Scotland goes secular

 

A majority of Scots do not belong to a religion.

In the Scottish Household Survey 2019 annual report, which Scotland's chief statistician published on Tuesday, 56% of adults reported that they did not belong to any religion.

The figure, which stood at just 40% in 2009 and has risen by four per cent since the 2018 report.

 The proportion of adults who say they belong to the Church of Scotland has sharply declined since 2009, from 34% to 20%.

How to end poverty

For the 1983 film Mazdoor (Worker), Hasan Kamal wrote a song that captures the essence of this sentiment:

Hum mehnat-kash is duniya se jab apna hissa maangenge
Ek baagh nahin, ek khet nahin: hum saari duniya maangenge. (When we labourers demand our share of the world. Not just an orchard, not merely a field: we will demand the whole world)

Hasan Kamal, from the 1983 film Mazdoor (Worker),

Capitalism vacillates between a major contradiction: between social production and private property. Capital – namely money that thirsts to make more money endlessly – organises all the forces of production into one effectively organised social process that generates maximum profits to the owners and minimum possible wages to workers. The remarkable network of social production ties workers in one part of the world to another, brings commodities from there to here. This network promised to link people together and to allow humans to enjoy the fruits of each other’s labour. The problem, however, is that the immense productivity of capitalism stands on the foundation of private property. Capital is restless and must always seek a profit. It is through the control of the production process that capital exploits labour and draws out surplus value. Private capital controls the system of social production, and appropriates the social wealth produced, with little share to the actual producers. The control of capital over the production process prevents the flowering of the creative power of human labour; the pressure of profit, the fruit of private property, seeks to draw more and more from the workers whose own resourcefulness is stifled by the demands of routine, obedience, and conformity enforced by the social relations of production. Poverty is not an unfortunate manifestation of this system, but its necessary product. To eradicate poverty – which is a shared human dream – requires us to do more than seek welfare and charity. Charity and welfare might lighten the suffering, but they cannot do more than that. The producing class needed to be organised to overthrow the system of private property and to found a system based on socialist principles.

The capitalist system has lurched from crisis to crisis, unable to face its deeply rooted contradictions and unable to offer solutions to endemic social problems. Marxism remains an essential framework to analyse the system. Capitalism has no doubt changed in many different ways, developed a greater role for finance for instance; but it remains governed by the system of social production and private gain, by capital’s immense power over the system of production and accumulation. Harsh conditions of work and life, the fight over labour time and intensity, the pressures of unemployment and hunger illuminate the centrality of class exploitation in our social order. The political fight must be waged by the workers not for this or that reform alone but for the transformation of a system that continues to generate poverty. The capitalist system, by its nature, produces diabolical levels of poverty; the future does not seem possible within the system. Socialism is the great hope that we can go beyond a system that immiserates billions of people.

Adapted from here

https://dissidentvoice.org/2020/09/not-just-an-orchard-not-merely-a-field-we-demand-the-whole-world/

 

Our Commandment - Thou shalt not be stolen from.

Socialism stands for the abolition of robbery and the abolition of poverty. We therefore declare that the present capitalist system is based upon the legalised robbery of the wealth producers by the capitalists, and the undoubted object of socialism is to get rid of these property monopolists as speedily as possible. Socialism promotes peace, solidarity and goodwill among all peoples. No other political influence has operated half so powerfully to eradicate racial animosities and national rivalries. As socialists we have no quarrel with the workers of any nation on earth. There is ample room for all in the world, it is only the conduct of industry for profit-making on behalf of the plutocracy that makes each nation fight every other nation. Stop this, and begin to produce for use and there is harmony for all.

Socialism does not seek to destroy but to construct, to build fine homes. Socialism does not aim at making people the slaves of governments, but to surely get rid of all governments other than the self-government of free citizens. Socialism does not aim at robbing the rich but at preventing the rich from continuing to rob the poor. Socialism is the recognition and adoption of the principle and practice of association and co-operation. Socialism gives each of us the responsibility of being our “brother’s keeper.” If a child, woman or man is hungry, socialism says there is something wrong in our social system, and upon us all individually and collectively rests the responsibility of righting the wrong. If a city contains one slum dwelling or a number of such, socialism says to each of us raze the slum to the ground and let the sun shine. If men or women are over-worked, and so prevented from fully sharing in the joys of life, socialism bids us to immediately lessen the toil. Socialism does not seek to destroy individuality, but to make it possible for each person to develop his or her faculties up to the highest possible pitch of perfection.

