FELIX

And that was a party election broadcast by the Green Party. Next at 7, The One Show.

There is just so much wrong with this article.

Firstly, the author announces from the off that they are all in favour of vandalism as a form of protest. Before spuriously qualifying this with that it must be legitimate. How does the author propose to determine what counts as legitimate. If I and a gang of friends all agree we don't like something and then go off and commit vandalism in aid of this is that ok because we all agreed amongst ourselves it was legitimate? The rule of law is here to protect us from arbitrary actions from groups of people leading to tyranny. If the author truly believes that his views are the same as a majority of others, and that the system itself has turned only to oppressing its people in a dictatorial regime, then I truly despair that he is to be given this platform to spread his ridiculous views.

If they think that our systems of freedom are as restrictive as regimes around the world which brutalise and kill their own people and thus we should feel free to engage in vandalism as long as some vague ambiguous qualification of legitimacy is granted (presumably the author assumes he is a good judge of such legitimacy). Sometimes we have to accept that the reason peaceful protests are not listened to is because quite frankly they do not compose the view of the majority, or even a plurality, of people.

Secondly, the author's bizarre hostility to companies and obvious belief they have no part to play in improving the lives of the people of this world shows a complete lack of comprehension of former successes in the developing world. The green revolution was credited with the saving of billions from starvation and famine in countrys like India through the partnership of business, government and research.

Without agro-chemical companies producing fertilisers and pesticides upon which our system of agriculture depends I would imagine the famines of impoverished East Africans would become a lot more familiar closer to home. This idea of blaming big companies for all the ills of the world is a weak response to the true problems which in many cases are actually very difficult for us to deal with from our homes distant from the problems. Compare this to poorly thought out policies on improving agriculture such as the collectivisation of farms, resulting in disastrous famines because of no partnership to businesses that actually knew what was needed on the ground.

Thirdly, the author pronounces scientists as the Green Party's natural voter base. On what possible basis is he qualified to make such a sweeping characterisation.

I for one am tired already of parties being described by such weak stereotyping which is obviously not the case, Labour is not supported solely by poor northern and welsh miners and public sector workers, the conservatives do not receive their 36% of the general election vote from aristocrats (somewhat obvious from aristocrats not making up 36% of the population, and the liberal democrats do not receive all of their votes from people who do not want to vote labour or conservative. There may be enrichments for party support within different social groupings, but to trot out an entire diverse group such as scientists, which encompass the entire breadth of scientific endeavour, as somehow being a group that really wants to vote Green but needs a push in a direction is just ludicrous.

The dismissal of the idea that students and scientists should ever actually want to vote for Labour or Liberal Democrats, (no mention of the Conservatives - presumably the author thinks no student or scientist has ever voted Conservative) based on the author's opinion of their terrible past record in such issues, reveals a lack of understanding of how people vote. The larger parties are by their nature broad churches as they need to appeal to large groups of people. The small parties however inevitably end up having to define a smaller niche to distinguish themselves from major parties. This however will never lead them to government as they rely only on scraping supporter from the extremes of the larger parties.

Thus while the Green party may hold sympathies for its policies on the environment and its opposition to policies like tuition fees, its hostility to businesses, its proposals for wholescale political reform and its policies on international issues render it unpalatable for many people. Essentially what I want to get across is people are not defined solely by their status as students or scientists, they have a stake in the rest of the world too, and if they are quite happy to continue with our free market system and are cynical about the socialist utopian vision proferred by smaller parties they might well be happy to swallow less palatable policies such as tuition fees.

You yourself have consistently claimed for the greens as the party for scientists yet in the end you conclude with it being the only genuine option for bringing socialism to Britain. I put it to you that perhaps large numbers scientists would not consider themselves socialists, or would not want to see the Green party's brand of socialism. It is not an issue of dismissing single-issues, it is that scientists and students are not solely themselves occupied by single issues. And that is why they dismiss the Greens.

@Science and Politics: Hello, I suspect we aren't going to agree on much, but nonetheless...

With respect to companies and social justice in GM, see this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monsanto#As_plaintiff

A company's first duty (by law, usually) is to its shareholders, which almost always prohibits social justice from taking place.

On your next point, perhaps "highly-educated people" would be better than "scientists" given that the Greens Party has by far the highest proportion of PhDs amongst its members. Moreover, scientists tend to be very aware of the importance of combating climate change, hence more likely to vote Green.

