[Peace-discuss] [Peace] YES!!! Patrick Martin nails it.

[Karen Aram]

Sorry if I misunderstood you David. I’m so used to Carl bashing any and all activities unrelated to war that I made an assumption. My patience is wearing thin with the continued killing and destruction taking place everywhere by my bloody government, with only a handful of people taking notice.

Though not a member, merely a supporter of PSL/ANSWER, I shouldn’t speak for them.

However, I will give my impression: My first reaction to this countering of “fascists, nazi’s and kkk, was not to support it, due to that which I learned of anti-fa. from the originator during an interview by Chris Hedges. I see anti-fa as provoking violence, if not them, then the USG infiltrators. This is what was done frequently in the past and elsewhere in the world, one can use Kiev for just one such example.

However, when I realized the goal was to “counter with “speech only," "no provocations or violence” at least on the part of ANSWER, I had to support it. Isn’t this what we attempt to do when speaking “truth” against propaganda?

Most of all, its the opportunity to meet, enlighten, and recruit people to an understanding of what the government "system” is doing. Certainly not all ten thousand people, but its a start. Isn’t that what AWARE attempts to do every month with our demonstrations?

Yesterday I posted the link to the ANSWER speeches at the “Occupy Lafayette Square.” While the focus was on fascism, the goal is to corral concerned participants in order to engage in future activities. PSL/Answer Coalition more than any group out there has been speaking out, protesting against US interventions and war, nationwide.

The article by Patrick Martin counters what I believe mainstream media has been spinning. Young people especially people of color need to meet like minded groups, in person. We can not rely upon social media online or UPTV and we must deal with issues that concern them. Sharing their concerns is the only way to get them to listen to us. As parents I think we’ve all learned that lesson the hard way.

I ask myself what would I have done after WW1 in Berlin with the rise of Nazism. I know I would urge against violence, as counterproductive, but I would like to think I would have spoken out and taken to the streets, no matter what the cost, not sat back waiting until its too late.

We may not be dealing with “fascism” in the traditional sense, but ask people of color, of limited means, living in Baltimore, St. Louis, Chicago what they are experiencing, and they will likely say fear, due to militarization and poverty. Defining fascism as to its true character is of little meaning to victims of incarceration, injustice and inequality.

Just as we may have few immigrants in our community being deported, nonetheless we know there are hundreds if not thousands in detention, with children torn from their parents. How can we abide such behavior, and where does it end?

I say, this is just the beginning if we don’t stop it now, and that means organizing, coordinating and resisting the USG system of capitalism, no matter who is in power. We can only do that by building bridges, not frowning on actions that don’t meet our standard of “horror."




On Aug 14, 2018, at 10:42, David Green <davidgreen50 at gmail.com<mailto:davidgreen50 at gmail.com>> wrote:

Karen, I'm not casting aspersions on ANSWER. I'm asking whether those who showed up at the rally in questions would show up at a rally regarding Yemen or Gaza. Yes, it's time to think strategically; that is: what is the goal? what are the tactics to achieve that goal? Is the anti-fascist response a tactic to achieve the goal of ending our involvement in Yemen and Gaza? Is it even opposing Trump's facilitation of genocide in Yemen and Gaza? I think these are pretty obvious questions. But it's not at all clear that those who attend such a rally are challenging either capitalism or the war machine. At least not to me. So tell me what I don't understand about these people.

DG

On Tue, Aug 14, 2018 at 11:42 AM Karen Aram <karenaram at hotmail.com<mailto:karenaram at hotmail.com>> wrote:
David, you and Carl are not listening. The article below is written by someone who has been telling the world about Yemen and Gaza every damn day, along with our other wars, not just Yemen and Gaza, but including them.

The ANSWER group has been organizing for many years against the wars in Yemen and Gaza, as well as Syria, Iran Russia and China. This is not a group of Democrats blind to everything but fascism, and racism. If you want to rail against them or those in our community fine do so. But wake up to the reality that sitting in our own little corner of the world bemoaning the American people for not giving a damn sure as hell hasn’t gotten us anywhere in over 15 years.

There were some anti-fa people there  but they weren’t the main group.

It’s time to think strategically. These are groups who came together to unite against fascism, proving what a small bunch of buffoons the USG supported alt right, really are, that they are not a threat as some would like us to believe, that it is a distraction.

The organizers of ANSWER are Brian Becker of “Loud and Clear” Gloria La Riva, Presidential candidate, for many years, Eugene Puryear, etc. they have been focused on “war” throughout, plus other issues of concern that you and Carl choose to ignore, because they aren’t as important. What you fail to recognize is that you have to join others in their causes and concerns if you wish to unite people against our government and capitalism. Not sit on your academic pedestals talking all the time. In the five years I was with AWARE we failed to recruite new members, other than one, losing more than that. Think about it. Even the Greens lost a chance to gain some environmentally concerned individuals because you didn’t show up, not wanting to “work with Democrats.” Where has that gotten AWARE?

After 15 years, maybe you need to be a little more positive and stop just bashing everyone who doesn’t sit in awe of your intellectual discussions, that haven’t changed anything, only further deterioration.

On Aug 14, 2018, at 09:23, David Green <davidgreen50 at gmail.com<mailto:davidgreen50 at gmail.com>> wrote:

So you can get all those people to counter-protest "fascists," but you can't get them to protest Yemen or Gaza?

That's absolutely disheartening in my view, on a number of levels, including the authenticity of their alleged political consciousness.

