Student rebellion and state repression: the events of 1968 in México
Continuing our series of retrospective talks on the events of 1968, this week’s WP on Campus meeting looks at the explosion of student militancy onto the streets of México City in the months leading up to the Summer Olympics of that year.
Wednesday 6 August, 5pm
International Room, 1st floor UCSA Building
Workers Party on Campus “Introduction to Socialism” study group
The first session of our planned regular series of introductory study groups meets this Wednesday after the conclusion of the México 1968 talk, at 6.30pm in room 1106 (11th floor Central Library). The reading for this week’s session is “How Revolutionaries Choose Their Political Priorities” and can be found here.
Copies of the readings for subsequent sessions will be available for pickup on Wednesday.
NOTE: WP also currently run an advanced study group on Marx’s “Capital” – send us an email if they would like to find out more about participating in this.
Workers Party Election Campaign
Last week saw the official launch of our local election campaign with several public forums as well as the beginning of leafleting and doorknocking in working class areas of Christchurch. Our policies such as abolishing GST, ending the corporatisation of public services and putting all elected MPs on the average workers’ wage have been getting a good reception from workers, students and pensioners and we will be taking our anti-capitalist message out to more local neighborhoods over the coming weeks. If you can help us with any of this work please get in touch!
There was a piece on 1968 on TV One’s Closeup earlier this evening. During the ad breaks it was advertised as ‘a time when Olympic athletes weren’t too scared to take a stand’. They showed the two African American athletes pulling a fisted salute on the dais but shamefully did not mention the 500 Mexican students demonstrators gunned down during the 1968 Olympics. The rest of the item showed the Vietnam war, student uprisings in Paris, the USA and the Czech Republic, drug taking and rock music.
Sadly an opportunity to show how the Olympics and state repression come together was overshadowed by 1960s cliches about ‘generation gaps’, drug taking hippies and ‘youthful rebellion’ 🙁
Unfortunately I missed the piece on Close Up, however I’m not surprised they left out any mention of the Tlatelolco massacre and the revolutionary events taking place in Mexico during the lead up to the 68 Olympics.
The “circle of moral concern” for modern day liberals apparently does not extend to people living outside the imperialist metropoles – unless they are passive victims lacking in any political agency!
btw I’ve uploaded my talk from the forum on my blog here