Destroying Racism With Communist Revolution

Building Unity Among the Masses

Communism, and only communism, will forever abolish one of the worst evils capitalism has inflicted on the working class: racism. That’s why we invite you to join the International Communist Workers’ Party in mobilizing the masses for communism.

Racism is the Nature of Capitalism: Not Human Nature

Capitalism invented racism. Capitalists all over the world have adopted local forms of racism. Racist exploitation and terror remain cornerstones of capitalism-imperialism today.  Every imperialist power relies on racism to win workers and youth to fight its deadly profit wars.
Whether it is Black and Latin workers in the US, Arab and African migrants and Roma in Europe, black workers and students in South Africa, or indigenous peoples from Guerrero to Australia, it’s the same story. Racist unemployment, segregation and police terror force billions to accept abysmal wages, living and working conditions.
For centuries, the fight against racism has inspired untold millions to heroic acts of resistance.
The masses have destroyed particular forms of racism: chattel slavery, open colonialism, South African apartheid.  But new forms of capitalist exploitation emerged.  They turned out to be every bit as racist.

Capitalism—Based on Competition—Needs Racism

Capitalist competition forces bosses to create some section of the working class to super-exploit.  That drives down wages for all workers. It’s why capitalists use everything they can to divide us.   It’s why they invented the very idea of race.
Capitalism’s racist terror enforces this super-exploitation.  Its wage system forces us to compete with each other in a labor market in order to survive.
Thus capitalism creates the material basis for its “divide-and-conquer” politics.
This same racism divides the working class politically.  It undermines class-consciousness and keeps us from joining together to liberate our class from wage-slavery.
Individualism and labor-market competition create fertile ground for racism.  The bosses’ politicians and ideologues sow the seeds.  Their schools, media and culture water the poison weeds that take root.
Communists, like many others, have long seen the critical need to fight racism.  What we must see now is that only communism can end it.

Communism—Based on Cooperation—Must Eliminate Racism

Communist society will do away with money and wages, and the labor market where workers are forced to compete to get and keep a job so we can buy groceries and pay the rent.
Eliminating this competition for survival will eliminate the material basis for racist ideas within the working class.
Freed from the fear of individual poverty and mobilized to meet the needs of the working masses, we’ll decide together what needs to be done. Collective work will replace slaving for a paycheck.
We’ll cooperate to build housing, grow food, create new transportation systems, and produce the clothes, furniture, tools and toys that human beings need.
At first we may only be able to provide the bare necessities.  But a fundamental communist principle is that nobody will live better or worse than anyone else.  Wiping out racism is therefore integral to building communism.
The ideological struggle against racism will escalate as we fight to build communism. Millions of workers, soldiers, and youth will mobilize against class enemies who use racism to undermine the power of the working class.
Communism will end racist terror.  Ending class society will end capitalism’s need for racist cops, courts and jails – indeed all cops, courts and jails.  The abolition of private property and exploitation will make it possible for mobilized masses to solve any social problems ourselves.
Fighting against racism will be an essential part of everyday life—the only way we can work together to build a communist world. It won’t be automatic, but it will be obvious that to build the world we need we must defeat the legacy of racist capitalism.

Communism, not Nationalism

Some people think that all people of a particular “race,” regardless of class, should fight together.
This strategy – we call it “nationalism” – is a disaster for the working class. It reinforces the divisions in the working class that hold us back. It delivers workers into the arms of capitalists who come from similar ethnic roots.
In the worst case, nationalism as patriotism  enrolls workers in their bosses’ fight with  rival  bosses. It wins us to kill other workers for the bosses’ profits.  The ICWP stands for communism, not nationalism (see South Africa article)

The Communist Fight against Racism

Racism creates a huge section of the working class with an especially deep hatred for capitalism. We must seek and build leadership from amongst the super-exploited and super-oppressed.  We must convince all workers to respect this leadership.
By mobilizing the masses for communism today, we begin to smash racist divisions in practice.  The victory of communism will create the material basis for ending racism forever.
Some people think this is impossible.  They wrongly believe that white workers benefit from racism. But capitalist wage slavery penalizes—not privileges—all workers.  Capitalism only privileges a few capitalists and their hangers-on.
Nobody will be privileged in communist society.
Early on, communist society will inherit a huge amount of racist baggage from capitalism. The struggle against this legacy will be the fight of many lifetimes. An important example is widespread residential segregation.  We will need to act immediately to end separate and unequal housing.
The ICWP will mobilize the masses to integrate neighborhoods and workplaces.  We will collectively design and build (or rebuild) them to meet everyone’s needs.
Masses mobilized for communism will fight to build comradely unity in all aspects of work, education and social interaction. Communist workers’ power will create the conditions for eliminating personal (often unconscious) prejudices.
We will end the separation of “mental” and “manual” labor.  This will set the stage to end racist education and work assignments.
Everyone will take turns performing difficult and unpleasant tasks. These will no longer fall disproportionately on the backs of a super-exploited group.  Everyone will have opportunities to learn and practice new skills.
Education will be taken out of the schools that class society has created and made part of the collective process of work and community. (See our pamphlet Communist Education for a Classless Society here

Mobilizing the Masses

The ICWP will mobilize the masses to suppress capitalism’s racist culture. No longer will mass media be in the hands of corporations who pimp and profit from racist, sexist garbage.  Instead, communism’s anti-racist art and culture will strengthen the unity of the working class.
The ICWP acts on these principles today. Our party unites communist workers and youth of every description and from around the world.  We struggle together as comrades to mobilize the masses around the vision of a communist world.
We haven’t completely overcome capitalism’s racist training.  Nor have we healed completely from the pain inflicted on us by racism.  But the struggle to mobilize the masses for communism develops our better selves while moving us closer to our shared goal.
Only by fighting racism can we establish communism.  Only by establishing communism can we end racism for good.

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