Would you be prepared to fight for your political views?

[Buzzer]

Hi peeps. Not been on here for a few weeks. Been very liberating for me and you lot too no doubt.

I've been reading a book "Granny made me an anarchist" by Stuart Christie who was charged, at the age of 18, with the attempted assassination of Franco. His politics were a big part of what he was and he regarded himself very much as a political animal. I kind of empathise with his revolutionary zeal and at that age also wanted to change the world. If you'd have given me a gun and a chance at putting a bullet in Gorbachev or General Jaruzelski or Pol Pot or Deng Xiaoping I'd have taken it.

I've got older, perhaps mellowed and have responsibilities too now and, although my views on socialism are still as strong and at times, I think f*** the consensus politics, some tyrants and regimes can only be overthrown by force I'm not sure I've got the hunger anymore to really get active against it. . Some people never lose that hunger and fair play to them.

So....a poll.


By the way there's a fascinating article on Antonio Garcia Baron on the BBC website

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/7420469.stm

He's the last survivor of the Durutti Column anarchists, a survivor of Nazi concentration camps and an all round fascinating bloke. He got his hand bitten off by a jaguar!

 

[Old Greg]

Perhaps how i feel is a bit ridiculous, but i strongly believe in the way to progress, is to have a reveloution with a fair, non-racsist or whatever dictatorship. However mutated, with some left wing policies such as equality, but ruled by a heirachy. Essentially if there was a party that had a similar ideology t hat i do, then i would join the revolt, and get stuck in

 

[coventrygull]

I have fought for my views in the past but I am getting a bit old for all that now but when I look into the eyes of my grandchildren and think about their future. I sometimes think oh f*** it I have got to do something.

 

[The Clown of Pevensey Bay]

Maybe. At the moment, I feel lucky not to have to.

 

[itszamora]

Maybe. At the moment, I feel lucky not to have to.

I'd agree with that. Although if I was armed and Robert Mugabe were nearby...

 

[Dr Bandler]

Thoughts

Wow - interesting topic.

One of the problems is that politics is no longer splintered down traditional left-right lines as it was when we were younger.

So...a lot of us feel passionate about some of the shit going on in our society but aren't sure where to vent our anger. We look at old comrades in the Labour Party speaking a mixture of managment-speak and mealy mouthed gobbledegook and despair. They clearly do not have the answers that are so desperately required in our country and the world.

Now the dear old Tories, who we feel in our hearts we cannot trust, are starting to say things that resonate with us. My goodness, Ian Ducan-Smith sounds thoughful and radical. But we kinda know it is just Blair style opportunism.

And then on the world stage - Zimbabwe makes me most angry (as I spent some time there 10 years ago and loved it) but the politicians are really not interested to act (we all know why).

So I feel the problem now is different - global capital has won, politicians from all sides are their lapdogs, and there is a huge disconnect between governments and what people actually want.

Sounds like time for a bit of revolution....

 

[fatbadger]

I've been involved in the odd fist-fight with fascists in the past, but I don't think I have the physical stamina for such stuff anymore.

Buzzer, you seem to be calling for the 'attentat' as opposed to full-on revolutionary war. Can I suggest Alexander Berkman's writings, if you haven't come across them already (I imagine you have)? He wasn't a particular fan of all-out war, but he did believe in the specially-directed one-off assassination in times of real need to remove the individual cause of oppression. He ended up serving 14 years for one such attempt (the shooting of Frick, Carnegie's murderous agent). Later, he was expelled to Russia, the revolution of which he had welcomed. Being a proper revolutionist and believer in true liberty, he very quickly worked out what was going wrong and denounced the Soviet "counter-revolution" as he called it. He then left Russia (it has been suggested he had to leave as he realised the Soviets were looking to get rid of him). All-round top bloke he was, hating oppression by both the left and the right.

 

[Questions]

I thought for my vievs most vehemently during the late seventies and early eighties. I maintained that all Crystal Palace fans were wankers and told them so on many a visit to the S.E. London area resulting in many a disagreement.

Sometimes I felt you had to stand up for your beliefs even if on several occasions it meant you had to give the twats a good slapping.

 

[Lord Bracknell]

When I lived in Italy, I had a very good friend, Marco Boccardi, whose uncle had been a partisan, fighting the nazis during the rather nasty civil war that broke out in central Italy in about 1943. Marco's uncle, Pardo, had been captured and shot by the nazis, when he was in his early twenties. A brave young man.

