I can't fleep in my bed fometimes for him. What do you come back for, friend? As I was going out. Sir, the poll came to the door, and brought this letter. Let me fee it The gypfies have got hold of him! I may do as I pleafe! I'll read my letter, and think no more about him. I'm glad of it'-a villain of a fellow! I met my mailer on the way. Sir ;— our cares are over: He muft be put under a proper regimen dl- reftly. Sir — He arrived at my houfe within thefc teo minutes ; but in fuch a trim — He's now below lairs— I judged it proper to leave him there till I had prepared you for his reception..
Nothing fo eafily accounted for: I caught the rafcal my- fclf reading that nonfenfical play of HambUty where the prince is keeping company with llroUers and vagabonds: A fine example, Mr Gargle! His diforder is of the malignant kind, and my daughter has taken the infection from him — Blefs my heart! O, is that the faft you mean? But I have done for my young madam: Look ye, friend Gargle, I'll never fee the vil- lain's face: Lenitives, Mr Wingate- — lenitives are proper- efl at prefent: His habit requires gentle alteratives: Where is the fcoundrel?
Dear Sir, moderate your anger, and don't ufe fuch harfli language. Dear Sir, he may ftill do very well ; the boy has very good fentiments. Sir — Why, for a long time paft, he could not converfe in the language of com- mon fenfe. Afk him but a trivial queftion, and he'd give fome cramp anfwer out of fome of his plays that had been running in his head ; and fo there's no under- Handing a word he fays. And then, Sir, I have found out that he went three times a-wetk to a fpouting-clnb. A fpouting-club, friend Gargle! A meeting of 'prentices and clerks, and giddy young men, intoxicated with plays ; and fo they meet in pubhc-houfes to aA fpecches ; there they all ncglc6t bufinefs, dcfpife the advice of their friends, and think of nothing but to become aAors.
You don't fay fo! Duck J I damn your ducki. Who's below I he re? Don't plague me fo, man. But I ftiall alter the morbid ftate of the juices, correal his blood, and produce laudable chyle. Dear Sir, be a little cool Inflammatories may be dangerous. Sir, moderate your paf- lions. Now, my good father, what's the matter? You have had your frolic? Do you think I mufl fall in love with your face, becaufe I am your father?
Nothing to fay for yourfelf? What an old prig it is! Mind me, friend — T have found you out 1 fee you'll never ccme to good. Wounds, you'll not have an eye in your head in a month — ha! Look ye, young man — take notice of what I fay: Pretty well that ; — ingenious, faith!
Can you tell how much is five eighths of three Jixteenths of a pound? Mind the fcoundrel now. Do, Mr Wingate, let me fpeak to him — foftly, foftly — I'll touch him gently. Come, come, young man, lay afide this fulky humour, and fpeak as becomes a fon. X O Jephtha, judge of Ifrael, what a treafure hadft thou!
Win, What does the fellow fay? He relents, Sir - Come, come, young man, he'll forgive. Well faid, lad, well faid — mind me, friend: Commanding our own paflions, and artfully taking ad- vatitagc of other people's, is the furc road to wxalth — Death and fire! Tis my regard for you makes me fpcak ; and if I tell you you're a fcoundrel, 'tis for your good. If you want any thing, you ihall hi. What a ridiculous numfkuU you are now? X Elfe wherefore breathe Zookers, you blockhead, you'd better ftick to your bufmefs, than turn buf! I Ihall, Sir Vol. Ay, Cocker's arithmetic Study figures, and they'll carry you through the world — Dick.
Yes, Sir, [Jiiflitig a laugk. Ay, Sir, you know the world — the young man will do very well 1 wifli he were out of his time ; he iliall then have my daughter Win. Yes; but I'll touch the cafh— he flian't finger It during my life. DicL t Who call'd on Achmet? What's the mattei- now? Does the fellow call me names? What makes the blockhead ftand in fuch confufion? That BarbarolTa ihould fufpedt my trufh! The fellow's flark Itaring mad Get out of the room, you villain, get out of the room. I'm very peremptory, friend Gargle: Friend Gargle, your feryant. Mr Wingate, a good evening to you — You'll fend him home to his bulinefs — Win.
He fhall follow you home direclly. Five eighths of three fixteenths of a pound! Enter Dick and Simon. Lord love ye, mafter I'm fo glad yoi':: Dick, f I have done the deed — Didil thou not hear a noife? I will, I will ; but firft help hie on with this coat. Hark yf, Simon, — when I am playing fome deep tragedy, and f cleave the general ear with horrid fpeech, you muft ftand between the fcenes, and cry bit- terly, i Teacket him.
I am gone to ferve you, mailer. But a teller, Sir. Mailer Matthew — let's fee it. You have had fitteeo fixpences now— — Dick. I dott't doubt that, Mafter — but mum. It wilL be much better to 1 ip in capitals. The part of R-. I will enjoy it, though but in fancy But what's- o'clock? Pflia I you blockhead, doa't you know that Fm in chains? That is not the rule I mean: Come, gentlemen, let us have no qUaiTcls. That will be rare. What doll leer at, mon? Here, here, I'll lend you a helping hand. Rofeucrofs — Gentlemen, I rejoice to fee ye — But come, the news, the news of the town!
You play'd at Briilol ; let's hear. Ay, let's have it, dear Dick. Menu Nay, nay, but how was you receiv'd? Romeo was my part 1 touch'd their fouls for 'em — Every pale face from the wells was there ; and fo on I went — But rot 'em, never mind them — f What bloody fcene has Rofcius now to aft? Several things — But, Genius, why did you. Why, 1 intended it: But who fliould I meet in my way but friend Catcall, a devilifh good critic?
