past caring
The Cathars were right
And on the substantive points?
Beating the Fascists: The authorised history of Anti-Fascist Action
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articul8
Dishonest sociopath
I was answering a question directly put to me by Ayatollah. Joe's already accepted that violence isn't the only way to be genuinely anti-fascist. I'm not making this accusation of RA, but some around AFA and afterwards wanted to keep up street fighting tactics long after they were tactically redundant/counter-productive. This shows that there is the *potential* for the politics to be subordinated to the buzz of the aggro.
love detective
there's no love too small
yes, but don't you find it odd that those who stressed at the time the redundancy of, and the necessity to dispense with, political violence as an effective tactic are often the same ones who are implicitly or explicitly labelled as those who were there just for the buzz of the agro and for fighting in and off itself - this is pretty much the standard liberal lefty revisionist view of things - which of course completely inverts the reality of what happened
love detective
there's no love too small
neither of those two things have any connection to, or bearing on ,the point I made though
past caring
The Cathars were right
So when precisely - in your view - did the street fighting tactics become redundant? Be useful if you could also give reasons as to why.
So the energy around the IWCA projecting appearing to have dissipated (in your view) is a consequence of the fact that those who previously advocated physical violence against the fascists still, in reality, wanted to be involved in that? And their arguments within AFA as to it being essential that the IWCA project was the way to go were nothing more than an elaborate get-up?
What exactly are you trying to say here?
love detective
there's no love too small
there's always that lingering doubt among a certain type about a certain type isn't there - no matter that there is no rational, logical or empirical reasons for it, it seems to constantly emerge and manifest itself in all kinds of ways - the fear of the 'other' as joe put it above
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
Of course there is, this a a banality. There's the potential for all sort of actions or responses to actions to undermine or push to one side the original intentions - labour councillors getting addicted to the little-power buzz their position affords them, academics getting addicted to freezing others out by deliberate and unnecessary use of complex jargon. Pointing out a potential for something to occour doesn't mean too much aside from asking whether it happened or not, if it did then to what extent, and did it drive or inform the organisations actions at the time and the (political) conclusions drawn. Now, have you a suggestion that this was the situation with AFA and now the IWCA? Because you already asked this in an interview and were fairly comprehensively answered, only to come back with it again. Have you come to a conclusion then? If so, then for fucks sake spit it out, instead of this weasleing around the edges of it.
articul8
Dishonest sociopath
At much the same time and for much the same reasons as cited by RA/IWCA. Once the BNP had concluded that building a street fighting force on open fash lines was a)very difficult and b)counter-productive to their electoral fortunes, then they started to put forward their 'analysis' in terms that resonated with some sections of working class communities. This then necessitated a directly political response, and violence against people making a superficially reasonable and peaceable argument became counter-productive since the fash weren't isolated and isolate-able in the way they had formerly been.
I'm saying there appears to be some contradiction between the political logic of the analysis and what sustained a subjective commitment and involvement in a small group previously working with a very different style and pace of operations. There's a nostalgic tone to the book which suggests these were the "good old days"..?
love detective
there's no love too small
there is and was no contradiction between the political logic of the analysis and activity - it was the political logic of the analysis that produced that activity, then and now - activity was the result of and subordinate to the political logic/analysis. You may disagree with the political logic/analysis but you can't claim it's in contradiction with the activity that it subsequently produced/produces
your struggling here because you are grappling around trying to find a way of rationalising your irrational prejudice on this
your struggling here because you are grappling around trying to find a way of rationalising your irrational prejudice on this
articul8
Dishonest sociopath
I'm not struggling, I'm pointing (successfully if I might say so) to a palpable truth - your non-violent exploits aren't sustaining much in the way of active subjective commitment, and hence you're nostalgically reliving the more "exciting" aspects of a previous incarnation. That begs the question of the degree to which the violence was part and parcel of what kept people involved in the first place.
love detective
there's no love too small
you've completely detached yourself from any kind of semblance of logic or rational thought on this one i'm afraid - indeed that is what is required to even make an attempt (however flowed) to rationalise the inherent prejudice here
where is this 'nostalgic reliving of the more exciting aspects of a previous incarnation' actually happening out of interest? where is it manifesting itself? in what form does it do so?
where is this 'nostalgic reliving of the more exciting aspects of a previous incarnation' actually happening out of interest? where is it manifesting itself? in what form does it do so?
past caring
The Cathars were right
Yeah, this thread - all 80 pages of it - is entirely dominated by RA and ex-AFA people recounting old war stories and reliving past glories.
articul8? Incoherent, more like.
articul8? Incoherent, more like.
articul8
Dishonest sociopath
a lot of it is!
bignose1
Searchlight Spoiler
The buzz of running a spy inside the fash...of bugging their meetings..taking pics from the tops of buildings...all the covert stuff....was never appreciated by some elements who took it as some kind of cop out..they never understood the intelligence war more they didnt want to and they deliberately obstructed what people were doing and it was damaging. With some activists there was a certain naievity but generally they viewed it as useful but the old guard were deliberatly hostile...thought that bringing in heavies to lean on people would bring better results..and I will get a shitty reply cos there stubborn cnuts..
