First Published: The Call, Vol. 4, No. 5, February 1976.
Transcription, Editing and Markup: Paul Saba
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International Women’s Day will be celebrated this year in cities throughout the country with rallies mobilizing both men and women to fight back against the oppression of women and the imperialist system.
The history of this working class holiday goes back to March 8, 1908, when thousands of women garment and textile workers marched in New York demanding an end to sweatshop conditions and child labor, and supporting the right to vote.
To commemorate this event, Clara Zetkin, a German communist leader, proposed in 1910 that every March 8 should be celebrated as International Women’s Day. The purpose of this holiday was to bring the masses of women as well as men into militant actions against the system of capitalist wage-slavery which lies at the root of women’s oppression.
Since those early days, great victories have been won in the fight for women’s rights. In addition to waging the fight for equality, women have also come forward in the leadership of every major battle against oppression, whether it be the fight for union rights, for integration and civil rights, or against imperialist war.
Around the world, women in the hundreds of millions have stood up to fight against the imperialist oppression chaining not only women, but their nations as well. From the battlefields of Indochina, Africa and Palestine to the fields, factories and communities of the industrialized countries, the women’s struggle has swept the entire world.
Perhaps the most dramatic changes in the status of women have taken place in socialist countries like China and Albania where centuries of feudalism as well as capitalist oppression have been overturned in a few short decades. In these countries, women who were once the object of bloody clan wars or whose feet were bound so that they could not stray far from home, are today active in all aspects of socialist construction.
While there have been many gains for women, the fact is that under capitalism, women still remain the victims of special oppression, both on their jobs and in the home, as imperialism systematically promotes the ideology of “male supremacy.”
As the present economic crisis worsens, it is taking a specially sharp toll on women in the U.S. In the factories they are among the last hired and the first fired when the layoffs hit. A number of legal battles over the question of compensative seniority for women in various industries have drawn widespread support from workers over the last year.
A further indication of the growing attacks on women and the family are the continuing exposures of forced sterilizations of poor and minority women in counties coast to coast. These vicious sterilizations, designed to “curb overpopulation” are carried out either as blackmail for women to continue receiving welfare, or without the woman’s knowledge or consent.
The right to have abortions, which was won through years of struggle, has also been under consistent attack, with the loudest anti-abortion spokesmen coming out of other fascist movements such as the segregationist movement in Boston. These same forces have also championed opposition to the Equal Rights Amendment for women, which recently suffered setbacks in several states. On the ruling class agenda for legislation, however, are state laws to legalize prostitution as an “alternative” to starvation for unemployed and welfare women.
Repression against women, and especially minority women fighters has also intensified in the last year, as exemplified by the attempt to railroad Joan Little to death row for defending herself against a sexual assault by a prison guard: A widespread movement of support for Joan Little spread from the South across the whole country, and was the decisive factor in the dropping of the charges. Joan Little’s supporters pointed out that her only real crimes were being a Black woman worker, and daring to stand up to attacks and abuse. A similar movement of support must be built for Cheryl Todd and Desi X. Woods who are on trial now in rural Georgia for defending themselves against a rapist.
These examples of women’s special oppression fly in the face of the ruling class lies that “women have already achieved equality.” Gerald Ford smiles patronizingly as he appoints a new woman official; a “Women’s Bank” opens in New York City; the revisionists of the Communist Party (CPUSA) and their Soviet backers point to the fascist dictator Indira Gandhi and say she is striking a blow for women’s liberation. But in spite of all these lies and demagogy, the real condition of the masses of women in this country remains one of exploitation and oppression.
It is not only “women’s issues” which are of concern to women, but all the fronts of struggle for the whole working class have a particular significance to women. The mounting dangers of fascism and war, for example, are attacks on the masses of people with devastating effects on women, as they viciously dismember, the family and victimize women in new forms of enslavement and degradation.
International attention was focused on the woman question in 1975, as the United Nations declared it “International Women’s Year.” The high point of the year was the U.N.-sponsored meeting in Mexico City where the question of the road for women’s liberation came up before the representatives of over 100 countries. This conference clearly exposed the main enemy of women and the people of the world as the imperialist system, headed by its superpowers, the U.S. and the USSR.
The U.S. representative to the conference claimed ’that women’s issues are “non-political” and tried to justify the oppression of women in the U.S. by saying that “women are oppressed under any social system.” The Soviet spokesmen harped on “detente”; and “disarmament” as the main issue for women, trying to cover over the fact that it is the Soviet union whose aggression and arms build-up internationally is threatening to throw the world into a new war. But all the “socialist” talk in the world can’t hide the fact that today women are oppressed in the Soviet Union just as they are in the other imperialist countries. Moreover, it is the Soviet Union along with the U.S. which is responsible for the imperialist oppression of countries all over the globe, including the vast majority of women in those countries.
It is for this reason that most of the Third World delegations to the Mexico City conference took up opposition to imperialism and colonialism as the primary task of women everywhere, while simultaneously fighting for their own equality in society. Chinese delegate Li Su-wen emphasized this in her speech saying, “Under the colonialist and racist rule in southern Africa, where the masses of people do not even have the right to survive, how can women win emancipation without fighting colonialism and racism?”
The Third World countries have taken historic steps in linking the women’s struggle to the fight against imperialism and the superpowers. This same link will be made loudly and clearly by the March 7 International Women’s Day demonstration this year at the United Nations building in New York. The demonstration will take place under the slogans: “FULL EQUALITY FOR WOMEN! DOWN WITR IMPERIALISM! SUPPORT THE STRUGGLES OF THE THIRD WORLD PEOPLES! END SUPERPOWER WAR PREPARATIONS! ”
The day before the demonstration, a mass meeting sponsored by the Black Women’s United Front (BWUF) will discuss the oppression of all women and the road to liberation. The October League is supporting both these actions, along with demonstrations and activities around the country.
One demonstration that we cannot support is being called by the revisionist Communist Party in New York on the same weekend. To the revisionists, who have long ignored Women’s Day, this holiday is not a time for struggle but rather a day of exchanging niceties and proposing new legislation to Congress. Under the slogans of “Detente ,” “Peace ,” “Equality” and “Development,” the CP demonstration will not aid the struggle for women’s equality because it is aimed not at the system of imperialism, but rather at drawing the masses of women further into the system. There can be no “peace,” no “equality” and no “detente” as long as imperialism runs wild in the world. No “development” can take place as long as the majority of the world’s women and other people are suffering under the yoke of colonialism and foreign domination.
The anti-imperialist International Women’s Day demonstration is meant to draw a clear line of demarcation between the genuine and sham fighters for women’s equality. As the women’s struggle has grown stronger, this holiday has increasingly become a focal point of political struggle as well.
Last year the CP-Ied demonstration was bigger than the one led by the genuine anti-imperialists. Many people were confused by the CP’s pose as “defender of womenhood.” But through their own experiences they are coming to see that the only course towards equality is through class struggle. Last year’s demonstration at the U.N. had a tremendous impact on the struggle to break with revisionism and to build a mass movement for women’s liberation. This year the demonstration will be even larger, reflecting the growth of the revolutionary forces during the past period. Participation will be broad with all those being asked to unite who are genuinely committed to the struggle for women’s rights.
While we oppose so-called “united action” with the revisionists, we stand for firm unity with all who can be united to fight against imperialism and its attacks on women. We are calling on every group and organization to turn out for this great event.