Anti-Fascism is a Public Service. Proud Boys Terrorized the Nation’s Capital
Tags: Society, Election 2020, Politics, Fascism, Donald Trump

I was in the streets that night, trapped outside the police line surrounding BLMP. For hours, I was a refugee lurking in the streets of my hometown. Several of my personal friends were brutalized and beaten by Proud Boys. If my partner and I had not brought a non-black change of clothes, if we made any missteps, told the wrong lie, or turned down the wrong alley, we would have been assaulted as well.

It’s been a week since the MAGA invasion turned my city into a battleground. Collecting my reflections and processing that trauma has been a challenge. I am still struggling to sift through it all and to put it to paper. But the take-away, I think, is the same as it’s always been:

“F*ck 12/12” (Tyrone Turner/WAMU)

The fascists must be stopped. And the country must wake up to the dire conditions that have lead us to nation-wide authoritarian violence.

The Proud Boys are fascists. Just like the Nazis so many of them try to emulate, they commit acts of violence against innocent people demonized by their party’s interests. They hate communists, they hate queer people, they hate Black Lives Matter, and they really hate “antifa.”

Why? Because antifa stands for anti-fascist.

“6 million wasn’t enough” referring to the 6 million Jews murdered in the Holocaust. This is a Proud Boy. They are Nazis. (Twitter)

Because “antifa” represents the united efforts of ordinary people bold enough to resist their hateful ideas.

Anti-fascism is a public service because the public is being actively threatened by bigoted nationalists lead by Donald Trump. For all of the mainstream and right-wing media’s efforts to demonize us, black bloc demonstrators like myself are still organizing to stand for justice and to confront those that set us further back.

This year’s uprisings for police abolition and BIPOC liberation have morphed, temporarily, into something else. What began as a nation-wide reckoning on race has created a broad alliance of comrades who agree that being anti-racist means standing up to the president’s racist, misogynistic, and homophobic death cult.

Anti-racism and anti-fascism have coalesced into the same force for justice. We still want to defund and abolish the police. We still want communities of color to be given the support and opportunities they deserve. We still want to renovate the American system to finally make space for the oppressed and disenfranchised.

However, since the election, we have had to focus on fighting fucking Nazis.

And we did it fairly well.

Contrary to what Bill Barr, Alex Jones, and Fucker Carlson would have you believe, none of the people in that video are paid by George Soros.

Or the PRC. Or Putin. Or Joe Biden.

DC’s activist community is an organic network of organizations, co-ops, collectives, and dozens of unaffiliated individuals that share a belief in radical love and in caring for local communities. We organize regular mutual aid events — providing meals, clothes, health services, and communal support to the unhoused and underserved in DC. We raise funds and awareness for Black lives in need. We write press releases and public statements about the injustices in our city and around the nation. And we are NOT all affiliated with Black Lives Matter (TM). The majority of organizations working on the ground are grassroots and community funded. While Black Lives Matter DC often coordinates with the grassroots orgs, and though they are a big part of our family, it is wrong to say that we all share the same black and yellow banner.

We all believe that Black lives matter. But there is a wide range of how these orgs and individuals interpret how to fight for that belief. Many want to march and demonstrate publicly to pressure political leaders to make changes. Some seek to address systemic failures horizontally, by independently crowd sourcing and distributing resources which the government has failed to provide. Others are focused on venting our collective rage at police officers and the American imperial system. And a number are intent on fighting fascists, and keeping white nationalist reactionaries at bay while we advocate for systemic change.

For December 12th, a broad coalition was formed between these organizations to do just that.

Anti-racist/Anti-fascist Defense Coalition (Dee Dwer/NPR)

I don’t think Joe Biden’s communist insurgent force could ever look as good as these comrades.

And just because you see white folks in black bloc, shouting our chants, and holding our lines, it does not mean that the movement for BIPOC liberation has been infiltrated by outside agitators. In many cases, putting white volunteers at the front line was a conscious choice made collectively by leaders of color to keep our Black comrades safe.

We are all committed, foremost, to keeping the community and each other protected. Our shared belief in the strength of human dignity empowers us to love and care for one another. We strive to embody the change that the world so desperately needs— the change which you, the average American, must embrace if you claim to believe in progress.