brought within the orbit of capitalism, the difficulty to sell is intensified.

The world is scoured for raw materials by rival gangs; the wage slaves are driven faster and ever faster so that relative cheapness can enable one exploiter to undersell another, but all in vain.

The markets are decreasing comparatively and the powers of production are increasing. The capitalist class must sell in order to realise profits and yet they are compelled to set in motion factors that make the necessary sale ever more difficult.

The unemployed grow in number in all lands and eventually the situation becomes so bad that the harder pressed gangs of exploiters become desperate, arm their slaves, and demand at the point of the sword certain concessions in the way of a right to raw materials, markets, etc., from their rivals—the war is on.

Amidst the flag-waving and the beating of the war drums let our battle-cry be “the common ownership of the means of life.” When amidst anguish, made bitter by grinding poverty, the disillusioned wage-slaves cry out “What shall we do?” We give the answer. Free yourself from the chains of wage slavery. Make the means of life common property. 

We have solved the problem of production. We can produce all that is needed to supply the necessities of life, as well as some of the comforts of life — education and the opportunity for recreation — to all the people. And yet all but a very few are not sure of their livelihood. The existing industrial system is a huge profit-making machine, which has no relation to the happiness and well-being of the people. If the work of reconstruction is to result in a better world, its aim must be the abolition of the profit system. If common ownership is to solve our problem of reconstruction, it must come hand in hand with industrial democracy. Together with the establishment of collective ownership of industry there must be developed the democratic management of industry by the workers' Industry must no longer be conducted as a private business for profit but must become a coordinated, collective process conducted for the purpose of supplying human needs and comforts. Such a transformation can only be accomplished by taking the ownership of resources and means of production and distribution out of the hands of the present owners and vesting the ownership in the people collectively. We can through socialism — through the organisation and coordination of our powers of production, eliminate waste and will enable us to bring into existence more than enough wealth to give a high standard of living.

There is no hope for the working class if they continue to support the political parties representing the interest of the capitalist class. The idea that socialism would be established through a series of legislative acts extending possibly over a decade or two has been shown to be an illusion. Socialism will not be legislated into existence but will be established by a mass movement of the workers. The legislative acts will merely give the accomplished fact the stamp of approval as the will of the majority. The struggle of the working class will henceforth be a political struggle for control of the state because it must gain control of the government before it can hope to establish democracy in industry. For the working class to endeavour to take control of industry while all the repressive power of the class state remained in the hands of the capitalist class would be to invite destruction. The work the workers have to do, the way to freedom, is through building a class-conscious political movement which will carry on the work of educating the workers to an understanding of the system of exploitation which now exists and the class character of the government and to organise the workers for the struggle to wrest control of the government out of the hands of the capitalist class. The Socialist Party is the medium through which this task can be done. At the same time, it is an essential part of the work of the workers to build up organisations in the industries themselves, having as their goal to supersede the capitalists in control of industry. These organisations in the industries are the beginning of the new industrial order that will expand and grow until they become a huge cooperative organisation of the workers for control and management of the work of production and of all matters pertaining to their common interest.

Only One Thing Worth Celebrating.

July 1st  was the 154th birthday of the capitalist state of Canada and never could it be celebrated in so inauspicious circumstances. 

On June 30th 182 more unmarked graves of indigenous children were found in Cranbrook, B.C. Not many native Canadians will be celebrating, surprise, surprise! 

Since the Catholic Church ran the residential schools where this genocide occurred, some churches have been burned down and one can understand how the arsonists feel. As expected, native Canadians demonstrated their anger at the genocide of Indian children.

 The only great thing about it was when they pulled down the statue of that old parasite Queen Victoria in front of the Manitoba legislature. 

Happy Birthday Canada. The only thing worth celebrating will be the day the working class wake up and see capitalism as the great big, useless, mean spirited, impractical, economic piece of junk that it is.

S.P.C. Members.

This is Primarily a Poor Man’s Problem.

Western Canada has been hit by a massive heatwave which has broken records. It has sent people scrambling for air conditioners strained emergency resources and caused some schools to close early. 

In Vancouver, the police said they have responded to 65 deaths since the heatwave began on June 25 and most of them were heat-related. The B.C. Coroners Service said they would normally get about 130 reports of death over a 4-day stretch, but now it’s been 233. Ambulances have been delayed for as long as 2 hours for emergency calls as paramedics are stretched to their limits because of demand across the province. 

In Edmonton, the police are handing out water and in Calgary, water wagons are being deployed. The heat is expected to last for a few days then move eastwards so the rest of Canada can sizzle. 

This is primarily a poor man’s problem and you can bet your bippy the rich have air conditioning and plenty of water. 

The irony is that it’s all part of global warming which eventually will affect the capitalist class too. 

Crazy, insane capitalism.

S.P. C. Members.

State ownership nor State control is not socialism.

 

A good deal of our time as an organisation has, unfortunately, had to be devoted to denouncing false ideas about socialism as well as to explaining what socialism really means. This has led us to strong criticisms of left-wing parties claiming to be working-class parties, which have very frequently been grossly misunderstood. Our position is a simple one regarding these parties. It is, briefly, that they do not stand for socialism, that is to say, the common ownership by the whole of society of the means and instruments of production and distribution, and their democratic control by and in the interests of all. Some bristle like Christians rebuked for lack of faith when the position is stated thus. Yet that is the position from the evidence of programmes, newspapers and conferences. Worse—many thousands who describe themselves as socialists have so vague an idea as to what socialism means that they would not, so to speak, recognise it if they saw it.  State ownership or State control is not socialism.

The capitalist class possesses power to-day because it has control of the machinery of government, including the armed forces. Not always has the capitalist class been so powerful. It was not able to become the most powerful class in the State until it had wrested from the feudal aristocracy a share in the control of the machinery of government. To-day, the capitalist class still controls the machinery of government. But this is due only to the fact that the working class is immature. The workers still believe their problems can be solved within the framework of capitalism. Consequently, at each election, they send to Parliament and to the local councils people prepared to uphold the capitalist system of society. Thus do the war mongers and financial magnates get their power.

When the workers understand that they constitute a slave class and that their slavery and all its accompanying evils will remain as long as capitalism itself, then they will become socialists. They will cease to vote  the supporters of capitalism. Instead, they will elect socialist delegates. Since the working class forms the majority of the population, nothing but its lack of political knowledge prevents it gaining control of the machinery of government for the purpose of carrying out its own wishes.

The power of the capitalist class will have vanished. Whether the capitalist class will be foolish enough to attempt to resist their  hopeless position is a question we cannot answer categorically. We do know, however, that were the attempt to be made, it would be impossible for them to put up any serious opposition. They would, of course, be rebels against society, and by rebelling they would make their already hopeless position still more hopeless: their unconstitutional action would cause many fence-sitters to support the socialists—the democracy defenders. The puny efforts of the rebels would be met by the highly developed and organised might of the armed forces.

Slavery is involved in the wages system. As a result of realising the cause of their enslavement the working class will obtain a knowledge of what is essential to their emancipation. Capitalism  is the means of exploitation. It is the chain that grows ever heavier. The very chains that the workers are compelled to forge to enslave them. 

The left-wing parties has propounded doctrines which have done nothing but obscure the fundamental issues of socialism versus capitalism. How was this made possible? Cunningly and with wilful lying, and distorting the teachings of Marx, through the pages of their journals.

The workers must preserve and strengthen their organisations on an independent basis. Let them hold fast to their right to organise, to meet together, to speak freely, so that they may keep their power of influence and to work for socialism. We hold out our hands in solidarity across the frontiers to the workers of other countries, and over the roar of guns and the thunder of bombs.

The Socialist Party is fully aware of the sufferings of  workers under various iron heels of jack-boots and wholeheartedly supports the efforts of workers everywhere to secure democratic rights against the powers of suppression, but history of the past decade shows the futility of war as a means of safeguarding democracy. The retention of capitalism results in the building up of new tyrannies and terrorisms through the inability of the capitalist states to solve the problems created by the system of private ownership of the means of production and distribution and the competitive scramble for raw materials, markets and control of trade routes. 

When they understand what capital is and the place they occupy in society as a result of being bound to it the working class will generate within themselves the will to be free.

To those workers who are growing tired of their own exploitation and would like to bring a speedy end to the brutal suppression which capitalism causes everywhere, we extend an invitation. We invite them to join with us in our struggle for socialism—a system of society which will bring to an end their own exploitation and “will involve the emancipation of all mankind without distinction of race or sex.

The waste of Amazon

 Footage and photographs of Amazon’s Dunfermline depot in Fife, taken by one of its workers, appear to show boxes of groceries, including crisps, tinned food and soft drinks, being earmarked as waste. They included products with intact packaging that had not passed their best-before date.

 Amazon was already facing scrutiny in the wake of a previous report by ITV News that showed large quantities of non-food products, including laptops, TVs and books, being sorted in the same manner in Dunfermline.

The secret filming in an area called the “destruction zone” showed computer equipment, power tools and even sealed face masks being placed into boxes labelled “destroy”.

“I reckon 70% of what we put into bins is sealed and in its packaging,” the worker said. “It’s stuff like Heinz tins of soups or tins of beans. Unopened bottles of water, Coke, orange squash or nutrition drinks. I’ve also thrown away in-date fancy chocolates or Easter Eggs, treats that kids would love.”

