Tag: Antifa

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crime and punishment folly general freedom ideological culture media and media people moral hazard national politics & policies responsibility

Five Fascist Things

Antifa, fascist, fascism, November 4, protest, coup, overthrow, violence,

Mass protests have been planned for this Saturday in many major cities across the country. “On November 4, 2017,” says the Refuse Fascism website:

Take To The Streets And Public Squares in cities and towns across the country continuing day after day and night after night — not stopping — until our DEMAND is met:

This Nightmare Must End:

The Trump/​Pence Regime Must Go!

In the Name of Humanity, We REFUSE to Accept a Fascist America!

The group took out a full-​page ad in the New York Times, repeating all that along with the ominous “Nov 4 • It Begins.”

Now, I am against fascism. You may have noticed that … reading between the lines. I’m for limited government, a classical liberal, a modern libertarian. Fascism arose in no small part as a replacement for liberalism, which fascists scorned for not promoting activist government. 

And though I’m not gung-​ho about President Trump, I do not see much fascism coming from the White House. I challenge tomorrow’s protesters to name five fascist things* the new president has done … that the previous president had not also done.

And then, I ask, what practical way could you oppose these putatively fascist things without taking to everybody’s streets until you get your way?

Also, please keep non-​violent, as promised. When protesters become rioters, bad things happen — including conjuring up greater authoritarian sentiment from some.

That reaction may not be fascism. But it wouldn’t be good.**

And, on the right: don’t welcome civil war, as some have already done.

Do you want to see blood running in the streets? I sure don’t.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

 

* Or four? Three? Two? One? Remember, we are talking about new fascism.

** Alas, everything bad in this world is not automatically fascism.

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Accountability crime and punishment folly general freedom ideological culture local leaders media and media people moral hazard national politics & policies political challengers property rights Regulating Protest responsibility

Alt-​Comparisons

Antifa, violence, Berkeley, free speech, fascists, alt-right, alt-left

“There is no comparison,” concluded Washington Post columnist Margaret Sullivan, after spending her entire column doing just that, i.e. comparing Antifa, the so-​called “alt-​left,” with Nazis and white supremacists, the so-​called “alt-​right.” 

When Trump spoke about Charlottesville violence on both sides, Sullivan argued, “He was comparing things that aren’t the least bit equal, neither in scale nor in intent.”

Sullivan trumpeted statistics compiled by the Anti-​Defamation League. The U.S. had 372 politically motivated murders between 2007 and 2016, with 74 percent committed by right-​wing extremists and only 2 percent by left-​wing extremists.* 

Yet, those perpetrating 2 percent of such slayings can legitimately be compared to those perpetrating 74 percent — and also likened to thugs who beat down opponents in the street (thankfully without murdering them). 

All of the above use violence to achieve political goals.** Some are more deadly than others, but the violent actions of all should be condemned. 

Sullivan acknowledged that “it’s safe to say that most news consumers, if they know anything about antifa, know what the president has told them, and what they’ve gleaned from the club-​wielding protesters shown endlessly on TV …”

Are citizens not supposed to take note of the violence in living color right before their eyes?

And why are folks uninformed? Could the mainstream media’s failure adequately to cover, say, previous Antifa rioting at Berkeley and elsewhere have something to do with it?

Lastly, Sullivan called on the media “to resist conflating [Antifa] with liberal groups.” Agreed. And let’s have the same fairness in not conflating Nazis and the KKK with conservatives. 

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob. 

 

*  By the process of elimination, “moderate extremists” are apparently committing close to a quarter of all political killings. 

** I’ve not drilled down into these stats, or figured out what, precisely, qualifies as “political.”

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ideological culture moral hazard national politics & policies U.S. Constitution

The Great Diversion

Nazi, Civil War, soldiers, dead soldiers, Charlottesville, antifa

Though the breakdown of civil debate seems new, the subjects are old. We are actually talking about Nazis, again. Nazi death counts. And the Confederacy. The former defeated by my father’s generation, the latter defeated several generations earlier.

Why?

Because talking about the future would require actual thought. It’s easier to fight over the past, over symbols of the past.

That is why there was a Charlottesville debacle. It is about a statue, a monument to dead soldiers featuring the Confederacy’s General Robert E. Lee. And what it means. The “Unite the Right” rally was set in Charlottesville because of the city council’s decision to remove it. 

It is interesting, though, that the event did not unite “the Right.” Conservative and even many alleged “alt-​right” groups refused to participate. 

