The patriarchy is the oldest form of oppression in the world. It‘s roots are going back to the primitive society during the development of private property. It lasted throughout all stages of humankind and evolved with them all the way to modern capitalism. These days it is anchored and widespread within society. In capitalism, we talk about the multiple oppression of the proletarian woman. On one hand women are suppressed because of her class affiliation, on the other hand they are suppressed by patriarchy.
Today all people are socialized in patriarchy. None of us can deny the behaviors which are drum into everyone in capitalism. The patriarchy is a relation of oppression which has existed for thousands of years. As a consequence, it is deeply rooted in people‘s minds. In patriarchy, that means the oppression of women because of their gender: every man takes the role of the oppressor and every women takes the role of the oppressed. These relations don‘t only exist in civil (bourgeois) society, they are existent in the revolutionary movement in just the same way.
We have to fight a universal fight for the liberation of women and the liberation of the whole society, a fight for communism! Alexandra Kollontai said „Without socialism, there is no liberation of women – Without liberation of women, there is no socialism!“
There are two fights we have to fight as women. The fight for the socialist revolution and the fight for the liberation of women these are impossible to separate. We are aware that the patriarchy can not be completely undone under capitalism or socialism. Only in a communist society will it be possible to fully overcome these structures.
We call this struggle for the liberation of women, the struggle to destroy patriarchy, a women‘s revolution. It‘s aim is the complete liberation of women in communism.
At this time, the Bourgeoisie profits from the oppression of women. First, because women‘s labor power is cheaper than men‘s. In addition to that, a big part of reproduction work is exercised by women who are not being payed for their labor. An other point is that the patriarchy leads to a split in the whole working class, and so it inhibits that the proletariat fight together as a whole.
You can see, the maintenance of patriarchy is the interest of Bourgeoisie and they will do everything to inhibit the unity of the working class. Today it is our task as communists to fight against the patriarchy in all parts of our live and in the whole society.
The oppressed people in the world can only liberate themselves. Because the oppressors won‘t yield their privileges voluntary, the oppressed have to fight for their freedom. Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels sad: „The liberation of the proletariat must be the work of the proletariat“. That‘s correct and the same applies for the fight against patriarchy. Who should liberate women, if not they themselves?It will be a long struggle for the women to reach liberation in all aspects of society.
Because of that we need a special work exclusively for women. Communist work with women means to construct spaces where women can educate and evolve themselves .
If we treat unequal requirements with the same instruments, immediatelywe treat people unequal! We need extraordinary expenditure to educate women to political leaders, that means to destroy the whole bourgeois education of women.
In all-gender groups women have to fight against the resistance of their male comrades.
Communist work with women means to construct a place abundant of women‘s solidarity. Solidarity of women means to have other women‘s back and fight side by side against patriarchy. In this fight we stand like a imperviously front and we won‘t allow a conciliation with the bourgeois society.
Solidarity of women also means to construct an increased awareness of gender. This awareness of gender means the awareness and reflection upon the role of the own gender in the context of society. Solidarity of women means to criticize ourselves in a compassionate way and to fight against our bourgeois behavior.
Communist work with women means to build activity among proletarian women, to organize them and to show them a socialist alternative. Today in the communist movement, the work with proletarian women is the most underdeveloped area of revolutionary work. The successful socialist revolution is impossible without the organization of the masses of women.
Communist women‘s work does not exclusively mean the work with women. It also means to work with the male comrades, to criticize them and to fight against their bourgeois behavior.
We have to do this work every day in our collectives, in classes, in our daily routines, in our peer groups and everywhere else.
Oftentimes, male comrades ask how they can support the work of communist women. It is very important for women that male comrades don‘t stand in their way. For example that means that sometimes it can be beneficial that male comrades don‘t take a task so that a women, even if she is – until then – utterly inexperienced in this field of work, can take it and develop her skills.
It is important to make appropriate demands on women comrades.
The development of female comrades has to come to the fore.
It is the task of our male comrades to take women and their critiques seriously, to try to get to the core of their own behavior and to change it.
Let‘s lead a consequent fight against our bourgeois behavior !
Let‘s fight together with all women and not leave any alone!
Women who fight are women who live!
