Red Youth (Norway)

Red Youth
Rød Ungdom
Leader Iver Aastebøl
Deputy Leader Marte Teigen
Secretary General Seher Aydar
Founded 1963
Headquarters Oslo
Ideology Revolutionary socialism, Feminism, Anti-Zionism, Anti-racism[1]
Mother party Red
Website Official Website

Red Youth (Bokmål: Rød Ungdom, Nynorsk: Raud Ungdom, shortened RU) is a Norwegian revolutionary youth league. It is the youth organization of the party Red and former Red Electoral Alliance and the Workers' Communist Party. The current leader of Red Youth is Iver Aastebøl.

Contents

Politics

RU is an organisation with three main principles: socialism, feminism and anti-racism. Their goals are typically communist, and they aim to organise the working class in preparation for an eventual overthrow of the capitalist system. RU wants to have more democracy in Norway today by banning Far-Right parties that attack democracy from being formed and also distance themselves from the Communist regimes in the Soviet Union and the People's Republic of China.

The Red Youth is active on several political fronts, supporting the Palestinian resistance and opposed to the European Union, racism and sexism.

In August, 2008 a faction of communist dissidents left the youth organization to form Revolutionary Communist Youth, the youth affiliate to Serve the People.

Activism

Red Youth is an activist organisation and has performed political actions and media stunts against Norwegian politicians. One of the more well known actions is when the Red Youth, in support of gay rights, interrupted the Christian Democratic Party' national meeting in an attempt to expose and highlight what they perceived as the Christian Democrats' homophobia.[2][3] The Red Youth also built a refugee asylum in the garden of the Conservative Minister of Local Government Erna Solberg, as a protest against her immigration policies.[4] In 2004, they tried to arrest the Conservative Minister of Education, Kristin Clemet, for crimes against Norwegian students.[5] Several members of the Red Youth were arrested in 2005 after trying to charge the Parliament of Norway in what was generally peaceful anti-racist action. Since the election of the so-called Red-Green government in 2005, Red Youth have been working to push the Social Democrats in a more leftist direction. They have also drilled for oil in Finance Minister Kristin Halvorsen's garden as a protest against oil drilling in the northern parts of Norway. In 2010, the Red Youth launched a campaign to collect 100,000 NOK to offer Siv Jensen, party leader of the Progress Party, for her to leave the country in response to her own party's proposal to offer immigrants the same sum of NOK to go back to their own country.[6]

References

  1. ^ "Rød Ungdoms prinsipprogram". sosialisme.no. http://sosialisme.no/politikk/prinsipprogram/. Retrieved 16 May 2010. 
  2. ^ Tveranger, Ingveig; Hadland, Wenche Lamo (30 January 2004). "Ballettdansende rebell" (in Norwegian). Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation. http://fil.nrk.no/nyheter/distrikt/rogaland/lokalen_pa_nett/1.223934. Retrieved 25 December 2009. 
  3. ^ "RU aksjonerte mot KrFs landsmøte" (in Norwegian) (Press release). Red Youth. 30 January 2004. http://sosialisme.no/nyheter/2004/01/ru_aksjon_krf/. Retrieved 25 December 2009. 
  4. ^ Viseth, Ellen Synnøve (2 August 2008). (in Norwegian)Dagsavisen. http://www.dagsavisen.no/innenriks/article362004.ece. Retrieved 25 December 2009. 
  5. ^ http://www.aftenposten.no/jobb/article851671.ece
  6. ^ Lilleås, Heidi Schei (15 October 2010). "- Vi gir 100.000 kroner til Siv om hun forlater landet" (in Norwegian). Nettavisen. http://www.nettavisen.no/nyheter/article3005540.ece. Retrieved 16 October 2010. 

External links