Can you tell, now, whether the emphafis fliould. Ever, while you live, lay your emphafis upon the epitaph. Dick, jl Arrah, my dear Coufm Macfhane, won't yoa put a remembrance upon me? Nay, prithee, no offence — I hope we ihalj be. What do you intend to appear in? I ihall certainly laugh in the ftrllow's face. What, with that impediment. I do not leefp— do i? I'll give you a fpecimen of Mockbccth. Make hafte, theji, and I'll begin Othollo — Scotch.
With all my heart ; though I ftiould have bodp der'd 'em finely if they had liaid.
Nepal: The Martyrs Road. - Indymedia Ireland
What in the name of wonder are they all at? Prithee don't diftnrb the peace — A Man. Enter IVatchtMsn-from all parti, fonti drutik, Jbv: Here are the diilurbers of the peace I charge 'cm all — Diclt. Dick, f I have it ; it will do ; Egad I'll make. Enter Dick, ivitb a iunthorn and a ladder. Butfoft, — what light breaks through yon- der window? The fame, my love, if it not thee difpleafe. No, no, not fo faft — Charlotte — let us ad the jrarden-fcene firft Char. A fiddleftick for the garden-fcene— — Dick. Nay, then I'll aft Ranger — Up I go, neck or nothing. Well, but I tell you I would not give a far- thing for it without the ladder ; and fo, up 1 go.
Enter Simon at the door. Prithee be quiet, Simon 1 am afcending the high top-gallant of my joy Situ.
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An't pleafe you, matter, my young miftrefs may come through the hop 1 am going to fweep it out, and fhe may efcape that way faft enow Char. No, no, but that v. Lord love him, how comical he is! Dick, f Cuckold him, Ma'am, bv. IVatchman behind the Janes. Pafl fix o'clock, and a cloudy morning. Dear heart, don't let us ftand fooling here— As I live and breathe, we ftiall both be taken — Do, for Heaven's fake, let us make our efcape. Pall fix o'clock, a cloudy morning' ' Char. It comes nearer and nearer ; let us make off'— Dick. Give us your hand then— my pretty little ad- venturer, I attend you.
Heav'ns blefs the couple of 'cm But mum. Enter Bailiff and his FollCiVer. That's he yonder, as fure as you're alive Ay, it is — and he has been about feme mifchief here. Paft fix o'clock, and a cloudy morning-— Hey-day! I hope you an't robb'd, Mafter Gargle? As I was going my rounds, 1 found your window open. I fear this is fome of that young dog's tricks — Take away the ladder ; I mull inquire into all this — lExit. Enter Simon like Scrub. What's the matter with the fellow!
Spare all I have, and take my life — Watch. Any mifchief in the houfe? They broke in with fire and fword — they'll be liere this minute— five and forty. What, are there thieves in the houfe? With fword and piftol, Sir — five and forty. What's the fel- low in fuch a fright for? Get up, you fool, get up— —Dear heart, I'm all in a fermentation. This may be worth looking after. I'll fix y eye on him Other people's foil ; eftate tije man that knows how to make hi O — no wonder — My daughter, my daughter! Oh dear heart, dear heart!
Fallen out of the window! Here, I found the book — coi: Oh dear, Sir, 'v. A melancholy cafe indeed, to be fo ignorant — Vv";;y il. One fifth of ,",c lixtcenth, what part have I of the whole? Loft beyond redemption Win. Zookcrs, be quiet, man, you put me out Seven times fevcn is forty-nine, and fix times twelve is vcnty-two, — and — and — and — a — Here, friend Gar- u', take the book, and give it that fcoundrel of a fel-. Lord, Sir, he's returned to his tricks. Returned to liis tricks! Carried off your daughter! How did the rafcal contrive that? And fuppofe he does fhe's a woman, an't fiie?
Dear Sir, how can you talk thus to a man di- itrafted? I'll never fee the "fellow's iace. What, are you in the fecret, friend? You won't fpeak, firrah! Yes, Sir — faw him to be fare. Like an ouzel — Wounds! I'll tell you what, friend Gargle — I'll think no more of the fellow — let bira bite the bridle — I'll go mind my bufmefs,?
Good now, Mr Wingate, don't leave me in this affliflion — Confider, when the animal-fpirits are pro- perly employed, the whole fyftem's exhilarated, a pro- per circulation in the fmaller du6ls or capillary veflels — JViv. Look ye there now — the fellow's at his ducks agains ha, ha! Who are you, pray? Yfs Who wants him? Here's a letter for you. Let me fee it, Gargl. I have done with him Xct him flay till the fhoe pinches ; a crack-brained num- feull!
Sir, I fancy the gentleman is a little befide himfelf — He took hold mi me here by the collar, and called me villain f , and bid me prove his wife a whore Lord help him, I neverfee'd the gen- tleman's fpoufe in my born-days before. Is ihe with him now? Ith him all in tears. My daughter, to be fure — Win. Let the fdlow go and be hang'd Wounds! I would not go the length of my arm to fave the villain from the gallows. Where was he, friend, when he gave you this letter? I fancy, Mailer, the gentleman's under trou- bles 1 brought it from a fpunging-houfe. Yes, Sir, in Gray's-Inn Lane.
Let hisi lie there ; let him lie there — I am glad of it - Gar. No, not I ; let him flay there — This it is to have a genius — Ha, ha! Yes, Sir; — 'tis in Gray's-Lan Lane. X Now, thank heav'n, I'm not worth a groat. Then there's no credit here, I can tell you that You mull get bail, or go to Newgale Who do you think is to pay houfe-rent for you: Mi'q Loiife — You fliall go to quoJ.