On your next point, I was referring to people who had voted Green in the recent local elections, but decided to not vote Green in future because of the GM debacle. So presumably they are, at least to some extent, socialists.

@Stephen Smith: Just because a company's first duty is to its shareholders, it doesn't necessarily follow that it is incapable of doing good for others, or for the world at large.

Growing the company can often mean benefiting shareholders with higher profits, but it also benefits new workers who are taken on - or those who benefits from the higher tax revenue which those higher profits produce. Similarly, and more importantly in the case of GM food, by providing products that would not otherwise be available companies can benefit consumers. When that means providing food that would not be available, they are literally saving lives.

Large agribusinesses produce most of the world's food and them producing more, cheaper, would benefit not only those in the developing world but those in the West impacted by food poverty.

Those companies also sell seed crops to be used by developing world farmers (usually with charities, governments etc working as intermediaries).

I lol'd hard @ 'Labour is a right-wing party'.

My main motive for not voting Green is that they are raging communists. A single issue party that just wanted to emphasise the need for alternative energy, and protection of our nature heritage would on more than a few occasions get my support. The current Green Party does, however boast an admirably extensive manifesto; alas, that is where the admiration must end.

The reason most people ignore the Greens, Respect, and the SWP is the same reason that it took Tony Blair's gargantuan movement of Labour toward centrism to make them electable: because the huge majority of people in Britain have no interest in the discredited and contemptible philosophy that is Marxism.

Firstly Stephen, it is always a pleasure to read your writing, because it is so readable.

You point out that Shell has had a terrible track record on Human Rights abuses in the past. I would point out that reactionary socialists who rapidly resort to violence don't historically fare too well either:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gulag

Glib over-simplifications aside, your article presents the problem faced with pretty much any apologetics piece I've ever read: you open up by reinforcing my already held opinion on an issue, but then lose me when you say "But you should still do/believe what I say because...[insert less convincing argument here]"

Do you know the Dara O'Brien sketch on herbal medicine? He points out that all medicine was originally herbal medicine, but that after extensive trials, the stuff that works is just called "Medicine".

Similarly with politics. Policies that are both workable and popular become mainstream polictics. Everything else is a waste of time.

@Matthew Allinson: My point was that you shouldn't dismiss the Green Party just because Jenny Jones is an idiot.

"Policies that are both workable and popular become mainstream politics. Everything else is a waste of time."

You are nowhere near cynical enough about "mainstream politics" and nowhere near idealistic enough about everything else.

@Viscount Stansgate: This should assuage your doubts:

http://www.politicalcompass.org/ukparties2010

@Matthew Allinson: If you have to put glib oversimplifications aside, why include them in the first place?

@Stephen Smith: Not really, the Political Compass isn't an indisputable or objective authority on the matter.

Labour declare themselves to be 'democratic socialists' in their constitution and their policies and philosophy reflect that, be it the continued dominance of trade unions over the party or the Shadow Cabinet's proposition of wildly unrealistic tax and spend policies.

One Labour leader who knows how to appeal to the political centre and aspirational voters does not make the whole party 'right-wing'.

@Viscount Stansgate: The modern Labour party is neoliberal and therefore right-wing, as neoliberalism is a capitalist ideology. Neoliberalism broadly consists of the privatisation of public property and services and the shifting of social welfare from public welfare programs to policing and surveillance. If New Labour seemed lax in enacting these policies it is only because so much had already been done by the Conservatives (e.g. the mass privatisations of the 1990s) and because the Conservatives are more flagrant in their pursuit of this ideology (e.g. the partial privatisation of the NHS and the tests of partial privatisation of the police). New Labour did not reverse the privatisation under the Conservatives and it expanded contracting with the NHS and other bodies.

New Labour are right-wing in real terms and potentially slightly to the left relative to the other one and a half dominant parties because the Conservatives are more willing to appeal to supporters of right-populist groups such as the BNP.

@Pippa Mitchell: Because I'll do anything for a cheap chuckle.

@Stephen Smith: I don't like the Green Party because I'm staunchly (disgustingly/stupidly/blindly, delete as you politically see fit) anti-authoritarian. This is also the primary reason I would NEVER vote Labour, with their weird boners for: ID Cards, centralised power & stupendously long custody-without-charge sentences.
I would never vote Conservative because ... well because they're the Nasty Party and always will be.
The Green Party, to me, appear as a load of bossy, authoritarian do-gooders with very little direction.

