In the early 90’s my politics lecturer kept me behind one seminar, after I was the only one out of ten to see themselves as working class. He gave me a copy of Class War to read, as he felt that it would suit my politics down to the ground – what a discovery.
Twenty years later, not a lot has changed, or if it had it is now reverting back to class based politics. Today’s article in the Guardian has given space to the views of the rioters and it is evident people don’t see the current system working for anyone but the wealthy. Total Policing is there to suppress any views that challenge not only the current heiarchy but any changes that will reinforce inequality in this country.
The OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development) have just released statistics that show the rich are getting richer. The OECD, whose mission is “to promote policies that will improve the economic and social well-being of people around the world.” is obviously not working that well as in the UK, the richest 1% has seen their incomes double since the 1970s. The average annual income for the richest 10% of British people in 2008 was £55,000 – which is 12 times higher than the average for the bottom 10%, and this has increased over the last few years.
Information has become readily available which means the need for actual papers like Class War is no longer as necessary as most information can be found online, however it is important to know where to look. Keeping people in the dark is harder in today’s society (unless that’s where you want to be) and it is becomming more and more evident that people are not willing to accept the inequality within society and our repersentation within parliament (where are the MP’s from honest working class backgrounds).
Even if people believe that class no longer exists – the ‘them and us’ mentatlity is becomming more evident; class war still is prevalent in it’s goal to destroy the rich.
Liberty, Equality, Solidarity
Jason E Cooper 