youthsurvival-network : [Youthsurvival-network] Fwd: TOPICS FOR AFRICAN WOMEN'S CONFERENCE IN LOS ANGELES, 10-15-05

TOPICS FOR AFRICAN WOMEN’S CONFERENCE – Los Angeles, CA

SATURDAY OCTOBER 15, 2005

African Women’s Charity Organization ForAfricanWomen@xxxxxxx

WHY ORGANIZATION IS NECESSARY

Organization is necessary in order to facilitate the planning of our liberation and monitoring the implementation of the plan.

Organization is necessary because it channels all of the energy of those who work for our betterment and improvement.

Organization is necessary because without it, we leave ourselves open to the oppressors’ tactic of “divide and conquer” or “ divide and rule”.

Organization is necessary because without it we let issues dictate what direction we go in. The enemy constantly creates issues for us to respond to. The end result is that we go in circles and never really get to the root of the problem.

Organization is necessary to ensure that the youth are brought into the struggle.

Organization is necessary because it forces us to be more conscious and aware of our conditions and to be responsible for changing our lives.

Organization is necessary to systemize training programs for potential members.

Organization is necessary to expedite women’s emancipation.

Organization is necessary to make sure that we engage in self-evaluation of our strategies and tactics, to insure that we modify our approach when necessary.

Organization is necessary for us to keep an inventory of our resources, to see that they are utilized properly.

Organization is necessary for us to have expert communication systems to all parts of our community.

Organization is necessary for us to see that we as a people respond quickly when the situation dictates that we do so.

Organization is necessary because oppressed people have never defeated the enemy without it.

Organization is necessary to safeguard our independent territories from external aggression.

Organization is necessary because the enemy is organized.

Organization is necessary to combat the lies that the media bombards our community with.

Organization is necessary because it allows us to see who are the real workers for the people.

Organization is necessary because lack of organization is our biggest enemy.

Organization is necessary to attain power. There is a direct relationship between power and organization. Those who are the most organized have power. Those who are the least organized are powerless.

Organization is necessary because it allows us to use our time most efficiently. With organization we can do in one day what previously took twenty years.

Organization is necessary because “organization decides everything!”

WHAT KIND OF ORGANIZATION IS NECESSARY

We need organization that is permanent because it guarantees that the struggle will continue beyond the current phase. We must plan for generations ahead with the understanding that our development spans forever.

We need organization that is capable of mass mobilization, which is necessary to keep the energies of the people working for the right objectives.

We need organization that recognizes the proper role of women at the forefront of the movement along with men.

We need organization that educates the people as to what we are fighting for, what we are fighting against and WHY.

We need organization that is in the interest of Africa and led by Africans.

We need organization that is revolutionary because it seeks a total transformation of society from the backwards way of having a privileged few who own and control almost everything to a new kind of society where there is no exploitation of the masses of the people.

We need organization that supports allies and brother-sister organizations, that believe in the same principles, and which struggles for justice and the return of stolen land.

We need organization that allows for us to correctly interpret the true nature of our oppression and how it affects the political, economic and cultural reality of our lives.

We need organization that is self-sufficient economically.

We need organization that requires day-to-day sacrifice from its membership.

We need organization that is strong enough to withstand the enemy’s onslaught of intelligence and espionage.

We need organization that is Pan-Africanist, which has as its objective the liberation of Africa from all foreign domination, and corrupt uncle-tom leadership.

We need organization that is for Scientific Socialism where there is no exploitation and the masses are in control of society.

We need organization that is global which seeks to organize all Africans throughout the world wherever we happen to be.

We need organization, which focuses on political education, which is necessary for understanding each phase of history, the past, the present and the future and to build on the good and to minimize the bad.

We need organization that trains its members to organize and educate prospective members.

We need organization that integrates with the people so well that you cannot tell where the people end and the organization begins.

We need organization that unleashes the creative energies, of all the people, the women, the men and the youth.

We need organization that works for the unification of Africa into one nation.

We need organization that develops a cadre of people who are good at uniting and organizing the people, who are unselfish and who put the interests of the people first.

We need organization that is democratic with a strong, centralized, collective leadership, with iron discipline and cohesion and which is bold in making criticism and self-criticism.

We need organization that is political, and successful in our struggle for power because there is a direct relationship between power and organization. Those who are the most organized have power. Those who are the least organized are the most powerless.

THE IMPORTANCE OF WOMEN’S LEADERSHIP IN BUILDING THE AFRICAN WOMEN’S MOVEMENT

The political maturity of the African masses may to some extent be traced to economic and social patterns of traditional times. Under communalism, for example, all land and means of production belonged to the community. There was people’s ownership. Labour was the need and habit of all. It is very important to know that humanity lived in communalism for at least 90% of the time that it has been on earth.

During communalism women played a leading role in the society. There was a division of labor that developed in which for the most part men hunted and the women gathered in order to provide food for the collective.” History teaches us that the class or social group that plays the principal role in social production and performs the main functions in production must, in the course of time, inevitably take control of that production. There was a time, under the matriarchal, when women were regarded as the controllers of production. Why was this? Because under the kind of production then prevailing, primitive agriculture, women played the principal role in production, they performed the main functions, while the men roamed the forests in quest of game. Then came the time, under the patriarchal, when the predominant position in production passed to men. Why did this change take place? Because under the kind of production prevailing at that time, stock-breeding, in which the principal instruments of production were the spear, the lasso, and the bow and arrow, the principal role was played by men.” It was from the gathering that women learned that some of the plants could heal certain illnesses and thus women became the first doctors. It was women who discovered that you could start putting the seeds of the plants in the ground and from that process grow crops. It was women who discovered agriculture. It was women who figured out the relationship between having sex and a baby being produced some nine months later. Women were the first and primary teachers of both the boys and girls in the society. Women were responsible for organizing the collective.

