Corporate and workers’ sport history

From Socialist Worker weekly in Britain:

Tue 10 Jul 2012

A league of our own: the story of the workers’ sports movement

As the corporate dominated London Olympics looms on the horizon, Simon Basketter looks at the little known history of an alternative tradition

Between the First and Second World Wars, hundreds of thousands of workers took part in mass left wing sports movements.

These movements, mostly ignored by today’s history, were set up in conscious opposition to the growing sports industry—and were highly political.

German Communist leader Ernst Grube declared, “Worker sport has nothing in common with the petty bourgeoisie’s craving for freedom; it is Marxist class war on all fronts of sport and physical exercise.”

That sounded a bit less bombastic in those days—because this was a global movement. A Socialist Gymnastics Union had existed in the US as early as 1850. But it was in response to sport organised by the bosses in the 1880s and 1890s that workers’ sporting events started to take off.

Workers’ gymnastics and cycling societies were formed across Germany in 1893. In 1895, a British workers’ cycling club was organised around the Clarion newspaper. Hiking groups grew up around Europe.

Germany was the centre of the movement. There were over 350,000 worker sportsmen and women organised there before the First World War.

Workers’ sports were consciously different from “bourgeois” sports, in that they were open to all. A good example was the setting up of a “Workers’ Wimbledon” tennis championship.

The idea was that workers’ sports would remove class barriers from participation in sport, but also substitute socialist values for capitalist ones.

That’s why, prior to 1914, there was an emphasis on activities that could be less competitive, such as gymnastics, cycling, hiking and swimming.

The German newspaper Volksstimme (The People’s Voice) deplored “our youth’s interest in sport which is solely concerned with contest and victory”.

Competitive

However after the First World War competitive sport became ever more dominant. So left wing sports groups embraced more competitive activities—partially to keep members.

Political divisions also shaped the form of labour sports’ organisation. The International Union of Red Sports and Gymnastics Associations, better known as the Red Sport International (RSI), was founded in Moscow on 23 June 1921.

It hoped to run sports with the values of the Russian Revolution. It wanted “revolutionary proletarian sports and gymnastics organisations in all countries of the world” as “support centers for the proletariat in its class struggle”.

The RSI aimed to act as a counter-balance to the Lucerne Sport International (LSI). Established in 1920 by representatives of European worker sports federations, the LSI was allied to the Socialist (meaning Labour-type social democratic) parties.

This reflected the key division in the labour movement after the First World War. The Communists believed that capitalism could only be beaten by revolution, while the Socialists looked to reforms from above.

Membership of the Communist RSI groups in most countries was significantly smaller than the LSI ones. But the RSI was still substantial.

So in Germany, the mainstream workers’ sports organisation ATUS had some 1.2 million members in 1929. But there were also 250,000 workers in Communist sport groups. They were expelled from the ATUS in 1928 for insisting that sport groups should commit themselves to revolution.

This reflected Communist policy at the time—and it didn’t always fail. In both France and Germany, the majority of workers football clubs joined the Communist group after the split.

But the Socialist groups were on a different scale. In 1926 the ATUS opened the most modern sports facility in Germany, the Bundesschule in Leipzig.

Affiliate

One affiliate, the Workers’ Cycling Association, was the largest cycling organisation in the world with 320,000 members. It even ran its own bicycle factory.

In Austria and Czechoslovakia the movement was also impressive. The Czech groups for instance taught over 10,000 people a year how to swim.

A further measure of the flourishing movement was the labour sports press. The German groups published 60 newspapers with a combined circulation of 800,000—and that’s excluding local editions.

On top of this the Communist sports groups were printing eleven regional and four national sports papers of their own by 1932.

The most imposing part of the labour sports movement was the Workers’ Olympiads. These were organised as a counter to the national chauvinism of the recently revived mainstream Olympics.

The first was held in Prague in 1921. At the time the losers of the First World War were banned from competing in the Olympics. In sharp contrast, the Prague games featured competition between worker athletes from “enemy” nations.