COMMENTS (239)
Nay, but my tlear angel — Rnter Wingatc and Gargle. Only mind the villain. O thou foft fleeting form of Lindaraira! You lie, you villain, you fhan't be happy. Dick, [on the ground. So, my young madam — I have found you again. I'll break every bone in your body — [Strikes. II Parents have flinty hearts ; no tears can move 'em: A fcoundrel, to rob your father: I made my own fortune ; and I'll take a boy out of the Blue-coat hofpital, and give him all I have — Look ye here, friend Gargle — you know I'm not a hard-hearted man — the fcoundrel, you know, has robb'd me ; fo, d'ye fee, I won't hang him I'll only tranfport the fellow And fo, Mr Catchpole — you may take him to Newgate.
Wljy no, Sir — but your pafTiuns — However, if you will but make the young gentleman ferve out the lall year of his apprenticefhip, you know I fhall be gi- ng over, and 1 may put him into all my practice. Nay, but prithee now have done fpeeches. You fee we are brought to the ;.. You know it was always ray intention. Look ye here, vming man 1 am tlie beft- Baii. The gentleman gave his note at Briilol, I un- der Hands, where he boarded — 'tis but twenty pounds. Well, why don't you fend to your friend Sbakcfptare now to bail you?
No fuch people have been here, Sir — ' ' y ;ufe-keepers? Dick, f You do not come to mock my mifcirits. Hufli, young man, you'll fpoil all — Let mc ak to you — ' How is your digellion? X Throw ph 'fic to the dogs, I'll none of it— Char. Nay, but dear Dick, for rpy fake — IFin. He repents, Sir — he'll reform. That's right lad — now you're right and if you will but ferve out your time, my friend Gargle here will make a man of you. What do you fay, friend? Nay, but prithee now do it in plain Englifh.
Very well, that's right — you may do very well. Sir, when Pve the writ. Well, now I hall fee how much you love me. It fhall be my ftudy to deferve you; — and fince we don't go on the ftage, 'tis fomc comfort that the world's a llage, and all the men and women merely players. Some play the upper, bme the under parts. And moft afliime what's foreign to their hearts: Thus, Life is but a tragic-comic jeft. And all is farce and mummery at bell. Enter Old Gerald and Martin. YOU are refolv'd, Sir, to marry, you fay?
Mar, May I be fo bold, Sir, tO alk the lady's name you intend to make your wife? Mar, Sure, Sir, you're not in cameft! She's not above fifteen ; that match, Sir, would be fitter for your ion. I don't intend that he hall marry yet thcfe feven years. But, Sir, confider well before you marry, that thcfe are qualities will not agree with an old man's con- ilitution. Age is a thing never to be inquir'd into, but when you are buying horfcs.
Not if a man be very rich. Hold your tongue, I fay: This is my own' concern: That I am fure of ; he has promifcd me ; and he's a man of his word. Tliat indeed is fomething. I know he is a little domineering ; but then I know too that Mr dodor is a wife man. He who can cure mad folks, fcorns to be wife-ridden. See, Sir, here is the doAor. Bon jour, Monlicur Girarde, bon jour. Mr doctor, I was coming to fpcak to you- Dec.
Comment vous portez- vous? L'autre main — t'oder hand, t'oder hand. Tint's liot my bufmcfs. No matter for my tongue. Do you fleep a veil? Yes, very well, Sir ; but Doc. How be your flomaque? You digefta veil vat you eat? Yes, very well ; — but will you hear me. Et vous avez — you ave all de oder benefite of nature? Ebien done — may foy! Bon jour, Monfieur, bon jour. Stay, good Sir, ftay. An affair that you know of. Dat I know of! Vat about my daughtere? About my marrying her. Begar 1 had touglit It had been fome bus'nefs of confequeince — ha, ha, ha! And have you bi"oke it to your v;Ife?
No, no ; — I tauka my ftar I ave no do- mellick broil en ma famille ; my vifc fommite to mc in ev'r - ting. Ay, but, if you pleafe, we'll acquaint her with it ; 'tis a formality all mothers may expeft. Attendcz une peu — I vill call her — mais dere is no occafion Bcgar I vill c;dl her to vou. Ger, Well Martin, what fay you now? Enter Doctor atni Wife. Sir, your fervant ; though my liufband's a phy- fician, I am glad to fee you're in good health.
Speak to her Mr doctor, tell her the bufi- nefs. Commenccz vous — fpeaka you firft. No, no ; 'tis pruperer for you.
Nepal: The Martyrs Road.
Non, non — you lall fpeaka much bettrc— eccutez! But you have the authority of a hufband, and may without ceremony open the matter to her. Non, non — commencez vous, je dis ; you be- gin fii-ft, et you fall fee my autoritc if fhe rcfifte. Pray, gentlemen, what's this contefl about, End why was I call'd hither: A foolifli pundilio of honour. Madam; and fjmething — that Mr dcftor has to acquaint you with.
Mon Dieu, quelles fottifes! Yes, Madam ; and upon fuch terms as few parents are difplcas'd with. Hold there, good Mr Gerald. Your ages are moft unfuitable. But your hufband, Madam, has giv'n me his promife. What if he has? But, Mr doftor, a man of honour ought to Itecp his word, and ftand to what he fays. Speak then, have you not promis'd me your daughter? Well, Mr Gerald, promife or not promife, all's one for that. Mais my petite ame! Wife me no wifes, but hold your foolifh pra- ting. If once my wife fhou'd contradift my will, to be fure flie ftiau'd foon fee what fort of metal 1 am made of 1 think my ftars, we have no domeftick broils; my vvife fubmits to me in all things.
Martin fays true ; this leffon you read to us before you call'd your wife, good Mr doftor. He is a lion in private, but yoa faw ht was a lamb in public. I fear you had better take the wife's word than the hufband's ;— 'tis plain he rules the loaft. Attendcz ici une pcu, et you fall hear me fcold her commc le diable! Mar, Well, Sir, what think you now? Sir, your fervant ; I am glad I have found you.
