Hollman Morris

Hollman in a more Columbian setting

Related Links:
Hollman speaks on Youtube
Link to the Latin American Solidarity site (Lasc)
Amnesty library listing for Holman Morris
Holman's Facebook page

Arthur Scargill - a man among the people

As part of the build up to this Friday's 'Day of Action', Unite the Union, invited legendary Trade Union leader Arthur Scargill to Ireland for a series of talks. Before his talk to a packed Matt Merrigan Hall, Indymedia caught up with Scargill to chat about the Miners' Strike of 1984/85 and other contemporary issues such as January's Lidnsey oil refinery strike, which Scargill supported, a strike which caused much debate on the left with the use of the slogan 'British Jobs for British Workers'.

Kevin Brannigan – Folk singer Billy Bragg recently said, “Today’s economic crisis started on March 3rd 1985, the day the Miners were defeated.” Do you support this view?

Arthur Scargill – No. Billy Bragg unfortunately has moved to the right instead of moving to the left. Billy Bragg supported the Miners in 1984/85 and indeed did a lot of things which were very positive, but I think his analysis is completely wrong. The position is that the Labour and Trade Union movement failed to understand in 1984/85 that this was not just a matter of a dispute between an industry and a trade union, this was a fight promoted by the Tory government to try and destroy trade unionism.

Windmills mark the line of the Great Retreats

Seventy years after the Battle of the Ebro the dead remain unburied and the ghosts of Franco's dictatorship still haunt the landscape. Indymedia investigates...

Related Links:
A Catalan blogger's post on the remains in the Terra Alta | An English translation of Elies 115's original post | Website for the old town of Corbera | The official state-sponsored website for the Battle of the Ebro

Yes to Irish, Blacks, and Dogs. NO to the BNP

As this article is published the leader of the BNP, England's neo-fascist racist political party & one of the principle articulators of European neo-nazism in the English language has entered the BBC studios in London to take part in a BBC "question time" broadcast. The presence of Griffin has not gone without protest or reaction in Britain as much as in Ireland. This article collates much of the recent coverage of that reaction & puts this week's publishing on the internet on "Wikileaks" of the current BNP membership list in context.

But the point of this article is to examine from a leftist and Irish perspective the possible consequences of the BBC invitation to Griffin and the reaction in the liberal English chattering classes and at parliamentary level. Rather than moving to a revamping of the Race Relations Act the British it seems are considering a return to the censorship which was applied to the factions of the north of Ireland in general and Sinn Fein in particular.

Stephen Gately's Funeral
Photo © Michael Gallagher

Today's (October 16th) edition of the English newspaper "The Daily Mail" carried an opinion piece by the English journalist Jan Moir. The homophobia and inherent hatred voiced in the article led to an extraordinary amount of comments on that newspaper's website which together with reaction from other newspapers saw the title of the article changed by mid afternoon. By late afternoon an internet campaign had begun to pressure advertisers who use the Daily Mail to cut their support.

The loss of revenue to the English newspaper might be the most serious blow to its editorial policy of articulating and pandering to middle English prejudice ever. As such the article which prompted this reaction merits archiving.

Excerpts from the Daily Mail article:
"Something is terribly wrong with the way this incident has been shaped and spun into nothing more than an unfortunate mishap on a holiday weekend, like a broken teacup in the rented cottage."
...
"And I think if we are going to be honest, we would have to admit that the circumstances surrounding his death are more than a little sleazy."
...
"Another real sadness about Gately's death is that it strikes another blow to the happy-ever-after myth of civil partnerships."
...
"For once again, under the carapace of glittering, hedonistic celebrity, the ooze of a very different and more dangerous lifestyle has seeped out for all to see."
Read the full article HERE.