From the front of our website

"We do not publish anything considered racist/homophobic/sexist/ableist,"

This article is racist/Islamophobic. We should not have published it. It should be taken down and maybe replaced with a statement explaining why. Anyone who wants a newspaper which publishes crap like this so that no one who suffers from racism wants to touch it with a bargepole then they're free to start their own, but I thought Slaney Street was meant to be different.

Okay but this is so not relevant to Slaney street and I'm reyt not having this shit storm. Like Sean said if there was even the slightest concern about racism should be discussed and we have always done so in the past. It was a dick move

I've just read the article, and without knowing the background, find it completely incomprehensible. On those grounds alone, I don't think it should be on our website. Then it seems to be a product of a faction fight, and again, I'm not sure we should be part of that. So I'll vote for its removal.

I think it should be taken down.

The damage this could've done to slaney street is something that cannot be overlooked.
I believe over 2/3s of the editorial board want this off, so I think i take it down
and I think we should prepare an article to explain why we took down a article that was very clearly posted

Yeah I don't want this on here for a whole variety of reasons. Please remove.

Would you be able to do that, Mumit? Somebody obviously needs to write something, and it needs to be someone who knows what's going on. I don't know whether you're in one of the factions involved in the fight though.

If you do it, something short and simple is all it wants.

The only problem with me is that some people may not be happy with me doing it. Nonetheless I will have something short written up and posted on here by tomorrow evening

Is there anyone else? Trouble is, we don't have many people who know what's going on.

Perhaps you could post it here for starters, so it's coming from the group not just from you.

Are people happy with this:

Dear readers,

Earlier today an article was posted on our website attacking the NUS' Black Students Officer. This was done unilaterally by one person with admin access who acted contrary to our previous processes. When this was discovered the editorial board had an emergency discussion this evening due to the article's potentially racist content and decided to remove the article immediately. We apologise to anyone who was hurt by this being posted and we will review our processes to prevent something like this ever happening again.

Firstly Sean. Why didn't it go up on NCAFC. I didn't think it was appropriate for it go up on NCAFC so I offered to publish it on Slaney Street. It is a complex comment piece article on as you say a “contentious issue”. NCAFC is a broad campaign representing hundreds of members. This article is clearly more suitable for a website that was set up to host free and open debate on the left. Also why is this irrelevant? Considering Malia is a Birmingham student and we have been pretty badly split over the issue and have been debating it huge amount. It makes perfect sense to publish copy on the subject.

I think it is more than a little disappointing how quickly the commitment to debate and reply and also how quickly our democratic procedures are asked to thrown out the window and new precedents are made up.

You removed the article without a 2/3 vote of the board nor did you go through any of time-frames procedures in our agreed constitution.

To address Dan's points - in order that you make them, not order of importance.

Point 1. “The 46-strong NUS National Executive Council (NEC) all support action in solidarity with Kurdistan, yet have voted to do nothing about it.” No. They voted for a rewritten motion to be put to the next meeting.

Firstly, Mcash also mentions that they voted to re-write the motion for the next meeting a few paragraphs later in the article!

Secondly, it has been six month since the motion was first sent in its been knocked back two NUS NEC meetings, if the will was there it could have easily have been passed by now. Kurds have been being murdered in their thousands for all this time. We wouldn't be so tolerant of this delay in sorting out a position on other issues. If Israel was bombing Gaza for six months and Palestinians were being murdered in these numbers we wouldn't be uncritical of constant delays and constant ignoring of motions. Especially when people have months to make the appropriate amendments.

Another quote from Mcashs post“Similarly, the content of Cooper and Salih’s motion did not prevent the rest of the NEC from doing anything to demonstrate solidarity with the Kurds.” - They have done nothing. That is just a fact.

This point is not a reason not to publish it clearly.

Point 2
“The Black Students Officer, Malia Bouattia, opposed it on the grounds that it is Islamophobic and that it supports US military intervention.” This is massively misleading. She opposed the motion because a nonsensical part of it about encouraging students to boycott ISIS supporters had Islamophobic consequences. She doesn’t think opposing ISIS is Islamophobic and has already condemned them in the Black Students Campaign statement. The author of this article is planting the false idea in people’s heads that she thinks opposing ISIS is Islamophobic.
Firstly “The author of this article is planting the false idea in people’s heads that she thinks opposing ISIS is Islamophobic.”
I just don't think this the case. Mcash, NCAFC, Dan Cooper have all issued public statements that they don't think Malia thinks that. In response to the right wing attacks on Malia that is what we all said. I don't think that is what Mcash is trying to do, why would he do that? Why would he want to do that? What he is saying in that text is true Malia did oppose the motion it on the grounds that it is Islamophobic. However I don't think in him saying that he is trying to say “she thinks opposing ISIS is Islamophobic”. I think considering that he later refers specifically to resolves of the motion 5 and the boycott thing as the questionable part of the motion which could have deleted, I think it is clear this is what he is talking about.
Maybe I'm hopelessly naïve but I don't believe that Mcash has an agenda of trying to paint Malia as an ISIS supporter. My concern is a lot of this has turned in hyperbole on all sides, that nearly everything is being construed in the worst possible way.
I think this is your strongest reason for not wanting to publish the article. Presenting Malia as ISIS supporter or opposing opposition to ISIS on the grounds of Islamophobia should be avoided. If that is something he had said explicitly in the blog, not something that has to be interpreted by presenting him with the worst possible of intentions then I would not have published it. Considering the context that he and all of NCAFC have put out a statement saying they did not think she thinks that. I think that is not his intention in the article.
I also I don't think there is a danger of this blog re-kicking off the attacks in the rightwing press the issue is over and has been reported. I think after the fallout it is important to analyse what happened in a slightly calmer situation, which is what he is doing and it should be encouraged. You should 100% do the same and write an article for the website.

