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My view, as an environmental and natural health campaigner for the past 30 years, on why the authoritarianism and quasi-religious fervour of the UK Green party is such anathema to any true vision of a better world

'Why I will never vote for the UK Green Party and why you should also make that decision if you value freedom and democracy'

As an environmental and natural health campaigner for the past 30 years, I joined the UK Green Party in October last year, under the impression that this party would be my natural home.

In January 2017, I received an email from the local Green Party which referred to "dangers in releasing helium balloons and sky lanterns", with a view to supporting a motion to the local council to implement a ban on their use on Council-owned land.

I emailed back, as follows:

I received this reply, from Richard Edwards, the Secretary of the West and South Dorset Green Party:

Now there's a phrase: "for no good reason"! This, to me, means that any reason which someone might have arrived at personally is not a 'good' reason, if it conflicts with what has been decreed as 'bad' in some way by any organisation which has come to believe that it holds the moral and ethical high ground.

Can Mr Edwards, or any other Green Party member, really believe that a grey future of bans and compulsions - a future in which simple pleasures are legislated out of existence - can be anything other than totalitarian? Does he not see that a life with frequent small pleasures can be a truly happy life? "Small pleasures, small pleasures - Who would deny us these?" wrote Lionel Bart, in It's A Fine Life, from the musical Oliver. But it seems, unfortunately, that there are many people who are so sure of the fundamental rightness of their world view that they do indeed seek to deprive us of our small pleasures - and with a self-righteous, missionary zeal.

As an earth-bound species, the ability to fly has always fascinated us. Helium balloons, Chinese sky lanterns, kites - with all of these, our spirits sour upwards as we, even for a few minutes, see these man-made creations lift up into the sky. "You can have your own set of wings - with your feet on the ground you're a bird in flight … All at once you're lighter than air", as the Sherman brothers wrote in Let's Go Fly a Kite, from the musical Mary Poppins. Or, as Clint McLean put it, in a 2010 article:

For me, a smile on a face and an uplifted spirit are a sufficiently good reason to want to indulge in a substantially harmless pursuit, but I'm sure that a zealous campaigner could think up spurious reasons why kite flying should also be banned.

However, it seems that a temporary escape from a boring, earth-bound existence is not a "good" enough reason why the Green Party should not wish to ban these small pleasures.

There is precedent for such bans: the Chinese banned flying pigeons, kites and balloons, as potentially "suspicious flying objects" in the run-up to National Day in 2009 and the Taliban banned kite-flying as "un-Islamic" when they ruled Afghanistan early in the 21st century.

So there we have it - the soulless, hectoring hypocrisy of a party which professes to be a party for people is laid bare. Molly Scott Cato, a Green Party (EU) MEP wrote, in an email to supporters on April 20th 2017: "The Green Party has a clear message to the young people of Britain: We will fight for you. We will fight for your future."

But, it seems, not a future which involves "joy, a carefree spirit and the innocence of youth". As the great US anarchist Emma Goldman wrote:

Furthermore, if we are to consider trusting a political party to enact legislation on our behalf, we have to completely trust their integrity and their vision. But what are we supposed to make of a party which is prepared to stoop to absurd, mendacious hyperbole, by describing the pursuit of a so-called "extreme" Brexit as a "right wing coup" (Jonathan Bartley, co-leader of the UK Green Party, on BBC Question Time, 6th April 2017). In an earlier email (March 25th 2017) which members received from Mr Bartley, he referred to a "right-wing, UKIP-inspired hard Brexit"?

These spurious adjectives attached to the word are designed to detract from the reality that the British people democratically chose to leave the EU in the June 2016 referendum - not "hard", "extreme", "right-wing" or "UKIP-inspired", just a simple exit from the EU. The myth that we did not know what we were choosing, and the full ramifications of it, are predicated on the assumption that all of us who voted to leave the EU were hoodwinked by what are categorised as the "lies" of the Leave campaign.

But, for me, this simply amounts to a disdain and mistrust of normal people who, as usual, are written off as stupid, ignorant - and completely incapable of thinking sensibly for themselves - by the educated liberal left. So much for respecting all people: yes, people and their views are respected, but only if those views align with the 'correct' views, as defined by our omniscient bien pensant liberal betters.

