Red is the East, Rises the Sun
One month after the death of Mao Zedong the revisionists, rightists, stuffed shirts, and bureaucrats led by Deng Xiaoping waged a coup within the Chinese Communist Party. The focus of their attack was the revolutionary headquarters led by Zhang Chunqiao and Jiang Qing, two of Mao’s closest comrades, the latter being Mao’s wife. Comrade Jiang, one of the unsung heroes of world revolution, was a fundamental leader in the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution (GPCR) where she focused on the realm of art, theater, and opera. Imagine your revolution bestowed upon you the power to change things, to obliterate misogyny from the billboards, televisions, and advertisements, imagine all your favorite films with the sexism and bourgeois values removed; now you begin to recognize the importance of Jiang’s cultural work. However Comrade Jiang was not limited to the cultural sphere. In her days leading in the GPCR she would make many important interventions in support of revolutionary workers and against bad ideas like bloodline theory (born “red”, born “white”) held among some of the Red Guards.The Architect of the People’s War in Peru
Many comrades will invoke the name Gonzalo and but know far less the name La Torre. Augusta La Torre, or Comrade Norah, was a founder of the Movimiento Feminino Popular and coauthor in 1975 of the masterpiece “Marxism Mariategui and the Women’s Movement”, a text which more than any other lays out the foundation for a revolutionary and proletarian feminism.Norah would go on to be the second in command of the Communist Party of Peru (PCP). Chairman Gonzalo in the early days was supported and encouraged by Comrade Norah to launch the People’s War and some claim that Norah held a more firm line on developing armed struggle than Gonzalo did in the period leading up to the people’s war. The first guerrilla attack of the PCP in 1980 was led by comrade Norah after which she went underground to the countryside. The Peruvian People’s War led by the Communist Party of Peru is unlike any other revolution largely because of Norah. The PCP alone claimed the large participation of women from its inception, the burning of the ballots which signaled the start of the Protracted People’s War in 1980 was initiated and carried out by a team of women with only one man. Unlike any other Communist Party before and since the PCP’s central committee hosted a women’s majority. Many of the important branches of the Party were filled by women including the metropolitan Lima Command, at one point run from a women’s prison, which carried out urban assassinations.
The Martyred Soldier
Edith Lagos was 19 years old when she was martyred by the Peruvian state on September 2, 1982. 30,000 people would march in her procession. Those 30,000 people constituted approximately 45 percent of the population of Ayacucho, even though the government had declared it illegal to attend her funeral. What would compel such a turn out? For starters the death of Comrade Edith shows fully how much the masses of people beloved the Communist Party of Peru. Edith had one of the first major criminal cases of any party member and she was known and admired for beating the charges thanks to a team of lawyers who were also supporters of the revolution.On This Day
On this day we wish to take time to honor our fallen women comrades. These are only three of our tradition’s finest and there are many more whose names were never recorded due to the persisting patriarchy within revolutionary and leftist movements. We must also take this moment to honor the women comrades who command our organizations and populate them. Red Guards Austin especially owes a debt of respect to working women on this day as an organization with a minority of men. We understand the pressing need for women’s war. To all working class women and to all women comrades, we salute you!Long Live International Working Women’s Day!
Red Salute!
Red Guards Austin
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