Is Antifa a thing?

Great Debates
1

I’ve seen a lot in the news, one way or another, that Antifa is (or isn’t) involved in hijacking some of the recent protest. I’ve also heard that there IS no real Antifa group, i.e. no organized group. Then there is the right wing supremacists/militiamen who are actually behind a lot of this, basically disguising themselves as Antifa to, I presume, try and build up bad press about them or get people at each other’s throats.

I honestly don’t know what to think on this one. I think there are left wing radical groups in the US, just as there are right wing ones, but I don’t know if they are as organized as some seem to be speculating about this Antifa group. On the other side of that, I don’t really know that right wing groups or militia groups really are sophisticated enough or disciplined enough to try and do false flag operations like this. To me, it seems more plausible that a lot of the violence and looting are just frustrated people pushed to their limits, or people who really don’t get a fuck about WHY the protests are happening but want a new TV or pair of shoes…or just think it would be fun to break stuff and burn things.

2

I have a suspicion the “Antifa” is kind of like “Christian” in that anyone who wants to call themselves one, is one. After all who are any of us to call them wrong? The converse also applies of course.

3

Black bloc is a thing and it sounds more like them.

There are various left wing and anarchist groups out there. I think antifa is just an umbrella term.

4

I’d classify Antifa as being “anarchist-adjacent”. While many members may have anarchist leanings, the “group” is more reactionary towards alt-right groups like Proud Boys and Patriot Prayer, both groups that have regularly escalated to violence against those they don’t like. Antifa isn’t innocent in these interactions, however, as incidents like the Berkeley riot and various fun times in Portland show.

An Antifa organizer stated it fairly well:

5

Did he though? Is he an official in the Antifa organization? Or is he just some guy who says he is “antifa”?

6

It is a thing, but American Antifa is much different than European Antifa, and today’s Antifa is much different from the 1930’s Antifa. A lot of what we’re seeing right now is people calling themselves Antifa, but behaving as Black Bloc.

The distinction (as I can best understand it) is that Antifa is a non-anonymous paramilitary unit that specifically combats fascist mobs and paramilitaries. These were the guys and gals we saw at Charlottesville with heavy weaponry. They were not there to cause disorder or damage property, but to physically oppose the white supremacists who showed up there.

Black Bloc on the other hand is just the practice of dressing in all black, including a face mask, and raising hell in any way possible. Favored activities are highly visible forms of vandalism and chaos… smashing windows, burning tires, and provoking the police to make them seem disarrayed and out of control.

I think Americans are confused about the difference. Obviously, the right wing finds it convenient to conflate the two, because associating Antifa with indiscriminate chaos and property damage serves to rob them of any noble moral aspirations.

Then I think we have some confused young protesters who see the G20 riots and think “OK, this is how you do aggressive protesting, and I’m calling myself Antifa now”.

As to whether it’s an actual organization, I don’t think it’s any more organized or well-governed than a loose affiliation of social media groups.

But yes, it exists. It’s a thing, like the Macarena is a thing. You can’t put your hands on it but it’s obviously a thing that people do alone or together.

7

What Antifa organization? Are you aware of a central command structure for an ideology that is intentionally unorganized and spread out that everyone is unaware of?

Scott Wood was considered enough of an expert as to be interviewed by credible news sources about Antifa. If you disagree, feel free to provide arguments and sources for your opinion.

8

Antifa is a concept and not an organization. I think I understand them from the hardcore (punk rock to some of you) music scene in the early 1980’s. Antifa are the “white hats” like the anti Nazi punks. At least in my time, most were young, didn’t like bullies (maybe were bullies themselves), liked to fight, and got off on kicking some ass as “good guys.” Sheesh, what’s not to like if a bunch of racist bikers show up to intimidate a crowd, but meet their match with folks that don’t mind a dust up.

Antifa aren’t anarchists and not out to loot (although I’m sure a few would join in).

Look at the Seattle WTO protests in 1999. The window smashing and damage was kicked off by maybe a dozen guys in hoodies that were there to start shit when the crowd got riled. The crowd weren’t anachists, but crowds can easily get out of hand.

