President Trump tweeted Sunday that the United States will designate Antifa, which has been active in organizing the horrific riots that have mushroomed in the wake of George Floyd’s recent death in Minneapolis, as a terrorist organization. But in reporting this story, most media outlets have taken very obvious pains to suggest that the president is unjustified in doing this. CNN’s assessment is representative of the tenor of most media accounts:
Current and former government officials say it would be unconstitutional for the US government to proscribe First Amendment-protected activity inside the US based on simple ideology…. [The name] Antifa … describes a broad group of people whose political beliefs lean toward the left — often the far left — but do not conform with the Democratic Party platform. Antifa positions can be hard to define, but many members support oppressed populations and protest the amassing of wealth by corporations and elites. Some employ radical or militant tactics to get out their messages.
In a similar vein, The New York Times describes Antifa as “a diffuse movement of left-wing protesters who engage in more aggressive techniques like vandalism.”
Now that you’ve tasted these two doses of useless pablum, here’s what you actually need to know about Antifa:
Antifa is a revolutionary Marxist/anarchist militia movement that has gained prominence in recent years as a decentralized army seeking to bring down the United States by means of violence, intimidation, and terror. A September 2017 report in The Atlantic noted that Antifa had already fomented “a level of sustained political street warfare not seen in the U.S. since the 1960s.”
The name “Antifa” is a shortened form of the term “antifacist,” and the movement’s adherents are sometimes seen waving the red-and-black flag of anarcho-communism. The website ItsGoingDown.org, which serves as a newsblog for Antifa, says that “in the U.S., most [anti-fascist] activists are anarchist, although a few are Maoist or anti-state Marxists” ― while “in other countries, the movement is predominately Marxist.” The U.S.-based anarchists of Antifa typically denounce not only the capitalist economic system, but the institution of government itself. And they explicitly advocate and encourage the use of violence to undermine and destroy both.
It is vital to understand that in Antifa’s calculus, the term “fascist” does not describe solely Klansmen and neo-Nazis, who constitute nothing more than a small, impotent, universally despised contingent of fringe lunatics. Instead, Antifa attaches the term to anyone who holds conservative values. This means people who believe in: (a) the notion that American traditions are worthy of respect and protection; (b) tolerance of opposing viewpoints in the marketplace of ideas; (c) individual rights and responsibilities (as opposed to group rights and identity politics); (d) limited government; and (e) free enterprise and private property rights. Antifa rhetoric routinely conflates actual fascists on the one hand, with thoughtful, respectable conservatives on the other.
The organizer of ItsGoingDown.org notes that leftists in “the anarchist movement” are “excited” about “looking for alternatives outside of party structures.” In other words, traditional political processes are too mild to accomplish anything of consequence; violence is the only real answer.
At a rally in Berkeley, California, a large group of Antifa Marxists and anarchists candidly gave voice to their desire to permanently wipe the United States off the face of the earth. Conveying their rejection of President Donald Trump’s proposed construction of a border wall, the protesters repeatedly chanted the war cry: “No Trump, No Wall, No USA at All!”
Because Antifa rejects the legitimacy of America’s very existence, the movement likewise contends, by logical extension, that the people who are entrusted with protecting and preserving the nation’s civil society are illegitimate as well. Thus, it firmly instructs activists to “build a culture of non-cooperation with law enforcement.”
Antifa and its allies exhort their followers to make the United States “ungovernable” by engaging in “mass insurrection,” “mass resistance,” and “all manner of physical violence” against supporters of President Trump, capitalists, and so-called “conservative fascists.”
A Philadelphia-based Antifa cell cell known as the Revolutionary Abolitionist Movement (RAM) openly advocates armed violence against “fascists” and police officers. Toward that end, RAM trains its members and allies by means of workshops bearing titles like “Introduction to Anarchism” and “Our Enemies in Blue.”
Central to RAM’s long-term objective is the forcible theft and redistribution of property. “To begin the revolutionary process,” RAM explains, “goods, land, and tools must be expropriated, or taken away from those who withhold them,” and then must be “shared with those who lack them.”
Andy Ngo — an openly gay, conservative journalist of Vietnamese heritage who is well acquainted with Antifa’s agendas and tactics — said the following in a July 2019 interview:
Their [Antifa’s] stated goal, they’re quite open about it…. [It] is revolution and it’s, in particular, their political ideology is anarcho-communism. So some are more anarchist than others. Some are more communists than others. They believe that the United States is an irredeemable country, literally irredeemable. And the targeting of police as well as border enforcement as well as even the concept of sovereignty is all strategic toward their goal.
So you see, contrary to the mealy-mouthed “analyses” by CNN and The New York Times, Antifa’s positions are not at all “hard to define.” Antifa very openly and very proudly advocates Marxism, anarchism, violent revolution, and the permanent destruction of America. What’s so “hard to define” about that?
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