In country after country, the rage of women has erupted into full and jubilant rebellion against male dominance and the heinous violence and contempt that surrounds them, and which has pained them to endure for so long. They rise up against oppressive forces that, from state power, reinforce the chains that subject women and protect the murderers who kill them. Why do states do this? Because the subjugation of women is a cornerstone of the entire capitalist system.

This battle is now being fought in Iran, where since September 2022 a powerful women’s uprising has spread and been sustained in the face of brutal repression by the theocratic state. Increasingly large sections of the population have joined in a veritable “festival of the oppressed” that has shaken the reactionary Islamic state. This has inspired women and all who hate oppression in the world, because this uprising embodies deep longings to break free.

The spark that set Iran on fire was the murder of a young Kurdish woman (one of the oppressed nationalities in Iran) by the “morality” police. Her “crime” was not wearing her hijab “correctly” (the veil required by law to cover women’s hair and neck). Jina Mahsa Amini died from a brutal beating by the police. They tried to cover up their crime by stating that this healthy 22-year-old died of “cardiac arrest.” This ignited the fury of women who opened the floodgates to a whole unprecedented rebellion against the regime: Young women took off and burned their veils in bonfires, cut their long hair, danced in the street (which they are forbidden to do), shouted out “Woman, Life, Freedom,” and uploaded videos of all these “transgressions” on social media. Faced with beatings, arrests, sexual abuse, threats, disappearances, and bullets from the state, the protests multiplied, with young women and men at the forefront, but now accompanied by workers, doctors, artists, lawyers, peasants, athletes, merchants, and people in general.

For more than four months, the uprising has been sustained in the face of the barbaric repression by the regime. This has moved people all over the world and there have been support protests in several countries in Europe, Turkey, the United States, Qatar, and Mexico, among others. The regime is executing protesters who are sentenced to death by courts without defense lawyers or valid evidence of guilt, on charges such as “Enmity with God.”

The movement has become more radical, there is talk of “revolution,” but how do you overthrow this barbaric regime and what do you put in its place? The reactionary state is still strong and is intensifying its murderous repression. Different political programs that reflect the interests of different classes and social forces are contending in the movement. In addition, the imperialist powers, such as the U.S., Russia and China, maneuver to benefit their respective nefarious interests. In this critical situation, it makes a difference that the Communist Party of Iran (Marxist-Leninist-Maoist) exists, which opposes reliance on any of the imperialist powers and applies the new communism of Bob Avakian to the concrete situation in order to fight to make a real revolution. They point out that “revolution is the overthrow of the Islamic Republic regime, its entire military and state apparatus, and its ideological institutions in an all-out and organized struggle of millions of conscious people, with the aim of establishing a socialist state.” This represents the only path that can lead to the liberation of women and everyone, in Iran and throughout the world. All those who hate patriarchal oppression and want a much better world need to support this heroic fight, which is of the oppressed around the world. [For more on the CPI (MLM), see “People of the World: Take up the Cry of Revolution from Iran as Your Own!”]

From Iran to Mexico and all other countries, the situation of women is abominable. The ways of oppressing, violating, humiliating, and stealing the lives of women vary, but there is nowhere where there is no patriarchy and oppression of women by men, because it is sustained and reproduced by the imperialist capitalist system throughout the world. This oppression can and needs to be ended with a revolution that overthrows this system, builds socialism, and continues the fight to eliminate all forms of oppression and exploitation.

In Mexico, the upheaval of women against macho violence—femicides, rapes, disappearances, sexual slavery, and harassment—unleashed the fury of millions of women, shook society and raised awareness and fight against these horrendous crimes. But this righteous fight runs up against the state time after time: The presidency, the prosecutors, the armed forces, the police, the courts, etc. who work against truth and justice, spy on, threaten and repress activists, and protect the guilty. [Current Mexican president Andrés Manuel] López Obrador [AMLO] and his government are trying to reassure us with made-up figures. They congratulate themselves on supposedly small declines in femicides, while 10 or more women continue to be murdered every day (on average). Only 1 in 4 of these murders are “investigated” as femicides and 9 out of 10 murders of women go unpunished. What happened to the cases of Debanhi Escobar and Yolanda Martínez, murdered in March and April 2022 in Nuevo León, and Luz Raquel Padilla, burned in a park in Zapopan, Jalisco, last July? Prosecutors first declared them “suicides.” The protests forced them to finally open investigations for femicide, but eight months or a year later, there is no substantial progress. There is no truth, there is no justice.

Every day, eight women are disappeared in Mexico, the majority between the ages of 15 and 24, and on many occasions there are angry street blockades. What is the Office of the Attorney General of the Republic (FGR), headed by Gertz Manero, doing? It refuses to create a legally mandated database of the more than 52,000 unidentified corpses in order to match them with a database of missing people. Instead of complying with the law, the FGR files a lawsuit against the victims [and their families]! In addition, human trafficking, rape, domestic violence and the deaths of women due to “negligent homicide” (which often hides femicides) are increasing.

All of this demonstrates the stark reality that fundamental change cannot be achieved within the capitalist system. The problem is not only “the lack of political will” of certain authorities, but the nature and functioning of the system and its institutions. All these stolen lives, all these intolerable horrors, and all this unnecessary suffering will only be ended by ending the system that sustains and reproduces it.

It is possible and very necessary to wrench some concessions for women now, as part of the fight for a more fundamental and revolutionary transformation. But even hard-fought victories can be overturned as long as the current system continues. Such is the case of the right to abortion, which is very fundamental for women’s liberation. Women being able to decide over their own body and life is essential to break the subjugation of women. Due to the massive struggle of women, the [Mexican] Supreme Court declared unconstitutional the criminalization of abortion in 2022. So far in Mexico, 11 states [of a total of 31 states] have decriminalized abortion up to 12 weeks of pregnancy, but the vast majority of women still cannot access a legal and safe abortion. It is completely unacceptable that AMLO and [his political party] Morena have refused to submit to the legislature a federal law that guarantees this right! In contrast, in 2021 the massive struggle of women in Argentina won the right to abortion at the national level, and in 2022 they won this right in Colombia up to 24 weeks of pregnancy (the best that has been achieved so far in Latin America). Two months later, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down this right nationwide, and many states there have already banned it again. Reforms won within this system can always be overturned; even something as fundamental as safe and legal abortion can be revoked as long as there is no revolution to overthrow the system and establish a new socialist system.

The oppression suffered by women is more than enough reason to make revolution, and the fight to eliminate this oppression has to be at the center of communist revolution. Many other horrors also urgently demand revolution: Poverty and hunger, the forced displacement of thousands, the dispossession and bloody repression of indigenous peoples, the desperate migration of millions. The capitalist-imperialist system has brought us to the brink of the real danger of nuclear war between imperialist powers (U.S., China and Russia) that would devastate the planet. In addition, global warming is leading to the extinction of many species, possibly including ours, if the chain of imperialist domination and capitalist exploitation is not broken in all possible countries.

We call on all women and men who want to end patriarchy and all forms of oppression: Join the Revolution Movement, and let’s work collectively for the liberating revolution that is needed. What is to done specifically? Get into why this revolution is necessary, what it implies and what the new socialist society will be like; learn about and debate the new communism that is the essential guide to open up a new stage of revolutions in the world. Take this liberating revolution to the people to spread the movement for revolution, as we unite with all the people willing to fight against the crimes, injustices, destruction, and attacks committed by this heartless system.

Break the chains!
Unleash the Fury of Women as a Mighty Force for Revolution!

Revolutionary Communist Organization, Mexico

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