Europe Solidaire Sans Frontières
Spectre Managing Editor Ashley Smith interviews sports writer and socialist Dave Zirin about the dramatic NBA players’ strike that shut down the league’s playoffs and quickly spread throughout the rest of professional sports and even into collegiate athletics. Zirin talks about what led to the (...)
APRIL 5, 1968 — the night after the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. — was the opening of a crucial playoff series between the Boston Celtics and Philadelphia 76ers. Reluctantly, the players from both teams went ahead with the game, although their hearts weren’t in it in an atmosphere that (...)
I’m in Russia – but I’m not here for the football. Fifa has allowed the sport to legitimise Putin’s abnormal regime – and I’m here to protest.
‘There can be no normal sporting relations with an abnormal regime like that of Vladimir Putin.’ Fifa President Gianni Infantino and Putin in Moscow during (...)
It doesn’t look like FIFA or the Russian state will act to halt anti-gay violence.
Welcome to the 2018 World Cup, a World Cup you may not be watching. Many Americans will undoubtedly be choosing to tune out this year’s soccer extravaganza, absent the nationalist pull of seeing the US team, not (...)
Leading figures in the anti-2020 Tokyo Olympics protest movement have launched a lawsuit seeking ¥3.5 million from the Japan Sport Council, Tokyo Metropolitan Government and the state over the forced eviction of homeless people from Meiji Park in April 2016 due to the construction of the New (...)
The Rio Olympics start in one month — they won’t be the first games to spark popular protest.
“We are not elected. We are self-recruiting, and our terms of office are unlimited. Is there anything else that could irritate the public more?”
So spoke Baron Pierre de Coubertin , French patrician and (...)
Mike Marqusee (61), who died of cancer in London last week, was one of the finest products of the Anglo-American world’s “‘60s generation”, with a brilliant intellect and a passionate commitment to social justice and human values. A prodigious writer and political activist, Mike was known in India (...)
As a luge competitor at the 2006 Winter Games, I saw the dehumanization and corporate domination behind the Olympic ideal. As a former Olympic athlete, I can tell you from experience that the Olympic Games have much more in common with The Hunger Games than anyone would want to admit.
I (...)
The Russian government’s anti-gay scapegoating diverts attention from what appears to be the most corrupt Olympics in history. It says something about the skittish levels of repression and fear in Russia that nail polish could provoke an international crisis. But that’s what happened at the IAAF (...)
What could have provoked such massive protests against a soccer festival from the sport’s most passionate fans?
On Sunday, June 30, as the Brazilian soccer team scored three goals against its Spanish rival in the finals of the most controversial Confederations Cup in history, thousands of (...)
Illegal waste dumps, displacement of residents, harsh retribution against local activists: Sochi has it all.
The Sochi olympics are already infamous for being the most expensive in history. But corruption-inflated construction contracts aside, there is also a huge environmental and human cost (...)
Mike Marqusee argues that the ceaseless injunction to consume, cheer and celebrate the Olympics has made the enjoyment of competitive sport something it is not and never should be – mandatory.
I enjoyed my afternoon at the Olympics, sitting in my public lottery assigned £50 seat at the ExCel, (...)
June last year, Iran’s women’s soccer team before an Olympic qualifier against Jordan was disqualified. FIFA thinks hijab “could cause choking injuries.” Ironically, FIFA boss proposed in 2004 that women players wear « hot pants » to boost the sport’s popularity.
These are the first Olympics when (...)
The famous clenched-fists image of Tommie Smith and John Carlos protesting against black oppression at the 1968 Olympics is worth revisiting as London 2012 presents us with a regime of licensed private dictatorship, writes Mike Marqusee.
In a world where the words ‘iconic’ and ‘icon’ have been so (...)
Howard Cosell said that “rule number-one of the sports jockocracy” was that sports and politics don’t mix. And yet last night, at the ballpark in Philadelphia, we received another reminder that some political expression is deemed not just acceptable but glorious.
When the killing of Osama bin (...)
In a recent article that appeared in India allrounder Ferveez Maharoof had said he was surprised to learn his omission from the squad for the tri-nation series, especially after a good showing in the Asia Cup in Dambulla. He said that he did well for Sri Lanka ‘A’ and in the warm up games. He is (...)
Matches always draw spectators, often generate controversies and sometimes provoke protests. The Davis Cup match Sweden played against Israel last weekend in Malmö, a port town south of Sweden, was a match with a difference. It generated lot of controversy, provoked a 10,000-strong demonstration (...)
While most of the recent attention that has been focused on the Beijing Olympic Games has been concerned with civil rights and environmental issues, virtually no comment has been made on the fact that by hosting the games, China becomes yet one more country to enter into what is essentially a (...)
The Indian Premier League is seen as a bonanza for cricket viewers, players and corporate owners, but hidden behind the glitz is the fact that it represents a distorted form of commodity and consumer excess. The Indian Premier League (IPL), a corporate-driven tournament featuring a set of city (...)
Dear Rahul Dravid,
Namaskar!
You, presently, lead the cricket team of India and wear the National Flag, Tri-colour while playing for India in different parts of the globe. You must be well aware of the fact that this Tri-colour represents a Secular-Democratic India and team led by you (...)
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