Socialist Organiser

The weekly of the fused Workers Socialist League, July 1981 to April 1984

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Socialist Organiser no. 72, 11 February 1982 · scan pp. 3–4 · about 1,348 words

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The reasons given by Race were very different from the reasons of Tory backwoodsmen, and the result was a curious alliance of feminist-influenced progressives and the most reactionary characters who think Advertisement 50p Capitalist Crisis and Socialist Alternative' , a detailed study of the breakdown of the boom, by Bob Sutcliffe. 50 p plus postage from PO 'Box 135, London NIODD. sexual fulfilment.

Apparently, local authorities, who will issue licenses, will not be able to ban sex shops altogether, but they will be able to say no to particular sex. shops in particular areas-which could prob2y 1lI Since we live under a male-dominated society almost all erotic literature or pornography (however we define these) uses women in the way Reg Race described. So for that matter does a great deal of mainstream literature, the popular press, advertisements and so on. We have to challenge this, show how misogynist and male dominated ideas and images are put across, but censorship is no answer.

If Lady Chatterley's Lover were on trial now, and the criterion by which it were to be judged were the feminist-type arguments used against modern pornography, the book would certainly be condemned. If any novel describes sexuality from an entirely male point of view, this is it.

In the 1970s obscenity laws were relaxed, and liberals were generally in favour of eroding censorship. We are now in a period when this libertarianism is being reversed. with Sainsbury's Bill coming into force last year, and now restrictions on ser shops.

It is no coincidence that censorship is being introduced at the same time as a revival of the ideology of the family, attacks on abortion and on working mothers.

Women have nothing 1o gain by it. Unfortunately. now the liberals are on the side of censorship. "NOT since the siege of Mafeking, or possibly Little Nell's fate dragged out from installmert *o installment has the British public followed a sequence of events with such deep and genuine emotional involvement as the fate of Sir Freddie Laker's airline.

That was how the Telegraph, in its solemn manner, summed up the hysteria that surrounded the death of Laker Airways.

Perhaps they talk of little else but Mafeking and Little Nell in Fleet Street bars. If so Matcking is probably mentioned to ridicule days of the British Empire. Perhaps in years to come Sir Freddie Laker will be the punchline in Thatcher jokes.

Laker himself was cleared by the press of any responsibility for the crash. The Daily Mail said: "lt was Margaret Thatcher. the champion of free enterprise who gave the final thumbs down to Britain's best-loved entrepreneur (but) it was the international airline industry which was responsible for the closure.

•Poor Sir Freddie is the victim of recession, of bad luck-of contracts to pay tor his aircraft in dollars made when the pound was highof his own buoyant optimism. and of the vindictiveness of the big airlines who were out to get him for blowing their cosy pricefixing cartels sky-high.

In fact it was not Laker who pioneered cheap package flights. He used the principle of cheap flights to attack the cartels over the Atlantic. And he was able to do so because he had powerful financial backers who, like Laker, thought that they would make a packet. He was not the David of the popular press against the Goliath of the giant air companies.

The TV news followed the press in portraying Laker as some kind of folk hero. But the TV cameras panning down the lists of subscribers to the Save Laker Fund could not hide the truth. It was not the 'public' coming to Laker's aid at all, but big and small busingss.

The Telegraph reported that one •businessman offered £1 million and that fund organisers "were also checking offers of £35 million and £5 million to see on what basis the money was being offered and to ensure the bona fides of the donors"

The Oxford Mail reported that i Blackwells, that bastion of anti-trade unionism and Freedom 'Association-style management-was flying a union jack upside down at half mast. "If Sir Freddie can't My again, then neither will our flag" ' said the company. MAGGIE'S DONE THE ONE TORY FORGET THE LIST TIME LER When the News of th World produced across il front page the banner hea line We Love You, S Freddie" it really was speat ing for Fleet Street. Behin the razzamatazz there w: no space for the 2,50 workers whose jobs are no in jeopardy.

Those who declar themselves ready to work li nothing, and the 200 (whe was the general public?) wi marched to the . Stor Exchange and to Parliame were allowed on stage on as cheerleaders for the absent hero.

As for those por bemused people who meek parted with their 50ps al £l notes to help their herc they may be meek, but th sure won't inherit the earth they won't even inherit t skies.

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According to Tehran Radio, organisations, the Kurdistan a number of leading mem- Democratic Party.

ACT NOW TO BACK heddin have been killed by struggle of the NCR against Khomeini's Revolutionary the government's repression.

Among those killed, was leadership of the NCR aims Moussa Khayyabani, in at best to secure for the charge of PMOI operations Iranian masses a (valuable), after the flight from Iran of brief, democratic interlude the organisation's leader, after the double carnage of Massoud Rajavi. Other the Shah and Khomeini. bani's wife and Massoud gramme of the PMOI and Clearly this represents an Sadr will hinder the develimportant set-back for the opment of a distinct party PMOI and for the move- of the working class, instead ment of resistance to the tying the masses to sections Khomeini regime. But it is of the 'bourgeoisie and petty ridiculous to think, as the bourgeoisie. Socialist Organiser. Thursday ONE year on strike: that is the unprecedented extent of the struggle by workers at the Wilson-Rowntree factory in South Africa, organised by the South African Allied Workers Union (SAAWU).

Despite mass arrests and detentions of SAAWU's membership and its entire leadership by the stooge police of the Ciskei bantustan, the union is growing, galvanising widespread support.

Last November after ten months of a widespread consumer boycott, two SAAWU mass meetings called for a blacking of Rowntree products by railway workers and suppliers. 1982 Page national demonstration in Brian Bolton, a TGWU official (who has polemicised in the press against Rowntree and in support of SAAWU) addressed Saturday's meeting.

But when asked what had happened to SAAWU's invitation for the TGWU to send a delegation from all levels in the union to South Africa he refused to discuss it, saying that TGWU policy was opposed to it.

The meeting threatened to break down in a furore; many activists were unaware of the invitation and shocked at Brian Bolton's attempt to play down the matter. Obviously a change bers of the People's MojaGuards in Tehran. victims were Moussa KayyaRajavi's wife. government's press statements predict, that these deaths will silence the fight back against the Islamic Republic's butchery.

These deaths are the latest in a long, heroic line of PMOI martyrs. They come almost three years to the day after the same peoble had risked their lives the mobilisations that overthrew the Shah.

The most important focus of° resistance is the national Council of Resistance, headed by Massoud Kajavı and including Iran's ex-President Bani-Sadr.

The NCR also includes largest of the Kurdish We must support the But the programme and Inevitably the prothe linking up with BaniIRANIAN WEEK OF ACTION Picket and photographic exhibition, 10am-6pm 9 February, Tottenham Court Tube Fleet Street, Theatre Lane Victoria lith and I2th Demonstration on 13 Feb.

2 pm, Assemble behind Albert Hall. Rally Trafalgar Square, 4 pm. Hunger fast6 pm. outside UN Information Office, 14 Stratford Place, W1 (Bond St. tube).

Organised by Muslim

Students Society (Britain)

(supporters of PMOI)

----- pull-quotes -----

WORKERS REViEW 1

SAVE ST. GEORGES

EXPRESS• C 1... PRIME MINISTER FE

ghang Khomein"'s nepresssiom Wor a Yews

2 month struggle at Wilson-Rowntre

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