Before he deletes it and tries to pretend he never said it, here's a screenshot
The deeds and misdeeds of Tim Coates, bookseller turned self-styled library campaigner
The deeds and misdeeds of Tim Coates, bookseller turned self-styled library campaigner
Before he deletes it and tries to pretend he never said it, here's a screenshot
Maybe he had in mind John Pateman (Hackney, Merton, Lincolnshire, Lambeth)? "My view is that the US and UK are not liberal democracies – they are Selfish Capitalist states (what D’Angelo calls postmodern consumer capitalism). They are also one party states – it doesn’t matter if you vote Republican or Democrat, Conservative or Labour, you are voting for a capitalist party which does not seek to change the capitalist system. As Ken Livingston (Mayor off London) once ‘If voting ever changed anything, they would abolish it.’ Voting does not make any difference, but it gives the illusion of choice and control. Many people are now seeing past that illusion and refusing to vote.
ReplyDeleteBy supporting democracy and civil education, Public Libraries are supporting capitalism. Education and Public Libraries were invented by capitalists (such as Andrew Carnegie) to take the pressure out of the capitalist system, to prevent revolution. Capitalism has survived so long because it is able to accommodate and reform itself to prevent social unrest and revolt." from review of Barbarians at the Gates of the Public Library on Information for Social Change web site.
Maybe he had in mind John Pateman (Hackney, Merton, Lincolnshire, Lambeth)? "My view is that the US and UK are not liberal democracies – they are Selfish Capitalist states (what D’Angelo calls postmodern consumer capitalism). They are also one party states – it doesn’t matter if you vote Republican or Democrat, Conservative or Labour, you are voting for a capitalist party which does not seek to change the capitalist system. As Ken Livingston (Mayor off London) once ‘If voting ever changed anything, they would abolish it.’ Voting does not make any difference, but it gives the illusion of choice and control. Many people are now seeing past that illusion and refusing to vote.
ReplyDeleteBy supporting democracy and civil education, Public Libraries are supporting capitalism. Education and Public Libraries were invented by capitalists (such as Andrew Carnegie) to take the pressure out of the capitalist system, to prevent revolution. Capitalism has survived so long because it is able to accommodate and reform itself to prevent social unrest and revolt." from review of Barbarians at the Gates of the Public Library on Information for Social Change web site.
Maybe he had John Pateman in mind? Ex Merton and Lincolnshire Head of Library Services - coming to a library near you: "My view is that the US and UK are not liberal democracies – they are Selfish Capitalist states (what D’Angelo calls postmodern consumer capitalism). They are also one party states – it doesn’t matter if you vote Republican or Democrat, Conservative or Labour, you are voting for a capitalist party which does not seek to change the capitalist system. As Ken Livingston (Mayor off London) once ‘If voting ever changed anything, they would abolish it.’ Voting does not make any difference, but it gives the illusion of choice and control. Many people are now seeing past that illusion and refusing to vote.
ReplyDeleteBy supporting democracy and civil education, Public Libraries are supporting capitalism. Education and Public Libraries were invented by capitalists (such as Andrew Carnegie) to take the pressure out of the capitalist system, to prevent revolution. Capitalism has survived so long because it is able to accommodate and reform itself to prevent social unrest and revolt. Education and Public Libraries are two prime examples of accommodation and reform. Their overt purpose was social change – to improve the lives of working people. Their real purpose was social control – to control the reading habits of working class people and to ensure they have the skills to perpetuate the capitalist economy" - from a review ofBarbarians at the Gates of the Public Library by Ed D’Angelo on the Information for Social Change web site.
Third time lucky perhaps - let's see if this comment appears:
ReplyDeleteMaybe he had John Pateman in mind? Ex Merton and Lincolnshire Head of Library Services - coming to a library near you: "My view is that the US and UK are not liberal democracies – they are Selfish Capitalist states (what D’Angelo calls postmodern consumer capitalism). They are also one party states – it doesn’t matter if you vote Republican or Democrat, Conservative or Labour, you are voting for a capitalist party which does not seek to change the capitalist system. As Ken Livingston (Mayor off London) once ‘If voting ever changed anything, they would abolish it.’ Voting does not make any difference, but it gives the illusion of choice and control. Many people are now seeing past that illusion and refusing to vote.
By supporting democracy and civil education, Public Libraries are supporting capitalism. Education and Public Libraries were invented by capitalists (such as Andrew Carnegie) to take the pressure out of the capitalist system, to prevent revolution. Capitalism has survived so long because it is able to accommodate and reform itself to prevent social unrest and revolt. Education and Public Libraries are two prime examples of accommodation and reform. Their overt purpose was social change – to improve the lives of working people. Their real purpose was social control – to control the reading habits of working class people and to ensure they have the skills to perpetuate the capitalist economy" - from a review ofBarbarians at the Gates of the Public Library by Ed D’Angelo on the Information for Social Change web site.
Not publishing comments? Surely some mistake...or are you frit JP?
ReplyDeleteDon't know what's going on; had three e-mail notifications of a post, but it hasn't appeared. Are you filling in the captcha?
ReplyDeleteHere's what you said:
ReplyDelete'Maybe he had John Pateman in mind? Ex Merton and Lincolnshire Head of Library Services - coming to a library near you: "My view is that the US and UK are not liberal democracies – they are Selfish Capitalist states (what D’Angelo calls postmodern consumer capitalism). They are also one party states – it doesn’t matter if you vote Republican or Democrat, Conservative or Labour, you are voting for a capitalist party which does not seek to change the capitalist system. As Ken Livingston (Mayor off London) once ‘If voting ever changed anything, they would abolish it.’ Voting does not make any difference, but it gives the illusion of choice and control. Many people are now seeing past that illusion and refusing to vote.
