An open letter to the Labour Party sums up what many people across the UK seem to be feeling at the moment. It’s particularly well timed. Because internal and media attacks on Jeremy Corbyn have continued amid the ongoing row about antisemitism in the UK Labour Party.
Now Canary reader Matthew Sabien has written an open letter. In it, he openly challenges the current situation as he sees it.
Dear The Labour Party
Matthew wrote:
Dear The Labour Party,
It is with an incredibly heavy heart that I write this for I had hoped that you would’ve grown up by now, put your differences aside and for the sake of the country, risen up to take the fight to the Tories.
And what an easy victory it would have been. The Tories have been on the ropes since Cameron’s departure but rather than take full advantage of that situation, you’ve been grandstanding in the opposite corner continually punching yourself in the face.
As a political party, you have become an acute embarrassment to me. Your constant infighting, backbiting, bitching, moaning, whining, complaining, not to mention your scheming, plotting, planning and procrastinating, is deeply humiliating to someone who hoped that with the election of Jeremy Corbyn as your leader, you would actually become a force for many, not the few.
But it’s not your leader that’s the fucking problem, is it?
It’s people like Jess ‘I’d stab him in the front’ Phillips.
It’s people like Tom ‘I’ll work with whoever the membership decide is our leader… oh no not him’ Watson.
Its people like Hilary ‘yes bomb Syria, throw all our bombs at Syria, let’s buy more bombs to throw at Syria’… Benn.
It’s people like Steven Kinnock, Andrea Eagle, Owen Smith, you’re all just astoundingly useless.
Margaret Hodge? Called the leader of your party a ‘fucking racist’ [but]… somehow that’s not a reason to chuck her out.
You saw how the public engaged with the party under Corbyn. But rather than ride that tidal wave all the way into Number 10, you chose instead to put your own ambitions ahead of those of your membership, your electorate and your country and started a political guerrilla movement to remove the populist leader from your party because…?
Erm???? I don’t know… because… you’ve never been popular before so being popular now scares you?… None of you got into politics to be popular? Honestly, from here you just look like a bunch of squabbling morons who are about as fit to form a government as [the] Ant Hill Mob.
Look.
If you can’t get it together then you will not ever be elected…
Unless you sort out the absolute clusterfuck that you represent right now, then you’re not fit run a tiny town council let alone form a government.
You see that guy over there?
He’s not a racist.
Or an antisemite.
Or a danger to the Jewish community.
Or a threat to national security.
Or a terrorist sympathiser.
Or a communist spy.
Or whatever grade ‘A’ bullshit the Murdoch media and the tabloid press are going to come out with next but I’ll tell you what he is…
He’s the last chance that you have of forming a government that truly works ‘for the many, not the few’.
And I tell you what…
If you don’t stand by him, like he would stand by you (because you know he would), then you don’t deserve him, you don’t [deserve] electoral success and you certainly don’t deserve to represent…
Word
Sabien told The Canary that he wrote the letter because:
of sheer frustration with a group of people who have been deliberately chucking spanners in the works purely for their own political gain. What they’re doing is in no way good for this country, or good for communities.
And Sabien doesn’t seem to be alone in feeling this. In recent weeks thousands of pro-Corbyn Labour supporters have taken to social media to show solidarity. On 2 August, thousands shared #WeAreCorbyn images, comments and memes. On 5 August, thousands stood in solidarity with Corbyn again as #ResignWatson went viral after Labour deputy Tom Watson broke ranks to criticise the party leader in the Observer. Sabien’s letter seems to resonate with a wider mood and feeling in the UK.
Tragically and unfortunately, antisemitism does exist on all sides of UK politics. But many people are unhappy that current attacks on Corbyn may detract from fighting antisemitism, racism and all forms of prejudice where it exists. It should always be condemned but Corbyn and his supporters – including many Jewish people – are not given adequate coverage when they speak out against it.
Since Corbyn was elected as Labour leader in 2015, membership has risen to 552,000. Like many thousands of others, Sabien wanted to join Labour when Corbyn became leader. Following two leadership challenges, Corbyn increased his mandate in 2016. In the 2017 general election, he “increased Labour’s share of the vote by more than any other of the party’s election leaders since 1945”. But still, the attacks continue.
This letter is one to share with the many who agree with Corbyn, and who continue to stand up against the few who don’t.
Word.
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