I have to say, also, that the vitriol and anger (in a letter to the Daily Telegraph described, astonishingly, as a "visceral all-consuming, white-hot fury" at people who "we will never forgive") expressed by many of those on the left seems to stem from a frustration that working people didn't share their educated, urban, middle class, internationalist, pro-EU views!

It is difficult not to see here an element of Lenin's arrogant and totalitarian view that the 'workers' were not yet ready for elections, because they were not sufficiently educated in the class struggle! This was why Trotsky was denounced and exiled - he wanted a democratic system and (therefore) trusted the workers to vote for what was right.

Perhaps the Green Party and their ideological allies would really prefer it if the only people who could vote were the property-owning middle classes who could be trusted to vote with their wallets, not their hearts? In other words, the situation which existed before universal suffrage!

I have been an active green campaigner for 30 years, but really am appalled by the Green Party's obsessive support for the EU. As far as I'm concerned, the major enemy of the planet and its people and animals is globalisation and the EU is one of globalisation's leading proponents.

I agree wholeheartedly with the Party activist whose presentation I have included in Appendix 1 (below):

And, to further convince us of its crazed pro-EU doctrine ("passionate about the EU", as their only MP, Caroline Lucas, put it), the Green Party appears to truly believe that, if elected, it would be a priority to attempt to overturn a democratic vote by "giving Britain another chance to stay in the EU." (email to Green Party supporters, April 24th 2017).

"Every Green vote we win on June 8th is one more voice telling other parties to back voting reform and a more plural politics" they wrote, in that same email and Molly Scott Cato wrote, in an email to supporters on May 5th 2017: "This morning Caroline Lucas and I issued a Green Party pledge that we will give voters the option of remaining in the EU if they don't like the look of the Brexit deal ... if like me you also what to stand up for democracy then please donate to our general election fighting fund, and stand up for what really matters.".

But what could be more "plural" or "democratic", I wonder, than a simple one person, one vote, yes or no, referendum?

The only conclusion I can draw from this is that plurality and democracy are fine for the Green Party, as long as a plural and democratic vote agrees with their own views and doesn't conflict with their authoritarian agenda. I'm sure that Nicolas Maduro (the totalitarian Venezuelan president), Vladimir Putin, and the ousted Gambian president, Yahya Jammeh would wholeheartedly approve of such a position!

And the assumption that every Green Party member shares these dogmatic pro-EU views - an assumption which is blatantly obvious in every single email I receive and wilfully ignores the fact that a minority of members are opposed to the EU - serves to suppress opposing views, like the views of that (sadly) minority of Greens who are opposed to the EU, which includes no less a figure than Jenny Jones (Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb), the only Green Party member of the UK House of Lords.

This is not an overt suppression but - much worse - an insidious hidden message that differing views are not acceptable and that, in the case of the EU, the person holding those anti-EU views is likely to be vilified as 'racist', 'bigoted', xenophobic' or 'authoritarian' ["Theresa May’s authoritarianism" (email to Green Party supporters, May 8th 2017)]. Extremely likely, in fact, since those are the insults thrown - time after time - at anyone who does not follow the orthodox, pro-EU dogma. And it is difficult for me not to categorise a claim that another party is 'authoritarian' as a massive projection!

This type of targeted vilification amounts to authoritarianism in all its hideous, warped glory - an attempt to cast even our own private thoughts and beliefs as 'thought crimes', in the mould of the dystopia presented by George Orwell in 1984. Why would I even consider voting for an authoritarian, dogmatic party which suppresses dissent?