What catife brings you to town? That letter will inform you. This is not my fon's. This is fome roguery of your's, birrah— — Crif. To tell you the plain truth. Vrrite this letter for me. No, 1 have read enough. You diftated this letter to the fcxton, ha J Grifpin? Nothing, that the ftyle is very eloquent. I have not been at the univerfity with my mafter four months for nothing. Has my fon fpent all his money in fo fliort a time? He has been prodigal. He cou'd not help it ; he was forc'd to treat at his firft coming, Sir. Ger Look you do. So far all's well. If J can fcrew a good fum out of him, I do my matter's bufinefs: O, here he comes.
I fent you with my letter to my father j why are you loitering here? Sir, is done effeftually. I met your father here, juft in this place ; gave him your let- ter: Then I made him an eloquent oration,. This melted his hard heart ; made his old eyes twinkle like flames in the bottom of two fockets At laft he bid me come home to him feme half an hour hence — by that time, Sir, the money will be ready But how durft you venture aJsroadby day-light? Gcr, My dear A ngelica! Mr Gerald, I am glad my maid found you: You mock me, Madam.
No ; 'tis too true: Thefc arc propofals few parents will refute. What's to be done? I will acquaint my mother with our love, and try to make her of our party, btay hereabouts ; if I fucceed, Beatrice fiiall give you notice. Do, my dear Angelica ; and fuccefs attend you. Well, Of all your father's follies, this is the woril ; When old men fall in love, they're furely curft.
Anti-water charge protests have been taking place all over the country today The organisers of the protests claim that 20, people took part in the demonstration earlier in Dublin. By Cianan Brennan Saturday 23 Jan , 6: See more articles by Cianan Brennan. Contribute to this story: Please select the reason for reporting this comment. Please select your reason for reporting Please give full details of the problem with the comment Debunking the myth of the squeezed middle Killian Donoghue High earners pay more tax but they also benefit from the fact workers in the service industry get paid low wages, writes Killian Donoghue.
The Irish state is a very bad parent - when its children turn 18 they often end up on the streets Shane Dunphy Sometimes we talk about people ending up as statistics. But there are no statistics compiled for how many children raised in state care become homeless, writes Shane Dunphy. How I Spend My Money: Woman stabbed at 'isolated, unlit' Dublin bus stop. Woman goes on trial accused of murdering her three-year-old son.
Man sentenced to 4 years in prison for sexually assaulting daughter Sentencing adjourned for Patrick Nevin over attacks on two women he met on Tinder. Appeal for witnesses after serious assault in Co Offaly. Local TDs condemn attack on repossessed Roscommon farmhouse, but call for negotiations to keep family in home. As always, the first problem with such myths is that they are based on inaccurate statistics that compare projected population size with actual population size. This method assumes constant population growth, which is far from reality during tumultuous periods in history such as revolution and population displacement.
In reality, the deaths attributed to the Great Leap were mostly due to starvation in the Great Leap's aftermath , when flooding and drought seriously affected over half of China's landmass. Thousands of Soviet technicians who were in China to assist with industrial development left within the period of a month, taking with them their blueprints and stopping supply shipments.
China is going through a major economic boom. Whatever you think of the cultural revolution, education did improve greatly. The Chinese themselves admit this and their current leaders were largely the cultural revolutions enemies. It just takes a little bit of non-aligned study to arrive at this conclusion.
Without apologising for the cultural revolution, its real term effects are not very much appreciated out of sinology circles. Many intelligent but often indulged people were sent to the provinces to engage in farm labour, something which rarely really harms anyone, and despite the official propaganda a cross-poliniation occured. Each piece of repetoire just got renamed.
So he knew as did his possibly effette pals that the music was Mozart, but the kids who learnt it called the same music -"Mozart's 5th song in praise of chairman Mao". This explains the curious titles still to be seen in Beijing music stores for much of the western repetoire. Of course there were elements of the "gulag" about much the cultural revolution, but there were positive elements as well. Oh god, this has degenerated into a "Mao is great, he never killed nobody, he loved children and small animals" discussion. Don't think we'll get much rational discussion from now on, but before the argie-bargie carries on, I'd just like to make a couple of points: This is just for the benefit of "historian", before he works himself into a frenzy about the evil murderous totalitarian Left again.
But I'm inclined to distrust any movement that cites Mao as its main inspiration. Pat C may be right, that the Nepalese Maoists have no intention of carrying out any of the crazy, murderous policies of the Great Helmsman. Still, I wouldn't trust them to be in power on their own.
I see from the article above that they are part of the same organisation as Peru's Sendero Luminoso, who would certainly have carried out a Khmer Rouge-style slaughter if they had ever taken power their behaviour while fighting against the Peruvian government made that clear. I'd want a bit more reassurance about their long-term goals before offering them any kind of support. I'd say this is why most progressive activists outside Nepal have been very wary - having seen the experience of foolish radicals who supported Stalin or Mao in the past, they don't want to make the same mistake.
Still, I wouldn't demonise the Nepalese Maoists either, and I'm willing to be proved wrong if the evidence is there. Whatever else you might say, the revolution against the monarchy this year was a hugely positive development. Maoists denounce UN arms approach The Maoists rigorously defend their right to bear arms. Maoist rebels in Nepal have angrily denounced a government move to ask the UN to monitor the number of weapons held by both sides ahead of elections. They say that the move should not have been made without consulting them. Both sides clinched a landmark power-sharing deal last month after the king abandoned direct rule in April.
Full story at link. Just finished their book and although it is pretty flawed by a pathological hatred of Mao this is not a fair summary of their argument at all. Their argument is that during the GLF the ridiculous claims that were made for agricultural productivity gains were not taken seriously by Mao. Rather such claims were promoted so the state could greatly boost the claim for food it levelled on the countryside. The state needed to greatly raise its demands in order to 1. Curry favour with radical movements elsewhere by providing loans, gifts etc.
