Trudeau’s defective apology to LGBT people

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SOCIALIST ACTION DECEMBER 2017 11 (continued from page 9: “Donald Trump to 60,000 Haitians: ‘Get out!’”)

Clinton’s role as the U.S. and UN “earthquake relief” boss, during which $13.4 billion in international aid was mis­ spent or went missing in a grossly uncoordinated effort that reached and/or involved few Haitians, while lining the pockets of U.S. Beltway corporations and U.S. based nongovernmental agencies (NGOs).

Any attack on immigrant workers, like that on TPS Hai­ tians, is an attack on all workers. Immigrants are not to blame for the crimes of this sick capitalist system. Capital­ ism is in crisis, throwing unprecedented millions into pov­ erty worldwide and forcing massive migration to escape exploitation, racism, war and climate change. Over 2.5 mil­ lion immigrants were deported under Barack Obama, more than any other president, earning him the title of “Deport­ er-in-Chief.”

TPS and DACA recipients, all immigrant workers, includ­ ing Muslims, should unite in a common struggle against Trump’s war on immigrants and the working class, espe­ cially oppressed communities, in this dangerous moment. A massive national immigrant march on Washington is long overdue! n The National TPS Coalition has been formed. Go to www. fanm.org; email [email protected]; or call 305756-8050.

... Zimbabwe (continued from page 12: “Mugabe steps down after military coup in Zimbabwe”)

tion”—cutting wages for public sector workers by 20%. Import controls staggered the informal ven­ dors. This along with the bond notes triggered anoth­ er wave of stay-aways by the unions and unrest from veterans.

International capital’s goal is to turn Zimbabwe back into a disciplined loan-payer. China and Russia are major investors in diamond and platinum mines, and believe that Mnangagwa is likely to repeal the indi­ genization law. He has also signaled possible restitu­ tion for white farmers, which could lead to sanctions being lifted.

Former finance minister Ignatius Chombo has been charged with defrauding the national bank, in the first reprisal against G-40 supporters. Mnangagwa has in­ dicated that he is against violent reprisals but it is not clear how much further he will move against the de­ posed faction.

Arising out of the effective resistance to a police campaign of anti-queer harassment and arrests in Toronto’s Marie Curtis Park, all contested charges have been dropped. This is the result of strong local community organizing in the area, a development that likely would not have been possible even in the recent past.

This suggests the growth of self-confidence and willingness to act in the public arena on the part of the local LGBT community and allies.

Another victory is Prime Minister Trudeau’s apol­ ogy for the decades-long vicious campaign by the RCMP and the military to eliminate gays and les­ bians from the civil service and the armed forces. Between the 1950s and the 1990s, the Canadian state conducted widespread spying against queer people, firing numerous people simply on the basis of their sexuality, tried to intimidate them into giv­ ing information on others, destroying careers and lives along the way. (There were suicides that re­ sulted from this witch-hunt.)

While Trudeau’s apology is fairly wide-ranging, it is also defective and lacks honesty. He attributes As of this writing, Mnangagwa has promised a new democratic era but has not named a permanent cabi­ net or indicated whether scheduled elections will proceed next year. Opposition leaders including Ts­ vangirai and Mujuru have called for a broad transi­ tional government.

Robert Mugabe was once an electrifying freedom fighter against an apartheid regime. A self-proclaimed Marxist-Leninist, he nevertheless spent decades fol­ lowing the ruinous advice of imperialist creditors. His late turn to land reform and indigenization had mod­ est results but came after decades marred by repres­ sion, corruption and kleptocracy. Mugabe’s official portraits are being taken down and street signs with his name removed even while his birthday has been made a national holiday.

When Mugabe accepted the terms offered by impe­ rialism rather than fighting toward the revolution­ ary overthrow of capitalism, the fate of the national liberation struggle in Zimbabwe was sealed. It would never be allowed to be anything more than a neocolonial state in the imperialist order. Zimbabwe, like this atrocity to “the thinking of the time.” This was a deliberate and calculated policy orchestrated by the highest levels of the federal state. And the apol­ ogy is the result of decades of protest organized by queer activists and their allies, not the implied gen­ erosity of the government.

Money has been allocated to compensate people grievously harmed by this campaign. But it is too late for many. And if compensation is handled the same way as it has been in the case of the atrocity of residential schools, people will wait a long time to see any money.

The promised expungement of criminal records involving consensual sex does NOT include convic­ tions for violating the medieval bawdy house laws under which hundreds were arrested, as in the in­ famous Toronto bathhouse raids.

So, while the apology is a victory for queer com­ munities, it is not an unqualified one, and major is­ sues have not been addressed. Among these is the ongoing prohibition of gay men donating blood and the continuing criminalization of HIV. The struggle continues. — JOHN WILSON South Africa a decade later, overthrew an apartheid regime only to see a Black-led capitalist regime come to power, which favored white settlers at home and imperialist creditors abroad.

Many revolutionary efforts, such as those in Nica­ ragua and El Salvador in the 1970s and ’80s, went down similar roads, and their leaders hold posts in capitalist governments doing the bidding of imperi­ alist countries such as the United States. In contrast, the Cuban revolution overthrew capitalism; land was nationalized, health care and culture were revolution­ ized, and a workers’ state was created that still stands as a bulwark against capital.

But no matter how we evaluate Mugabe, it was the ruinous austerity plans imposed by the IMF and World Bank that put Zimbabwe in its present eco­ nomic state. Zimbabwe is still paying debts incurred by Smith’s apartheid regime and has never recovered from the ESAP. Western institutions owe it the end of sanctions and the cancellation of all debt. Aid tied to transparent development programs would be the start of reparations for the damage done. n

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