Beyond the politics of left and right

RICHARD HOUSE [RH]: Tell us about Real Left, Chris - when and by whom it was founded, and why.

- RICHARD HOUSE

CR: Real Left - which was originally Left Lockdown Sceptics until our name change in 2023 - was founded in January 2021 by David Fletcher and his colleagues from the Marxist theoretical journal Marxist World. Since then, through members leaving and joining, the demographic of the editorial has changed to a more libertarian left (anarchist) weighted makeup, although we still have active members/supporters who identify as communists, Marxists and socialists.

The founding purpose was to provide an online publishing platform for critiques of the 'new normal' or bio-security state from anti-capitalist perspectives. Such critiques were, and mostly still are, absent from left-wing discourse. We have since broadened the focus of our critique to all aspects of the Fourth Industrial Revolution, platforming 'dissident' positions on issues like net zero, for example.

RH: Those who've historically identified with the political left have been hugely frustrated by the robotic labelling of all those questioning establishment covid and globalist narratives as 'far right'. Do you think that the labels of 'left' and 'right' still have any use or relevance?

CR: It is understandable that people claim that there is no longer any relevance to the traditional left-right political model. All mainstream and most non-mainstream political parties and organisations of all persuasions fell in step with the diktats of the covid tyranny. This led to generalised disgust within the freedom movement with the old political model.

The new forms of political resistance that emerged in response to lockdowns (properly speaking, lockouts) and 'vaccine' mandates were untrammelled by traditional political orthodoxies. But the underlying social and economic realities that gave rise to the left-right model in the first place have not changed; in fact, since 2020 they have intensified.