next on your comments on the motion the resolves 5 to boycott ISIS related organisations. This part could have been deleted on the day or amended beforehand. Cooper doesn't support Boycott nor do the AWL (who are famously opposed to BDS as a tactic). The Motion was written by  Roza Salih, the Kurdish Vice President of Strathclyde Students and NUS Scotland international student officer’. Not Cooper. Considering BDS is a normal demand of many other campaigns of the student left you could see why she might have included it? As Mcash says in the article “instead of arguing that Resolves 5 the boycott point has unintended consequences that could be damaging to Muslim students, it was seen as a hostile and intentional attack from Cooper on Muslims everywhere. This meant that denunciations took the place of constructive debate.” <--- this is true really I agree with this there is no reason it could have been deleted many people would have agreed with the deletion.
“The problem with the motion is that it didn’t oppose the ONGOING Western military in Syria, not that it ‘supported’ intervention. There’s a big difference.
Firstly I just don't know if this is true or not? I have seen different people arguing both positions and no clarification from Malia. There have been a lot of people saying the problem with the motion was that is was pro-intervention and that cooper is pro-intervention. Particularly the stalinists in the NUS. Fiona Edwards has taken that position.
This issue is confused by the fact there are some very real stalinists who are close to Malia politically like Aaron Kiely the stalinist socialist action member of the NEC. Who were crowing about the motion falling online. Who are saying all these things. There is a very legimate and important criticism to made of the stalinist politics of Socialist Action and SBL. Malia is too close Socialist action and hasn't made a clear any opposition to their politics.
Is this really a big difference? Considering that the key reason that nearly everyone is quoting for “The problem with the motion is that it didn’t oppose the ONGOING Western military in Syria” is that not having text condemning western intervention would not make the motion clearly anti-intervention and therefore pro-intervention. It seems to me that being critical of the motion not having explicit anti intervention text is the same as saying the motion is pro-intervention and needs clear non-intervention text.
Is this a reason not to publish? I don't think so hopefully it is something that would be clarified through debate. Malia should also separate herself from the politics of socialist action.
As for supporting the ongoing Syrian bombing campaign. Yes the motion could have used some text opposing this but the NUS does already have a position against it and again it could have been added in in an amendment rather than it being voted down. It is also worth noting the the NUS is already opposed to the Syrian bombing campaign and the motion passing without text opposing the Syrian bombing campaign would not have changed that. In that situation I do think it was a little odd for it to be opposed on the grounds that it didn't have text repeating opposition to the bombing of Syria.
“He switches the order of events that it was the press that attacked Malia and then Twitter/far-right exploded” Shall I ask him to change it? Again I think this probably not a sinister move and probably just a factual mistake.
“Bouattia’s international politics are influenced by Stalinism” It’s obvious what this means, Cooper said elsewhere too that it’s not opposing anyone who’s opposed to the US government, “
Malia is close to Stalinist socialist action and SBL. There are Stalinists on the NEC who have tried to delay/vote down this motion on the basis on their Stalinist politics. There is a legitmate criticism to be made of Stalinist politics and how slow the left is, as it in this case to take seriously solidarity when international political forces don't line up in certain clear way.
“And as if they don’t know the implications of falsely accusing the only Muslim Officer in the NUS for years of refusing to oppose ISIS.”
 Roza Salih who wrote the motion is NUS officer of kurdish from a muslim family as she describes. Can you stop whitewashing her out of existence.
“In fact, the core narrative of the articles in the mainstream press is true: Bouattia spoke against a motion condemning ISIS on the grounds that it was Islamophobic.” Fuck off. The core narrative was that Bouattia spoke against a motion BECAUSE it condemned ISIS, and that is not true. This is propagandistic twisting with racist undertones.”
There is a lot of stuff in the right-wing press Bouattia spoke against a motion condemning ISIS on the grounds that it was Islamophobic. Like see this one of the main ones from the daily mail says exactly just that. (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2794183/national-union-students-refuses-condemn-isis-fears-islamophobic.html). Maybe some other right wing press articles span it like you said it. However clearly many posted it like Mcash says. I don't think that was “propagandistic twisting with racist undertones” on his part – however again this just about what we think of Mcash's intentions.
“Despite the fact that he started it and the press/far-right are only repeating what he said happened”. He didn't start putting it in the public domain. From numerous tweets on the day from accounts that have thousands of followers like Kielys and SBL and other on facebook. Yes they seem to have got it from his blog but why could they not have got it from other places? This never seems to have been addressed? This tweet from Keily weeks before could have easily have kicked exactly the same thing off. https://fbcdn-sphotos-d-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-xap1/v/t1.0-9/10653715_10152654071140240_9090767666823085185_n.jpg?oh=8a86bc8871b509ae9561742406c79696&oe=54B11316&__gda__=1422206787_d9d77d7d27913acf10d0aa08a3dfd5d9
“About the whole inaction thing, McCash surely knows that Malia etc have been trying to get an emergency NEC meeting so they can pass the amended anti-ISIS motion. He doesn’t mention this because it undermines his line that she doesn’t care about Kurds and is responsible for ‘inaction’.”
It doesn't change the fact that nothing has been done for six months while thousands of Kurds and Kurdish students are organising lots of activity.
“The author is massively associated with the AWL (I don’t understand why he doesn’t just join, I’ve never seen him disagree with them on anything”.
I have never seen Malia disagree with Socialist Action on anything but yet we seem to be able to separate them... I know of several reasons why he doesn't join and why the AWL don't want him. I assume you might know of some difference between Malia and Socialist Action.
“Whenever something controversial has come up (e.g. the Friends of the Earth stuff) we have had consultation”. That is just not true nor was the friends of the earth thing consulted on really.
“Why in this case has someone decided to ignore all precedent we have for this kind of stuff and just do whatever the hell they like with our space.”
Seriously what precedent? All the precedents people have cited so far were only discussed because they went into the paper copy. The online editorial process has always been to allow a more broader set a viewpoints.
Going on Mumits points, sorry not going to reply to all them.
Clearly the press did not ignore his comments.... I don't think anyone is saying the press did ignore his comments.
However just because someone in the press copy and pastes 'This is an issue which needs to be discussed in more depth, but essentially the idea is widespread that if a Liberation Officer opposes something, it must be bad.’ Doesn't mean that the statement is therefore wrong. Further It is true that his left wing criticism of Stalinism were not included in the press statements can you didn't quote any press references to his points against Stalinism.
- "the majority of the NEC has not accepted current and former Black Students’ Officers’ defence of Julian Assange or the SWP” This is a powerful, bigoted and racist accusation insinuating a connection between Black Students and Rape Apologists which will not be tolerated
But why is this insinuating connection between Black Students and Rape Apologists? I don;t understand? What is said in that sentence is the case and this did actually happen and the people the black students officer in question in this case were defenders of assange. Its not Racist to state the positions that people took defending Assange and George Galloway... their positions are not above criticism, they were wrong in defending Assange.

I'm not at all convinced at all that this article is beyond the pale of debate and that it is so contentious that it must not be allowed to see the light of day.

@seanfarmelo @daniellindley @bobwhitehead @robert2 @mumitm

Firstly you called a board meeting this evening? to have it taken down. Obviously that board meeting was illegitimate due it being called and organised and decision completed while I was asleep. Secondly you didn't have 2/3rd vote needed to remove an article. Is this really how thin the commitment to democracy is?

Edward don't 'I didn't think it was appropriate for ncafc' to a group of people who are fully aware of the democratic vote down of this article going up there

The decision has not been completed.

1) the article clearly says removed pending editorial decision, a meeting hasn't happened yet and another statement will presumably go up once that has happened.
2) we have 7 active editors who have contributed to any aspect of Slaney street within the past 5 months (on loomio or in physical meetings or by email). At the recent conference an action point was to ask inactive editors to resign (partly to make it easier to set up our bank account, and partly to avoid problems of people referencing the democracy of a large but inactive board)- I haven't gotten round to doing this yet, and perhaps this is my fault, but I've got a long list of Slaney street tasks that I'm slowly trying to work through.
To my understanding 4/7 active editors wanted the blog removed and I made clear to the person who removed this blog that I would be abstaining, making that 4 out of 6 editors which is a two thirds majority.
3) I'm not happy that we've been put in a position where a blog has been removed, but neither am I keen on an absolute lack of discussion or consulting, especially with people who have strong concerns about the line of argument taken in the article, happening prior to you posting this article up.

1) you cannot do that! that is against the rules we all agreed to run this paper.
2) That is really bollocks point you are using some very inactive members in your count of the people on the board. You know as well as I do that is bollocks to just abitrarily reduce the number of editors down 6 to give yourself a 2/3rds majority.
3)it would have been better for everyone if due process had been followed. We have everything to gain from calling a proper meeting to discuss the contents of the article to convince each other of its merits and and problems. We have everything to lose by not talking to each and abandoning completely the democratic rules we have place.

You clearly made your case and 5 of the 7 editorial board members who've posted on the Loomio or been to a meeting in the last 6 months (our last main meeting we agreed that the rest would be asked to resign) wanted it taken down. That is over two thirds. We are not counting long inactive asked-to-resign members in the total or it'd be impossible to have even a majority on doing anything.

Furthermore, several people who've been involved in Slaney Street the last few months (but aren't board members) have unanimously on here said they want the article taken down. It's not undemocratic for us to do what almost all of the people active in Slaney Street strongly wanted to do.

