I want to be involved in politics, actually do something rather than just complain about the world online all day.
That is why I joined the CPB but I have been feeling disappointed in my experience so far aside from a few good moments here and there. In retrospect I also should have done more research on them before applying, they have a lot of past controversies and bizarre, arguably reactionary views.
But my other options, aren’t great neither. You’ve got: The Greens which are Eco-Socialists I guess, not exactly M-L’s but they’re doing well at least. Labour are right-wing neoliberals now so they’re completely out of the question. ‘Your Party’ was supposed to be the up and coming democratic socialistic left, pro-Palestine party but mostly fell apart and might remain irrelevant. RedFightback no longer exists since 2023 which from what I can tell were created as the alternative to the other shite out there. The CPGB-ML are from what I can tell are even worse than the CPB.
Am I missing something (like some mystical British M-L communist group which is everything I could dream of but have yet to hear of) or is there really nowhere that makes much sense to join? Is the state of the current communist movement in the UK genuinely this dire? Do I have to ‘do a Hasan Piker’ by joining the Greens and hope to turn their members further left?
Help, I want to actively be involved in building socialism in my country, get organised in my community but have nowhere I can see where I would feel that I truly belong!
Relevant texts on the TERF (Trans exclusionary radical feminists) stuff I have been reading through, the CPB are mentioned in both:
I was in the CPB when I first became a commie. They taught me a lot, I did a lot of canvassing and demonstrating with them. I met a lot of interesting people who helped dispel a lot of the myths I had come to believe about communism. The protests were fucking awesome too. The people I interacted with seemed cool and very serious. But yeah, then I started reading shit that the party actually published and I realised I was propping up a reactionary party. I left…
The last year and a half I’ve been very selfish and have been uninvolved with politics, but when I am back to the UK I do wonder where the fuck I can even go. I have the same issue as you.
Any suggestions on what I should do?
Join Plaid Gomiwnyddol Cymru maybe? They accept members also outside of Wales.
I’m considering it, going to actually look into them thoroughly before I apply (or not) this time. Perhaps learning and communicating in Welsh is the key to revolution as any MI6 agent listening in our plans to allegedly overthrow the bourgeois dictatorship would logically assume we are insane.
edit:
Statement from Plaid Gomiwnyddol Cymru / the Communist Party of Wales & The Welsh Underground Network: “The UK Supreme Court’s ruling of April 16th is a disgraceful assault by the British state upon the dignity, humanity, and rights of trans women by denial of legal recognition and protection.”
Holy shit, an actually reasonable take on trans rights??
Honestly right now no. I’m completely out of the loop. I’ve thought about trying to get involved with something more specific like Palestine action rather than a political party, as they actually seem to do stuff
I’ve been in precisely your position for a good decade now - I want to join a cool commie party and help, but Britain has no sizeable cool commie parties.
I wonder if perhaps there are just small, hopeful, still regional parties out there that would want volunteers to expand and start local chapters?
After reading through the comments of this post and looking into this issue a fair bit, it’s become quite clear to me that the working class of Britain desperately needs better representation. The existing parties - parties above 1000 members - to varying degrees fail, whether by policy or lack of action, to actually represent and fight for the working class.
There is a lot of work to be done, new organisations need to be made and the smaller organisations who are on the right track need to grow. Personally, I wouldn’t even know where to begin, I need to read more theory that’s for sure.
Couldnae agree more, but then a lack of working class representation is kind of built into the system these days.
I should also read more theory. And maybe join/speak to a national union at least. Let us know if you do find a place to begin.
Hi, so I just remembered this comment and thought I’d let you know I’m 99% sure I will be applying to join ‘Plaid Gomiwnyddol Cymru’: https://communists.wales/
Just going to go to one last meeting of CPB this month and then move on. Even though Plaid Gomiwnyddol Cymru are a Welsh focused party they seem to actually be active, serious and not reactionary, potentially a little ultra lefty (I could be wrong, there isn’t much info on them really) but they’re definitely much better than CPB on policy and worth supporting. At least I should get a lot of experience out of them and feel more comfortable without TERF’s and other twats around.
Also worth mentioning that I checked out NCP - New Communist party of Britain: https://www.newworker.org/index.html | and Revolutionary Communist Party of Britain (Marxist-Leninist): https://www.rcpbml.org.uk/ | they’re small but do seem to be an improvement and reasonable alternative to the bigger ones, feel free to check them out. Even if you join, or see something about them and they’re shit, you can cross them off the list of options.
If you stick without a party, I’ve realised that there are so many other organisations which hold events that can still be a ways to bridge across to all sorts of organising and making connections to like-minded people like, as someone else here mentioned, the Cuba Solidarity Campaign for example. We’re still in early days but things are for sure picking up. Best of luck to you.
Ah, wow, thanks for following up on this comrade. These do seem like interesting possibilities, and Plaid Gomiwnyddol Cymru do seem pretty rad and serious. Due to my location I’m not sure there’s much these 'uns can offer me (or vice versa) sadly.
You make a very good point about at least doing other organising, I even saw this week some immigrant solidarity and anti-war marches, so there’s definitely stuff around, gonna take look to those.