Men, women and children are dying by millions because they are barred from getting life’s necessaries. This in the midst of an abundance of wealth the like of which the world has never known before. Our principle is one of  comradeship based on the socialisation of the means of production and distribution and the complete emancipation of labour from the domination of capitalism. For the working class capitalism means a growing insecurity of their existence, of misery, oppression, enslavement, debasement, and exploitation.

The capitalist mode of production, because it has the creation of profit for its sole object and is based upon the divorcement of the majority of the people from the instruments of production and the concentration of these instruments in the hands of a minority. Society is thus divided into two opposite classes, one, the capitalists and their accomplices, the landlords and bankers, holding in their hands the means of production, distribution, and exchange, and being, therefore, able to command the labour of others; the other, the working-class, the wage-slaves, the proletariat, possessing nothing but their labour-power, and being consequently forced by necessity to work for the former. 

Private ownership of the means of production has today become the means of expropriating workers, and small farmers, and enabling the non-workers – capitalists and large landowners – to own the product of the workers. Only the transformation of capitalism’s private ownership of the means of production – the land, mines, raw materials, tools, machines, and means of transport – into common ownership, and the transformation of production of goods for sale into socialist production for use, managed for and through society, can bring it about that the great industry and the steadily growing productive capacity of social labour shall for the hitherto exploited classes be changed from a source of misery and oppression, to a source of the highest welfare and of all-round harmonious perfection.

This social revolution means the emancipation not only of the workers, but of the whole human race, which suffers under the conditions today. But it can only be the work of the working class, because all the other classes, in spite of mutually conflicting interests, take their stand on the basis of private ownership of the means of production, and have as their common object the preservation of the principles of contemporary society.

The battle of the working class against capitalist exploitation is necessarily a political battle. The working class cannot carry on its economic battles or develop its economic organisation without political rights. It cannot effect the passing of the means of production into the ownership of the community without acquiring political power.

 

Capitalism is the Curse of Humanity

The Socialist Party seeks to organise the workers of this country into one great party of labour. The object of a Socialist Party is socialism. To that end the education and organisation of our fellow-workers and their persuasion to socialist principles is essential. We cannot have socialism without socialists. Therefore, the first duty of a socialist party is propaganda, in order to make socialists. In doing this a socialist party should also champion every movement of the working class towards improving its condition or in defence of its interests. It is of importance however, that a socialist should be elected and a seat won for socialism. From this standpoint, therefore, it is better for a socialist to fight and be beaten as a socialist than to fight and win under any other party. Are the Socialist Party’s principles unsound? If so, we have been on the wrong track all the time. If the fundamental principles of the Socialist Party are sound, then why try to build another movement on a false foundation?

We as a party declines to plunged ourselves into the mire of vacillating policies, of opportunism and reforms; compromising the revolutionary position we have occupied as a socialist party, for a vote-catching policy, based on reforms, aimed exclusively at electing candidates to office, no matter who the candidates were or their stand on the class struggle. Instead of seizing the dangling the bait of reforms ours is a case of the class struggle to usher in of the cooperative commonwealth.

The Socialist Party believes that the dependence of the working class upon the owners of capitalist property, and the desire of these capitalists to keep the people subjugated, is the cause of all our modern social and political ills – of nearly all crime, mental degradation, religious strife, and political tyranny and organise itself industrially and politically with the end in view of gaining control and mastery of the entire resources of the country. Such is our aim: such is socialism. Our method is: Political organisation at the ballot box to secure the election of representatives of socialist principles to all the elective public bodies , and thus to transfer the political power of the State into the hands of those who will use it to further the principle of common ownership. We therefore appeal to all workers to throw in their lot with the Socialist Party and assist it to pursue, unfalteringly and undeviatingly, its object – common ownership of the means of producing and distributing all wealth.

The socialist struggle is not confined to one people or one land but covers the whole of civilisation. Humanity cannot by any possibility remain in its existing chaotic economic condition and the consequences of the capitalist system. The Socialist Party seeks the revolutionary change in the basis of human society. The clear object of the Socialist Party is to hasten the change to transfer from private ownership to common ownership, all the agencies of wealth production and distribution, to control these agencies on a co-operative basis in the interests of all alike, and to aim constantly to secure for all well-being. The object of the Socialist Party is to secure economic freedom for the whole community, where all men and all women shall have equal opportunities of sharing in wealth production and consumption untrammelled by any restriction.

