Speech at Your Party Founding Conference

If certain sections of this speech were quoted by a news outlet or require more context, I’ve cited that in the following version. I decided to keep my own notes in, so you can see what sections I’ve skipped for time reasons. Remove everything in [Brackets] to receive the speech as I wanted to hold it. This is the speech:

Speech for the Founding Conference of Your Party UK: Hope.

Dear Ladies and Gentlemen and everyone in between and outside of those social categories: Of all the democratic socialist parties across Europe, the last one that should lecture anyone on international solidarity is the German left. Well, here I am anyway. As a representative of Die Linke, I know how rough it can be existing as a democratic socialist within a world subject to the contradictions of capital. However, I think through all the media defamation and other struggles we can so easily forget how monumental this party, our conference here today, truly is. Not just for Britain, but the whole world.

Defamation is Normal Against Left

When in history have the people doing the right thing not been defamed? Their goals been described as utopian, impossible? When have those who wanted to shake the foundation of an established power structure in exchange for something that benefits all over the few, not been attacked unfairly by those few. For those who want feel good politics and defeating fascism with the power of love, I am sorry to tell you that our world isn’t that kind. However, love is always part of the solution, and hence within our ranks solidarity should always be priority number one. We should live the world we want to create as well as possible within our party, otherwise, how would people be reminded of what they are fighting for?

The End of History (?)

These founding documents, which you’ve all probably studied tirelessly, wrote amendments for, and are now here to debate for two days, lay the foundation for a new kind of politics in the United Kingdom. Zohran Mamdani winning the New York mayoral elections, democratic socialist parties being on the rise again in all of Europe, especially in Germany with a historic sweep in the last general elections this year: With decades of unregulated capitalism leading to the degredation of public services everywhere, people are fed up and it’s safe to say that, at the latest with the founding of our party, once and for all…

Thatcherism is dead! [Applause]

Yet this isn’t a reason to celebrate right away, because as the strengthening of the far right has shown, the hole neoliberalism left is currently being flooded with reactionary, fascist forces like Reform and their kin. It’s our job to offer an alternative, by daring to criticize the system responsible for the worsening of people’s lives, instead of trying to once again find scapegoat after scapegoat.

We recognize that people’s lives are worsening due to the contradictions of capitalism: The economic division between the rich and poor increasing, less people being able to afford a place to live, more people becoming homeless, more hatred, racism, and transphobia as a tool to divide the working class, something that has always been inherent to the capitalist system and always will be. This system isn’t broken, it’s working exactly as intended.

We aren’t just planning on managing a broken system or fighting against symptoms, but we will point out and criticize the root of our problems: the capitalist world and the faulty electoral system that upholds it.

We know: Capitalism cannot be reformed, it needs to be abolished! [Applause]

Hence, it isn’t our job to fight its symptoms, become managers of this crisis, and have our main political goals just be redistribution of wealth, we need to ask why wealth is even distributed this way to begin with and establish a system where the exploitation underlying that fact doesn’t exist in the first place. [Applause, but continue talking] A socialist economic system. That’s our goal!

Anti-Imperialist Positioning

I’m proud to stand here today. Proud of every volunteer and member of our party.

At what was once deemed the core of imperialism, and is now threatening the world to become the core of imperialism yet again, with Trump and Blair’s plan occupy Gaza, to now have an anti imperialist party fighting the status quo here, is a success the working classes of the world must rally behind and be proud of, not just the people of the United Kingdom. [Applause]

The people of Cuba would live much better, if it wasn’t for the global blockade. India would be rich if the United Kingdom never robbed it of approximately 45 trillion U.S. Dollars in wealth. There wouldn’t be nearly as much conflict in the Arab world, if it wasn’t for British occupation, subjugation and oppression. Kurdistan would be united and free, as it will be again within our lifetime.

Palästina, Kurdistan – Intifada, Serhildan! [Applause]

What is International Solidarity?

These countries don’t need our pittance, they need our solidarity, and that means fighting the imperialist oppressor at home, not just rebuilding the chaos they have left behind and will continue to create over and over again. “I envy you. You Westerners are very lucky. You are fighting the most important fight of all as you live in the belly of the beast”, Che Guevara once said. The Bandung Spirit would be flourishing, the global south emancipating itself, if it wasn’t for our constant subjugation, be it through sanctions, bribery, weapons exports or occupation. Nay to that, all of it! Now! [Applause]

On Terrorism & Palestine Action

Terrorism. What’s that? A word with no internationally recognized definition, suddenly being used against domestic organizations like Palestine Action to justify their silencing. The so-called global war on terror culminating in what was always its goal: pointing the double-edged sword of imperialism against one’s own people.

