Boeing Workers Discuss Opportunities to Build ICWP in Era of Civil Strife here ♦ Fascists Mobilize Around Sexism as Well as Racism here ♦
ICWP in Women’s March In Los Angeles, 2017
Bosses Build Racial and Religious Factions: Boeing Workers Discuss Opportunities to Build the ICWP in an Era of Civil Strife
SEATTLE (US), January 22— “When the U.S. descends into civil war, it will happen fast,” said C, a Boeing retiree and long-time comrade.
What makes him think this might happen? What kind of civil war? And most importantly, how will this—if it really is likely—affect our present efforts to build the ICWP and communist revolution?
The U.S. has been in big trouble for decades and won’t go back to ‘normal.’ Civil strife, including fighting between racists and anti-racists, has been escalating especially since 2017. Those who are direct victims of attacks based on “race” or religion might be more attuned to the increasing prospects for fascism, but most workers can see the writing on the wall. We should not be surprised. But we should be better prepared.
Racism and religion define most of the emerging factional groups in the US, India and elsewhere. But this is not a “battle between extremism and democracy” as liberal media portray it.
Since 2010, massive protests have surged around the world. CIA advisor Barbara F. Walter calculates that there have been more protests in the last ten years than at any time since researchers began to collect data in 1900. In 2019 alone, political protests erupted in 114 countries, on every continent.
These protests have increasingly failed even to achieve reforms, leaving masses angry. Influential advisors on the Council of Foreign Affairs warn of more and deadlier civil wars. They are concerned about whether their imperialist empire can survive.
The Key to Party Growth Is Right Before Our Eyes
Predicting the future is not the main point. This is the present reality.
We must be keenly aware of what is driving mass struggles. The main point is for comrades to learn how to recruit new members to the party during the escalating battles. What happens in the streets can help us advance communist understanding in the factories and everywhere.
The millions who have protested and rebelled against the evils of capitalism will not spontaneously join ICWP and develop into seasoned communist organizers. Our party must bring our communist line not only to the demonstrations, but also to key industries, the military and youth. We must develop the communist relationships and collectives necessary to help new friends who hate capitalism become new members who organize for communism.
We have powerful examples from the work of Party comrades in India. Comrades in Bengaluru reported last fall about an ICWP meeting of garment workers who were attracted by the struggle of farmworkers 2000 km (1200 mi) away. Many ICWP comrades participated in that mass movement and wrote about it in Red Flag. Now the Bengaluru comrades are building ties with more garment workers and developing new communist leaders.
In Seattle, Boeing workers have more on their minds than an immediate threat to their livelihoods. Boeing might rupture, with the company spinning off its defense and space sections, leaving the commercial airlines division $42 billion in debt. This menaces the jobs of active workers and the pensions of retirees.
But when a comrade told Boeing workers closest to the party about a recent Martin Luther King Day rally, it generated as much discussion as anything else. While the official speakers bragged about their six-figure salaries, the rank-and-file joyfully engaged comrades in serious and lengthy discussions about communism.
“Racism is not about Black and white. It’s about ideology,” C noted. “Capitalism teaches us to focus on me getting to the top. Communism teaches us to think about the collective good.”
Workers need Communist Revolution, Not Democracy
C criticized Biden and the Democratic Party sharply for pushing democracy and elections. They support capitalism and hence can’t be relied on to defeat far-right fascists. “We have to fight fire with fire,” he concluded. The fire next time must be communist revolution.
The communist fight against racism, sexism and xenophobia is more important than ever amidst civil strife and civil war. Our ability to provide communist answers has expanded wherever we have recruited from mass struggles. From India to South Africa to the US, when we take communist ideas to mass demonstrations, we see how open so many people are.
The capitalists realize the danger these potential communists present to their system. Even in the U.S., over a third of people under forty tell pollsters that they prefer communism. Capitalism’s promise to reform has become a bad joke as poverty and inequality skyrocket.
As the capitalist crisis intensifies, different ruling-class factions vie for the allegiance of the working class. In the U.S., the main imperialists want a multi-racial armed force. Yet the Pentagon just reported that they have failed to quash racist divisions.
Similar fractures have emerged in the South African army. Governmental institutions worldwide face these internal conflicts caused by the crisis of capitalism.
Capitalism’s civil strife – like its imperialist wars – pits worker against worker, race against race. Communist revolution is the way out of this deadly chaos. When we pick up arms, let’s do it for the collective good of our class.
Fascists mobilize around sexism as well as racism
USA, January 25—The annual anti-abortion march in Washington, D.C. this year brought out thousands (including buses of students organized by churches) despite icy weather, Covid, and their opposition to the capital’s anti-Covid regulations. They look forward to the US Supreme Court soon overturning “Roe v. Wade,” the decision that made abortion legal (but often still inaccessible) nationwide. The USA, Poland, and El Salvador are the only countries currently rolling back women’s access to reproductive health care.
The German Nazi Party’s slogan was “children, church, kitchen.” Today’s fascists aren’t much different. Their “replacement theory” builds racism around the declining birth rate among whites and the increasing share of BIPOC people in the US and Europe. Making it harder for white people to get abortions is part of their solution. Denying health care to BIPOC people is another.
As we have said before, anti-abortion laws will make abortions more dangerous but won’t reduce them. The “anti-abortion” forces oppose the best ways to reduce abortions: freely available birth-control and material support for new mothers and babies.
Communism will do these things and much more: Collective responsibility for childcare. Shelter, food, health care according to need. Collective decision-making about how we each can best contribute to our common good. That includes helping women make choices about childbearing.
It’s a big mistake to respond to anti-abortion Christian theocrats with Democratic Party reformism. Fascist initiatives reflect the deeper reality of US imperialism in decline and world capitalism in crisis. That’s why a mass communist fight against sexism and racism is so important now.
For further discussion, see:
- A Communist World Without Money: India Farmers’ Protest Inspires Garment Workers
- Trump Impeachment Sharpens Fight Among U.S. Rulers
- Anti-Abortion Laws: Sexism, Religion and Fascism
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