Tuesday, March 27, 2007

A Reply to Micky "H" --in a VERY personal capacity

Micky H, the infamous anonymous blogger who spends his/her time attacking what they term the "vermin left" ( what he means are good, consistent and combative socialists who will not sell UNISON members and their interests down the river for the Kings shilling unlike some I might mention) has posted another anonymous attack on the Islington branch.
Whilst I am a leading officer of the said branch, I am writing these thoughts at home--at 6.29-- in my capacity as Mikey Calvert, not as Assistant Secretary of Islington UNISON


Micky "the anonymous for fear of retribution" H writes the following:

"The vermin left use this approach quite a lot, as though listing a whole bunch of lefty losers is going to influence anyone other than...other lefty losers. For example, the list of 'supporters' carried on the publicity for the Fighting (and losing) Unions conference held last year. Not much use to anyone other than those drawing up a trot hit-list, I'd imagine.

But what to make of all this 'in a personal capacity' (often abbreviated to 'pc') business? You know - where someone puts their name to a statement and then adds their title in the organisation, and it is followed by the disclaimer 'in a personal capacity'.

A bit like this lot below who have collectivised their personal capacities to hitch themselves to John '22' McDonnell's wagon:

"The following branch officers of Islington UNISON (in a personal capacity) would like to welcome and support your candidacy for Labour Leader and believe your policies and practices reflect not only our branches policy but also UNISON national policy.

Fiona Monkman, Branch Chair
Jane Doolan, Branch Secretary
Andrew Berry, Deputy Branch Secretary
Mike Calvert, Assistant Branch Secretary
Fred LePlat, Vice Chair
Keith Facey, Young Members Officer
Cliffe Obaseki, Black Members Convenor
Pam Woods, Labour Link Officer
Rosemary Plummer, Education and Schools Convenor
Denise Facey, Homes for Islington (ALMO) Convenor"

Clearly they need to state their roles in UNISON as otherwise who the flying ferret would have a clue who they were outside of the heated confines of the membership of UNISON United Lunatics?

And, in a way, that makes my point. They can't say they are doing it in an official capacity as it would be against UNISON's rules. So what do they do? They drag UNISON's name in as a kind of crutch for their identity, abusing our good name to cover their shame with a figleaf of credibility.

How about next time they leave UNISON out of it? They could always list their political parties and/or 'currents' instead.

But then we all know what kind of credibility that would muster!"


Well, Micky, the fact that you use the word credibility in the same breath as signing something anonymously is a little bit rich. Here are a number of points to correct your lies and distortions, written from home as Mikey, not in work time!

1. At least we--the officers named below-- all sign things we believe in, in our own names (whether we use the tagline Personal capacity or not) and will not hide behind pseudonymous anonymity!

2. We do not hide behind misogynistic attacks on female comrades as you do with Marsha-Jane. I am sure that she can defend herself and her own political integrity, but, we do not attack people anonymously! We are NOT snakes in the grass like you!

3. The majority of the people you have listed are not affiliated to any political group whatsoever, other than maybe the Labour Party. There is no secret that I support Workers Action, to my knowledge so does Andrew. I will concede there are not many of us and not much in the way of Action either,but hey ho!

There is no secret that Fred supports the Socialist Resistance current,and no secret that Pam Woods is a supporter of Socialist Appeal.

BUT...

4. Fiona, Jane, Keith Facey, Cliffe Obaseki, Rosemary Plummer, and Denise Facey, are not politically organised. Keith, Denise and Rosemary--I am sure that won't mind this-are salt of the earth working class Islington: not like you, some jumped up middle class interloper claiming that you once made the turn to industry--Fiona is a UUL supporter I(she may have once been in an organised political current but I don't think she is now) and some of the others may have been supported by the UL in Regional elections, but some haven't: so what?

5. Where does your "inside info" come from? It certainly seems like you have access to the UNISON membership lists. As I said before, if you do then naughty naughty! Do you?

5. I suggest that you keep taking the Tegretol mate! Me, myself and I have much better things to do than sparring with you.

MikeyBear

In a very personal capacity

2 comments:

Jon Rogers said...

Mike,

don't rise to the bait of the two - or is it three - indolent individuals who prefer to abuse those they consider "trots" rather than lift a finger to do any real work for our movement

you and I both know that the suggestion that any lay UNISON activist in London would need to keep their identity secret in order to abuse the left is fanciful and absurd

so we know that the composite character who tries to draw you into debate is not simply, as they wish to portray "themselves" a lay activist

we should keep our focus on the positive work which socialist activists have to do in our trade union movement and leave these slightly sad and disturbed individuals to carry on waiting for their pensions

don't you think?

Andrew Berry said...

Can I point out that this must have taken some finding; it was posted on the john4leader blog about nine months ago. I am flattered that someone must have spent some considerable time in finding stuff from the branch, when I viewed the post I laughed for about half an hour. I have now forward the original post to the John4leader website so they can put it on their new endorsements section, thanks for reminding me Mickey.