Left wing MMA gym training Londoners to defend themselves from hate crimes

Solstar trainers Ella Gilbert (L) and Anna Zucchelli (R) at one of the gym's sessions
Paula Lamont
Luke O'Reilly24 November 2019

A left wing mixed martial arts club is training Londoners to defend themselves against the rising tide of hate crime.

Solstar began as a 'Red Gym' seeking to improve the physical fitness of left wing and progressive people.

The gym started in Stoke Newington but has now moved to Tottenham, where it is based in a Kurdish-Turkish migrant community centre.

In recent years, the gym has begun to work closely with LGBT and minority groups to provide self-defence and deescalation training for those most vulnerable to hate crime.

Members of Solstar taking part in an anti-fascist demonstration
Paula Lamont

Paula Lamont is a Taekwondo trainer for the club, which also has boxing and Muay Thai trainers.

She told the Standard: "We do a community self-defence seminar, which is focused around hate crime - you can be with your friends, you can be attacked on the street by groups of people - and just really how you defend yourself and your friends in those scenarios."

As the number of reported hate crimes increases, the gym has found itself contacted by minority groups looking to train.

According to Home Office figures, reported hate crimes in the UK more than doubled between 2013 and 2018.

"With the rise in reported hate crime what's happening is there's a lot more funding accessible in terms of counteracting those issues, especially for people from the LGBT community, and people like migrants.

"We have been working with migrant organisations and women's organisations to develop self-defence seminars and courses, and also confidence building and increasing self esteem."

Paula Lamont (centre) teaches a self defence seminar for women at Solstar
Paula Lamont

The classes usually have a ratio of one man to one woman.

Paula rejected the notion that the group was an 'anti-fascist fight club'.

"We have been given that label and it's quite clickbait-y, but we loosely describe ourselves as a Red Gym, which incorporates the broadness of the left, anybody from the most hardcore anarchist to somebody who makes tea for their Labour party meetings", she said.

Unlike most other fight sport gyms Solstar's trainers are all women.

"Being female-led is the most important thing and that is reflected in our membership." she said.

She added: "Really also, it's not just about fighting and martial arts it's about creating a healthier and more confident left. We're against this kind of victim position that has been perpetuated, I think, on the left a little bit.

"It's about promoting being healthy both in physical health and mental health, and the benefits of doing regular exercise.

"We should be demanding our rights as opposed to asking for our rights and I think that need, that kind of assertion needs a level of confidence that we wanted to project

"That kind of assertion needs a level of confidence that we wanted to project and we felt that having a very positive presentation of left wing politics was very important to us."

She said that the club's values are "very broad progressive principles of basic decency".

One of the Solstar's members does some pad work
Paula Lamont

Solstar holds a boxing session Mondays and a mixed martial arts class on Thursdays, and works closely with the Kurdish-Turkish community.

It offers women's self-defence seminars that are particularly popular with women from the local Kurdish community.

Solstar was the first 'Red Gym', but is no longer the only one. Other gyms have begun to pop up in Manchester, Cambridge and Dublin and they even have inter-club fighting competitions.

"We attend inter-clubs with other gyms", Paula said. "Except in a very kind of lefty way where no one wins and everyone gets a medal."

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