Capital Shifts Approach To Sex And Gender: Workers Suffer
Since the Trump administration has settled in, the long signaled strategic shift regarding how the U.S. government at all levels would approach the LGBTQ+ movement, and gender and sexuality as a whole, has taken shape. Little time was spared before a flurry of legislation actively hostile towards transgender and gay people was passed by state governments across the U.S. Some of the most notable include Iowa HSB252 (1), removing anti-discrimination protections based on “gender identity;” Idaho House Joint Memorial 1 (2), a petition to request the Supreme Court to restore marriage to its “natural” definition, which would overturn same sex marriage; and Texas HB3399 (3), which was amended to outlaw the funding and practice of virtually any sort of medical practice to alter one’s sex in accordance with their gender. Trans-people in sports, bathroom bills, conversion therapy, and more are all a part of capital’s strategic realignment.
It’s crucial to understand that none of these policies, the attitudes that surround them, or the political forces pushing for them are new. In fact some of them are simply reassertions of what existed prior to the notable shift in public opinion of the contemporary “LGBTQ+ community” as a political force. We can see the bourgeoisie takes not one definitive position to gender and sexuality, but two approaches in constant development. One that embraces the inequality of the sexes and seeks to reinforce the condition of dual-exploitation by worsening the condition of women, relegating them to a role of subservience and child rearing in addition to cheap labor, and (as we are currently seeing,) deepening social divisions between the sexes by targeting groups who contradict this ideal incentivizing gender violence, homelessness, and social ostracization, allying with forces of reaction and religious superstition. The other believing in a social movement that seeks to divorce the targeting, degradation, amelioration, and outright social murder of people along the lines of sex and gender from the underlying class conflict that perpetuates this, focusing on that of “individual identity,” developing political infrastructure based on reform to dampen the revolutionary potential of this strata of the working class, and encouraging ideological development divorced from material reality favoring eclectic theories that do more to stall those who need guidance most than to actually guide them. While they are contradictory strategies, they exist in flux, as changes in capital’s unending search for growth will result in favoring some social and political strategies compared to others at any given time.
Capitalism-Imperialism is moving towards a state of economic conflict, and around the world we’re seeing the rise of reactionary and fascistic political reorientations to reflect this. It’s not simply a crackdown because of the wrong people being elected, its a pattern, an ebb and flow that is in direct relation to the conditions Capital develops under. We already see how the targeting of segments of the working class as a product of said realignment is manifesting in an increase in gender and sexual violence (4), including the torture and lynching of Sam Nordquist. (5). We see that the U.S. intelligence apparatus is preparing its spying apparatus to target inevitable resistance (6).
This wave of reaction must be frustrated against. But just as we must expose the more reactionary face of how the bourgeoisie sees gender and sexuality, we must also expose the face of reform, and how the LGBTQ+ movement is designed, not to build a society where the relationships between the sexes and human sexuality broadly reflects the proletarian outlook, but simply to maintain and adapt the bourgeoisie’s dominance and allow small concessions to placate the working class. An independent political path forward, where our action is guided by material, scientific outlook of gender and sexuality is needed. Knowing firmly that capitalist productive relations lie at the heart of this attack on the workers, it’s our duty to reject class collaboration in the name of comfort and fear, and instead choose revolution as the only path forward.
References
1. N/A, House Judiciary Committee. House Study Bill 242. 2025.
2. “HOUSE JOINT MEMORIAL 1 – Idaho State Legislature.” Idaho.gov, 2025, legislature.idaho.gov/sessioninfo/2025/legislation/HJM001/. Accessed 7 Mar. 2025. https://legislature.idaho.gov/sessioninfo/2025/legislation/HJM001/
3. “89(R) HB 3399 - Introduced Version - Bill Text.” Texas.gov, 2023,
capitol.texas.gov/tlodocs/89R/billtext/html/HB03399I.htm. Accessed 7 Mar. 2025. https://capitol.texas.gov/tlodocs/89R/billtext/pdf/HB03399I.pdf
4. Alfonseca, Kiara. “Hate Crimes, Particularly against LGBTQ Community, on the Rise: FBI Data.” ABC News, 24 Sept. 2024,
abcnews.go.com/amp/US/hate-crimes-lgbtq-community-rise-fbi-data/story?id=11396267 3.
5. Lavietes, Matt. “Mom of Sam Nordquist, Transgender Man Tortured and Killed in New York, Slams Police Response.” Nbcnews.com, NBC News, 20 Feb. 2025, www.nbcnews.com/news/amp/rcna192864. Accessed 7 Mar. 2025.
6. Adamczeski, Ryan. “DHS Quietly Eliminates Ban on Surveillance Based on Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity.” Yahoo News, 26 Feb. 2025, www.yahoo.com/news/dhs-quietly-eliminates-ban-surveillance-135621643.html. Accessed 7 Mar. 2025.