Tuesday 2 December 2014

BANarchists at PEOPLE'S HISTORY MUSEUM

THE busy business of banning Barry Woodling continued apace last Saturday at the People's History Museum during this year's so-called Anarchist Bookfair on the banks of the River Irwell.  The river is a 39-mile stretch of water that flows through the Irwell Valley in the North West of England.  The source of the river is at Irwell Springs on Deerpark Moor just north of Bacup.  The river forms a boundary between the great cities of Manchester and Salford.

Less great and more murky than the river itself is the politics of the Manchester Banarchists, who annually ban Mr. Barry Woodling from their midst at a now discredited annual event called the Manchester & Salford Anarchist Bookfair.  Though Mr. Woodling, who lives in Swinton, is of Jewish descent, he was first expelled from the Bookfair in 2012, when he was  accused of  being an 'anti-Semite' by one of the organisers of this event and seemingly 'banned for life'.  Although this has now been disputed, no-one will put a precise date on when he might be accepted as a good comrade again.

The Banarchists are committed to excluding folk like Barry for all kinds of reasons. 'Anti-Semite' was the first charge in 2012, but recently it has been claimed by Peter Good, a self-proclaimed professor of mirthology, who has had a stall at the bookfair for donkey's years, that Barry was somewhat intemperate in 2012 and indulged in altercations with various stall-holders.  Mr. Woodling denies this but has never been given the opportunity to put his side of the case because no proper case has been put forward by the organisers of this event.

Who are the organisers?

Well, it is not possible to identify the two main protagonists because they assume the titles 'David under the Pavement' and 'Meat and two Veg'

On Saturday various veteran anarchists like Ron Marsden from Didsbury, and a well-known senior fellow-traveller, Mike Ballard, from Chorlton, expessed their surprise at the continuing ban on Woodling.  Yet, the exclusion of Barry continues.

Who is to blame?

It seems that the management of the Museum were asked about their stand on this matter by other parties who happened to be at the event:  'Is Barry Woodling banned for life?' someone asked.

The Staff manager present said certainly not but was unable to identify any date in the distant future when Mr. Woodling would be allowed into the 'Anarchist Bookfair'

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Yawn!

martin s. gilbert said...

That is why, see post above, I did not attend that event. Although quite innocent of any political connection with Brian Bamford, since his destruction of the Nothern Anarchist Network, I am tarred-with-the-same brush as Barry Woodling. My relationship with Brian is like that which I have with my Zionist relatives, love the company but nothing in common politically.

Spark said...

Looks like Ian Kerr's Consulting Association and the Economic League could learn a trick or two off the Manchester Banarchists! LONG LIVE THE BLACKLISTS and the Anarchist Federation!

Anonymous said...

why bother commenting on Brian's vanity organ? Few do.

He will only twist what is said for his cadre's own warped purposes who like to wallow and nurse their pints surrounded by the feint smell of wee and crusty old salad cream.

Dave said...

Good God. Are they still banning Barry Woodling? Shouldn't the anarchists in Manchester be organising a boycott of the Manchester Bookfair?

bammy said...

Ronnie Marsden was this year (2017) accused of applying the original label 'anti-semite' to Barry Woodling & using Veg as a ventriloquist dummy to spin the yarn at a bookfair at the People's History Museum in 2012. Veg, has been a long-term 'organiser' / stooge at a series of Manchester Anarchist Bookfairs since at least 2010. Veg, when asked outside the Partisan bookfair premises, didn't deny it was Ronnie's very original idea to use the offensive term. The people who organise the Manchester Anarchist Bookfair have now been banned forever from using the People's History Museum in Manchester as a venue for their bookfairs owing to their intransigence in banning Barry Woodling and others from their events.