This theme was also prevalent at the first official labour Olympiad in 1925. Held in Germany under the motto “no more war”, more than 150,000 people attended.

The 1931 Second Olympiad in the Austrian capital Vienna was in many ways the high point of the workers’ sports movement.

The social democrats who governed “Red Vienna” built a brand new stadium and even offered their guests reduced fares on public transport. Tens of thousands of athletes stayed in workers’ houses in the city.

March

On the last day of the Olympiad some 250,000 people came to watch the “festive march” through Vienna of an estimated 100,000 people from 26 nations. They toppled a symbolic figure that represented capitalism.

But sports groups associated with the Communist RSI were excluded. Besides the Russians, these included some 250,000 Germans and 100,000 Czechs plus smaller contingents from Europe and the US.

The RSI organised its own competitions, the international “spartakiada” (named after the rebel slave gladiator Spartacus). They were held in Moscow in 1928 and in Berlin in 1931. This division wasn’t fully bridged until the third and final workers’ Olympiad, held in 1937 in Antwerp, Belgium.

In response to the rise of fascism, the Communists—under the influence of Stalin—declared the popular front. Political differences were to be ignored in the name of unity.

Antwerp offered a huge display of labour solidarity. Some 50,000 filled the stadium on the final day, and 200,000 marched.

But the movement suffered heavily as fascism swept through Europe. A workers’ Olympiad scheduled for Barcelona in 1936 had to be aborted after Franco’s attempted military coup led to civil war.

The German ATUS had been one of the Nazis’ first targets in 1933. And Hitler’s armies suppressed others as they marched across the continent.

But it wasn’t just repression that hurt the labour sports organisations. The growth of corporate sport, combined with the Cold War, meant that they never recovered. But nonetheless their attempts to organise workers’ sport are worth remembering.

How sport became a class battleground

People have been playing games for centuries—but organised sport as we know it is a more modern phenomenon.

It developed first in elitist British public schools such as Eton and Rugby. Then it spread around the world in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries as a by-product of imperialism.

In imperialist countries, sport helped to bolster nationalism. That’s why the author George Orwell wrote that sport “is war minus the shooting”. So the Tour de France helped create the idea of a French nation state, as did football in Italy.

Organised sport moved into the working class as a result of industrialisation. Industrial capitalism drew a sharp distinction between work and leisure. The regulation of the working day brought with it periods of rest.

The working class takeover of English football only occurred after the reduction of the working week, specifically the introduction of the Saturday “half-holiday” in the 1860s and 1870s.

As more workers took up football, many public schools dropped it rather than be contaminated by the masses. Increased leisure time also encouraged workers’ involvement with different sports in the same period in France, Germany and the US.

The increase in leisure time was due in no small part to workers’ organisation. The spread of the eight hour day after the First World War came on the back of struggle.

The need for healthy soldiers and nationalism made states keen on sport too. And employers had an additional motive.

They wanted a healthy workforce to boost productivity, and sport came to be seen as a way of ensuring physically fit workers. It was also viewed as a way of combating militancy and ensuring “industrial peace”.

For example, West Ham Football Club began in 1895 as the Thames Ironworks Football Club. The boss set it up after a major strike, as part of a concerted programme to improve “cooperation between workers and management”.

This was also true of a number of US baseball clubs. Writing in the 1920s one US industrial management guide argued that sports “saved the worker from agitators”. It was moves like these by the bosses that led the labour movement to start organising its own sports.

British mammal roadkill survey

This video is called British wildlife.

From Wildlife Extra:

Annual GB mammal roadkill survey

Public asked to keep an eye on Britain’s animal kingdom

July 2012. In the 60 years of Queen Elizabeth II’s reign, mammal populations in Britain have undergone many changes. While some, such as rabbits and foxes have grown in numbers over the decades, other iconic native species such as the red squirrel and hedgehogs have suffered a dramatic decline. Mammals on Roads, an annual survey run by the People’s Trust for Endangered Species (PTES), allows motorists, especially families travelling together by car, to record sightings of any mammals, dead or alive, that they spot from their vehicle, contributing towards the charity’s efforts to monitor the changing state of Britain’s mammals.

