Authenticity, Integrity, and Unity: The Rapid Rise of Mick Lynch

 

Had you told me just 7 days ago I would be writing about a virtually unknown 60 year old Londoner that would spend the week ahead quite literally decimating the ‘best’ of the British establishment media and a string of Tory MPs, I would’ve been a tad cynical of your claim. 

But here we are, and what a tremendous week it has been for Mick Lynch, the RMT Union, and the countless lefties that have been starved of an authentic working class socialist voice for way too long. 

Lots of you are (quite rightly) describing Lynch as “a breath of fresh air”, but it’s a lot more than that, isn’t it? 

For a start, it is seeing and hearing someone that speaks much the same as you. Isn’t it refreshing and incredibly addictive?

Let’s be honest, Sir Keir Rodney Starmer and Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson don’t look or sound like any of your friends or associates, do they? 

Sure, you probably know some characterless bores, and you might even know some scruffy philandering urchins, but I doubt they’re key players in the British establishment. 

Lynch has the simple but priceless ability to look and sound believable, which is something 99.9% of the political class are unable to do because they are blinded by their own privileges and deeply held belief that they are the superior beings, born to rule over the poor and working classes. 

There is a certain relatability with a chap that left school at 16 to train to be an electrician that you just don’t feel with a former Director of Public Prosecutions, or a failed journalist from the college of Eton. 

And that relatability comes across in the numerous incredible media interviews we have seen over the last week or so. 

We haven’t seen a leading left-wing voice handle the media and members of parliament quite so magnificently for some time. Lynch has seized the platform presented to him by the media and made it his own, on his terms. 

Just a tiny bit of authenticity and sincerity is a dangerous thing, and a great deal of it can be absolutely fatal, and Lynch has used his authenticity and his sincerity to brutally drag the ‘cream’ of the British media in a way they’re just not used to. 

From Piers Morgan thinking Lynch is an actual super villain, to witnessing the David Cameron lover Kay Burley fall to pieces when she couldn’t get Lynch to own up to bundling a few agency workers into the back of an RMT van and making them disappear, there have been some truly jaw dropping, golden moments. 

The clinical destruction of Tory MP Robert Jenrick, the decimation of Tory MP Chris Philp, the bodying of that ridiculous fool, Tory MP Jonathan Gullis, the fantastic obliteration of  Labour frontbencher, BARONESS ‘don’t tell me I’m not working class’ Chapman. I could go on.

If you line them up Mick Lynch will plough through them, without a single shit given for reputations, and rather than unleash a torrent of political-speak, he arms himself with little more than truth and sincerity. 

It’s a powerful combination, particularly when we spend day after day being told to be grateful for the crumbs from the table while the unaccountable ruling elite frequently piss your money up the wall. 

It’s not just the Tories that have suffered at the hands of Mick Lynch. 

Mick’s powerful media performances have left quite a few of us wondering why the leader of the opposition, Keir Starmer, isn’t capable of doing the same thing. 

Mick Lynch has displayed more clarity and leadership in a handful of interviews interviews than Keir Starmer has managed in more than 2 years of standing for absolutely nothing. 

The Lynch effect is something to behold. 

Online enquiries into trade union membership has increased by a whopping 700% since the RMT workers launched their strike action last week,

Google searches for “join a Union” have increased by 184% during the same period.

And Google searches for “how to strike” have soared by 135%. 

Enthusiasm and optimism are back, care of Mick Lynch.

The establishment knows he’s the real deal, and they are going to throw everything at him in an attempt to discredit him. 

We’ve seen it all before. They will call him a Putin-sympathiser, a Republican revolutionary, a threat to national security, and they will call him an antisemite, if they haven’t already.

So why does Lynch inject this enthusiasm and optimism into so many people? It’s not just us socialists, even some of the softer left think Mick Lynch is the best thing since James O’Brien. 

My mate Wren is a socialist and a trade unionist, and like me she hadn’t really heard of Mick Lynch until he addressed the TUC rally in Parliament Square, back on June the 8th. 

I asked her why she felt so optimistic by the emergence of Mick Lynch and she said:

“He cuts through the bullshit. We're spoonfed so many lies by our politicians and the media, convincing the masses that this is their lot in life 

Lynch takes their propaganda and rips it apart”. 

And that’s exactly what it is. Mick Lynch cuts through the bullshit. 

Lynch picks apart a Tory lie with a fearless and confident ease that I have never seen before, and I absolutely love to see it. Don’t you?

I’ve seen some excellent media handlers. Labour MP Barry Gardiner is an excellent communicator, he would often go out to bat for Jeremy when others didn’t fancy it. Len McCluskey was also very effective at getting his message across. 

But Lynch’s take-no-shit style, his relatability, and his working class authenticity has won him, and the RMT Union the respect of a majority of the British left. 

Does Mick have any political ambitions? 

I’m not sure anyone really knows. What I do know is Lynch recently spoke of ‘broad-based campaigning against cuts’ rather than electoral activity, which doesn’t sound like he is likely to be a prospective parliamentary candidate in the near future. 

The Conservative government insisted they didn’t want the rail strikes, but it is quite clear they thought a bit of Union bashing would fire up the Tory voters' engines, much like the hideous Rwanda deportation plan. 

But after a week of Mick Lynch dismantling one Tory after another, and a poll indicating the rail strikes have the support of a majority of the British public, the battle for hearts and minds has quite clearly been won by Mr Lynch and the team around him. 

I urge you all to support the RMT. Their strike is our strike, and when they win it will be a victory for all of us. 

It’s about time someone stood up to these pernicious Tory bastards. The opposition oppose the left as much as they oppose the Conservative government - if not more. 

In the space of just one week Mick Lynch has shown us exactly how to stand up to the Tories. 

A coalition of the left - unions and political organisations - must come together to ensure the enthusiasm and optimism created by Lynch doesn’t go to waste. 

Give the grassroots someone or something to get behind, and we will be there.

If you do just one thing today, please, join a Union. If you’re already in a Union, become a member of groups such as The People's Assembly or the Peace and Justice Project. 

Alone we can do so little, but together we can do so much.

Until next time, 

Rachael 

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