Your above post just shows you have no idea at all what's going on in the NUS and really should stop before you do more damage. But if you insist, do this on your own personal space. You've been told by Slaney Street to not drag us into your crap again.

Overnight in a matter of hours!!!! you decided it while me and Kelly and other members of Slaney Street who disagree were offline/asleep/busy/at work and unable post any replies. Lets stop pretending you had any legitimacy in the rules for the removal and get back to debating the article or what do now.

This may seem an ‘apolitical’ response but this piece feeds into my wider confusion as to the identity and purpose of Slaney Street.

I have read this article three times and I do not feel informed or more knowledgable after reading it.

I accept there are important political issues and differences at stake here but the post is an internal polemic from one view point without context and without other posts providing alternative perspectives.

If this matter is to be aired here then there is still a duty of the Slaney Street editors to frame the debate so a wider and non-student audience can understand it and take an informed view on it.

If Slaney Street is to develop as a media project then it must keep its intended audience and readership to the fore.

I think there does need to be an agreed resolution to the constitutional questions raised by the posting and the response to it. There needs to be an urgent editorial meeting set to do this.

In my opinion rather than return to the McCash posting I would propose there should be a discussion of how Slaney Street should seek to cover the issues relating to Syria.

For example there is a significant Kurdish community in Birmingham can we report different perspectives and responses to the events of Kobane and beyond.

I think Mumit's response needs a bit of rewriting, so it's not blaming any individual for posting it.

Who knows any politically inclined Kurds who could tell us who to go to? I know a few apolitical ones, but I don't know when I'm likely to bump into them.

I've raised this question before: who is our intended audience? This article was apparently written for students involved in a particular issue, and without context, is incomprehensible to anyone outside that debate. The way it's distributed means it's likely to reach a wider Birmingham audience, so it's important that articles should be accessible to that audience, with editorial material to give the background where necessary.

Hi everybody. I hope you will excuse me posting given that I contribute so little to debates often had on here. I read the article, didn't really like it, but was pretty sure it was posted up in accordance with the editorial guidelines.

However, what seems to be the case is that this article is particularly controversial - not just in terms of its content, but in terms of the manner in which it was posted and subsequently removed. Without wanting to take sides in this debate, I would suggest that a meeting of the editorial board be called by the editors so that this issue can be resolved in a constructive fashion. This seems to me to be the right course of action - both sides in this debate seem to have particular and legitimate grievances that need to be addressed to each other. I think this can be best achieved in a face-to-face meeting which can decide the best course of action.

I also hope that the editorial board will have the interests of Slaney Street as a paper at the forefront of their minds when discussing this issue.

The editorial board should meet first to see if they can discuss and resolve their differences and if they can't the matter should go to a membership meeting for a final decision.

As someone who is not a member (despite several attempts I have still not paid any money!) I think the best way to proceed is to go ahead with the scheduled editorial board of Tuesday of next week at 6 PM.
Here we have a sharp dispute (these things happen) which needs to be resolved without doing damage to what is so far an important and successful initiative.
Dan says the article was racist and his opponents say it's removal was unconstitutional. That will only be resolved by a vote at a face to face meeting. If next Tuesday is not suitable then rearrange it.
The recent successful conference noted that several EB members had de facto dropped out, but only Kara had formally resigned. It was considered re electing the EB but instead agreed to muddle through till the next scheduled conference on 20 th January. If things cannot be resolved next Tuesday then the conference should be brought forward as an emergency one as demanded.
There is also the matter of the FoE to resolve next Tuesday.

I suggest one hour on this dispute and FoE, and one hour on issue 6 at the EB

Where

That depends on the result of the vote? If the proposal for an emergency conference is passed, do we just go ahead with an EB that just focuses on issue 6? Or does it get cancelled?

This is the first time an article has been censored and it has been censored very clearly against the rules of the paper. Who should police the actions of the editorial board the board itself? Can the editoral board give a vote of confidence in itself? no of course not. I don't see how a meeting of the editorial board will resolve this issue. We need a full members meeting arranged with atleast a weeks notice.

All meetings are open to members regardless, we have a meeting scheduled for next week. I don't see what the difference is and why this is being proposed and signed by people as if it is something that isn't happening next week anyhow. Next weeks meeting is an editorial meeting for the next print though so would encourage discussion of this not to derail the already existing business + FOE discussion.

Actually, I sent an article to the site some time ago, which never saw the light of day. I was slightly miffed, but assumed that someone had decided that it was too crap to go out. Maybe it was, or perhaps it was just an oversight.
Anyway, move on - am I right that there are enough votes for an all members meeting? In that case it will have to be organised. But what about the current EB and the next issue of the paper, deadline Friday and EB next Tuesday? Presumably that is all still going ahead?

I had one printed and not posted. I suspect they're just oversights.

We should not be calling a members' meeting over this. All that is going to do is export this ridiculous student sectarian war into Slaney Street which has nothing to do with us and will create even more ugliness. We have the editorial board meeting on Tuesday and anyone else who wants to discuss can come do so there.

Until yesterday Slaney Street was sorting out the new edition the deadline of which is tomorrow. We were trying to get new articles in which have been pitched to us. We were busy doing this. This has massively wasted our time when we're trying to run a community newspaper here, not being forced to fight invasions of irrelevant student factionalism.

I'm absolutely exhausted by this and the events of the last few weeks even before this got even worse when it was brought into Slaney Street. Now calling a member's meeting where we can put more efforts into fighting this out more feels like a strategy of trying to mentally break people until they cave in. I don't appreciate how the people calling for this have made no consideration of how their actions are hurting people and have made no attempt to talk to anyone of the people directly affected by this mess and their subsequent actions. It is unbelievably arrogant to behave like this like they're the most important people in the world and everything must stop for them.

I believe me and the other editors acted as best we could in the absolutely awful situation we were thrown into due to that article being posted like that. It's very misleading to argue "we haven't done something like this before" when that's because no one has unilaterally just posted a hugely controversial and damaging article before. It's because Slaney Street has been run pretty nicely and with mutual respect that it has never been necessary to take action such as this until now.

I do believe we acted within the rules by taking it down but also agree our rules are not well written and open to interpretation so should be sorted out. I think interpreting our editors to mean those actually active in the last 6 months is a reasonable opinion. It is also in our rules that we do not post racist content and even if he disagrees the person who posted this knew full well that some of us who were aware of the context would consider this article racist, yet he didn't even ask the other editors before doing it. This is a very nasty way to act and shows a complete lack of care for other people and marginalised people in particular. It is against all the values I believe Slaney Street is meant to uphold to do something like that and I do not believe we were under any obligation to facilitate such rotten behaviour by keeping that twisted article up.

This whole thing has already turned into people waging an NUS Trotskyite faction style war. It's horrible and is the kind of thing that will make no one want to be involved in this thing when we have to deal with these attacks because some petulant insensitive person is demanding to be allowed to do something shit and is throwing tantrums and causing havoc until they get what they want. Just leave us alone. If you want to wage war over what's happened in the NUS do it somewhere else not Slaney Street.

I also don't see how this poll can have any legitimacy when the creator is on one hand arguing for a particular very strict interpretation of our rules, yet what is the process here? Who gets to vote in this poll (members, editors?).What proportion need to approve a member's meeting, a majority, 2/3rds? What even is this.

Can people still come to the editorial meeting on Tuesday though! I might make a facebook event if that is ok?

@seanfarmelo where will it be?

Yes do, please. We need to hash this out face to face. The ICC or the library?

ICC

Suits me.

