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Ain't I A Woman? newspapers, June 1970-July 1971

1970-08-21 "Ain't I a Woman?" Page 10

discussion continued from pages 8 & 9 

    The Red Women's Discussion of Feminism, Women's Liberation and Gay Liberation creates a dichotomy between the necessity of waging an armed struggle and the necessity for desired cultural changes, many of which women's liberation has been concerned with. Red Women seem to be saying that waging a cultural revolution is to wage a counter-revolution to the armed struggle for the creation of a socialist/ communist society. They see no hope for Gay Liberation to be anything but counter revolutionary and they view feminism and women's liberation as divided into two camps. The revolutionary feminists ally themselves with the proletarian women to wage an armed struggle. Women's oppression they define at the point of work, at the point of production, and in terms of females as workers. The Women's Liberation Movement, as they see it, is narrow political reformism, "....that proposes to tack on an extra point or two to a world already long accepted."

     I question their conception of the women's liberation movement as one they can exemplify by electoral campaigns waged by the Socialist-Workers Party/Young Socialist Alliance. Is an electoral campaign waged by the YSA indicative of the women's liberation movement? Most of women's liberation has not spent their time on such obvious examples of Amerikan liberalism, or cooptation. Clearly, the Red Women's Detachment are not dealing with women's liberation but with obvious examples of campaigns waged by others in the 'name of the rights of women, in this case, a campaign by a group which has not even begun to understand the validity of the issues raised by women's liberation. 

    We have spent time questioning the cultural position of women and in doing this recognize that not only must the labor of women be valued and women be in control of the means of production (along with men) but that certain cultural stereotypes and power relationships be destroyed. A wife is a subordinate, paid or unpaid. 

     Revolutionary feminists, say the Red Women's Detachment, are concerned with the fundamental question of marriage as an institution based on slave labor while women's liberation can see marriage only in terms of rights and legal pro-visions. Again, the Red Women have drawn a false dichotomy, implying that women's liberation simply wants to make marriage a more equitable relationship. We also see the need to do away with marriage. Doing that is a necessary step in freeing women but it is only part of the overall relationship women as a class have to men as a class, and we want that whole relationship questioned. Marriage is an institutional relationship which reinforces cultural roles. Such institutions must go, but the relationships of weak over strong, leader over follower, powerful over powerless, are what we want to end. To attack only a symptom of such relationships is to avoid the hard questions revolutionary feminists should be asking. If the essence of feminism can be gotten to by being against marriage, there are plenty of male feminists around. If that's all revolutionary feminists want to fight for as women, they have simply tacked on an extra point or two to a revolutionary scheme already long accepted. 

      The Red Women's Detachment and many other political groups apparently see a real danger in giving attention to how people relate to each other, in questioning the heterosexual norm, in exploring the cultural image of women, an image we have been socialized into believing. Attempting to work collectively and attack elitism and hierarchical structures, to question the family structure or to try to understand the role sex plays in our lives is viewed as liberal and reformist. Giving attention to any of this is often seen as a privileged indulgence when there is a revolution to be waged. Usually this criticism comes from leftist men who have lost their typists, but we should treat this criticism differently when it comes from other women. 

      Most of us active in Women's Liberation have questioned our priorities. We want the liberation of all people and have been afraid of the tendency we have to deal with all these issues by proposing personal solutions or fighting for reforms which could be granted under a capitalist society and would benefit an already. privileged class of women. We are painfully aware that there is the tendency to forget that the questions we raise do not always speak to the immediate needs of the poor women struggling to exist, not having the freedom or time to seek the solutions that many of us find available through class privileges. But we must insist that women in any class have special problems and women in any revolution will have special problems, that sexism and racism will not simply disappear by defining women and blacks as workers. 

      There is a lot to be said on how we bring about a revolution to establish the society we want. There really is no choice to be made between waging an armed struggle based on the needs of the proletariat and fighting to destroy a culture dependent on sexism and racism. One is irrevocably tied to the other. We do not see the possibility of poor women waging a revolution unless they are somehow freed to do so. Just as they do not have the time to opt for middle class privileges, they do not have the freedom or time to 

[photo]
Militant militia women of the People's Republic of China

train tor self-defense or revolutionary leadership. This freedom is a preliminary step to the real battle unless of course we believe in the cliche of the inevitable proletarianization of women. (A point I would like to see the Red Women address themselves to--what does it mean, how does it relate to past Marxist theory in which the household work of women has never been related to the means of production? Do women become proletarian by magically passing into the labor force?) In that case we don't have to do much of anything but train to fight when the inevitable mass revolt of proletarians occurs and be prepared to join them (or lead them). 