Help with the survey

Wildlife enthusiasts can complete the survey via a printed pack or by downloading the Trust’s free Mammals on Roads app onto their iPhone. The app makes it easier to take part in the survey on the move: the location of sightings and the routes of participants’ journeys are recorded using the inbuilt GPS of iPhones. The information captured is then sent to the Mammals on Roads database and analyzed by wildlife experts at PTES. Journeys that are repeated along the same route year on year especially provide important scientific data on changing populations.

1 million mammals killed on UK roads every year

PTES Surveys Officer David Wembridge says: “It is a sad fact that around one million mammals are killed on UK roads each year. However, roadkill provides wildlife experts with clues about the state of wild animal populations, as the proportion of dead animals relates to the number of those alive in the wild. Since the launch of Mammals on Roads in 2001, volunteers have surveyed over three-quarters of a million kilometres of road along the length and breadth of Britain. We hope that with the availability of the iPhone app in addition to the paper-based survey, even more people will take part and help us by surveying the country’s immense road network for signs of wildlife. In the last sixty years, our mammal populations have undergone huge changes, underlying the need for monitoring to in conservation.”

This Jubilee year marks the twelfth anniversary of the survey; continuous monitoring each year is vital to help the Trust build a more complete picture of the state of the UK’s wild mammal populations. A review of the results from Mammals on Roads provided evidence that the hedgehog population had declined by a quarter over the last decade, leading PTES to initiate a campaign to protect the endangered animals.

Mammals on Roads is an annual survey and runs through July, August and September. The app, which was developed by Dr Brock Craft of the London Knowledge Lab and Dr Adam Talcott of Atomic Powered, is available to download for free at the App Store. Scan the above QR code for details on how to take part, or contact mor@ptes.org or call 020 7498 4533 to request a printed survey pack.

How have the top mammals spotted on Britain’s roads fared?

Rabbit (Oryctolagus cuniculus)

The rabbit population in 1952 was around 100 million (40 million were culled each year for meat and fur); the following year, myxomatosis was introduced and by 1955, 99% had been killed. Thirty years later, the population had grown to 20 million and today it is almost twice that (38 million).

Hedgehog (Erinaceus europaeus)

Burton, in 1969, estimated the population in the early 1950s to be 36.5 million in arable and pastoral land areas, although this was based largely on guesswork. Since then, there has been a steady decline. In 1995, the population in Great Britain was estimated to be 1.5 million, but over the last decade, counts of hedgehogs in Mammals on Roads have fallen by a quarter.

Squirrel (Sciurus)

Grey squirrels were introduced throughout the 19th and start of the 20th centuries. Their range expanded rapidly between 1930 and 1945. In the 1950s, a bounty system failed to reduce grey squirrel numbers or prevent their spread. By the early 1960s, only parts of Cumberland, East Anglia, north Lancashire and Westmorland remained largely uncolonised in England.

Badger (Meles meles)

In 1952, there were more badgers than there had been fifty years earlier, but in the 1960s and ‘70s, numbers fell as a result of continued persecution and the effect of insecticides such as dieldrin. The first legislation to protect badgers specifically was the Badgers Act 1973, which prohibited badger digging for sport. It was followed by the Protection of Badgers Act 1992, and from the 1980s, the population has increased from about 190,000 to 300,000 today.

Fox (Vulpes vulpes)

Fox numbers in 1960 were very low, perhaps as a result of the loss of rabbits from myxomatosis, but the population recovered over the next thirty years and in 1990, the number of foxes killed per square kilometre was four times that killed in 1946 on the same estates. Since the 1990s, numbers have changed little.

July 2012. Over 1200 hours of work by volunteers and staff this spring has created a new picture of the native red squirrels’ current geographical range in northern England: here.

