{Now I like to make this as clear as possible, I do not and shall not speak for LGBTQIA+ peoples. But I like to express my thoughts on why political activism is very useful for LGBTQIA+ peoples. This cannot be stressed enough, for any attempt to divorce the two will weaken each other. In one way it makes easier to strip away the existing rights LGBTQIA+ peoples have. In another it makes it easier to shut down any rallies, protests and movements that want to make LGBTQIA+ peoples less oppressed. Notice also that this post is a restructuring of a post I did 6-months ago and an update at the same time. So there will be more information and some cleanup of any issues. That and being more informed than I was beforehand 6-months ago. Also note that LGBTQIA+ communities have been doing this way before the article has been out, this is to reach out to LGBTQIA+ peoples who have no clue on political activism.}

- On political activism for the LGBTQIA+ community -

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- Why does one commit to political activism? -

Although this is a loaded question, I shall rather answer the "asked" question and make aware that I intend to answer the other unasked questions down below. Simply put, politics is inescapable; from the fact that we vote people to run society, our concerns when the economy betters or worsens, our thoughts when tragedy strikes and so on and so on. To move a step forward, there's the fact that even apolitical people are still very political; they simply admit that they accept the status quo through inaction. Or to say this: "I don't care what is around, don't involve me in that" doesn't just mean that but something more. This moreness being that they accept it enough where it won't be a problem to them even if the know it presents very tangible problems to others.

To take a step forward again, there's the concerns of being ideologically consistent (which equals not purity) and taking any chance to forward one's politics. To take one last step forward before we hit the limits and have to explore the "unasked" questions, it's because we are agents that are constantly given the choice to enact, delay or deny something. The giver of that choice being the influences all around us from gravity, to the decision of one's life and the politics that constantly nag at us. Our consciousness, though free to choose, is influenced, but the influences need interaction to even exist to begin with. And politics, though exploding always from the Base (economy), does rely on the choice of the people to even render having any effectiveness over the people it affects.

In this manner, politics qua SuperStructure (Culture and Ideology) needs living Subjects to make one of the three fundamental decisions. Else it is merely a meaningless waste of people's time and concerns; if it had borne any fruit, then it is because it signified something to these living Subjects. And unfortunately, even if you try to back away, society will function without you and you'll suffer from non-involvement. Not because politics hunts the fleeing people, but because the World is more than you and is affected by the decisions of billions of people. Indeed, to even function in society is to have a political consciousness and an ideological unconsciousness. To kick at a dead horse, the apolitical people feel "complete" without politics but very much supports the status quo for they know it benefits them. However, we've now reached the limits this question can bare down upon us; let's move on to the "unasked" questions this loaded question really meant to ask.

Communist propaganda poster for women’s rights, from the DPRK. It reads, in Korean: “Put an end to sexual assault in the 21st century!”

- Defending gains? -

In any political organization, one must commit to defending any gains one has made. This goes for any ideological organization: from the stock-standard conservatives and liberals to all the way with Anarchists and Marxists. Nobody is absolutely free to relax and think that nobody is willing to reverse the fruits gained in their movement. The LGBTQIA+ community, despite effectively rupturing the popular political landscape since the '60s, is still facing an uphill battle. (Let's not forget that they've existed way before the '60s, just these recent "identities" have been able to be signifiable and understandable to a collective Unconsciousness since then.) This uphill battle isn't to only gain their civil rights, but to just function at all in daily life.

Why this underlying demand is probably the most earnest demand that gets squashed on without an iota of care from both conservatives and liberals. The non-conforming Subjects, mostly affecting LGBTQIA+ proles, live with the fear of repercussions for identifying the way they do. For in the confusion of self-discovery which is a pain of its own, they have to tend with a political climate that allows the annihilation of their gains with simply ink and paper. What's even worse is the fact that conservatives are curtailing LGBTQIA+ gains. Why? Since they, along with this bourgeois faction that aligns with conservative beliefs, cannot profit out of their activism nor their identities with how they ran biz so far.

