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Editor’s Note… Hello and welcome to the Sixth Issue of Teenage Democracy. It has been a privilege to edit the articles and oversee meetings since I took on the leadership in September. I’d like to thank all contributing authors for making this a wonderful magazine where ideas and free thought prevail. I’d also like to thank the readers of the magazine for coming back to us and want to apologise for the delay we’ve had in publishing, given that our last issue came out almost a year ago. I also want to give a special shout-out to Harrison for desigining the front cover of this issue.
range of views on certain matters, which I see as this magazine’s greatest strength. It allows the youth of today to make their voices heard, regardless of their opinion, and that is important in a world where people’s voices aren’t always heard. So many experience the oppressive and evil reign of government tyranny that it is incredible that we can discuss ideas freely and in a safe environment. Changing minds is very important, but what we want most is for our articles to make you think. We hope that you enjoy this issue and it really makes you think…
There’s an awful lot going on the world today, whether it’s new types of candidates entering the Presidential race to the huge power of China. 2016 looks set to be an interesting year for everything from politics to Hollywood. We’ve compiled a vast and interesting selection of articles from people with a
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Stephen
DISCLAIMER: VIEWS EXPRESSED ARE ENTIRELY THOSE OF THE INDIVIDUAL AUTHORS. THEY DO NOT REPRESENT THE VIEWS OF OTHER AUTHORS, THE EDITOR, THE MAGAZINE OR THE COLLEGE.
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ARTICLE WIND OF CHANGE IN U.S POLITICS CHINESE POWER: WHY CHINA SHOULD BE TAKEN SERIOUSLY SOWING THE SEEDS OF DEMOCRACY REJECTING UNIVERSITY CRACKDOWNS ON FREE SPEECH THE SICKNESS OF THE LEFT BUILDING A LONGER TABLE LIBERALISM: A BOURGEOIS IDEOLOGY MARXIST ONTOLOGY: SEEING REALITY OUR RECCOMENDATIONS ADVERTS
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Though corporate control of United States elections had been increasing since perhaps as far back as the mid 1970’s, it was the Citizens United Act of 2010 sealed the fate of the land of the free. This act was passed by the Supreme Court on 5 votes to 4 and it would be no exaggeration to say that the justices that voted for the Act were, like most of America’s presidential candidates, heavily influenced by financial incentives from vested interests. Justice Clarence Thomas, for example, has worked as an attorney for Monsanto A biochemical giant and has repeatedly ruled in their favour when cases concerning them have be decided by the Supreme Court. The Citizens United Act essentially opens the flood gates to unchecked legalised bribery in the form of campaign donations to politicians. It does this by allowing independent interests as well as corporations to spend unlimited amounts of money on financing the advertisements and political tools used by candidates to get elected into office. Even more disturbing is the justification for allowing this: the infamous “corporations are people” clause. This declares corporate personhood and with it the right for donate limitless amounts to campaigns as any person apparently has the right to.
are sick and tired of politicians lying to them and putting profit before people. A very notable example of this is WolfPac, an independent group of both right-wing and left-wing concerned citizens who have been campaigning for a change to the US constitution that would make donating to a politician’s election campaign illegal. On the local level they have had some success by talking to representatives on the state and regional level and so far 3 states: California, Illinois and Vermont have passed this law. Sadly 75% (38) of the states are needed to force constitutional change so they are a long way off yet. To give credit where credit is due they have certainly outdone expectations in that they were told that they had no hope of passing a bill calling for a convention in even one state. It might seem as though the United States is doomed to this almost oligarchical system for a long time to come, but there is a ray of hope. It may be down to citizens of the country being more aware of the way their politics has changed or maybe it has just happened by chance, but either way there has been an unprecedented rise in support for non-corporate backed candidates. There are a few of these but the only two that matter are Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump because they are within reach of the presidency. Both of these two are
Naturally there has been a backlash against this, mainly because people 4
important and could, if elected, set a new standard of the views of American people being more important than money in an election. They are also very interesting people and are worth looking into.
of Burlington and won by just 10 votes. He managed to hold his position for four terms and chose to not seek re-election in 1989. He had bigger ambitions in mind. At this point the creeping influence of money in US politics was well on its way, so when Sanders won a seat in the House of Representatives in 1990 he instantly alienated both Republicans and Democrats with his view that they were mainly working for the wealthy. He himself was evidence of this system as he was the first independent candidate to be elected into the House for 40 years. After 16 years in the House he was fortunate enough to receive support from Democrats in his run to become a Senator for Vermont in 2006. He also entered into an agreement with the Democrats that if elected he would serve as a member of their party in the Senate. This certainly helped him win a 2 to 1 majority over his opponent.
Bernie Sanders was born on 8th September 1941 into a Jewish family in Brooklyn, New York. His Grandparents on his mother’s side were killed in the Holocaust when he was very young. He became interested in politics partly because of this. He said "A guy named Adolf Hitler won an election in 1932 ... and 50 million people died as a result ... what I learned as a little kid is that politics is, in fact, very important." Whilst attending the University of Chicago he joined the Young People’s Socialist League. Through this he become active in the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s, attending both protests at his own college and the famous March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom. In addition to this Sanders supported the anti-war movement becoming a member of the Student Peace Union and supporting veteran’s benefits. He left University with a degree in political science; it is clear that he had made the choice to undertake a career in politics. However this career did not start until 1971 when he joined the Liberty Union Party but received very little success and so Sanders left the party in 1979, choosing from then on to campaign independently. Very soon after this in 1981 he ran for the position of Mayor
Bernie Sanders
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Sanders did not join the Democrats because he felt that they had become less respondent to the will of the rich and powerful minority. In fact they had only become more corrupt since he joined Congress. Sanders believed that with this position he could reform the party and US politics as a whole which is why after gaining more and more support though his actions he chose run for the Democratic candidacy in for the 2016 presidential election.
Donald Trump is an altogether different story. Although like Sanders he was born around the same time (1946) into a family of recent immigrant decent, he had a much more privileged upbringing. He had a private education where he received rigorous military style training and then went on to study at the University of Pennsylvania where he earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Economics. From here he began his career at his father’s real estate firm but, to give Trump credit, he desired to build on the success of his father in an entrepreneurial way.
