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Title: What Counts as Violence?
Author: CrimethInc.
Date: January 23, 2017
Language: en
Topics: violence, fascism, analysis, J20
Source: Retrieved on 22nd April 2021 from https://crimethinc.com/2017/01/23/what-counts-as-violence

CrimethInc.

What Counts as Violence?

A long-time anti-fascist was shot Friday night during a protest of

alt-right racist and troll Milo Yiannopoulos, in the middle of a crowded

square. The shooter, who later turned himself in, claiming self-defense,

was released by UW police early Saturday morning. Somehow, this is

barely newsworthy. Meanwhile, local news outlets condemn the violent

protesters for throwing “potentially lethal” balloons filled with paint.

This is our new reality.

It is somehow unremarkable and understandable for a protester to be

shot, while it is beyond the pale for anyone to block the entrance to a

fascist rally.

This should be extremely concerning to all people of good conscience.

Let us imagine, for a moment, that the tables had been turned: imagine

that a Milo supporter had been shot, in self-defense or otherwise. The

alt-right and the mainstream media would be in an uproar. The

anti-fascist would still be in custody, charged with murder. Why do we

know this? Because anti-fascists and anarchists are regular assaulted by

the police and held under outrageous bail conditions. Hundreds who

protested the inauguration in Washington, DC, were in jail for over

twenty-four hours before getting bailed out; some now face up to ten

years imprisonment on felony riot charges. Women are regularly

incarcerated for self-defense against abusive men. People of color are

regularly held for weeks on end, without bail, for skipping bus fares

and other minor offenses. But somehow, a man who shot into a crowd, on a

campus that bans firearms, is deemed responsible and safe enough to

release without charges or bail. When we are arrested, our names and

faces are advertised in the media, along with denigrating comments and

descriptions. We are all aware of this double standard; one only has to

look at the difference between the hands-off response to the armed

militia occupation of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge, and the

violent attacks on water protectors at Standing Rock in North Dakota.

This is not to complain, or to ask the police for protection. We are not

calling for prosecution; the courts will never serve us, and the police

will never protect us. They only protect the wealthy, the privileged,

and their own ranks. It is common practice for police to protect

neo-Nazi rallies; and yet, when the fascists pull guns or knives on us,

as in the UW shooting, as in Minneapolis, as in Sacramento, they rarely

face serious consequences. We cannot rely on the police, and we do not

care to. They are a violent and racist force, descended from slave

patrols and anti-union thugs. Their job is to enforce white supremacy,

the property of the wealthy, and the patriarchal order of society. We do

not want their help. We are not surprised, because the police have

always worked with the fascists, in every country where fascism has

taken hold.

More alarming than the behavior of the police is the degree to which

right-wing gun violence has become normalized and acceptable.

Conservatives cry self-defense and gun rights, while the media accepts

their narrative, seeking instead to criminalize victims like Trayvon

Martin. Liberals decry gun culture, but have also become accustomed to

it; it is no longer surprising, it becomes part of the background of

normal life. Meanwhile, popular narratives cast anti-fascist actions and

protests as exceptional, extreme, and violent. This is part of an

ongoing culture war over language and truth; the extreme right seeks to

cloak their violent, racist rhetoric in pleas for free speech, while

refusing to take responsibility for the violence that follows. We saw

this with Trump’s support for attacking protesters during his campaign,

and we see it now. Every time a right-wing attack goes under-reported

and unpunished, it grants legitimacy to right-wing violence and

encourages others to do the same. The spike in hate crimes following

Trump’s election demonstrates this clearly. As racist, misogynist, and

transphobic violence becomes mainstream, it spreads and gains

legitimacy. This is how fascism works; this is how it spreads. In 1932,

five Nazi stormtroopers beat a young communist to death in front of his

mother; Hitler applauded their actions, and subsequently released them

after taking power. Their “national passion” excused their crimes.

This cannot be the new normal. We cannot cede ground on this front, or

on any other front. Media organizations that refuse to call Trump on his

lies, that present Milo Yiannapoulis supporters as scared victims, or

that give voice to Milo’s absurd statement after the shooting that “if

we stop, we let the protestors win,” are complicit in granting

legitimacy to fascist political violence.

This country is barreling down the tracks towards a very dark, very

violent future. Protests and rallies are important, but

self-congratulatory photos and safety pins are not enough to stem the

tide. Those of us who recall the anti-war protests in 2003, then the

largest global protests in recorded history, should remember that our

numbers were not enough.

We must make our struggles more real than symbolic, to stop the fascists

from organizing and to ensure everyone hears, over and over, that this

is not normal, and this is not okay.

We live in exceptional times; we must ensure these exceptions do not

become normalized. But of course, simply turning the train and returning

to the pre-Trump “normal” is not enough. This country has always been

racist; it is founded on genocide, slavery, and colonialism. Our task,

as Walter Benjamin described it during another period of anti-fascist

struggle, is to create a real state of emergency, to throw all of our

assumed truths and behaviors into question. If we do, “our position in

the struggle against Fascism will thereby improve.” To do so, to truly

combat fascism requires real anti-fascist struggle, and requires

supporting those who are wounded on the front lines.

America was never great; let’s make America not exist again, and replace

it instead with a human community that is truly free—free of white

supremacy, free of capitalist exploitation, and free of patriarchal

violence.