Keep On Keeping On! – the Redskins and me (part 2)
In the second part of his recollections on the Redskins, Colin Revolting recalls being a revolutionary during the miners’ strike and its aftermath during the Redskins’ growing popularity, including TV appearances, being attacked by fascists and touring against apartheid with their radical rock and soul music. (To read the first part of Colin’s reflections, click […]
Take no heroes – only inspiration: the Redskins and me
Colin Revolting recalls how he became a revolutionary and the role in the process played by the music of the Redskins, a band who gained a notable amount of popularity in the 1980s for their blistering, punked-up version of unabashedly radical soul music. If you type ‘Neither Washington nor Moscow’ into a search engine the […]
Pride not profit
The London Pride march takes place this coming weekend, on Saturday 8 July. Barclays, Tesco and Virgin Atlantic are all sponsors of an increasingly corporate event. But opposition to dominance of corporations and official state bodies is also emerging internationally. After Black Lives Matter, uniformed cops can’t march at Pride in Toronto, while on 10 […]
#GE2017: Immigration, Labour and the left
Any concession to restricting immigration necessarily involves the notion that immigrants are a problem, and contributes to hostility and racism against all immigrants.
revolutionary reflections | Climate Change and Migration in the age of Imperialism’s four horsemen
How can we trace the interconnections between war, famine, pestilence and conquest that are being unleashed in a new form as the climate crisis unfolds?
Reflections on the Manchester bombing vigil
Colin Wilson reflects on the vigil in Manchester after the bombing of the Ariana Grande concert on 22 May.
‘There are no foreigners here except the bosses’: Precarious workers strike back
Leo Zeilig, author of An Ounce of Practice (Hoperoad, 2017), describes recent precarious workers’ strikes at the University of London. By eight in the morning on Tuesday last week it had already been raining for a few hours. I had turned up early for the strike and stopped on my way to the picket-line in […]
#GE2017: Why does Labour make concessions to the right when it comes to immigration?
Jonas Liston reflects on Angela Rayner’s recent appearance on Question Time. How can she be awful on immigration whilst savaging the Tories on everything else?
Free movement is a workers’ right – Unite must defend it
Lisa Leak argues that defending freedom of movement for migrant workers is the only way forward for British trade unions. On Monday (27 March) Unite members started to vote on who will be their next General Secretary – the centrist incumbent, Len McCluskey; the right-winger, Gerard Coyne; or the socialist, rank-and-file candidate, Ian Allinson. We are currently […]
#M18: Vienna protests against racism and attacks on the right to protest
Report and photos by Nick Evans. “Stop instrumentalising us. Muslim women are fed up with being told what to wear. We want freedom to wear what we want.” The #M18 demonstration in Vienna began with speeches by Muslim women, Afghan and Syrian refugees and socialists, condemning the recent ban on the full-face ban and attacks […]
Racist Scottish Defence League humbled in Alloa
Luke from Edinburgh UAF reports The Scottish Defence League came to Alloa yesterday as they thought they could take advantage of a 2000 signature petition claiming that the council was giving refugees priority for housing over disabled and homeless locals. Just 40 SDL were confronted with a loud and proud demonstration of 200 overwhelmingly local […]
Peckham Pride: ‘When one marginalised group becomes a target, it is a risk to all of us.’
Last Saturday saw the second year of Peckham Pride; marching through south London in a show of solidarity between the LGBT community and migrants. Ida-Sofie Picard, an organiser for Lesbians and Gays Support the Migrants, writes on the politics of Pride, solidarity, and the importance of celebrating histories of resistance for struggle today. February the […]
Fortress UK, migration and Brexit: a briefing
Mike Haynes puts forward a briefing on some of the facts showing the difficult situation migrants already face trying to obtain legal permission to live in the UK Socialists argue for the free movement of people – it should be a human right for people to go anywhere; attempts to control movement are racist and divisive; […]
One Day Without Us – an interview with Laura Stringhetti
Steve Eason spoke to Laura Stringhetti from the One Day Without Us campaign about the migrant solidarity day of action on 20 February What is your campaign about and where did you get the idea from? Our campaign is called One Day Without Us. It was created after the Tory conference, as a reaction against the […]
May and Trump: Bringing us back to the streets
Joe Hayns discusses the spate of demonstrations in the UK instigated by Donald Trump taking office and the prospects they open up. Is a proto-protest movement forming? What are its prospects? On Friday 20 January, 1000 protested outside the US embassy; Saturday 21 saw the 100,000-strong Women’s March; on Monday 30, at least 40,000 were […]
Demonstrate against Trump and May tonight – details of all the demonstrations that we know of