     We see revolution as not something that just happens, but as something we must be bringing about. Some things are probably necessary steps to waging a revolution, for example, day care free to women for releasing them from the sole responsibility for child raising. And we do not accept the bourgeois definition of human nature that would have us content and placid once granted those things we see as necessary for women before they can even begin to fight for the society they envision. (Why is it so many of the revolutionary women who were fighting in the early labor battles turn out to be middle class "drop-outs" or women who were past the age of caring for their children?) Does dealing with these cultural issues incapacitate us for armed struggle? The Red Women's Detachment seems to think it does while we think it can aid us. Perhaps it does incapacitate if armed struggle is an end in itself or if women's needs can be met so easily. But if meeting the needs of the people is to mean anything it begins before armed struggle, it prepares you for it, it provides a meaning to your revolution, it threatens the status quo and power relationships, and increases your understanding of the place in history in which your revolution will occur. 

  If we are committed to wage a revolution to establish a society we see as decent, we must be concerned with what kind of society we want. If we see a revolution that happens because people whose needs are not being met now make it happen, we must constantly attempt to define that society--a society that a mass base of people will fight for. There is no question that much will have to be destroyed as a necessary step to creating that society, just as the Chinese found that much had to be destroyed in the cultural realm even after many years of a continuing revolution. But we do not see the possibility of creating a society out of only the knowledge of what we reject. We must begin to define what we want. 

     The problems we seek solutions to are real. The sexual revolution did not arise only as some imperialist plot to further the oppression of women. It arose in part because there was a need people felt for freedom from the repression we all suffer. It is not at all surprising that a male dominated society trying to bring about a sexual revolution would do so without considering the needs of women. For women the sexual revolution was a sham and therein lies the sadness--it was a sham--a failure which is not to say a real sexual revolution, a real coming to grips with our sexuality is not needed. We can't dismiss it as an imperialist plot, but should attempt to understand it along with our understanding of imperialism which is an outward manifestation of the control of the means of production by a class and not vice versa. 

     We will learn much about how to wage a revolution once we begin waging one. It is impossible to think a fixed theory on how to wage a revolution is available--all real revolutions that have occurred in this century have done so by breaking at important points with Marxist theory--Russia by making a revolution in an industrially back-ward country, China by making the peasant the base of the revolution and Cuba by making a revolution without a Marxist-Leninist party apparatus. We need to read Marx, Lenin, Mao, Guevera, Fanon, and all other revolutionary inspirations and aids, but we will never be in the position to recreate their revolutions. Only as we enlarge our struggle will we begin to know the means necessary and the society we are struggling for. 

10  VOL. 1, No, 4   AIN'T I

Saving...

