Thread by @sethnotes

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The excellent Top Boy returned for a final season on Netflix yesterday.

So what has that to do with Jeremy Corbyn, an international network of socialist militants, and anarcho-punk music?

To answer that, we need to look at the bio of Top Boy creator/writer Ronan Bennett

In ‘74, when just 19 yrs old, Ronan Bennett was convicted by a no-jury Diplock court of murdering Inspector William Elliott, a 49-year-old police officer in the Royal Ulster Constabulary, during an Official IRA robbery at the Ulster Bank in Rathcoole.

Sent to Long Kesh prison (the H-Blocks/the Maze)- and with little outside support- Bennett started a correspondence with Iris Mills of the Anarchist Black Cross (ABC), an organisation set up to support and correspond with ‘international class struggle prisoners’.

In 1975 Bennett’s conviction was declared unsafe and he was released. Unsure of his future in Ireland he moved to Huddersfield in England to join Iris Mills, with whom he had developed a romance through letters.

Mills had moved to Huddersfield to join her ABC comrades, Stuart and Brenda Christie. The Christies had moved to Huddersfield in an attempt to rebuild their lives after the infamous Angry Brigade trial, of which Stuart had been a defendant. Which wasn’t Stuart’s first brush with>

>> the law. In 1964 Stuart had been caught carrying explosives destined for an assassination attempt on the life of the Spanish dictator General Franco.
Sentenced to 30 years for his part in this operation, Christie was released after serving 3 yrs due to international pressure

Returning to Britain, Christie founded the ABC to aid Spanish anarchist comrades he had met inside.

As a key node in international anarchist communication Christie was constantly monitored by the state, and in 1972 Christie was one of eight people accused of conspiracy to>

>>make explosions as part of what became known as ‘the Angry Brigade’ trial. Christie was one of 4 defendants found ‘not guilty’ and after the trial closed he was advised to leave London by a special branch officer because if he didn’t ‘he would be permanently targeted’>

>> Relocating to Huddersfield, the Christies and the ABC group focused their efforts on the production of their newspaper ‘Black Flag.’

It was into this scene that Bennett arrived- and alongside his now girlfriend- Iris Mills-threw themselves into the political life of the ABC>

>> like everyone in the ABC network, activists were constantly surveilled and harassed by the police. And in 1978, Bennett was arrested with Mills for conspiracy to cause explosions with "persons unknown" against ‘targets unknown’ and spent another 16 months in prison on remand.

>> Many in the anarchist movement suspected the ‘persons unknown’ trial to run as long as the ‘Angry Brigade’ trial had (which was one of the longest trials in British legal history) -and immediately set to work raising the funds needed to fight the case >

>> The most notable of the fundraising efforts came in the form of a benefit single recorded by the anarcho-punk band the Poison Girls, a split release with the seminal anarcho-punk act ‘CRASS.’ >

This single raised over 10k in funds, however the ‘Persons Unknown trial’ was over far quicker than had many anticipated, Bennett and his codefendents were acquitted of all charges in 1979.

Using the proceeds raised from the Poison Girls/CRASS single, Mills and Bennett set up the Wapping Autonomy Centre- a venue and organisational space that became the epicentre of the Anarcho-Punk explosion>

>>In ‘87 and having parted ways with the anarchist movement, Bennett completed a degree in history. However things must have looked uncertain for him. He was 31, and had been implicated in both a murder and a plot to cause explosions - who, if anyone, would give him a break? >

> Enter this guy.

In ‘87 Jeremy Corbyn as MP for Islington North, hired Bennett as a researcher- in a move that provoked much controversy and security concerns at the time.

Since then Bennett has authored five novels and two non fiction works, contributes a regular chess column for the guardian and has written for television. His most notable creation being Top Boy for Channel four, which was revitalised for Netflix by funds from the rapper Drake.

If you know where to look- there are Easter eggs peppered throughout Top Boy that speak to Bennett’s history in the libertarian left. For example in season 2 of the Netflix run, two young boys make and sell ‘Big Flame burgers’ at their school gates to raise >

>>much needed funds for a parent of one of the boys- a migrant woman unable to work or claim benefits. This act of social solidarity is reminiscent of the activity of Big Flame- the name of a radical workplace/community organisation in the 1970s- whose politics and activity>

> Ronan would be aware of. This is one of countless examples throughout the show.

Top Boy remains one of the best shows on television, teasing at the realities of working class existence, it’s resistances and it’s failures. Essential essential viewing.

The history of the libertarian left, the ABC and other organisations can be found in London’s @maydayrooms and @56aInfoshop archives- which are safe havens for radical social movement print ephemera. Alternately these histories can also be found online at @libcomorg

@maydayrooms @56aInfoshop @libcomorg As an aside Big Flame also intersect with Jeremy Corbyn’s bio.

It was feminist comrades from Big Flame and the radical collective of the counter culture newspaper ‘the Islington Gutter Press’ (most notably Lynne Segal) who initially convince Jeremy to stand and run for office.