I’m pissing people off again, so I’m going to back off for a while. But since this is about the 1,000th time that it’s been suggested that I promote political violence…
1) I do not advocate for violence against the state, and never have.
For the simple reason that it does not work. Unless you’re willing to ramp it up to full civil war scale, shooting one cop is useless. For that sort of tactic to work, you have to be willing to shoot all the cops, in which case you’ll have to shoot the army as well.
The government has a massively greater capacity for violence than the civilian population. Armed insurrection is a last-ditch desperation tactic that almost always fails, and inevitably carries a great cost. Don’t do it.
2) I do not see anything wrong with violent self-defence against fascism.
The march on Charlottesville was an assault. Antifa were justified in forcefully resisting the invading fascists.
Despite that, it is notable from the eyewitness reports that most of the antifa violence was in direct opposition to acute danger faced by the peaceful protestors. The fascists had no hesitation in beating up non-resisting pacifists, but the antifa crowd repeatedly stepped in to disperse their assaults.
They acted as a largely defensive and reactive force, didn’t kill anyone, and caused minimal injuries and property damage. Most of the fights were broken up with pepper spray. The antifa didn’t shoot or knife anybody, or even beat anyone severely. If the attackers withdrew or surrendered, the antifa let them go.
As Mark Bray says, if you are planning to confront fascists, there is a good chance that the fascists will employ violence against you. Given that fact, is it better to go to that confrontation prepared to defend yourself, or not?
Many of the peaceful protestors from Charlottesville report that, in their view, antifa defended them from severe danger.
The Deacons of Defence, The Pink Pistols, Redneck Revolt, etc. are all defensive organisations. They present no threat to anyone who is not a threat to them. But they are regrettably necessary.