And we see this type of bias dripping through everything which the fanatically pro-EU liberal establishment writes on the subject. Moving even further into the realms of fantasy than the Green Party, Denis MacShane, on the inappropriately named 'In Facts' website applied another sneering adjective, referring to a "UKIP Brexit". Mr McShane is a senior advisor at a consultancy firm called 'Avisa Partners' which, apparently, is "perceived as an independent third-party". Stating that "Avisa Partners enjoys trusted relationships with key officials of the European Commission" their protestations of "independence" seem somewhat suspect, and were further evidenced as disingenuous at best when Mr McShane wrote, in a massive push towards the absurd hyperbole which I am reading all too often:

[For a series of extremely cogent (and vehement) arguments against the EU, please see Appendix 1 (below), a transcript of a presentation sent to me, which was given by a Green party activist prior to the UK EU Referendum, and with which I wholeheartedly agree. (I have deliberately made this anonymous, because of the vitriol which might be directed at the writer if their identity were disclosed.)]

However, there is plenty of precedent for authoritarianism - and the suppression of dissenting views - amongst 'progressive' left-wing 'liberals'. We saw this in action when Californian Democrat Governor Jerry Brown decided that his view that a new future, with a 100% healthy, disease-free population, could be achieved by a law - the infamous July 2016 SB277 - forcing every school age child to receive every single one of the vaccines 'recommended' by the US Centers for Disease Control (CDC).

Then, in September 2016, this overweening control of the people of California was extended with SB792, which requires proof of a variety of vaccinations for an exhaustive list of people who work with young children. including even parent volunteers who care for and supervise children.

The quasi-religious belief that vaccines are safe and effective was, for Governor Brown, a simple fact, echoed by Hillary Clinton, who tweeted, on June 3rd 2015:

This view is wildly unscientific and leads to the death or long-term illness of a substantial proportion of vaccinated American children. But, for the zealot, facts are irrelevant: that was the belief of Mr Brown, so he moved to socially engineer his dogma into Californian state legislation.

The punk band, Dead Kennedys, had easily discerned Governor Brown's authoritarianism (during his previous control of the state from 1975 to 1983), when they compared his regime to the Nazis, in their 1978 song, California Über Alles. Their fear, at that point, was that Mr Brown might become President at some point [fortunately, their fears were unfounded]:

Whilst many US states (both Republican and Democrat) have vaccination mandates for schoolchildren, it was no surprise to me that the most stringent mandate laws have been enacted by a supposedly 'progressive' left-liberal regime.

I am not suggesting that the UK Green Party are in favour of compulsory vaccination; in fact, reports suggest that many Green Party members share my own evidence-based and scientifically sound opposition to vaccinations.

However, the Californian Democrats, our own Liberal Democrats and the Green Party are hewn from the same rock. They all believe in social engineering by means of authoritarian legislation, in order to bring into being their vision of a better world.

Whilst it might seem strange for any party which most people would identify as 'liberal' to behave in such an authoritarian way, the fact is that, since the late nineteenth century, liberal politicians had been advocating a much greater role for the state, believing that the poverty and ignorance of the working classes could only be improved by a strong interventionist state government. The original liberal principles of self-help and freedom of choice had evaporated.

And how far the US Democrat Party has moved from its Jeffersonian roots, when the view was held that central government is the enemy of individual liberty and that government intervention in the economy will never benefit the poor, but will instead serve to enrich corporations at the expense of everyone - and everything - else.

As Jefferson wrote:

My belief, in contrast to the modern-day 'liberals' - and very much in tunes with Jefferson's belief - is that the only real and lasting solution to anything which might appear in need of change is to provide information for people, so that they can make their own well-informed judgements on each issue. The authoritarian tendency on the 'liberal progressive' left towards heavy-handed social engineering simply leads to a resentful and disempowered populace. Disempowered people do not change the world - they meekly acquiesce to orders from those who they have allowed to have power over them.

When the people in power are supposedly enlightened liberals, their policies will be pursued with a religious zeal, and woe betide the heretics who stand in their way.

Let's take a hypothetical example: the Green Party wins a General Election (God forbid, that such a thing should ever happen!) and they start to remodel the country as they would like it to be, by enacting a whole host of new laws. They (rightly) decide that Glyphosate ('Roundup') is hazardous to health, so (wrongly) pass a law to ban it from sale in garden centres.

Most working people feel so out of control of their lives that they will try their make their homes and gardens comfortable and pretty places to be in. Their home environment is, after all, the only part of the world upon which the disempowered citizen of a western 'democracy' feels that he or she can exert any real influence.

