I have been a trade union member since 1973. I see no reason to stop. One thing above all keeps me in, even though I have many quarrels with the National Union of Journalists. By the way, I should say here that the naïve belief among BNP supporters, that the NUJ in some way requires its members to oppose the BNP, is a baseless fantasy. It has no power to do anything of the kind. The NUJ is, like most unions, largely run by people whose prejudices are left-wing. This is in the nature of unions, especially white-collar ones, for reasons which are obvious if you think about them I am sometimes even attacked in its official journal by other NUJ members who would be shocked to learn that I also belong to it.
But the thing that keeps me in the union is a single unforgettable experience - the day I went to Gdansk, 31 years ago, and met Lech Walesa, then the leader of the great shipyard strike against the Soviet Empire.
I was at the time an industrial correspondent for another newspaper. I had watched, the previous September, the extraordinary scenes at the Trade Union Congress in Brighton, where the leaders of the major British unions had been deeply embarrassed by the Gdansk strike. They knew they ought to support it. But the British Labour movement was in those days so rotten with Communist fellow-travellers and their dupes that it could not bring itself to give clear backing to the Polish workers.
Since then, thanks to ‘Euro-Communism’ and the influence of such things as ‘Marxism Today’, the fellow- travellers have converted themselves into a lobby for EU membership, for ‘equality of outcome’ schemes, for the social and cultural revolution and for the other causes which have in fact made the British left far more powerful and influential than it was when it was trapped by its embarrassingly close association with the worst tyranny in Europe. In these days people, including some members of the labour movement, could see the left for what it was. Now they can’t. I’ll always remember a wonderful moment at a 1970s conference of the old General and Municipal Workers’ Union, when some leftist wiseacre made a speech saying grandiloquently ‘There is no unemployment in the Soviet Union’, and a gruff old geezer then shuffled to the podium and snapped ‘There’s no unemployment in Dartmoor Prison, either’.
I had arrived in Warsaw by train two nights before, the train pulling up in deep snow at a remote suburban station, after an eight-hour journey from Berlin without a scrap of food or drink on board. The promised Polish dining car had disappeared – the country at that time was so broke that there really was very little food available, except for hard currency, and even then pretty limited. We had passed groups of Soviet Army soldiers at the Polish border with East Germany, soon before we clattered across the River Oder. The Polish passengers had anxiously interrogated them (they all spoke Russian) to see if they knew anything about rumours of an invasion. They didn’t. they were just glad not to be in Afghanistan.
Ronald Reagan had just been elected US President (and Michael Foot had just been picked as Labour Leader, though when I saw the announcement of this on Polish TV, Foot looked so gloomy, and his beaten opponent Denis Healey so jovial, that I thought for some time that Foot had lost). Washington was therefore in its lame duck period. And the challenge to Kremlin authority in Gdansk was so outrageous that many believed that Moscow would order in the troops. In the end, Poland invaded itself rather than undergo an actual occupation, setting up an authoritarian regime.
But nobody knew this was coming. Nobody knew what was coming at all, except that it was probably quite frightening. What the strikers did know was that they were up against the same force that had crushed revolts in Berlin in 1953, Budapest in 1956 and Prague in 1968. On each occasion, it had killed, imprisoned and persecuted those who got in its way, sometimes using torture as well. There was at that time no reason to believe that the Politburo had lost its nerve. But when, on that ice-cold grey morning I took the bumpy, rudimentary flight from Warsaw to the north coast, and found my way through the sad, concrete suburbs of the great ‘Free and Hanseatic City’ till I reached the seedy Hotel Morski , which was then Walesa’s headquarters, neither he nor anyone else seemed remotely afraid. The student who volunteered to interpret for me wasn’t afraid. Walesa wasn’t afraid , and obligingly gave me ten solid minutes of unequivocal denunciation of the British union leadership. The people in the shipyard weren’t afraid.
Yet the place was still quite plainly under Communist rule. The slogans extolling the party were still in place (these were never intended to convince anyone, merely to cast in the teeth of non-Communist the fact that they were subjugated). The police and the army were still under the control of the Communist Party, as were the schools and universities, the newspapers and the broadcasters.
