By Ian Ocx, LGBTQIA+ Commissioner of the American Party of Labor.

Over the last year the LGBTQIA+ Commission of the American Party of Labor has been doing its best to cover, report on, organize within, and provide a Marxist-Leninist analysis to ongoing queer struggles across the United States. Much of this work became necessary to combat the ceaseless onslaught of anti-LGBTQIA+ attacks that our community is experiencing nationwide. As of June 2, the Human Rights Campaign has noted that more than 400 anti-LGBTQIA+ bills have been introduced thus far in 2023, and 82 of these bills specifically targeting transgender and gender-nonconforming people have already been passed at various state levels. The rate of the reactionary anti-queer legislative attacks does not seem to be slowing down in the coming weeks and months. These numbers do not account for the dangerous rise in extra-legal attacks against the community as a whole due to the increase in anti-queer and anti-transgender fervor that is gripping the far-right within the US.

The increases in both legal and extra-legal attacks against the queer community have their origins in the ongoing crises that American capitalism is facing, which in many ways were intensified by the global COVID-19 pandemic and the reactionary presidency of Donald Trump and are now being used to aid in the cannibalization of the working class. While a new labor movement is emerging across the nation, as can be seen by the uptick in unionizing activities among workers at major companies like Starbucks and Amazon, it is still small and needs time to grow and develop. In an attempt to lessen the blow of the ever-intensifying class struggle, the American bourgeoisie is engaging in a struggle over culture, in hopes that spreading reactionary sentiment against LGBTQIA+ peoples will cause workers to divide over cultural issues and fail to unify as a class against their oppressors. This tactic however is clearly not universal among the entirety of the American bourgeoisie since many corporations choose Pride as a time to honor and celebrate their queer workers, with the expectation that “inclusion” will stave off the growing anti-capitalist sentiment among the American working class. This is also a danger. We cannot allow capitalism to sanitize Pride from its revolutionary beginnings at the Stonewall Inn. The alienation of Pride from its origins allows for capitalism to pivot itself as a system of inclusion and liberation, which it is not.

We queer workers must understand that our interests are always with the multicultural working class as a whole, and that our true liberation and freedom will not be won by an inclusive “rainbow capitalism,” an inclusivity that will be rescinded when no longer convenient. Our liberation as queer people and as workers lies in the destruction of the socioeconomic system that oppresses us daily, in the downfall of capitalism and its inherently exploitative social relations. 

Pride 2023 does not need to be another corporate party or another city or state sponsored parade. Pride 2023 needs to be a time of reflection on the queer struggles that have come before: what has been won, what has been lost, and what still stands to be lost if Pride loses its revolutionary origins, if the queer community loses its fervor for change and liberation. The struggle for our lives and our right to exist is under threat. States like Florida have already done much harm to the LGBTQIA+ community and have inspired others to follow suit. It will take an organized mass movement led by the unified multicultural American working class to stop the reactionary anti-LGBTQIA+ rhetoric once and for all. This struggle starts by getting organized and fighting back to re-establish the democratic rights we’ve lost, and by maintaining and expanding the ones we still have. Pride needs to be a time of revolutionary struggle and revolutionary celebration, nothing less. 

Queer Lives Matter!

Categories: LGBTQIA+