Talk:Harry Pollitt

Untitled

Sadly, the cited version of the Ballad of Harry Pollitt is so poorly recollected that it does not scan and would be impossible to sing; it is also poorly punctuated. The actual words for the first three stanzas, as sung on numerous occasions, are:

Now, Harry was a Bolshie, and one of Lenin's lads, Till he was foully murdered by reactionary cads, By reactionary cads, by reactionary cads, Till he was foully murdered by reactionary cads.

He came before St Peter, trembling at the knees: 'Oh, may I speak to comrade God, I'm Harry Pollitt, please? I'm Harry Pollitt, please; I'm Harry Pollitt, please; Oh, may I speak to comrade God, I'm Harry Pollitt, please?'

'Very well', said Peter, 'if you're humble and contrite And a friend of Lady Astor, then OK, you'll be alright; OK, you'll be alright; OK, you'll be alright; And a friend of Lady Astor, then OK, you'll be alright'.

Mountdrayton (talk) 23:23, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

NPOV edits

I've edited the article to be less of a hagiography than it previously was, and closer to a neutral position. Particularly:

• Harry Pollitt supported the war in September 1939 but reversed this position in November 1939.
• There is no evidence that Harry Pollitt was a "strong supporter of the international brigades". He was a communist who lived in the 1930's, but this appears to have been it.
• Harry Pollitt's criticism of the Malayan counter-insurgency appears to have been primarily (according to the sources I can find) from the position that it was a "capitalist war" fought in the interests of rubber-planters. Anyone wanting to say otherwise needs to find sources supporting that position.
• A lot of the changes in CPGB positions appear to have been on direct instructions from Moscow. Pollitt was in direct, secret communication with Moscow.
• Harry Pollitt's electoral performances extend beyond his near-win in 1945, and encompass a lot of other quite heavy defeats. FOARP (talk) 12:39, 23 March 2021 (UTC)

incomplete ref

The three citations of Monty Johnstone added by FOARP are incomplete in the JSTOR source: "1930–194". Spicemix (talk) 20:09, 5 September 2021 (UTC)

Fixed. WP:DIY is a great rule. FOARP (talk) 15:17, 14 September 2021 (UTC)

"Red lives" is not a reliable, independent source

I've deleted the information sourced only to the book "Red Lives" as it appears to have been written by members of the Communist Party of Britain's anniversary team as part of a centenary celebration. This source also attributes the authorship/publication of the book to CPB. WP:RS requires that sourcing been independent of the subject-matter, and this case, the membership of the political party that claims to be the successor to that led by Pollitt is clearly not independent of the subject. Even if it were independent of the subject matter, the publisher does not appear to be a well-established one with a reputation for fact-checking.

Additionally, the following statements based on this source are not supported by other sources. Particularly:

- Pollitt did not appear to play a key role in forming the British battalion. Instead this was set up by Wintringham and others. Our page on the battalion does not even mention Pollitt.

- Pollitt was not a "life-long anti-fascist". He clearly was not anti-fascist during the period of the Hitler-Stalin pact.

- Pollitt was not a "revolutionary". He did not lead any revolutions.

- Pollitt does not appear to have consistently opposed imperialism/colonialism when the USSR was doing the imperialism/colonialism. He appears to have written on the subject of India and Malaya so it appears that he did oppose at least some instances of British imperialism/colonialism and this is the most that the sources support at present.

- Pollitt's financial support for German and Indian communists is not mentioned by other sources and needs better support for inclusion in the article. Particularly, that fact that members of CPGB did these things does not mean it was ordered by Pollitt. FOARP (talk) 15:58, 14 September 2021 (UTC)