Only two things got in the way. One was the Roman Catholic Church, which on its own had been fairly weak, but in concert with the strikers at Gdansk was extraordinarily powerful. The other was the strike weapon, obviously a vital protection against an over-mighty state.
How could I support its use in these circumstances, and not also support the continued freedom to use it (and therefore the unions themselves) in my own home country? It was one of the guarantees of liberty, and. Having seen it in sue, I couldn’t doubt it. Even if it was misused, as it so often was, it was its misuse that was wrong, not the thing itself (one might say something similar about press freedom just now).
So I’ve always held on to my union card, as a deliberate repudiation of the oversimplified view of unions taken by some political conservatives. But I’d add that I think this week’s one-day strike cowardly and wrong. It’s cowardly because it’s willing to wound but afraid to strike – that is, the union leaders and members alike know that their grievance isn’t big enough to justify the use of a real indefinite strike to the end.
So instead they adopt this guerrilla tactic, of messing up other people’s lives every few weeks, in the hope that the public will get so sick of it that they will press the government into giving in.
I also really dislike two arguments used by union spokesmen. One, there’s this pretence that people work in the public sector because of their ethical commitment to the job. No doubt they do, but as they all get paid for it ( I believe public sector pay is now in general higher than private sector wages) they presumably also work for the money. How nice to be paid for being good, or at least for thinking you are good. But in my view most jobs have some sort of positive moral character, if you think about it.
But that leads to the next point. These people claim that David Cameron and George Osborne made them go out on strike. Twaddle. They decided to strike, and they were free not to do so. Whenever anyone grizzles ‘There is no alternative’ or ‘I had no choice’, it invariably means that there is an alternative, or there was a choice but they don’t want you to consider it, or they don’t want to admit it to themselves.
So, if they’re so ethically committed to the state school system, the NHS or whatever it is, how can they bring themselves to shut these things down for a day, forcing their fellow-creatures into inconvenience or worse? I gather that funerals are having to be postponed because of this strike, not to mention non-urgent ( but even so long-desired and important) operations. How can they do that? You can’t, while vigorously kicking someone in the shin, declare ‘I feel your pain and I’m sorry for you’.
As for the trouble caused by closing the schools, it’s enormous. These people’s neighbours should tell them, politely but firmly, that we’re sorry their pensions aren’t what they used to be, but that’s the case for plenty of other people who have no way of forcing taxpayers to make up for the shortfall.
And it’s not good moaning on about bankers and fat cats. Tax, by its nature, mostly comes from those on low and middle incomes. Always has done. Always will.
Wearily I turn again to the ‘war on drugs’. Mr Wooderson seems beguiled by the various grandiose panels, commissions and other gatherings of ill-informed and well-meaning people (Mr Walesa, alas , among them) who have been seduced by the drug lobby into accepting the claim that ‘The War on Drugs has failed’. These people know no more than I do ( and in many cases considerably less than I do) about the nature and history of drug law enforcement. I doubt if most of them, for instance, have even heard of the Woottton report , let alone know what its results were)Why should we listen to them on this topic?
The main blame for this lies in the modern Western media, which are absolutely packed with former ( and current) drug users, who wish to legalise their own misdeeds. They constantly misrepresent the situation, and misinterpret it in a self-serving way. And a number of silly but grand commentators, who love to shock and appear advanced, lend their names to this. Again, they know little of the matter, as they show by their claims of a ‘war’ and their blether about ‘criminalisation’ of cannabis users.
As Mr Heslop so cogently points out, the miseries of Latin America or Afghanistan are the fault of the selfish, affluent wasters in our society who *take* drugs. If they stopped doing so, then the fabulous sums of money which corrupt these places would cease to be available. Yet our supposed ‘war on drugs’ treats the purchase and use of drugs as either a minor misdemeanour, or no crime at all. How can it be so wicked to grow or transport or sell these substances, but excusable to buy and take them? What, if not their evil effects on those who take them, is the reason for the campaign against them in the first place. This blazing anomaly goes completely unnoticed, and so unexamined, by hundreds of newspapers, TV stations etc. The failure to disapprove of, and to interdict consumption is an absurdity. No campaign could work which sought to interdict supply and ignored demand. Yet that is what we do, and then complain it doesn’t work.