OK

On second thoughts I'm not going to make an event, as it is a little bit hairy with regards to FOE stuff, so calling an event that is publicly visible so close in the future isn't something I think is a good idea. So best that people here on this thread and group just remember that the meeting to discuss the print edition (and this thread if people want) is happening at 6pm on Tuesday at the ICC

Why is it a bit hairy? What's likely to happen do you think?

Neither me and kelly can make the editoral meeting, we both have work that night. As people know we need notice to be able to book time off work. Despite the fact we have got enough people supporting the call for the members meeting to have it called (we need 5 members by the constitution) we are not going to push ahead with it.

It is clear that what people might rather happen is that people want to just de-facto recognise the removal of the article, and not really discuss it. What people seem to want is to have the decision to remove approved as an agenda point at the next EB meeting.

I think it obvious that when this many people are questioning the legitimacy of the board, that it can't just meet and a majority approve its own actions. However if this what people want to happen I guess there is nothing I can do to stop it other than push ahead with an unpopular members meeting. I think there is a serious danger that at this point we cease to become a democratic and plural group and Slaney Street goes from becoming a discussion website to one that represents the views of a narrow group. Rather than attempting to be an institution which seeks to host and propagate left wing debate of many kinds.

A number of comments so far have already indicated that that is what some would like to happen "the majority of board want it down, take it down etc", which is of course opposite of the principles of plurality we agreed when setting up Slaney Street.

I can't attend the meeting but I think we need to do three things in relation to this incident that would be a reasonable compromise and restore some legitimacy to the board.

1) Re-affirm we are plural paper and we seek to recognise and host both sides of this debate.

2) with this in mind we should re-publish Mcash's article. With this added at the start and with a reply article written by whoever published at soon as it is written.

"My article on Slaney Street was taken down several hours after it was posted. I have been informed this was because two editors felt “The author of this article is planting the false idea in people’s heads that she thinks opposing ISIS is Islamophobic.”. This was not my intention I would like to clarify that I don't think she thinks opposing ISIS is Islamophobic. I think you have read some of my words in a certain way while attributing to me the very worst possible intentions. I think context here is everything on a issue that is getting very distorted. I think it is obvious that nobody in the student movement thinks that Malia Bouattia thinks opposing ISIS is Islamophobic or that she supports ISIS. I hope with this note before the article any doubts about my views on this can be assuaged."

Hopefully this will ensure that Mcash's article can no longer be considered Islamicophobic and within the realm of political debate?

3) We should publish this statement or a statement like it as an attempt to heal this divide.

For the first time last week an article was censored and removed from the Slaney Street website. The article is now back up on the website and reply to its points will also be up shortly (if it has not already been published). The article has also been published with the following clarification to ensure that it can not be interpreted in anyway that could be considered islamophobic.

"My article on Slaney Street was taken down several hours after it was posted. I have been informed this was because two editors felt “The author of this article is planting the false idea in people’s heads that she thinks opposing ISIS is Islamophobic.”. This was not my intention I would like to clarify that I don't think she thinks opposing ISIS is Islamophobic. I think you have read some of my words in a certain way while attributing to me the very worst possible intentions. I think context here is everything on a issue that is getting very distorted. I think it is obvious that nobody in the student movement thinks that Malia Bouattia thinks opposing ISIS is Islamophobic or that she supports ISIS. I hope with this note before the article any doubts about my views on this can be assuaged." - James Mcash.

The Editor in question who published it, Edd Bauer, published it in accordance with the rules of Slaney Street. Our rules state that it only requires one editors approval to publish an article to this designed to ensure that even minority viewpoints can get published. Slaney Street does this because it doesn't want to represent the views of a clique or a sect but because it wants to be institution that supports and propagates left wing debate of many stripes. Edd Bauer, accepts that he should have consulted with the board before publication and would have done so if he knew the article would have been as contentious as it proved to be. He apologies for any upset caused and if he didn't have all the information at that other board members did.

The article was removed from the website against the rules of our paper and for this those who removed it apologise for undemocratic actions which made the situation worse. At the very least an online vote to remove the article should have been initiated at best we should try and have a discussion in person about the article before censoring. This will always be done in future.

We would like people to note that just because the article has been re-published does not mean the editoral board agrees with it. Just that we think it is within the realm of acceptable debate. When the article was put up many conflated that the article being up meant that editors agreed with it and treated Slaney Street like it was the website of an party which represents the views of its members.

This has been the first real test of if Slaney Street is actually a plural institution that people with different views can participate in despite being a minority viewpoint. We hope that now with the debate restored we have passed this test and emerged stronger because now we are plural institution in action not just words.

hopefully all the above with edits from anyone who wants to make them could be agreed in some form next Tuesday.

I really, really can't stand the idea of Slaney street getting dragged into pointless student factional politics, but this will need to be addressed at some point.

I'm close to wanting to support a no platform for this kind of stuff, but not yet. To me it seems fair that there should be a members meeting to hash out and discuss this if it's not possible for Ed to make the meeting and to allow for some kind of discussion about what is wrong with the article, so we can facilitate discussion rather than silencing it.

To me, it seems like there's two separate issues. One is the constitution and blocking of articles. The other is the AWL and their method of interacting with other groups, the lack of tact around sensitive issues and the harm that they have, perhaps unintentionally, directed towards minority students, and the apparent lack of contrition.

This issue will not be resolved by trying to force it through constitutionally, but through dialogue, and respect. Respect in this issue should come from recognising the structural barriers which, as far as I understand, mean Muslims are regularly attacked and discouraged from participating in our democracy, which, on top of these kinds of articles, try to make academic politic discussion out of what is a deeply personal and unpleasant experience. I think some apologies could help.

I also think trying to push this through now is counterproductive for us getting our next issue out. I don't see the point in it, but whatever.

Since I've not actually seen this article, instead I'd like to see what it was in the article which was objectionable. If it's just that the article is wrong, I'd like to see that addressed in whatever we put out.
If there's stuff in there which is racist, we should remove it and use it in subsequent criticism as part of the article.

'We need to host both sides of the debate' here means 'we should give bigots platforms'

I'm very unsure about posting stuff which is going to be incomprehensible to anyone outside the specific group involved. I've nothing against having articles on it, preferably from both sides, but they need to be accessible to the wider community.

I agree Robert, the problem Ed has is that, apparently, the way the article was removed goes against our constitution. Since I have no idea whether or not this does so, I couldn't say. I think the article is pointless at best but I'm sure people think lots of our articles are pointless.

@mumitm this is what I am worried about.

The problem we have is that, if they are bigots, we need to know how and why they are bigoted so that articles which are block are done so in a way where people know why it happened.

The recent Slaney conference was, although smallish in number, very positive, even inspiring. The fact that the vast majority of issue 5 had gone out and it had made a profit (gasp!) and it was the best one yet (imo) was quite uplifitng.
But there was a brief discussion on the constitution. Nobody had one to hand and there was even a question or two as to whether we actually had one. Now, this may represent an appalling example of collective amnesia, but that is how it was, as I recall.
I have looked for it on the site and could not see it. If I have gone completely myopic please walk me to it. If its really not there can I suggest that it is either put up or re-circulated to all members?

If it's possible to have such a deep disagreement about what is or is not constitutional then it probably needs rewriting anyway. What are you supposed to do when only about half the editorial board remains active?

Now that the location of the constitution has been pointed out by Ed (Ta!), and having studied it, it is clear that I for one am not a member and therefore not constitutionally entitled to be a member of the EB, so will take no further part in this discussion or the EB itself.
I will, however, continue do my best to help in the production and distribution of Slaney 6, including turning up on Tuesday if that is acceptable.

Where's the constitution, Bob?

By the way, I think we all recognise the effort you've put in and I think it's fair that you participate in the discussion, just not with voting rights.