Henceforth my buzzword for them is "Canvas Bag Communists".

You quote their perfectly reasonable manifesto point, backing GM research, but then one of their leading lights comes out & actively goes against it? You're asking me to vote for a political party that hasn't got it's own, very small, ship in order. For me to vote for them, I need to see a coherent organisation I can trust.

I know I'm asking for a beating WRT the Lib Dems & the Tuition Wheeze but I've ran out of characte

@Stephen Smith: Just to clarify, I don't vote for politicians because I think they are slick, coherent and organised people: I'm just even less likely to vote for them when they act like a sack of cats in public.

@Matthew Allinson: "I don't like the Green Party because I'm staunchly (disgustingly/stupidly/blindly, delete as you politically see fit) anti-authoritarian"

The Greens are by far the least authoritarian party in the UK. Much less authoritarian than the Lib Dems, as it happens.

http://www.politicalcompass.org/ukparties2010

It's all about localism and direct democracy. But I can see I'm never going to convince you, since you have already made up your mind. Shame.

@Matthew Allinson: Also, do you see the irony in deploring a party for not having its "ship in order", while also claiming to be anti-authoritarian?

@Stephen Smith: Yeah I'd rather base my assessment of the parties on their manifestos, policies, and records in Government or Opposition than take the opinion of 'the Political Compass' to be gospel.

The Greens have a raging contempt for every kind of property rights, the right to own, to invest, to earn, and to improve. The same rights which have historically swept aside feudalism and resulted in a freer, more socially mobile and undeniably more prosperous life for everyone in this country.

'Localism' just means the people giving you orders and dictats are in a local council office not Westminster. And the idea that direct democracy and the kind of communism the Greens want are compatible is laughable - as we've seen, the top petitions which resulted from the Government's tentative steps toward ballot initiatives were pro-death penalty, anti-immigration, and anti-EU. The reason the Greens are an irrelevance is because the country is way to the right of their silliness.

@Big Dog Jeremy: I'm guessing you won't like my comment article this week, where I suggest replacing the current economic system with full communism.

@Christopher Lazenbatt: The Government making up over 50% of the economy is hardly the hallmark of a staunchly capitalist government.

Labour under Blair was essentially a social democratic party, which is why they didn't go round nationalising everything in sight like they did in their hard left days under Attlee or Wilson. However, they did let spending soar through the roof and raised taxes constantly; while they weren't Marxist policies, they are clearly to the left of centre.

I'd also point out it was the Tories who opposed Labour's ID Cards and months-long detention - similarly it is disaffected Labour voters who prop up the BNP, as you can see by their success in Labour heartlands such as working class East London, Kent and Essex and the North West and North East. If anyone is to blame for the rise of the BNP, it's a Labour Party which has abandoned the working class to welfare dependency in the mistaken belief that doing so will create a captive voting base.

How right or left wing a party is is a relative term not an absolute one. If you think all major parties are right wing or all major parties are left wing, that probably says more about how on the extremes you are, rather than a judgement on the parties themselves.

@Stephen Smith: Sounds like a top plan, bro.

Signed:

Vladimir Lenin
Joseph Stalin
Mao Zedong
Ho Chi Minh
Pol Pot
Fidel Castro
Erich Honecker
Nicolae Ceausescu
Kim Il-Sung
Kim Jong-Il
Robert Mugabe

@Stephen Smith: "I'm guessing you won't like my comment article this week, where I suggest replacing the current economic system with full communism."

When did Felix turn into the Morning Star?

@Poltical sextant: If you look outside a narrow national spectrum of politics, it becomes obvious when some countries have more right wing mainstream politics than others. The USA's major parties, for example, are quite clearly more 'right wing' or neoliberal than those in most of Europe.

@Pippa Mitchell: Thanks for agreeing with me, yep different parties are more right wing than others. It is a relative thing as I said. The author needs to say that all three major parties are right wing with respect to himself. Because with respect to the vague concept of the British centre most would say they are not all right wing, but they are close to the centre.

@Pippa Mitchell: The reason for that is that different countries have different cultures, both politically and more generally, and thus the political consensus forms around a different set of ideas.

That's the result of democracy, in which the majority of voters who sign up to the consensus view shaping the debate, rather than an impediment to it.

Democracy doesn't mean that everyone gets their way. It means that the most popular set of ideas does.

