Antifa: There are Monsters Everywhere!!!!

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Kyriakos said:
I am not seeing why any march should be banned, just cause it is "anti-immigrant". Moreover, at least if we are talking about Greece, the only way anything of the kind could take place would be if it was specifically anti illegal-immigrants. And still it isn't very likely to happen.
But given in theory it can, I don't see why it should be banned, nor why there would have to be a counter-march - rest assured there would be a counter-march, which would force the police to stop both march and counter-march anyway when the inevitable clash would happen.

A far more common example of a "right" march would be on some national issue, eg the fyrom thing. Afaik there always would be some moronic counter-march, which helped the state use the police to disperse everyone (like when Syriza wanted to sign, and did).
The police pigs here have no issue beating up right-wing protesters either.
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If one of these marches could end up jsut being about stopping immigration then maybe I'd be okay with it, but honestly they never are and furthermore those types of marchs have a long long storied history of leading ot violence even without counter protest. Like marches against the Chinese in San Francisco back in the day for example.
 
El_Machinae said:
Why can't you think of examples? Like, why wouldn't you be aware of examples? Also, how do I distinguish this from sealioning? It seems like sealioning.

Is your echo-chamber such that you're never confronted with examples that you will not defend, even while you tiredly explain that the need for the antifa concept is necessary in today's world, because the Right is dangerously mobilizing?
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Accused: "Please provide evidence of what you think I did."

Accuser: "Why can't you think of the evidence? Like, why wouldn't you be aware of the evidence?"

Great argument.
 
Kyriakos said:
I am not seeing why any march should be banned, just cause it is "anti-immigrant". Moreover, at least if we are talking about Greece, the only way anything of the kind could take place would be if it was specifically anti illegal-immigrants. And still it isn't very likely to happen.
But given in theory it can, I don't see why it should be banned, nor why there would have to be a counter-march - rest assured there would be a counter-march, which would force the police to stop both march and counter-march anyway when the inevitable clash would happen.

A far more common example of a "right" march would be on some national issue, eg the fyrom thing. Afaik there always would be some moronic counter-march, which helped the state use the police to disperse everyone (like when Syriza wanted to sign, and did).
The police pigs here have no issue beating up right-wing protesters either.
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If the police do their job properly theres no reason why a counter-protest should lead to violence between the 2 protest groups.
Often when it does its because the police are effectively siding with 1 group.
 
El_Machinae said:
I am. I am outright saying that if someone claims to be antifa - without knowing anything else about them - you're more likely to give them a pass and be biased against the people they're acting against. I think it's problematic. It's why you straw-man, scare-quote, and mischaracterize the concern. You didn't authorize the people to commit violence in your name. You didn't vet them. Instinctively vouching for them is going to lose people when you vouch (or even defend) bad cases. Jesus, you're instinctively mocking the very idea that people claiming to be 'antifa' can over-step.

"I would support your opposition to fascism, but you aren't doing it in the way I like so I guess I'm going to sit this one out."

This isn't what I am saying. I'm saying that we should actually reign-in people who're "fighting fascism" inappropriately. Or, if we think that collateral is 'necessary' (and I actually suspect it is), then we describe and learn from it rather than denying it.

There is a very simple statement here

Antifa is a self-identification and there are going to be people who misapply violence (or intimidation) while wrapping themselves in the flag of 'antifa'. People's interpretation of that misapplied violence is going to be predictable based on their latent biases. So, don't be biased and recognize that you will lose people when they notice your bias. Let's flip it here.
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Pulling this from the 2020 Election Thread.

Again, you are dodging a very simple question: Please demonstrate that people have been "intimidated" by 'Antifa' on a level beyond "someone said something mean about me on the internet". For someone who is so concerned about 'Antifa' misapplying violence, surely it shouldn't be this hard to get you provide some examples of people being intimidated by them.
 
Estebonrober said:
If one of these marches could end up jsut being about stopping immigration then maybe I'd be okay with it, but honestly they never are and furthermore those types of marchs have a long long storied history of leading ot violence even without counter protest. Like marches against the Chinese in San Francisco back in the day for example.
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And to @AmazonQueen too: Greece isn't the US; there aren't marches which turn to violence against any minority. Only case I can think of was a kind of pogrom-like GD event where they broke tables at some illegal fleamarket in Athens.
Besides, other than in Athens there aren't any visible numbers of immigrants around*.

Athens has part of its center become an actual ghetto, though. I lived near the area last year and it isn't nice.

* Apart from the hell with the siphoned illegals from Turkey, and the detention centers in those islands.
 
How many of the people who rail against "Antifa" have ever actually been to an anti-fascist demonstration?

At any demonstration I've attended, there's a broad swathe of people, from Green Party types to LGBT activists to trade unionists to old school Communists. Most of the photographs or footage you see of "Antifa" are just scruffy punk kids who wear black because that's their entire wardrobe. This idea that every anti-fascist demonstration is accompanied by a swarm of heavily-armed black-clad marauders is just totally at-odds with any observable reality.

We can debate the merits of physical force anti-fascism, and I'm honestly on the sceptical side, but "Antifa" is just a bogeyman for hand-wringing liberals and violent reactionary fantasists to bond over.
 
El_Machinae said:
Why can't you think of examples? Like, why wouldn't you be aware of examples? Also, how do I distinguish this from sealioning? It seems like sealioning.

Is your echo-chamber such that you're never confronted with examples that you will not defend, even while you tiredly explain that the need for the antifa concept is necessary in today's world, because the Right is dangerously mobilizing?
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That is a weird response to a specific call for evidence.
 