Hi, sorry for coming into the discussion a bit late. I have to admit I have lost track of it a little bit, but I would like make a few points:

1. Sean and anyone else who said that it should have gone to anticuts.com: that seems like a bit of a hypocritical thing to say since you were also arguing that the first NEC report shouldn't have gone on anticuts.com. I voted against this article going on anticuts.com as I felt it would be best to have the necessary discussion on a more neutral ground. People hadn't accepted that the original article was posted as a comment piece and I didnt think they would accept it this time. So I also thought that a page like Opendemocracy or Slaney street which are used to having comment pieces on these kind of issues, would be best.

2. "This doesn't have anything to do with Slaney Street and the community": I understand the sentiment behind this, but I think it is simply wrong as actually well demonstrated in the reaction to the article. A lot of Slaney Street members / Slaney Street ED members have actually been quite involved with this whole chapter and also Slaney Street has published articles quite specific to student politics/ co-ops/ Birmingham Anti-capitalist and similar issues before. The bigger questions (of which MCash asks some in his article) are certainly relevant to Slaney Street. The whole point of Slaney Street is that it publishes articles on loads of topics which are broader than Birmingham, i.e I remember a front page with the Palestine-flag or articles on Russia-Ukraine in the paper.

3. "Slaney Street hasn't published controversial articles before": Loads of articles even in the paper have been (rightly) published which loads of members didnt agree with (i.e. on the topic of Russia). I also remember the article about Ray kirkmen being published which Slaney Street could have easily been sued for, but it was still right to publish it still.

4. The vote around the members meeting: I agreed with Ed's proposal for the members meeting, NOT because I disagreed/agreed with MCash's article, but because I felt like it was the right and frankly only way to go about this situation. I get the feeling that a lot of people disagreed or agreed with the proposal on the basis of disagreeing/agreeing with the article going on the website.

5. This is a genuine question as I dont understand the word: what is a bigot ?

6. Clarification: MCash is not in the AWL.

7. "I am tired of this issue": Again, I completely understand the sentiment and tbh I am incredibly tired too, I am sure so is Ed. But that is not a defence for deleting an article. The reason why Mcash wrote it is, that he feels that the now mainstream opinion lacks quite a few facts and that someone had to write an article with a different view. I understnad that this might not be convenient, especially if one agrees with said mainstream view, but again that isnt a reason to delete it.

8. Ed's new proposal for how to re-publish the article seems sensible, especially if it is published with a counter - piece.

9. On a side note: I do find the manner in which people who dont agree with the mainstream opinion on this issue (= Dan's article caused everything that happened later) are being isolated and labelled as Racists/Apologists for Islamophobia quite scary. I have frankly been to scared to say anything on this issue because I thought exactly that would immediatly happen.

The constitution, in the form of minutes of the founding conference, are on page 2 of "minutes and meetings", 3rd post down - March 29th. Sorry I missed it earlier.

My objection to the article was that it's incomprehensible if you're outside the debate. It badly needs some context, or it's going to go straight past anyone who isin't involved in Birmingham Uni.

Bob from my understanding of the way in which you aren't a member is because you are unable to pay membership because your debit card is linked to another account and we haven't managed to set up a bank account for you to do a standing order on paper. You've made numerous attempts to contribute financially and distributed loads of the last paper and were elected as an editor by the membership. The fact your paypal doesn't work and that we don't have a bank account are out of your control - I don't think it makes any sense to view you as anything but an active editor, and am sure other people will feel the same.

I've tried to make a comprise proposition based on what @daniellindley @mumitm said was the problem with the article and got mcash to write an addition to the article as well as written a statement in which I apologise for putting it up without consultation. If this isn't good I enough can people please say on loomio before 1pm tomorrow which is the last time I can get online before the meeting to respond to any response to my proposal.

@robert2 and others I get the point that this a local blog for local people and we should have the majority of our content aimed at that audience. However this really isn't a reason to censor.

I think this discussion has now become one solely about the rules and if they have been broken or not. I didn't just say I only had a problem with the rules being broken I also made a very lengthy political post discussing some of the problems I had with Dans comment. I'm willing to accept I am wrong on this subject but nobody has replied to any of these points I made. In fact the opposite has happen people have voted down an request to have them discussed in an open meeting for this subject which everyone can attend. (Something I still think is important considering that this is our first major disagreement).

As for the rules although I think it is important and although I was at first confused by people saying that nobody could find them (I posted and quoted a link to the rules in first post on this thread which was made before the article was taken down - which was why I was so confused when people where saying what rules, I can't find them). I am completely willing to accept that this thread happened so fast and became unreadable that people lost/forgot and didn't read this post. I'm can accept that people were really stressed and this caused them to break the rules. So while I think the rules being broken should be discussed and probably apologised for being breeched. I also think this discussion should not prevail over a serious discussion over the contents of the article and its politics.

The events of Kobane and providing solidarity with the Kurds should be the substantive issue and Slaney Street should be considering how to cover this.

I am not trying to shift the goal posts or avoid the outstanding issues.

Sorry Ed - may have missed your deadline as I'm working on the November Edition but I'll post this up anyhow.

1) It is unclear what rules have been broken, for you to keep categorically claiming the rules have been broken when 2/3rds of active editors gave dan the go ahead to take the article down is confusing. There is nothing to say that article removal needs to be agreed on in a meeting just then umber of editors needed.

2) In the last full AGM we agreed to ask inactive editors resign because it was making democracy impossible to work in the organisation, it does not make sense to refer to an inactive group of editors when claiming there have been 'serious breeches of democracy'. Stuff like this wouldn't have happened if editors were chatting regularly.

3) you keep claiming your proposal for a full members meeting was voted down. It wasn't a vote, it was a proposal - if you check my response I make clear that there is ALREADY a full members meeting happening tonight. This will be on the agenda and people are welcome to attend at 6pm at the ICC.

4) you haven't explained why you didn't try and speak to other editors before you posted this, even though it wasn't time sensitive, you apologised for it causing a fuss and not anticipating the reaction, but that isn't a full clarification of why it happened in the way it happened.

In Response to Debs

1) I didn't say it should have gone on anticuts I was more speculating about why mccash actually wanted the article on Slaney St, I don't think it should have gone anywhere really because it is a boring rehash of arguments that have been around for months already, but if I was him I would have posted it on my own blog- this is what I actually said "I also wonder why mcash wanted it on Slaney Street - could he not have asked ncafc if they wanted it, published it on his own blog, as a facebook note or is it simply because he perceived it was easy to publish easily on slaney street or was asking around for somewhere that would publish the article without recourse to a more thorough democratic process?"

2) The blog post itself has no context beyond the student movement, and doesn't relate to any birmingham issues. That effort could have definitely been made but it wasn't, and that is mccash wasn't concerned about where it went he just wanted someone to publish it to push his arguments out into public.

3) all of the articles you mentioned were discussed by editors before they went out.

4)members meeting is happening tonight

5) I don't actually know either! - this is what the internet says though although I thought it had something to do with homophobia? ': a person who is obstinately or intolerantly devoted to his or her own opinions and prejudices; especially'

6) yeah you are right, but in this case he is saying exactly the same thing as them so it is easy to see why people are getting the two conflated although I think they should steer away from doing so.

9) Dans original article ignored crucial things like malias support for writing a new motion supporting kurds, that was insentive and although I don't think you can blame anyone for what murdochites write and think some things have been extrapolated too far in the way people were responding, you can definitely see where Dan should have thought long and hard about writing something like that about someone who is a prominent muslim union figure and therefore first in line for the muslim bashing media circus. And I think it is a massive error that that thought didn't go in before publishing it. Likewise ed published mcashes article without consulting editors on the board who he knows have a different view to him to see what he thought the impact might be. or to see if they wanted to write an ammendement or talk to mccash about changing bits.

