Gender identity is incompatible with socialism unless we adopt understandings of queerness

The first chapter of Part II opens the project of de- centering queer theory by focusing on the epistemology of sexuality in Soviet Marxism. While some studies have concentrated on comparing different countries during the Cold War with regard to specific gender policies (e.g., reproduction and abortion), my strategy is to interrogate Cold War epistemologies of bodies. By interpreting theoretical and visual Marxist materials from the Soviet Union and Romania, the role of the chapter was twofold. First, it introduced the argument that the conceptualization of gender identity is in conflict with eastern European socialism. Bodies and sexuality in Productive bodies in east European Marxism early Soviet Marxism gesture to an abolitionist politics that has been ignored as a theoretical resource by critics of queer liberalism. Second, my analysis revealed not only that corporal productivism constituted an important thread in Marxist cinema, but also that it was gradually transformed by Cold War dynamics. In historicizing the epistemology of productive bodies, I analyzed a Romanian Marxist film from the mid- 1960s, which incorporated conservative western tropes of abortion. This chapter has offered only a brief introduction to the question of conflict in the political contrast between two epistemologies, however. More research is required to understand the various evolutions of different socialist cinemas in their relation to sexuality during the Cold War. This investigation is needed, given that, at least in Anglo- American theory, the archive of Marxist cinema does not have an important role in queer studies. In bypassing this resource, the danger is that queer theorists can replicate the liberal anti- communist discourse that saw eastern European Marxism as a historical void. Two consequences emerge from this chapter. First, the epistemology of productivist bodies offer a powerful challenge to Productivism was an important theoretical thread in Soviet Marxism, particularly in its emphasis on destroying an old capitalist system by abolishing its epistemological ideas. Instead of merely living in the world, productive bodies were designed to be theoretical accounts that work with the analytic of gender. Katherine Verdery’s deployment of gender consolidated the perception that eastern European Marxism was an authoritarian regime, unlike those in the free countries of the Anglo- American world. In opposition to this argument, I have provided an account that sees productivist bodies as part of an emancipatory and dialectical project to abolish capitalist sex roles. Soviet Marxism offers a counternarrative to the contemporary assumption that bodies have to be theorized in alignment with values such as freedom and individuality. Similarly, I contested Kligman’s idea that Romanian anti- abortion politics is a direct result of communist ideology. Studies such as Kligman’s that trace in a causal argumentation abortion bans to communism miss not only the history of abortion laws in State socialism, but also historical developments that were part of the Cold War. In turn, I suggested that the ideological underpinnings of Marxism offer a strong progressive epistemology that was directly affected by the rise of conservative ideas on sexual reproduction. Second, the epistemology of a productivist body offers a window onto not only eastern European Marxism, but also its rival developments in the West. Eastern European epistemology is not the only body of analysis that is affected by this theoretical account, given that the Cold War shaped the politics of decolonization in Africa, Asia and Latin America. To rephrase Verdery’s formulation that gender is “a symbol system by which bodies enter into sociality,” gender appears to be a symbol system by which bodies entered in the Cold War.70 Yet, while gender became a dominant theory in social sciences, particularly after the 1990s, political dynamics during the Cold War are not perfectly aligned to the binary between communism and liberal capitalism. As I have shown, Romanian socialists have integrated a conservative rhetoric to justify anti- abortion restrictions. Also, I suggested that future detailed historical work can identify different turns and trajectories for Marxist sexuality in an eastern European context. This chapter introduces the possibility that the analytic of gender needs to transform its epistemological assumptions. The danger is that its emphasis on individualism and freedom can block projects designed to lead to collective emancipation. I resume my historical analysis by looking at the emergence of gender in North America, concentrating on the sexology literature. I focus on John Money’s texts between the 1950s and the 1970s, given his prominence in the rise of sexuality studies. The chapter continues the work of tracing the difference between productivist bodies and gender identity, but this time it provides a historical reading of Money’s logic as part of US anti- communism during the Cold War.