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From Socialist Worker, No. 102, 21 December 1968, p. 1.
Transcribed & marked up by Einde O’ Callaghan for the Encyclopaedia of Trotskyism On-Line (ETOL).
THE EDITOR REPLIES:–
Criticisms aside, David Mercer has written a frank and interesting description of his political development and his role as a playwright, which readers may feel is worthy of discussion and comment.
In view of the seriousness of his reply, it is certainly a pity that our diary in allowing itself a small blast at the Socialist Labour League, should have sprinkled shot on Mr. Mercer.
We were not attacking him or his attitude to writing. Rather, we were criticising the hypocritical attitude of the SLL to what might be called ‘public figures’.
In Mr. Mercer’s case, because he supports the campaign for a daily Newsletter, his name and blow-ups of his picture are featured prominently in SLL publicity for the for the coming paper.
Mr. Mercer, it is known, has political disagreements with the SLL, particularly on the Cuban question.
It is true to say that the SLL is normally tough and uncompromising to marxists who do not accept their entire programme.
Certainly the Cuban question used to be the touchstone for their attitude to other organisations and individual marxists.
But perhaps this attitude does not apply if you are a ‘trendy rebellious figure’ prepared to help push the daily paper. The use of the word ‘trendy’ was deliberate: it is a phrase used by establishment-orientated hacks to turn serious political people into acceptable stereotypes.
Tariq Ali is another ‘trendy rebel’ – a serious, committed revolutionary whom the millionaire and racialist-tainted press have attempted to defuse into a ‘colourful’, eloquent alien.
It is interesting to note the double-valued approach to Mercer and Ali in The Newsletter. The first has political differences with the SLL but supports their daily paper campaign; he is an OK figure.
The latter has political disagreement and does not support the daily paper. He is repeatedly abused in The Newsletter in a completely unmarxist manner as a ‘political playboy’ which represents an unthinking acceptance of the methods of the bourgeois press and its desire to avoid political argument by turning opponents into figures of fun.
Mr. Mercer’s description of the kind of daily paper he would like to see is excellent. We, too, would like to see such a paper, though whether the time is ripe for its publication and whether a small group can carry such a burden are debatable.
Such a paper would clearly have to abandon the ‘vindictive and paranoid sectarianism’ of which The Newsletter and not Socialist Worker (which campaigns for a united revolutionary movement) is guilty. This reply marks only the third reference to the SLL in our paper this year, while The Newsletter – as Mr. Mercer must be aware – devotes space week after week to cheap and vulgar distortions of our policies and ideas.
If The Newsletter feels that our theory and practice need to be combated, then surely the discussion should be based on a clear, principled analysis, not on innuendo and hearsay. We are frequently accused of being anti-marxist and opposed to the building of a revolutionary party, but an honest assessment of our writings would show that such accusations are nonsense.
Opposition to accepting the SLL as the revolutionary party should not be construed as opposition to building a revolutionary party.
The dishonesty goes deep. One member of the International Socialists is alleged to have said in public that Russia is a ‘fascist state’. If this was said, then the comrade was certainly not speaking for IS; nevertheless, The Newsletter now crudely and frequently labels IS as the organisation that ‘says’ Russia is fascist.
In its analysis of the October 27 demonstration, the paper printed a picture of a Maoist tendency, the Revolutionary Students Front, which held a placard opposing Russian and American ‘fascists’. The caption said the placard was carried by the ‘state capitalist’ RSSF. This is political dishonesty of the worst kind.
But sectarianism reached an all-time low in the issue of December 7. It contained a spiteful and dishonest caricature of the politics of Eamonn McCann, the Northern Ireland revolutionary socialist.
The Newsletter chose to attack McCann on the very day that he was appearing in court in Derry on charges arising out of the brutal police suppression of the civil rights march on October 5. There was no mention of this case, no basic solidarity with a socialist under attack by the capitalist state.
Is this, Mr. Mercer, the kind of daily paper you are championing?
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