Hard On for Revolution

I remember the first and last listening circleor talking circle or whatever it was because it was a distinctivly banal 30 minutes of my life.
I mean I did my bit and sat on a cushion, but I hadn't offered much because this dude kept dragging it back to people not realising we had the power for revolution. Which wasn't surprising he was introduced as a marxist.
I just finished reading Iron Council by China Mieville, I didn't like it as much as the first book of his I read which was 'the scar' not least for which Iron Council seems to be the exact same structure ostensibly as the Scar was, kind of like in the latter days of Nu Metal Korn and Limp Bizkit albums became more or less fill the gap albums.
It had a tremendous sense that he took the scar and said man I just didn't make the point clear enough. So Iron Council came out with the city of ships changed to a perpetual train, and the undercurrent of revolution and expansionis economic policies across the world of Bas-Lag, but then the Socialist narrative is much more overt.
And that much was clear from wikipedia which probably took a bit of shine off the novel before picking it up, because of spoilers I read, I knew the beginning and the destination before reading the detail.
What perplexes me though, is with the words 'socialism' why does the world 'revolution' almost always spring out in the next sentance?
They are two different things that seem to have married and like your best friend and their cool girlfriend now wife, are now both really uncool to hang around.
As unhip and polluted the marxist brand is, Karl Marx did prdict a lot of the fallout of the industrial revolution and his observations are for the most part accurate and run true today.
I also am a believer in a lot of social welfare, such as free education up to secondary (how we adapted to industrialisation) and would push for free and compulsory higher education too. Also scialist healthcare, public transport all that shit.
But the fashions, the smell, the getting your arse beat by cops all these are what have put 'the socialist alternative' and other groups firmly in a place called 'beneath contempt'.
To return to Mieville's world of Bas-Lag and notably the depiction in Iron Council, there are some lengthy debates and such that make it clear (though isn't self evident in the book) that Iron Council's narrative is told from the socialist perspective and ultimately Mieville's perspective, which when you think about it is neither contraversial, outragous or surprising or for that matter even poor authorship and does I must say make for a change.
So in fairnesses the depiction of 'the man' has an admitted deliberate bias to cast them as the bad guys, and it is rare for a fantasy to not have a bad power structure that is not 'pltting the destruction of the world' but instead more the orwellian 'power is the means and the end' sense.
And motifs become everyday economic and shit which is good.
But the real stretch of fantasy is how he instills the sense that Iron Council the perpetual train itself is important, a symbol of defiance where the people triumphed for the first time in taking something from 'the man' which you know for the fantasy world equivalent of London - New Crobuzon doesn't stick for me.
Largely because while their is a wealth and poverty gap, the people of the world can lead a large self deterministic life, and this in itself makes 'the revolution' fantasy.
And they are the biggest leaps or 'dues ex machina' in the novel, for example, the main character Judah Low inspires his followers in seeking out the Iron Council by use of some mystical 'good' quality that lives inside him. Without really explaining it people aren't draw to the inherant logic of his position, but instead to this 'don't worry its good' feeling.
It never really captures why we should sympathise with any of the characters, there is nothing really to win us over to the cause.
There is nothing substantial to suggest why there is a revolution brewing in the midst of the city, apart from recession, the next closest 'evil' the militia engag in is the remaking punitive measure where disobediant citizens are made into freaks that then are engaged as slave labor or left to beg.
That I can understand, but again it is probably more accurate of the overcrowded prison system that spawned the convict colonies in America which in turn led to convicts being sent to Australia.
But its just the meaningless cruelty.
But apart from that its all pretty glossy, the peopledon't like the government, they want to rise up they embrace these self governed communities. I don't think a case is built and am probably thankful for it because Mieville's other great virtue as a fantasy author is the rare ability to complete a narrative in less than 9 books, or that said 1 an outstanding achievement.
He does capture the frustrations inherit in the socialist community, as in the frustration of the members who are all waiting for a revolution that is never coming and particularly the narrative of Ori and his godfather like decent into activist hell as he is betrayed and drawn in further all round.
SO why the socialists, that at least in Australia inspire the general public not to go to protest worthy causes by not wanting to be associated with filthy vagrant nutbags, who are beloved by investigative journalism and talk back radio, but tv particularly because usually the 5 violent individuals are enough to fill a camera shot and call their actions a 'riot' and thus further discredit anyone takig a countrary position to conservative.
So this is the fundamental paradox, why are the socialists on the outskirts of society?
Now if they were the fascists I could understand the desire for revolution, of seizing power because the rational debate would be like this 'we want to contro everyones lives and syphon off resources to prop up the wealth of the totalitarian ruling class so most people wil be worse off.' but fascists throughout history have usually seized power by scapegoating and emphasising their role as providing 'security' and often been gradually voted in as their ideology gained momentum such as the Nazi party.
But why are socialists at the point where they are espousing that socialism needs to be forced on society and then dividing into faction ater faction until a faction such as anarchists-without-adjectives springs up appealing to bring it back to some center again.
Is it a fundamental ego problem, that competing interests as to who casts off theshackles of imperialism and capitalism and globalisation has to be them? or is it another paradox?
Is it tht these movements need a certain amount of liberty to exist in the first place. I mean certainly in the case of the Socialit Alternative, in their status as 'beneath contempt' or perhaps even lower at 'useful to power' given their ability to detract from worthy political causes rather than advance them, can meet and post bills all they want, because in a society where they are free to do so, free to exist, nobody sees much to be gained by pursuing it?
In China sure, except socialism has been hijacked by the oppressor, and the oppressor doesn't even let groups other than the party form, they invented thought crime to council it out.
s it that in a society where there's just enough critical leverage that one is born with the chance of imroving ones lot in life, that they'll take all the other shit rather thn risk the destruction of the violent revolution most socialist nutbags I meet are hellbent on.
In Iron Council, the city is destroyed when the revolution prematurely ejaculates so to speak. And in a way that really impresses me, Mieville as an author manages to capture at once all the frustrations of a lot of the issues and paradoxes above that I have listed, the facions, the fact that he movement more or less cancels itself out, removes is own steem, that the ego to be the ones drives the iron council on its suicidal path.
I still though am unsatisfied with the tenuous threads of sentances and mystical qualities unexplained that make the Iron Council so important symbollicly, and so popular a mythology. I think their Mieville might have assumed some values that I at least just can't share.