Liberals are no better; slowly, but surely, they're following suit along with the conservatives. The Base (economy) has given them many a hints to the Liberal faction of our Bourgeois Superstructure (Culture and Ideology). And those hints indirectly suggest one thing: its becoming unprofitable to support the LGBTQIA+ movement; either coerce and subordinate the movement, or they become a revolutionary movement once again. And the liberal is no friend to revolutionary movements, indeed they have been the sterilizers of such! Look no further with the POC leaders and movements, respectively, like MLK Jr and the recent "Black Lives Matter" group. MLK Jr's "Birmingham jail letter" and statements like "a riot is the language of the unheard" are two documents that have long been whitewashed away from history and scathing criticisms of liberals (most being white "moderates"). To go BLM: a group that had very real concerns despite being unorganized; yet achieved many good goals along the way. But they've lost legitimacy and respect within the POC community as soon as the Democratic Party of the USA adopted them (which may have been done forcibly). Regardless, the Democratic Party of the USA slowly corroded any revolutionary potential and used them as a branding tool to gain voters.

But to return back to LGBTQIA+ peoples (which must be reminded that indeed ethnicities plays a crucial role and the movement isn't a white movement), they have lots to learn from other oppressed groups in the USA as they have with their experience. And this trend of continued liberalization will shake up the community rather harshly while being a long pain for the LGBTQIA+ communities. Eventually, the LGBTQIA+ communities will be forced to either enact full liberalism or deny it as the time to delay the final decision will be over. For better or worse, may they turn more radical solutions in their programmes before that decision is made. May the communities realize that these bourgeois figures exploit your position and will abandon you as soon as they earn full access to the arsenal the bourgeoisie had fun with!

Indeed, liken to the Feminist movement between the Bourgeois Feminists and the Prole Feminists (ridiculed with the "younger sister" tag), the Bourgeoisie may share a general experience and suffering. But their aims are only for their recognition as first bourgeois and second as nothing else; in other words: to be recognized as another bourgeois and nothing else. You, and only you, LGBTQIA+ peoples that are not ingrained in the concert of bourgeois culture can only liberate yourself. Indeed, those that clamp you down are reactionary; those same reactionaries either being supported by the Bourgeoisie or the Bourgeoisie themselves. And it's understandable that everyone online is a total dick, but it means not to look for allies that actually care for you and are willing to struggle with you! The "actual" World may have the same percentage of crass, but definitely a wider margin of revolutionaries willing to help!

For often while parties do exist to maintain the gains of a group - they do more. And it's a necessity that they do more than defend, and that more is fighting for their right to exist. While legal rights are nice to talk about, they often do not get enforced if there's no enforcers for such. (And it's pretty telling that there's not only an anti-LGBTQIA+ movement to curtail LGBTQIA+ rights, but it's growing as well.) For who shall enforce the newly executed rights or rulings if the liberals are in retreat and the conservatives are in full motion? Why it takes the very people and their allies that refuse to retreat to build the bulwark for their movement. Those very people are the ones that raised the rainbow banner and those that protested with allies shall never fret in the face of Death. They are those that're willing to put the first and last defences of the movement as to both ensure survival and guarantee a future in the struggle.

Without the existence of rebel, revolutionary organizations wouldn't exist to begin with. One must not only stand up to laws, but know, as Mao Zedong puts it, that it's "right to rebel against reactionaries." The defence presupposes their right to exist, and nobody shall compromise the right to exist with lesser gains than that. If so, they bargain to become slaves and toys for a ruthless master indeed! Yet once the right to exist has been established, it follows necessarily that the whole system has to be reconfigured to fit them in. If the system is in failure to do so, it ultimately will seek to annihilate them in any way; which is happening to all oppressed groups: POC, Indigenous peoples and LGBTQIA+. And the revolutionaries are there to ensure that existence shall never be stolen by bourgeois hands.

Alexandra Kollontai holds Clara Zetkin’s hand and Rosa Luxemburg stands near behind them in this photo taken at the 1910 International Socialist Congress in Copenhagen.

- Earning more rights? -

As such, a system can ultimately stay the same but pass on acts and laws that grant minor recognition. What does that say to the group that has won its rights? It shall follow suit that it shall remain benign to the entire ordeal and history of the group because legalism had triumphed again. (I need not point back to the Civil Rights movement and how figures like Malcolm X, MLK Jr, the Black Panther Party, Cesar Chavez, National Farm Workers Association, the LGBT movement and so on and so on had done more to secure rights than any legal system would ever dream of granting.) Thus, there's another presupposition that comes out of political activists: the double movement of defence and gain. For the latter movement, gain, is a necessary inclusion for the movement to even exist in the first place.