New London history book

This video from England is called A People’s History of London – Lindsey German & John Rees on Robert Elms Show 11 May 2012.

By Jean Turner in Britain:

Lindsey German and John Rees – A People’s History Of London

Verso, £12.99

Tuesday 10 July 2012

Lindsey German and John Rees have undertaken a formidable task. In one volume, they seek to encapsulate the history of London in terms of the ordinary people who have shaped it and given it its spirited life.

They have achieved this by drawing on many reputable and fascinating ancient chronicles, histories and biographies, including those by communist historians and activists and social reformers.

It’s a history familiar to socialists and London lovers and what the book succeeds in doing is relating past with current struggles. The chapter headings – from Lords, Lollards, Heretics and Peasants In Revolt proceed in chronological order to Neoliberal London – and enable the reader to browse in a favourite period of popular history.

Every common land, park, square, market, street and building in London is built on the foundation of a turbulent and often violent past. Many of these places are still the centres of protest and action – as the authors demonstrate, the “London mob” has never gone away.

The City has become the centre of vast wealth arising from the exploitation and occupation of other countries, the slave-trade and present day finance capital. The chapter Old Corruption And The Mob That Can Read records that in the 1750s bankers Alexander and David Barclay and Francis Baring made their money from the slave trade and one can only hope that Barclays soon meets the same fate as Barings Bank.

The reverse of this stupendous wealth was terrible poverty and squalor, well described by Fielding, Marx, Engels, Dickens and Mayhew and the authors emphasise that Londoners played an important part in the formation of trade unions, the rise of Chartism, universal suffrage and social welfare.

They reference the popular support in the capital for the 1848 national revolutions, the Paris Commune, the Russian revolution and the national liberation movements in the British Empire.

Fascism was fought and defeated on the streets of London and Occupy UK has built on the stratagem of the communists in WWII who led the occupation of the Underground and luxury hotels for air-raid shelters.

While this is a reference book for all progressive people who want to identify with a city that never stands still, but some of its statements are questionable. For instance, it states that “the July 1945 general election took place with a depleted electoral register and with many troops still overseas.”

In fact the overseas forces were able to vote and the three weeks between the July 5 polling day and the announcement of the election result on July 26 allowed for their votes to be counted. The Labour landslide was the result of highly politicised troops voting to return to a new society free from pre-war Tory misery.

But such errors in no way detract from the value of such a history.

Another review of this book is here. Yet another one is here.

Save New Zealand’s dolphins

This video is called Hector’s & Maui’s Dolphins appeal by William Trubridge.

From Wildlife Extra:

New Zealand chastised by IWC for failure to protect world’s rarest dolphins

International Whaling Commission criticises New Zealand over failure to protect Maui’s & Hector’s dolphins

July 2012. Hundreds of delegates from government and conservation groups are gathered in Panama at the 64th meeting of the International Whaling Commission (IWC) this week to discuss the future of [the] world’s whales.

Amidst the annual wrangling between pro- and anti-whaling fractions, there has also been occasion to consider the fate of the world’s smallest and rarest marine cetacean, New Zealand’s little known Maui’s and Hector’s Dolphins.

The IWC’s scientific body urged New Zealand to take immediate steps to arrest the decade of decline of its only native dolphins, pointing out that current protection measures are inadequate in terms of the area and the fishing methods they cover.

Nylon nets led to edge of extinction

Since the introduction of nylon filament nets in the 1970s, Hector’s dolphin numbers have dropped from 30,000 to around 7,000. The situation for Maui’s dolphins, a subspecies of Hector’s dolphins, is even worse. More than 94% are already lost and Maui’s dolphins are now confined to very small remnant population on the west coast of New Zealand’s North Island. With just 55 survivors older than one year, less than 20 breeding females, and an annual decline of around three percent, Maui’s dolphins are facing imminent extinction.

The New Zealand government has come under fire for opposing action to save the critically endangered Maui’s dolphin at the world’s largest conservation summit – with leading conservation groups calling New Zealand’s actions on the international stage ‘shameful’: here.

