Prepared: as internal documents, 1974.
Transcription, Editing and Markup: Paul Saba
Copyright: This work is in the Public Domain under the Creative Commons Common Deed. You can freely copy, distribute and display this work; as well as make derivative and commercial works. Please credit the Encyclopedia of Anti-Revisionism On-Line as your source, include the url to this work, and note any of the transcribers, editors & proofreaders above.
EROL Note: The following are excerpts from the minutes of two meetings of the Motor City Labor League Central Committee. The excerpts themselves are complete and unedited.
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3. The National Continuations Committee has taken a position on homosexuals and their Relationship to the party (not being in the party.) Nothing as yet has been received in terms of a written scientific analysis, but the CC unites with that position as we understand it. Below is a summary of that position as the CC understands it. We believe that this discussion is an important part of the discussion of the woman question.
The general question is the question of what the party is – it is the leadership of the proletariat, it will always be small relative to the size of the proletariat and it will be composed of the most advanced, the most respected, the most resolute elements in the proletariat. Homosexuals are not leadership in the proletariat; the proletariat will not follow their leadership. Thus, in a period of party building and following that, class struggle in which the party must be the general staff, it is not possible for the party to resolve the contradiction of homosexuality in the class sufficient to enable homosexuals to be class leadership (It is related to the fact that because homosexuality is a social response in the realm of sexual relationships, to the exploitative relationships of capitalist production, the basis for the resolution of the contradictions of homosexuality assume the removal of such exploitative personal relationships.) In this period, bringing homosexuals into the party would require that the party spend the time necessary to resolve those contradictions for each personal case – a struggle that is not unworthy of communists, but inappropriate as a priority in this period. The fundamental contradiction of capitalism assumes many aspects, and we must make a scientific analysis of what aspects are the most important keys to attacking the fundamental basis of the contradiction!
Homosexuals will also, by the nature of their relationships, link the party to the problems and contradictions of the homosexual community, an arena of struggle, again, in which the party of the proletariat cannot in this period take as a priority of work.
This position does not preclude the fact that many homosexuals will unite with the line of the party and be active in the mass struggles of the party; this line does not mean that the party will not take position against the repression of the state against the democratic rights of homosexuals.
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1. There was an extensive discussion regarding errors made in the minutes of 7/9. It was felt that it was important to understand the basis for the errors as well as clarify the errors themselves. The basis or source of the errors in the minutes were seen as coming from four conditions:
a) haste and political sloppiness on the part of LAE in the writing of the minutes; the tendency of LAE to lay out a difficult position in a liberal way;
b) the line and level of unity was established w/in the CC but not made sufficiently clear;
c) the fact that the meeting of 7/9 tended to ramble rather than a clear and well organized agenda;
d) incorrect information brought to the CC by RG.
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The CC unites around the position that homosexuals should not become members of the party.
a) 2nd paragraph. “In this period, bringing homosexuals into the party would require that the party spend the time necessary to resolve those contradictions for each personal case – a struggle that is not unworthy of communists, but inappropriate as a priority in this period.” This statement, as written is unclear and confusing and therefore incorrect. The statement implies that homosexuals could be brought into the party which would then move to resolve the contradiction at some later time. The position of the CC is that the party, as leadership of the class, would not include homosexuals in membership in any period.
b) last paragraph – “...this line does not mean that the party will not take positions against the repression of the state against the democratic rights of homosexuals.” This statement is not the position of the CC. The party will, and always will struggle for the rights of the working class but as the statement reads, it implies that the party will take up as a struggle the “rights of homosexuals to be homosexuals”. This is not the position of the CC. Inasmuch as homosexuals are members of the class the party will defend their rights, as members of the working class.
Historically, no communist party M-L has ever taken up the struggle for the rights of homosexuals nor has there even been a communist party M-L that has taken homosexuals into the party’s membership. The party’s purpose is to carry on the CLASS struggle – for the right of the proletariat to a fully human productive life. To divert the purpose of the party into the struggles for the specific “rights” of varied sectors of the society (e.g. women’s “rights”, Black “rights”, Gay “rights”) is anarcho-syndicalist and is related to the petty bourgeois tendency to perceive “individual rights” as the problem of capitalism, not class struggle and class oppression. The various sectors of the class which are specially oppressed will be educated by the party as to the class basis of their oppression and will be united with the entire working class in struggle. The differences between men and women and the sexual relationship between mem and women is a dominant historical fact of the human race. This is not to deny that homosexuality has always existed, but it has never existed as an accepted and general mode of sexual relationship for the working class of any society. Homosexuality has most often been a response to the exploitative and degraded position of women. The fight for women’s equality is the struggle to define clearly and precisely the nature of the basis on which men and women build relationships based on their differences, (individual sex-love) and the basis on which men and women achieve equality in their relationships (all other areas of social activity). This acknowledgement of the fundamental differences between men and women and the basis for individual sex love is an important part of the party’s position on the women’s question. The party cannot lead the struggle for the equality of women, based on this analysis, if it also takes a position that it is politically correct to blur that fundamental difference and to base individual sex-love on some other criterion. This is not an abstract “moral” question – it is a political question, in which we come to understand that “...any phenomenon can be understood and explained if considered in its inseparable connection with surrounding phenomena, as one conditioned by surrounding phenomenon”. (Short Course, p. 106) Homosexuality cannot be understood or analyzed separate from the woman question; the woman question cannot be analyzed and understood separate from the question of the family; and the family cannot be analyzed separate from the fundamental contradiction of a society in which one class appropriate the value created by the labor of another class. The question for communists of homosexuality in bourgeois society is not an idealistic question of what is “fair” or “just”; it is a practical political question of what is necessary to build a Multi-national anti-revisionist Communist Party, carry on class struggle, emancipate women and build the dictatorship of the proletariat.
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