They make a big deal of this but I suspect in percentage terms it is more symbolic - the idea of China providing 'aid' to East Germany for instance. Get the foreign currency it needed in order to massively build up the arms industry and in particular China's development of a nuclear weapon. The end result was that in the years of the GLF the state was taking most food from the peasants on the basis of the false claims of bumper harvests.
Hence they say the development of the bomb cost 30 million Chinese lives - their estimate for the deaths due to famine in the GLF period - these extra calories would have saved all of them. You can 'see' the reality of the GLF deaths in the population graph based on official Chinese government figures. The enormous gap is of those who were born between and - famine drastically reduces both fertility and the rate of infant survival.
It is quite weird to see modern day 'maoists' justifying Mao's policy on the grounds that it somehow help the peasantry when in fact the victims of starvation were for the most part peasants rather than city dwellers. Sorry forgot to post the source for the graph. It is from http: But, it certainly provides a useful bogeyman in place of reasoned analysis.
In response to such claims in which the PCP was accused of being, "demented, messianic, blood-thirsty, Pol Pot-ian, dogmatic, sectarian, etc", Chairman Gonzalo was to reply: With respect to the charge that the peasantry is caught between two fires, this is an elaborate invention because it is precisely the peasantry that makes up the majority of the Peoples Guerrilla Army. What must be understood is that the Peruvian state, with its armed forces and repressive apparatus, wants to drown the revolution in blood. This is our understanding, and we would recomend that these gentlemen study a little about warfare in general, revolutionary war, and mainly about people's war and Maoism.
Although I doubt that they would understand it, because to do so requires a certain class stand. The reality was that the killings had been carried out by the MRTA and even though they claimed it, the west was only interested in blackening the Maoists. To be fair, the MRTA may now have repudiated their actions, reactionary and brutal as they were. I just don't know if they did. If the west began ranting about khmer rouge style maoists in Nepal tourism might suffer and revenue would decrease.
Big businness hates communism but it loves money even more. If the current Maoist project were to fail, we can of course expect to hear tales of massacres that, as always, Maoists seem to be able to carry out in retrospect. Actually I was referring to claims made in Wild Swans please don't make me dig them up and quote them.
Although it is a study in self pity and sefishness, it is still worth reading for much of its early commentary. The latest book is so bad that they would never have got a publisher had not the swans book been so popular. It really isn't worth the paper its printed on. What was Halliday thinking? As to the rural question, certainly mistakes were made and because the countryside is always poorer than urban centres, the peasants took the brunt of any disasters. This however, was the last of China's many major famines which should be important in itself. Famines before the Liberation never seem to get mentioned, do they?
Either way, I can't believe you brought a graph to this debate. There is nothing on that BBC link to suggest the Maoists are rigorously defending their right to bear arms. What they are denouncing is not being adequately consulted about the decision to refer the issue of arms to the UN ahead of an election. I think they are just arguing about modalities. Pat was quoting the caption underneath the photo on the BBC article your issue is with them not him.
Good article though, well done Pat C. And I stand by what I said about Sendero Luminoso - while still in opposition, they murdered their opponents on the Left, assassinating trade unionists, radical priests whom they dubbed "clerical fascists" , peasant organisers and other "enemies of the people".
I'm basing this on what I've read from progressive journalists based in Latin America who have no motive for smearing Sendero Luminoso with false claims. The other major Maoist guerrilla force, the Filipino NPA, has been issuing death threats in recent times against left-wing activists who don't follow its line. Whether the Nepalese Maoists are just as bad, I don't feel qualified to say. But the track record of movements that placed Mao on their banner isn't very promising, so caution is advisable.
Oh, and regarding the Khmer Rouge abandoning Maoism - this was a pragmatic adaptation to international politics, one the Great Helsman himself surely would have admired. After all, not only did he align himself with Richard Nixon while the bombing of Indo-China including Cambodia was ongoing, he supported Pinochet's coup in Chile and ordered the Chinese embassy in Santiago to hand over Chilean Maoists to the secret police.
A true hero of progressive humanity! An interesting debate about Mao and China, but let's get back to the main subject - Nepal. Take a look at the different forces in Nepal: The monarchy now represented by King Gyanendra and a few diehard reactionaries. What have these people ever done for the people of Nepal? They lord it around their palaces thinking they are hindu gods, Prince Paras murders Nepali citizens in cold blood and they have never ever done anything for the development of the masses in the countryside.
Now it looks like this force is being sidelined, though with some loyalty from the army it could still come back to the forefront. Again, what have these people done for the people of Nepal? In short, they are mainly the representatives of keeping Nepal a dependent state, in unequal treaties with India which rapes it of its natural resources especially water and timber and keeping the countryside in a state of underdevelopment by hoping for foreign aid and NGO projects which inevitably end in failure or being siphoned off by the bourgeoisie in Kathmandu.
The Nepali people also keenly remember Congress's role in Operation Romeo and Operation Kilo Sera II when they tried to destroy the Maoists but ended up killing and raping numerous innocent civilians and thus making the Maoists more stronger. What have they done for Nepal? Well, there is no bloodbath to talk of. Although 13, have died as a result of the people's war so far the vast majority of these were killed by the state forces not the Maoists.
Instead the countryside has REAL rural development for the first time ever. The Martyrs Road is a very good example of this. Can you imagine living on steep mountainsides where you have never even had a road! At the moment the SPA can be considered progressive because it is generally against the outright reactionary pro-feudalist and pro-imperialist monarchy. This is why New Democracy is uniting the people of Nepal in their struggle. Delve deeper than the bourgeois media does, seek the truth from the facts.
I use statistics myself. The relevance of the PCP is that much learning afround political line and military strategy was gleaned from the PCP war and is now being applied in Nepal. What you say about the khmer rouge is a lie. They never declared themselves to be maoist so therefore had no reason to renounce this ideology. You either knew this or "just heard it somewhere and decided to believe it".