After all, if it couldn't gain a thing, then it had nothing to defend for. Equally so, if there's none to gain because it's impossible to do so, the movement will loose steam fast. Which then leads to the taming of the group and allows infiltration to happen as to shut down or make a sock puppet of its old self. And the subsequent deradicalization of the group can leave the entire group on defence of what they got. Well, with whatever they can use to defend whatever they gained until they internally disband themselves. And the disbandment happening as a result of fearing for one's life, impossibility to reunite the struggle, the alphabet letter agencies (FBI, CIA, NSA and so on and so on) conducting their missions and/or feeling defeated as everything collapsed in front of them. The last case ever presenting a sincere question despite how insincere it looks: why to defend something when the World grows ever more hateful of your group?

Thus there should be attempts to resist taming and a propulsion to go even further than what one has succeeded in gaining at any one moment. For the inclusion of earning more rights not only further inspires the group to defend the new gains. It does more, it allows them to see what else they can do to fight to extend on the founding right that allowed them to be, to exist. Where it goes from the right to exist to the right to exist as one wishes; one that had long presupposed and demonstrates a strong self-Consciousness. The LGBTQIA+ had fundamentally made it clear that they have the right to exist, but they don't have the right to exist as they please without being harmed in the process. Thus, the spirit of '68 should be the driving force that teaches them not only to struggle but to remind people of why they struggle to begin with. For, to repeat once more Mao Zedong, they have the "right to rebel against reactionaries."

Rosa Luxemburg delivers a speech to a crowd gathered at the Seventh Congress of the 2nd International in Stuttgart, 18-24 August 1907.

- Combating the Base-Superstructure of this Social Order? -

Yet in the double movement of political activism, it will eventually come to clash with the Base-Superstructure of today's Social Order.

Why so? Because the group will get to the point where the Superstructure will see them as a threat to the things that already are. A threat to the Order of things that allows itself to exist and to reproduce without error (including the contradictions that threatens violent change if they go unresolved). Yet from the Base side, the economy which has no reason to change the way things operate will fundamentally resist any attempts. For to modify the Superstructure qua to make less painful the principled ills and byproducts of such is, in the eyes of the Base (economy), unacceptable. For the Base (economy) is in fear of any change except the ones it wants or expects to happen.

As to quote Engels from Socialism: Utopian and Scientific - "The materialist conception of history starts from the proposition that the production of the means to support human life and, next to production, the exchange of things produced, is the basis of all social structure; that in every society that has appeared in history, the manner in which wealth is distributed and society divided into classes or orders is dependent upon what is produced, how it is produced, and how the products are exchanged. From this point of view, the final causes of all social changes and political revolutions are to be sought, not in men’s brains, not in men’s better insights into eternal truth and justice, but in changes in the modes of production and exchange."

And for some LGBTQIA+ people, they had made the radical shift away from liberalism towards Anarchism and Marxism. For not only do they not only see how the current economy can never support a cause such as theirs, but they see these two banners as outlets to achieve their programme. For while we could speak of pure empathy the groups can transmit across each other, there's a higher Order that dictates their coming together. The contradictions that generate their oppression to begin with and a common source of all evils as well; the one of which coming together can effectively resolve. For while the LGBTQIA+ peoples are a bundle of slightly modified contradictions that compels their identity to be oppressed as they are, they all fundamentally share the original contradiction. Of which still incites them to rally support and to change the things that compels them to rebel and makes it right to do so.

Women stand at the front of a demonstration organized by the Marxist-Leninist Black Panther Party against the incarceration of their comrades in the party.

- How does one commit to political activism? -

So with a baseline of why people choose to commit to political activism, there comes the question of how one should carry out political activism? Fundamentally, two strong strategies persist nowadays with the Anarchist and Marxist traditions. As of such, both should fundamentally be rechristened all across LGBTQIA+ communities. That of Direct Action and the Vanguard Party, respective of their tradition, from the Anarchist and Marxist traditions are the strategies I be speaking of. But I humour below and ruminate on a third tactic that all three communities (LGBTQIA+, Anarchists and Marxists) should fundamentally seek, if they haven't already. And to start getting in the process of implementing such in their efforts to gain political power in any area they face themselves in.