Well I logged on to see what your reply was to the position I put forward as a compromise - to see if you replied with another compromise solution which I could have replied to. Instead you've just re-stated all your previous positions you have stated on this thread. There is nothing constructive I can say in reply. It won't help anyone if I reply by repeating my points. I can do nothing other than to say people should re-read mcash's article, ask is it really that controversial, read my points on Mcash's article (that nobody has replied to) and read the rules of Slaney Street.

okay but consider this: delete and move on with your lives.

@helena that it what I will do ultimately.

I'm not threatening to resign from Slaney Street or walk out if I don't get my way, I don't think that is a good way to behave. I put forward a compromise solution without threats or conditions for the sake improving of our working relationship after this incident and for the sake of creating a chance of political debate to either convince me that I was really out of order to post Mcash's article and give people the chance to tell me why. I would like to hear at somepoint a reply to points I made in reply to Dan's and Mumits points.

This was also the reason I pushed for a full members meeting on the subject not just adding this onto tonights editoral board meeting (not members) which has an already full agenda. Which further everyone knows I and others can't make.

Can I ask - @daniellindley how is the article going regarding an outline of this whole affair? Has it been posted up/sent to an editor? I think @edwardbauer wants a chance to respond to the article so that a debate can actually take place relating to this. Hate to bring up such a controversial matter again, but it was brought to my attention that this issue hasn't moved forward since the editorial meeting. I am a little concerned, as what this means is that an article was taken down and no real reason has been given to the readership as to what happened.

I sent a short statement explaining the editors' decision to you (Darcy) and Sean over Facebook a few weeks ago for you to look at/consider editing.

My understanding from when we discussed this at that meeting was that there'd just be a statement explaining what happened and not a public debate with 'articles' about it.

Well in that case it should go up if it is ready the readership do deserve and explanation. I think the issue is less tense now and people should be ok with revisiting it.

I was told exactly the opposite post the meeting by @darcyluke that the agreement was that I could do a right of reply. I wasn't at the meeting so if people who were could please let me know.

I would be very surprised if there wasn't a right of reply because if that is the case. Then Slaney Street Editoral Board has 1. Censored article on highly political grounds 2. Refused to have members a meeting to discuss the censorship and made it very clear to those who wanted a members meeting that a members meeting being initiated would not be smiled upon 3. Released a statement justifying its censorship and then finally 4. refused any right of reply to that statement.

I think that would be dodgy in a plural organisation by anyone standards.

I remember reading the minutes of the last EB somewhere. Can they be put on the site and then we can look at them again?

How is 2 the case at all Edd? all meetings are members meetings (just not general meetings) and people were explicitly invited to the meeting with this on the agenda. Only 5 of us showed up. It is not the case that discussion was closed down by the E.B at all.
Also 'members meeting wouldn't be smiled on'- I think more the case was the fact we had a general meeting the week before all of this kicked off attended by max 8 people who decided to reschedule elections of the board until January. For another general meeting to be called in the interim whilst we are in the process of distributing 10k of newspapers with very few people getting involved in that doesn't make sense for the priorities of the paper.

Well can I ask Sean or another editor to put up the statement from Dan? A right to reply is something that any person should have related to a topic they feel hasn't been adequately addressed. This is a plural paper, and controversies like this should be clearly discussed so that the readership understands what is going on. Otherwise the EB is just serving itself.

@daniellindley - maybe you could post up your statement on this thread?

To quote from the minutes: "Agreement that Dan would write up an article explaining the background of the NUS debate, the reasons for the controversy regarding the retracted article (why it was unacceptable, etc.). Edd and others should be encouraged to work on this with Dan or write a response outlining an alternative position. Potentially, the editorial board should write a statement about the issue and about what has happened and why (referencing the debate)."

So clearly, we agreed that an airing of the disagreement should be visible on the website. This is important stuff - as the controversy of the Mcash article is clearly not a settled issue in everybody's mind, so the readership should be given a right to judge for themselves - taking into consideration both Dan's points and Edd's. I also think that the controversial article should be linked in one or both of the articles relating to it.

Also - @bobwhitehead here are the minutes. Apologies for them being so slim, but it was quite difficult to discuss and take minutes at the same time. Not making excuses for poor minuting, but mitigating circumstances!

I doubt whether this issue is likely to be resolved to everyone's satisfaction, but now we have the minutes, the matter should be resolved one way or another as soon as it can be, so that at the AGM we can move forward with the Slaney project. If it cannot be resolved, then there will have to be a discussion and vote on the 20th Jan, (that is assuming that no special EB is called). I think the former procedure would be preferable.
On a different matter, assuming we still have quite a few papers left, it would be very good to cover the two Council "consultations" over next year's budget, Dec 11th and 15th, 6-8pm, at the Council house and in Erdington, St. Barnabus church, respectively. There could be hundreds of people there.

I'm hoping to be at the Council House one; is anyone else planning to go?

yeah it would be really good if people could organise another distribution day before people disappear for christmas - we really need to make sure more of them get given out and putting them through doors is the easiest way to do this. Giving them away at the events mentioned is also a must

Just a gentle reminder that the reasons for the articles removal statement should be posted up on the website. Or on this thread at the very least. It is already written right? just copy and paste it across.

This is what was written (see below) after the meeting by Dan - I suggested these edits 'I would remove the 'promoting a groups agenda bit' no one will know what that means but it is obvs a reference to AWL and people will point out that mccash isn't a member.'

They haven't been made yet and the article hasn't been published which I'm not too happy about. To be honest though there has been a lack of any slaney street meetings at all then. I don't think the article being removed was handled well at all, neither do I think the fact it was put up and the way it was put up were good at all. I agree with much, but not all of what dan has written but I strongly think the explanation should have gone up to explain the removal to the membership a long time ago and it is a failiure of the editorial board that it hasn't yet happened. It is beyond me why Edd and Dan haven't worked together on doing this as was agreed in the meeting. I do think though that people should be careful not to derail todays meeting covering these points - it should be confined to one short agenda point and gotten out of the way quickly, as there is lots of (more important) stuff to be getting on with.

Earlier this week, two thirds of Slaney Street's active editors decided to remove an online article posted earlier that day as we considered it considered Islamophobic, incomprehensible to almost all our readers and posted in an underhanded manner. Naturally not everyone was happy with this, so the editorial board decided at its meeting on November 4th to publish an explanation for why this was done and how we intend to move forward.

To explain the context for those understandably confused by this: there has been a lot of tension in the National Union of Students over the last few weeks lately due its (Muslim) Black Student Officer being falsely reported as having convinced the union to refuse to condemn ISIS, and suffering intense levels of abuse and threats over social media due to these incorrect claims. After the NUS official responsible for initiating these allegations came under fire within student union circles for his actions, an inflammatory article was posted on Slaney Street defending him and attacking the NUS' Black Students Officer.

Firstly, we as editors of Slaney Street agreed that this website is not the platform for NUS officials to publish articles attacking one another about things said in union meetings almost none of our readers know about. We are a community paper for Birmingham, whilst we do occasionally post articles that aren't Birmingham specific, they are at least on issues the general public is aware of (e.g. the Ukraine crisis) and can benefit from. We do not want this paper to be hijacked to push an irrelevant group's agenda and become utterly alienating for all those not interested in political infighting.