Our hypothetical working man has a nice, neat garden. Neatness is about control - ie the rare ability to exercise control, in a life over which he feels he has so little control in all other respects - subject to the whims of his boss, the local council and the government. To ensure that neatness, he uses Roundup; he's not heard about it being potentially carcinogenic, or damaging to gut health.

Then it's banned. He's told that was because it was dangerous, but he's heard that so many times before - they're always telling him this is dangerous, that is dangerous! What does it matter - you only live once, after all, so you might as well enjoy yourself. And, anyway, his Dad used to use pesticides and it didn't do him any harm!

So his ability to keep his garden neat and tidy has been ruined - his pride and joy; the only thing which really keeps him going when he slaves away at work; a little oasis of calm and beauty in his busy, unhappy life.

He is resentful; he feels even more disempowered.

But what does that matter? The world has been made a safer place for all of us! Utilitarianism prevails and the greater good must always take precedence over the individual.

How much better it would have been if he could have been provided with information, so that he could come to the realisation that the use of Glyphosate was potentially damaging to his own health and, more importantly, the health of his wife and children!

Then he could have a conversation with a friend: armed with his new information, he could have persuaded him, also, to stop using this hazardous chemical.

He would feel empowered and in charge of his life; proud that he had been able to make the right decision for himself and his family. What more could he achieve, armed with the facts? His garden will be less neat and tidy, but he will put up with that, because it was his decision - and his alone - to stop using it.

But, if we are providing information, we need to be aware of the sad fact that, all too often campaigning information is based on increasing our fear. The problem seems to be that, when you want so much to persuade people of your point of view, you lose perspective and actively search for the most frightening image, in order to ram home the point. I well remember myself, doing just that, many years ago, when campaigning against the transport of nuclear waste by rail through London. In our area, the railway lines were used perhaps once a year, if that, but, in our determination to 'bring the nuclear issue closer to home', we used fear as our main campaigning tool and moved to misinformation-by-exaggeration. "Nuclear waste goes past your back garden", our leaflets warned, even though, in all probability it didn't!

To encourage a new fear, when there are already so many real or imagined fears for people in our society, is to encourage despair and hopelessness. Our only defence is to shut down the emotional responses to that fear. To present a position which results in fear and, worse, suppression of that fear is to do a profound disservice to the world.

Instead, a strong campaigning position comes from encouraging action, of whatever sort, within a context of personal empowerment.

So, yes, I am with Margaret Mead, the American cultural anthropologist, who wrote:

So how do we do that? Do we rely on persuading local or national governments and supra-national organisations, like the EU, to make the changes we would like to see, by passing laws to outlaw 'bad' practices and make 'good' practices' compulsory? Or, perhaps, instead we should concentrate on persuading multinational corporations to act in the best interests of humanity and the planet, instead of the interests of profit? Or both?

I strongly believe that the answer to those questions is a resounding NO!

Instead, we must reclaim our power to make decisions about our own lives. Empowered people can change the world! We might be written off as idealists but, in the words of Emma Goldman:

And, as far as the Green Party is concerned, every time I read an email from them, it reinforces my view that this is not a Party which people with a good heart should vote for. This is not the "different kind of politics", which they tell us they are seeking, but a worse, and sinister, kind of politics - an authoritarian, self-righteous politics, filled with shrieking, shrill voices raised against demons which they have created in their own heads - all those people with "no good reason" for doing what they do.

I know that it might seem ridiculously idealistic and unreasonable to expect people to gradually move, of their own volition, towards a better future. But the alternative of compulsion automatically makes a worse world, not a better one: a world where people feel a completely valid resentment at - yet again- being told what to do by people who set themselves up as cleverer and, indeed, better than them. At having their small pleasures priced out of their reach or legislated into oblivion. Why should they not resent that?

The alternative was identified in George Orwell's prescient novel, 1984, when O'Brien tells Winston the Party's vision of the future:

Winston had no choice but to succumb to the Party's authority. We - still - have that choice and we must resist bans and compulsions, or will never be able to resist the boot stamping on our faces.