 Mankind’s powers over science and technology are constantly increasing, the only possible future will be for us all sharing in these advantages on a co-operative basis, ending the existing anomalies of immense wealth for a few and hardships for the many. With modern methods of production, effectively applied, an abundance of commodities can be provided to satisfy the needs of all.  Working people must organise and run the industry in the interests of the people co-operatively. The future of the world is to be co-operative and not competitive. Commercial rivalry will end and economic collaboration will take its place.

The Socialist Party advocates peace that transcends the peace preached by churches. Socialists always declare in favour of the solidarity of the interests of the workers of every country. Warfare means continuing exploitation and enslavement.  Armed conflicts today are not between the workers of one nation and the workers of another nation, but a conflict between the capitalists and the workers of all nations, and appeals to national pride, to religious prejudice, to race hatred. The clarion call of the World Socialist Movement is workers of all countries, unite. You have the whole world to win and nothing but your chains to lose. We declare a class war to get rid of classes.

Socialism is the Cause of Humanity.

 

We address you as socialists. 

Many will not pay any to us, saying we are impractical visionaries with idealistic notions in their heads. Many accuse us as too theoretical and they distrust theories. We are said to be dogmatists and sectarians for standing by a set of socialist principles. The only question for ourselves is whether our ideas adequately explains present society and a future alternative to it, or whether, if it contains an element of truth or not. We conclude that the Socialist Party does not present false, useless and misleading theories. Socialists claims to be an explanation of the present economical facts  of a great many other things, and also to know the only way out of the present situation. We are very practical Nevertheless, we can still keep questioning how to act upon these ideas. The socialist movement is not the invention of one man, or the property of one body of men and women. It is the expression of a phase of social evolution, and of a yearning for freedom which fills the hearts and minds of the people of all lands, a collective yearning which no individual can create. There is a difference among those who describe themselves as socialists the world over, not only on principles, but on action as well. We have to make our choice.

 For ourselves socialism does not mean mean ownership or management by the government. The State is only the agent of the possessing class and State-owned businesses are run for profit just as other businesses are. The government, as the agent of the possessing class, has, in the interests of its employers, to treat the employees just as other employees are treated. If socialism does not mean nationalisation or municipalisation of the means of production what do we mean by socialism? We mean the establishment of common ownership and democratic control of the whole of the world’s industry. Socialism means a complete change in society in all its aspects. Socialists constantly assert their belief in the speedy downfall of the present system, and the advent of socialism. We see the promise of socialism. We visualise a society that would be based on the common ownership of the means of production, the elimination of private profit in the means of production, the abolition of the wage system, the abolition of the division of society into classes. We don’t propose anywhere the elimination of private property in personal effects. We speak of those things which are necessary for the production of the people’s needs which shall be owned in common by all the people. When classes are abolished, as exploitation is eliminated, as the conflict of class against class is eliminated, the very reason for the existence of a government begins to diminish. Governments are  instruments of repression of one class against another. According to the doctrine of Marx and Engels and of  Marxists who followed them, we envisage, as Engels expressed it, a withering away of the government and its replacement by purely administrative councils, whose duties will be to plan production, to supervise public works, and education, and things of this sort. The running of a socialist society in reality will be an administrative body, because we don’t anticipate the need for the military, judges and jails and consequently that aspect of government dies out for want of function.

Capitalism – production for profit – presupposes a class of property-holders, who possess the means of living, and a class who have only their labour-power to offer in exchange for the necessaries of life. The capitalist, as capitalist, must seek to intensify the working day and to keep down wages, in order thereby to increase his profit. The workers have to defend themselves against the capitalist; and we soon finds that the only way we can do this is by organisation.

In these dark hours of disease, strife and poverty, the Socialist Party, reaffirms our belief in world socialism and in the principles of human solidarity is the only way that can bring order to the chaos and prevent a catastrophe. We urge all lovers of freedom to rally round the banner of Socialism — which represents liberty of today. Socialism will guarantee to every person the full fruit of his or her labour and thus do away with the main cause of destitution and conflicts. Socialism will usher in a new civilisation based upon the welfare of all. A heartening sign of the fraternal mood has been growing in the radical movement across the world. Building such a socialist party is today the common task of all who seek an alternative to the misery and exploitation of the present capitalist order. The ideal socialist party is one which has: First, a clear and definite understanding of socialism as applied to the social conditions and expresses its views lucidly. Such a perspective ought to appeal to the imagination of every worker. Given favourable conditions the activities of our organisation should spread throughout awakening the consciousness and stimulating the militancy of the oppressed masses, and winning them in growing numbers to the banner of the party of the socialist revolution, the Socialist Party.