The article was considered to be racist (not to mention misleading) in the way it gave credence to the original false claims mentioned above. These have caused widespread harassment of the only Muslim Officer in the NUS by misrepresenting her (widely held amongst Muslims) views on Islamophobia. Whilst Slaney Street does believe in publishing a plurality of views, this needs to be balanced against inciting bigotry, spreading misinformation and hurting already marginalised groups, and we did not feel publishing this 'view' (already widely available in the mainstream media) was justified.

Complaints have been made regarding the interpretation of our constitution, specifically whether two thirds of editors required to remove an article means those still active or those elected at the last conference. At our last main meeting in October those present agreed to ask those editors who've not been active in Slaney Street in the last six months to resign, and we have not considered them in our total. We believe this was the best (perhaps, 'least bad' is more appropriate) way to run the paper for the time being. However this issue can never be resolved at the moment as our constitution is not clear, so the only way to resolve this conclusively is at our next Conference on January 20th (details to follow). We implore all our members to attend, where we will democratically improve our process and elect a new editorial board.

We didn't talk it over last night. The discussion (which wasn't part of the agenda/a motion it was just brought up) consisted almost entirely of people speaking who wanted the article published, mostly Edward shouting and using very aggressive and condemnatory language which I later complained to the chair was inappropriate. No one who disagreed was given a chance to respond to that as the meeting was then ended. Edward continued shouting and swearing at other members for some time after the meeting was closed. I don't think that behaviour should be accepted nevermind rewarded. I don't see how it's in any way legitimate to just say we're having a vote now after such a one-sided and badly held discussion which wasn't really an item to be voted on anyway.

We've already had two decisions by the editorial board to take down/not publish the article and a member's vote to not call a meeting over the issue (where those who voted such a way showed opposition to publishing the article). I am strongly opposed to reversing decisions outside of a real process following a disgruntled member using dodgy intimidatory tactics creating a very unpleasant atmosphere for everyone until people agree to just give them what they want.

We agreed to publish an explanation from the majority of the board why the article was taken down, and to allow a 'minority' view to go up with that ages ago. I drafted a statement giving the view of the majority of (then) editors. I assume the article would be linked to as it's on the internet elsewhere. I do not understand why this was never implemented when I quickly did everything asked of me at the November editorial board meeting.

Nothing has changed from when most of us said we didn't want to host that article. I don't want to be part of an organisation where decisions are ultimately made based on whoever can be most domineering and shout the longest.

just a very small point: as far as I remember, there was actually enough people who wanted to call a members meeting! But the decision was made to not call it at the time and to delay a discussion on this issue to the next official members meeting (= Tuesday's meeting).

I agree that the only principled way forward is to publish the article and let the simple process of right of reply take over. On thinking it through I think Dan is right a simple vote online cannot reverse an editorial board meeting. Either the new editors have to decide to put it back up or there must finally be a discussion at General meeting. The process by which it was taken down was dodgy it needs to go up democratically and for people to stick to our rules from this point onwards.

What I have always wanted an actual discussion of this. I do not want this "sorted out asap" or just stuck back up. I want a discussion on if the article was racist or not. I want people to discuss the politics behind the allegations as well, we need to talk about that some members do not think any guns should be given to the Kurds in Kobane etc. This process should not be about the path of least resistance, trying to avoid difficult debates.

I'm sorry for shouting dan but frankly I have been a model of patience on this issue - waiting months as nothing was done and agreements to publish reasons for taken it down and give me a right of reply to that very clearly broken. Everyone can tell it is joke that just one hour before the January conference a statement which didn't really provide any political justifications was finally put up.

I really don't think your in a position to talk about bullying either your late night phone calls and behind the scenes pressuring was totally unacceptable. You bullied that article down when you should have just written a simple reply.

"Okay I'm not reading everything thats coming up but posting sensationalised nonsense to malign someone for calling out racism is what main stream papers do im sick of Mcashs - and that white contingents racist nonsense" - Basically I want this kind of stuff discussed and properly justified.

As I said at the conference, the best way forward would be to implement the decision reached by the EB last year, but there is no sign that this is actually going to happen.
So I think the best way out of the impasse would be to have a debate on the article itself on the website by publishing it, and, as has been pointed out, that would necessitate the new EB giving the green light.
(It would also force idle people like me who have not decided that it is racist or not to study it a bit more deeply!)
By the way, do we have the election results for the EB and the two workers?

"I really don’t think your in a position to talk about bullying either your late night phone calls and behind the scenes pressuring was totally unacceptable. You bullied that article down when you should have just written a simple reply."

I'm quite taken aback by this accusation. To try and make myself as accountable as possible this what happened: when I found out about the article from Mumit after arriving home from work I contacted the other editors by phone telling them that an article had been posted without consultation that I felt was Islamophobic, highly misleading and would seriously damage Slaney Street's reputation if we hosted it, and advised that they look on the Loomio to see what I was talking about and asked that they post their views so we can have a decision on what to do.

I didn't talk to Edward on the phone, I tried ringing but there wasn't an answer, so he doesn't know how I talked to people first-hand.

It was in the evening not "late night". I remember the last person I spoke to was Robert who said he was a in church meeting and said he would ring me back when it was finished which he later did, so it couldn't have been that late. I was talking to Sean on Facebook chat mentioning contacting other editors by phone, that conversation is timed from 20:30 to 21:28 so that will have been when these phone calls happened. I don't think this counts as 'late night'.

I don't accept that me making phone calls to other Slaney Street editors on a decision that needed to be made by editors whilst openly telling other editors that I was contacting those who weren't online can fairly be called 'behind the scenes'.

I think I was calm and whilst obviously I had my opinion I do not believe I was aggressive in pushing it and I was careful that I asked those I contacted to say what they thought and not ''you need to say this'' or something.

I had phone conversations with Mumit, Sean, Bob and Robert that day (I tried contacting other editors without success). This is the first time I've ever heard that I was 'bullying' them by doing this and I'm not aware of any of them having complaints against my conduct. If any of them think I was bullying I'll listen to them explain why and would apologise, but at the moment I think it's a bit unfair that Edward has thrown an accusation at me without any evidence that is hard for me to defend myself from.

“As I said at the conference, the best way forward would be to implement the decision reached by the EB last year, but there is no sign that this is actually going to happen.“

See I just want the decision made by the Editorial Board implemented. Still no one has explained to me why it hasn't happened or why we ought to go back on it now.

I wrote a draft two months ago now of a statement from the editorial board explaining why the article was taken down from the majority's perspective. I agreed at the time for Edward or whoever else to be allowed to write a counter-view. All that needs to be done is the EB members who voted to take the article down to approve the statement, and for someone to write their opposing view.

I'm really bothered on a procedural level now - leaving aside how opposed I am to us hosting that article in the first place - that an decision of the EB is apparently being overturned by online chats because it ''isn't happening'' without any good reason.

"But frankly I have been a model of patience with this issue" - what?

In what way have I not been patience? We agreed to have this issue discussed at the next conference I waited for that.

Is it because I'm saying that you have publicly branded someone a racist that you should finally justify it months later? Is that impatience?

If we have big disagreements the way forward is not to pressure individuals it is to attempt to have a big broad and open debate in full meetings. That is the best way to ensure people are not being leaned on hard behind the scenes.

This is now simple we must either call a members meeting to decide the issue if the article is racist or not.

I do not get how so many have not read the article but, have been happy to support it being taken down, have been against calling a full meeting to discuss the issue and support Slaney Street publicly branding someone a racist.

I m not saying making phone calls was unacceptable. However yes I have had a number of people complain to me that they felt they were being pressured by you. One person stated that you told them you would organize a demonstation against them if the article wasn't taken down. That you would make "Slaney Street the next SWP, the next NCAFC".

