Statement of the Communist Party of Canada (Marxist-Leninist) Issued August 28, 1973
The women’s liberation movement is part and parcel of the revolutionary movement of the working class and without the emancipation of the working class, women cannot be emancipated. This clear Marxist-Leninist political and ideological line is gaining ascendancy amongst the revolutionary women. More and more of them see the necessity of organising proletarian revolution as the basis and the precondition for the emancipation of women.
During the 1960’s when the revolutionary youth and student movement swept the U.S. and Canada, there also arose the movement of the women workers to liberate themselves. As with the youth and student movement, the monopoly capitalist class tried to divert the women’s movement, lead it into a blind alley and liquidate it. But the revolutionary sentiment of the women workers was deep, their class and social oppression profound and the need for emancipation genuine. So they persisted in fighting the monopoly capitalist influences of fighting for “women’s issues” (e.g. abortion on demand, etc.) by taking up the class issue of building the Party of the proletariat and leading the revolutionary struggles of the workers towards proletarian revolution.
A trend began in 1970-71 when women who had participated in the women’s liberation movement began serious summing-up and abandoned the monopoly capitalist class position on the question. A comrade, one of the veterans of the women’s liberation movement, came forward in 1971 to denounce the bourgeois line on women and took up the task of building CPC(M-L). Several women followed this comrade’s path. In November, 1972, over half a dozen women who had previously been involved in the women’s liberation movement came forward to join CPC(M-L).
The Control Commission of the Central Committee of CPC(M-L) has received applications to join CPC(M-L) from two revolutionary women (see letter at the end of article) who had previously been involved in the women’s liberation movement. CPC(M-L) considers this move on the part of the two revolutionary women to be a reflection of the developing trend amongst working women against reformism and bourgeois women’s liberation and for proletarian revolution. CPC(M-L) firmly believes that this trend is the main trend and will continue to develop as such.
The Communist Party of Canada (Marxist-Leninist) warmly applauds the revolutionary sentiment of these two women comrades who have decided to take up the task of building CPC(M-L) and to work for proletarian revolution so that working men and women can be emancipated. We warmly welcome them to join our ranks.
The Communist Party of Canada (Marxist-Leninist) takes this opportunity to state that CPC(M-L) considers working women as a decisive factor in proletarian revolution, as they not only participate in the struggle for production but also in the struggle for reproduction, more so than their working men partners. For this reason, the mobilisation of women to join CPC(M-L) and to work for proletarian revolution is decisive in winning victory over capitalism. Without the large-scale participation in proletarian revolution by working women, there can be no victorious and successful proletarian revolution.
Marxist-Leninist women have already played an important role in building the Party. There are two women in the Central Committee of our Party and there are women who are also local secretaries. Many women have participated in the resistance movement and have spent months in jail for the sake of proletarian revolution. Our Party has always put a great deal of emphasis on mobilising women on the Marxist-Leninist basis. Irrespective of which sex an individual is, CPC(M-L) organises the Marxist-Leninists from amongst both working men and women.
The Communist Party of Canada (Marxist-Leninist) takes this opportunity to call upon all our comrades to further mobilise Marxist-Leninists from amongst both working men and women and to assist in the campaign to eliminate discrimination against women workers as women. CPC(M-L) is convinced that as the revolution progresses and more and more working women and men join the revolution, the more the social basis of discrimination against women workers will be eliminated. Total emancipation of women workers as women will come about with proletarian revolution.
LONG LIVE THE STAUNCH REVOLUTIONARY SPIRIT OF WOMEN WORKERS!
LONG LIVE THE WOMEN WORKERS’ STRUGGLE AGAINST SOCIAL DISCRIMINATION AND CLASS OPPRESSION!
LONG LIVE THE COMMUNIST PARTY OF CANADA (MARXIST-LENINIST)!
(This article first appeared in People’s Canada Daily News, Vol. 3, No. 261, August 29, 1973)