Best of luck also comrade. Good research and thanks for following up
This lines up with what I’ve seen from the UK. I wonder what it would take for some of you here to start your own party. I have never done something like that, but if you could connect with each other, you could volunteer with another organization together or simultaneously if you’re in different cities (any generally left organization, really) to learn some practical skills and help you evaluate social conditions while studying and preparing for launching your own org, and hopefully that would be enough for you to be able to approach it in the right way in a couple of years or so. It would take a ton of long-term dedication and discipline, but surely there are at least several people prepared to make the sacrifices necessary.
i think the extreme low level of political education/development in the west means two things:
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most existing large-scale parties are necessarily shit, because no one is developed enough to know how to correctly run a party in the first place, let alone know the correct line on any or most issues. leadership is ossified and crap usually
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if the primary contradiction is low development/education, educating ourselves (individually or in groups when possible) is the most important thing we can do right now. if being an autodidact isn’t possible for any reason, then making that possible is the most important thing instead
scientific socialism will take serious, rigorous study in order to become fully developed cadre. and, ultimately i don’t think any existing party in the west can provide that serious rigorous study, we simply have to do it ourselves. one thing you could consider is reaching out to people you think are as developed as you in the org and starting a private study group yourself.
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Best bet right now is join and be active in your trade unions and local community/hobby groups, with a view to finding like-minded people and making new like-minded people. From there, book clubs etc. can be organised with interested people, and the skeleton of the party form can be constructed. As you may have already found out, not all CPB comrades are reactionary, and it may be worth continuing to work in a limited capacity with them on local issues and in national pressure groups like the Palestine and Cuba solidarity campaign groups, Stop the War coalition and the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament. There’s a lot of space for organising on socialist issues not as a member of a particular party in Britain, which does owe to the considerable effort put in by those same parties that do take reactionary lines. These ‘united front’ style entities exist precisely because the parties want to ensure that on specific issues people can be aligned without needing to agree on absolutely everything else.
Maybe you’re right, I just wouldn’t even know where/how to begin. I’m not great at socialising, organising nor motivating myself individually to do such things.
Really I could do with being trained by someone, which I expected the CPB would at least to some extent do with newer members but they don’t, infact I have brought this up to my branch but have heard nothing back about it. Because they’re shit.
You could start by joining your local Cuba solidarity campaign group online then attending their meetings. That’s a good babysteps easy and concrete thing you could try.
Okay, one step at a time, thanks for the recommendation comrade
If you find nothing you can join prolewiki like all the people who got disillusioned with western Marxism lol. Feel free to request an account
I know this is a late reply but I just read the about CPB on prolewiki, here:
https://en.prolewiki.org/wiki/Communist_Party_(Britain)
If I had read this before I joined them, well, I never would’ve joined! Thanks for recommending me prolewiki 🙂
I have been following this org in the UK and i like their output: https://www.climatevanguard.org/
more education focused though, but maybe they will pivot in the future or you can make some good connections
https://lemmygrad.ml/post/9715841
Welcome to the club.
Me reading that post lmao:
What a mess this country’s communist orgs are, holy shit
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Wait, weren’t CPB already outed to be big labour aristocrats decades ago?
I have a comrade who joined the RCP after going back to the UK. They’re trots but my friend seems to be relatively happy organizing with them despite being an ML themselves. It depends on the chapter I guess, and you will definitely encounter some brainworms but they also seem to be doing decent work in some places at least. Might be worth a try?
So far, as far as I can tell, these are the two parties you’re probably looking for (they also work together and with international orgs):
NCP - https://www.newworker.org/index.html RCPB-ML - https://www.rcpbml.org.uk/
The general rule of the worse the graphic design, the better the politics, appears to hold true.
‘the worse the graphic design, the better’ also holds true for chinese takeaways with their menus haha
I’ll keep both in mind, I was very impressed with the look of Plaid Gomiwnyddol Cymru, which another commenter mentioned, but I’m still not decided yet.
I’m looking into joining both atm :)
The RCP sound interesting but I’m not 100% sure tbh. Alot of their journalism in The Communist is good. https://communist.red/
Trotskyist cut out from the old IMT, or Socialist Appeal as their newspaper was called.
Yes and BTW they rebranded because the old name became unusable after so much abuse and cult tactics made it toxic.
Trotskyist Parties and Cult Leadership
Name a more iconic duo!
Ah yeah not good. Are there any big revolutionary parties/orgs that arent swappies or trotskyists in the UK?
NCP and RCPBML appear to be our best bets.
it’s hard to get a good judge on them though due to a lack of information. I’m going to join Plaid Gomiwnyddol Cymru even though I’m not Welsh as from what I can see they look great and it should be a good learning experience. And perhaps if they get enough non-Welsh members they’ll create a Plaid Gomiwnyddol England/Scotland/Britain of sorts.
what information are you lacking on them? I can see if I can find it :)
Some policy stuff, such as how they view China, whether they are transphobic like many other uk parties and do they offer a good induction scheme.
I’ll try n put something together :)
