Thanks cde Gugu for your intervention to restore order, as always. One thing I admire about you is your infinite reasoning backed by logic and diplomacy. Keep it up, cadre! Back to the subject in question, I understand where cde VC comes from. He's not entirely saying "no posting of materials for discussion" but cautioning our utterances when analysing these issues. We shouldn't make runaway statements but dissect issues broadly and emerge with a concise political analysis absent of distortions, baseless theories and antagonism as articulated by comrades. Therefore usage of words like dealing with journalists might mean we're calling for undemocratic practices in the midst of the public outcry by media on the proposed tribunal. Research reasoning and timing become important, hence we need to be sensitive about what we're saying so that we do not send wrong signals and create impression that the tribunal is the ruling class attempt to censor the alternative voices. The public is the biggest stakeholder, hence any public motion or bill process to have a weight the public must have a say as the constitution dictates, wherein a diversity of voices are accommodated which includes naysayers, anti-communists, renegades, neo-liberals, et al. Because they all occupy space and have mass - so whatever a view they hold must also be respected. I think that is the reality we need to accept and live with. Having said that, however I agree with comrades that cde VC was very harsh on cde Skhumbuzo. My appeal is that let's act fairly yet also be firm in our inputs when challenging one's contributions to the forum. We should make it difficult or cause comrades to be shy to make inputs for fear of being dealt with. Tolerance, maqabane, we're one. Everyone's contribution must be treated with respect without questioning his/her bona fide. All inputs are valuable and important to the forum as long as it adds value to the cause of our movement. Remain, Morgan Phaahla
"Sometimes, if you wear suits for too long, it changes your ideology." - Joe Slovo --- On Fri, 8/6/10, Gugu Ndima <[email protected]> wrote: From: Gugu Ndima <[email protected]> Subject: Re: [YCLSA Discussion] A Duhring Wanna BEE To: [email protected] Date: Friday, August 6, 2010, 5:35 AM Comrades, I think its proper that we acknowledge the fact that there are individuals out there who are hell-bent in tarnishing the SACP/Left at all costs. they will even resort to narrow tactics as illustrated by this unbearably emotional "Barney" character. However it will even be more futile if we pretend that such characters do not exist and simply opt to ignore them. We must vigorously occupy the space they utilise to rubbish our revolutionary leaders and ensure that we defend them. As Cde. Khaye correctly puts it, we must do so through clear, concise political analysis absent of distortions, baseless theories and antagonism. Let us engage on this article and the insinuations made by this lost soul named "Barney the purple Dinosaur" . There are a number of articles that are posted on the YCLSA discussion of which at times we might not necessarily agree with. That is when our character as Protagonists and defenders of our movement is tested. We have always been characterised by tolerance even when severe contradictions arise, so such articles should never deter us from our revolutionary morale and our ability to ensure that common parlance prevails in debates. Cde Gugu On Fri, Aug 6, 2010 at 11:15 AM, Dominic Tweedie <[email protected]> wrote: I would still like Cde Skhumbizo to tell us what his intentions are, in posting this article. One problem is that we are in the middle of a furore about press freedom. There are many terrible things in the media such as lies and smears and we want to protest about those. But if we start saying that anti-communists like Barney Mthombothi are to be dealt with, just because they are anti-communist, then we are on a slippery slope. The way to respond is with polemic. That is, you take Mthombothi's article and you expose all his lies, including his bogus Lenin quote and his claim that he, as a media person, is democratic, while the democracy of the country according to Mthombothi is making a war on democracy. You expose the lies and you lambaste the old hypocrite. But Cde Skhumbuzo did not do so. All he did was to trail Mthombothi's article past us, noting only that Mthobothi had insulted the SACP GS. Whereas Mthombothi's article insulted others as well as Cde Blade and also made some seriously wrong statements. I suspect Cde Skhumbuzo is just too lazy to do the polemical job that is required and he wants to volunteer somebody else to do it. That is behaviour that we all know in meetings et cetera. Comrades get up and call for things to be done, when they should have just done them already. VC On 6 August 2010 09:44, Luzuko Buku <[email protected]> wrote: I fully concure with comrade Khanye, sometimes as communist we must expose ourselve to these liberal onsloughts in order to defend our position and our ideology, which informs our quest. Some people hold different views but I read anti-communist works in order to stregthen the ideology that I have made