But “the Left” seems more united than before. If you focus on past racism and the persistence of Nazi and Confederate symbology, it’s pretty easy to agree. I agree. 

And yet, I take a step back, and remember that those monuments do not have the univocal racist meaning attributed to them. They were intended to heal wounds.*

Now they open up old ones.

And yet this is all a diversion. We are facing a major set of crises that could lead to war, depression, chaos, and (possibly) worse. But we are not now handling them because we are fighting over symbols of the past.

This may be a very human thing to do.

But it is not smart.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

* At least 350,000 young American men died wearing Confederate uniforms in the Civil War, and half a million Union soldiers are believed to have died directly from their war wounds. Today’s population is ten times greater, so adjusted for today it would be eight million deaths. That is a lot of searing wounds.

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crime and punishment First Amendment rights general freedom ideological culture moral hazard national politics & policies Regulating Protest U.S. Constitution

Thorns in the Parade

Portland, rose, parade, protest, violence, AntiFa, BAMN, free speech, censorship

Portland, Oregon, styles itself as “The City of Roses.” For over a century, this Pacific Northwest city has held an annual Rose Festival, complete with multiple parades.

This year, there will be at least one parade less.

“The annual 82nd Avenue Rose Parade and Carnival scheduled for Saturday have been canceled because of threats against the Multnomah County Republican Party, a longtime participant in the parade,” we learn from the Portland Tribune. “In a Tuesday afternoon email, the 82 Avenue Business Association, which sponsors the Rose Festival-​sanctioned event, said it canceled the entire event because [it] could not guarantee the safety of the community.” 

KOIN‑6 News reported that the threats came from the Direct Action Alliance, an “antifa”-styled group that “created a Facebook event called ‘Defend Portland from Fascists at the Avenue of Roses Parade.’ The group wanted to disrupt the march because of ‘Nazis and fascists’ participating.”

Now, what you regard as “white supremacist” and what young pseudo-​antifascists think of as “white supremacy” are probably very different. I doubt that many real Nazis and fascists would have marched on Saturday.

But the identification issue is irrelevant. If fascists want to peacefully parade, let them.

What is objectionable? Those who engage in violence to suppress views of which they disapprove.

Also objectionable? The organizers and the City of Roses police, who, by caving in, let free speech and assembly be squelched.

Spontaneous marches did occur on parade day, corralled to the left and right sides of the street. Literally and figuratively. Three violent activists were arrested but not identified by affiliation.

Portlanders used to worry that the clouds would rain on their parades. Now, it is ideological violence casting a dark shadow.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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crime and punishment folly ideological culture media and media people moral hazard national politics & policies responsibility

God Knows You’re Good

Henry Louis Mencken, Black bloc, Antifa, protest, terrorist, violence, Milo Yiannopoulis, Gavin McInnes

“The trouble with fighting for human freedom,” wrote H. L. Mencken, “is that one spends most of one’s time defending scoundrels.”

Henry Louis Mencken (1880 — 1956), master prose stylist and social critic, knew whereof he wrote. But he also penned things to which few would give their hearty assent.

Today, we find several controversialists who, like Mencken, side with individualism against collectivism. They are raising a ruckus.

But are they “scoundrels”?

Does it matter?

The big news, last week, was the anti-​Milo Yiannopoulis riot in Berkeley. But also last week, Robby Soave explains, “Black bloc ‘anti-​fascists’ attacked right-​wing media figure Gavin McInnes outside a New York University building,” where things got so crazy that one protester, a professor, screamed at the police for protecting Mr. McInnes when they “should” have — get this — been beating him up!

She called McInnes a Nazi. And insinuated he was a rape threat, etc.

So what did Reason writer Soave do? “McInnes,” he noted, “routinely says obnoxious things that deserve criticism. He’s something of a Diet Milo.”

What Soave did not do was ever address the Nazi charge, the rape charge, or any of the calumnies hurled at McInnes. Were Mencken the one being attacked, would he have written that the Sage of Baltimore “routinely writes obnoxious things that deserve criticism”? 

Sure, true. But is that the stance you want to take? 

Soave finds Milo and Gavin icky.

I feel his pain. But … when “Nazi” is the charge, calling the accused “obnoxious” and “deserv[ing] criticism”? 

Gavin McInnes isn’t a Nazi. Or a rapist. And he retains free speech rights, regardless of what one thinks about his anti-​feminism, or other controversial opinions.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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