FMQ, Online
An endless topic of discussion on the left going all the way back into prehistory is that the current left is bad and that people need to do something better. There are many, many solutions out there about what to do about it. This is in part a consequence of the internet giving people instant access to material that constitutes debates which have been going on for over a century and a half, as well as access to millions of strangers who have bespoke positions on countless topics. Given this it’s really easy to mix and match ideas to stake out some niche position about what should be done that can be turned into a grift or Discord community.
So how might someone cut through this spectacle? Well, the simple, boring answer is that for all the intellectualism of the left, the ideas that become dominant in it about how to change the world are the ideas which drive movements which appear to be winning. As a heuristic this can fail horribly – I recommend Russell Jacoby’s essay Conformist Marxism for a quick overview of how this can go horribly wrong. But despite such dangers, the basic point is that there’s an undeniable charisma to those who can actually make change that can cut through the spectacle of pointless debate and get to brass tacks. That’s what online theory dorks who do nothing but talk cannot have.
Because if you want to win people to your position, you need to give people who are willing to be in the struggle for the long haul a reason that your particular venture will not just result in the same tired cul-de-sac of ineffective activism and drift into existing liberal political institutions. The best way to show you are serious is not to write the perfect programme or party constitution or come up with the most sophisticated theory of the value form but to actually demonstrate that you have ways of shifting things in a world that seems increasingly resistant to it. That’s the only way to stand out in this day and age.
The point is to actually do shit, not engage in endless metacommentary on metacommentary or find ever more bespoke positions with which to signal your uniqueness.
Editor’s note: Unclear if this is a critique of the RCO or any particular organisation, or The Left in general.
PARTISAN! 