Mr Hogarth argues :’ Saying that without consumers there would be no drug trade is pandering to a utopian society that will never exist. There is a demand for drugs, always has been, always will be.’ This is historically inaccurate. Demand for illegal drugs in this country was infinitesimal until the 1960s. The pre-1960 period was hardly an unattainable utopia. Does it occur to him that the cultural and moral collapse of that period, followed by the abandonment of law enforcement, might have affected the amount of drug use in western societies? I have seldom seen the word ‘Utopian’ more wrongly used. Drug abuse in or society is still rare enough to be deterred into a very small corner indeed. Only current users, or people hoping to become rich if drugs are legalised and ‘regulated’ have any interest in putting the opposite case.
I see ‘Bert’ is back. I can’t imagine why. On each attempt to establish that he knows everything, he shows that he doesn’t (I’m still waiting for his alternative explanation for the growing number of fortnightly British rubbish collections, long promised, never delivered. Come on ‘Bert’. What is it if isn’t the Landfill Directive? You’ve had long enough).
Now he wants to argue about how much of Istanbul is in Europe, and how much in Asia. Well, it is quite certain that, measured in simple land area, the European part of the city is bigger than the Asian part ( I am not sure about population). But in general, so what? I was simply responding to a contributor who asserted that Turkey was an Asian country and therefore excluded from European Union membership automatically. The fact that a large part (not necessarily the larger, but almost certainly so) of its biggest city is in Europe would seem to knock that argument on the head. ‘Bert’ only comes here, as I have so often said, to pick nits in a futile and pettifogging way. And I wouldn’t mind if it weren’t for his insufferably vain and grandiose fake name. I have twice visited Istanbul, on both occasions with excellent Turkish guides who know the city well - and I can say that a great deal more than the ‘famous bits’ are on the European side. Enormous, sprawling suburbs which take hours to cross, for one thing. And the main international airport, for another.
By the way, my definition of ‘Europe’ and ‘Asia’ is purely conventional, and certainly not based on a line of longitude. I think it has been accepted for centuries that the Bosphorus, which cuts so majestically through the heart of Istanbul, divides Europe from Asia. The border also lies on the Ural and Caucasus Mountains. But unlike the other continents, Europe and Asia are arbitrarily separated, and might otherwise be considered as a single continent. Perhaps one day they will, when ‘Eurabia’ has come to pass.
I have many times said here and elsewhere that the success of PC arises from its apparent defence of plain good manners. And that conservatives will never defeat this PC as long as they fail to recognise this, and to join sincerely in stamping out such things as the n-word, and the use of derogatory terms for homosexuals. Not that it does me any good with my enemies or (in many cases) my supporters. I get into all kinds of trouble when I say it’s a good thing that the name of Guy Gibson’s dog in ‘The Dambusters’ has been changed, or when I object to golliwogs.
Mr MacDougall, in a thoughtful contribution, asks : ‘What surprises me is that you praise this [Ataturk’s secularisation] in any way, when you rightly attack the less authoritarian but nonetheless successful secularisation of Britain. Islam is not the enemy, only the Islamic extremism of a minority is, and moderate Moslem groups like the AK Party should be our allies. To take one example, the AK does not support the Chador; the President's wife wears a head scarf for modesty, just as many English women did a hundred years ago (and does so with high heels). Why are you so critical of immodest dress in Britain, yet find this so oppressive?’
