EDL watch

[juice_terry]

I don't think they did .. the nonsense of overhearing a group of lads saying they'd dressed casually so not to attract attention from other firms, they could overhear what was said by coppers but couldn't hear the speeches. They use a picture from the daily mail of a twat at an EDL march across town, it has taken 9 days to come up with a pile of toot made up of titbits they've read on social media. They spend the whole article sayoing there was nothing suss about this march and then issue warning that it's going to be the next big neo nazi movement.. I call bullshit

 

[Red Sky]

I don't think they did .. the nonsense of overhearing a group of lads saying they'd dressed casually so not to attract attention from other firms, they could overhear what was said by coppers but couldn't hear the speeches. They use a picture from the daily mail of a twat at an EDL march across town, it has taken 9 days to come up with a pile of toot made up of titbits they've read on social media. They spend the whole article sayoing there was nothing suss about this march and then issue warning that it's going to be the next big neo nazi movement.. I call bullshit

Not sure why they used that photo. It undermines what they're saying. But I don't think they talk about neo nazis at all.

 

[Red Sky]

I'm not too keen on all the self congratulatory "we were right" stuff. I'm not sure anyone suggested they were wrong.

 

[butchersapron]

Even being right is wrong now.

 

[juice_terry]

Edited I may have been mistaken re rewrite

 

[Arbeter Fraynd]

I don't think they did .. .. I call bullshit

wow, the desperate desire of some people on here to attack or ridicule anything post-Red Action antifascists do can be pretty bizarre... for what its worth, you're wrong

 

[19force8]

How so? I think they went on the march as reported.

Like as not, but maybe a bit of wishful thinking too:

From our standpoint, the tactic of non-confrontation and being on hand and in numbers close by to react to any potential...

More detail and analysis here:

‘Football Lads Alliance’—the threat of a new racist movement on the streets

 

[ddraig]

another view, not read yet
Who are the Football Lads Alliance (FLA)? - Stand Up To Racism

Toni Bugle spoke on 24 June. She ran as a candidate for the English Democrats, (ex-Nazi British National Party) in 2016. She is one of the organisers of Mothers Against Radical Islam, an organisation exposed by the Daily Mirror on 15 April 2017 as linked to fascist groups. She is also linked to the Nazi English Defence League.

Gerry Farr, one of the admins on the FLA facebook page seems to be a big fan of ex EDL leader Tommy Robinson, a man who built a career on targeting Muslims and stirring up hatred against them.

 

[The39thStep]

After youve read it tell us what you think

 

[The39thStep]

Like as not, but maybe a bit of wishful thinking too:

More detail and analysis here:

‘Football Lads Alliance’—the threat of a new racist movement on the streets

Neither detailed or analytical.Just a parotting of the SWP line

 

[19force8]

Neither detailed or analytical.Just a parotting of the SWP line

Well let me see, it names several of the organisers and speakers, looks briefly at their histories and quotes them, makes comparison between the FLA and the EDL and offers suggestions for countering them.

Then again, opposing them isn't what you're about so "parroting the SWP line" it is.

 

[Red Sky]

The FLA has so far trodden a different path to the EDL. That started as a localised conflict in Luton as a direct backlash against a jihadist demo, itself called against the celebratory return of the local regiment from Iraq. The first thing they did after that was in Birmingham which immediately turned into a punch up with local youth. The next was Manchester, about a month later,again a fight/stand off in Picadilly Gardens this time with a mostly UAF crowd. The demos came thick and fast then and the movement grew rapidly often marching in Asian or Muslim areas. FLA isn't planning anything (so far) till October. Their march route was through a pretty non controversial part of central London.

 

[19force8]

The FLA has so far trodden a different path to the EDL. That started as a localised conflict in Luton as a direct backlash against a jihadist demo, itself called against the celebratory return of the local regiment from Iraq. The first thing they did after that was in Birmingham which immediately turned into a punch up with local youth. The next was Manchester, about a month later,again a fight/stand off in Picadilly Gardens this time with a mostly UAF crowd. The demos came thick and fast then and the movement grew rapidly often marching in Asian or Muslim areas. FLA isn't planning anything (so far) till October. Their march route was through a pretty non controversial part of central London.

I agree, at the moment they don't look like EDL MkII. That doesn't mean they're a positive development. We need to draw comparisons in order to decide how to combat what they represent. We have to know how they differ as well as what they have in common.