His grass roots funded campaign is heavily centred on reforming the financial system so that the events of the 2008 crash and the subsequent bailout cannot happen again. He wants to weaken the power of the banks so that they cannot get away with risking taxpayer money and controlling politicians with campaign donations. Also a focus is his support of a stronger welfare system as he believes America does not do enough to help its poorest and most disadvantaged. This message has resonated with many who are sick of the current situation but he still faces a steep climb to overtake Hillary Clinton who sits in first place as of the 16th of February 2016 with 49% in the polls, Sanders may be down at 35.3% but his support continues to grow. We can only hope that Clinton’s $20.3 million in corporate funding and entrenched support from the legacy of her husband Bill Clinton is not enough to stop Bernie’s efforts.
Donald Trump He moved to New York in 1971 to begin his own real estate career and quickly became involved in larger projects often featuring more expensive design in order to gain a public image. After this period he began to invest the money he was making in further enterprises beginning in throughout the late 70s to 80s with buying established landmarks and buildings. These include but are 6
not limited to Wollman Rink in Central Park, the Taj Mahal Casino and the Javits Convention Centre. Because of outlandish and peculiar business choices, Trump was often going from high profitability to bankruptcy in many of his businesses but still maintained a quite lavish lifestyle. As he became more famous, his name and brand becoming recognised (helped in no small part to the construction of “Trump Tower”, “Trump Place” and “Trump Hotel and Tower”) he, like many of those in the lime light, began commenting on political affairs and making his views heard. He has written ten books on business (and one on golf) so far, but up until 2000 when he published “The America We Deserve”, he had not written one on politics. This happened to coincide with his first run for president, which, like his current run, came completely out of the blue.
Sanders. But unlike his other random escapees such as The Apprentice, golf, beauty pageants and wrestling, Trump is apparently invested in this for what he thinks is best for the American people. He could easily take huge amounts of money from all kinds of corporate interests, who would no doubt be excited by his campaign, yet he has taken none and paid for most of his campaign out of his own pocket. And even despite this lack of funding he has managed to massively outclass his opponents with 31.7% of the poll. Only Ben Carson is challenging him for first place and he currently sits at 22%. His rise to the top of this race is down to his personality and attitude, very different to Bernie Sanders’ use of a resonating message. Trump Speaks highly of himself whilst belittling his rivals. He has made idealistic claims and promises that have drawn the attention and support from Republican voters looking for a strong, confident leader. Overall it looks likely that he will be the Republican candidate and one with no external interests to reign him in.
It could be said that politics for Donald Trump is another wild pursuit that he woke up to one day and decided to follow. It certainly isn’t a hard lifetime’s work like it is for Bernie
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I personally think that Bernie Sanders, who has worked his whole life to make those of others better, would do more to restore American democracy to what it once was. He has stated multiple times that he will create an equal society where the government will be accountable to those who elect it and not the money of donators. Furthermore Trump certainly doesn’t care as much about the suffering of the poorest in society. But putting my own opinions aside I can see that both of these men are setting an important standard by getting to the front of the
world’s most important political race by the support of the will of the people alone. I for one did not think it possible until now. It is a precedent may inspire others to follow even should they lose, as those on the right and the left care a lot about their democracy. It is a definitive sign of hope that the land of the free may not be screwed just yet.
-Hursley
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CHINESE POWER: Why China Should Be Taken Seriously Let's talk about China. You know, the faraway land that hates Japan, still has communism and has Romance of the Three Kingdoms. Run by Xi Jinping, or as an Indian State TV Presenter called him by mistake, “Eleven Jinping.” In any other country that would be bad enough, but putting a number in the official’s name implies a hereditary basis on China’s leadership and you’ve just accused a very powerful man that he is the hypocrite that epitomises everything the People’s republic accused the West of in the aftermath of World War Two.
and everyone knows it. The US defence secretary Ash Carter gave a very strong response on the subject. Which may be why, as of this writing, the US has flown two B-52 bombers over this sea, making a "serious military provocation" to the Beijing government. Potentially leaving the US with only Japan as a country that is on good terms with the West. China manufactures most of our electronics. If it needs to be made cheap, then China is a place where that can be done. In 2014 its GDP was 10360.10 Billion US Dollars. China owns 6.5% of the National Debt and despite strong rhetoric from some US politicians, the Chinese leaders are not going to walk
It has been extending influence into South East Asia for around a decade, becoming infamous for claiming waters through land reclamation and using the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea it can claim 12 nautical miles, 13.8 land miles or 22.2 kilometres. By simply taking vast amounts of sand from its considerable natural resources and dumping it into the sea, it creates a bit of "China" with a military base on it. It's perfectly within the writing of the convention, but against the spirit of it 9
into Congress one day, snap their fingers and declare himself King of the Texans, Lord of the 50 States and Protector of the Free World.
up, the people self-police their opinions at the risk of having them and their friend's credit ratings being downgraded for the wrong view. Orwell was only wrong about the date.
China can sell the debt, or use it as a source of income from the United States like a businessman investing in Microsoft, except Microsoft is the largest superpower the world has ever seen and knocks over small governments when it's convenient.
China is a major player in international politics and doesn’t have nearly the attention paid to it by most people it should have. Putin has hard military power and some control over oil, but China is a puppet master that can influence nations in the same way the US does, but without half the negative reputation.
China is a bizarre country in comparison to the Western NationStates we're familiar with. It's Authoritarian Capitalism, moving into a more decentralised system, to the West's Liberal Capitalism bordering on kleptocracy. In China the party fills all of the local government positions, in the West we elect through varying systems people that should be representative of the local population, as broken as the latter may be.
Now China has demographic problems internally, with 112 men to every 100 women, it’s going to have thousands of young men without a wife to help them care for their families in the coming decades, but it is potentially an efficient government in charge of a large nation, the people united with a single identity, which is more than can be said of the West. China has a population of over 1.3 Billion, but less than 10% of the world’s food, water and a small land mass for its population, it needs resources to support its people or they’ll face a new revolution, as happened in France and Russia, so too could happen in China again.
