Natasha Lennard: This Is Not a Time for Civility

On his application to hold a demonstration in Washington, DC, to mark the anniversary of last year’s Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, white-supremacist Jason Kessler ticked “yes” to the question of whether any groups might seek to disrupt the demonstration. “Members of Antifa affiliated groups might try to disrupt,” Kessler wrote. The National Parks […]

The Nation, “These Southern Cities Are at the Heart of the Struggle Against White Supremacy”

The Black Lives Matter activists and anarchists, the socialists and anti-fascists, the religious leaders and local residents who risked their bodies and their well-being in Charlottesville this month should be celebrated for their courage and praised for their good sense and smart tactics. Violent fascists, neo-Confederates, Ku Klux Klanners, and other racist extremists don’t care […]

The Atlantic, “Durham’s Anti-Klan Block Party”

With no Klan protest available to counter-protest, the crowd became a big celebration instead. Estimates ranged as high as 2,000 attendees. It was a diverse cross-section of the Durham community: young and old, black, white, Hispanic, and Asian. There were hipsters with sculpted mustaches and band t-shirts, men with graying dreadlocks, black-clad anarchists with bandanas […]

Politico, “Domestic hate groups elude feds”

Also, the FBI and the Justice Department don’t keep lists of domestic terrorist organizations, because of concerns about civil liberties. Those concerns also prevent federal authorities from engaging in the kind of sweeping surveillance and monitoring of the Ku Klux Klan and anarchist groups that was more accepted in decades past, before reforms were put […]

New Republic, “The Left’s Supporting Role in American Hate Theater”

And so the good people of Charlottesville, along with a fair number of masked anti-fascists and anarchists from god knows where, took to the streets on July 8. They drowned out the Klansmen with their own taunts and threats, tried to block them from driving away after the rally, and turned their ire toward the […]

Al Jazeera, “US authorities handle white supremacists with kid gloves while branding Antifa protesters ‘domestic terrorists'”

On June 12, 2017, New Jersey’s Office of Homeland Security and Preparedness (OHSP) added a new name to its list of “domestic terrorist” threats: Antifa. The report characterises “Antifa” as a group of “anarchist extremists” who “focus on issues involving racism, sexism, and anti-Semitism, as well as other perceived injustices,” a half-baked definition, while technically accurate, is […]

Triad City Beat, “Militant anti-Klan protesters march through downtown Asheboro”

Organized by a chapter of the Redneck Revolt based in neighboring Davidson County, the march drew from the larger anarchist community across the state, including members of the Industrial Workers of the World from Durham to Asheville. The anarchist-oriented Redneck Revolt also sent members from chapters in Shelby and the western part of the state. […]

Al Jazeera, “US anti-fascists: ‘We can make racists afraid again'”

Largely made up of anarchists and, to a lesser extent, activists ascribing to various strands of Marxism, anti-fascist activists decided to adopt the tactic of physical confrontations against white supremacists from across the spectrum: from neo-Nazi punks to the resurgent Ku Klux Klan. The Anti-Racist Action (ARA) was established in 1988 in Minneapolis as one […]