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Meanwhile, deeming “violent resistance” to the Nazis “an abject failure,” Chenoweth and Stephan argue that some examples of “collective nonviolent resistance” in Denmark and Germany were only “occasionally successful.”408 As a Jew who lost ancestors in the Holocaust, the suggestion that the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising and other examples of armed resistance to the Nazis were “abject failure[s]” is insulting. These moments gave an entire people pride in a context where they faced extermination. Those brave combatants reclaimed their humanity, if only for a brief window of time. If that is not a
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nonviolent methods can topple dictators. But in such cases nonviolence needs to be able to leverage public opinion domestically or internationally to make the dictatorship untenable. Where in the world did there exist a population in the early 1940s whose potential outrage could have made Hitler change course?
the Far Right thrives off the fear it generates from both violent and nonviolent leftist advancement and the progress of broader social justice. The KKK has thrived during eras of black social advancement—the election of Obama in 2008 spurred white-power recruitment, and led to the rise of Donald Trump.
the Black Power Movement rightly understood that they could not construct their political program with white people in mind if their main goal was black autonomy. Sometimes self-determination needs to be prioritized over winning a popularity contest that is designed for you to lose.
A civil rights movement for the equal rights of black Americans cannot, and should not, be focused on the feelings of white people.
Likewise, in the United States, although revolutionary socialists and Democrats might all be considered part of “the Trump Resistance,” revolutionaries aim to achieve a post-capitalist society, while Democrats aim to achieve a post-Trump presidency. Such different goals dictate different strategies.
The tradition of using noise to drown out fascist speakers dates back to the beginning of the anti-fascist struggle.
term “intersectionality,” coined by the law professor Kimberlé Crenshaw in the 1980s.
…many leftist or liberal opponents to antifa would conflate militancy, even nonviolent militancy, with machismo. This was insulting. And personally infuriating. These attempts to circle around and take potshots from a more radical position usually rested on a foundation of gender essentialism. At its core, they believed our womenled group wasn’t appropriately feminine enough.
We still have to fight this on the left, which seems weird and contradictory. But it is unfortunately true.
The rationale for the black bloc tactic is simple: In an era of constant surveillance militant tactics require some level of anonymity.
What we think is needed is both”—popular organizing and anti-fascist confrontation.
Dominic from Germany agreed, emphasizing the need to transcend “isolated subcultural politics” in order to engage “the losers of neo-liberal politics” who might be sympathetic toward fascism. Dolores C. from Sweden concurred, arguing that anti-fascism requires that “we build movements to show our solution” to popular issues.432
This must be our next step. As people are increasingly dissatisfied with neoliberal policies, and failed by tRump, we need to offer solutions to the real problems, not just action against the alt-right. We need both.
the goal should be to “give people the tools of no platforming, researching, and identifying threats” so they can self-organize.
the goal of antifa organizing is to “serve as a wedge,” as former RCA organizer Christy phrased it, to break the bonds that connect racists to the community.
Rather than imposing what is essentially an electoral mindset of appealing to the lowest common denominator in relation to the fascist threat, anti-fascists prioritize working with marginal communities to neutralize any potential threats, whether it’s popular with “the majority” or not. This perspective is especially important in anti-fascist work given the historical fact that those who have suffered the most under fascist regimes have not had the backing of most of the rest of society. Instead of starting with public opinion and working backward toward strategies and tactics to placate the
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This is one of the most important passages.
we must bear in mind that the fascist regimes of the past could not have survived without a broad layer of public support.
Liberals tend to examine issues of sexism or racism in terms of the question of belief or what is “in one’s heart.” What is often overlooked in such conversations is that what we truly believe is sometimes much less important than what social constraints allow us to articulate or act upon. This issue is at the center of questions of social progress or regression.
Except since 2016, Repubs have really focused on how people feel or what they believe, versus the facts. This seems to be the same as the Dem tactic.
An anti-fascist outlook has no tolerance for “intolerance.” It will not “agree to disagree.” To those who argue that this would make us no better than Nazis, we must point out that our critique is not against violence, incivility, discrimination, or disrupting speeches in the abstract, but against those who do so in the service of white supremacy, hetero-patriarchy, class oppression, and genocide. The point here is not tactics; it is politics.
goal of everyday anti-fascism is to increase the social cost of oppressive behavior to such a point that those who promote it see no option but for their views to recede into hiding.
For example, by doxxing
Hearts and minds are never changed in a vacuum; they are products of the worlds around them and the structures of discourse that give them meaning.
We may not always be able to change someone’s beliefs, but we sure as hell can make it politically, socially, economically, and sometimes physically costly to articulate them.
First they came for the Muslims and we said “Not This Time Motherf***ers!” —Popular slogan from protests against the Trump travel ban in early 2017
Following the rise of “fascism” to the second-most-searched-for word on the Merriam-Webster website in 2016 (behind “surreal”),
Sounds about right
Martin Niemöller’s classic “First they came for the communists…” quote
Anti-fascists must not only concern themselves with those who organize on behalf of white supremacy and those who casually parrot racist slogans, but also those who never say anything at all.
We must concern ourselves with those who silently consent.
Despite the popular perception that race is “natural” or “timeless,” the biological notion of race is a modern European invention. When race was invented, however, it was invented as “the child of racism, not the father,” as Ta-Nehisi Coates points out, and “the process of naming ‘the people’ has never been a matter of genealogy and physiognomy so much as one of hierarchy.”442 Whiteness has never existed independent of its location at the top of the racial hierarchy.
targeting sources of white privilege and struggling in solidarity with the disinherited of the world.
On its own, militant anti-fascism is necessary but not sufficient to build a new world in the shell of the old.
“The most important thing with anti-fascism is to show up.” —K. BULLSTREET, U.K.448
You need to be ready to attack and defend yourself. You have to be prepared, but mainly it’s a cultural struggle because fascism grows up in the working class.
“Anti-fascism must be intelligence-led…you cannot do anti-fascism in the abstract…learn what they’re doing, what they’re talking about, know which groups to destroy, learn about their internal frictions, work on them, leverage them, divide and conquer.” —PAUL BOWMAN, U.K. “See how racism or fascism or other forms of oppression are playing out in your community because it’s not going to look the same from one city to the next.”
“It’s not a game show called ‘Who’s the toughest antifascist?’ All methods complement each other…the guys who fight fascism cannot exist without a theory which is written by those at home writing.” —GEORG, GERMANY
Antifa is a state of mind, a way of reflecting and critical thinking (also about ourselves), not about black clothes and martial arts.”