In theory the Chinese system is a Statist's dream, an efficient single party making all the decisions, so you don't have to deal with corruption, trusting the leader to make the state run smoothly. The issues of the private market in healthcare, commerce and certain government roles have never been so clear. China doesn't have incentives for the people to be locked
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Harry
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Sowing the Seeds of Democracy
On the 17th of January 2014, Pablo Iglesias, a political science lecturer from the Complutense University, formed a grassroots anti-austerity party. He named it ‘Podemos’ meaning ‘we can’, and with no money or visible structure, it seemed destined to be lost in the rising anti-austerity sentiment. Pablo Iglesias at a Podemos Rally
On the 24th January 2016, Iglesias met with King Felipe VI of Spain, on his way to becoming Vice President of Spain with the backing of 5 million voters.
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This amazing rise to power for a party which is just 2 years old is astounding in itself. But when analysed in a global context, it seems like the successful spearhead of something much larger. 2015, as well as seeing the elections which brought Podemos to power, saw the UK’s Labour Party elect Jeremy Corbyn as party leader on a wave of popular support from the ground up. Polls in the US showed the continuing rise of political underdog Bernie Sanders, a politician well left of the American political norm, who gained traction as the Democratic candidate from a strong citizen base. One common element linked all of these campaigns - their grassroots origins. Which begs the question: are grassroots politics here to stay?
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Grassroots politics is the focus of local people in creating political traction for a campaign. Rather than relying on large donations from large corporations and wealthy donors, funding and support come directly from the ground up. This may seem ineffective, but Bernie Sanders, the aforementioned Democratic candidate has managed to raise $30m in small donations from over 250,000 supporters. This is $70,000 more than Obama managed in his run-up to the Democratic primaries, and dwarfs Hillary Clinton’s total of $13m. The movement has been in a large way facilitated by recent technological advancements. The rise of social media has become a tool to unite bands of individuals into campaigns. Rallies can now be organised and coordinated with incredible ease, through a medium which is regularly checked by large
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swathes of the population. This efficiently keeps campaigning costs down too - why spend millions on a TV ad when a Twitter hashtag can achieve more for free? On the run up to the Labour leadership, the supportive hashtag “#jezwecan” was tweeted on average once every 25 seconds, each one a piece of free and widely-seen advertising for the campaign.
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The movement also represents an interesting shift in how we interact with politics. For years party membership has been consistently decreasing, as people disengage from party politics and rhetoric. Instead, people would rather engage in exciting and dynamic movements like Corbyn on the left of the UK, and even Trump on the right of the US, who has gained massive grassroots support through his campaigns teams pragmatic use of social media channels. This change in political attitudes in mirrored in the rise of pressure groups such as 38 Degrees, who often mobilise large sections of the public to achieve very antiestablishment aims.
Tea Party Movement Logo In a way, via the avid search for the new and fresh, the movement may say more about our political attention span then we would like to admit - we no longer have the time to see through the political progression of existing parties, and so instead look to the new and fresh. The dwindling Tea Party of the US shows how, while a rebellious movement can gain great following in a short time, they can often burn bright and fast, falling off the radar as quickly as they entered it. The power of populism is also something of concern - a situation that the Labour party may soon be facing with its ‘unelectable’ leader, brought in a wave of enthused, motivated
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turn the tide even on authoritarian regimes - one could see the Arab Spring as an example of a grassroots uprising, with those at the bottom of society performing a very 21st century revolution organised over Twitter and Facebook.
Anti-establishment sentiment is very much at the core of these movements. While the antiestablishment feeling has always been there (notably in the UK and US with their entrenched party systems), access to opinions and other like-minded people that the internet has provided grassroots campaigns with the ability to 12
campaigners without consideration for his appeal to a wider voter base.
corporate interests and highly professionalised lobbying remains to be seen - while Corbyn was able to gain much support from loud, active members, it is the silent majority which decides elections, which the 2015 UK elections expertly demonstrated.
Time will only tell whether grassroots movements will persevere. Podemos are the first significant victory for such movements in Western liberal democracy, but being elected isn’t the final battle. As the antiausterity party Syriza have shown us in Greece, once swept up on a populist wave, it is often very difficult to carry out the change required to keep your base engaged.
However, as a way to energise the new generations into the world of politics via mediums they understand and engage in, it is an unparalleled tool in bringing direct democracy, and democracy in general, into the 21st century.
Whether grassroots movements have the power to defeat strong
-Benedict
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REJECTING UNIVERSITY CRACKDOWNS ON FREEDOM OF SPEECH In recent months, various remarks have been made in the press regarding free speech in Universities across the United Kingdom. The issue of free speech, the freedom of the individual to express thoughts, emotions, ideas and the right to offend, is for anyone who seeks to take part in our democratic system, either to be a part of it or to revolt and change it, requires freedom of speech.
internationally acclaimed universities a sinister devil to freedom of speech.
Freedom of speech in debates, the press, education and politics are fundamental practices of life in 21st century Britain. In the 21st century, the philosophy of equality, openness, freedom, toleration and diversity are the cornerstones of a modern civilised society, in which all people in theory are equal. It is right that these values are advocated within the past week in which we remember the victims of the Holocaust. Such evil filled the last century and in those dark and horrid times freedom of speech was restricted. Is it right then that today a dangerous and growing threat emerges to seek to muzzle freedom of speech? This threat comes not from an oppressive regime, nor a censored press or even a politically correct Parliament, but from the higher end of the educational establishment. It is of course wrong to stereotype and to generalise, but there is however in some of Britain’s greatest,
In the dictatorship of Oceania in George Orwell’s 1984, there is no freedom of speech. In a modern liberal Britain we as a collective of individuals are fortunate to have the privilege to freedom of speech; millions of lives have been lost in the past century in the name of freedom and today when the world is rocked by nefarious terrorist groups in the Middle East and Africa, we should honour that freedom and protect it. Privilege brings responsibility and so the privilege of freedom of speech brings responsibility. A responsibility to listen to all voices and philosophies no matter how erroneous. Free speech means that views that are not always pleasant to hear and are hurtful at times. It is however far better to 14
defend the right to speak even if what is said is wrong. This includes all views, a truly inclusive society. Enoch Powell’s infamous Rivers of Blood speech is inherently racist, Yasmin Alibhai-Browns anti-white man comments have been deemed racist and Donald Trump’s call to ban Muslims entering the US have been deemed racist, prejudiced and discriminatory. Although these remarks are by and large perceived wrong, to ban the ability of the individual to say it would be start a dictatorship of oppression, oppressing free speech.