February 2013. In a letter to New Zealand’s Prime Minister, the Society for Marine Mammalogy (SMM) urges the government to ban gillnets and trawling in Maui’s dolphin habitat immediately to avoid their extinction. With a membership of some 2,000 scientists from 60 countries, the SMM is the world’s largest professional body dedicated to research on marine mammals and the ecosystems that support them. The letter highlights that fishing nets alone kill about nine percent of an estimated population of 55 individuals over one year of age, which will render Maui’s dolphins virtually extinct in less than 20 years: here.

Tool-using dolphins form subculture: here.

Scientists find out that dolphins ‘talk’ like humans: here.

Related articles

• New Zealand dolphin faces extinction, group warns (phys.org)
• Icelandic whaling scandal (dearkitty1.wordpress.com)
• Barry’s Cheese and Hector Dolphins – Akaroa, New Zealand (travelpod.com)
• Australian baby dolphin endangers, saves pod (dearkitty1.wordpress.com)
• Leave No Dolphin Behind: Dolphin Pod Carries Injured Member Until She Stops Breathing (blogs.smithsonianmag.com)
• Dolphins form self-made ‘raft’ to try and save dying friend (ctvnews.ca)
• Dolphins try to save dying companion (bbc.co.uk)
• Video Shows Intelligent Dolphin Asking Divers for Help (techeblog.com)

Barclays fraud bank’s boss gets millions

By Tony Patey in Britain:

Barclays bungs Diamond £2m on his way out

Tuesday 10 July 2012

by Tony Patey

Barclays boss Bob Diamond walked out of his job at £40,000 a footstep, it was revealed today, a week after he quit amid a rate-rigging scandal.

Mr Diamond – who has already raked in millions as a high-flying banker – is expected to receive £2 million after deciding to forego a potential £20m in bonuses and share awards.

So when he walked out – with immediate effect – of Barclays’ headquarters in Canary Wharf he took the lift from his 31st-floor office and made £40,000 a stride as he went 50 metres to the door.

He has agreed to take up to 12 months’ salary, his pension allowance and other benefits, the bank said in a statement, which works out to around £2m.

Unreality also extended to the world of No 10.

Asked about Mr Diamond’s pay-off, Prime Minister David Cameron’s official spokesman said: “This is a decision for Bob Diamond and for the board of Barclays.

“I think the decision to forgo the bonus is a sign that they understand public concerns and that they understand that there is a need for a change in the culture of banks.”

Barclays chairman Marcus Agius told the Treasury select committee that Mr Diamond had voluntarily decided to forego any deferred consideration and any deferred bonuses worth up to £20m.

Both resigned last week over revelations that Barclays traders attempted to manipulate the key inter-bank lending rate Libor, but Mr Agius is staying on to lead the search for Mr Diamond’s replacement.

The bank was fined £290m for attempting to fix Libor.

…

It is thought Barclays remains in talks with Mr Diamond’s right-hand man, chief operating officer Jerry del Missier, over his pay-off. He quit the same day as Mr Diamond.

As big banks face the fallout from a global investigation into interest rate manipulation, American and British lawmakers are scrutinizing regulators who failed to take action that might have prevented years of illegal activity: here.

The latest annual study by Democratic Audit depicts important aspects of the decay of democratic rule in Britain under the impact of a growing divide between rich and poor: here.

Saudi dictatorship kills demonstrators

Activists posted this video from a protest in Qatif, Saudi Arabia on Monday 9 July.

From the New York Times in the USA:

July 9, 2012, 9:58 pm

At Least Two Protesters Are Killed in Saudi Arabia

By MICHAEL SCHWIRTZ

The arrest of a prominent Shiite Muslim cleric over the weekend has ignited protests in eastern Saudi Arabia that have left at least two people dead, the Saudi interior ministry told news agencies on Monday.