I’m not sure that I praise Ataturk’s secularisation, exactly. Ataturk was a despot, interesting for having concluded that his country could not survive and prosper if it continued to be ruled by Islam. I think he was right about that, and Turkey’s current prosperity is in the end owed to Ataturk. It will be interesting to see how long it survives the Islamisation now being adopted. But my guess is that Turks, who are increasingly devout, value their faith above prosperity
I simply point out that from a Western point of view, we should be more aware of Turkey’s decision to rejoin the Islamic world and dispense with the Ataturk settlement. From a purely Western point of view, this is going to make our position weaker. And the absurd description of the AK party as ‘mildly Islamist’, constantly parroted by the grand press, is simply and straightforwardly untrue. When the real nature of the Erdogan revolution becomes clear, we will be wholly unprepared for it.
I’m not sure I’ve said all that much about immodest dress in the west. I’m against pornography and gratuitous nudity , and things along those lines – especially when broadcast. And I think the sexualisation of the young, partly through fashion, is a dangerous and damaging trend. But I am not in favour of enveloping the female form in shrouds. Some longstanding readers here will remember the hot water I got into when I made an admittedly flippant remark wishing good luck to women who dressed provocatively. As for the growing Muslim insistence on headscarves, it seems to me to be a very interesting form of psychological warfare. But when I visit Islamic countries where it is widespread, it seems to me that the covering or wrapping of the head and hair have a powerful significance. What is that significance? Is a be-scarfed woman more or less contained? More or less able to express and assert herself among men? I do not think the effect is liberating. Western women who have adopted Islamic garb to gain access to mosques or devout areas of Muslim cities have told me of the powerful transformation wrought by donning the required garments, the feeling of submission and diminution involved, and the loss of individuality as they sink into a crowd of shrouded humps. When the dress takes the form of the burqa or niqab, this is even more so, as the face itself disappears, and in many cases even the hands must be gloved.
This may be voluntary where Islam is weak. But again, I know of Western women venturing into the suburbs of (for example) Basra, and attempting to adopt correct Muslim dress, finding themselves very rudely and abruptly and menacingly told off by local menfolk for allowing even the tiniest bit of flesh to show. In the Iraqi city of Najaf I was warned by my (Christian Arab) interpreter not to approach any women directly, as their menfolk would probably have attacked me had I done so.
I do not think the headscarf and the rest of these garments are all that voluntary. Though I don’t doubt that there is a form of female Muslim devotion much like that which leads Christian women into convents, in which these things are enthusiastically adopted. I also think that if a woman wants to be reasonably safe from molestation in such societies, she is careful to dress with great modesty (the recent very unpleasant treatment of western female reporters in Cairo’s Tahrir Square emphasises that in such societies those who do not cover up are seen by many men as little short of prostitutes).
But is it for protection , or is it a mark of second-class status? Well, , in several Muslim countries that I have visited, women are usually restricted to a special segregated part of the mosque, and are not to be seen inside devout homes, except by other women.
Christianity is different from Islam, and the position of women in Islam is one of the things which makes this especially clear. I am happy to have alliances of convenience with British Muslims against such things as pornography and sex indoctrination (called ‘education’) . But this doesn’t mean the two faiths are the same, or alter my view that Christianity is the better religion. Nor does it alter theirs, that Islam is better.
And as for that, a note on Christianity. Repentance’ is not outward apology, but actual inward change, whose truth is known only to the repentant person and (if He exists) to God. That’s why it is an essentially theistic concept. And as for Mr ‘Bunker’ and his goblins and Father Christmases, these features of his squabbling discourse have a double significance. First they demonstrate his puerile inability to recognise that serious and thoughtful people can and do believe in the existence of God, not to mention his strikingly unjustified belief that he is in some way superior to such people. I am by contrast quite ready to believe that serious people can be atheists (though Mr ‘Bunker’ isn’t one of them). The other feature of it is his complete unwillingness to accept that there is an interesting question to be answered, namely ’Why is there something, rather than nothing?’ and the connected question, almost as important ‘Why is there a universe?’.
Belief in an Almighty Creator offers a possible (not certain, just possible) explanation of this. A belief in Father Christmas, or in Goblins on the end of one’s nose, does not. The two things are not comparable. To equate them ( as Mr ‘Bunker’ has repeatedly done despite numerous pleas of this kind to cease his giggling) is possible only for someone a) utterly incurious about the cosmos and b) wilfully determined not to grasp the difference.
