anger at the Dobbs ruling into “vote Blue” campaigns, explosive protests still happened in dozens of cities across the U.S. Rather than hand-wringing and sad acceptance of an inevitable post-Roe future, these protests were characterized by deep anger and determination not to accept the rolling back of women’s basic rights. Some limited victories have been won on this basis. Socialists in Seattle and Dane County, WI mobilized to pass abortion sanctuary laws, ensuring that women who travel there seeking abortions won’t be sent home to face legal charges. Voters in California, Kentucky, Michigan, Montana, and Vermont reinforced abortion protections by turning out in huge numbers to vote on ballot measures in the 2022 midterms. The instinctive solidarity that exists between young people active in the fight against sexism, LGBTQ oppression, and racism shows the potential that exists to unite anti-oppression struggles
and use our strength in numbers to more effectively fight back against right-wing attacks. This solidarity is antithetical to the rigidly siloed identity politics of many misleaders, which only serves to keep oppressed groups isolated and vulnerable, playing right into the divide-andconquer strategy of the far right and ruling class. Socialist feminism is the opposite of “girlboss,” exclusionary feminism. It bases itself on the principles of solidarity and class unity that so many young people instinctively gravitate towards, because lived experience teaches us that working class women have more in common with working class people of all genders and racial identities than we do with rich women. More women CEOs exploiting workingclass women and men does nothing to further the feminist movement. In fact, it can in some instances undermine the ability of workingclass women to advance our interests by papering over the grim realities of the economic
ROSA International Socialist Feminists and International Socialist Alternative In 1908, 15,000 garment workers marched through the streets of New York to protest their working conditions, demand an eight-hour work day, a pay rise, an immediate end to child labor, and the right to vote. The next year, the Socialist Party of America declared the first “National Women’s Day” in recognition of their struggle. In 1910, pioneering German socialist feminist Clara Zetkin, inspired by the New York garment workers, proposed the adoption of an international working women’s day. This proposal sought to link the universal struggle for women’s political and social rights to the fight for an end to exploitation of all workers; and conversely, to link the fight to end the exploitation of workers to the struggle for women’s political and social rights. The following year, more than one million women took part in marches and meetings to mark the first International Women’s Day. International Women’s Day (IWD) 2023 approaches as the wave of women leading movements and struggles against oppression and capitalist exploitation continues to develop, often explosively. The dire consequences of war, mass hunger, climate destruction, political crisis, and social breakdown falls heaviest on working-class and impoverished women around the world. It is no surprise that they are fighting back. Since IWD 2022, new explosive and revolutionary
situation facing the vast majority of women. All working-class people share a common interest in fighting back against the all-sided attack on our ability to earn a stable living. Our enemy is not each other, but the tiny minority of wealthy bosses, served by their loyal politicians in both parties, who appropriate the vast majority of the wealth that we create through our labor and leave us to fall further and further behind. Women’s rights are workers’ rights, and this has been shown through the crucial role women have played in the revitalized labor movement – from the Starbucks unionization effort to the New York nurses strike. The labor movement needs to aggressively mobilize against all forms of sexism. But we can’t sit back and wait for this to happen; we need to proactively fight against sexism and complacency in the labor movement by organizing our workplaces and bringing fighting demands into existing unions. Using the
economic leverage of organized labor (the ability to shut off the flow of profits via strikes and slow-downs) to fight for a $25/hr minimum wage, free abortion on demand, free universal childcare, and paid family leave would absolutely transform the women’s movement while bringing millions of women and young people enthusiastically into the labor movement. Our potential strength is in our numbers and our willingness to use them in a coordinated, strategic way to win our demands. Together, working-class women, LGBTQ people, people of color, and all those whose labor is being exploited to make a rich boss richer represent 99% of society. By getting organized in our workplaces and schools, we can harness our collective power to shut down businesses and institutions that refuse to meet our demands.J
struggles have taken place, with working-class and young women on the front line. In Iran, the slogan “women, life, freedom” has captured the mood of a generation unwilling to accept the systematic brutality of the Iranian regime, whose rule relies on the oppression, subjugation, and rigid control over women and their bodies. In 2023, socialist feminists organized in ROSA and International Socialist Alternative (ISA) will draw inspiration from such struggles and seek to play our part in organizing protests to fight for all the things that women need to live free of oppression – from abortion rights to a fully funded care sector, a society free from fear and violence, an end to right-wing attacks on migrants, and more. Struggling for equality and an ending of oppression necessitates a truly radical vision for change. It means struggling for the socialist alternative to capitalism. This means disempowering the parasitic capitalist class that is profiting from sexism and destruction of the ecosystem. It means taking the wealth and resources out of private hands – and for democratic, public control and ownership of the banks and the major corporations, the key levers of the economy. The sort of socialist change that is required to really end oppression would necessitate a mass and revolutionary struggle. Women have an integral role to play in any such revolt of the working class and oppressed masses. Demands for bodily autonomy, freedom from violence, free and high-quality childcare and elder care, public housing, rent cuts, price controls, and an end to racism and transphobia all must be inextricably part of that movement. That very reality means that in the process of building such a movement, as well as building major political forces organized around revolutionary and internationalist socialist ideas, all sorts of enduring sexist and oppressive attitudes and behaviors as they reflect themselves amongst the exploited majority will be challenged. Build the socialist feminist struggle internationally with us on International Women’s Day and beyond! J
INTERNATIONAL WOMENS DAY 2023 – women in struggle MARCH 2023
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