>>35
I can't think of a single org in my country worth piss (UK) the youth wing of the CPB the YCL has some solid people, but ultimately they will al get funnelled into the CPB which is completely ossified and total trash, recently tweeting about how Keir Starmer will be a victory for the working class. They do however have some presence in the trade union movement.
On the other hand, you have CPGB-ML which is more or less a collection of mal adjusted nerds from school who have the right positions on most things but the social skills and community building prowess of an XL bully gone rogue in a playground
Then there are various lib left/trot orgs of the sort I imagine you are all accustomed to, but there is honestly so many I couldn't even name. All of them tiny and ineffective,remnants and rags of SWP splits on splits.
For those who don't know, the SWP was a fairly sizeable trot movement that had prominence in the late 70s through early 2000s, but ultimately came to fuck all. They were actually quite based and did a fair amount of good shit, inarguably the most successful explicitly communist movement post war Britain has seen.
That said, the legacy is a million micro orgs, each with a handful of aging grey haired men with fairly backward social politics and a safe career in the trade union bureaucracy.
I would love to get into detail about the effect that relationship has on the british left. Maybe I'll have a stab.
Basically what happens is you get involved in orgs, these guys, using their in built clout and knowledge of their position in 50 years of labour struggle, combined with usually a kind of over bearing personality, which is sort of half earned at the same time, first impress younger members, and then draw them in to the disfunction of the machine.
The youth will come up will ideas, they will have a million and one reasons why actually, doing just what we have been doing for years is the correct way, despite years of failure and mediocrity. The fault is never with them or what they've done, they always have some anecdote from days of yore to draw on, if not some quote from lenin/trotsky etc. They tend towards softer anti imperialism or outright imperial collaboration.
Now that said, these guys are often basically the only guys holding the torch for a more militant trade union approach within the unions themselves, but that is basically what is is, holding a torch, make sure the embers don't got out. You feel for them, but on the other hand, you hate them.
Around them social networks and career pipelines are created, and the whole thing sustains itself in this way, the upstart youth willing to play the game to get into their good books, become the new set of organisers on a comfortable enough salary they can coast on, while still feeling good about themselves, they become old and then they've the same self serving positions. The whole thing lacks any energy or even really care.
I'll post about my positive org experiences maybe later tonight
