“The oppression of women and male supremacist/patriarchal social relations are metastasizing and intensifying all around the world. ... in the last few decades, there have been major changes in the context of the global capitalist system that have brought women into the economic sphere in an unprecedented way, that has transformed and ‘feminized’ the labor force and ‘feminized’ poverty. This is a global phenomenon ... These changes have shaken the structures of male supremacist/patriarchal relations, and in response, the ruling classes of countries ... have increasingly sought to build up the family and traditional values.

“This has included the reassertion of male entitlement, fueling a culture of hatred against independent women, governmental murder and torture to enforce compulsory hijab, and in the United States, the right to abortion has been abolished to enforce childbearing.”

Communist Party of Iran, Marxist-Leninist-Maoist, March 2024

The battle to restore traditional and patriarchal values is one of the main battle fronts of the fascists and ultra-reactionaries like Trump, Milei and Bukele. The prohibition of the use of “inclusive language” in public institutions is one recent example. All this means that fundamentally, we do not need to change the words, but change the system. We need to overthrow and dismantle—by means of a real revolution—this capitalist system which needs to maintain and reinforce patriarchy.

“In many ways, and particularly for men, the woman question and whether you seek to completely abolish or to preserve the existing property and social relations and corresponding ideology that enslave women (or maybe ‘just a little bit’ of them) is a touchstone question among the oppressed themselves. It is a dividing line between ‘wanting in’ and really ‘wanting out’: between fighting to end all oppression and exploitation—and the very division of society into classes—and seeking in the final analysis to get your part in this.”

Bob Avakian, Revolution #158

“You cannot break all the chains, except one. You cannot say you want to be free of exploitation and oppression, except you want to keep the oppression of women by men. You can't say you want to liberate humanity yet keep one half of the people enslaved to the other half. The oppression of women is completely bound up with the division of society into masters and slaves, exploiters and exploited, and the ending of all such conditions is impossible without the complete liberation of women. All this is why women have a tremendous role to play not only in making revolution but in making sure there is all-the-way revolution. The fury of women can and must be fully unleashed as a mighty force for proletarian revolution.”

Bob Avakian, BAsics 3:22

“While individual experience can be important ... our approach should not be to primarily proceed from ‘individual narratives’ ... but to look for and proceed from the larger and deeper patterns as well as the common shared experience of millions and actually billions of women. Our goal should not be reduced to individual ‘self-empowerment’ but should seek to encompass the emancipation of ALL women everywhere. And as a key and critical necessary component of the emancipation of humanity as a whole.”

Ardea Skybreak, revcom.us, October 14, 2013