Over the years, I'd lost touch with Marco, who had been training to be a doctor when I first met him. A few weeks ago, I came across a reference to his brother on a website that was dedicated to a community fund raising project in Montalcino, where the family lived and where I got to know them. This prompted me to google up Marco's name and see if I could find out what he was doing. I unearthed an astonishing story.

Marco had qualified as a doctor, but had decided not to do what most newly qualified doctors in Italy seem to do - start climbing the greasy pole towards a comfortable, middle class life style. Instead, he decided to stay true to his family's communist principles and crossed the Atlantic to take his medical skills to the Sandinista revolution in Nicaragua. Once there, he found employment in a small rural clinic, earning $15 a month and specialising in obstetrics.

He stayed in Nicaragua for over twenty years, marrying a local girl and fathering a couple of kids. He then fell ill, with a virus that forced him to give up his medical work. So he reverted to what his family had done when I knew them, back in Italy - he ran a small shop.

But the repercussions of the political situation in Nicaragua eventually caught up with him. One day, Marco simply disappeared.

In March 2003, his body was found, tied up and weighted down with stones, in a lake. Nobody knows who killed him and the authorities have made no efforts to find out. His son, Pardo (named after the uncle who had been shot by the nazis), has now reached an age where he is able to ask some questions. So far, though, answers are proving hard to come by.

I guess this is what "fighting for your political views" is all about. Some people can do it. All I know is that I'm not as brave as my mate Marco Boccardi or his uncle Pardo.

 

[Questions]

My mother who was Italian told me that one day in about 1942 her very first boyfriend (she was about 13/14 and he was 15) decided to speak out at the door of his house when the German occupying forces knocked at his door to ask for his fathers whereabouts as he was a local councillor who opposed the Nazis vehemently.
After a heated debate a German soldier quite cold bloodedly pulled out his revolver and shot the yound lad straight through the forehead.
My mother who witnessed this was whisked away and had her head shaved because she persisted in speaking English to them purely to antagonise them ( she was born in london where my Grandad worked for a few years)
She knew nothing of the Partisans or the Nazis but it was only as I became an adult I wondered how that must have affected her in her early years.
She had so many horror stories to tell - not that as children we pushed her to hear them - that I often wonder how she retained any sort of sanity.

not political I know but..............

This was in a small village near Perugia in Umbria.

 

[The Merry Prankster]

Mao Tse Tung said "Change will only come through the barrel of a gun". Great song.

 

[steward 433]

Obviously yes i would

 

[mr sheen]

Like Coventrygull I often fought for my views in the past, whilst a "card carrying anarcho-syndicalist"! This included numerous turf battles with members of Combat 18 and other barely human life forms thorughout Yorkshire and the Midlands. And some memorable scuffles one May Day in Barcelona. But how much of that was down to group belongingand how much down to fervent political beliefs I don't know. I would suspect from my curernt political position that it was more down to liking a scrap.

 

[SULLY COULDNT SHOOT]

When I was younger yes..... now I have a child and wife who need me more than the world does.

 

[Horton's halftime iceberg]

I am a pacafist, where do I sign up for non violent resistance

Nonviolent resistance - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[hans kraay fan club]

The simple answer, is that I don't know. I am very passionate about my political beliefs, which is why I rarely contribute to the trite political threads on here - they really would wind me up.

As Sully alludes to, there would be a massive conflict between my political responsibilities and my personal responsibilities, and that would certainly stop me ever actively looking to become involved in any level of conflict [from a fist fight to a civil war].

Having said that, in an situation like the Spanish Civil War, with Facism forcibly stealing control of the nation [this nation, not another] I may be convinced that I would be best serving my families future by getting involved.

 

[London Calling]

In my younger days, I believed I would have answered the calls to arms to fight for the Spanish Republic in 1936, I have utmost respect for all the men and women that did.
And whilst my political leanings have mellowed, on this particular subject they are the same and I still financially support the International Bridgade "charity."

 

[mr sheen]

In my younger days, I believed I would have answered the calls to arms to fight for the Spanish Republic in 1936, I have utmost respect for all the men and women that did.
And whilst my political leanings have mellowed, on this particular subject they are the same and I still financially support the International Bridgade "charity."

No pasaran!

 

[London Calling]

No pasaran!

To the point, elements of the republic side, fought each other over. the best course of action and trhe way forward in their republican dream.

 

[MattBackHome]

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