Tonight will see angry protests across Britain against Trump’s vile racist travel ban and Theresa May’s revolting invite to him for an official state visit. We list here all the demonstrations that we know of 10 days ago the Women’s Marches against the newly anointed Trump mobilised millions across the USA and the world. […]
Paris, 19 March 2017: A March for Justice and Dignity
We publish this statement in solidarity with those demonstrating on 19 March, on the eve of the French presidential election, against police brutality, murder and state racism in France. Translated by David Broder. https://blogs.mediapart.fr/marche19mars/blog/191216/le-19-mars-une-marche-pour-la-justice-et-la-dignite One a month. That is the average number of fathers, brothers and sons we lose because of the brutality of the forces […]
Trump inauguration: Edinburgh protests
Eileen Cook reports on two demonstrations in Edinburgh in less than twenty-four hours. The first, on Friday evening, was called by Stand Up to Racism, UCU Scotland, Muslim Women’s Association, anti-war and peace groups and others. It was attended by nearly six hundred people. It was very crowded at the assembly point on the narrow […]
Mafia III – fighting white supremacy in ‘New Bordeaux’
Arjun Mahadevan reviews a new game, Mafia 3, with a black Vietnam vet hero and in the process takes down white supremacy Mafia III is an open-world action game set in 1968 in the town of ‘New Bordeaux’, a fictionalised version of New Orleans. The protagonist is a black Vietnam veteran, Lincoln Clay, trying to […]
Opening up a debate on black America – Beyoncé’s Lemonade
Monique Alicia Bell considers her favourite album of 2016 – Lemonade from Beyoncé I have been a Beyoncé fan since the days of Destiny’s Child, expressing my teenage moods by blasting ‘Emotions’ on repeat. As I watched women freaking out in excitement over this year’s visual album Lemonade, I decided I had to dedicate one full […]
Challenging racism on the Kent coast
The need for a mass anti-racist movement in Britain needs to be at the very heart of socialist politics today. Here Bunny La Roche and Ben Millard reflect on the experience of anti-racist organising in Kent over the last twelve months. Kent Anti Racism Network (KARN) has been busy over the last year. But it […]
Lessons from Fawley: From ‘British jobs’ to migrant solidarity
In 2011 the ‘British jobs for British workers’ slogan sent shivers down the spine of anyone championing the rights of migrants. Brian Parkin assesses a recent watershed dispute at Fawley and discusses how – and why – the tide has turned On Wednesday 27 July at 10.00 am, just four hours before workers at the […]
Is a People’s Brexit possible?
How do we respond to the right wing chorus over Brexit and the threat of Farage to organise a 100,000 strong march? Should we line up with the pro-EU centre of British politics that would like to overturn the referendum result? Seb Cooke argues here that we can only undermine Theresa May’s ‘Brexit for the […]
Racism renewed
Anindya Bhattacharyya traces the roots of the current anti-migrant racism back to the contradiction at the heart of New Labour’s immigration policy. Here he argues that changed circumstances necessitate a radical popular movement against racism. Everyone Who Is Here Is From Here, a one-day organising forum against racism and for migrant justice is taking place this Saturday (5 […]
revolutionary reflections | From the War on Drugs to Black Lives Matter: exposing the discourse on drugs in the history of US racism
The war on drugs has played a significant part in the creation of the prison-industrial complex that has condemned the lives of millions of Black Americans. In this article for Black History Month Laura Clark explores the history of the discourse around drugs in the creation and maintenance of racism in the US. You can […]
Everyone Who Is Here Is From Here
Saturday 5 November 2016, 10.00 – 16:30, Capstan House, 1 Clove Crescent, London E14 – near East India DLR The EU referendum campaign and its aftermath have brought to the surface the constant scapegoating of migrants and immigration by both the far right and ‘respectable’ politicians from all parties. Migrants and minorities are blamed for […]
15 October could be a dark day for refugees in Calais
It has been strongly rumoured that the threatened closure and demolition of the refugee camp in Calais, often referred to as “The Jungle” will commence on 15 October at 5am.
A poem by Alan Gibbons
Alan Gibbons, poet and novelist, penned this poem in response to Theresa May’s vile racist speech at the Conservative conference. We are proud to republish it for National Poetry Day There was an Irish immigrant Who dug the canals And built the bridges, Who carved the tunnels And made the roads And only consumed […]
Policing the Planet – charting changes to policing under neoliberalism
Sølvi Qorda reviews Policing the Planet: Why the Policing Crisis Led to Black Lives Matter, edited by Jordan T. Camp and Christina Heatherton Police killings have reached a shameful apex this week, the highest number in one week in an already-murderous year. How can we begin to comprehend a world where Americans will apparently express […]
Tim Farron – no friend to refugees
Seb Cooke discusses why Tim Farron, the leader of the Liberal Democrats, is no friend to refugees Tim Farron gave a speech at the Lib Dem conference on Tuesday where he told a story about the time he was handing out water to refugees on the Greek island of Lesbos. In his story, as he […]