Unity, the magazine of Unite Against Fascism

Review

By Caroline Colebrook

THE FIRST edition of Unity, the quarterly magazine of Unite Against Fascism has at last appeared, giving us now three major anti-fascist and anti-racist journals in this country, the other two being the monthly Searchlight and the bi-monthly Hope not Hate.

 Unity is £3 for 32 pages and its first edition, Spring 2012, is focussed on the local elections that happened in May.

 The cover picture depicts Doreen Lawrence, mother of Stephen Lawrence, the black teenager who was murdered by racists in 1991 and leads to a story on page four by UAF joint general secretary Weyman Bennett entitled “The murder that exposed racism in the justice system”.

 There are campaigning articles on the elections and the launch of “Griffin must go”, a report of the UAF national conference in London, an article on the history of the UAF and its predecessor, the Anti-Nazi League.

 There is a very good article on Paul Robeson, and articles on combating homophobia, fighting the extreme right wing in Catalonia and on fighting racism in football. There is a contribution from Love Music Hate Racism.

 And there is an introduction by Christine Blower, the general secretary of the National Union of Teachers.

 There are plenty of full colour photos, graphics and advertisements for UAF merchandise.

 But none of the articles is very long – around 500 words is the maximum with most at about 300. So all topics are covered rather superficially.

 It is a great magazine for handing out in large numbers to young people who are not yet involved in anti-fascist activity. For anyone who is already involved it will not tell them anything they do not already know.

 In that sense it is complementary to Searchlight which covers issues and give analyses in much greater depth and supplies up to date information and intelligence on the fascist and racist organisations. The two journals are not in competition; they aim at different readerships.

  Unity can be obtained from the UAF national office at PO Box 36871, London WC1X 9X, phone 020 7801 2782 and email: info@uaf.org.uk