As Mao said, "seek truth from facts", but you just seem to want to defend a corner. This is of course quite normal in cyberspace. The beliefs are so radical because the stakes are so low. Here it is really difficult to get people to go to a protest march in the centre of town, so when people walk for miles to oppose the king and support the maoists, we can safely assume that they are thinking hard about the road they have taken. Maoists denounce UN arms approach? If so, please post an extract and a link.
Mao said it better than I could: Knowledge is a matter of science, and no dishonesty or conceit whatsoever is permissible. What is required is definitely the reverse - honesty and modesty. If you want knowledge, you must take part in the practice of changing reality. If you want to know the taste of a pear, you must change the pear by eating it yourself If you want to know the theory and methods of revolution, you must take part in revolution.
The funniest thing of all is that all you Maoists here would be the first "intellectuals" to be worked to death in the fields, or shot for being able to read. Hilarious to see people actually defending Mao in this day and age. Hey you lot, allow me to introduce you to cuddly ole Uncle Joe. He's great crack, and a hell of an engineer My other uncle Kim is great with the oul fireworks, but d'you know, he spends all his housekeeping on them, and keeps forgetting to get the grub in for his slaves, ooops, I meant "Workers". Careful now, you might commit a thought crime.
Have a quick two minute hate and it'll be alright. It's a load of bollox to say that if you want to know about revolution you have to take part in one. You can learn all you want about revolution to be an innocent victim of it, or in suppressing a revolution. The people are getting fooled again!
James the purpose of posting the graph is that it is a very clear visual indicator that the period of starvation was the period of the GLF and not as had been claimed a couple of years afterwards. Your right of course that there is not so much discussion of the famines that proceeded the maoist period but then it is also true that you don't get fans of the Gunxi clique or the other warlord gangs of that period suggesting they serve as some sort of model for today. As to the GLF being the last famine in China - well yes but this only underlines its root in maoist policy rather than natural disaster.
Anyway if its any comfort to you I acknowledge that the general method mao used of building industry based on super exploitation of the peasantry wasn't that different from that used by Lenin, Trotsky, Stalin and even the US backed regime in South Korea. Nor in proportion to population is the death toll of this method in China greater then it was in the Soviet Union.
On Nepal - I guess it would be possible for the Nepalese maoists to distill some sort of political method from his early writings which are not bad that wouldn't automatically intend to ape his later methodology. But that their supporters in the west are led by people who as we have seen here not only have no problem with mao but still stand over the Shining Path would not fill me with hope on that score. It is easy for you armchair warrior trotskyites and social democrats tapping away furiously on your keyboards commenting on all others who do not fit into your purist forms of untested ideologies.
While professing in your smug self importance that all others are wrong and if only we all just listened to you, the whole world would be perfect. In reality all you lot have shown us from history is that when the communists were fighting and dying in China against the imperialist Japanese army the trotskyites were cosying up to the Japanese trying to do deals and sell out their people.
In Germany when the German Communist Party KPD were struggling and fighting againat the Nazis calling for a united left front surprise, surprise the social democrats were doing deals behind their back, is it any wonder that real revolutionaries would not take you lot seriously. Revolutionary Maoism has been tested from the jungles of Peru to the mountains of Nepal and from the vast expanse of China to the streets of the United States of America.
It has not been found wanting which is more than I can say about you lot, so on a final note I would like to say, I respect the revolutionary Maoists who put their principles into action and go to the ends of the world to bring their ideals to fruition. Ok, having read over the contributions of the various Maoists on this thread, I'm satisfied that we're dealing with deluded fanatics who are willing to excuse any crimes in the name of "revolution".
If the endless piles of corpses generated by their creed aren't enough to make an impact on them, clearly no arguments from me, Joe, Cormac Eile or anyone else will. You might as well try convincing a Christian fundamentalist that human beings evolved from apes. Anyway, back to the original point I made - these deluded cranks are a miniscule minority, the vast majority of people on the Left I've ever met despise Mao.
It remains to be seen how the Nepalese Maoists will develop, whether they can be a liberating force in Nepal or just end up creating a new form of tyranny. As Joe said, you might be able to come up a fairly harmless ideology by taking some of Mao's political writings at face value without trying to imitate the practice of his regime - it wouldn't be my starting-point, but there are a few examples of radical organisations that started off with sympathy for Mao without ending up like Sendero Luminoso the Manifesto group in Italy and the Dutch Socialist Party are two example; the Black Panthers also liked to quote Mao.
It's possible the Nepalese guerrillas could follow the same path, but I don't know enough to say how likely that is. The further they drift away from orthodox Maoism which has always meant hyper-Stalinism the better. Luckily, the peasants in Nepal don't have to listen to these armchair lectures on how foolish they are. For the record, the graph you posted cannot be treated as reliable around the GLF period as there are no reliable figures from that time.
As I pointed out in a previous posting, all information from the time were based on inaccurate statistics that compare projected population size with actual population size. If I am not mistaken the figures that this graph is making reference to were gathered in Szechuan province and projected over the whole country. This was at a time when over half of China's land mass was afflicted with major flooding. There are no reliable figures on population growth for this time either. The fact that the current Chinese regime is ideologically opposed to communism ensures that they have no reason to admit that they "don't really know".
The people in such countries as Nepal and Peru, it is at least acknowledged, are poor and oppressed, but when they resist, they are manipulated by forces that are somehow 'far worse'. This shows the class-bias inherent within much of the western European left, they admit that things are bad, but mutter darkly about how things could get worse if "the mob", that's ordinary people to you and me, should take over, ultimately finding security in the status quo.