By supporting democracy and civil education, Public Libraries are supporting capitalism. Education and Public Libraries were invented by capitalists (such as Andrew Carnegie) to take the pressure out of the capitalist system, to prevent revolution. Capitalism has survived so long because it is able to accommodate and reform itself to prevent social unrest and revolt. Education and Public Libraries are two prime examples of accommodation and reform. Their overt purpose was social change – to improve the lives of working people. Their real purpose was social control – to control the reading habits of working class people and to ensure they have the skills to perpetuate the capitalist economy" - from a review ofBarbarians at the Gates of the Public Library by Ed D’Angelo on the Information for Social Change web site.'
But Pateman is an anarchist, as any careful reading of the above would show; you will have to try harder.
Where to start? Comrade Pateman offers the worst, the most philistinic, mechanistic analysis of nineteenth century history. Marx was far more subtle. Even Pateman's chronology is wrong.
ReplyDeleteCapitalism does not 'reform itself'. It is incapable of reform. Such reforms as public libraries, or eduction, were won through bitter and protracted struggle.
Pateman revives the Trotskyite notion (though it was too banal and crude for even many of those politically benighted sects) that illiteracy and ignorance are revolutionary.
Finally he attributes to Ken Livingstone an old anarchist slogan. Neither Marx nor Lenin ever saw elections in such crassly simplistic terms.
I suggest comrade Pateman might usefully read some of their works, as might anyone else who thinks he can be described as a communist.
Also worth your website picking up on the fact that Coates has taken an anonymous comment left on his blog and elevated it to the status of article - the comment alleges that public librarians have enriched themselves at the expense of the public library sector. You would imagine that such an accusation would come with evidence. Sadly not. Innuendo rules at the Good Library Blog.
ReplyDeleteI wonder if P Miles has any comments to make on the ethics of the GLB, which he or she spends so much time defending.
Some of us are getting sick and tired of this attack on our integrity.
I will try harder as requested.
ReplyDeleteThe Morning Star is a daily paper published by The People's Press Printing Society, a co-operative established by the Communist Party in 1945 to enable the Daily Worker (as the paper was then known) to broaden its base of ownership and support.
In June 2002 Merton Library and Heritage Service (Head of Service John Pateman) had 10 vacancies to fill: two of the positions were for Library and Service Managers, one was for a Site Manager, five were for Library Officers (one part-time) and two were for part-time Library Assistants.
One might think that the 24,700 (ABC certified 2002) members of CILIP would read about the professional vacancies in their monthly magazine and the 69,000 local residents interested in local employment would see the Library Assistant jobs advertised in the Wimbledon Guardian free newspapers.
You would be mistaken. The only external advertisement was the full-page one which appeared on Saturday June 8th 2002 in the Morning Star.
In 2002 the www.electoralcommission.gov.uk website listed a Mr John Pateman as the Second Officer of the Bexley and Bromley unit of the Communist Party of Britain (Register of Political Parties).
An official investigation was conducted after a whistleblower complained that 'placing the only external advertisement for the ten library positions in the Morning Star could be construed simply as a contribution of Council money to the upkeep of a minority political organisation – with no rational justification on the basis of cost/benefit.'
As reported on the Merton website (Analysis of Whistleblowing Allegations since July 2000):
Date 24/07/02
Allegation: a) That a senior officer placed adverts for staff in political publications
b) That the above action represented poor value for money
Findings: a) Advertisements were placed in an inappropriate publications
b) Allegation founded
Action Taken Revised code of good practice; Management Action taken
P Miles, your defence of Coates's ludicrous and laughable statement that there is a problem with public librarians being communist is to point out that one librarian put an advert in the Morning Star 9 years ago?
ReplyDeleteTell me, did you write the Zinoviev letter for the Daily Mail?
CoatesWatch/Anonymous (spot the difference!): I was not defending any statement - simply directing your attention to one high ranking communist public librarian. Isn't that what you were doubting in your original post? All facts in the public domain - no forgeries. Council tax payers in Merton were not pleased to discover money being spent on placing an advert (the ONLY advert) in a communist newspaper. Neither were the Standards Committee.
ReplyDeleteNo, Miles, or shall we call you P, unlike other blogs we could mention we have no need to falsify. CoatesWatch is us, anonymous was someone else who wanted to comment.
ReplyDeleteWe do wonder. Why this witch hunt, at this particular moment? Libraries and librarians have always stood for intellectual freedom. Clearly in bookselling there is a less liberal culture.
One is not 'many'; and if John Pateman's political affiliations are easy to find out, they are hardly hidden.
ReplyDeleteLast year Bob Usherwood debated with John Pateman, presenting quite a different view, politically and professionally. As one Communist makes many Communist, does one Usherwood make manu Usherwoods?
So, P Miles, what political position do you adhere to? how did you vote in the last general election?
ReplyDeleteIf it's relevant to be able to judge librarians, then it should be relevant to judge those who criticise public librarians. So 'fess up.
Perhaps you're on the un-intellectual knee jerk, populist and ill informed Tory right like Perkins the cat who proves this by his peaens of praise for the the portly Pickles.
"CoatesWatch is us, anonymous was someone else who wanted to comment." Sorry...I forgot that the anonymous CoatesWatch is/are following in the brave footsteps of other non-anonymous satirists such as Swift, Orwell, Viz LOL! You are silly!
ReplyDelete"We do wonder. Why this witch hunt, at this particular moment?" What? Do you not recognise hypocrisy? Isn't CoatesWatch itself a witch hunt? An exercise in self-indulgent secretive smugness?
I have no quarrels with Pateman's political position - simply putting on record the existance of one prominent Communist public librarian. Which, again, was the point of CoatesWatch's original juvenile post.