Why the IMT is a cult – a social media analysis

by

When I first joined the IMT, the organisation was in the middle of developing its social media presence. This is at the heart of the organisation’s cultish nature. This is what the cult expert Lifton called ‘milieu control’. Against my better judgement, I was persuaded to get Facebook for the first time in order to … Read more

A Tribute to Louis Proyect (1945-2021)

by

Louis Proyect’s death was announced just this week. Having just found out the news, I feel duty-bound to write something in tribute. A well-known and well-respected online Marxist commentator, with a blog that attracted millions of hits over many years, he is one of the people to which I am indebted for rescuing me from … Read more

Martin Malia’s The Soviet Tragedy: Review

by

The late American historian of Russia, Martin Malia, wrote a book a few years after the USSR’s collapse entitled The Soviet Tragedy. It is one of the best books on the USSR I have read, together with Nekrich and Heller’s Utopia in Power. It’s a very detailed, scholarly work of historiography that I would not … Read more

Ayatollah Woods and the ‘petty-bourgeois renegade’ Paul Mason

by

Last August, the IMT came out with a couple of stinging articles condemning Paul Mason as a ‘renegade’ and apostate from Marxism. The dispute is too boring to go into detail about, but anyone who is interested can go here and here. Mason foolishly gave the cult more publicity than it deserved by linking to … Read more

The terrible truth about the IMT Split of 2010 – or, Debate in Trotskyist Sects: Part 8

by

When I was in the IMT, we boasted endlessly of our democratic credentials. We compared ourselves favourably with Peter Taaffe’s organisation, which hounded out dissidents mercilessly. We replayed the trauma of the 1991-2 split over and over again. We convinced ourselves that we had much higher standards for our organisation. Little did I know that … Read more

How I raised my differences in the IMT, or Debate in Trotskyist Sects: Part 7

by

When I joined the IMT, I found myself in this strange environment with which I was both personally, and, as it would turn out, politically incompatible. It was inevitable that it would all end in tears and that, as with so many other times in my largely depressing life, separation, ostracism and anger all round … Read more

Will I ever recover from cultism?

by

I often wonder when I will ever fully recover from cultism, if ever. I was in the International Marxist Tendency for only two and a half years, but those years were the most traumatic and psychologically damaging of my entire life. I have never had such an intense experience in my 22 years of being … Read more

Ian Thatcher’s Trotsky (2003) Review

by

Ian D. Thatcher’s 2003 biography of Trotsky is a work of genuine historical scholarship. In contrast to the hagiographies of Trotskyist sects, and the impressive but biased account by Isaac Deutscher, Thatcher’s work is a measured and objective assessment of Trotsky’s political career. It also includes incisive observations on Trotsky’s writings and political analyses in … Read more