Archive for the ‘LeftEast’ Category
This International Women’s Day, Iranian Feminists Are at the Front Lines
There is much that the global feminist movement can learn from the current women’s struggle in Iran and their vision.
About the author, Frieda Afary :
Frieda Afary is an Iranian American public librarian, translator, writer, activist and author of Socialist Feminism: A New Approach (Pluto Press, 2022). She is also the producer of Iranian Progressives in Translation and socialistfeminism.org. Article Souce : https://truthout.org/articles/this-international-womens-day-iranian-feminists-are-at-the-front-lines/
Frieda Afary is an active supporter of the European Network for Solidarity with Ukraine (ENSU). https://ukraine-solidarity.eu/feminist-news-and-analysis
On International Women’s Day, the world is at a turning point. On the one hand, we are facing the global rise of authoritarianism and fascism. On the other hand, popular uprisings for a democratic existence against authoritarianism and imperialism have been emerging in various parts of the world, with popular resistance persisting from Myanmar to Sudan and from Ukraine to Iran.
Women and trans people in the U.S. have suffered a heavy blow with the U.S. Supreme Court’s repeal of the federal right to an abortion, and the intensifying effort of the Republican right wing to repeal or severely limit abortion rights in various states. At the same time, women in Latin America — specifically in Argentina, Chile, Colombia and Mexico — have made some important gains in decriminalizing abortion and expanding reproductive rights as part of a broader social justice movement that involves working-class women, including Indigenous women.
Iran has been on the front lines of active organizing by women who have been leading a popular and mostly youth uprising, which was set off by the September 16 Iranian state police murder of a young Kurdish woman, Zhina Mahsa Amini, for her “improper” hijab. This uprising continues to manifest itself in different ways and faces increasingly brutal state repression. It represents both courage and the effort to articulate specific feminist demands.
Iranian Feminists and Labor Activists Articulate Emancipatory Demands
The latest manifestation of the misogyny that seeks to hold Iranian women back has been the systematic and nationwide poisoning of school girls. Since early December 2022, over 1,000 schoolgirls in over 50 schools around the country have become sick with symptoms of nerve gas poisoning. In the lead-up to today, various teachers’ groups, student groups and women’s groups have issued calls to protest the poisoning and to honor International Women’s Day. Feminist and labor groups have also been issuing various statements of demands to articulate their perspectives for a future democratic Iran. These statements have called for free and equal quality education for women and men at all levels without any gender segregation; women’s equal participation in the social, political and economic sphere; reproductive and abortion rights; divorce and custody rights; banning female genital mutilation, child marriage and polygamy; criminalizing gender violence and sexual harassment; categorizing domestic work as onerous labor requiring better compensation; and legal and health services for incarcerated women.
Read the rest of this entry »International Women’s Day 2023 in Ireland – Show Solidarity With the Women of Ukraine – Wednesday March 8, The Spire, O’Connell Street, Dublin
On 8 March, Wednesday, #IWD an International Women’s Day march assembles 17.30 at The Spire, Dublin.
The Irish Left with Ukraine, part of the European Network with Ukraine will attend will attend to show our solidarity with the Ukrainian resistance and the Ukrainian feminist resistance.
Links : https://www.facebook.com/groups/irishleftwithukraine @EuropeanWith https://ukraine-solidarity.eu/
Read the rest of this entry »RUSSIAN PRESIDENT VLADIMIR PUTIN THROWS LEFT SUPPORTERS UNDER THE BUS – by Brendan Ogle
The Russian President Vladimir Putin spoke for several hours to a captive audience in a Moscow palace on February 21, describing LGBT Rights as “Pure Satanism”. Brendan Ogle, a UNITE Trade Union official in Ireland, responds. Source : https://www.facebook.com/camilo.ogle
It had to come to this.
In fact for those watching, those not completely blinded by their understandable hatred of US and NATO imperialism, it came to this a long time ago. But yesterday it happened in horrific awful technicolour. Putin threw left supporters – and there are still far too many of them – under the bus.
A year from his invasion of Ukraine Putin’s war with what he calls ‘the west’ has now openly gone full #FarRight. The language of the toxic fascist inspired racist protests that took place here and elsewhere recently is 100% Putin’s language. He helped to create it. Yesterday in a lengthy monologue in front of a room of nodding donkeys applauding rapturously in case they got a nerve agent in their lunch, he described LGBT rights as ‘pure satanism’, engaged in transphobic hate speech and described paedophilia as the ‘new norm’ in the west.
A year from his invasion of Ukraine Putin’s war with what he calls ‘the west’ has now openly gone full #FarRight. The language of the toxic fascist inspired racist protests that took place here and elsewhere recently is 100% Putin’s language. He helped to create it.
Yesterday in a lengthy monologue in front of a room of nodding donkeys applauding rapturously in case they got a nerve agent in their lunch, he described LGBT rights as ‘pure satanism’, engaged in transphobic hate speech and described paedophilia as the ‘new norm’ in the west.
Sound familiar?
Read the rest of this entry »Zero Tolerance for intimidation – Anthony McIntyre reports on a Labour Party Public Meeting in Drogheda – Unity in Action Against a Common Far-Right Racist Enemy
Differences exist on the left-wing spectrum in Ireland – some of them concern fundamental disagreements about political principles. One clear example is opposition to entering any coalition government with right wing ruling class parties in Ireland such as Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael, the Democratic Unionist party or the Alliance party.
Other issues place a duty on parties in the broadly left-wing spectrum to put aside tactical differences, and explore methods of practical co-operation. Building effective practical opposition to the dangerous growth of far-right racism in Ireland is on the agenda today. In this spirit we re-publish an Anthony McIntyre article which reports on a well-attended Irish Labour Party rally in Drogheda which tackled the issues of racism, immigration, and Russia’s fascist and genocidal invasion of Ukraine head-on.
Anthony pulls no punches discussing his political differences with the Labour Party!
John Meehan February 3 2023
link : https://www.thepensivequill.com/2023/02/zero-tolerance-for-intimidation.html
Zero Tolerance For Intimidation
Anthony McIntyre Wednesday, February 1, 2023
It has long struck me that the Irish Labour Party more than any other has abandoned the constituency that returns it in pursuit of office. It promises a left package then delivers the Rabbitte punch to the recipients of the promise so that it may become the prop sustaining governments which view left packages much as a dog does a lamppost.
Whatever the Labour leadership sought to project onto the screen, the filtering process left the electorate feeling that it had just viewed Pensions Before People. Last time out those who had voted the party in such numbers in the previous general election followed through on Eamon Gilmore’s promise, while still with the Workers Party, to destroy the Labour Party. Since then Labour has struggled to make any impact on the Irish political scene.
None of that stopped me from turning up at a Labour Party Town Hall meeting in Drogheda’s D Hotel on Monday evening. I actually left Dublin early to make the event which was attended by around one hundred people. I had never been at any of the party’s gatherings before although any time I have approached its elected representatives or party workers, the response has been nothing less than helpful. Their members also have been to the fore in defusing the moral panic that the far right has been trying to stoke and amplify over a range of issues, most notably refugees.