discussion continued from pages 8 & 9 The Red Women's Discussion of Feminism, Women's Liberation and Gay Liberation creates a dichotomy between the necessity of waging an armed struggle and the necessity for desired cultural changes, many of which women's liberation has been concerned with. Red Women seem to be saying that waging a cultural revolution is to wage a counter-revolution to the armed struggle for the creation of a socialist/ communist society. They see no hope for Gay Liberation to be anything but counter revolutionary and they view feminism and women's liberation as divided into two camps. The revolutionary feminists ally themselves with the proletarian women to wage an armed struggle. Women's oppression they define at the point of work, at the point of production, and in terms of females as workers. The Women's Liberation Movement, as they see it, is narrow political reformism, "....that proposes to tack on an extra point or two to a world already long accepted." I question their conception of the women's liberation movement as one they can exemplify by electoral campaigns waged by the Socialist-Workers Party/Young Socialist Alliance. Is an electoral campaign waged by the YSA indicative of the women's liberation movement? Most of women's liberation has not spent their time on such obvious examples of Amerikan liberalism, or cooptation. Clearly, the Red Women's Detachment are not dealing with women's liberation but with obvious examples of campaigns waged by others in the 'name of the rights of women, in this case, a campaign by a group which has not even begun to understand the validity of the issues raised by women's liberation. We have spent time questioning the cultural position of women and in doing this recognize that not only must the labor of women be valued and women be in control of the means of production (along with men) but that certain cultural stereotypes and power relationships be destroyed. A wife is a subordinate, paid or unpaid. Revolutionary feminists, say the Red Women's Detachment, are concerned with the fundamental question of marriage as an institution based on slave labor while women's liberation can see marriage only in terms of rights and legal pro-visions. Again, the Red Women have drawn a false dichotomy, implying that women's liberation simply wants to make marriage a more equitable relationship. We also see the need to do away with marriage. Doing that is a necessary step in freeing women but it is only part of the overall relationship women as a class have to men as a class, and we want that whole relationship questioned. Marriage is an institutional relationship which reinforces cultural roles. Such institutions must go, but the relationships of weak over strong, leader over follower, powerful over powerless, are what we want to end. To attack only a symptom of such relationships is to avoid the hard questions revolutionary feminists should be asking. If the essence of feminism can be gotten to by being against marriage, there are plenty of male feminists around. If that's all revolutionary feminists want to fight for as women, they have simply tacked on an extra point or two to a revolutionary scheme already long accepted. The Red Women's Detachment and many other political groups apparently see a real danger in giving attention to how people relate to each other, in questioning the heterosexual norm, in exploring the cultural image of women, an image we have been socialized into believing. Attempting to work collectively and attack elitism and hierarchical structures, to question the family structure or to try to understand the role sex plays in our lives is viewed as liberal and reformist. Giving attention to any of this is often seen as a privileged indulgence when there is a revolution to be waged. Usually this criticism comes from leftist men who have lost their typists, but we should treat this criticism differently when it comes from other women. Most of us active in Women's Liberation have questioned our priorities. We want the liberation of all people and have been afraid of the tendency we have to deal with all these issues by proposing personal solutions or fighting for reforms which could be granted under a capitalist society and would benefit an already. privileged class of women. We are painfully aware that there is the tendency to forget that the questions we raise do not always speak to the immediate needs of the poor women struggling to exist, not having the freedom or time to seek the solutions that many of us find available through class privileges. But we must insist that women in any class have special problems and women in any revolution will have special problems, that sexism and racism will not simply disappear by defining women and blacks as workers. There is a lot to be said on how we bring about a revolution to establish the society we want. There really is no choice to be made between waging an armed struggle based on the needs of the proletariat and fighting to destroy a culture dependent on sexism and racism. One is irrevocably tied to the other. We do not see the possibility of poor women waging a revolution unless they are somehow freed to do so. Just as they do not have the time to opt for middle class privileges, they do not have the freedom or time to [photo] Militant militia women of the People's Republic of China train tor self-defense or revolutionary leadership. This freedom is a preliminary step to the real battle unless of course we believe in the cliche of the inevitable proletarianization of women. (A point I would like to see the Red Women address themselves to--what does it mean, how does it relate to past Marxist theory in which the household work of women has never been related to the means of production? Do women become proletarian by magically passing into the labor force?) In that case we don't have to do much of anything but train to fight when the inevitable mass revolt of proletarians occurs and be prepared to join them (or lead them). We see revolution as not something that just happens, but as something we must be bringing about. Some things are probably necessary steps to waging a revolution, for example, day care free to women for releasing them from the sole responsibility for child raising. And we do not accept the bourgeois definition of human nature that would have us content and placid once granted those things we see as necessary for women before they can even begin to fight for the society they envision. (Why is it so many of the revolutionary women who were fighting in the early labor battles turn out to be middle class "drop-outs" or women who were past the age of caring for their children?) Does dealing with these cultural issues incapacitate us for armed struggle? The Red Women's Detachment seems to think it does while we think it can aid us. Perhaps it does incapacitate if armed struggle is an end in itself or if women's needs can be met so easily. But if meeting the needs of the people is to mean anything it begins before armed struggle, it prepares you for it, it provides a meaning to your revolution, it threatens the status quo and power relationships, and increases your understanding of the place in history in which your revolution will occur. If we are committed to wage a revolution to establish a society we see as decent, we must be concerned with what kind of society we want. If we see a revolution that happens because people whose needs are not being met now make it happen, we must constantly attempt to define that society--a society that a mass base of people will fight for. There is no question that much will have to be destroyed as a necessary step to creating that society, just as the Chinese found that much had to be destroyed in the cultural realm even after many years of a continuing revolution. But we do not see the possibility of creating a society out of only the knowledge of what we reject. We must begin to define what we want. The problems we seek solutions to are real. The sexual revolution did not arise only as some imperialist plot to further the oppression of women. It arose in part because there was a need people felt for freedom from the repression we all suffer. It is not at all surprising that a male dominated society trying to bring about a sexual revolution would do so without considering the needs of women. For women the sexual revolution was a sham and therein lies the sadness--it was a sham--a failure which is not to say a real sexual revolution, a real coming to grips with our sexuality is not needed. We can't dismiss it as an imperialist plot, but should attempt to understand it along with our understanding of imperialism which is an outward manifestation of the control of the means of production by a class and not vice versa. We will learn much about how to wage a revolution once we begin waging one. It is impossible to think a fixed theory on how to wage a revolution is available--all real revolutions that have occurred in this century have done so by breaking at important points with Marxist theory--Russia by making a revolution in an industrially back-ward country, China by making the peasant the base of the revolution and Cuba by making a revolution without a Marxist-Leninist party apparatus. We need to read Marx, Lenin, Mao, Guevera, Fanon, and all other revolutionary inspirations and aids, but we will never be in the position to recreate their revolutions. Only as we enlarge our struggle will we begin to know the means necessary and the society we are struggling for. 10 VOL. 1, No, 4 AIN'T I