Weekly Worker 409 Thursday November 22 2001
Letters
Victory over homophobia
Lennox Lewis has won a sensational victory in the ring and an equally sensational victory over homophobia. Hasim ‘the homophobe’ Rahman was knocked out by the man whose masculinity and sexuality he derided.
In the run-up to his world title fight, Lewis was subjected to a stream of taunts about his sexual orientation from Rahman and rival managers and promoters. In August, Rahman accused Lewis of a “gay move” over his legal action to force a rematch between the two fighters. Two days before the fight, he repeated his insinuations, making an issue of the fact that at the age of 36 Lewis has no children.
The World Boxing Council, International Boxing Organisation and International Boxing Federation did nothing. They colluded with Rahman’s vulgar bigotry. The WBC, IBO and IBF collusion with homophobia brings shame upon the sport. It makes boxing look nasty, cheap and prejudiced. By not condemning the homophobic slurs against Lewis, the boxing profession gave a green light to prejudice.
It would never tolerate racism. Why is it tolerating homophobia? If a white opponent was taunting Lennox Lewis about his race he would face disciplinary action. Yet boxing’s governing bodies gave Rahman a free hand to make repeated offensive insinuations about Lewis’s sexual orientation.
Why is Rahman so interested in Lewis’s sexuality? Perhaps his obsession reveals something about his own sexual desires? Rahman is a cheap, small-minded bigot. He deserves to be treated with the same contempt as racists. It is outrageous that the boxing boards of control did not discipline Rahman over his homophobia and failed to support Lewis by publicly condemning homophobia in sport.
There is no evidence that Lewis is gay, but if he is gay he should come out. It would be an act of great courage and dignity: the equivalent of Jesse Owens braving racist prejudice to win gold in Berlin in 1936. Lewis would become one of the all-time great sporting legends, on account of both his record in the ring and his guts in standing up to the notorious homophobia of the boxing scene.
Peter Tatchell
London
To sign or not
The Revolutionary Democratic Group has been asked to support the statement, ‘For a democratic and effective Socialist Alliance’. In our view there are four key questions for any pro-party bloc at the current time.
- First, the need to adopt the aim of a party in the new SA constitution. It is not necessary to specify at this point when such party should be launched.
- Second, and following from that, the recognition of the need for a democratic process leading to a special founding conference to launch a new party.
- Third is the necessity of establishing urgently a regular Socialist Alliance newspaper.
- Finally, the need for a transitional constitution based on democratic federalism as the best means of uniting the existing and potential forces in the SA.
The problem is that the statement, ‘For a democratic and effective SA’, does not deal with any of these key pro-party issues.
Strictly speaking, the statement is not a pro-party statement. Comrade Larsen (CPGB) has said that when he asked Nick Wrack to sign, he was asked if the statement was pro-party. When comrade Wrack was assured that it was, he agreed to sign. But why would he ask such a question if the statement was clear? The fact is that it isn’t clear and therefore requires support from additional statements and reassurances.
The Socialist Workers Party is opposed to adopting the aim of a party in its constitution, does not recognise the need for a founding conference, opposes an SA paper, and opposes a democratic federal constitution. It could adopt the statement without making any concession on its position. The only exception to this is on members’ platforms. Apart from that, they could sign up without supporting any of the key pro-party demands. The argument for a “democratic and effective” SA is now used by the SWP as a non-party or anti-party line.
These are the reasons the RDG has not signed this statement so far. It is not that we are opposed to democratic effectiveness. Everybody wants that. We can sign statements whose contents we don’t disagree with. The problem is that the statement does not focus on the key questions around which a “democratic and effective” pro-party bloc should coalesce. It therefore points us in the wrong direction.
Shortly after the statement was launched, we requested some minor but important amendments. They were not accepted. It would have been difficult, but not impossible to accept them. It is now (virtually) impossible to make such changes. But since the CPGB are our closest political allies on the left, we are in favour seeking some other way to find agreement. We have called for discussions with the CPGB with that aim in mind. Talks have been agreed in principle. If the CPGB is serious in wanting us to sign, we are optimistic that an agreement can be reached.
RDG
Web design
I thought you might be interested in some feedback on your new web layout. I find it very hard - the text is initially too small to read and when you zoom in, you have to keep flicking from one side to the other and text is still not as distinct as before.
I do not know if you have adopted this new layout for financial reasons. If so, I understand (and I gave my £20 donation to your comrade in Trafalgar Square today for reading the web edition). But if it is for clarity I think it is a lot worse than before.
Colin Price
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