I had friends that were bystanders for the Sacramento Nazi mayhem. As soon as one group of nazi biker showed up, a whole group of antifa jumped them like a pack of wolves. Being nazi bikers, it wasn’t their first gang fight, and they managed to stab a few antifa while getting shit kicked.

Antifa are not some organized left wing anarchist bogeyman out to subvert Amerika. Unless you think this guy is antifa?

XT, how’s about facebook removes nearly 200 account tied to hate groups: Earlier this week, Facebook announced the removal of a “handful” of other accounts created by white supremacists who had been posing on Twitter as members of the far-left antifa movement.

Trump and others are trying to create an Antifa boogeyman to create a far left “enemy” in order to justify their fascist attempts.

9

Unless you thinkthis guy is Antifa?: President Trump on Tuesday shared an unfounded conspiracy theory that an incident in which an elderly man was pushed to the ground by police in Buffalo, N.Y., during a protest over the police killing of George Floyd could be a “set up.”

10

Okay, look, I understand that people are resistant to watching any Youtube videos as citations on the board. Much less hour long ones. I know, I understand, I get it, but the most comprehensive source I know of for explaining antifa is the video The Philosophy of Antifa. Possibly the only other source that comes close is the short book Antifa: The Antifascist Handbook, and honestly I think the video does a more thorough job of citing influential sources (including said handbook) than the handbook itself, and is definitely better at explaining it to laypeople. So your choice between ordering and reading a 200 page book or watching a one hour video I guess.

The very, very short version is that there is no “Antifa” organization. In fact, when Trump said he was going to “police antifa as a terrorist organization” it immediately became a popular joke on the left to say you’re the “CEO of Antifa” because Antifa has no permanent, widespread, consistent organizational structure. It’s a loose collection of independent groups of people that respond to certain fascist actions. It’s also not strictly true to say it’s anarchist, or communist, or any other ideology. Even (neo)liberals can be Antifa, but due to their personal politics often won’t participate in it. However, in practice in the US the people doing things under the Antifa banner are likely to be Left-Anarchists, with some other far-left people interspersed such as Marxist-Leninists and such.

Antifa is based on the phrase “Antifascist Action” so (while nobody would naturally say this) it’s in some ways more accurate to say you “do an Antifa” than “are Antifa”. Antifascist action is a philosophy and set of actions you can perform, some of them even without organizing with others, and this is a wide range of things: it can be counterprotesting, or joining BLM protests, but it can also be less visible action such as (and all of these have been done withing the last 2-3 years alone):

Infiltrating far-right groups to gather intel and create dossiers on their movements
Tearing down far-right propaganda posters
Influencing legislators to not support certain legislation
Creating resources or directly providing counseling or support to facilitate the intervention, rehabilitation, and peaceful deconversion of fascists (especially ones that they may be related to or close to in other ways)
Flagging their webpages to get advertising pulled/their hosting revoked/their funding removed etc
Getting fascists fired from their jobs by calling their employer’s attention to their publicly hateful behavior

among other things.

Now, all that said, obviously there are people more into doing antifascist action than others, and these people organize, and often there are regulars who meet up and such. So in some sense there are multiple organizations with Antifascist principles with semi-regular attendees to their events, so there is some sense in which there are multiple Antifa organizations, but it’s not an organization in the same way as some formal 501(3)(c) or even something like the “Milwaukee Men’s Choir” or whatever is. It’s more an organization in the way you and your friends getting together to do a book club every week is an “organization.”

11

Missed edit: None of this is to say there’s anything stopping a bad (at least nominally) far left group from calling itself Antifa and proceeding to do really dumb or heinous shit, of course. I do not claim every single Antifa cell that has ever existed is good and has done no wrong, in the same way that your book club being normal doesn’t mean nobody has ever turned theirs into a suicide cult, but Antifa as a philosophy, general organizing principle, and the average execution of the concept, isn’t about rabble rousing or far left agitation (except in direct response to fascist organization). And antifa really has very little to do with the current BLM protests other than I suspect heavy overlap in people that attend Antifa counterprotests and BLM protest attendees, as well as occasionally people presenting “as antifascists” at some rallies here and there.

