Schrödinger’s Labour leader | TheCritique Archives
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Labour centrists just cannot help themselves, can they? JK Rowling – she who has gained barely-explicable recognition as one of the world’s ‘great’ authors – last week describedthe current Labour Party as a ‘solipsistic personality cult’. (On that evidence, I am not even completely sure she understands what the word solipsistic means, only adding to my doubts about her status as an author.) Nick Cohen, the Guardian writer singly most unable to distinguish between a fairer world and a world torn apart by all-pervading warfare, added his own clamour of contempt a couple of days later, calling the Labour Party Conference, ‘The cult of St. Jeremy’.
The damned-if-you-do-damned-if-you-don’t quality of trying to please the so-called ‘centre-left’ – really just conservatives with somewhat queasier consciences – is brought most sharply into focus by how bizarrely unaware they seem to be of their own contradictory mindset. For almost two years, their overriding objection to Jeremy Corbyn as Labour leader was that, “He’s unelectable because he doesn’t engage with the electorate.”
Step aside, Schrödinger’s Cat. Step aside, Schrödinger’s immigrant. We now have Schrödinger’s Labour leader. How can someone who does not engage with the electorate draw a large cult-following from the electorate?
Mr Odoni goes on to make the point that those of us on the Left who have been campaigning since before Mr Corbyn’s election as Labour leader for a return to true centre-ground politics (with a mixed economy and working welfare state) have been saying from the moment the critics started spouting their drivel:
The frustration of these contradictory insults is partly because, in truth, very, very few of Corbyn’s supporters see him as an ‘object-of-worship’ as such. They admire him for having the courage to smash the Overton Window of the last forty years and speak again ideas that were considered unthinkable thanks to Margaret Thatcher and Rupert Murdoch, and finally bring Keynesian social democracy back into the mainstream. Yes, there is affection for Corbyn, but for better or worse, it is the ideas he stands for that are important, and not just the man himself. Corbyn, it should be emphasised, is among the first to say that.
Those are the facts, and the likes of Ms Rowling and Mr Cohen can’t change them – no matter how often they try, or how contradictory their efforts.
You can read more facts here: Schrödinger’s Labour leader | TheCritique Archives
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Quite naturally, the politicians most committed to empowering and democratising the political process are the ones vilified as authoritarians, and Corbyn, being about the most unlikely politician in the UK to encourage worship of himself, is accused of establishing a personality cult. Pundits of the right and centre really, really, really, do not like it that empowerment is popular.
Thanks for the reblog!
Solipsism: the theory that only the self exists.
I do believe that J.K.Rowling is the one living in her own little world. Her books have perhaps taken over her mind and she can’t distinguish between reality and the fiction she writes.
The only thing I would thank her for is to introduce language that I need to look up in order to understand, other than that her books are pure fantasy to me, they do say, there is a very fine line between genius and sanity.
No competition to decide which side.
Of course he engages with the electorate! Where was May when Grenfell happened? At least JC tried to comfort some of the victims.
JK Rowling is Not a great Author, OK she sold a lot of books but does Not make her a great author! Do you really think she would have the same opinions if she were still penniless, also that is all they are opinions.
A great author, in my opinion is someone who writes books and articles that make a difference, or at least try to, like for instance Charles Dickens. Rowling’s books are pure fantasy, whereas Dickens are more of a written account of the gritty side of life in his time.
Odd that none of the detractors of JC compare him to the last two real “cult of personality” politicians : Thatcher and her greatest achievement …Blair!
Corbyn’s supporters aren’t a cult or a mob,we’re citizen voters who’ve been ignored by every party for the past 30 years! No wonder we love a man who’ll stand up for what’s right and decent and the fact that we do,even after the Tories/Tory media have vilified him at every opportunity,speaks volumes!
I’d rather be a cult member than a neoliberal flat Earther. Being accused of cult behaviour by the Blair idolators is itself hilarious, anyway. Not to mention stupid, patronising, obvious and laughably failing.