Libcom twitter fight with Lee Fang of The Intercept

Looks like yer fairly typical black bloc silliness to me. Bellends.

Disclaimer - this comment is not intended to tar all black-clad folk with the same brush and in no way endorses kicking the arses of black blockers due to their shit mode of dress (which makes them look a bit like like cast-offs from an Oswald Mosley meeting).

A facebook post from Oz Katerji

https://www.facebook.com/oz.katerji/posts/1336883169713019

Dear friends who are currently feeling uncomfortable by the growing anti-fascist action movement and protests, I would like to clear a few things up to avoid misunderstandings.

Firstly, the AFN cannot and will not unseat Trump, that is not the purpose of the movement and it lacks the ability to reach the sort of critical mass required to do something like that. Anti-fascism isn't a political ideology and it has no political purpose other than opposition to fascism, as such it brings together disparate groups of leftists, liberals, anarchists and libertarians, these people can't agree at the best of times, they aren't setting out to start a revolution.

Secondly, anti-fascist tactics work and they have been working. Anti-fascists have not been seen or heard for the most part during the Trump or Brexit campaigns, they appeared in force at the protests afterwards (in some instances at Trump rallies too but in fairness those riots were rarely organised by an antifa bloc). I understand friends in North America have a different relationship with antifa to those in Europe generally. In Britain anti-fascist protests have nullified the far-right's presence on the streets, groups like the EDL or the BNP simply cannot march in Britain. They try and try and try, but every time they do 100 kids with black banners turn up and make sure the fascists get punched in the head, fenced in by police and shipped back off to the holes they came from on tour buses.

Again, the point in this isn't to "stop Trump", it doesn't think that far ahead, it exists to "no platform", which is, for the uninitiated, to remove the platform given to fascists to preach their hatred.

Milo Yiannopoulos was scheduled to speak at Berkely, under the US constitution he is entitled to free speech, that means the government can't arrest him for what he says, that does not mean that private citizens have to respect what he says or give him the time/space to air those views. He was due to use his platform at UCB to give personal details of undocumented migrants studying at UCB, he was doing this to intimidate them, encourage violent, racist retribution towards them and encourage far-right leaning students across the country to do the same thing.

Do you seriously not understand what is happening? These fascists, and that is what they are, are organising politically to promote and encourage racist violence and if you haven't noticed, they are winning. Big time.

Turning up to stop the event, by any means necessary, is a completely justifiable act. No one is encouraging senseless violence, no one wants people to be hurt for no reason. The goal is the 'no platform', the students and protesters had already tried every available method to stop the event from happening, after every method failed, they took action into their own hands.

Fascists believe in strength through violence, it is central to their ideology. Standing with candles singing songs doesn't scare them, it makes them weep with laughter as they go on stage and put the lives of foreign UCB students in danger.

Do I think black bloc tactics will bring down this racist administration? No.

Do I believe black bloc tactics will make it harder for fascists to achieve critical mass, find platforms and spread their hatred? Absolutely yes.

The protests haven't given Milo or Spencer a larger platform believe it or not, they already have those things. Instead, we have seen them being punched in the head and crying like babies because they can't get their own way, this hurts their image in a way that protest alone simply cannot. The only images we have seen of these fascist white men since these protests began are them in hiding and complaining. Those are small victories, that is all those protests set out to achieve and that is what they will continue to achieve with or without your support.

Encouraging violence is senseless and stupid, but using direct action, civil disobedience and force to accomplish the goal of shutting down a platform for fascism is not even close to what can be described as "senseless violence". Shutting down fascist platforms works, it's effective and it's something we have the power to do.

Y'all really need to take a look outside at what is happening in the world right now, we are in this mess because we have allowed fascist views to be legitimised, we have had straplines running on CNN asking if Jews are human. This is 2017 for fuck's sake and we have people promoting genocide and ethnic cleansing like those are perfectly legitimate political positions to hold. These people are organising to achieve those goals, either you hold the line against them or you let them do what they want without putting up a fight. The choice is yours, just don't think that in some way you hold moral superiority over the kids at UCB because you don't.

There are definitely a lot of idiots in that crowd, there are definitely a lot of stupid kids doing stupid things that I completely disagree with, I understand that. But this is bigger than that and it sends a very clear messages to other campuses in America, DO NOT book Milo Yiannopoulos, if you do, the black banners will shut you down and cost you thousands of dollars in damages and security costs. This will hurt the pockets and image of any university in the country. If you think a peaceful protest would have shut down Milo you are not only mistaken but you are sleepwalking into a future none of us can tolerate.

Some opinion pieces from the Berkeley student paper:

http://www.dailycal.org/2017/02/07/violence-self-defense/

Breitbart report from Milo's previous talk at UNM

During his talk at the University of New Mexico, MILO, “in the spirit of Trump’s agenda,” displayed the ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) hotline for reporting illegal immigrants, and encouraged students to use it.

This number can be called if you suspect anyone of being an illegal alien. MILO told his audience that he would like them to “think hard about working class people, about poor people; think hard about the disabled who are desperately in need of state care; think hard about students in public universities in need of federal funding; and think hard, and mostly, about women and homosexuals,” highlighting those groups in society who are most at risk of the adverse effects of illegal immigration.

The number [...] was displayed on a poster below a picture of MILO in a police uniform, with the tagline of “support women and homosexuals; purge your local illegals.” [...]