The cleric, Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr, is reported to be a prominent voice of protest among Saudi Arabia’s Shiites who say they face discrimination at the hands of dominant Sunnis in the workplace, universities and elsewhere. Mr. Nimr was arrested on Sunday for “sedition” after being shot in the leg in a tussle with the police, Saudi officials said.

The circumstances of his arrest remain murky. The authorities said that Mr. Nimr and his entourage opened fire on police officers attempting to arrest him before crashing into a security patrol while trying to escape, Reuters reported, citing government-run television.

[A] Video reportedly shot just after Mr. Nimr’s arrest shows the cleric lying in the back of a vehicle, his head cradled by a man in uniform. He is covered in either a white sheet or robes that appear to be covered in blood.

This video is said to show Sheik Nimr al-Nimr after his arrest on Sunday.

Word of Mr. Nimr’s arrest spread quickly through Saudi Arabia’s Eastern Province, an oil-producing hub heavily populated by Shiites. By nightfall on Sunday, hundreds of people reportedly gathered for a protest in the Qatif region.

In one video from the protest, a sizable crowd is seen walking down a street lined with palm trees. Loud pops, apparently gunshots, are audible at various points, and several injured people are shown being carried away. At least one of the injured was covered in blood.

Curiously, the shots fail to disperse the demonstrators who continue their boisterous march.

There were reports of another protest on Monday evening in the town of Awwamiya, also in the Qatif region. Video from that protest shows a large group of people chanting, “We will not be humiliated,” according to a Saudi journalist, Ahmed Al Omran, who posted a link to the video on Twitter.

This video is said to be from a protest in Awwamiya on Monday.

Moroccan rapper’s hunger strike

This video is called Morocco / Free Moroccan rapper Moad Lhaqed [Mouad Belghouat].

From daily The Morning Star in Britain today:

Rapper starts hunger strike

MOROCCO: Rap artist Mouad Belghouat has gone on hunger strike to protest at prison conditions.

His brother Aderrahim said he began the strike on Monday because he was forbidden from using the phone, was harassed by other prisoners and had his belongings “constantly” searched by guards.

Mr Belghouat was convicted in May of showing contempt for public servants because of one of his songs.

Music of the Arab revolutions spreads alongside the struggle: here.

Katie Holmes breaks with Scientology, Cruise

This video from the USA is called Tom Cruise Scientology Video – (Original UNCUT).

Scientology is often considered to be a for profit business, claiming to be a religion because religions are tax exempt.

Scientology was already the cause of the breakup of film actor Tom Cruise’s second marriage, with Nicole Kidman.

Recently, Scientology ruined Cruise‘s third marriage, with Katie Holmes.

By Naughty But Nice Rob in the USA:

Katie Holmes Returns To Catholic Church

Posted: 07/09/2012 1:09 pm Updated: 07/09/2012 1:17 pm

Five years after revealing that she had started to study Scientology, Katie Holmes has officially returned to the Catholic faith, registering as a parishioner at the Church of St. Francis Xavier in New York City.

“Everyone is thrilled to have Katie join us,” a member of the church’s choir told me. “She has not yet attended a service, but when she does she will be welcomed with open arms.”

The church, located on 16th Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues, is known for inclusive thinking and its welcoming of many gay and lesbian Catholics.

In this, that New York parish differs from elsewhere in the United States Roman Catholic Church. But also certainly from Tom Cruise, from other Scientologist movie stars, and from Scientology.

Its mission statement indicates that the Roman Catholic Church parish “strives to be a prophetic, welcoming community, inclusive witness to the presence of Christ Jesus in our midst.” Its website proclaims that it is a respectful community, “where seekers and their questions are welcomed, where injustice is challenged, where the poor, the alienated and marginalized find a home,

That is certainly different from Scientology; where, if you are poor, then you get even poorer as you have to give your money to the Scientology bigwigs.

and where people are refreshed, reconciled and renewed.”

Scientology Reportedly Auditioned Girlfriends for Tom Cruise: here.

Man says treatment at Scientology-affiliated clinic triggered suicide attempt: here.

