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| The dialectics of idealism masquerading as dialectical materialism. |
1. Transwomen are women.
2. Sex work is work.
3. Feminism is bourgeois.
Misogyny
in its many forms has long been a challenge for the left; not just the
misogyny of the reactionary right, but misogyny coming from within the
left itself. But it has not been until recently that this leftist
misogyny has sought to portray itself as being inherently progressive.
By engaging in revisionism of the most blatant kind, reactionary
elements within the left have managed to posit themselves as the agents
of progress. Much has already been written about the harms caused by
these three lies, but no attempt has yet to be made to debunk them from a
solidly Marxist standpoint. That is what we are out to accomplish here;
to demonstrate definitively that these big lies are not just
regressive, but inherently revisionist and anti-Marxist to the core.
The
first of these three big lies, “Transwomen are women”, might well be
the most damaging, because it directly contradicts the heart of the
Marxist method: dialectical materialism. There are two main definitions
used by proponents of transgenderism to explain their narrative. The
first is that gender is an identity; the state of being a man or a woman
(or any one of the other numerous “gender identities”) stems not from
biological sex (to the extent that transactivists acknowledge the
existence of biological sex), but from an internal identity, i.e.
personal feelings, personal consciousness. The second definition says
that transpeople are not really the sex they physically are, but the sex
they say they are, because they really have “male” or “female” brains.
Both of these definitions are rooted in the personal, not the material.
One of the patron saints of queer theory, Judith Butler, says:
“It’s
one thing to say that gender is performed and that is a little
different from saying gender is performative. When we say gender is
performed we usually mean that we’ve taken on a role or we’re acting in
some way and that our acting or our role-playing is crucial to the
gender that we are and the gender that we present to the world. To say
that gender is performative is a little different because for something
to be performative means that it produces a series of effects. We act
and walk and speak and talk in ways that consolidate an impression of
being a man or being a woman.”[1]
Though
queer theory is a postmodernist philosophy, its roots go far deeper
than just postmodernism; rather, this statement of Butler’s is an
example of the dialectics of idealism. Marxism, as a philosophy, was
formed in reaction to the idealist dialectics of the Young Hegelians.
The dialects of idealism posit that reality flows from consciousness.
Marx, on the other hand, argued “It is not the consciousness of men that
determines their existence, but their social existence that determines
their consciousness.”[2]
That is, it is not our thoughts that shape material reality, but
material reality that shapes our thoughts. In fact, Marx’s first major
work, The German Ideology, is exclusively dedicated to explaining this.
So
what is the materialist definition of gender? And how does the embrace
of the idealist definition under the guise of Marxism harm the Marxist
aim of women’s liberation? The foundational Marxist text dealing with
the oppression of women is Engels’ The Origin of the Family, Private Property, and the State.
According to Engels, while there has always existed a sexual division
of labor in human society, it is not until the rise of private property
that this division becomes hierarchical. Before the rise of private
property, society was organized under what was called “mother right”,
i.e. a person’s family is traced through their mother, given the
difficulty of identifying with certainty the father in primitive
communist society. But because private property grew out of male labor,
and became concentrated in male hands, mother right gave way to “father
right”. In order to bequeath his property to his son, the father needed
to know with certainty who his sons were. This meant controlling the
reproductive labor of the female sex, and its subordination to male
supremacy; thus the advent of patriarchy. In Chapter II of Origin of Family Engels
calls the overthrow of mother-right “…the world historical defeat of
the female sex. The man took command in the home also; the woman was
degraded and reduced to servitude, she became the slave of his lust and a
mere instrument for the production of children.”[3]
Note that Engels here is dealing with sex, with biology. Women are not
oppressed because of some abstract gender identity, but because of their
sex. Class society and patriarchy, the two of which exist in a
symbiosis, need to control women’s reproductive labor to sustain
themselves. To put it more bluntly, they need to control the means of reproduction. Thus, women’s oppression has its origin in material reality.
But
we have not yet dealt with the concept of gender. In the current queer
theory dominated discourse, sex and gender are increasingly become
conflated to the point that they are being used as synonyms for one
another. Engels analysis of patriarchy is in many ways incomplete, but
it forms the basis of future materialist explorations of sex and gender.
The second-wave feminists who developed much of the thought around
gender did not revise these fundamentals, but expanded on them, the
opposite of what today’s revisionists are doing. Gender, according to
the radical feminist Rebecca Reilly-Cooper, is “the value system that prescribes and proscribes forms of behaviour and appearance for members of the different sex classes, and that assigns superior value to one sex class at the expense of the other.”[4]
Gender is therefore not the same thing as biological sex, but a kind of
parasite grafted on top of biological sex to maintain the current
sexual hierarchy, and ensure continued male control over reproductive
labor. Gender non-conforming, as well as homosexual, men and women are
therefore “exiled” from their gender community not because of some
abstract identity, but because they do not fulfill their proscribed
functions as members of their sex class; they are essentially class
traitors. Intersex people, which form a distinct material category, are
also lumped into this community of “exiles” because they too are unable
to fulfill the goals of the patriarchal sexual hierarchy. Such
communities of exiles have existed throughout history, and continue to
exist to this day in all parts of the world, from the hijra in
India to the two-spirited people of the Native Americans to the
contemporary shunning and violence directed at gender non-conforming
individuals. But to reiterate, none of this has to do with identity, but
with the material structuring of class society.
While
transactivists have started to turn against the biomedical explanation
for transgenderism, it is very much alive and well in the medical and
psychological community. Victorian-era theories about “brain sex” that
would have earned the ire of Marx and Engels are now making a comeback.