@Poltical sextant: I'm afraid I disagree. I read a study recently where people were shown a list of policies and asked to select which they agreed with most. As it turned out, the most popular party by far (when voting according to policies alone) was the Green Party. To my detriment, I can't find this study now, so you'll have to take my word for it.

@Stephen Smith: You can't judge a party on single policies asked seperately. A certain subset may well be more popular but it depends which ones are included in a survey and i doubt it was exhaustive. What is important is judging a party's overall policy mix and seeing which overall best fit your views, that and which party's ideology best approximates your own and thus whose judgement you trust best is an important factor. The green's dismal electoral performance is the truest test of their support and no matter which type of election, fttp or variations of pr, they pale in significance to the three main parties in almost all examples. Albeit there are certain exceptions, such as jenny jones beating lib dems in the london mayoralty. But her performance was nothing compared to labour and the torys

@Stephen Smith: Is that the same kind of study which produces similar results for BNP policies when not attached to the party name?

Or could it bear similarity to the polls which offer about 50% support to an EDL-based party, provided it was 'non-violent'?

People select who they vote for based not only on single policies but on how convincingly those policies are argued, how likely they think it is that the party would be able to implement them etc.

Similarly the advantage of a open liberal democracy is debate - criticising eah others policies, offering alternatives, etc. In a vacuum I'm sure some Green policies sound lovely, but when you have an wet-behind the ears Green activist trying to debate an experienced Tory or Labour politician and getting torn to shreds it's no surprise the Greens are a non-entity.

@Big Dog Jeremy: "The most popular set of ideas"?

Funny you should say that, because:

http://voteforpolicies.org.uk/

@Big Dog Jeremy: Finally, someone actually understands what democracy is and explains it to people. Am tired of people complaining that whenever something happens they disagree with its undemocratic.

@Stephen Smith: As self-selecting surveys go, this one included a slightly larger number and range of participants:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Kingdom_general_election,_2010#Results

@Big Dog Jeremy: From the looks of his twitter feed, he must think that every general election we all secretly want to vote greens but just vote tactically for parties we have no interest in. If only we knew that everyone else is a green too...

Lol Stephen Smith on Twitter today "I can't work out whether it's the same troll commenting over and over again, or whether Imperial is just full of stupid people." Fantastic indictment of the author's view of debate on his articles.

@Viscount Stansgate: Firstly, modern social democracy is a capitalist economic ideology, as it still allows private property (which should be made distinct from personal property). It's simply the least oppressive of the various capitalist ideologies that exist in theory or in practice. Even if you believe that New Labour was social democratic, they would remain right-wing in real terms. However, their policies were considerably neoliberal (contracting, privatisation, protection of the financial apparatus, increasing 'public order' spending (e.g. police and prison) and military spending etc.).

Secondly, my point about the BNP had nothing to do with the rise of the BNP or who they gained their newest influx of voters from. I was using them to illustrate the reverse - that the Conservatives can (potentially, according to their policies) take ideological BNP voters better than New Labour.

I'd like to see your sources for the 50% claim, because as it stands it's incredibly nebulous.

@Christopher Lazenbatt: Applying terms of right and left wing is as I said a nonsense to claim in real terms as you do. If you say they follow a capitalist ideology that would be accurate, but they are as they claim, a centre-left party. What is this bizarre objective external system you are measuring right-left by? Where is the external viewpoint that fixes the left-right axis, If you mean capitalist vs socialist that is one thing. It is a fallacy to claim you cannot be capitalist and also be considered left wing

@Big Dog Jeremy: The general election is useless as an indication of public desire for specific policies for several reasons:
1) Policies are bundled together within parties, forcing people to pick and choose which policies they can afford out of those they support.
2) All 2.5 of the dominant parties hold a neoliberal ideology and differ only in slight degrees (all three supported higher tuition fees in one way or another, for example).
3) People associate parties with their leaders and the media narratives about them, and base their votes on these kinds of external factors too.
4) Few parties can afford to stand across the UK and influence the media as the dominant parties do, so choices outside of the dominant parties are less available and the public is less aware of them.
5) Rising cynicism of parties' motivations for choosing policies (take, for example, the Conservatives declaring that they would protect the NHS, then beginning privatisation) will affect how the public votes.

@Christopher Lazenbatt: Whoah the NHS is being literally privatised? When can I buy shares in my local hospital?

Or are you using the same twisted definition we saw in Stephen Smith's other article?