Today not many would argue that homosexuality is wrong however less than a hundred years ago to speak in favour of homosexuality was deemed wrong. Today not many would say that a woman’s place is in the home but less than a hundred years ago it was laughable to question that view. Today universal suffrage is a vital part of democracy; one hundred years ago democracy was a newish idea Europe that challenged traditional Conservative ideology of Orthodoxy, Autocracy and Nationality. The condemnation of freedom of speech is spiteful of liberty, ignorant of education, delusional of freedom and hating of difference. The very issues that university teach are at risk. The liberty of the individual is to be sacrificed for a shared collective view. Education should open eyes, challenge and test pre-conceived ideas. This is a slippery slope argument, I accept. Although intellectuals may criticise this when the actions of banning speakers from the Oxford Union is happening before our own eyes, this is not a slippery slope argument to be laughed at.
To ban views that are not shared by society as a whole sets a menacing precedent. Who are we to say what is correct and what is incorrect? Who would be the neutral arbiter? Why should individuals not be free to hold different views? For anyone who is a liberal a simple message of “I disagree with what you say but I will defend your right to say it” is enough for defend the freedom of speech. To ban freedom of speech would make debates pointless and education pointless. To ban freedom for speech would be to undo the work of The Enlightenment.
The fight for freedom has brought out the very best in human nature. It challenges oppressive authority, it finds the truth and liberty prevails. When the historical concept of freedom of speech in universities is threatened the very foundations of liberty and freedom are threatened.
When young individuals at universities seek to have safe speech zones this is consequentially a repeat of history. It is discriminatory against others who hold less commonly shared views. It would segregate individuals from debates because their views are not compatible with the majority. It would be apartheid of intellectual discussion.
-James
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The Sickness in the Left I speak to you today as a British lefty. And I'm ashamed to be one. Over the past few years a strain of Authoritarianism has been rising. Communism collapsed in Russia, leaving a void in the top left quadrant of the political compass. A form of Marxist Feminism has filled that void.
statements. "Everything is sexist, everything is racist, everything is misoynistic and you have to point it all out." Seriously, google this. You couldn't make up what comes out. These people seem to have taken Marx's principles of class struggle and then applied it to men and women. The men are the bourgeoisie and the women are the proletariat.
Now depending on who you ask, you will get a different answer as to when feminism went bad. Karen Straughan would tell you it went bad with the second wave. Naomi Wolf would tell you it hasn't. And then she'd call you a rape apologist. Tumblr would tell you to shut up with your white male privilege.
This new branch of the left is bizarre. Freedom of speech and innocent until proven guilty have gone out the window. Take Bill Cosby for example. Countless accusation and not a single court case, but he's a pariah. I don't know if he has or hasn't raped anyone, but I want a trial by jury as laid out in the Magna Carta before we decide on if he should be put in jail. Same goes for the case with Kesha right now. She's being automatically believed by the media without a shred of evidence.
Now the following example is an anecdote, but from browsing Twitter I have been blocked by self described feminists and Social Justice Warriors because I followed Christina Hoff Somers. I didn't even remember following her. Sometimes I just follow random people down the side of Twitter, when it goes "if you like Stephen Fry, you will clearly like Nigel Farrage!"
I'm concerned by these ideas. Now I listen to neo-nazis, fascists, communists and theocrats. They all have their odd ideas, rangeing from ethnic cleansing (movement of people) to outright genocide, but the new feminism worries me a lot more. The Alternative Right (neo-nazis and white nationalists) have some crazy ideas, but they don't run universities.
Christina Hoff Somers is a 70something feminist, who's been active since the second wave. The generation of feminism. The generation I associate with ending several bits of discrimination against women. Then the third wave came in. Figures like Lacey Green and Anita Sarkeesian came out with some baffling
Almost every university in the UK and America has a Gender Studies course. Hell, ust look to Bell Hooks. A fairly 16
crazy third wave feminist who thinks that women are being opressed by men. Germaine Greer wrote an essay called "The Female Eunuch". Take a look at it and you will find a conspiracy theory.
think about all the kids of divorced parents you know and count the number who live with their fathers more than half the time. Women get quotas for jobs and universities. Men retire later than women and have a shorter life expectancy than women. Women have it pretty good, but "misogyny is the air we breathe� apparently‌
Now I don't think women are the losers in this current society. Women seem to be doing fairly well. The wage-gap is a misunderstanding, the women win at divorce cases, seriously,
-Harry
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Building A Longer Table A wise person once said that “When you have more than you need, don’t build a higher fence, build a longer table.” Yet this is what is sadly so frequently ignored during the immigration debate and indeed debates on protectionism vs. free trade. What I hope to see changing the debate is a return to a belief in a free market, not hiding behind the sandbags of protectionism and anti-immigration rhetoric from the likes of UKIP, but out on the frontlines of tempestuous free trade, like many classical liberals.
country in the world, yet if we were to revert to an Australian style points system, we’d be stopping poorer unskilled workers from benefitting from our wealth, our jobs, our opportunities. And what’s to say the government knows better than a businessman, a doctor or skilled labourer on who they should hire? In a way, we’d be building a higher fence, not allowing for fairer competition and the fairer distribution that should ensue. It would also be going against fundamental capitalist principles such as hard work for self-interest.