Cave paintings by Neanderthals?

This video is called Ancient Rock Art & Cave Paintings of the World.

By Philip Guelpa:

Did Neanderthals create cave art?

10 July 2012

A newly published article in the journal Science (Pike et al, 15 June 2012, “U-Series Dating of Paleolithic Art in 11 Caves in Spain”) indicates that Paleolithic cave art in Europe dates even earlier than previously known, to at least 40,800 years ago. This is only a few thousand years, at most, after the earliest documented appearance of anatomically modern humans on the continent and at least 4,000 years older than the previous estimates for the earliest cave art in Europe. Tests run on samples from the 11 caves identify the earliest image as a red disk dating to 40,800 years ago, followed at 37,300 years by a hand stencil, and a claviform-like (key-like) symbol at 35,600 years.

Over the following millennia, artistic representations painted on cave walls developed tremendously in variety and sophistication, including a whole range of abstract symbols as well as exquisitely life-like animal representations, which demonstrate a fully human intellectual and aesthetic capability. However, these early simple designs, assuming that they do indeed predate the more elaborate images, may illustrate an aspect of the artistic tradition that modern humans brought with them when they first migrated out of Africa. The newly applied dating technique uses the ratio of radioactive uranium to thorium in the calcium deposits (calcite) that have formed on the cave walls after the paintings were created. Uranium gradually decays into thorium at a predictable rate. Once a calcite deposit is formed the initial ratio of the two elements will progressively shift; thus the older the specimen the greater the proportion of thorium to uranium.

This technique is more accurate for the time range in question than radiocarbon dating of organic compounds in a painting’s pigment, since the latter technique becomes unreliable for dating materials more than about 30,000 years old. Since the uranium-thorium technique dates material deposited over the paintings, it gives only the latest possible date. The actual age of the paintings may be even older. Given the time frame of this earliest known cave art, the authors of the Science article suggest the possibility that some of this work may have been created by Neanderthals (also spelled Neandertals) rather than by modern humans. If true, this would tend to further reduce the previously postulated evolutionary distinction between Neanderthals and modern humans. However, the proposal is controversial and, at this time, speculative.

Nevertheless, the corporate media and some scientists have been quick to sensationalize it. These accounts play up the novelty of the idea that Neanderthals, once thought to be hulking, sub-human brutes, actually had the intellectual capacity and aesthetic sense to create art, which is taken to indicate abstract, symbolic thought, while minimizing the tentative and so far very weak scientific basis on which this hypothesis is based. Neanderthals had been present in Europe at least 150,000 years ago and, so far, there is no evidence of cave art over more than two thirds of that time period. Currently available data indicates that modern humans only arrived on the continent sometime between 40,000 and 45,000 years ago. Neanderthals became extinct or were genetically absorbed into the modern human population within 10-15,000 years of the latter’s arrival. Some recent research suggests this may have happened even more quickly. While there may have been sufficient genetic compatibility for successful mating, as recent genetic research seems to suggest, the overwhelming preponderance of data currently available indicates that Neanderthals, at least prior to the appearance of modern humans, had very limited artistic capabilities, confined to small items of personal adornment.

Unfortunately, the stratigraphic integrity of the principal source of this supposed evidence, Grotte du Renne at Arcy-sur-Cure in central France, is in question. Modern humans also occupied the cave, so the separation between artifacts associated with each group cannot be confirmed.

Similar objects are clearly associated with undisputed sites of modern human occupation. There is also evidence that Neanderthals employed red ocher (iron oxide) pigment, which is often used in cave paintings, in some contexts, such as the decoration of burials. However, their technological capabilities, as illustrated by stone tools, while exhibiting a certain degree of sophistication, appear to have been markedly inferior to those that modern humans brought with them from Africa. By contrast, there is gradually accumulating evidence that anatomically modern humans had by the time of their spread out of Africa already developed intellectual and aesthetic capabilities beyond those so far documented among Neanderthals. For example, new dating of a cave site in southern Germany reveals that modern humans were making flutes out of bird bone and mammoth ivory at about 42,000 to 43,000 years ago, very soon after their initial arrival on the continent.