ILPS 2019 poster

- Direct action? -

Direct Action, in accordance with the coining and origination in Anarchist communities, is the philosophically-ideological strategy that seeks to combat the ills of current society in confrontations. Though heavily inspired by worker's movements that had long committed to it to gain more worker's rights, Anarchists and Marxists both fundamentally use this strategy. Whether it be to nowadays consolidate their gains and gather more rights than they had before or to challenge unpopular decisions (like Macron's Gas Tax), it has a definite place in everyday political action. And while we could go into discussions of how differing their usages of this strategy are, the underlying basis goes back to, once again, Mao Zedong's line: "right to rebel against reactionaries."

And so I profoundly state to the reader, ally or person within the LGBTQIA+ communities, to utilize Direct Action. Now one could state: how can I utilize this more than mere protestation of reactionary politics? My only response to it is to fundamentally defend the picket lines while disobeying the laws that oppress you, to call and root out any reactionary scumbag in a movement, to be principled against all atrocious deviations and to have the courage to fight on when the movement is forced to retreat. For I can easily point at why a political activist must commit to their programme as before, but grant me one thing of which I want to espouse. Why it's something more to it that fundamentally Anarchists and Marxists have learned. In fact, a regret within both when their movements have failed: there's never enough, there's only more than one can ever do.

I hear now the bells, but it doesn't mean to accept one can never do enough; it means to do as much as you can to forward the movement. To stand on Mao Zedong's "right to rebel against reactionaries" as a basic starting point and to move on forward. To see that there's more one can do and to achieve it whenever you have the means to, not when it's convenient for one. To hearken to the calls of revolutionary fervor and to fan the flames; for no movement can survive for long without a leader, but without a revolutionary there is no movement. All around you are alienated and oppressed folk, don't deny them the words they need to hear! Help them churn out courage instead of fear in the face of hopelessness, this heartless Word of Spiritless conditions we live in today.

A call for Marxism and Trans Liberation

- Vanguard Party? -

Running parallel to the Anarchist tradition, the Marxist tradition seeks proudly to bolster the Vanguard Party. Why so? For it is the spearhead of the movement that is utilized by the people to destabilize the current Social Order of things and to help create a New Social Order that precludes their oppression in the new one. And clearly the LGBTQIA+ community can stand to have organizations to take a more active role and to be the loudspeaker of their movement. For the ability to possess their voice without having to sacrifice for another group's whims, liken to the liberals, will leave the group to think what they actually wish to gain and how they wish to achieve such. And the Vanguard Party is the mouthpiece of the movement that wishes to abolish the current state of things that necessitated them to exist in the first place for a group that is oppressed by such.

The Vanguard not only serves as a mouth piece but the centralization and mass planning of all political activities. Concentrated activities that can truly strike at the heart of whomever wishes to keep them down. In the meanwhile, it is the collection of the most revolutionary and forward thinking parts of the community who actively helps develop the consciousness of the masses to revolutionary levels. For Mao said "the leaders must therefore be skilled in uniting the small number of active elements around the leadership and must rely on them to raise the level of the intermediate element and to win over the backward elements." There are certainly great leaders within the LGBTQIA+ alone that can string up and find active elements that can win over the hearts and minds of similarly oppressed folks as to then win over the people who are non-LGBTQIA+ and squash the reactionary elements that oppresses them. In fact they've been doing this, as aforementioned in the beginning, for a while; yet they need more help than ever and to devote to the rooting out of the main causes of LGBTQIA+ oppression is a worthwhile endeavor.

Yet why to say this is a strategy? Why I say such for it's part of a grander strategy of any and all movements that uses them. For when a Vanguard Party succeeds in its mission, it will subsequently be converted into the Party, with proper organization and one that can actually be more serious in its endeavors. For the size the Vanguard Party finds itself in is limited with its potential to consolidate what is gained and cannot carry out all tasks that need to be done. Thus it eventually gets replaced with the Party, the true strategy of any movements. But this is constantly being transformed into the Party as the movement continues on, for when a movement gets bigger it needs more roles to be fulfilled and more areas to cover. Thus the Vanguard Party cannot truly fulfill it without sacrificing something in return with its limited size and is relegated in the revolution that is to come.

