....We derive our organizational ideas from our ideological conceptions. We want no separate organizations of communist women! She who is a Communist belongs as a member to the Party, just as he who is a Communist. They have the same rights and duties. There can be no difference of opinion on that score. However, we must not shut our eyes to the facts. The Party must have organs, working groups, commissions, committees, sections or whatever else they may be called — with the specific purpose of rousing the broad masses of women, bringing them into contact with the Party and keeping them under its influence. This naturally requires that we carry on systematic work among the women … not only proletarian women, whether they work in mills or cook the family meal. I also have in mind the peasant women and the women of the various sections of the lower middle class. They, too, are victims of capitalism, and more than ever since the war. …
Saturday, July 9, 2022
‘Woman’s equality is part of working-class struggle for power’ – The Militant
Court ruling spurs debate on how to defend the rights of workers, women – The Militant
Restrictions imposed since Roe
By the time the ruling was overturned, state governments had loaded on more than 1,300 restrictions to Roe v. Wade. In 2017 there wasn’t a single medical facility providing abortions in 89% of the counties of the United States. The end of Roe hasn’t led to a huge plunge in actual access to abortion. It highlights what has already been conceded since 1973 and what needs to be fought for in the years ahead.
Unlike laws permitting same-sex marriage and access to contraception — which continue to gain wider and wider acceptance — access to abortion doesn’t hold overwhelming support. Opinion on it remains deeply divided.
The Supreme Court decision overturning Roe v. Wade allows for reopening the much-needed debate to clarify how best to advance the interests of the working class and of women. There can be no road to women’s emancipation without addressing the broader social crisis bearing down on the working class, and defending the family, a refuge workers are more and more turning to.
Men and women are increasingly using our unions today to take up the fight for jobs, improved wages and working conditions, and an end to brutal work schedules — all things that are key for workers trying to start a family, or to hold one together. That includes the fight for affordable housing and child care; to federally funded medical care for all; for cost-of-living raises built into all union contracts and social programs; and access to adoption and family planning, including contraception and safe, secure abortions.
Saturday, July 2, 2022
Defend the working class, our families, women’s rights – The Militant
[....] Shutting down debate is the opposite of what working people need. We need to discuss and debate how we can join together and protect our families, and why our unions should lead the fight for jobs, better working conditions, access to adoption, affordable child care and family planning, including contraception as well as safe and secure abortion.Essential to advancing such a fight is answering claims of those driving to restrict access to abortion that they are “pro-life.” That banner belongs to the party that advances a course toward workers power, the only road to begin ending women’s oppression and to protect all human life.
The National Organization for Women in New York responded to the Supreme Court ruling by stepping up its drive to win votes for Democrats. Under successive Democratic and Republican administrations assaults on workers, farmers and women’s rights have accelerated.
The SWP candidates in the 2022 elections point to the need for workers to join together and organize independently of the bosses and their parties. We need to build solidarity with each union fight and build a labor party that advances a course of uncompromising struggle for what our class needs. The stakes are enormous. Working people must see the necessity of taking political power into our own hands....