So, yes, it is a dream, if you like, but without that vision of a better world in our mind's eye, how can we ever hope to move towards it? As George Bernard Shaw wrote:

The Green party will not - and never will - move us even one centimetre towards the type of future which is my vision. Indeed, the opposite is the case: with every single pronouncement they move us towards a grey, soulless and doctrinaire future of their choosing.

The Grey Party - Shame on them!

© Andrew Green, April 2017

Appendix 1

The following is the transcript (slightly edited by me for readability) of a presentation given by a Green party activist prior to the UK EU Referendum, and with which I wholeheartedly agree.

The Core EU ideology is Capitalism

• It comes in different shades of blue, but there is no escaping the truth that the EU is founded on the desire to advance capitalism, on a large scale
• It's a trading club – its core (unapologetic) purpose is to oil the wheels of capitalism, which means:
  • Growth at any cost
  • Trade at any cost (TTIP is finest example of this desire)
  • Mass, unstoppable consumerism, at any cost (any cost to the planet, to people's health and wellbeing, to people's ability to afford it), Capitalism cannot survive without consumerism, we must therefore consume, consume, consume
• We cannot achieve anything close to socialism or ecologism whilst we remain in this powerful capitalist club, where not only can you trade, but you must trade!
• This ideology is at odds with what the Green Party stands for, it's at odds with what I believe we stand for

Democracy is a shade of grey

• Yes, we vote for MEPs, but this is maybe the extent of democracy
• When it really matters the EU has been very clear about how it respects democracy, as the people of Greece know all too well
• In January 2015, the Greek people overwhelmingly voted to elect anti‐austerity party Syriza to parliament - they outright rejected the Brussels / Bundesbank austerity program
• But just 1 month later the EU squashed Greece's hopes of self determination, threatening to bankrupt the country if they did not surrender to the program, unresistable pressure was applied to maintain the Eurozone (at any cost to the people of Greece)
• Austerity for breakfast, lunch and supper, was not the [Greeks'] democratically chosen menu
• The EU is mighty - not democracy at any cost, only democracy at the right cost! At the cost to some.
• So Yes, we vote for MEPs…….Are we satisfied with how EU respects democracy?

Without Self Determination we cannot pursue a green(‐red) agenda

• The case of the Greek People vs the Bundesbank (aka the EU) shows we cannot determine our own path whilst we remain in the EU
• Our green vision for the future is one based on sustainable living, localism, small scale modest consumption, democratic decisions at the most local level feasible, this is at odds with an all powerful growth‐driven economy based on federal capitalism
• I cannot see it is possible to embrace these two ideologies and economic systems. We must sacrifice one or the other.
• Stay in ‐ our hands are tied to an agenda we can't control (TTIP‐like, composed behind closed doors, undemocratic),
• Come out and aren't we exposed to "home‐grown‐much‐of‐the-same"? Yes, we are, but I believe the battle is more winnable against 1 platoon than a whole army of capitalist junkies

What about the benefits of EU Membership?

Some extraordinary and creative claims have been made by the National [Green] Party, such as:

• We cannot tackle climate change individually – the same arguments were used by those who said we can only disarm our nuclear weapons if we do so multilaterally – surely we would still campaign for unilateral disarmament? we can therefore campaign for unilateral climate change strategy?
• Without the EU we won't have workers rights – this is a gross misrepresentation of history. British workers have excellent track record of resistance, rising up, fighting for what is right and just, here in Dorset, the Tolpuddle Martyrs set the course. Women's equal pay, fought hard by people like my mother, or the women at Ford's Dagenham plant. Labour laws, contracts, conditions introduced as a result of trade unions and solidarity. They are being eroded and we must fight here in Britain to protect and improve workers rights – but we mustn't sit idly by and wait for them to be bestowed upon us by the "philanthropists" in the EU
• The NHS is safer if we stay in Europe – I can't begin to understand where that theory comes from. The NHS is ours, and as Jon Orrell has said, each generation must fight to keep it and protect it. there is nothing like it in Europe, we are the best in class as far as that is concerned. Fight for it, don't rely on Europe!

Articles Why I will never vote for the UK Green Party and why you should also make that decision if you value freedom and democracy