[Too little time, skip this]

As if the west ever had an issue with Islamic terror? In the 80s the Mujahideen were “our” allies. In the 90s, one of your most famous newspapers, The Independent, and this is real by the way, even portrayed the Osama Bin Laden as an anti-soviet freedom fighter who simply wants the best for his people. Yet, when they no longer served their purpose, they became enemy, and the next endless desert wars were started for two decades. Millions of Iraqis, Afgahnis, Iranians, dead.

But today, islamic terrorism becomes okay for western powers yet again: in Syria, we can begin collaborating with a president who used to be on the US’ most wanted list just last year, with a head bounty of 10 million USD, for being a founder for the Al Qaeda affiliate organization HTS, now sitting hand in hand with our leaders. Why? Because they support our geopolitical interests yet again.

These Al Qaeda affiliates are no longer classified as terrorists, but Palestine Action is. Yeah, right.

As if Islamist beliefs are so very different to other far right beliefs. If Nigel Farage were to ever sit down and talk to Islamic terrorists, he may realize that they have more in common with his so-called “conservative” views than he is yet to believe. But no, we must only condemn the dangers of far right thought when it’s foreign, as if that matters.

[Continue here]

Islamophobia was always a necessity as part of the manufacturing of consent of our war efforts. It’s a tool. Hatred doesn’t come up out of nowhere, it always serves a capitalist purpose.

Our Party?

When I spoke of this party, I said our party, didn’t I? Many people asked me in the past months why I, as a German, was such a strong supporter of this British party or interested in British politics at all. Now, I could respond to this citing my many queer, especially trans friends who finally feel like they have a political home, and feel the hope spreading through this country thanks to the movement you started. I could talk about how soul crushing Israel’s genocide in Gaza is, and how this political movement allows for a glimmer of hope in an age of darkness. But let me respond to this inconsistency with a question:

How many proletariats are there? 195? Or just one? [Applause]

Elephant in the Room

[Skip this if little time]

In that analysis we are unique. And a unique party is in a unique position when it comes to debates and internal struggles. So let me address the elephant in the room: I’ve read lots of criticism of this party and heard many people who have already given up hope, to which I can only ask: really? Not to be mean or anything, or maybe I’m missing something, but in the last two years in which I’ve been a member of the German left, we’ve had way worse: We’ve split, a cult of personality formed a party from inside our ranks, named after its leader, and defeated us in the federally run EU elections last year. We’ve had constant infighting due to some of our member’s unbroken support of the genocidal apartheid state, with daily defamation and public statements against me and my anti-imperialist comrades. Many already wrote off Die Linke as dead. Many lost hope and left after the massive election bomb last year. Only because the contradictions of capitalism came to a maximum, every other party from the Greens to the Social Democrats peddling the talking points of the AfD (our Reform), only because of these developments have people flocked to the last party remaining true to its antifascist values. Us. The Left.

[Continue here if little time]

I believe in this party, not because I need to know its leaders or have trust in anyone particular. I believe in the success of this party because I understand history, because our analysis of this world is materialist, and the same logic of capital that has lead to the rise of fascism back in the day applies to Great Britain today. The contradictions of capitalism are coming to a maximum, people will flock to reactionary forces, other parties will try to imitate their racist politics in a doomed attempt to win over some voters, and in that mess we will be right there, ready with the solution. [Applause]

Words of Hope

A glimmer of hope for the disenfranchised. That’s what we are. We must never steer away from our goal of a socialist world, and on our path there, never forget one thing: we organize hope. That’s what socialists do. It’s the one resource more scarce than crude oil or good prime ministers. Hope. A finite belief that a better world is possible.

I believe there can be no crime greater in the age of neoliberalism than for the ruling class to have robbed us of hope. Nobody voices their opinions anymore, they state their analysis of the world as fact and their preferred political actions as the only possible consequence. They pretend our solutions are utopian, and by doing so, smother any social justice movement before it could even launch. When in reality: Another world is possible, otherwise their propaganda would be unnecessary. [Applause]

The war over hegemony, authority, and your future has been outsourced into the one space capitalism has yet to occupy: your mind.

Final Words

Rosa Luxemburg once said that saying what must be said is the most revolutionary act, and while I don’t disagree, let me give a more modern interpretation: Having hope, despite everything, must be the most revolutionary act there is. [Applause]

Yet saying what must be said, I can also do. So with my final words, let me leave with one message so contemporary and yet timeless: I oppose genocide. I support… any Action against it. My name is Erik Uden, and we from the German Left wish you the best of success for all to come.

End Notes

Published in Portuguese by the Socialism and Liberty Party of Brazil.
Published by “The Left Lane” (thoughts on The Left Lane).
Grok thought I was an Australian actor.

Watch the speech as it happened here on YouTube.