 In the UK, as employees from eight different warehouses told the broadcaster that they destroy new and unsold products as part of their jobs.

Charities call for ‘Amazon anti-waste law’ after firm denies destroying in-date food | Business | The Guardian

The dawning of socialism.

 

We want to take over the means of production peacefully. Our mission is to inform the majority of our ideas because we want to educate the majority of the people to accept our ideas.  It is impossible to use force against the masses. We can only use the power of persuasion and no other power. We attempt to educate our fellow workers to act independently on the political field and also to exhaust all possibilities of a peaceful change,   an ideal most desirable. Every socialist would subscribe to that idea. It is nonsense to think that a small party like ours can, by its agitation, create dissatisfaction. What will create dissatisfaction is the capitalist system itself. The class struggle will go on whether we agitate for it or not. We have very little influence in the labour movement but the struggle goes on right now.  The human mind is surrounded by a crust of all the ideas it has absorbed from childhood, and not until events destroy that crust is it ready to accept new ideas. It is because we want to get the confidence of the workers that we promote their interests. We are internationalists. We make no distinctions between colour and nationalities. For us internationalism is the very heart of socialism. We conceive of the world as an economic unit. No nation, no matter how wealthy or powerful, can separate itself from the rest of the world.  Socialism is a world system under which all lands and all peoples will cooperate to produce enough goods to satisfy the reasonable needs of every human being. Every region will produce that which it is best fitted to produce. If a region can produce good machinery then let it not busy itself with producing agricultural products. Let some other region best fitted for the production of agricultural products produce those products and exchange its products for the machines produced by another. Peace will come to a world cooperating in this way, which will be made possible only by socialism, which will do away with capitalist cliques fighting for colonies and markets.

We reject the idea that one nation or one people is superior to any other nation or any other people. To us all human beings are equal. The prejudices that exist are a product of the social system and not inherent in human nature. The brotherhood of man will be made possible and real under a socialist society which will do away with economic conflicts. Our party belongs to the World Socialist Movement.

Wherever we are, there we fight to the best of our abilities for liberty and democracy. Our aim to win a majority of the people to our ideas.

We plead guilty to being Marxists. We are Marxists because we believe that the economic structure of society is the determining factor in social development and that man is a product of his social environment. We are Marxists because we believe that the productive forces of society have reached a stage where it is possible to produce everything necessary to satisfy the reasonable needs of the people; because we believe that capitalist society has reached a point when the people must either progress with socialism or perish through barbarism.  

 

We proclaim to the world that if is possible to build a new social order guaranteeing every human being a decent livelihood and a chance to develop ones individuality, free from economic worries, free from the dangers of war. We say that we have reached an epoch where mankind must go forward to socialism or else back to barbarism. The strength of our ideas lies in the very fact that we are living in an unorganised society. The strength of our ideas lies in the fact that our general predictions, based upon the laws operating in society, inevitably come true. We base our activities upon a theory that has withstood the test of time and events. We still have hopes that the people will come to accept the ideas of socialism. The darkness that surrounds us can be destroyed only by the dawning of socialism.

"Deadline Glasgow—Defund Climate Chaos"

More than 160 organizations launched a campaign demanding that Wall Street and U.S. President Joe Biden cut off funding for companies and projects fueling the climate emergency.

The "Deadline Glasgow—Defund Climate Chaos" campaign is spearheaded by the Stop the Money Pipeline coalition, which targets asset managers, banks, and insurers for their roles in climate destruction.

Anyone who supports the campaign's demands can sign a petition "calling on all financial institutions and the U.S. government to end their support for companies engaged in climate destruction and human rights abuses by the start of the Glasgow climate talks."

COP 26, scheduled to start on October 31 in Glasgow, will be "the most important climate talks since the Paris agreement," the petition says. 

The petition points out that over the past year, "many financial institutions―from banks to insurance companies; asset managers to pension funds―have made new climate commitments, such as 'net-zero' emissions by 2050."

"Yet, at the same time they are providing loans, insurance, and billions in investment capital to corporations expanding the fossil fuel industry and deforesting the Amazon and other tropical forests―companies that are guilty of human rights abuses and violations of Indigenous sovereignty," the campaigners continue.

They also highlight that "major new fossil fuel projects, such as Line 3, the TransMountain pipeline, the Formosa plastics plant, and major deforestation projects, could not get off the ground without the support of the financial sector and the U.S. government."

'Deadline Glasgow': As Climate Summit Looms, Campaign Targets Complicity of Banks and Biden | Common Dreams News