@Christopher Lazenbatt: http://cdn.hm-treasury.gov.uk/sr2010_completereport.pdf - Page 13
http://www.ifs.org.uk/bns/bn43.pdf - Page 4

Public Spending at 48% of GDP - a little shy of 50%, alright. But still staggering that you could consider that to constitute anything but a mixed economic system, let alone a free market.

Similarly, the idea that merely tolerating private property (you'll have to explain to me how there can be a distinction between something you own and... something else you own, I guess?) is the hallmark of a 'right-wing' ideology is a bit ridiculous. You could own an overcoat or a bottle of vodka in Stalin's Russia - what a 'capitalist' system that must have been.

'Real terms' which measure of right-vs-left better than a subjective comparison seem pretty dubious - the entire political spectrum/compass/any old shape is just a method of comparison, and thus the 'real terms' are defined by a person - you, me, or someone else. It seems fair to let that person be the UK voters.

@Christopher Lazenbatt: The whole point of parties is to bundle together policies and to have a known ideology. Obviously that means not all policies approved by public will get in, but government is there to make informed choices on our behalf. I'm more comfortable with electing representatives who act on advice and sometimes make choices i disagree with, rather than delegating every policy to some sort of direct democracy constant referenda system that would result in rampant populism and incoherent decision making.

We'd have military interventions one day, then troop withdrawal a few weeks later upon the first difficulties due to fluctuating public opinion. We'd borrow billions one day and default the next. It would be a catastrophe. We need parties to form a coherent approach that frankly the public does not as a whole hold

@Political sextant: Right-wing as in supportive of hierarchical control of society (e.g. fascism or neoliberalism), as opposed to left-wing as in the shared control of society (e.g. anarchism, communism or syndicalism). The framing of New Labour as extreme left and the Conservatives as right-wing has no basis in global, historical and philosophical definitions of the terms. You cannot be capitalist and left-wing because capitalism inherently directs wealth and power to those who already possess wealth and power. This can be mitigated by interventions (by trade unions or social democratic governments) but never fully prevented without a shift in the understanding of ownership, making social democrats right-wing.

While social democrat parties initially began as reform socialist parties they have opposed real socialism for decades. The alliance of the Weimar SDP with the fascist-precursor Freikorps to suppress the Spartacist uprising and kill its leaders is a key example here.

@Christopher Lazenbatt: I don't think those arguments prove general elections to be 'useless'.

1) No two people agree on a whole set of policies and ideas - picking, choosing, compromising is a fact of life, even more so when governing for 60mn people.
2) Regardless of how much you believe the parties differ, the reason they share so much is that they cluster around the centre. That's where most of the support is which is why they get 85-90% of the votes.
3) The people who make up the cabinet are very important. They have to address anything that arises between general elections - no one saw 9/11 coming during the 2001 election, or the Falklands in 1979, but they were aware 'something' big could happen, and chose leaders they thought could handle potential events or crises.
4) How come the Liberal Democrats are a major party despite being nowhere a few decades ago? How come the SNP is the major party in Scotland?
5) Surely this would boost the support for other parties, rather than allow the Big Three 90%?

@Christopher Lazenbatt: Yeah man, I hate hierarchies.

You should talk to my bro Stalin about that one.

@Christopher Lazenbatt: You really aren't listening. You are just applying right wing and left wing as absolute terms when in fact they are simply comparisons of the nature of political parties. If you say that many left of centre parties are not truly socialist parties I could agree, but they are still left of centre if we assume the vaguely defined centre to be a rough average of the populace at large. The american democrats are often described as left in america, but to here they would look more right. Its all relative!

You can't just say you are right because you are defining right wing as hierachical control of society and left as socialism, communism, etc, anymore than I can say I am right by saying the earth is absolutely stationary by defining a favoured frame of reference.

@Viscount Stansgate: There has never been a free market, nor can there ever be one. A 'free' market would lead to monopoly or duopoly even in a case where every company was initially equal, due to chance differences in profit and exposure leading to some companies dominating and subsuming others until a monopoly or duopoly forms. Historically, government intervention has been used to prevent or break private monopolies to allow competition, and to kickstart innovation seized upon by private groups (e.g. NASA's technological developments, the internet, AT&T Bell contracts).

Private property is owned and controlled by someone who profits from it but doesn't use or maintain it, instead engaging in an exploitative relationship with the workers who do use it. Personal property is owned, controlled, used and maintained by the same person or people. Those who use it gain the full benefits of their use. A socialist system would have the latter but not the former, by converting private enterprises to cooperatives.

