Olga Shparaga The imprisoned Belarusian opposition politician Maria Kalesnikava has been in a critical condition since the end of November. In October she was awarded an honorary professorship at the University of Salzburg. The philosopher Olga Shparaga, a fellow member of the exiled Coordination Council, pays tribute to a feminist legend. ‘It is a great… Read More Risking all in the fight for democracy
JUAN COLE Last Saturday evening, activists said that on Sunday, 20,000 Israelis staged demonstrations and marches against the new Netanyahu government, which has given powerful ministries to the small Religious Zionist and Jewish Power blocs of Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben-Gvir, respectively. Both are given to racist and intolerant statements about persons of Palestinian heritage, who constitute… Read More Israelis protest “Thuggish” “Fascist” new Government, as it Proceeds to Ensconce Apartheid toward Palestinians
NB: This is a moving and valuable historical document. It is published on a Leninist portal, with whose politics I disagree, so my posting this speech does not imply my endorsement of the doctrines of Socialist Worker; or the KPD or the CPSU. (A detailed analysis of Bolshevism may be read here). Nonetheless, the brunt… Read More Clara Zetkin: Fascism must be defeated (1932)
Letter to the readers, Mainstream, January 7, 2023 DOCUMENTS: BOOKS: IMAGE & SOUND: Editor’s Picks:
YOGENDRA YADAV Has the Bharat Jodo Yatra lowered communal tempers? I ask this question with some trepidation. I have been a data person for a long time. I have asked for hard evidence for any cause-effect claim. And this question does not admit hard evidence. At least not in such a short time span. Yet… Read More Has Bharat Jodo Yatra lowered communal tempers or is it naive optimism?
Bharat Bhushan Rahul Gandhi’s Bharat Jodo Yatra (BJY) has become a headache for the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). Not only is it startled by the public response to the BJY north of the Vindhyas, but it can sense that Rahul Gandhi’s emerging leadership style offers a real challenge to that of the BJP’s top leaders.… Read More Rahul Gandhi’s alternative approach to leadership
First posted November 11, 2016 A few weeks ago, five people who were selling papers outside Hyde Park were arrested by the police for obstruction. When taken before the magistrates, they were all found guilty, four of them being bound over for six months and the other sentenced to forty shillings fine or a month’s… Read More George Orwell: Freedom of the Park (1945)
Following the Taliban’s ban on university education for girls, the male students in the country have boycotted their classes condemning the suspension of higher education for women, Tolo news reported on Sunday. The male students have put forward a strong opposition to attending classes until they are open for female students as well. “We will… Read More Male Afghan Students Boycott Classes, Protest Women’s Education Ban / ‘We are treated worse than animals’: Afghan women speak out against university ban
[This article by Mahatma Gandhi was published towards the end of March 1930. It was part of a series of Gandhi’s articles and was a prelude to his arrest in the first week of May 1930] There is no halfway house between active loyalty and active disloyalty. There is much truth in the late Justice… Read More Duty of disloyalty. M. K. Gandhi (1930)
Patrick Wintour Taraneh Alidoosti, one of Iran’s most famous actors, has been detained by security forces in Tehran days after she criticised the state’s use of the death penalty against protesters. She had previously posted a picture of herself on her Instagram page in which she was not wearing the hijab and holding a piece… Read More Iranian actor Taraneh Alidoosti arrested after criticism of death penalty
After the truth-shower 