[lbo-talk] Orwell, George Garrett, and Working-Class Socialist Intellectuals

[Michael Dawson -PSU]

Thanks for confirming that one's attitude to Orwell is one excellent quick
test of the overall quality of one's politics and mind.  None of what you
try to hang on Orwell actually hangs.  The British working class was and is
passive.  Orwell did not put himself or other middle class intellectuals
above working class intellectuals.  He merely noted, correctly, that workers
tend not to have the time and resources to think it all the way through.
"British socialism" has never existed, so any "portrait" of it would be
fiction.

As to the notebooks, wow, what a scandalous discovery, that an author of a
published book had notebooks that included materials not in the book!  What
an atrocity, a clear case of self-censorship!  Cleary, Orwell failed to
report reality, which was that the British working class was a happy,
well-organized band of Communist intellectuals.  Why anybody reads Wigan
Pier, which completely blew the call on the soon-to-be triumph of the Union
of British Socialist Republics, is a huge mystery to me!

Orwell was far from perfect, but he was also one of the top 2-3 socialist
advocates of the 20th century.  Nobody who admires his best works denies his
flaws.  We simply value his insight and clarity and dedication to both
realism and idealism.

You Althusser/CP admirers are throwing out the baby with the bathwater.
Your loss.