Solidarity 250, 20 June 2012

Emma Rickman reviews Ridley Scott’s Prometheus, in cinemas now. Prometheus is the prequel to the Alien trilogy; a series of battles in the bellies of spaceships with a creature that hatches through the rib cages of its human “wombs”. The (infertile) human heroine pursues the mother alien in a fight to the death, through three long sequels. The predecessor in Prometheus to the heroine in Alien (Sigourney Weaver’s character) is a “believer”. She and her archaeologist husband board the ship Prometheus in search of “the engineers” (giant humanoid aliens that resemble statues of Greek heroes), who...

Most self-respecting LGBT people do not aspire to religious doctrines to sanctify their relationships. Those who want to have a legal union are catered for by civil partnerships which ease some immigration restrictions for LGBT couples, make passing on and sharing property a bit easier, and in a society as a whole provide the social status of a “committed” relationship — in the communities that matter to us, of course. But Stonewall’s campaign for gay marriage rights is not just about the practical application of recognition of LGBT relationships under the Church, it does something incredibly...

On Friday 15 June, LGBT rights activists staged a determined demonstration outside the Uganda High Commission in London. The rally, organised by the Movement for Justice, was protesting the UK’s deportation of Ugandan LGBT asylum seekers and the revival of the notorious “kill the gays” anti-homosexuality bill in Uganda. Protestors cheered when news came through that 22-year-old Ugandan lesbian Linda Nakibuuke had won her appeal for refugee status in the UK. Linda had been detained since 11 April by the UK Border Agency who planned to deport her despite being told that she had been tortured for...

Jade Baker looks at the life of Bob Marley and how it is portrayed in a new biopic of the musician, directed by Kevin MacDonald. Bob Marley was and remains one of the world’s most popular musicians. He was also an advocate for the rights of black people, spoke up against poverty and a fighter against western oppression. Bob Marley, the film, tells the story well. The film touches most poignantly on the conflict Marley’s mixed-race identity posed and the effect it had on his creative output and ideological outlook later on in life. It is also the story of the poverty-stricken and reggae-infused...

The programme of the Greek left coalition Syriza is a challenge (though an incomplete one) to EU policy as well as to Greek policy. It demands a change in EU policy away from enforced cuts and enforced destruction of worker-protection laws. The left across Europe should take up this challenge, and spell out a full and coherent alternative. Both because democracy is important in its own right, and because calls for change in EU economic policy spin in a void if there is no measure of democracy at a European level to allow them traction, the left’s alternative must include proposals for...

A spectre is haunting Greece: the spectre of Syriza. All the powers of old Europe and the world have entered into a holy alliance to exorcise this spectre. Neoliberals Merkel and Schäuble, social-democrat Hollande, unelected officials of IMF and EU, pink-green Daniel Cohn-Bendit, and the presidents of Slovakia and of Malaysia, all united in ideological terrorism and blackmail. Yet Syriza won 27% of the votes on 17 June and was only narrowly defeated by ND [New Democracy, Greek equivalent of the Tories]. This historical challenge should not to be dismissed as a mere illusion or as an attempt to...

On 9 June, the North East London branch of the AWL hired the tenants’ hall on the estate where one of our members lives and showed the Gillo Pontecorvo film Burn, a 1969 classic starring Marlon Brando and dealing with issues of imperialism, racism, and class struggle. Members of the branch helped make food, and we invited friends and contacts of the organisation. We charged £8 (£4 unwaged) for tickets, which included food and drink. As well as raising £70 for the AWL funds, the event was a good chance for AWL members to spend some time together outside of more formal political settings...

A court of judges appointed by Egypt’s disgraced former president Hosni Mubarak last week (June 13) dissolved the Islamist-dominated parliament elected last year — in the first proper elections in Egypt’s recent history. Many oppositionists denounced the move as a coup d’etat, as it leaves the army — the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF), which has ruled Egypt since Mubarak was deposed in February 2011 — in uncontested control of the country. June 16-17 saw the second round of Presidential elections. But without the Parliament, which was elected to oversee the drafting of a new...

The decision of Antarsya — a block of ten Trotskyist, Maoist and dissident Stalinist organisations — to run a slate in last weekend’s Greek election split opinion on the British far left. In the event, it secured just 0.33% of the poll, leaving the purpose of the exercise, even on its own terms, open to obvious question. A majority of activists favoured critical support for Syriza. Socialist Resistance, the British group linked to the Fourth International, took that stance even though their Greek comrades participated in Antarsya. By contrast, the Socialist Workers’ Party swung fully behind...

The Society for the Protection of the Unborn Child (SPUC) and East London Mosque have launched phase two of their anti-SRE (sex and relationship education) campaign in Tower Hamlets. Following a public campaign against schools using the Channel Four resource Living and Growing, a DVD that is accused of “priming” children for sex because it shows a brief animation of sexual intercourse, a petition has been launched to ban the programme of study many schools replaced Living and Growing with The Christopher Winter Project. This too has been termed “sexually explicit”, by which they must mean...