Killing in the name of sexism and racism
Posted by John, February 29th, 2012 - under Australian army, Defence, Defence forces, Racism, Racism in the armed forces, Revolution, Socialist Alternative, sexism.
The ABC’s 7.30 Report had a pretty eye opening story on the Army and its sexism and racism.
The message from our brave boys was simple enough: Women are meat and Muslims are dead meat.
The only surprise was that anyone is surprised by this.
First, many soldiers are from backward sections of the working class with its ideas of maleness as violence, women as objects and non-whites as the enemy.
Second, they are the armed thugs of the capitalist state. They have to be dehumanised into killing others. In training they have the last shreds of their humanity torn from them to make it acceptable to kill the enemy – most often dark skinned people.
The Army does the bidding of Australian capitalism whose interests are closely linked to US imperialism.
Our rulers have a real interest in dominating the region and that is aided in part by the umbrella of protection that the ANZUS treaty provides.
Since 1885 working class Australian men have been killing dark people in foreign countries for the dominant version of imperialism and our own brand of vicious capitalist rulers.
Of course they have also been involved in a genocidal war against Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders since 1788, a war that continues to this day with the Northern Territory Intervention.
Is there any solution to these dehumanised thugs being let loose on innocent Afghans, Iraqis, Vietnamese etc etc?
Yes. Bringing the troops home would be a good first step. But that won’t get rid of the racism from the ranks of the righteous. It will only confine it to barracks here in Australia.
Can we address the incredible sexism of these killers for capitalism? No.
The time has come for more drastic solutions. We spend almost $30 billion a year on defence. Abolish the defence force and spend the money on socially useful things like public health, public education and addressing climate change.
Of course none of this is going to happen, short of a revolution. And then the killers for capitalism will most likely turn their guns on us.
If we want to end the racism and sexism that pervade society, not just the variety that is amplified in the rarefied unnatural atmosphere of the defence forces, we are going to have to have a revolution to turn society on its head and establish democracy and freedom.
Revolution is not going to happen overnight. We need to build a party of the working class to challenge the dictatorship of the ruling class and its killing machine.
Let’s get cracking. Join Socialist Alternative today to fight the bosses and their armies with ideas and strikes.