Why do I believe this? It’s because I believe that under a fair capitalist system, anybody should be free to move anywhere to try and improve their position. Whilst in Haiti, I saw a lot of poverty. I saw the people suffering from 70% unemployment. I saw the pain and hardship and poor living standards. I don’t think anybody should have to stay like that. I would hate living in those conditions. But if the U.S. Government were to prevent the hypothetical Haitian from migrating, how would that be helping him/her have access to better pay and conditions? Similarly, if the UK government were to prevent the hypothetical poor EU citizen from coming to the UK, how would that be helping him/her get the best deal for their family back home? The answer is that it wouldn’t. Being picky about who comes over on the basis of economics does no favour to the poorest. Everybody should have the right to try and do their best for themselves and their loved ones. I commend anybody who has the get-upand-go to migrate thousands of miles for love of family, experiencing the pain of separation. The UK is the sixth richest
I believe that the ugly economic arguments against immigration centre around protectionism. The link between protectionism and anti-immigration rhetoric is this: Protectionism believes there should be special treatment and protection of people in one country through government manipulation of the market and bureaucracy. It wants to use “cheat codes” on the market to stack wealth within a country and not allow for the free and natural movement of capital across borders. It will stop at nothing to keep wealth in special groups as opposed to those who earn it, and very sadly, poor immigrants who are just looking for a better life, are often the recipients of backlash from a total disregard of free market principles that UKIP claims to believe in. “Immigrants take our jobs!” “Immigration cause unemployment for British workers!” “British jobs for British workers!” These anti-immigration arguments are ridiculous. First off, this is Britain, not the USSR or the DPRK. Many of the jobs available in Britain that immigrants come to work in are not owned by the government but private 18
individuals. They cannot be deemed “British” because the government doesn’t own the vast majority of them, as in communist countries. Private employers should be able to access the best talent out there, and not have the government telling them who is best for the job. Employers are not stupid; they know what they want and they will get it unless the government stops them. But more importantly, THIS IS THE FREE MARKET! The key word is free. That means that there is unemployment, that there are good times and that there are bad times. What gives a British person any more right to a job than a poor foreigner? If the foreigner can do a better job than the British person, then they should be rewarded with the job. Such protectionism does poor immigrants no favours, and because of my desire to help the poor and allow those who wish to live here, to live here, we should stay in the EU, breaking down the fence and allowing for competition for all who wish to participate. Take another branch of protectionism: government subsidies. During the 1980s, US farmers received 40% of their profits as a result of government subsidies. This meant that they could sell crops on foreign markets at dirt cheap prices, meaning poor farmers (who receive no subsidies) cannot possibly compete. You’re probably wondering why I used this argument, as surely it gives more sway to a protectionist argument. Well no, it doesn’t, because under true free trade,
there is no subsidy for either poor or comparatively rich farmers. The playing field is even, therefore prices can be more competitive and thus the “consumer cake” can be more evenly cut to help both parties rather than allowing an artificial monopoly. Another way we could break down the fence and build a longer table is by pursuing a policy of free trade. This would not only allow greater consumer choice in poorer countries, to shop around for the best price, but businesses in poor countries can shop around for the best deal, which can maximise profit and create more jobs and make higher wages ,and therefore better living standards, in poorer countries. Where has free trade worked? Look to Mexico after NAFTA. Companies which exported 60% or more of their goods paid 39% higher wages. The European Commission wrote that
“The single market with the free movement of goods, services, people and capital within the EU’s borders is the cornerstone of the Union’s ability to create jobs by trading with other countries and regions.” Free Trade can help the poor, provided it is free from the tyranny of ugly crony-capitalism and competition can run free. I believe allowing access to our markets is a good way of building the longer table necessary to love all, rich and poor
-Stephen
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LIBERALISM: A BOURGEOIS IDEOLOGY A Critique and Examination of the Concept of Freedom: An Aid to Socialist Analysis and Subsequent Action Freedom is the one immaculate concept, advocated by everybody, even by fascists. (Proclaiming freedom from foreigners etc.) It is the one universal doctrine, strived for by both the starving man and the aristocrat. For one it is the ability earn a good wage to feed his children, for another it is the freedom to amass wealth or power.
progress (positive freedom) and the freedom from external constraints (negative freedom). Negative freedom may be viewed as ‘meritocratic’, or in other words, the freedom to succeed or starve depending on the supposed value of effort and labour, but the positive freedom may be viewed as the freedom from social evils, the freedom to succeed and flourish. Negative freedom is, in its unadulterated form, (without any positive freedoms) ironically tyrannical in its denial of any enabling freedom, its denial of any equality of provision. We will see positive freedom, as a considerable improvement on this, even with its still inegalitarian insistence on competition in supposedly ‘social’ markets.
So, in this article I wish to underline what we mean by freedom, -true freedom, we need, as a movement to underline what socialist freedom actually is. Also in this meeting I will be critiquing liberalism, as it is the ideology that is, misleadingly, most closely associated with freedom, its name coming from the Latin ‘liber’ for ‘free’. Liberalism, not conservatism (despite the name of the Tory Party) is the ideology of the bourgeoisie, it was a revolutionary ideology in the time of the bourgeois revolutions when the bourgeoisie replaced the feudal mode of production with its own one, but now it is an oppressive and reactionary ideology. Thus liberalism is almost synonymous with capitalism.
However, despite the fact that these liberals acknowledge individuality in these freedoms to a great degree, the liberal doctrines being built entirely on individualism, the classical liberals’ on egotistical individualism and the modern liberals’ on developmental individualism, both ideologies deny the individual of the individuality and particularity of their freedoms. They hold a universalist belief in inalienable rights, in natural rights and natural law. These beliefs are indeed admirable and were positively revolutionary in their time, but they require deconstruction by any of us who wish for true justice and are not content to accept violation and tyranny in the form of the bourgeois democracies first established by the very liberals who
There are a multitude of freedoms, due to the multitude of different people who wish for different things. However, politically, the liberals argue that there mainly just two types of freedom: the modern liberal freedom of John Stuart Mill and John Rawls and the classical liberal freedom of John Locke and JeanBaptiste Say. These freedoms are the freedom to ability, to a degree of universal 20
brought about these foundational concepts, in the revolutionary era of the late 1700s.
But morals, laws and ‘human rights’ are constructed by a society to maintain the strength of its hegemonic forces and its dominant class. The masses only get as many ‘human rights’ as the rulers and the lawmakers see fit. In the 10th century feudalist morals and laws reigned as sovereign, now in our modern bourgeois age, bourgeois morals and laws pervade society, these include human rights and such virtuous, revolutionary, liberal ideals as liberty and toleration (if only in a shallow way that doesn’t easily embrace different cultural practices), but they are also morals and laws of cut-throat, atomistic, unrealistic individualism and vile, contemptible competition.