Another report on the UNM meeting:

Free Speech or Hate Speech at UNM?

Slide from the talk (with phone number blacked out):

https://mobile.twitter.com/libcomorg/status/828727208852193281

This seems to be Lee Fang's main argument:

https://mobile.twitter.com/lhfang/status/829208084664958978

The people who wanted to block Milo's platform ended up growing it massively, and anything he would have said on campus he can say online.

Yes, fair enough.

Milo was already popular, I don't see how the UCB protests made him more popular than he was. The alternative - letting reactionaries and fascists openly utilize public platforms, ignoring them because that somehow reduces that the attention that they receive - does not actually seem to reduce their growth.

Also, his argument doesn't bear water when applied to the IWW GDC members who have been shot - where is all of the attention for them?

Spot on GN. Milo had already been on multiple national and international news stations; why give him yet another platform? Fucking liberals are always somebody's willing idiots.

I saw that Pie person ranting about how violent the Berkeley protests were, saying it's "arbitrary" who is an isn't a fascist and calling for more peaceful opposition (he also made that argument that it would only increase the sales of Milo's upcoming book, etc.) Not so much of a fan of him anymore. It's a strange request, in my opinion, that restraint should be shown toward full-blown fascists when the working class is already tied up with the capitalists. The way I look at it is talking about fascism (in Universities or elsewhere) is only a step away from fascist deeds. Why else talk about racism, xenophobia, etc. in the first place if you don't mean to act on those thoughts? I'm not sure if I really believe in the rights of people like Milo or their "free speech." But then again, didn't Chomsky defend that holocaust denier?

I was there that night at UC Berkeley and suspected Lee Fang's account was fabricated. According to Ergoat's first-hand account, it's was:

Ergoat

The despicable level of concern trolling “respected” reporter Lee Fang engaged in, without vetting, bothering to getting additional sources, or remaining objective and unbiased is utter fucking garbage journalism and, dare I say it, “Fake News”.

A handful of the #ProudBoys who remained on the sidewalk started talking shit to the Antifa, and again, someone tried to suckerpunch, only this time there was no barricades to hide behind. That the person in a fancy suit who got hit squarely in the nose was allegedly a “Syrian Muslim” is absolutely irrelevant. He chose what side he was on that night, wanted to play with Nazi boys who thought they could play rough and quickly learned they were out of their league: he got his clock cleaned, and was slowly led away by one of his GOP friends, crying. End of story.

“But Ergoat,” you ask, “where is all of the video evidence to support your claims over the Breitbart scumfucks?”

Well there is a good and rather obvious explanation why Black Bloc tactics don’t include having an Official Videographer in the ranks.

This part of Ergoat's account is relevant too:

Ergoat

The day after Milo Yanagofuckyourself got shut down at UC Berkeley, the first wave of highly selective on-the-ground Youtube clips came out from the Breitbart & College Republican crowd. Together they formed a “damning” narrative of “Look at all of these violent anarchist thugs attacking us peace-loving Nazis! Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaahh!”

I took a look at these video clips, reliving what I had witnessed firsthand less than 24 hours before. My initial skeptical thought was, “Huh, these videos seem to be starting 30 seconds too late,” IE there were a series of Nazi edited videos that conveniently left out the part where the College Alt-Right provoked the Antifa by trying to sucker punch one of them and run, but was caught, and got their asses kicked and strangely enough, these edited clips didn’t show the first part.

“Wait a minute Ergoat. Are you suggesting that supporters of Breitbart news, the scumfuck fascist organization that made its name by releasing highly edited videos to baselessly smear institutions such as ACORN and Planned Parenthood with outright lies, went ahead and edited videos to smear Antifa as violent instigators and make their “Proud Boys” look like victims who were attacked totally unprovoked?

Sorry for so many posts (my mistake was trying to do this on a tablet). Here are more details based on my own experience at the anti-Milo Yiannopoulos demo at UC Berkeley:

My comrades and I left before the black bloc marched off campus, but had witnessed a few brawls with alt-right provocateurs (who deserved everything they got). The antifa's action had tactical precision as they first pulled down the pigs' metal barricades, then broke through the student union's thick windows and managed to get a lit flare (or some other burning object) into the building, setting off audible fire alarms that also triggered emergency exit lights and turned the power off -- forcing the cops to evacuate the building. As it was getting dark, they also sensibly turned off and toppled one (of two) of the pigs' mobile light towers (the fuel of which later caught fire).

This may be of some relevance to the discussion above:

https://kpfa.org/episode/against-the-grain-february-14-2017/

In the aftermath of the shutdown of far right celebrity Milo Yiannapoulos at UC Berkeley, there’s been much debate among progressives and leftists about the use of militant tactics against the right. Some of the questions under contention are whether militant tactics bring down repression on the most vulnerable, and whether free speech—even for fascists—is sacrosanct. Undocumented UC Berkeley student Juan Prieto talks about why he supported the shutdown. And Kieran discusses the history of the group Anti-Racist Action and makes the case for mass militant organizing and action.

Resources:

Twin Cities General Defense Committee
https://twincitiesgdc.org/

Building Working-Class Defense Organizations: An Interview with the Twin Cities GDC
http://m1aa.org/?p=1316

A History of Anti-Racist Action
https://antiracistaction.org/history/

Liberals are a political mess but I guess that is an understatement?