Kyriakos said:
And to @AmazonQueen too: Greece isn't the US; there aren't marches which turn to violence against any minority. Only case I can think of was a kind of pogrom-like GD event where they broke tables at some illegal fleamarket in Athens.
Besides, other than in Athens there aren't any visible numbers of immigrants around*.

Athens has part of its center become an actual ghetto, though. I lived near the area last year and it isn't nice.

* Apart from the hell with the siphoned illegals from Turkey, and the detention centers in those islands.
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What this has to do with your being against counter-protests I don't know?
 
Traitorfish said:
How many of the people who rail against "Antifa" have ever actually been to an anti-fascist demonstration?

At any demonstration I've attended, there's a broad swathe of people, from Green Party types to LGBT activists to trade unionists to old school Communists. Most of the photographs or footage you see of "Antifa" are just scruffy punk kids who wear black because that's their entire wardrobe. This idea that every anti-fascist demonstration is accompanied by a swarm of heavily-armed black-clad marauders is just totally at-odds with any observable reality.

We can debate the merits of physical force anti-fascism, and I'm honestly on the sceptical side, but "Antifa" is just a bogeyman for hand-wringing liberals and violent reactionary fantasists to bond over.
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In Denmark, during the 5th of May, there was an Antifa gathering that was moved from a park and then violently shut down by the police on a bridge. I think it was 2019, it was within the last few years. Reporting on it was really strange (didn't detail the nature of the gathering or how the police dissolved it) since it happened after a recent event where a really, really nasty alt right guy was attacked by a segment of Antifa (that is, not necessarily the same people; the Antifa that attacked the guy was the masked teenagers you refer to). Mind you, Antifa always demonstrates during May 5th. So the police asked the gathering to disassemble in the park and walk a specific way over a bridge in Copenhagen, and then went into them. The police was largely unmarked and couldn't be identified in retrospect. A few people were wounded.

What the press didn't note was that the park gathering was a bunch of families grilling and cooking and singing for each other. Including literal children.
 
Maybe we can also debate the way Americans say "antifa"
 
Because analogous isn't pronounced analogious.
 
If you could, for the benefit of society as a whole, stop one of two movements, which would it be?
  • Avowed neo-Nazis
  • “Vaccines cause autism”
I know which one I would say presents a greater overall danger.
 
The neo-nazis are more dangerous. But it's a moot point because both only take root where authorities are doing stupid things that undermine public trust. Solve one and you'll be solving the other also.
 
I think that fascist or nazi-type popular governments are by now only a real possibility in a few countries. The actual ban on nazi emblems in Germany does make sense, cause if it wasn't there they would become popular again in that peace-loving and friendly country.
On the whole, however, I think that outright banning movements or views isn't very elegant and in most places it's not needed either - and creates more avoidable clashes. Eg GD wasn't taken out due to a ban, but because it failed to get 3% in the last election and thus lost its parliamentary group. Following that it did get banned.
This isn't the age of Aristotle, when you could have real (direct) democracy, so being actively participating in political stuff is also a dream and not particularly productive. Certainly the saying by Aristotle that if you don't care about politics you set yourself to be ruled by people who are worse than you, is true, but in the current state of things political parties are infested with parasitic or worse elements, so actual honest people are few and far between.
 
Estebonrober said:
Even the FBI says it does not do enough to fight right wing terrorists.

Calling breaking up a nazi rally a form of terrorism when nazis to this day walk into synagogues and wal marts and murder dozens of people at a time is insane. Considering how close we are to an authoritarian takeover by the GOP you might want to recalibrate your take on antifa.
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Defending someone's first amendment right to both free speech and right to assembly can hardly be equated with concurring with their actual rhetoric, which to say I don't would be an understatement.

They committed a politically motivated crime. Using violence and intimidation (which is a crime) in a way that was politically motivated. Ergo, under US law, that meets the definition of terrorism. I do not give Nazis a free pass when they do the same thing. You are assuming I support a double standard when I don't.
 
Kyriakos said:
I think that fascist or nazi-type popular governments are by now only a real possibility in a few countries. The actual ban on nazi emblems in Germany does make sense, cause if it wasn't there they would become popular again in that peace-loving and friendly country.
On the whole, however, I think that outright banning movements or views isn't very elegant and in most places it's not needed either - and creates more avoidable clashes. Eg GD wasn't taken out due to a ban, but because it failed to get 3% in the last election and thus lost its parliamentary group. Following that it did get banned.
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It's on the rise in several countries. In Denmark "The New Right", a party, is overlapping with "identitarians" and outright using dogwhistles, and the person I mentioned in a previous post, who was assaulted by Antifa, was 0.2% below the electoral threshold in the last election. (EDIT: He was part of Stram Kurs (Hard Line) that has an "everone must go"-policy; these are outright "identitarians" and alt-right.) He happenstance got arrested in Sweden recently, but The New Right has a similar stance that equates to cruel police policy and flirts with an "everyone must go"-approach to immigrants. Eastern European countries are promoting "illiberal democracy" as a Russia-emulating "solution" to the problems of liberalism.

EDIT If anyone knows about the Danish People's Party, it's usually listed as an ultranationalist, populist party, although it's arguable where you would place them on the cultural right/authoritarian scale. The New Right was largely a response against the Danish People's Party, claiming they were far too lenient, and is eating into their voter base. Hard Line/Stram Kurs is, naturally, even worse.

This isn't the age of Aristotle, when you could have real (direct) democracy, so being actively participating in political stuff is also a dream and not particularly productive. Certainly the saying by Aristotle that if you don't care about politics you set yourself to be ruled by people who are worse than you, is true, but in the current state of things political parties are infested with parasitic or worse elements, so actual honest people are few and far between.
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I don't want to get into it for this thread, but I wouldn't call ancient Greek democracy "real" ;)
 
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