March 8 is the Day of Anger, Revolt and Struggle of Working Women!
Long live March 8, International Working Women’s Day!
We welcome March 8 in a process where the attacks on the rights of women are increasing, the extent of violence is growing day by day, but where women do not leave the streets, continue their struggle with determination in the workers’ resistance..
We welcome March 8 with the anger of women who are the owners of flexibel and precarious work, which is deepening due to poverty, which has increased with the pandemic and the working conditions that are tried to be changed according to the interests of the ruling classes..
We welcome March 8 with the revolt of women who are the owners of the care burden of the elderly-children-sick-disabled households which aggravated due to the pandemic, the target of escalating male-state violence, but this revolt also spreads from country to country and cross borders…
While the occupation of the Turkish state and the hegemony of the imperialists in Syria and Rojava lands continue, we face March 8, the International Working Women’s Day, among the sounds of war of the US-EU and Russian-Chinese imperialist blocks over Ukraine, which has become another area of this conflict.
March 8 is the labor struggle of women under the burden of the economic crisis!
One of the most important topics of the multiple crisis experienced by the AKP-MHP government is undoubtedly the deepening economic and social conditions. With the state of emergency regime, which was perpetuated after July 15, the AKP targeted the fundamental rights and freedoms of the broad masses of the people, but not satisfied with this, subjected the masses to the deepest crisis in the history of the Republic and imposed/imposes great poverty along with the pandemic conditions. For a while, it continued with the discourses like “it has bypassed, it will bypass”, “external powers”, “the world is jealous of us” and hulking out like “Heyyy IMF”; The crisis, which could be postponed with unregistered income, credit card expenses, and ‘polishing’ the construction sector, is no longer “manageable”.
While it is known that such periods deeply affect large groups of workers, it is a fact that women are the ones who bear the greatest burden from poverty, unemployment, insecurity, etc. The AKP-MHP government manipulates the numbers or talks about the increase in women’s employment. However, the reality is that the rate of job loss and broadly defined female unemployment is 43 percent due to the impact of Covid-19 (DISK-AR). In other words, only one out of every four women is working and the female workforce has decreased by 8.2 percent in the last year.
Poverty is being referred with women more and more, while women are getting poorer, poverty is becoming more ‘womanized’. This situation is not only related to unemployment rates, but it is also fixed in titles such as women’s inability to receive “equal pay for equal work”, mobbing and harassment in workplaces, preference of women in unregistered and unqualified jobs, intensive use of women’s labor especially in agriculture as unpaid family workers, the owners of unpaid-unrequited care work within the family. The poverty of women is also sought to be deepened by trying to limit the “right to alimony”, which is tried to be added to this table. On the other hand, the rise in women, who are seen as docile labor, increasingly become the owners of “unappreciated” labor that seeks their rights and revolts. Here is March 8, the day of the struggle of women’s labor, which has been devalued, ignored and left unrequited!
March 8th is the anger of the murdered women and LGBTQI+!
As the economic and political crisis of the ruling classes deepens, violence and trans/homophobia against women and LGBTQI+ people in the social sphere are becoming more and more widespread. On the other hand, the patriarchal system is hidden from view and all the blame is tried to be attributed to “economic difficulties”. Although poverty has a significant impact on the increase in violence against women and LGBTQI+ persons, the increase in violence in “developed” capitalist countries where there is a certain level of economic welfare shows that it is not possible to explain it with economic reasons alone. Violence, murder, harassment-rape, homo/transphobia against women and LGBTQI+ people will not disappear until the patriarchal system disappears as a whole.
March 8 is the day of anger and revolt against the patriarchal system against all kinds of violence against women and LGBTQI+ persons! March 8 is the day when the voices of women and LGBTQI+ people who were dragged to death in prisons like Garibe Gezer, and ill prisoners like Aysel Tuğluk who are trying to be murdered under isolation should resonate!
March 8 is the scream of women who bear the burden of unjust wars!
While the contradiction and conflict between imperialists continues with conflict centers and proxy wars all over the world, especially in the Middle East, this contradiction and conflict has entered a new phase with the attempt of NATO to expand towards Russian territory and Russia’s invasion attack against Ukraine. entry. The war decisions taken by the imperialists return to the oppressed peoples as death, migration routes and unlimited poverty.
Whether it is the USA-EU, or the Russian-Chinese etc., imperialism means massacre, death, rape, poverty, hunger, migration for the working class and oppressed peoples of the world. Again, women and children are and will be the ones who suffer the burden of this picture the most.
So March 8 is the outcry of women against the unjust imperialist wars! This outcry must be answered with the just wars of the working class and oppressed peoples.
March 8 is the call for resistance of Kurdish women in four parts!
The fascist Turkish state is acting with aggressive and occupying policies in a wide geography from Syria to Iraq, from Cyprus to Libya and Armenia, with the dream of an “empire”. The AKP-MHP government, which insists on the policy of destruction and war-occupation in the Kurdish national question, is trying to overcome the political and economic crisis it is in, with war outside its official borders and with the fierce attacks of the fascist dictatorship inside its borders.
The biggest target of this aggression inside and outside the borders is of course the Kurdish National Movement and the Kurdish people. So much so that while on the one hand, the parliamentarians elected by millions of people are lifted one by one and thrown into prisons, on the other hand, attacks are carried out against Kurdish institutions and the people with counter-guerrilla methods. Just like in the attack on HDP İzmir provincial building in which Deniz Poyraz was murdered, and in the massacre in which 7 members of the same family were killed in Konya…
March 8 is a call of resistance by Kurdish women, who are fighting against all this aggression of the Turkish state in every field!
Communist Union of Women calls on all women to organize and struggle on March 8!
The year 2022 started with the rise in workers’ resistance. It is very important that women are the most influential and resitant in most of these actions, and it is giving hope and confidence for the future of our struggle. Women workers, who constitute the most elevated and devoted and in this sense, the most resistant part of the resistances, add new inspirational pages to our history of struggle every new day. Because there are additional reasons that make women take action, and they have to overcome many obstacles before they can take action. Besides low wages, they also struggle for equal pay and against mobbing, insults and union hostility, especially by bosses, chiefs, managers, etc. That’s why it’s inspiring to look at women’s resistance. This struggle of working women creates new positions and barricades. There is no doubt that all these fights add great strength to each of us and create an important accumulation for the liberation of women.
It is not difficult to foresee that the class struggle will witness much more serious encounters in the near and medium term. This situation can be easily observed from the data on both the course of imperialism in the world and the course of the ruling classes in our country. In terms of our country, we are going through a period in which fascism organizes fierce attacks and accelerates massacres and oppression, due to the latest developments in the region. However, the reaction and anger of all the oppressed, the poor and the workers are also growing. Sovereigns cooperate to reduce the fire of this struggle and mobilize to protect the regime of exploitation and settlement. The only condition for intervening in this process is; to meet and organize with all the resisting dynamics.
All women who organized and became leaders by breaking down the chains of the system that encircles women, one by one, are our source of inspiration and our guarantee of victory. By following their footsteps, we have walked, we are walking and we will walk on the path of raising our struggle and achieving victory…
Long live March 8, International Working Women’s Day!
Long Live our Party TKP-ML, TİKKO, KKB, TMLGB!
TKP-ML Communist Union of Women
March 2022