Thus it transforms itself into the Party, to truly carry the movement forwards and to inspire a new wave of determination and goals that has to be achieved in its entire life. Thus, the Vanguard Party serves as the first step in the creation of the Party, to consolidate all the influential leaders and disunited forces that'll help steer the movement towards its end goals, one step at a time. To then make the valiant struggle out its restricted zone and to win over the backward elements that never was allowed to develop a revolutionary consciousness while crushing all reactionary elements that have something to lose with their victory. Here, there's still massive amounts of work the LGBTQIA+ community has to put in; yet here I call, if it wasn't implicit all about the passage, upon allies and non-LGBTQIA+ peoples that call themselves "Marxists/Communists" to take a valiant stride with our LGBTQIA+ allies

Proletarian Feminism

- And of the Third? -

Why the third is a rather strenuous but necessary action one has to commit to when one wishes to guarantee the success of the movement. But the third is the strategy of reproduction of politics, the most necessary one that gets forgotten until one makes one's first mistake and dime-a-dozen if one is stubborn. For the strategy of reproduction of politics takes on many forms but all consolidate under such and are reinforced for being under such. In fact, only two slogans are needed to truly explain away this: "Agitation, Education and Organization" as the first one and "help without asking a favor back" as the second one.

For the former is, in essence, the necessary organs of keeping alive a movement. Agitate: to generate new fervor, wake up the old guards, inspire new waves of courage and bring shock to the enemy's hearts. Educate: to keep one's group educated, to combat dogmato-revisionism or dogmatic behaviour with revisionist tendencies, to remind one's Vanguard of what they do of why they do and help bring theory to new heights with giving the conditions for it to foster. Organization: to make best use of everyone in consolidated fashions, to centralize yet allow for more actions to be taken, to allow a wide range of criticism to happen as to fix any error and prevent infiltrations that often shut down movements. This slogan, though a repeated one and one that bears repeating, highlights the active organs of the reproduction of politics.

The latter is, in practice, a necessary conclusion to allow the former to even be possible. For trust is everything in a group that is ridiculed for existing as such. As to quote the Epictetus on struggling forward with one's passions: "[f]or remember that, if you adhere to the same point, those very persons who at first ridiculed will afterwards admire you." Yet we must go beyond admiration and seek help from the masses, as only a few people can do so much. A revolting mass fighting against a reactionary mass can do so much more and a united mass can overcome any struggle they face. But everything starts out with little steps and somethings will have to be done to then commit to the serious work; however: don't start shit, but take none either.

And while we all do struggle and try to make it our best effort, we must remember that respect comes not out of submission but from triumph over a struggle. This is where the LGBTQIA+ can really shine here, they fundamentally have their experiences to tell and they can fundamentally help change people's minds. Of which they can, with better clarity and more nuances of a particular struggle than their allies, change the minds of and help steer non-LGBTQIA+ people (not necessarily anti-LGBTQIA+) to become allies of the movement. They can slowly make people see that the lies about LGBTQIA+ are untrue and that it's all propagated to protect what is already here.

They themselves also have this power to also showcase, along with the Marxists and Proletarian Feminists, that, indeed, gender isn't trans-historic and indeed dependent on the material conditions and SuperStructure of the time. Meanwhile they can help agitate fellow LGBTQIA+ people on what is to be done and help organize a movement that will be most beneficial for them. For the LGBTQIA+ fundamentally know what they wish to achieve in their area and no one should dictate whether or not they shall be able to get it. Not only that, but only they can truly discuss on how they'll achieve such as long as they still exist as a movement.

To hit home and make clear on the original question of why political activism is needed: it is out of one's dignity and exerting one's right to exist as to why one commits to political activism.

Trans-sickle-n-hammer flag

- Sources -

All unsourced photos / white text underneath photos came from this article

Friedrich Engels's The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State (1884)

Alexandra Kollontai's Social Basis of the Women Question (1909)

Simone de Beauvoir's Second Sex (1949)

Leslie Feinberg's Transgender Liberation (1992)

Bob McCubin's The Root of Lesbian and Gay Oppression: A Marxist View (1993)

Silvia Federici's Caliban and the Witch (1998)

Anuradha Ghandy's Philosophic Trends in the Feminist Movement (2016)

Robin DiAngelo's White Fragility (2018)

Materialist Feminism and Mass Struggle

Beyond negativity: what comes after gender nihilism

Marxist Feminism

Carceral Feminism as reported by the Vegan Vanguard

"Privilege" - FemFreq

"Intersectionality?" - FemFreq

"Misogyny Mayhem" - FemFreq

"White Supremacy" - FemFreq

"Internalized Misogyny" - FemFreq