 

[Pickman's model]

I agree, at the moment they don't look like EDL MkII. That doesn't mean they're a positive development. We need to draw comparisons in order to decide how to combat what they represent. We have to know how they differ as well as what they have in common.

if i was planning an edl mk ii then i wouldn't start it off with big rucks but build up to them. one problem the edl had was that whenever they tried to make out they weren't racist etc someone would come out of the woodwork with something very racist. and apart from yaxley-lennon, late of the bnp, you spotted people out of the '80s nf, people who attended blood & honour gigs etc on the marches. rather than start off with a scrap which would cause people i wanted to recruit to have an early opportunity to decide against involvement, i would build things up gently so that any scrap came at a time i chose and from a position of strength. this isn't to say the fla is the edl mk ii. but it would be foolish to think that any street organisation would appear like the edl, that they wouldn't have learnt from the mistakes of that nefandous organisation.

 

[19force8]

if i was planning an edl mk ii then i wouldn't start it off with big rucks but build up to them. one problem the edl had was that whenever they tried to make out they weren't racist etc someone would come out of the woodwork with something very racist. and apart from yaxley-lennon, late of the bnp, you spotted people out of the '80s nf, people who attended blood & honour gigs etc on the marches. rather than start off with a scrap which would cause people i wanted to recruit to have an early opportunity to decide against involvement, i would build things up gently so that any scrap came at a time i chose and from a position of strength. this isn't to say the fla is the edl mk ii. but it would be foolish to think that any street organisation would appear like the edl, that they wouldn't have learnt from the mistakes of that nefandous organisation.

Yeah, but then you're a cunning, nefandous geezer who can think his way out of a paper bag.

 

[Pickman's model]

Yeah, but then you're a cunning, nefandous geezer who can think his way out of a paper bag.

let's not go down the route of saying hoolies are thick as pigshit or similar. there's often a feeling that they're lacking upstairs: but i think we ought to face up to the fact that there are some able people on the right. there are, yes, a lot of people who aren't so smart. people who draw swastikas on buses in their own blood aren't really doing themselves any favours. but the opposition not universally like that.

 

[19force8]

let's not go down the route of saying hoolies are thick as pigshit or similar.

Not all of them just enough so that if you get a couple of thousand together and in drink the cunning plan is likely to go out the window sooner rather than later.

 

[Pickman's model]

Not all of them just enough so that if you get a couple of thousand together and in drink the cunning plan is likely to go out the window sooner rather than later.

let's wait and see, eh, i wouldn't be so confident: although i would like to be proved wrong.

 

[Nice one]

The FLA has so far trodden a different path to the EDL. That started as a localised conflict in Luton as a direct backlash against a jihadist demo, itself called against the celebratory return of the local regiment from Iraq. The first thing they did after that was in Birmingham which immediately turned into a punch up with local youth. The next was Manchester, about a month later,again a fight/stand off in Picadilly Gardens this time with a mostly UAF crowd. The demos came thick and fast then and the movement grew rapidly often marching in Asian or Muslim areas. FLA isn't planning anything (so far) till October. Their march route was through a pretty non controversial part of central London.

there were two demos in birmingham before manchester. the first they unloaded their placards from the back of their cars without much interuption, there were a few black faces and placards that read 'black and white unite'. Down the other end the swp had their rally on the main shopping thoroughfare shouting to the local mostly asian and black youth that the NAZIBNP were in town. They even brought their anti-BNP placards. The local asian lads stormed up the precinct and after an uneasy stand-off, edl genuinely bewildered then they got ran all over town. (I think this is where martin smith earned his nickname the running man).

The second Birmingham demo the edl were much more prepared and up for a fight and a lot of the local youth stayed in the background which meant the anti-fascists were very exposed. A lot of cat and mouse, due mainly to heavy police presense, ending in full-on if fleeting confrontations.

The manchester demo was the clincher. Despite the fact there was a large anti-fascist presence - pretty much made up exclusively of lefty/trade union/anarchist types, despite the fact the edl were almost instantly kettled and took battering from police in piccadilly gardens - subduing tactics, they were allowed to march through the backstreets unhindered happily chanting up to the top of shudehill/corporation street where their buses were waiting for them.

I think that was the moment they saw themselves as serious business.

 

[Red Sky]

there were two demos in birmingham before manchester. the first they unloaded their placards from the back of their cars without much interuption, there were a few black faces and placards that read 'black and white unite'. Down the other end the swp had their rally on the main shopping thoroughfare shouting to the local mostly asian and black youth that the NAZIBNP were in town. They even brought their anti-BNP placards. The local asian lads stormed up the precinct and after an uneasy stand-off, edl genuinely bewildered then they got ran all over town. (I think this is where martin smith earned his nickname the running man).

