In this video from 2019, Alan Woods, head of the International Marxist Tendency (of which Socialist Appeal is the British section) makes the sensationally anti-Semitic claim at 12:34 that the anti-Semitism furor surrounding the Labour Party is a fabrication by the Israeli Embassy and its agents within the Labour Party. Needless to say, I did … Read more
Trotskyists always deny that Trotsky bears any responsibility for the horrors of Stalinism. It is entirely the fault of the ‘objective conditions’. That Trotsky assisted Lenin in suppressing the working-class, establishing a one-party state and crushing all opposition within the party itself are facts which are overlooked. All of this paved the way for the … Read more
One of the biggest philosophical questions is the problem of evil. Needless to say, it is a problem that Marxists wave aside. The whole notion of ‘good versus evil’ smacks of ‘bourgeois idealism’. Such moralism is to be avoided as much as humanly possible. One can only speak of ‘class struggle’, the forces of progress … Read more
There are a great many things that can be said about Lenin, but it would take up several posts. In this particular post, I will instead offer a couple of quotes that give us an insight into Lenin’s lack of ‘dialectical foresight’ – foresight which even people at the time had! Before and after the … Read more
In the IMT, I was always taught that Lenin and Trotsky had conducted a heroic battle against anti-Semitism, and that it was revived by the evil Stalin as part of the ‘bureaucratic counter-revolution’ that reversed many of the ‘gains’ of the Russian Revolution. I had no idea of the Bolsheviks’ early efforts to stamp out … Read more
Like everyone else in Britain, I heard the sad news of the death of Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh. His passing has been marked by a reflection on his life, legacy and the institution of monarchy that he did so much to uphold. Likewise, it has also been an opportunity for the worst far-left cranks … Read more
I have done quite a lot of IMT-bashing on this blog, being, as I am, a former member. But this blog was also set up to expose other Trotskyist cults, and now seems like a wonderful opportunity to bash the Socialist Workers’ Party, and their antics in a London school. It turns out that this … Read more
Just a few months ago, I would have denied that the IMT was anti-Semitic. I would have said that, for all my problems with them, I did not see anti-Semitism as one of them. I even convinced myself, for a time, that our position on Israel was ‘moderate’ compared to those of other left-wing sects … Read more
I had my criticisms of Ted Grant and Socialist Appeal, but I considered it free of the taint of anti-Semitism – until now. You see, our position on Israel-Palestine was obviously absurd, but was distinct from the overtly racist position of the SWP, which has no problem with the ‘reactionary’ Israeli working-class being driven into … Read more
Life in a cult leaves you bruised and battered. When I left the IMT in March 2020, I knew I had a road both long and thorny to travel before I could recover. I may never recover fully from the experience, but that does not mean that I am not going to try. In recent … Read more