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A fact from Yusuf Dadoo appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the Did you know column on 28 June 2011 (check views). The text of the entry was as follows:
The article says he was a tireless supporter, but what was his official capacity? Was he a politician, a football player, an activist? Could the author this article please elaborate?--Hraefen17:35, 28 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Very late reply, but he was the leader of the SACP for many years, one of three core signatories of the Freedom Charter, and a very prominent figure in the struggle against Apartheid. I'm busy expanding the article to make this clear (and going for a DYK in the process!) -Kieran (talk) 18:18, 18 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Got that bit about the Freedom Charter wrong... But the rest holds. And you can see some of the praise heaped on him by other prominent struggle figures. Anyway, I think the article now speaks for itself... -Kieran (talk) 16:41, 28 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
You'd have to read more deeply around the man's life. But he was definitely Muslim -- he was born into a Muslim family, attended a Muslim high school, was elected chair of the Madressa Anjuman Islamia of Kholvad in the late 30s, and, nearing death, he explicitly requested a Muslim burial. He was also deeply involved with the South African Communist Party, even chairing the organisation for several years. I should add that he was also an Indian nationalist and a great follower of Gandhi. In fact there's a whole chapter of a book containing the correspondence between the two.
It does, perhaps, serve to illustrate that political and religious views are often far more nuanced than they are portrayed to be in this day. -Kieran (talk) 16:38, 28 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
To put it in a more opinionated way, I think that, especially in the United States in recent years, but to a lesser extent in the West generally, there has been a tendency for any political view (on any side of the spectrum) to be recast in its most extreme, caricatured form. (e.g. "all conservatives are fascists", "all Muslims are Islamist terrorists", "all communists are evil Stalinists", etc). But politics, both today and in the 20th century, are far more complicated and situational than that. -Kieran (talk) 16:58, 28 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
