Imperialist Monarchy here ♦ Immigrant Workers in Qatar here ♦
“Kings, Queens and Princesses and Princes Belong in FAIRYTALES, Not in JAMAICA!” March 2022
Down with Monarchies and All Capitalist Dictatorship
“Off with his head, with his crown on it!” That was how Oliver Cromwell in 17th-century England rallied his coalition of Levellers and capitalists to attack the rule of King Charles I and replace it with a Parliamentary system of government.
Yet, in England, some 350 years later, Prince Charles assumes the crown on the death of his mother Queen Elizabeth II and becomes King Charles III. Somehow, the monarchy as a major institution of class rule has survived in capitalist England from feudal times to the present day.
It has survived because its role has changed. True, it still struts its wealth (and power) in ceremonial parades with gold scepters, crowns studded with huge diamonds stolen from South Africa or India, and soldiers with funny hats. Yet it is more than a mega-attraction for American and Japanese tourists.
In England (and some Commonwealth countries like Australia, Canada, and New Zealand) the voters elect a government and Prime Minister. That government, however, has no legal power until its leadership reports to the palace and swears allegiance to the King or Queen.
The same is true even of un-elected state institutions like the Armed Forces, the police, MI5 (Intelligence) and the 400,000 civil servants. All the institutions that run Britain’s day-to-day business swear allegiance to the King or Queen—the Monarchy—and not to the elected government. Even the Prime Minister must report to the Palace once a week.
Yet the Monarchy doesn’t have absolute power. Cromwell and his rising capitalist forces chopped that off along with the head of Charles I in 1649. The British monarchy is an institution through which the unelected major capitalist forces assert their power.
When the pro-Palestine, anti-nuclear bomb, leader of the Labour Party, Jeremy Corbyn, grew in popularity, leaders of the Armed Forces and intelligence agencies declared they would not fully serve his government. Their allegiance was to the crown, not any future government. It was a clear example of how the institution of the monarchy acted as a check on any radical political wishes of the masses.
After all, it was the Queen’s Governor-General of Australia who “constitutionally” removed the elected anti-Vietnam war Prime Minister of Australia in 1975. Behind the deference, the pomp, the curtsies, the stilted speech and the feudal titles, an efficient brutal dictatorship of capital operates.
As, after seventy years, “God Save the Queen” is finally buried, the deaths perpetuated by the Army that swore allegiance to her need to be answered. It’s a shameful legacy that stretches from the brutal suppression of the Mau Mau in Kenya, through the cowardly “Bloody Sunday” in Northern Ireland, the NATO bombings and occupations of Yugoslavia and Southern Iraq, and more.
To hell with the Queen and her capitalist consorts! The time has come to fight for the open, honest, direct rule of the working class that communist revolution can bring!
London, September 2022
Fight Deportations and Exploitation Everywhere by Organizing for Communism
Several migrant workers were arrested and deported from Qatar after participating in a protest denouncing the Al Bandary corporation, which has not paid them back wages for up to seven months. A very common practice since 2010 when Qatar was named the host of the soccer World Cup.
Among the deportees are workers from Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Egypt, the Philippines, and Africa. Thousands of workers, invisible and disposable in the eyes of capitalism, but with the magic to build great roads, stadiums and hotels that will serve to produce enormous profits during the World Cup this November. These workers labor 16- 18 hours a day in temperatures of over 40 degrees Celsius (100⁰ F).
Capitalism is in decline, and to try to stay afloat it must make life more miserable for millions of workers. For the other millions, it will also be our turn for the losing streak, when the bosses, in their desperation to hoard energy resources and markets, must push the buttons of world war.
These workers took their anger to a higher level and took to the streets. They did not sit idly by in the face of this situation that is the product of a capitalist system that wants to trample the working class. As for workers who do not accept this defeat, we have the weapon that is the Red Flag newspaper, which is raising awareness among these workers to organize the communist revolution that will destroy the capitalist system and its borders.
We are building the foundations of the communist system where borders and exploitation will be things of the past. Millions of workers will put their minds and hands together to build that new communist world.
We will eliminate wage slavery and all forms of exchange, based on sharing all the resources that workers have at any moment. Not one more deportation committed by the bosses! Let’s fight now for communism.
—Immigrant Comrade in the USA
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