>--- Original Message ---
>From: Premise Checker <checker at mail.sheergeniussoftware.com>
>To: debsian at pacbell.net
>Date: 6/17/02 5:39:19 AM
>
>"Comrades up in arms"
>Johann Hari, New Statesman
>Monday, June 10, 2002
>
>Stalin still exerts a strange hold over some, not least Arthur
Scargill.
>Johann Hari attends a Stalin Society meeting
>
>Comrade Chairman is very angry. His body is old, but hatred
smoulders in
>his eyes. He bangs his fist on the table and begins: "We must
put our
>own house in order! To read lies about Comrade Stalin in the
capitalist
>bourgeois press is to be expected - but to read them in our
own papers?
>It misleads good comrades and damages the socialist cause! It
cannot be
>accepted! The Trotskyites are doing massive damage!"
>
>The scene seems strangely familiar. But it isn't from some old
newsreel,
>or a documentary recreation of a distant tyranny: it's a meeting
of the
>British Stalin Society on a sunny Sunday morning.
>
>Some might see Stalinism's journey in just half a century, from
the
>ruling ideology of a world superpower to barely filling a grotty
>community centre in King's Cross, as a humbling one. Not the
Stalin
>Society. Founded in the 1930s, it ain't dead yet. One pale old
man tells
>me he remains confident because "we still have Cuba and [North]
Korea".
>Nobody in a two-hour meeting utters a word of regret about Stalin's
time
>in power.
>
>We are assembled to discuss "misrepresentations of the Soviet
and Maoist
>periods in the media", and the first speaker, Harry Powell,
a former
>college lecturer, talks confidently of the Soviet Union as simply
"the
>first wave of socialism in the world".
>
>Nobody blinks at this. Powell takes particular exception to
Jung Chang's
>bestselling autobiography, Wild Swans, which he condemns as
"a
>pernicious and dishonest book" that "does nothing but paint
a negative
>picture of the socialist period in China . . . How are people
meant to
>know about all the great achievements of Chairman Mao if they
only hear
>this kind of grumbling?" he asks.
>
>But that is not his only gripe. "Every time a Russian composer
from the
>socialist period is played on Radio 3, some smug presenter refers
to the
>supposed 'tyranny' or 'totalitarianism' of that time." Powell
says that,
>"in fact, the arts flourished under Stalin". George Orwell's
novel
>Animal Farm is, he believes, "crude anti-Stalinist propaganda,
written
>by a man who worked in a propaganda unit". And when he refers
derisively
>to a scene in Enemy at the Gates, the recent Hollywood movie
about
>Stalingrad, which suggests that Stalin persecuted the Jews,
the audience
>joins him in sn-wording.
>
>The gathering of around 30 people is primarily - as you might
expect -
>elderly to the point of decrepitude. A bevy of old women occupies
the
>front row, nodding sagely whenever the "lies" about Stalin are
>"exposed". For these people, Stalinism has become a habit they
can't
>shake off. Now in their seventies, they are not inclined to
review their
>beliefs.
>
>More interesting are the young people in the room. In the group
>discussion, a young Asian lad in his mid-twenties explains his
>attraction to the cause: "It's taken me a long time to find
out the
>truth. I've always wanted to know what happened in the Soviet
Union. The
>good thing about the Stalin Society is that it gives you the
truth,
>without any messing about." Another man nods vehemently. They
seem to
>relish the moral certainty of Stalinism: "We can be made into
better
>human beings," he says. "You need to believe that, or there's
no point.
>And Stalin did."
>
>All this may seem as irrelevant as the beliefs of, say, the
Flat Earth
>Society, or Elvis fans who insist that the King is still alive.
Why
>should we care about these rather sad, isolated figures?
>
>Yet a man who was very famous not so long ago is a very close
ally of
>the society. In an address to the members in 2000, and to an
>enthusiastic reception, Arthur Scargill celebrated the October
>revolution: "I am sick and tired of listening to the so-called
'experts'
>today who still criticise the Soviet Union and, in particular,
Stalin."
>There is a huge overlap between the membership of Scargill's
Socialist
>Labour Party and the Stalin Society, evident in its campaign
for the
>SLP.
>
>All those who argued for decades that Scargill represented a
legitimate
>part of the left may be expected to recant. Yet the signs were
always
>there: Scargill met Khrushchev in 1956 and scolded him for trying
to
>move away from Stalinism, telling him that "you can't get rid
of him by
>removing his body from the mausoleum". Now that Scargill no
longer has
>to be politic about his beliefs, he has outed himself as an
admirer of
>the worst totalitarian dictator of the 20th century (Stalin,
after all,
>murdered even more people than did Hitler).
>
>Perhaps Tony Benn might pause in his next eloquent speech about
>democracy to explain his unflinching support for Scargill.
>
>This article first appeared in the New Statesman. For the latest
in
>current and cultural affairs subscribe to the New Statesman
print
>edition.
>
>
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