Back Issues

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Established 1979
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These are the back issues of Red Rag. They'll be posted here every (usually) two weeks on or around the anniversary of their original publication. We're currently reissuing 1984; the latest issue is dated April 29th (scan / txt); the next one is due out on May 13th.

Red Rag, or Reading's only newspaper, had a noble tradition of misspelling, mixed metaphors, wrong facts, confused political judgements and a readership of 4000. It printed pretty well everything it got sent ("unless the Collective judged it racist, sexist, right wing, supportive of oppressive religions, or boring"). It aimed to provide a decent alternative coverage of local news and issues from a radical non-aligned position; to promote subversive and creative initiatives; to provide a forum for unorthodox views; to allow some sort of co-existence between a huge variety of interests. And in four and a half years it had never sold a single copy.

In this issue (scan / txt): Red Rag interviews members of the newly opened UB Cycles bike repair co-operative; after a long absence we celebrate the return of Diogenes; women in the Tory Party are to be seen but not heard (not one of the Tory women on Reading Council has spoken at a Council meeting this year); and anyone in the Reading area who finds themselves unable to cope without a fix will have trouble getting treatment from a local doctor: the Drug Squad has circulated a list of 'junkies' to surgeries and told them to phone immediately any of these people appear in their waiting rooms.