This is an archive of the former website of the Maoist Internationalist Movement, which was run by the now defunct Maoist Internationalist Party - Amerika. The MIM now consists of many independent cells, many of which have their own indendendent organs both online and off. MIM(Prisons) serves these documents as a service to and reference for the anti-imperialist movement worldwide.
This is an archive of the former website of the Maoist Internationalist Movement, which was run by the now defunct Maoist Internationalist Party - Amerika. The MIM now consists of many independent cells, many of which have their own indendendent organs both online and off. MIM(Prisons) serves these documents as a service to and reference for the anti-imperialist movement worldwide.
Maoist Internationalist Movement

Pro-choice is pro-war at this time:

Sterilize all men!

As predicted long ago by MIM, the abortion issue is slowly moving toward closure for technological reasons. Christian fundamentalist President Bush has approved the sale of "Plan B" contraception/morning-after type medication.(1) At a press conference August 21, Bush even said he was for adults' obtaining the drugs over-the-counter.

In March, 1989, MIM already said:

Anti-abortion forces in France temporarily stalled the marketing of new technologically-advanced birth control pill that a woman takes once and causes a period or abortion in such a way that it would be impossible to tell whether conception had taken place or not. Still as technology like this advances, it is likely that the entire abortion issue will become obsolete.
It was only a matter of time before the people obtained medications that made the line between contraception and abortion impossible to see. There is after all, a profit to be made--"free enterprise" and all.

In South Dakota, law-makers and courts are still working on a law that outlaws abortion.(2) The liberals are working hard on making the pro-choice issue a battle-cry, because it benefits the Democratic Party in many states or so the conventional wisdom goes. MIM has challenged that wisdom by pointing out how it was the Iraqi resistance that made Bush unpopular, not any partisan defense of Roe vs. Wade. Our wimmin's liberation movement needs to link with the anti- militarist movement and take account of the real political forces that bring change, even change in public opinion.

The remaining real battles in abortion in the united $tates are as follows: 1) the usual struggle for minors; 2) the possibility that people who do not use the drugs will end up in late-term abortions and in legal trouble. Hence, the pro-life side of the equation may say that the ease of technology makes later-term abortions less excusable. If they succeed in overturning Roe vs. Wade, the issue of abortion will return to the states, unless the federal government passes legislation for all Amerikans banning abortion. If the federal government did so, it knows there would be a black market in Plan B type drugs and services. Putting the clamps on abortion will not be so easy this time around. As we speak, Plan B pills are available via Internet.

The male left-wing of parasitism

Agreeing with Catharine MacKinnon that "pro-choice" is Liberal rhetoric the same as shopping "choices" between Coke and Pepsi for instance, MIM has always held a more group-oriented position that does not boil down to individual decisions. We came out with "Sterilize All Men!" and took that to the large abortion demonstrations of the 1980s.

"Sterilize All Men" is not a threat to reproduction, because it is possible to extract and refridgerate sperm before the operation. That operation is much less dangerous than the back-alley abortions that wimmin take up when abortion is illegal.

The MIM line flew in the face of the male chauvinist left-wing of parasitism that always had a problem recruiting wimmin. Yet, MIM held that there is no point in being radical, nevermind revolutionary if we are going to say the same things the sexual liberals do. MIM struggles to change the terms of debate.

"Sterilize All Men!" brings to the surface what the real issues in the abortion debate are. For starters, it points out to people that the whole debate as it exists in the united $tates has managed to center on what wimmin can and cannot do legally. So MIM asked the question, why did it come out that way. It would seem to MIM that there would be many fewer complications from centering the question on men.

All of these abortion debaters also talk about rape and incest and what to do in those cases. Yet, look what the answer is there again: sterilize all men and there won't be any incest or rape leading to pregnancy. The pro-life side tends to be for the freedom to have children as a result of rape and our slogan brings that out clearly. Why does the pro-life side reject MIM's slogan, one has to wonder.

The real reason is that the pro-life agenda is about the role of wimmin, not so- called murder. Admitting as much, a professor is now talking about the "fertility gap" between liberals and reactionaries calling themselves "conservative." Every 100 U.$. liberals have 147 children while 100 conservatives have 208, according to a "pro-life" website.(3) Thus it would seem to some without the overall scientific picture that only liberalism and pseudo-feminism are self-extinguishing, if who one's parents are determine one's politics, a prediction with a good basis behind it. It's also the reason that polygamous Mormonism is the most explosively growing religion.

What the reactionaries in the pro-life movement are saying is that after they have had enough children, they will be able to change the political atmosphere and ban abortion among those liberals who used to have abortions. This is a funny point. By succeeding in banning abortion, the pro-life side will expand the growth of liberalism and the pendulum would swing back by their own reasoning.