Recent research at Blombos Cave in South Africa indicates that modern humans were already exhibiting abstract, symbolic thought, as represented in a variety of objects, including pieces of ochre engraved with abstract designs and beads made from shells, at least as early as 75,000 years ago. Evidence that modern humans used red ocher as a pigment has been found at Qafzeh Cave in Israel dating back to 90,000 years ago. Evidence from other parts of the world suggests that as they spread out of Africa modern humans carried an already established artistic tradition wherever they went. Petroglyphs (rock engravings) appear in Australia at roughly 40,000 years ago. As in Europe, this artwork dates to shortly after the likely first arrival of the humans on the continent. Unless new dates for European cave art push its origins even earlier, well before the arrival of modern humans on the continent, it would appear that the hypothesis that Neanderthals painted in caves remains unproven at this time.

Study reveals Neanderthals at El Sidron, Northern Spain, had knowledge of plants’ healing qualities: here. And here.

Neanderthal ‘sister species’ interbred with us: here.

Neanderthals ate roasted vegetables: here.

Monti’s austerity in Italy

This video is called Italy unions unconvinced by Monti’s austerity plan.

By Marianne Arens:

Italian prime minister to cut additional €26 billion

10 July 2012

“Spending review” is the term given by Italian premier Mario Monti to his latest austerity package agreed by his government last week. The state budget is to be cut by a further €26 billion over the next two years.

Public spending is to be reduced by an additional €4.5 billion by the end of this year. In the spring pensions had already been drastically cut, while consumer prices and taxes were raised.

The latest official figures published by the statistical government agency Istat (May 2012) show an increase in youth unemployment (15 to 24 year-olds) to a staggering 36.2 percent. At the same time, living costs for an average family went up by almost €2,500 per year, according to the reports of two consumer organisations a few days ago.

In 2013 the state budget will be reduced by a further €10.5 billion and in 2014 once again by more than €11 billion. In September 2013, VAT will go up from 21 to 23 percent, putting additional strains on working class and low-income families.

Ten percent of jobs in the public service will be slashed. For every five state employees that retire, only one will be replaced. This will hit the public health sector particularly hard; the closure of 150 hospitals and the axing of 80,000 hospital beds are under discussion. …

More than 3,000 organizations, administrative offices and partly state-run enterprises will be cut. In the Emilia Romagna, for example, this will affect over 360 organizations.

The Emilia Romagna region is hit particularly hard by Monti’s “spending review” policy, because it was struck by the worst earthquake in its history only a few weeks ago. In this area alone 6,500 jobs of medical doctors, nurses and social workers will be slashed, and 4,000 hospital beds eliminated.

The austerity package aims to fulfil the conditions of the European fiscal pact even before the Italian government has approved it. Monti once again called on the members of parliament to agree to the fiscal pact and the European stabilization mechanism (ESM) before the end of July. He referred to his “success” at the latest EU summit in Brussels. (See “EU summit measures mean deeper attacks on the working class”)

The Monti government was not democratically elected. It is a government of big business and the banks. It was put into power in November 2011 by the president of the state, 87-year-old ex-Communist Party member Giorgio Napolitano, following pressure from the financial markets. Ever since, Monti has systematically worked to dismantle all the post-war gains of the working class and ensure that they bear the costs of the banking crisis.

The new austerity package is to be put to parliament on July 31.

Credit ratings agency Moody’s downgraded Italy’s government debt yesterday to just two notches above junk status: here.

Unelected Italian Premier Mario Monti said today that he’s “gravely concerned” that Italy’s autonomous region of Sicily may soon be forced to default on its debts: here.

Eurozone finance ministers meeting in Brussels agreed the terms of a bailout for Spain’s crisis-hit banks today: here.

Rajoy reveals more austerity pain for Spain: here.