@Christopher Lazenbatt: There has never been a *totally* free market, in the same way that you can't entirely eliminate private exchange and create a *totally* centralised system, but the extent and form of government intervention does vary hugely. A system in which intervention is limited and regulation aimed at preventing abuse is very different to a system in which the government directs the economy from the commanding heights, favouring certain players.

Similarly this private-vs-personal definition is ludicrous. If you can't make use of your property by renting it, hiring others to operate it, improve it, use it as collateral, etc, then you don't 'own' it. The idea that you 'own' a factory based upon whether you yourself operate the machinery, and that if you dare to stop that 'ownership' is forfeit, reeks of tyranny. Who is in charge of deciding whether you've worked hard enough to 'own' it? Who decides if you can join the cooperative? It just sounds like mobs grabbing what they take a fancy to.

@Political sextant: I fully understand relative right-left political dichotomies, which is why I'm opposed to their use in place of real terms. To say that the Conservatives are to the left of the BNP tells us nothing about the policies of either group without the understanding that both are right-wing parties. Their use also distorts public awareness: New Labour has a lot more in common with the Conservatives than any of the socialist parties, but the relative dichotomy inflates the difference between the first two to ridiculous proportions. This marginalises views outside these two very close poles and falsely presents the choice between the Conservatives and New Labour as a meaningful one.

@Viscount Stansgate: I didn't make a claim either way on absolute centralism, only on free markets. My point is that the 'freer' the market (from the present state), the more likely it will tend to stagnation or collapse, and that private enterprise relies massively on state action.

Property isn't just a means of exploitation (through relations such as rents). You'd have the right to use and maintain your property for personal benefit, but not to derive a personal profit by hiring others to use and maintain it and paying them less than what you gain from its use.

For an example of how cooperatives function in reality, I suggest the Mondragon corporation. Among other things, executive pay is decided by the majority of workers, and varies between 3 and 9 times what the lowest wage paid by the corporation is. In comparison, the ratio of CEO pay to average (note: not lowest) workers' pay in the West tends to be one to a dozen, one to twenty or, in the case of the US, one to several hundred.

@Christopher Lazenbatt: No one is making the case for no state action at all. It is obvious that state action is required for private enterprise. The argument is about how much state action is optimal. Your assertion that any freer a market from the current state makes it more likely to lead to collapse or stagnation seems wildly speculative. From what evidence do you draw the conclusion that this is the case. What precise optimum do you think is the case, more state or do we happen to have it perfect now? And as to how any increase in the freeness of the market leads to stagnation or collapse, seems completely unfounded. America likely has freer markets and it has not collapsed or stagnated, granted it too is suffering a slowdown at the moment and is not perfect, but cycles of boom and bust are hardly unknown and history does not bear out the permanence of the bust part of the economic cycle. Capitalism has given us unprecedented technological advancement while alternatives have failed and fallen to tyranny.

Is it really acceptable for a student newspaper to include such a stridently political article encouraging the support of one political party? If this were described as part of a series with contributions about various parties then it might well be considered contributing to a debate, but theres no evidence of this.

If I write an article for felix's comment section about the brand of television I think you should buy would I be able to get round paying for advertisement?

@Mr. Panasonic: Look at the top of the page. See that it says "Comment"?

Political discussion isn't the same as an advert. If you can't see that you're a fool.

Run along now.

@Sigh: Discussing politics isn't the same as an advert I agree. But as this "political discussion" is essentially just a piece on why students should vote green and not other parties it seems a lot like an advert to me. Its the sort of thing I'd expect in the editorial of a national newspaper, not a newspaper for students. Its very aliienating to be told what to think.

If you can't see that then you are a person who can't see that. (No need for insults from me)

@Banisher of pessimism: Mate, I gave up after it became obvious from Lazenbatt's last few comments that he's an actually thorough-bred Marxist - I'm pretty shocked they actually still exist. If you're trying to have a reasonable debate about politics in a liberal democracy, you're probably better off looking elsewhere.

@Sigh: Well you're right that it's fair for people to put forward their opinions in the Comment section, but how often do you see Tory or Lib Dem points of view, or even moderate Labour?

If it's only fringe socialist points of view which, if we're honest, make up a pretty small part of the overall range of opinions, then it does start to look like bias. Even the Guardian will have a few conservatives or the Telegraph a few left-wing people writing a comment or opinion piece now and then.