Also, just because there are very few Maoists in the western left, that doesn't mean Maoism is not a powerful international force. The Indian Home Minister recently admitted that million people in India live in Maoist controlled areas of the country. Check this for yourself, they call it "The Red Corridor". Because politics is a matter of life and death over there, they probably wouldn't have much time for the Irish left. Is this the normal nature of a debate here on indymedia? A few wild claims, some random insults and then a hissing tantrum declaring the opponants "fanatics". The reality of political struggle is that you have to make mistakes to advance.
This is what we term the, 'Theory-Practice-Theory' approach, the second theory being based on what we have learned from putting the first theory into practice. This is why none of the international Maoist organisations have attempted a three-day sparrow killing policy. Many of the more popular ideologies here in the west don't get beyond the theoretical stage and it is therefore easy to be self-righteous about an idea that has made no mistakes. Theory always looks better than concrete reality and it is not surprising that the hottest vitriole of the theorising left is dumped on the heads of the practicing left.
As Engels pointed out, however, "the working classes are practical men", theory is for students. I'm as little impressed by one lot of European lefties calling another lot of European lefties, 'Europen lefties' as I am with the 'middle class' equivelent in trotskyist circles. That aside James C's For the record, the graph you posted cannot be treated as reliable around the GLF period as there are no reliable figures from that time. It is not based on figures from the period of the GLF but on a survey of the age groups in the population in It shows that in there were far fewer 28,29,30 and 31 year olds in the population than you'd expect.
The only plausable mechanism for this is a starvation induced decline in fertility across most of the population in the years when the missing people were not born. Counting back from this is the period from , exactly the years you would expect if the starvation was due to the policies of the GLF. In the Chinese state was well capable of accurately surveying its own population. As I said, fanatics. No possibility of any kind of discussion with these cranks. This is degenerating into self-parody very quickly "theory is for students", god help us. Here's my "theory" student or otherwise: Millions of avoidable deaths are a bad thing.
Banning opposition parties and sending your opponents to labour camps is a bad thing. I'd imagine there are quite a few peasants in Nepal who would sympathise with this "theory". I'm only going to answer Joe here for obvious reasons. Again you are making the error of assuming that because the population fell around the time of the GLF, that it was due to starvation. This is not automatically the case.
Birthrates fall in times of major upheaval, and, as I have said the natural disasters that afflicted China at the time, not only cause death but also force people to move on. The old imperial system by which the mandarinate monitored the general Chinese population, was only effective so long as people remained where they were. A normal state of affairs in rural areas until a major catastrophe hits.
There is no denying that large numbers of people died during this period, but this was due to the country that the communists had inherited rather than to any of the major changes for the better made after the Liberation. Anyway Joe, kudos for arguing on something concrete rather than the familiar scare tactics we've been getting from other quarters.
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Would you not rather argue ideology rather than numbers? I think once the facts are straightened out a bit we can look at interpretations of the facts. Look at the graph again, the 3 year GLF drop in birth rate is not small, it is massive. In some years it is half the normal birth rate. Particularly in a population of hundreds of millions this means you are dealing with massive, widespread and prolonged starvation, nothing else could have produced such a drop in fertility well short of a King Herod but if Mao played that role we'd have heard about it by now!
Further up you'll see the effect of the much talked of 'one child policy' and it is very, very much smaller then the fertility collapse of the GLF. So in this period when according to offical claims China was awash with food at least half of the population were on the edge of starvation for a prolonged period. The only conclusion is that the production claims of the GLF were not only a lie but that actual food available to the population sharply dropped in that period. In terms of Nepal if maoists today continue to stand over a lie this big what space is there for any discussion of the facts on the ground in Nepal?
Why would I give you the benefit of the dougbt? The best hope would seem to be to hope that the rebels are not very 'good' maoists so that they will kick out the old regime but not carry on with an eqivalent disaster. A population doesn't only go into decline due to starvation. In times of economic hardship, especially during a revolutionary situation, the birth rate goes down due to practices adopted by the population themselves. Regrettably, this is thought to have involved an upsurge in the practice of 'infanticide', euphemistically called "bathing the infant" in China for many centuries.
Essentially it was a time when the peasantry are believed to have avoided childbirth where possible, as a means to staving off hardship in the short term. No one is claiming that there were no deaths during this time, rather, these were not due to executions as was first claimed in the west , nor by mismanagement of the economy. Given that China was emerging from both the Qing Dynasty regime, and a short-lived KMT-fascist regime not to mention the Japanese occupation , it is difficult to swallow the idea that a few socialist policies managed to kick off such a catastrophe.
I think I'm wasting my time as ideology is preventing you accepting the obvious but here goes anyway Dante: But for some reason this practise just lasted for the years of bumper harvets during the GLF? I can see no mechanism for this - did you just make it up to cover you ideology? Mismanagement is a pretty weak term for a policy that seems to have killed between 15m and 30m through starvation. All the more so when the official line was one of bumper harvests. We are talking of a process through which the state took so much food off the peasants that average fertility halved.
Given that China was emerging from both the Qing Dynasty regime, The maoists had won the civil war a decade earlier, whatever happened in the GLF was down to Maoism and not the relics of a historical process. After all the birth rate is much higher both before and after the GLF. Here is how it probably went Under pressure from the party bureaucracy People Collective No1 announces that thanks to the genius of the great Helmsman they have produced tons of grain rather than their usual tons.
In reality they have only produced 90 tons, the GLF commonly caused wastage. Using the false claimed figures the Chinese state says that rather than taking 50 tons of grain this year it will take tons. The peasants should be pleased as in theory this will leave them with twice as much grain.
In reality there is only tonnes so it make up the shortfall the seed stocks and the stores also have to be handed over. Multiply that across China and you see the reasons for the decline in fertility in those years. The key here is to ask if a food policy that starves the peasentry can really be called socialist at all.