For MIM, the discussion also reveals the truth of our group-oriented line "all sex is rape." The pro-life movement is saying it needs to use legal force to get wimmin to bear more children. When wimmin have the "choice," they have fewer children, as clearly indicated in the pro-life statistics and other global statistics as well. That means wimmin are being coerced to have more children when they do have more children. That coercion is not commonly called rape, but that is a problem for the lawyers, not the truth.

The male left-wing of parasitism was not so much interested in forcing wimmin to have babies but to have sex without consequences, a different sort of patriarchal agenda. That's why many of the allegedly communist organizations harp on the hetero-friendly "choice" issue. Since the 1960s, the package includes freedom of marijuana and pornography and distrust of fascists.

As Patrick Buchanan has realized, there is an inherent fascism to the pro-life side of the argument. Yet even cloaked as a religious argument, it's hard to avoid that the minute pro-life activists enter the legal arena, they are seeking to use force. At the same time, these fascists share the underlying individualism of their liberal opponents and end up producing the other side in effect.

The war angle of abortion

In the 1980s, when the largest single enemy of the u.$. imperialists was the Soviet Union, it was a case where pro-choice rhetoric had a positive aspect for the peace movement. In the Soviet Union, a case was easy to make that the attitude toward reproductive rights was more progressive than in the united $tates.

When the U.S. Supreme Court decision Roe vs. Wade in 1973 legalized abortion in the form we now know it, the imperialists lost a chance to wage war against the Soviet Union on the basis that the Soviet Union legalized abortion while the united $tates did not. Hence, pro-choice rhetoric after 1973 had no effect of preparing war on the Soviet Union.

Today the case is different, because the main targets of u.$. aggression all adopt more restrictive practices on abortion. There is already in fact a difference of lifestyle that warmongers take advantage of in a depoliticized petty-bourgeois population. The most effective plan for stirring up hatred is not hatred of another country's politics or even religion. Our Amerikan and British petty-bourgeoisie are too apolitical for that to work. The warmongers' strategy is taking a lifestyle and saying the other guy doesn't have it.

MIM has pointed out before that the foreign policy press releases of the National Organization for Women (NOW)last year added up to a case for war in the Middle East. Yet, the international also enters into the domestic politics of the united $tates, as when NOW referred to its pro-life opponents as "Republican Taliban."(4) This again is one of the reasons we do not get any traction in opposing the war in Afghanistan and Iran, where there are spotter troops already in action. Saddam Hussein was secular and the war against him has been a boondoggle even the petty-bourgeoisie wonders if it can afford, but these other wars are against opponents without the lifestyle favored in the Blue States, the states that voted for Bush's opponent in 2000 and 2004.

The abortion issue does not have revolutionary potential framed as "pro-choice" at this time. Because there is no white proletariat about to rise up any minute and just needing a spark like the South Dakota law restricting abortion, the effect of bringing pro-choice to the public and defense of Roe vs. Wade is militarist. Yes, the imperialists are quite prepared to trade sexual liberalism for war unity. Unfortunately, so is the majority of the u.$. population. That is why there is no revolutionary involved in the pro-choice movement at this time.

President Bush has proved willing to co-opt International Wimmin's Day. Unknown to most people, he has also made himself busy trying to turn the United Arab Emirates into a relatively sexually liberal oasis,(5) so that he can use it as a point of comparison to justify war in the Middle East. So contrary to his image and voters, Bush intervened to stop the execution of gay men in the United Arab Emirates. We have to understand that when Bush does that his long-run aim is to justify war against similar countries on a lifestyle basis.

The attempts to tail after NOW-style patriotism against the "American Taliban" only add to the militarist atmosphere. We do not need vanguard parties or radicals that cave in on the questions of Afghanistan and Iran. When Bush goes to war, he does not care the reasons that his people hate Iran as long as they hate it and won't stop his war.

Hence, we cannot say there are any genuine anti-militarists who take up the pro- choice cause at this time. If we fight for "Sterilize All Men!" that is something not in effect in the united $tates or Iran. MIM's slogan has no advantage to the warmongers. "All sex is rape" and "Sterilize all men" are important ideological pillars of internationalism and anti-militarism in the imperialist countries.

Notes:
1. http://www.motherjones.com/mojoblog/archives/2006/08/bush_says_he_su.html
http://www.motherjones.com/news/update/2006/08/planb_timeline.html
2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women%27s_Health_and_Human_Life_Protection_Act
3. http://www.lifenews.com/nat2525.html
4. www.now.org/press/07-06/07-26.html
5. http://www.gay-news.com/article04.php?sid=1398