12

Was ACORN a thing? Yes. Was it an important thing that warranted the right wing frenzy about it? No. Same thing here. Antifa is the right wing equivalent of quicksand; immensely feared, yet rarely seen and not particularly dangerous.

“Antifa” focuses the right wing conspiracy machine on a tangible enemy that can be whatever they say it is.

13

Antifa is to conservatives in 2020 as Emmanuel Goldstein was to the Party in 1984.

14

Many members of Antifa compete in the martial arts tournament known as the Kumite.

15

And speaking of Acorn, Almost all of what was said of them by right wing media misleaders like O’Keefe (who won recognition from right wing groups) was fake.

Point being that one should never forget that slime like O’Keefe are still part of the propaganda from the right that also guides the current moves against anyone that can be involved in Antifa efforts.

16

Yes. Antifa was just a name some well meaning guys called themselves when they went to counter-protest vs Nazis and KKK here in America. They have no organization, no membership cards, nothing.

Now, even tho most of what Antifa has done has been good, they do have a few black marks- they have done violence vs some white supremacists. I cant condone violence, but in this case, it is hard to condemn it strongly either.

Next as Wesley Clark says above, Antifa let itself be infiltrated by Black bloc anarchists, who look to turn peaceful protests into violent ones. Now sure, since there is no "Antifa’ organization, they cant exactly ask for ID cards, but the well meaning anti-facist counter-demonstraters just watched and did nothing while Black bloc anarchists- pretending to be Antifa- broke windows and torched cars. I blame them for doing nothing. This gave Antifa a bad name.
So, no, “Antifa” isn’t terrorist by nature, but it is easily infiltrated by those that want violence.

17

The Anti-Defamation League has this to say:

“Antifa is not a unified group; it is loose collection of local/regional groups and individuals. Their presence at a protest is intended to intimidate and dissuade racists, but the use of violent measures by some antifa against their adversaries can create a vicious, self-defeating cycle of attacks, counter-attacks and blame. This is why most established civil rights organizations criticize antifa tactics as dangerous and counterproductive.
The current political climate increases the chances of violent confrontations at protests and rallies. Antifa have expanded their definition of fascist/fascism to include not just white supremacists and other extremists, but also many conservatives and supporters of President Trump. In Berkeley, for example, some antifa were captured on video harassing Trump supporters with no known extremist connections. Antifa have also falsely characterized some recent right wing rallies as “Nazi” events, even though they were not actually white supremacist in nature…
All forms of antifa violence are problematic. Additionally, violence plays into the “victimhood” narrative of white supremacists and other right-wing extremists and can even be used for recruiting purposes. Images of these “free speech” protesters being beaten by black-clad and bandana-masked antifa provide right wing extremists with a powerful propaganda tool…
Today’s antifa argue they are the on-the-ground defense against individuals they believe are promoting fascism in the United States. However, antifa, who have many anti-police anarchists in their ranks, can also target law enforcement with both verbal and physical assaults because they believe the police are providing cover for white supremacists. They will sometimes chant against fascism and against law enforcement in the same breath.
While some antifa use their fists, other violent tactics include throwing projectiles, including bricks, crowbars, homemade slingshots, metal chains, water bottles, and balloons filled with urine and feces. They have deployed noxious gases, pushed through police barricades, and attempted to exploit any perceived weakness in law enforcement presence.”

The ADL says that it’s important not to equate white supremacy/neo-Nazi organizations with antifa, as the former have a much more violent history.

What I find most persuasive is that antifa violence gives right-wingers a convenient target and a means for drumming up support.
People who argue that violent means are necessary to counteract perceived fascist behavior or else we’ll repeat the events leading up to Nazi seizure of people should ask themselves: what was the outcome of widespread confrontations between such groups in 1930s Germany? Fascists were able to ride to power because they were seen as being able to crack down on disorder.

18

How did they pretend to be Antifa?

19

Whatever it is or isn’t labeled as, at the very least it’s a counterproductive, hypocritical, parasitical, and intellectually bankrupt entity.

20

Also largely imaginary, it seems.