Once you take that word out then it all becomes easier to understand as we are all familar with famines during which food continued to be exported because profits mattered more than lives. The degeneration into self-parody continues apace. Then dismiss anyone who questions those bogus arguments as "ignorant", "ill-informed", or a "know-it-all". The current dominance of free-market capitalism all over the world owes a great deal to the disastrous results of so-called "socialist" regimes in Russia, China and Eastern Europe.
If any socialist challenge to capitalism is going to be rebuilt, the radical left has to make it absolutely clear that we detest these brutal, murderous dictatorships and would never dream of repeating their practices, even if we had the opportunity. And that means challenging any self-proclaimed "socialists" who still defend Mao or any other tyrant. Indymedia has a large audience of people who aren't from the radical left. I've no idea how many of them might be following this thread, but I'm certainly not going to let people gather the impression that the Mao-lovers on this thread are in any way representative of those of us who oppose capitalism.
As the slogan goes, not in my name. It's funny how, when you disagree with some people, you are "blinded by ideology". No matter, this thread has about run its course. Joe seems unable to question his bright shiny graph even though it came from the chinese government. Now that china has turned capitalist he seems to deem them trustworthy. These statistics however are also based on figures supplied by the bourgeoisie and revisionists, which were enemies of the Great Leap and so therefore they are quite dubious.
So, if you put aside this hostile piece of evidence that you are so fond of, allow me to reiterate. In reality, the deaths attributed to the Great Leap are mostly due to starvation, particularly from the Great Leap's aftermath , not executions. Flooding and drought seriously affected over half of China's land in that famine. The Soviet Union withdrew its industrial aid in causing a virtual halt in most of China's industry. The Soviet Union had agreed to provide about modern industrial plants but only were completed by Thousands of Soviet technicians who were in China to assist with industrial development left within the period of a month, taking with them their blue-prints and stopping supply shipments.
Mao did claim government responsibility for , executions between and These were popularly sanctioned executions done in people's trials against the most hated landlords and pro-Japanese pro-imperialist elements who had terrorized the masses during World War II and its aftermath. Self-criticism is an important part of Maoism, and Mao himself wrote self-criticisms on some practices of the Great Leap.
Unlike the Soviets, the Chinese admitted when the goals they had set for themselves had been too high, and were unreasonable. It is not surprising that these myths are so actively propagated by capitalist countries, which are far more deserving of the label "butcher. Using the same methods that the bourgeois scholars and media use, in the United States in , 75, Blacks died from having inadequate health care. If the United States were the same size as China, that would mean the death of over , Black people annually!
With a quarter of the world's children, if China hadn't been liberated by Mao and the Chinese Communist Party, that situation would be much worse today. Under Mao and the Chinese Communist Party, the life expectancy of the Chinese people doubled from 35 under the capitalist Kuomintang to It was James Connolly who once said that anarchists of whom Joe is one , are men whose ideology "is but an extreme form of that which we are in revolt against". Hardly surprising therefore that he feels so comfortable with the practitioners of the status quo. Interesting story, but what worries me is the fact that an Irish citizen became part of a conflict, could he be charged with a "War Crime"?
If Mephistopheles provided only these two options, from a strictly healthcare point of view only an idiot or a brainwashed Maoist would choose being mystically transported into the body of a sick average Chinese national rather than a sick black man in America. Even today, people in China are still dying from regular bubonic plague outbreaks black death and WHO estimates that there are 1. There is absolutely no concept of preventative medicine in China aside from what's available in private clinics for the newly rich.
When was the last time there was a bubonic plague outbreak in America where anyone died? You reckon there are substantial numbers of infected untreated Hanson's disease suffers in America? Only in the cloud cuckoo land Maoist upside down utopian universe of your dreams.
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You should probably go visit rural China before you spread this sort of nonsensical shite around Indy again. And for your information in the USA it's the uninsured working poor that are really fecked with respect to access to health care - be they black or white or brown. You probably don't want to hear this but black and white Americans on the dole get better access to health care through Medicaid handouts than privately insured people in Ireland do.
And that's a situation that someone like yourself should get good and wound up about because it's actually within your domain to do something about rather than just talk empty shite about yanks. So much for your relativistic Maoist wet dreams. This debate, what I have read of it, appears to have degraded into some kind of fetishistic worship of a graph. It occurs to me that some people have way to much time on their hands and not enough experience of the outside world. That Tipper fellow really does get rather excited when he is being ignored, doesn't he? Although it does somewhat stick in my throat, speaking up for Maoist leftists, I should like to point out that the above graph is as they have been saying, quite unreliable.
Although the the Great Leap Forward was a Maoist project and consequently it is not surprising that it failed, it has to be acknowledged whether or not we want to believe it, that much of the early population figures were gathered by conducting a census in one province and conflating it over the country. Joe seems unable to accept that there are problems with his early figures or indeed his lovely graph. The graph isn't a lie as the maoists claim, it just isn't accurate and there really aren't any reliable figures from this time. Joe, I noticed, didn't seem too concerned about dismissing the Great Leap figures out of hand even though he obviously made these up off the cuff.
Of course it is a nice graph Joe, and it certainly seems to have non-plussed the maoists, but I'm afraid it cannot be trusted and I think it is more wishful thinking on your part to indignantly proclaim a famine, not to mention all the other niggling little charges that you carelessly cast up that owe more to Orwell than to history. I would have liked to know more about the UML people the interviewee mentioned, and their participation in the latest protests there.
Are there still any maoists on this thread? I believe that maoism was one of the greatest distortions of Marxism-Leninism and it was Deng Xiaoping who took China out of the chaos of the cultural revolution, guiding the country towardds conditions that are more conducive to creating a genuinly proletarianised country. There was a period of malaise under Zhang Zemin, but Hu Jintao is very much a leader in the Dengist mould, efficient yet underlit.