A student paper like Felix should be a platform for a whole range of ideas, not just a mouthpiece for the far left.

@Tweet hawk strikes again: Yeah well judging by the comments on here I'm not surprised - it's pretty hard to have a productive debate with people so set in their ideology or just that paranoid!

@Christopher Lazenbatt: How is hiring people exploitation? As long as they have civilised working conditions, a decent wage etc surely it's a mutually beneficial exchange?

Fair enough if people want to organise their business as a cooperative, a partnership or whatever, but why does that mean those who want to hire others should be oppressed? You're just cutting off your nose to spite your face then.

This whole left or right, state or no state is nicely summed by John Ward:
"I think the machine-driven political structures and polemics we have in the West today are sclerotic and irrelevant to most voters. The obsession with big State, no State, Left, Right, conservative and liberal is useful today only as the basis for damning critique."

You lot arguing about whose most wrong, rather than what's best is a nice realization of that quote.

@Big Dog Jeremy: "A student paper like Felix should be a platform for a whole range of ideas, not just a mouthpiece for the far left."

Like with the BBC I imagine those on the left feel that Felix is the mouthpiece for those on the right.

@Mr. Panasonic: This article says of the Green Party:

"they often disappoint me."
"I was severely depressed by [them]."
"fools that they are"
"the least of four evils"

If it is an advert, it's a really ineffective one.

If you actually read the article, you'll see it is aimed at people who had voted Green before, but decided not to in future because of the GM debacle. It is therefore aimed at socialists, and thus assumes certain things (eg redistribution of wealth is good, oil companies are bad). It's not surprising that you think it's biased.

@Big Dog Jeremy: > A student paper like Felix should be a platform for a whole range of ideas, not just a mouthpiece for the far left.

Well how about you do something about it and write them?

Get off your arse a do something about it yourself, big society style, rather than sit complaining.

@Big Dog Jeremy: > it does start to look like bias

What a load of nonsense. If you write it, Felix will publish it.

Unfortunately this means we get complete bollocks written by people like George Howard. On the upside it does mean that they make themselves look silly in public for future employers to easily find online, e.g. http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=george+howard+imperial.

@Fraser Waters: I'd find it difficult to see how, in the past few weeks we've seen an anti-boris comment, a UK uncut street party article, this article about voting for the greens and an article misusing the word privatisation to describe something completely different as polticians on the left do all the time. (Not that the right is immune to this charge with their own mix up of words, debt and deficit comes to mind). I mean fair enough if there are no submissions with varying views we can't just magic them into existence but maybe then we can see comments like these toned down somewhat so they arent making felix look like its just a political vessel for a subset of writers. We are all intelligent people, I'd much rather be presented with facts and make my own mind up rather than be told what to think.

@Slogger: I don't agree that thats what we've been arguing about tbh. My arguments have been that branding everyone as right wing if they approve of capitalism in some form, be it free market laissez faire or mixed economy isn't a useful comparison, and that right vs left wing is only good for comparing positions relative to the perceived centre of national politics. Similarly I haven't made any position regarding whether the state needs to shrink or grow.

If anything I think we are probably somewhat agreeing. Left vs right is overused and is only good as a comparison, and I agree people should argue for whats best rather than whats wrong. But I wouldn't say thats whats being argued above. Above is more about what left v right means and whether you can define any sort of capitalism bluntly as right wing. Comments also argue over whether this article is appropriate for felix, but thats separate to the right v left point

@Fraser Waters: I'm not particularly right-wing, just not as far left as the writer and some of the commenters. Unless of course, supporting a capitalist economy makes me 'right-wing'.

I see your point though, it's just that Felix's Comment section does seem dominated by far left pieces at the expense of not just right-wing but centrist and centre-left opinions.

Someone else posted suggesting if I don't like it, I should write something to balance it out - fair point, I might do that when I get the time. But it's all too easy to slip into the appearance of bias, even if it isn't there.

@Political sextant: To be fair, a Comment piece is supposed to be offering an opinion and arguing a case - it's not like I've got a problem with this article being published!

But I'd expect that in that case the writer is trying to spur some debate and actually engage in a bit of discussion about the Greens, GM food, politics, etc, and judging by his responses to comments here it doesn't seem like that's the case.

That's why it might be good to have a bit more of a back-and-forth between articles, where the arguments are less likely to be ignored or treated as flippantly as they are online.