Deareg
Well-Known Member
Are you sure that you are not confusing all of this with just not trusting Searchlight?
Good for you then, if true.....and I'm STILL trying to get a handle on your obsessive need to brand the physical force anti fascists who stopped the street thugs of the NF and BNP, etc, as "really" just footy hooligans. Because frankly this position places you with some of the most self-serving and spineless people on the "Left" then, and now. People who denounced the Squaddists as "Thugs" on a Tuesday.. then literally hid behind them when the fascists menaced a papersale the next Saturday....It happened MANY a time I assure you.
bignose1
Searchlight Spoiler
No mate...this was on a local level. I understand the reluctance...but dont forget AFA/RA still had an intel link til just after Waterloo if I remember right. I was pretty much shown the door by Searchlight in 94 for the company I kept and I suppose a little too much independance...my main loyalty was to Manchester and surrounds.
love detective
there's no love too small
people talking about and around a piece of important social history is not reliving anything it's, erm, talking about an important piece of social history
all books about the past are not then an important method of documenting, in a durable format, the social history of the time, but are merely a vehicle to relive the past are they? And by extension the only way to avoid that allegation is not to publish what you yourself admit is an important piece of social & political history?
and none of this has any logical connection to, nor is it a product of this notion that you have that poeple's 'non-violent exploits aren't sustaining much in the way of active subjective commitment' leading them to 'relive the more "exciting" aspects of a previous incarnation'
the book itself took something like ten years from conception to hitting the shelves, so this idea that it's recent publication is somehow connected to the 'dissipation' of energy around the IWCA doesn't make sense from that perspective either
bignose1
Searchlight Spoiler
Dont forget this was around the time of some AFA/RA getting rounded up for 'other' matters...I think a sweep out was considered neccessary and perhaps I came into that category...I had by then done some field work training and operational stuff with some of the new guys SS NL...I never got into the political shenanigans though and most fair minded people consider my anti fascist contribution worthy but then there are others that never will....ah well
Joe Reilly
Well-Known Member
Let's be absolutely clear what we are talking about here. What I said was that it isn't necessary to personally use violence in order to qualify, but it is in my view, absolutely critical that you do politically support those who are willing and able.
As BTF acknowledges certain elements within AFA did reject the Filling the Vacuum analysis. Ironically, the most egregious of that sub set located in Leeds (Searchlight entryists) did so not because they craved the buzz,(individually their reputations were anything but gung ho) but because they wanted anti-fascism as a whole to remain as a buttress to the Labour Party.
That FtV saw Labour as very much part of the problem was what they rejected. And thereafter used the most underhand methods in order to undermine AFA/IWCA project as a whole from without.
At the last general election Hope not Hate spent around £300,000: a reminder if one was needed that he who pays the piper invariably calls the tune.
Finally, for the type of 'anti-fascist' ever suspicious of the motives of physical force anti-fascism (and presumably any other physical force movement) there never would be any march, picket, carnival for them to publicly parade their self-rightousness without the capacity of the latter being willing and capable.
Other than rely on the plod (who tend to step up only when not needed) faced with the fascists unleashed, (I know, you've never had the pleasure) the tactic of choice would be to hide.
TopCat
Putin fanboy
Fucking irritant.
Joe Reilly
Well-Known Member
True. But also revealing. He is certainly more representative of the Left than you or I. It's a reminder how once it passes a certain stage just how easily fascism can take power. He and the likes of Nigel irritable are anti-fascists in name only. Anti-fascists prior to fascists becoming a threat and again after the threat has diminished. Look at how tiny the resistance in France actually was. Would it have been markedly different over here?
articul8
Dishonest sociopath
Nigel Irritable can speak for himself, but I've certainly never attacked the idea that physical confrontation with fascists is sometimes necessary. It doesn't follow that street fighting can't become an end in itself for people who get caught up in it and lose a sense of perspective. Maybe that's a banal and obvious thing to point out. But the idea that the merest hint of critically analysing the implications of your breathless hool-lit means we aren't "proper" anti-fascists is just plain daft.butchersapron
Bring back hanging
articul8 said:
Odd that you never called it breathless Hool-lit in the interview isn't it?
articul8
Dishonest sociopath
The interview wasn't about what my criticisms might or might not have been (in part I was voicing what I knew where standard left-liberal criticisms because I thought it was important to get a response).
I wouldn't say the book was *only* "breathless hool-lit. If it was we wouldn't have thought it worth an interview at all. It is important social history and interesting for its FtV analysis, for its critique of mainstream anti-fascism etc. etc. But that style is one of its less attractive features and suggestive of dangers inherent in that approach (see above).
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
Right, so when you had the chance to do the interview you though for some reason that the responsible thing to do was to was put the middle-class liberal-lefty criticisms - fair enough, you know your mags target audience, but when you get the chance to now put your own views you come out with an even worse version of those liberal-left objections ('breathless hool-lit' - as if you've ever read a hooligan book), and without having the honesty to openly state your case.
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