Firstly, these universalist pretentions hold all men and women as the same, with the same rights, stripping them of their natural diversity; they are colour-blind, culture-blind, gender-blind and purposefully class-blind rights. Indeed with this denial of class or race they can more easily maintain the dominance of the constitutionally validated ‘liberal’ elite: i.e. the bourgeoisie. Thus all peoples under liberal law, are entitled to formal equality where all have the same rights and moral equality, but no allowances are made for the fact that one’s class, race or culture may inhibit some rights or require different rights.
These liberal inalienable rights are a social construct, but the liberal social contract theory, drawn up by people such as John Locke and Thomas Hobbes, however, indeed partly acknowledges this social construction with its fear of the ‘state of nature’ and the idea that civil society with its civil liberties inherently requires establishment via mutual agreement and social contraction. Thomas Hobbes famously called human life in the state of nature brutish and short. But this theory in turn undervalues man’s sociability, proclaiming the need of humanity to submit to authority and capital if it desires life and security.
For example, in France, some Muslim women require the right to cover their faces in public, where others do not, but, as we all know, the burqa is now banned (along with other public religious symbols and face coverings, although many feel this law targeted Muslims). The approach of a true liberal democracy is to remove this right and hide this neglect under the guise of secularism or liberal feminism. In practice, liberal capitalism leaves the masses with few rights and the bourgeoisie with a long list of rights. For example members of the ruling class have, in reality, the right to better healthcare, better education and better lawyers, than workers do. De facto, the bourgeoisie have a long list of immunities from different laws, notably taxation laws –because, as we know, their state works and its machine works in their interests. Secondly, liberals imply that rights are given unto man by nature and by the very virtue of man’s existence. 21
It also misinterprets history; before the time of class society, humans lived in societies that practiced what Marx and Engels called ‘primitive communism’ –the state of nature here was not so ‘brutal’. Rather it was collectivist, ordered and on the basis of common ownership. In the Neolithic village of, Catalhoyuk there was not even a sexual division of labour, let alone class. Also, children were raised by the community collectively, which is interesting. Furthermore, ‘social contracts’ as the liberals call them, or ‘statist, class societies’ as the I will call them, were not established out of mutual agreement or ‘contract’, but out of ‘conquest and violence’ as anarchist, Mikhail Bakunin puts it.
Man is accordingly a complete being, absolutely independent, apart from an outside society, he necessarily forms his society by a voluntary act, a... contract, be it... tacit or formal. In short, according to this theory, individuals... are led to create a society by some necessity such as work or war.’ The liberal view of human society as atomistic and almost non-existent, say for a collection of individuals, is the basis for a classical liberal variety of freedom. It makes no allowances for the fact that man is a social creature by nature, able, without any statist social contract and without rights endowed by some abstract entity such as ‘natural existence’ or ‘God’, to collectively achieve individual freedom, equality and a society that genuinely exists as a cohesive form.
In today’s society, the contract could not possibly be seen as voluntary as the liberals wish it to be, rather one signs a contract by the very act of their birth, but they know not what they are signing. The infant is given no choice, duped on account of its innocence, stupidity and vulnerability to take a part in a society, in which it may only be a slave, never able to fully determine its destiny. Each human is born into an already existing world, towering above them, into an already existing class.
The one natural tendency of man, as he currently exists, is his sociability, as animals we are social creatures who benefit in a societal-evolutionary sense form mutual aid. Liberal bourgeois competition only slows down the collective process of societal evolution and hardens our spirits, making criminals of angels and machines of men. Man must create his own freedom by means of self-expression, selfactualisation or collective-selfembodiment; my means of revolution; creating a society free of contract, where each man is sovereign and thus, necessarily, the community is sovereign collectively. There will be no sovereignty other than this or that shall mean the slavery of the masses.
Returning to the social contract theory, Bakunin aptly summarised this paradox within liberalism between a belief in natural, inalienable rights on the one hand, and a fear of the state of nature/belief in the necessity of the social contract on the other, in a critique of the ideology: ‘According to (the liberals) individual freedom is not a creation, a historic product of society. They maintain... that individual freedom is anterior to society and that all men are endowed by God with an eternal soul.
In answer to the question of this meeting I will attempt to underline some economic reasons which clearly show why we
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cannot be free under capitalism. Please correct me if I am wrong at all.
One seeking freedom of the most genuine character must seek a freedom that quenches the most possible amount of the many thirsts for freedom. This subsequent freedom is utilitarian only so much as it advocates a freedom that acts in the individual, differing and personal interests of the vast majority of the world’s population, whilst acting directly against the interests of a small minority of the population. This is one of the only acceptable utilitarianisms that exists: class utilitarianism, others are generally oppressive and authoritarian.
Aside from the fact that capitalism leads to war and imperialism as pieces of capital increasing swallow each other up and the interests of the state merge with those of large corporations, aside from the fact that, as we are seeing now, capitalism whips up racism to divide and rule us, aside from the fact that capitalism causes environmental chaos because the shorttermism of markets locks companies into using the cheapest, dirtiest resources, aside from the fact these facts –the labour relations that are fundamental to capitalism, fundamentally enslave the working class and force the worker to commodify his/her labour and capacity to work. Surplus value is extracted from workers as they are paid less than the value of their labour. For example, the worker is paid £10 an hour but produces £10’s worth of labour in use and exchange value every 15 minutes. Thus every hour the capitalist gets £40 of work. So the capitalist loses £10 to the worker and say £20 to operating costs; he is left with £10 surplus. The capitalist has now got the potential capital held in the produce of the labour –his capital has been replaced by the labour and on top of that he has increased his capital by £10 on top of that. For the worker to buy back the commodity he has made he would have to pay more than he was paid to make it, i.e. £12 for example, (after marking up) –even though he produced that single object for only £2.50. This exploitative relation is at the heart of capitalism. We cannot hope to be free whilst the bourgeoisie steal form us and produce for profit. For freedom we must democratise all work places and produce for human need.
