The Members

Benjamin Solah, Marxist-Trotkyist from the Cliff Tradition – Benjamin Solah: Writer and Revolutionary

My name’s Benjamin and I’m a horror writer and Marxist revolutionary from Sydney, Australia.

I got involved in politics around the refugee movement in Australia. Australia has, and still does, imprison asylum seekers seeking protection in Australia, ignoring any international law. It was through this movement that I got involved in other campaigns such as the campaign against the war in Iraq and against the horrible industrial relations laws, WorkChoices.

My motivation to become involved in Socialist politics came from my early analysis that the reason why the world is so fucked up is that it’s driven by the desire for profit for a small minority and that everyone else suffers at the hands of this. From this, I know believe that in order to change the world, we need to get rid of capitalism and create a new society where human need is paramount and not profit.

I subscribe to the Cliffist tradition of Trotskyism that is characterized by its analysis of countries such as Russia, China and Cuba as State Capitalist. We don’t believe that these states were socialist and that Russia’s revolution was defeated by a Stalinist counter-revolution due to the failure of the revolution to spread to other parts of Europe, particularly Germany and that Russia needed this to happen because it was an economically backward country where the working class was not dominant enough to maintain a socialist society.

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John Angliss, anti-oppresion Leftist* – You see, it is simply a very young boy’s record

My name is John Angliss and I’m here to alternately please and conscientize – if you can do it better, then join us! Unlike Dave and Benjamin, I’ve no Trotskyist leanings, just a conscience. And the means might be different, but the end is the same.

I have been stuck on the small island of Guernsey for the (first and) last eighteen years, but will be at SOAS in London from October. So watch out Blairites!

My blog has been through a number of different phases – it’s now mostly politics, which of course will be X-posted here, if relevant.

* As opposed to what? The pseudo-left

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Shannon, Socialist – A la Gauche

My name is Shannon and I’m a public school teacher in Georgia. I’ve written on a blog called A la Gauche since 2004. Before that I created a website dedicated to exposing religious zealotry called BaptistWatch.org (although apart from the forum it is very rarely updated).

I’ve been interested in politics for as long as I remember. My first memories are actually of me being a Republican. I remember scrawling “Impeach Clinton” on one of my folders in Middle School back in 1992. Obviously I was a typical Republican – the man had only been in office for a few months. Gradually, and either despite or because of my rural surroundings, I became more and more liberal. And the shift hasn’t slowed since it started. I described myself as a Democrat for most of my college years, but began to grow disillusioned with the Democrats and with the two-party system shortly after I graduated from the University of Georgia.

Despite feeling left out, I was eager to work on a Senate campaign in 2004. I very much wanted to work in politics and what better way to get your foot in the door than by working on a Senate campaign. The problem was – we lost – miserably. I now call myself a socialist and feel even less represented than I did as a liberal Democrat.

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Richard Adams-Blackburn – Anarcho-communist – Anarchist Philosophy Blog

My name’s Richard, 21 from Auckland, New Zealand. I’ve been interested in politics and have been concerned with exploitation and injustice for a rather long time, but became convinced that anarchism was the solution only a couple of years ago. A political studies paper I did at stage one at university introduced me to the famous Russian anarchist Peter Kropotkin, and his thinking really struck a chord with me. I did not immediately become an anarchist, but slowly came to it after considering all other options carefully.

Now I am writing this blog to spread the message of anti-capitalism and anti-statism, and try to convince people that an anarchic society is the answer, and not merely a pipe dream. I hope to be able to bring a positive anarchist angle to this group.

More information about me is available on the ‘about’ page of my site.

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David Osler, libertarian Marxist – Dave’s Part

… and I’m Dave Osler from London, in my mid 40s and so probably old enough to be Benjamin’s dad. I first got involved in politics thanks to movements like Rock Against Racism and Youth CND that arose from the punk rock scene in Britain in the late 1970s.

By the early 1980s, I joined the Labour Party Young Socialists and then Labour itself. At that time Labour was a mass working class-based party with substantial socialist and revolutionary currents, and nothing like the neoliberal Blairite organisation it is today.

My best known book – Labour Party plc – documents the transformation. As a result of writing it, I occasionally appear on television and radio programmes, arguing the case that New Labour is institutionally corrupt.

I have also been a member of several Trotskyist groupings, but these days have departed from Trotskyist orthodoxy on several points, and my politics have evolved in a more libertarian direction.

When it comes to the Aussie far left, I like some of what I read and hear about Democratic Socialist Perspective, but I’m not entirely convinced by some of their theory.

I’m a newcoming to blogging, only starting two months ago, but my main blog Dave’s Part has generally been well received, even though it has criticised almost everybody on the UK left … and right, for that matter.

Editor note: Dave has gone missing from the FLBU since we moved from blogger to wordpress and as such, his posts have been automatically attributed to Benjamin Solah. Dave, could you please contact the editor to sort this out.