On Fundamentalism

Anuradha Ghandy- the ‘Red Feminist’

From Anuradha Ghandy’s ‘Fascism, Fundamentalism, and Patriarchy’

All religions proclaim the specific agenda of restoring family unity and, directly or indirectly, patriarchal control over women and a promise to destroy those who are ‘different’.

Pro-Life Campaign and Christian Fundamentalism in the USA

1. Ideologues of the New Right (Neoliberals and Conservatives) and the Capitalist Government proclaim that the moral values of the USA have been destroyed because women have begun to work outside the house.
2. “Though they have mobilised actively around opposition to abortion rights for women, they begin by arguing that welfare state expenditures have raised taxes and added to inflation, pulling the married woman into the labour force and thereby destroying the fabric of the patriarchal family and hence the moral order of society.”
3. This ideological campaign is also called the ‘pro-life’ campaign. Though it started as mere reactions to court judgements, it began to attack abortion clinics, kill activists and doctors who helped women get abortion done.
4. The hypocrisy of the campaign is revealed, when though they do not wish to abort an unborn baby, they support death penalty, larger military, and more aggressive foreign policy.
5. The pro-life campaign is patriarchal, white-supremacist, racist, discriminatory, and fascist in all their actions.

New Religions and Fundamentalism in Japan

1. After WW2, most New Religions adopted an agenda of issues in which restoring patriarchal order is a priority.
2. It restricts their choice in marriage, reproduction and divorce.
3. It also gives religious significance to the idea that being a good wife or mother is the way to a woman’s salvation.
4. Both the American and Japanese Movements have arisen as a reaction to the increasing independence of Women, and their transformation of hierarchy in society and family.

Islamic Fundamentalism

1. Islamic Fundamentalism was supported by US imperialism after the second war, as a counter to democratic and socialist movements across the Arab countries.
2. Capitalism was restored in both USSR and China:
3. In the USSR, revisionist leaders after Stalin’s death allowed loosened control over some of the regulated market.
4. In China, Capitalist Roaders (Those who bow down to the pressure and influence of the bourgeoise) led to liberalisation of China.
5. In Afghanistan, there was no such socialist movement- which meant fundamentalism thrived. Increase in freedom of women by the Soviets in Afghanistan thus gained no support from the rural masses.
6. Therefore, the warlords who came to power after Soviet Withdrawal was just as reactionary as the Taliban.
7. The USA supports fundamentalism, but does not like being associated with it. Thus, to improve its image in the eyes of the public, it launched a huge media campaign against Islam itself.

Hindu Fundamentalism

1. Hindu fundamentalists support regressive traditions of Sati, oppression of women, LGBTQ, and the caste system. This was shown brazenly during Roop Kanwar’s Sati, and many other incidents where the Hindutva came out in open support of one regressive tradition or the other.
2. The most recent growth of the Hindutva was with the growth of neoliberal economic policies in the 1980s- aggressive economic reforms and globalisation.
3. Since these neoliberal policies led to impoverisation of large numbers of people amongst the working class, the Hindu fascist forces realised the need to distract people from the crisis.
4. To achieve this, they mobilised people into a frenzied hate against Muslims and minorities.
5. This model has been a particular success in Gujarat, where the Hindutva has been successful in mobilising the Hindu masses into turning Muslims into a common enemy, and Hindu Rahstra into a common goal.
6. It is clear that capitalism and neoliberalism are the main driving force for the Hindu fundamentalists.