All claims and desires for freedom may be of equal moral worth, but here, the only logical freedom to fight for is the many freedoms of the proletariat –to live, to express, to develop, to flourish, to work, to excel, to be fulfilled -at the expense of the freedoms of the bourgeoisie –to exploit, to steal, to oppress and to profiteer. The classical liberals will contend that positive freedom extinguishes negative freedom and the modern liberals will contend that negative freedom extinguishes positive freedom. But the two are not necessarily mutually exclusive; only with the abolition of the external constraints of the bourgeois state may humans be free from the external constraints of bourgeois law, bourgeois coercion, bourgeois war, bourgeois imperialism, bourgeois societal regulation, whilst simultaneously having the positive freedom of personal progression, universal ability and the freedom from alienation, private property and poverty. Thus communism enables both positive freedom and negative freedom without paradox; they become one. It is the bourgeois authoritarianism that brings into existence the need for negative freedom because capitalism imposes external constraints on workers, which they cannot 23
control in any way, and it brings about desires for positive freedom and progression with the inequality, alienation and poverty necessitated by it.
by capital, property or their job. Of all the antagonistic freedoms these are the two freedoms that oppose each other with the most irreconcilable malice and violence: the freedom to equality and healthy selfdevelopment and the freedom to exploit and dominate. To enact the mass of freedoms, the single freedom of the authority of the bourgeoisie must be eternally extinguished, with total finality and the utmost vigour.
Many ignorantly argue that communism is authoritarian in that it deprives everyone of property and individuality, this is pure idiocy! Rather, genuine Marxian communism increases the personal property of the people by demolishing all private property of the bourgeoisie, it is only authoritarian towards the bourgeoisie and their private ownership of the means of production, secondly, it increases the capability for individuality by eliminating the reification, mechanisation and commodification of man, by making man self-defined and self-identified not defined
We must cease the power ourselves, crush the state and smash capital. We must strike, protest and occupy –to win!
Mataio the Marxist
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MARXIST ONTOLOGY: SEEING REALITY A Marxist’s ontological duty, in my opinion, is to deconstruct reality, being, existence and the categories of being in order to better understand the world and its material relations, all with revolutionary intent to change the world for the better, ending the domination of the present by the past, bringing about the emancipation of the individual with an end to bourgeois, liberal, idealist universalisms, bringing about the public ownership of the means of production and the self-actualisation of the people individually and collectively. A Marxist approach to Hegelian dialectics and the use of Marxist dialectics and both of their methods is key. Art is available as a tool for the revolutionary in all of these senses, art can embody and use these dialectical methods, it can use and depict historical materialism, it can aid in the deconstruction of capitalist reality/existence and the analytic deconstruction of capital itself, it can aid in the transformation of the proletariat into a fully emotionally and intellectually armed force for social revolution (with emotive imagery etc.)
to situate itself upon. Secondarily, it has arms, which many other chairs also possess, and a back also. These things justify its categorisation as a chair. It is an entity because it can be materially and empirically noted. I can verify that it is not purely a mental construct by talking to other human entities who can materially sense it (which goes further to demonstrate the social character to reality). -Q: How is it? -A: It came into being as a product of capitalist mode of production and involuntary relations of production, a physical manifestation of labour, with the use of specified machinery. It is a commodity and was bought by the college in which I study: sale and physical moving of the object is the process that situated it here where I now sit in it. Its production was a result of human demand and then human labour, it was then offered for general or targeted sale on the market. It has a use-value as a chair and an exchange-value as a commodity as well as a value, which represents the amount of socially necessary labour it took to produce it. It has a price: that which is the monetary expression of its exchange value, this is now probably mostly irrelevant because it has been heavily used by this college and probably would not be sold on for much, if it ever was, given the nature of the modern British market. Its geographical origin is unknown. Its qualities are its blackness, its smoothness, it is qualitatively useful. It is functionally unified in its essential properties, it is externally (and internally?) definite, and it is stable physically. The limits within which it exists as a chair and
Firstly, though, answering the questions of ontology, determining the categories of being with Marxist, materialist intent can help form a Marxist ontology. One must first chose an area of discourse to situate the ontological discussion. Let us choose the chair I have been sitting to write this essay: -Q: What exists and what is it? -A: A chair, this is its essence, this is its built function, it can be sensed physically and empirically and with scientific analysis. It shares properties with other chairs in that, it is mainly used to sit in and has a surface for the human buttocks 25
no other object are its distinctive back and arms, its seat that is crafted for the shape of the human buttocks etc. These qualities are inseparable from the notion of the object, without them it would cease to be a chair.
existence intransitively/independently of the mind but with materialist analysis and empirical observation one must conclude that it does exist independently of the mind, even if there is an element of social construction implicit in one’s experience of the chair, that space and the chair’s relation to it.
-Q: How much is it? -A: It is singular in so much as there is only one of this specific chair, however there are many surrounding it which, although they will most likely have minuscule differences due to their different lives and uses, empirically, for me bare no difference as they were produced to be identical. This does not mean that all these chairs are one because one can empirically observe the relationship and relation (-they are all sat on the floor) between them in physical space. In terms of how it can be quantified, it can be measured and is finite. Its quantity is expressed in its formal relationships between its parts, those parts’ properties and its obviously specific numbers, dimensions, elements, etc. These exact, finite measurements of quantity predate its “howness” and quality in the same way that knowledge of exact numbers and what they are/represent predates the qualitative act of counting. (Spirkin, A. Quality and Quantity 2015
This is a somewhat simplistic example of a Marxist ontological analysis as physical objects are rarely denied as having existence in ontology. Applying this logic and these questions to a social or economic relationship for example would prove harder and more philosophically, socioeconomically valuable. However, Hegel noted the totality of knowledge and considered all such investigations of almost equal importance. On ontology and material existence, Marx wrote:
“In direct contrast to German philosophy, which descends from heaven to earth, here we ascend from earth to heaven. That is to say, we do not set out from what men say, imagine, conceive, nor from men as narrated, thought of, imagined, conceived, in order to arrive at men in the flesh. We set out from real, active men, and on the basis of their real life process we demonstrate the development of the ideological reflexes and echoes of this life process. The phantoms formed in the human brain are also, necessarily, sublimates of their material life process, which is empirically verifiable and bound to material premises. Morality, religion, metaphysics, all the rest of ideology and their corresponding forms of consciousness, thus no longer retain the semblance of independence. They have no history, no development; but men, developing their material production and their material intercourse, alter, along with this, their real existence, their thinking, and the products of their thinking. Life is not determined by consciousness, but consciousness by life.”
available at: https://www.marxists.org/refernce/archive /spirkin/works/dialecticalmaterialism/ch02-s09.html date accessed: 16.12.2015.) -Q: Where is it? -A: It is in a specific college, in a specific town, in a specific county, in a specific country on a specific continent. A place with a series of historical reasons for its existence and a place of complex labour relations and power structures. The chair is a distinct part of this environment and plays a certain role in it, physically, educationally, socially, economically and in a hegemonic sense. It is difficult to judge whether the space and time that the chair occupies (and thus I occupy) is in 26
Marx, K. Engels, F. 1846 The German Ideology UK: Lawrence & Wishart
2. This second chair I have made is beautiful but uncomfortable
Hegelian dialectical approach to the chair:
3. This third and final chair I have made looks pretty good and is comfortable.
1.Thesis 2.Antithesis 3. Synthesis 1. Abstract 2.Negative 3. Concrete
Marxist Analysis of Reality and Existence
1.The chair is universally absolute in existence.’
