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REDFLAG.ORG.AU PUBLICATION OF SOCIALIST ALTERNATIVE 14 JUNE 2021 | REDFLAG

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Socialist Contact your local branch

Melbourne
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melbourne@sa.org.au
Alternative Sydney

0408 885 622
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Brisbane
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WHAT WE STAND FOR brisbane@sa.org.au
Adelaide
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adelaide@sa.org.au

Canberra
ed Flag is money and the very talism. So we support For a revolution to 0431 844 890
published wealthy to move freely and throw ourselves succeed, however, we canberra@sa.org.au
by Socialist while workers face into movements to end need political organisa-
R Alternative, restrictions and walls. oppression, including tion—a mass socialist Perth
a revolutionary socialist We argue that the that based on sex, party that convinces 0431 616 599
organisation that environmental crisis is gender, race, religion workers of the need for perth@sa.org.au
stands for a society caused by capitalism. and ability. revolution and stands
free from exploitation The relentless compe- We recognise that with the majority Wollongong
and oppression. tition for profits among the sovereignty of against the mainstream 0423 202 638
We argue that the ruling class—the Aboriginal and Torres parties and economic wollongong@sa.org.au
capitalism cannot be wealthy minority who Strait Islander people elites; ultimately, a
reformed—it must be own or control most of over this continent party that can lead the
overthrown by the the world’s resourc- was never ceded. The struggle to overthrow
working class and es—is destroying the genocide and dispos- the ruling class and
replaced with a world- planet. The crisis can session committed by the capitalist state and
wide socialist system be overcome only by European colonists and create new institutions Marxism Discussion
in which economic a planned economy the Australian state of workers’ democracy Groups
resources are demo- run in the interests of were and are criminal to run society.
cratically controlled everyone. acts. We support the We are trying to lay Interested in left-wing ideas and how
and class divisions are We oppose all forms Indigenous struggle for the basis for such a we can change the world? Want to know
abolished. Stalinism of social inequality. We land rights, sovereignty party by participating more about Marxism and the politics of
and one-party dicta- need trade unions to and economic and in campaigns and Socialist Alternative? Sign up to start
torships have nothing defend and increase social justice. arguing for socialist the series of discussion groups today
to do with the world we the wages of working We also argue politics wherever we at redflag.org.au/marxism-discussion-
want to see. people and to make that oppression and are. Together, we have groups.
To achieve this, working life better. So- exploitation can be a world to win. If you
we need an interna- cialist Alternative totally eradicated agree, join us. Introducing Marxism:
tional movement that members are union only through a
rejects nationalism members and activists. socialist revolution— Socialist a theory of social change
and imperialist war We understand that something Marx called Alternative’s by Tom Bramble is the reader
and supports open combating oppression “a movement of the statement of that accompanies Socialist Alternative’s
borders. We oppose is an essential part immense majority in principles is available weekly “Introduction to Marxism”
the globalisation that of building a united the interests of the online at: discussion groups. Order online at
allows corporations, struggle against capi- immense majority”. sa.org.au/node/3924. https://shop.redflag.org.au/

Vale Anthony Ashbolt

Chloe Rafferty Macquarie University, he campaigned to defend group. He helped to elbow out a space for radical
gay liberation activist Jeremy Fisher after he was discussion and organising against the hostile
thrown out of his university accommodation terrain of the corporate university.
for his sexuality and his politics. The campaign I had the pleasure of speaking alongside Rowan
succeeded by appealing to the Builders Labourers Cahill and Wendy Bacon among others at a sym-
WOLLONGONG ACTIVISTS and union- Federation. That connection between the class posium which Anthony organised to celebrate the
ists were shocked to hear of the sudden passing struggle and broader questions of political and so- 50th anniversary of the 1968 rebellion. I always got
of Anthony Ashbolt, a lifelong fighter against cial justice was something Anthony never forgot. the sense talking to him that his interest in those
injustice, at the age of 67. Anthony was a politics As an academic, Anthony was always keen to years of struggle wasn’t just nostalgia; rather, he
lecturer and union stalwart who wasn’t afraid to be preserve the lessons of past struggles. His writing looked to them as a guide to the struggles of the
outspoken inside or outside the classroom. He was on the Berkeley free speech movement of the 1960s future. He was pleased as punch, for example, that
never shy about taking up the fight to university was a defence of the radical left’s support for free I was late to the symposium because I was rushing
management’s agenda of corporatisation, and he speech. As a labour historian, he recorded work- back from what would be the first of many mass
was a refreshingly argumentative politics lecturer. ing-class radicalism in Australia that might other- student climate strikes.
Anthony was profoundly shaped by the strug- wise be forgotten, including the longest teachers’ Anthony will be sorely missed by his friends,
gles of the late 1960s and early 1970s. As a high strike in Australian history at Warilla in 1976. colleagues and comrades at the University of Wol-
schooler, he had thrown himself into the struggle Anthony was always the first person a student longong and in the local union movement. Vale,
against the war in Vietnam. Later, as a student at activist thought of when setting up a campaign Anthony Ashbolt.