[ssf] !7th Feb meet report

[Dave Havard]

Josh Davies wrote:

> nice one on the callout chris!
>  
> i think we should put tht out ASAP
>  
> as for all this talk of sinister left groups wanting to use the social 
> forum to mobilise (which is totally nlike the way that the italian 
> social forums mobilised for genoa isn't it?) well to be honest, so 
> what?  i want the biggest and best protest against the G8 that is 
> possible this year, and i think that the social forum encouraging 
> people to go to it and acting as a SPACE (that holy word which the 
> horizontals use) for people to plan the actions and to NETWORK 
> (another of the porto allegre commandments) so that they can be better 
> organised would be a good thing.
>  
> come june i don't want to be discussing the semaantics behind the word 
> 'mobilise' i want to be taking part in action, who here disagrees with 
> that?
>  
> josh*//*

I don't disagree with the need to mobilise and I quite agree with 
creating a space for people to plan actions and to network. 

Where you threw me into a panic was your talk of rejecting the PGA 
principles.  The reason I joined the Social Forum was that I wanted a 
space to do politics differently from the old party politics.  I was 
horrified by all the conflict surrounding the London ESF where it seems 
to me that people who want to work hierarchically hyjacked what I 
consider to be a non-hierarchical movement.

I am not saying we should not work co-operatively with unions and 
political parties.  I don't believe the PGA guidelines prevent us from 
doing that.  I think they safeguard a space so that it cannot be 
hyjacked by anyone with a specific agenda.

We all want to be taking effective action in June.  What we need are 
structures that will not prevent any group from taking creative action 
but where we can all encourage one another.

That's my two penn'orth !

In peace and solidarity,
D Dave