CC of the NCPN
On the occasion of the International Day against Homophobia, Biphobia and Transphobia, we stress the importance of the struggle against these and other forms of discrimination.
Not only do these people face relatively higher unemployment and low incomes, while they also suffer the consequences of the breakdown of social security and public services like the rest of the working class, but they also face discrimination in many ways, including verbal and even physical violence.
The NCPN condemns any form of discrimination or violence against individuals based on their sexual orientation, sex, expression or other personal characteristic. In particular, we condemn the spread of homophobic, transphobic and other reactionary views, which are reproduced by fascist political parties amongst others, but also by religious institutions and other groups. The origins of these views can be found in a system based on the exploitation of man by man. The system exploits and reproduces such views partly to divide the working class.
Against the ideology of the exploiters based on individualism, selfishness, competition and reactionary conceptions of relations between people, we advance the values of the labour movement, based on equality, solidarity and collective action. Through the common struggle of the working class in workplaces, schools, universities and neighbourhoods, we can fight all forms of discrimination.
The struggle against discrimination cannot be waged with general proclamations of equality that exists only on paper. Like the recently passed Transgender Act, which only aims at the mere formal recognition of changing gender, while completely disconnecting it from society’s duty to actually facilitate and support, medically and socially, those undergoing the change in gender.
As communists, we struggle for a society in which there is no room for homophobia, transphobia or any other form of discrimination. Emancipation, however, requires society to provide for the special needs of different people, so that each person can fully participate in society and have the possibilities to develop themselves. It requires society to meet the special needs of individuals and provide medical, psychological and social support where necessary. But also more generally, that society provides for the right to work, housing, education, care (including transition care), etc. Only in such a society, which creates the material conditions for everyone to actually participate equally, are the conditions also created for the definitive elimination of discrimination.
The struggle against discrimination and for the emancipation of each particular group of persons within the working class therefore goes hand in hand with the struggle for the emancipation of the working class as a whole – the struggle against capitalism and for socialism.