@daniellindley I don't think the current proposal is borne out of members' confusion. I think that the decision of the EB to not publish the article should not be taken as members' (or the EB's) acceptance of the reasoning given for why it should be taken down.

The current proposal is not an orchestrated attempt to reverse decisions. It is the result of a genuine desire to have a debate on the issue - one that is grounded in a discussion of real historical movements, and which moves beyond suspicions about the political maneuvering of this faction and the other.

Whilst the latter is important, confining the debate at this level means doing an injustice to the readership, and restricts the potential of Slaney Street as a paper.

I don't want this paper to become a battle ground for people trying to take control of the NUS. I want this paper to host a critical discussion of the dynamically changing relationship between racism, solidarity and internationalism, which a reply should address.

Is there anyone opposed to calling a meeting to discuss this.

I'm opposed. As I already said, I don't want people's opinions on this or on use of the procedures during this episode. Nothing done was unconstitutional. At worst, the claims of wrongdoing are of insensibility to controversy and of lobbying.

Hardly the important issues whilst Muslim comrades suffer Islamophobic attacks; whilst solidarity ties with Muslim sections of the working class and the organised Left are so poor; whilst the Left continues to (by and large) fail to support Muslims' struggle in the UK; and whilst the Kurds are fighting the world's worst forces so that they can complete their social revolution in peace. These are the things I want to see mentioned from now on. There is no substitute to political debate if we want to address these matters.

As things stand, I consider my original decision of keeping the article down in solidarity with comrades rightfully very concerned about the media backlash against Malia in a generally dangerous context for Muslims correct. But I also think that to publish the article now is the only way forward. I'm expecting Black comrades to easily surpass the article in question politically, and I'm honestly baffled and disappointed by the fact that Slaney Street hasn't been used as a great chance to do so.

Yeah I'm opposed. I want this to die and for us to move on to things which are actually good for Slaney Street rather than wasting our time on this non-issue.

I do not understand why it's so important that we publish an article that will piss off and alienate our comrades, and I do not understand what benefit it gives to us to risk doing so for the sake of validating some concept of debate. I'm sick of attacks on Muslims, even if this article isn't an attack, it's part of an ongoing whittling down of people's voices more concerned with process or winning arguments than showing solidarity. When this problem was being talked about, it was when bombs were being placed outside of mosques. Now we've had a huge reactionary wave which has caused our own campus to have anti-muslim graffiti with fucking swasticas on and have had the shops of muslims in my own city being smashed up, but no. Let's have a fucking meeting on some stupid student politics article which caused one of our allies to get attacked by a massive right wing media group, that's the REAL priority.

I will abide and go by the democratic principles of whatever people vote for, but I'll do everything I can to get this complete non-issue put to rest.

''One person stated that you told them you would organize a demonstation against them if the article wasn’t taken down. That you would make “Slaney Street the next SWP, the next NCAFC”.''

I don't want to have this argument I don't think it's helping anything, but I'm forced to respond to this. That is totally untrue and I'm in utter confusion as to where this bizarre hearsay has come from.

Proposal: I'm not seeing this go anywhere so I'm going to suggest this:

To remit this decision to the next editors meeting

In the case that a majority of editors are not present for the arguments to be noted and minuted and put up only for editors to vote on. With no further arguments

Oh and edd
Impatience is going into a random rant into Facebook with a link to an article that wasn't there
And no, I'm branding racists and deniers of marginalisation, racists.

I remember that phone call well, and it didn't strike me as inappropriate in any way at all. As Daniel said, I was in a meeting - they don't go on late - and my first reaction was that the rape issue had kicked off again. I phoned back as soon as I got home, whatever time that was. Not late anyway. It's been a long time since I looked at the article, but with no background or context, it didn't mean a thing to me. At the very least, that should have been incorporated in order to make a decent article. But if there's no other way to sort this, let's put it up and have a debate about it. We can't carry on like this without damaging the paper.

Problem with remitting any decision is that this is going to drag on even longer than it's done already, unless the meeting happens pretty quickly.

People do have the right to change their minds. For example, I was undecided about Ed's proposal for paid workers before the conference, I was open minded if you like. But on the basis of the argumentation at the conference I swung behind the proposal.
When I was first presented with "Ed's" article, I was unhappy about it. This was not particularly because of the exact line it was pushing, but because it seemed at the time unrelated to the Slaney project. (I have made my position clear on the latter recently; the original basis for the paper as a a paper of struggle should be complemented by "a vision for a new Birmingham - social, green and democratic")
I was originally persuaded by Dan to take my doubts one notch further by voting to take the article down. However, in the light of discussion at the conference and since, I now think it should be published, and let a debate take place on the website.
Slaney Street has only once, correct me if I am wrong, taken an editorial position, and that was on page two of the current paper - a consensus view. So it should be made clear that articles on the site are individual views, not editorial positions, and comments are invited.
Of course, that open ended view is conditioned by the overall anti-racist politics of the paper. But that can only be ascertained by a discussion of the article itself. If it turns out that the article has a racist dynamic, whatever the intentions of the author, then it can be disowned, apologies offered and lessons learned.
To return to my conception of paper, in particular the word "social". This broad term should be taken to mean opposing oppression in all its forms. Birmingham has a large black population, and within that a large Muslim population. If the paper is to take off, it must relate to the concerns of this minority that has been under the cosh for so long.
Now, if I have strong views on Kobane etc, as I do, then it is a pretty sure bet that our fellow Muslim citizens have even stronger ones and we have to relate to that. If we can publish articles on Palestine and the Ukraine, then dealing with Kobane should not be out of bounds either.
The current onslaught on Birmingham is financial, structural, ideological and of course racist ( while there were clear features of sexism in the Trojan Horse affair, it was all spun into the prevailing Islamophobic discourse). So we have to reply at every level, and if that means touching on some very difficult subjects at times, then so be it. However, as I said earlier, individual and editorial positions are not the same thing.

Now, as to procedure. So much water has passed under the bridge on this one it is probably not worth raking over past actions and words any more. In terms of resolving the impasse, I think the issue should be referred to the next EB. We could call another single issue conference on the article, but I think that would be a bit over the top.
If the EB considers that the article is, on balance at least, racist, then it has the prerogative to not publish. After all, the EB was elected to take important decisions.
The next EB should also have as a main item the production of the new paper, Slaney Street 7, as far as I am concerned. And the sooner the better, people out there are waiting for it.

who is on the new editorial board? the most popular opinion seems to be to refer it to them so we need to know who's involved so we can call that meeting ASAP.

personally i agree with elio: this needs to be debated politically and it's a weak article so i'm confident it can be addressed via a decent response. in which case i'd vote to put up the article.

Ok well fine if people don't want to talk about that is ok - I don't see how realistically a rift is going to be healed without a broad discussion with all of us there.

I don't see what is particularly weak about the article, I think people feel the need to say that as some-kind of comprise to putting it up "I'll put it up but I think its rubbish". I'm very happy to see its weaknesses pointed out in debate.

The only way for a project like Slaney Street to run is plural open right of reply basis in debate. If people don't take that seriously as how we run it will inevitably collapse. This is not so much about THIS article but a question of how we run, what precedents we set.

If in this instance all those people who have spent this debate attempting to dodge the question, not come out one side or the other and generally avoid anything difficult - had instead remained totally steadfast on the plural paper with a right of reply position and encourage rather than shut down a meeting on the issue. Then Slaney Street would have come out of this a stronger and more interesting paper because it would have successfully and interestingly been able to host a debate within the movement rather than tear itself apart over it.

In the long term I want to be involved in a paper that can do this.The people who run Slaney Street need to show that it is that project and not just another blog.