INTRODUCTION

Welcome to this post about the opening day of Marxism 2017 (see @MarxismFestival on twitter). As I write this, we are having our lunch break on Day 3.

GETTING THERE

With the first meeting due to begin at 12:30 on Thursday I opted for the 9:57 train from King’s Lynn. I duly arriuved with time to deposit my larger bag in the designated bag room, get information about the exact details of my accommodation (I was in a hall of residence, just not sure exactly where). 

MEETING 1: SARAH BATES ON WHAT SOCIALISM WOULD BE LIKE

This was an excellent start to the festival, addressing the question of what we are for. Sarah provided an excellent lead off, and the discussion that followed was also excellent. Here are some pictures from the early stages of the event:

MEETING 2: BIODIVERSITY AND SPECIES EXTINCTION – SARAH ENSOR AND IAN RAPPEL

This meeting featured so much in depth information that I shall be devoting a whole post to it. For the moment, here are a couple of pics to whet the appetite:

MEETING 3: ANTISEMITISM, ISLAMOPHOBIA AND THE FAR RIGHT: ROB FERGUSON

An excellent meeting, with the main speaker an anti-Zionist Jew.

THE OPENING RALLY

We had a superb venue for our opening rally, The Light, Friends Meeting House, Euston Road. We also had speakers to match, with people from all sorts of campaigns, such as cleaning workers who had bested the bosses at the London School of Economics, anti-fracking campaigners from Lancashire, speakers from the Justice for Grenfell campaign and campaigners against police brutality. I think everyone left this meeting feeling angered but also uplifted.

AROUND AND ABOUT

I conclude this post with some photos from this part of central London: