For hundreds of years, women have been leaders and fighters against sexist and racist oppression in the class struggle. They have been instrumental in victories for women and men alike. It’s this reality that gave birth to International Women’s Day. In celebrating this historic day, members and friends of Progressive Labor Party must shift the discussion to the necessity of anti-sexist struggle within the fight for communism. Capitalism requires sexism; we cannot end sexism without destroying capitalism.
International Women’s Day was born out of the working class. The first IWD was held on February 28, 1909, as part of the fight for socialism and against capitalist working conditions throughout the world. It recognized the role of women as essential fighters against sexism and racism. PLP keeps this militant history alive by fighting against sexism and building for communism.
Eliminating sexism hinges on workers holding state power and destroying the divisive capitalist system that thrives on gender inequalities and oppression. In Copenhagen in August 1910, with the leadership of German communist Clara Zetkin, an international conference adopted March 8 as the day to recognize the contributions of women in the class struggle. In 1913, women in Russia demonstrated in observance of the first International Women’s Day in Saint Petersburg.
In 1917, the women of St. Petersburg (later renamed Leningrad) let uprisings which sparked the Bolshevik seizure of state power in the October Revolution. They then IWD a national holiday. After seizing state power, the Bolsheviks pioneered many material and social changes in the lives of women, from access to higher education to equality in the workplace. Later, in China after the 1949 revolution, the communist movement eliminated prostitution, sexist foot-binding and the disparity in literacy between men and women.
As we prepare to celebrate International Women’s Day (IWD) on March 8, the capitalist bosses are intensifying the exploitation of women while pretending to fight against it. In the U.S., women will soon be allowed to serve in combat positions in the U.S. military — a move that Barack Obama and the ruling class media champion as a victory against sexism. But what does this really mean? Many more working-class women will be sent to the front lines to kill and be killed for the profits of U.S. capitalism.
Meanwhile, Sheryl Sandberg, the billionaire chief operating officer of Facebook, wants to build a new movement to push women to “lean in” and work harder to reach the top tiers in business. Her ideas push the lie that women are to blame for their lack of success, even as the economic crisis hits women — and particularly black and Latino women — the hardest.
With the betrayal of communism around the world, IWD has lost its working-class character. Sexism is an attack on the international working class. It is taught in the schools and media. It corrupts our workplaces and our personal relationships. It permeates the military and infiltrates the mass movements. It abuses, rapes, and murders women every day in every capitalist country. Last November, a fire in a garment sweatshop in Bangladesh killed 112 workers, mostly women, as they made clothes for Walmart. It thrives on the disunity between women and men workers.
We must take back International Working Women’s Day and renew our dedication to building a communist movement led by Progressive Labor Party. Raise anti-sexist politics and struggles at the point of production in the workplaces, schools, and mass organizations. Fighting side by side with men, women workers must become leaders of the revolutionary struggle worldwide.