The work of Roy Bhaskar is the main origin of critical realism and the work finds its origin in tern in the ontological polemics of modern Marxism. Thus Marxist critical realism holds a dualist perspective of reality, making a distinction between intransitive reality existing independently of human minds (in the not particularly materialist sense) and the socially constructed reality (materially generated by the relations of production). Alex Callinicos, of the CC of the SWP did work with Bhaskar on critical realism, calling for a Marxist critical realist ontology.
2. ‘The chair is merely a non-existent, cognitive construct.’ 3.‘The chair can be empirically observed as existent.’ Hegelian dialectical approach in art creation 1. Abstract-thesis: ‘This is object is beautiful thus I shall recreate it artistically.’ 2. Negative-antithesis: ‘Beauty is completely abstract, a social as well as cognitive construct, consisting of nothing more than a series of visual relations: it does not ontologically exist in the nominalist sense, its properties cannot materially be known, thus it is completely void so there is nothing to be gained from recreating it or capturing it or visually discussing it.’
(Marsh, D. Theory and Methods in Political Science 2002 UK: Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.) With reality Marx builds on Hegelian analysis, replacing his somewhat liberal atomism with organicism, holism and essentialism. Also replacing Hegel’s idealist view of history with historical materialism, with history moving in stages guided by the modes of production and the idea that dialectical change proceeds through the thing itself. Marxist and Hegelian ontological analysis thus cannot look at an object in isolation, but see it as firstly something as a part of a larger natural, economic or social structure, and secondly as something which has a historic line of development which leads to its being. In the movement of time, whereby each epoch of a new mode of production, brings about the materialisation of a higher consciousness of freedom in man, this law of history is
3. Concrete-synthesis: ‘Recreation is useless as the object already exists, instead it must be reinvented, perfected, rediscovered in order to discuss its attributed beauty, I must give reasons which might make it subjectively ‘beautiful’ and deconstruct its material, socioeconomic function or origin.’ In an aesthetic/design approach: 1. This chair is horribly ugly.
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not freestanding but is reliant upon the passions and needs of man to drive it. Meikle, S. 1985 Essentialism in the Thought of Karl Marx USA: Open Court Publishing Company.
implicated social relations. But what is trying to arise, liberty (socialist liberty) inherently negates everything before it, and everything that exists currently, which negated what was before that. No possible human institution or relationship can embody pure freedom as the bourgeoisie has stolen freedom, but when they took it, it was not pure. Any freedom that exists is sullied by centuries of class society. The relations springing from capital cannot materially accommodate pure liberty. Thus all of reality is presently caught between abstraction and concrete completion of any ideal –capitalism is not complete in its ideal because of its inbuilt proletarian contradiction, socialism is not complete because of the existence of capital. Everything that is actual or in existence is in a situation of contradiction, liminality, conflict and constant flux, it is both itself and its opposite. What is needed is for the conflict and antithesis to be escalated to a point of change, where, in Hegelian terms, the quantity changes the quality of existence and the negation is fully negated to create a socialist synthesis.
Man’s reality is not only conditioned by these societal forces but by nature, but nature progresses in a simpler manner – from germination to the full being and back to the seed, because of the creative, imaginative and self-identified nature of man, human history is more complex. (Meikle, S. 1985 Essentialism in the Thought of Karl Marx USA: Open Court Publishing Company.) Thus there is duality with socially produced and intransitive reality and again with natural (which humankind is conjoined with) and historical reality. This is part of Hegelian and Marxist contradiction; in any historical stage there is a contradiction between the thesis (what is) and what is about to be (the synthesis). A Hegelian dialectic analysis of capitalist reality is highly relevant here: what exists is an abstraction, an imperfection and that which is hostile to its own potential. Capitalism and all the current historic modes of being hold the potential, which capitalism built, for socialism and the
Mataio the Marxist
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The Creative Arts Here at Teenage Democracy, we love to see people enjoy reading, listening to music, watching films and TV programmes. Heck we even like to see people playing video games. This is why we’ve compiled a list of exciting books, songs, films and TV we recommend you explore. BOOKS The Establishment: And how they get away with it
MUSIC American Idiot
Owen Jones
Green Day
Alexander: God of War Christian Cameron
Two Minutes to Midnight
The Politics Book
Iron Maiden Formation
Paul Kelly The Kite Runner
FILM The Hateful Eight Pride
TV Deutschland 83 (German with Subtitles) Battlestar Galactica
VIDEO GAMES The Witcher III
The Banner Saga
The Martian
War and Peace
Democracy 3
Selma
Spin
Fallout 4
Khaled Hosseini
Beyoncé Floral Shoppe (album)
The Women’s Room
Macintosh Plus Fafa
The Help
Vieux Farka Touré You’re the Voice
Call the Midwife
Mount & Blade: Warband
Pulp Fiction
Making of a Murderer
Bioshock (the original)
Marilyn French Literature and Revolution
(French with subtitles)
Leon Trotsky The Female Eunuch Germaine Greer
John Farnham Dark Side La Haine Orange is the of the Moon New Black (album) (French with Pink Floyd subtitles)
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Civilization V
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CLOTHES MUST BE WASHED WITH NO HOLES OR STAINS TO H50 DURING LUNCHTIME OF MARCH 7TH, 8TH AND 9TH IN AID OF KOS KINDNESS: VISIT: http://wearewinchester.co.uk/kos-kindness/ 31