At best, these theories are chimerical pseudoscience which have not even
come close to being conclusively proven in any legitimate scientific
study. The standards by which gender dysphoria is diagnosed falls back
on the constructed tropes of masculinity and femininity already
discussed. Such theories risk misconstruing gender roles as being rooted
in nature as opposed to constructions that reinforce ruling class
control. Rather than being seen as the disease, dysphoria should be seen
as the symptom of the sexual hierarchy. The pressures of gendered
socialization are ubiquitous, and begin at birth. Very often we are not
aware of the subtle forms socialization exerts upon us. For those who
reject this socialization, it follows that they would experience levels
of extreme discomfort and anguish. Gendered socialization is not just
some abstract phenomena, but is, again, literally grafted onto us. Under
this system of socialization, the penis becomes more than just the male
sex organ, but the symbol of male aggression and supremacy, in the same
way the vagina becomes the symbol of female inferiority and
subjugation. Sensitive individuals who struggle against this
socialization often hate their bodies, but not because their bodies are
somehow “wrong”, but because of what they are drilled into believing
their bodies are. What they suffer from is the inability to tear away
the curtain that has been placed in front of material reality and to see
reality in an objective manner. The fields of medical and psychological
science are not immune from the influence of the ruling class. This is
especially the case in the world of psychology, where a method of
analysis is employed that isolates the individual from the wider society
around them, preferring to view internal struggle as the result of some
defect as opposed to the result of material and social forces exerted
on the individual.
While
capitalism has broken down certain elements of patriarchy, and allowed
for women to make some gains, it has not dismantled patriarchy
completely. Capitalism, being a class system, still needs to retain
control of the means of reproduction. For example, laws that restrict
access to abortion and contraceptives, while having negative
repercussions for all women, have the most negative impact on poor,
working-class women. These laws may be cloaked in the terminology of
moralism, but have a far more base logic; they ensure the continued
production of future proletarians for the benefit of the capitalist
machine.
By
shifting the definition of “woman” away from a materialist one to an
idealistic one, we lose the ability to define and fight the causes of
women’s oppression. In its most extreme form it erases women as a
class, and makes it impossible to talk about patriarchy as an existing
force. Why, then, are Marxists, who are supposed to be dialectical
materialists embracing a set of ideas the very opposite of dialectical
materialism? To answer this, we need to look at the nature of
patriarchy; it is a system that predates capitalism. As already stated
above, patriarchy and class exist in a symbiosis with one another. The
one cannot be eliminated without the elimination of the other.
Overthrowing capitalism is not the same as overthrowing class. As Mao
pointed out, class dynamics still exist in the socialist society, and
require continuous vigilance and combat on the part of revolutionaries.
This is why many socialist states still restricted women’s rights to
certain degrees, such as the draconian anti-abortion laws of Ceausescu’s
Romania. All males benefit in some way from patriarchy, even males in a
socialist society. It therefore follows that socialist males fighting
capitalism also benefit from patriarchy. While men and women may be in
solidarity with one another as workers, working class men also belong to
the male sex class, a class that predates the existence of the modern
working class. Class allegiances run deep. This is why so many socialist
and “feminist” men are quick to defend and even endorse the violent
language and actions perpetrated by some gender non-conforming men
against the female sex class, regardless of how these gender
non-conforming men identify themselves. This is not to deny that gender
non-conforming men are discriminated against, and face harassment and
violence themselves, but even as exiles from the male sex-class, they
still benefit from some of the privileges awarded to this sex class.
Note that I do not use privilege in the manner it’s currently used by
the regressive left, i.e. as some abstract notion that needs to be
“checked”. Rather, it is an actually existing force that must be combated,
just as white revolutionaries must actively combat white supremacy, and
first world revolutionaries must actively combat “their” state’s
imperialism.
Opportunism
and the “fear” of being on the “wrong side of history” are also driving
forces behind this embrace of revisionism. The Anglophone left,
especially in the United States, given its weakness in the overall
political arena, has long sought to be seen as “acceptable” and
“polite”, and is often eager to jump on any bandwagon it believes can
advance it. This desire to be accepted also drives the fear. It is true
that communists have made serious errors in judgment in the past, but
that is not an excuse to rebel against core philosophies and hastily
embrace ideas and movements without fully analyzing their beliefs and
goals. This is not to say that communists should not be on the forefront
in defending gender non-conforming individuals. A thoroughgoing
socialist revolution requires that these existing oppressive structures
be cast aside. But it is possible to defend gender non-conforming people
without embracing misogynistic pseudoscience and revisionism.
Women
are not just oppressed, but thoroughly exploited. Working class women
make up what is possibly the most thoroughly exploited section of human
society. By embracing philosophies that not only erase their ability to
define and explain their exploitation, but also deny them the agency to
organize as a revolutionary class, these “Marxists” have proven that
they are in direct contradiction to Marxist philosophy and ideas. They
are engaging in revisionism.
In the next part, we will examine the second big lie plaguing the left today, the notion that “sex work is work”.
[1] “Judith Butler: Your Behavior Creates Your Gender.” YouTube. Big Think, 06 June 2011. Web. 29 June 2017.
[2]
Marx, Karl. “Economic Manuscripts: Preface to A Contribution to the
Critique of Political Economy.” Marxists Internet Archive. Progress
Publishers, n.d. Web. 29 June 2017.
[3] Engels, Frederick. “Origins of the Family — Chapter 2 (III).” Marxists Internet Archive. N.p., n.d. Web. 29 June 2017.
[4] Reilly-Cooper, Rebecca. “Gender.” Sex and Gender. N.p., 06 Sept. 2015. Web. 29 June 2017. Emphases present in original text.
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