DG

On Tue, Aug 14, 2018 at 9:30 AM Karen Aram via Peace <peace at lists.chambana.net<mailto:peace at lists.chambana.net>> wrote:


  *   Print<http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2018/08/14/wash-a14.html?view=print>
  *   Leaflet<http://intsse.com/wswspdf/en/articles/2018/08/14/wash-a14.pdf>
  *   Feedback<http://www.wsws.org/en/special/contact.html?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.wsws.org%2Fen%2Farticles%2F2018%2F08%2F14%2Fwash-a14.html&t=What%20the%20neo-Nazi%20debacle%20in%20Washington%20showed>
  *   Share »<http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2018/08/14/wash-a14.html#>

What the neo-Nazi debacle in Washington showed
By Patrick Martin
14 August 2018

The turnout at the Washington neo-Nazi rally Sunday gave a glimpse of the real character of the fascist and white supremacist forces in the United States. Amid a blare of media publicity, grossly exaggerating the popular support for the ultra-right, less than two dozen people turned up for the “Unite the Right 2” rally in Lafayette Park, across from the White House.

The entire affair should be described as a state-sponsored provocation rather than an actual rally. The handful of neo-Nazis were given their own private car on the Washington Metro, separated by police from other passengers. They rode through subway stations patrolled by more police, were escorted from the Foggy Bottom Metro station through a private exit, escorted by still more police on the walk to Lafayette Square, and protected there by hundreds of riot police, who kept away anti-fascist protesters who outnumbered the neo-Nazis at least a hundred to one. After the rally, the fascists boarded white vans, supplied either by the police or Metro, and were whisked away to safety.

At every point, the neo-Nazis were outnumbered by the journalists covering the non-event. Dozens of reporters trailed Jason Kessler, the organizer of the rally, recording his every word. As for the scale of the media hype, the number of hours of cable television coverage proved to be greater than the number of neo-Nazis in attendance.

And this was not primarily Fox News, which was somewhat embarrassed by the pro-Trump character of the white supremacist rally. CNN and MSNBC provided virtually unlimited airtime, and National Public Radio granted Kessler a seven-minute-long interview to spew his racist filth virtually uninterrupted to a nationwide audience. The effect was to build up the neo-Nazis as a potentially formidable force, out of all proportion to their actual support among the American people.

Kessler called the rally to spit on the memory of Heather Heyer, the anti-fascist protester murdered by a white supremacist in Charlottesville, Virginia, exactly a year before, during the first “Unite the Right” rally in that university town. But it was clear that he miscalculated. While Charlottesville in 2017 was the scene of a full-scale fascist riot involving hundreds of torch-bearing racists, ostensibly defending Confederate statues from planned removal, Lafayette Park in 2018 was a debacle.

Many of the racist groups that took part in Charlottesville decided not to come to Washington, at least in part because of the planned left-wing counterprotests. Also, much of the Virginia-based ultra-right is engaged in the campaign of Republican Senate candidate Corey Stewart, who is openly appealing to racism and anti-immigrant bigotry and is being shunned by the Republican Party establishment, although not by Trump, who has effusively endorsed him.

It is worth pointing out that efforts to organize counterprotests to “Unite the Right 2” were censored by Facebook, on the thoroughly bogus grounds that they represented an artificial movement supposedly instigated by the Russian government to set Americans against each other. Facebook shut down one website promoting the counterprotest claiming that it showed signs of “inauthentic activity.”

In reality, thousands of young people and working people turned out for the counterprotest, with some traveling from New York City or even further to show their hatred for the fascists as well as their hostility to the Trump administration, which they clearly regarded as the moral author of the neo-Nazi rally, if not the actual sponsor.

It was “Unite the Right 2” which better deserved the label “inauthentic” since it was made possible only by state and media manipulation, attracted almost no one, and had no genuine popular support.

The debacle in Lafayette Park does not mean that neo-Nazis and white supremacists can be dismissed or ignored. But it showed where the real danger lies: not as yet in any significant mass support for their ultra-reactionary politics, but in the systematic promotion of such forces by the capitalist state, both by the Trump administration and through police forces at every level, from ICE and the Border Patrol down to the local cops.

Fascist elements are promoted to intimidate popular opposition to the Trump administration, and to create the impression that there is significant support for its right-wing rampage against immigrants and its all-out backing of police violence and brutality against the working class.

A particularly foul role is played by the corporate media, backed by sections of the pseudo-left, who present the white supremacist groups as having widespread support, in keeping with their habitual slanders of white workers as being incorrigibly racist.

For nearly two years, the Democratic Party and its media allies have peddled a racialist explanation for the election of Trump and the right-wing policies being pursued by his administration. According to this narrative, Trump won the presidency because of a white racist vote in the working class in states such as Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin.

The claims that America is awash in racism, and that Trump’s election proves it, have been repeatedly disproven by serious analyses of the voting patterns in 2016 (see: “The myth of the reactionary white working class<http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2016/11/12/pers-n12.html>”).

It is especially absurd, given that the same states voted twice for Barack Obama, the first African-American president, and several were won by Bernie Sanders in the Democratic primaries over Hillary Clinton. It was only the right-wing campaign of Clinton, who made not the slightest appeal to the working class, that drove down turnout among both white and black workers and gave Trump the opening to win support on the basis of economic nationalism and populist demagogy.

WSWS.ORG<http://wsws.org/>

The author also recommends:

Facebook censors the left
<http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2018/08/03/pers-a02.html>[3 August 2018]

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