Long live International Women’s Day!
The International Women’s Day is arriving at a time when the women’s revolution in Iran has taken off more spectacularly than ever before. From within the December-January 2017/18 revolutionary rising, which shook the whole of Iran, the ‘Revolution Street Girls’ have stepped forth to challenge and mock the Islamic regime by taking off the Islamic headscarf (the hijab), this symbol of the might of political Islam and of gender slavery and humiliation of society, and stick it up in the air.
Women’s first risings against the misogynistic Islamic regime dawned with the magnificent demonstrations on 8th March 1979 in protest against Khomeini’s order for compulsory veiling. Women took to the streets, chanting ‘We didn’t make a revolution to go backwards’ and ‘Freedom is neither Western, nor Eastern, but universal’. The women’s liberation movement was the first social movement that firmly and clearly stood up against the Islamic Republic, and which in the up to forty years since then has not paused for a moment in the fight against this regime of gender apartheid. Today, and from within the massive revolutionary movement that has begun for the overthrow of the Islamic Republic, women have come forward as a decisive and leading force of the revolution. The Revolution Street Girls is the most recent manifestation of the women’s revolution, i.e. the immense revolutionary movement that has started for toppling the Islamic Republic and for the liberation of women and the society.
The International Women’s Day this year is an opportunity to push forward the women’s revolution and in particular to support and expand the movement of the Revolution Street Girls, which is not only against the Islamic veil and Islamic misogyny, but is also an important front for the continuation of the December-January revolutionary movement of the people against the Islamic Republic and the totality of the existing wretched situation. The 8th March in Iran this year is not only a day for throwing off the veil and a protest against misogynistic laws and gender slavery, but also a day to expand the revolution of the people against the whole Islamic regime; a regime whose ideological and political foundation is based on gender discrimination, gender apartheid and hijab.
Emancipation of women is a pillar of the social revolution of the working class and the struggle for human liberation. No wonder the marching women on 8th March 1979 in Iran were carrying the placard ‘Emancipation of women is the emancipation of society’, and no wonder the start bell of women’s revolution was rung on an 8th March. The International Women’s Day historically was born as a day of protest against lack of rights and discrimination against women in capitalist society, and is thus deeply rooted in the struggle of the working class and the impoverished masses for social emancipation.
On this 8th March, we call on all women and men, workers, teachers, retired workers, students, and all people to celebrate the International Women’s Day in any possible way and using different initiatives at their work places, places of study, neighbourhoods, streets and gatherings, and turn this day into a day of protest against the Islamic veil and the Islamic regime of gender apartheid. The International Women’s Day this year is in particular a day for multiplying the Revolution Street Girls and for the most enthusiastic solidarity with these champions of women’s revolution.
Worker-communist Party of Iran
February 22, 2018
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