to be part of my life. For instance the writer of this article opportunistically connects the issue of lavish lifestyles of some cadres to the debate on media tribunal. This is a clear attempt to blackmail us into silence and stop persuing the debate on the Media Appeals Tribunal. We need to read such articles in order to challange them. In the recent Msebenzi Oline, comrade Jeremy Cronin goes about reading the reactionary articles of various columnist in order to expose their poor substance and rich grandstanding. Remember the Communist Party of London read the entire "Black book of Communism" and then wrote an entire pamphlet not just dismissing it but also exposing its flaws, myths and misrepresentations. Revolutionary Regards Luzuko Buku SASCO Regional Chair Western Region (EC) 0786172286 www.lbuku.blogspot.com "The state is the product and manifestation of the irreconcilability of class antagonisms..."State and Revolution, Lenin (1917) From: khaye nkwanyana <[email protected]> To: [email protected] Sent: Fri, August 6, 2010 10:32:23 AM Subject: Re: [YCLSA Discussion] A Duhring Wanna BEE VC I think you are unfair to Skhumbuzo. At times as communist we need to appraise ourselves about onslaughts pursued against us and our leadership so that we mobilize against those in the battle of ideas. This posting by Thomo should not mean a call for comrades to internalize but to fight the agenda through opinion pieces etc. In the same bourgeois media to demistify these myths. Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device From: Dominic Tweedie <[email protected]> Sender: [email protected] Date: Fri, 6 Aug 2010 08:49:45 +0200 To: <[email protected]> ReplyTo: [email protected] Subject: Re: [YCLSA Discussion] A Duhring Wanna BEE Skhumbuzo, Is it your intention to be posting all the anti-communist articles that you can find? Why? What is the use of that? Do you think we are all going to run barking after the Barney Mthombothis of this world like your pack of hounds? This article helps us not at all to understand anything. Are you the kind of bloke who reads the Duhring part of anti-Duhring, and ignores the Engels part? Because, frankly, that's a bit boring. Personally I read the Engels parts and ignore the bits about Duhring. VC On 6 August 2010 08:12, Sikhumbuzo Thomo <[email protected]> wrote: Comrades; Pasted are further insults on our general secretary. Rgds, ST Barney Mthombothi Editor’s note Deadly threat to all Barney Mthombothi Thursday, 5 Aug 2010 The collapse of the Soviet Union two decades ago exposed not only the bankruptcy of its ideology but the rich and obscene lifestyle of its leaders — the dachas where they romped and lolled and the extravagantly furnished bunkers where they would have safely repaired in the event of a nuclear attack. Meanwhile ordinary people were constantly exhorted to put their faith in the revolution. It was dachas for the cream of society and gulags for dissenters. Communism is an ideology conceived in a lie. Leaders say one thing while doing the other. They live a life of deception. They don’t seem prepared to live the life or reality they often romanticise, or to which their policies condemn ordinary people. And because the media and other forms of communication are controlled by the state, the so-called working class are kept in the dark and therefore meekly accept their lot. That is the nirvana that Blade Nzimande has in mind for us. The general secretary of the SA Communist Party, who works as minister for higher education when he feels like it, wants the media shackled because it has shown him up to be a hypocrite. This champion of the working class drives posh cars and lives it up in fancy hotels — at our expense. Now he wants a tribunal to stop or frustrate the media from telling the truth. But that’s par for the course, I suppose. After all it was Vladimir Lenin who blurted: “Telling the truth is a bourgeois prejudice. Deception, on the other hand, is often justified by the goal.” It’s revealing that the two men leading the campaign against the media have been in the news for the wrong reasons : Nzimande and communications minister Siphiwe Nyanda . Nyanda, the man with a fine taste for tenders, has seen his name crop up in many an unsavoury scrap as a result of his business dealings. He got a tender that got Siyabonga Gama fired at Transnet. He’s currently embroiled in a messy fight with his director- general, and tenders are at the heart of the dispute. On Sunday he wrote a long, rambling article in favour of a media tribunal. The logic was difficult to follow. He should stick to tenders. There are those who may think the media is obsessed with gazing at its own navel. This is not a war waged against the media only, but against democracy itself. It challenges the very essence of our constitution. As the FM argued recently, it is a battle that should involve all strands of society — business, civil society — against those who are intent on imposing darkness on us, so that they can loot and plunder at will. This is by no means an isolated attack. In the eyes of Jacob Zuma’s supporters, the media forms part of that axis of evil — to borrow a phrase — which almost