In a 1944 article, ‘I Tried To Be A Communist’, Richard Wright explains his brief involvement and disaffection with the American Communist Party. This essay was included in a 1949 collection of essays by former Communists, The God That Failed, in which they reflect on their experiences. Wright’s account is one of the most stirring, … Read more
Orlando Figes was and is a villain in the International Marxist Tendency. When I was a member of Socialist Appeal, he was rubbished as a loathsome bourgeois historian whose sole duty is to besmirch the spotless banner of Bolshevism and the glorious legacy left behind by Lenin and Trotsky. Back in 2013, for some reason, … Read more
The Social World of the IMT There is no real love or friendship or brotherhood in a cult. Since leaving, I have tasked myself with rebuilding whatever sense of community I had outside the organisation. When I was a member of Socialist Appeal, it was ridiculously easy to make friends and acquaintances. We were all … Read more
Introduction Year One was the second book that was recommended to me by the IMT leadership when I confessed to having doubts about the organisation’s doctrine. It is a mendacious work of propaganda by one of the most brilliant writers of the 20th century left, Victor Serge. Serge was the son of Russian revolutionary exiles … Read more
When the leadership of the International Marxist Tendency was confronted with my doubts in February 2020, I was recommended to read two texts to win me back to the ‘correct position’ – Marcel Liebman’s Leninism Under Lenin and Victor Serge’s Year One of the Russian Revolution. I was told that if I still had differences … Read more
A while back, I read an interesting article on plans Hitler allegedly had to transition Germany to a planned economy after the war. Whilst I doubt such plans would have come to fruition, it would have been interesting to see how the Trotskyist movement would have responded to him doing it. Since, according to Trotskyists, … Read more
Last night, I had a nightmare about the IMT – one of many. I was at one of those bloody paper sales, surrounded by all the familiar faces. I still marvel at how much time I would waste on these nonsensical endeavours, week in, week out. Steven Hassan does say in his book about cults … Read more
Bullying is a central feature of cults. I am taken back to my rather unhappy days in high school when I think of the horrific abuse I suffered from my peers in the organisation. I am recovering from this evil experience, but I doubt I will ever forget it. I still vividly remember how my … Read more
Leon Trotsky was one of the most hopeless and deluded ideologues who has ever lived. His self-righteousness and unwillingness to accept political reality led directly to his defeat at the hands of Stalin. It further led him to adopt all sorts of bizarre and ridiculous positions on fascism and WWII once he was in exile. … Read more
This evening, I could not help but chuckle when I saw on Twitter that the IMT had published yet another article about Venezuela, scratching their heads as to how it was that the socialist ruling party lost in Hugo Chavez’s home state of Barinas. Their conclusion? Not enough socialism. How predictable. When I was in … Read more