It was when private property emerged, and as communalism gave way to slavery and feudalism, that the exploitation of humanity and women began. The overthrow of mother-right was the world historical defeat of the female sex. The man took command in the home also; the woman was degraded and reduced to servitude, she became the slave of his lust and a mere instrument for the production of children. Individualism and tendencies to private ownership grew while communalism disintegrated and the collective spirit declined. The increase of production in all branches—cattle raising, agriculture, domestic handicrafts—gave human labor-power the capacity to produce a larger product than was necessary for its maintenance…. It was now desirable to bring in new labor forces. War provided them; prisoners of war were turned into slaves. With its increase of the productivity of labor, and therefore of wealth, and its extension of the field of production, came the first great social division. From the first great social division of labor arose the first great cleavage of society into two classes; masters and slaves, exploiters and exploited.

It is important to note that this is what happened among our own people. This was thousands of years before we came in contact with other races of people. It was this contradiction among ourselves that weakened us so that we could be taken advantage by other people. We think that it is important to go over this history because one of our biggest weaknesses to this day is the oppression of African women by African men.

If we look at our organizations today, we would find that African women are not recognized as playing a leadership role in any of our main organizations; even though women have played a key role in every significant struggle that we have ever had. This is a clear manifestation of the oppression of women. The exception to this rule has been when women have formed women’s organizations, and just like there is a hatred of women; there is a hatred of women’s organizations.

Don’t get confused. We are in no way against our men. True Women’s Emancipation can only be attained in the struggle of the whole people against exploitation of any kind. A liberation struggle cannot be afraid to talk about the weaknesses among the people. Our brother Amilcar Cabral used to tell us, “Tell no lies, and claim no easy victories”.

One of the biggest crimes related to oppression and exploitation is that it has a negative effect on the consciousness of the person that is being oppressed and exploited. Women are the primary educators of both the boys and girls of our nation. What bigger crime as a nation can we commit against ourselves that to exploit the primary educators of our nation and effect her consciousness in a negative way and therefore effect our whole nation’s consciousness in a negative way.

Everyone who loves Africa and African people must demand and insist that our sisters be recognized for the leadership that they have always displayed. Every organization that has a future will have women leadership and the organizations that insist on our sisters not playing a key leadership role will fade away and die. In traditional Africa women represented life, as Africans we know that anything that is anti-woman represents backwardness, evil, and death.

We are building an African Women’s Movement for the sole purpose of the liberation of our people and humanity. We know the difference between what is dominant and fading away versus what is very small and coming into being, and in time will be dominant. The organizations that have women and youth as leadership in them are the ones that are small but coming into being and in the future will dominate; the organizations that do not have women and youth in the leadership are the ones that are dying no matter how dominate they may seem now. African Women’s and youth movements represent the life, forward thinking, and love of the people. Those who come to be the most conscious and most grateful will acknowledge that it was women who were their primary educators, and leaders. Women will develop as leaders in the women and youth movements and use their skills to organize the bigger liberation struggle. Its in these movements that women and youth leadership will not only be welcomed but insisted on because these movements must represent the most conscious of our people. We chose women because we chose life. We chose women because we know our history and we know the positive history that we have was when women were clearly in leadership positions. The African women’s movement will be dynamic women’s leadership will not be fought against but to the contrary fought for. We ask our women to be full of confidence and come to understand our history because you know the true history of women in our struggle, then you will be no other way but full of confidence.

SOLIDARITY WITH WOMEN OF THE WORLD

We have been asked, “If this is an African Women’s & Youth Conference, then why have women from other nationalities been invited?” Our unification here is in solidarity with all nationalities of women worldwide. We are firm believers in collectivism. We understand that to be in harmony with collectivism the family must be considered more important than the individual, the community more important than the family, the nation more important than the community and all of humanity more important than the nation.

We would like to quote Samora Machel, the former president of Mozambique. “Our aim is to overthrow the power of the exploiting classes in Mozambique…Some think that the objective of our struggle should be to replace Whites in power with Blacks, and to appoint or elect Africans for the various political, administrative and economic positions now held by Whites. This reasoning is either for lack of a developed class-consciousness or because they are themselves involved in exploitation. We must understand and accept the need to destroy the exploitative period. Some identify with the system and refuse its destruction. For them, the final aim of the struggle would in fact be to ‘Africanize’ exploitation… That is a standpoint that jeopardizes the nature and purpose of the struggle. Because it does not eliminate exploitation, it creates a situation of Blacks exploiting Blacks or Africans exploiting Africans. This is the main problem among us today.”

We are part and parcel of the oppressed people of the world. We honor all people fighting against exploitation. We are aligned with all women fighting for emancipation of women and all humanity. We say this with no apologies. This is the reason we feel that it is so important to have this panel on “Solidarity With Women of the World.”

To take part in the African revolution it is not enough to write a revolutionary song; you must fashion the revolution with the people. And if you fashion it with the people, the songs will come by themselves, and of themselves. In order to achieve real action, you must yourself be a living part of Africa and of her thought; you must be an element of that popular energy which is entirely called forth for the freeing, progress, and the happiness of Africa. There is no place outside that fight for the artist or for the intellectual who is not himself/herself concerned with and completely at one with the people in the great battle of Africa and of suffering humanity."

Sekou Toure – Address to the Second Congress of Black Writers and Artists, Rome, 1959

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