denied their hero what he was due ; the other axis members being the Scorpions and the judiciary. Zuma’s triumph in Polokwane sounded the death knell for the Scorpions, who were immediately consigned to the scrapheap. The judiciary has been shouted down and almost cowed. Which leaves the media, with its enormous power to influence public opinion and to expose, shame and embarrass those in authority. As Lenin once posed the question, what then is to be done? The media tribunal and the Protection of Information Bill seem to be the answer. The notion of “protecting” information from the public in a democracy is, frankly, bizarre. It’s not the first time government has tried to rein in the media. The Nats tried several times, and failed each time . This lot, which seem keen to learn from their predecessors, will also fail. But that would demand concerted action from all sectors of society, including the business community. For once, business needs to raise its voice against what is arguably the biggest threat to our democracy since the fall of apartheid. -- You are subscribed. This footer can help you. Please POST your comments to [email protected] or reply to this message. You can visit the group WEB SITE at http://groups.google.com/group/yclsa-eom-forum for different delivery options, pages, files and membership. To UNSUBSCRIBE, please email [email protected] . You don't have to put anything in the "Subject:" field. You don't have to put anything in the message part. All you have to do is to send an e-mail to this address (repeat): [email protected] . -- Blog at: http://domza.blogspot.com/ Communist University web site at: http://amadlandawonye.wikispaces.com/ Subscribe for free e-mail updates at: http://groups.google.com/group/Communist-University/ Library of documents (CU "CD") at: http://cu.domza.net/ [email protected] -- You are subscribed. This footer can help you. Please POST your comments to [email protected] or reply to this message. You can visit the group WEB SITE at http://groups.google.com/group/yclsa-eom-forum for different delivery options, pages, files and membership. To UNSUBSCRIBE, please email [email protected] . You don't have to put anything in the "Subject:" field. You don't have to put anything in the message part. All you have to do is to send an e-mail to this address (repeat): [email protected] . -- You are subscribed. This footer can help you. Please POST your comments to [email protected] or reply to this message. You can visit the group WEB SITE at http://groups.google.com/group/yclsa-eom-forum for different delivery options, pages, files and membership. To UNSUBSCRIBE, please email [email protected] . You don't have to put anything in the "Subject:" field. You don't have to put anything in the message part. All you have to do is to send an e-mail to this address (repeat): [email protected] . -- You are subscribed. This footer can help you. Please POST your comments to [email protected] or reply to this message. You can visit the group WEB SITE at http://groups.google.com/group/yclsa-eom-forum for different delivery options, pages, files and membership. To UNSUBSCRIBE, please email [email protected] . You don't have to put anything in the "Subject:" field. You don't have to put anything in the message part. All you have to do is to send an e-mail to this address (repeat): [email protected] . -- Blog at: http://domza.blogspot.com/ Communist University web site at: http://amadlandawonye.wikispaces.com/ Subscribe for free e-mail updates at: http://groups.google.com/group/Communist-University/ Library of documents (CU "CD") at: http://cu.domza.net/ [email protected] -- You are subscribed. This footer can help you. Please POST your comments to [email protected] or reply to this message. You can visit the group WEB SITE at http://groups.google.com/group/yclsa-eom-forum for different delivery options, pages, files and membership. To UNSUBSCRIBE, please email [email protected] . You don't have to put anything in the "Subject:" field. You don't have to put anything in the message part. All you have to do is to send an e-mail to this address (repeat): [email protected] . -- Gugu Ndima +27 76 783 1516 -- You are subscribed. This footer can help you. Please POST your comments to [email protected] or reply to this message. You can visit the group WEB SITE at http://groups.google.com/group/yclsa-eom-forum for different delivery options, pages, files and membership. To UNSUBSCRIBE, please email [email protected] . You don't have to put anything in the "Subject:" field. You don't have to put anything in the message part. All you have to do is to send an e-mail to this address (repeat): [email protected] . -- You are subscribed. This footer can help you. Please POST your comments to [email protected] or reply to this message. You can visit the group WEB SITE at http://groups.google.com/group/yclsa-eom-forum for different delivery options, pages, files and membership. To UNSUBSCRIBE, please email [email protected] . You don't have to put anything in the "Subject:" field. You don't have to put anything in the message part. All you have to do is to send an e-mail to this address (repeat): [email protected] .