The second Birmingham demo the edl were much more prepared and up for a fight and a lot of the local youth stayed away which meant the anti-fascists were very exposed. A lot of cat and mouse, due mainly to heavy police presense, ending in full-on if fleeting confrontations.

The manchester demo was the clincher. Despite the fact there was a large anti-fascist presence - pretty much made up exclusively of lefty/trade union/anarchist types, despite the fact the edl were almost instantly kettled and took battering from police in piccadilly gardens - subduing tactics, they were allowed to march through the backstreets unhindered happily chanting up to the top of shudehill/corporation street where their buses were waiting for them.

I think that was the moment they saw themselves as serious business.

I don't remember the EDL being kettled immediately in Picadilly Gardens, there were plenty roaming around the outskirts, but yes I think you might be right in thinking that that's when they coalesced as a mob.

 

[Red Sky]

Not all of them just enough so that if you get a couple of thousand together and in drink the cunning plan is likely to go out the window sooner rather than later.

Britain First are taking things down the peaceful and disciplined route, hoping to build up numbers.

 

[Anudder Oik]

Searchlight has also joined the chorus of panic with this analysis (linked below) of how the far right is relaunching itself through FLA, despite the fact they were uninvited. What it fails to do, like the SWP and the other article linked above, is understand that ordinary people are much more concerned about islamic terrorism than one off attacks by far righters, so not really pushing the murder of a labour MP a year after the event and with three successive islamic attacks in a row with many victims is not tantamount to , well, nazism.

The football lads thing has quite obviously been motivated by the heroic defence put up by the Millwall fan who took on the three jihadists in Borough market, a selfless act which saved lives and should be recognized, as should that of the spanish banker who died trying to stop that same attack.

I think Searchlight and SWP are panic mongering and out of touch with the football crowd. Maybe they just don't have anything else to write about these days? The standuptoracism article, which repeats the mantra that "protests against extremism are an attack on all muslims, describes the EDL as a nazi organization, when techincally...

People need to stop equating real concerns with an agenda. By that I mean FLA and people in general not EDL.

A second warning for antifascists: thousands on the streets of London as far right reorganises

 

[Red Sky]

[QUOTE="Anudder Oik, post: 15137951, member:

A second warning for antifascists: thousands on the streets of London as far right reorganises[/QUOTE]

This is pretty hysterical and if you accept the premise that this a far right street movement pretty demoralising (These lads are good at fighting and organise under the radar).

It exposes itself by describing the "Pie & Mash squad" as a hard core Nazi firm. In reality they're about a dozen berks, mostly from Portsmouth who've been turned over again and again.

 

[mather]

I think Searchlight and SWP are panic mongering and out of touch with the football crowd.

First off Searchlight have links with the state and the spooks and have grassed up people on the left as well, so fuck em they are not to be trusted.

As for the SWP, they are not only out of touch with football fans but working class people in general, it is a fucking joke that they even have 'Workers' in their party name. They are a party led by middle class academic types who use their membership base of mostly uni students to do all their legwork while they cynically insert themselves into other people's struggles so they can either dominate those struggles (usually fucking it up in the process) or simply sponge off them so they can gain a few more naive new recruits.

 

[mather]

And that is before you even get onto the fact they had a rape scandal they tried to cover up and protecting the accused rapist and their whole see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil approach to Islamists, something they have been doing since they backed the Islamist terrorists in Afghanistan during the 80's against the Soviets.

 

[19force8]

First off Searchlight have links with the state and the spooks and have grassed up people on the left as well, so fuck em they are not to be trusted.

As for the SWP, they are not only out of touch with football fans but working class people in general, it is a fucking joke that they even have 'Workers' in their party name. They are a party led by middle class academic types who use their membership base of mostly uni students to do all their legwork while they cynically insert themselves into other people's struggles so they can either dominate those struggles (usually fucking it up in the process) or simply sponge off them so they can gain a few more naive new recruits.

You are full of shit.

It should be obvious to anyone familiar with the SWP who reads the Searchlight article that you know fuck all about them. You just trot out a bunch of stale, sectarian insults as if they were credentials for your own imagined superiority.

"The SWP are out of touch with football fans" - and you know this how? Because it doesn't fit your stereotype of "uni students?" Give me a break! Besides they weren't "fans" they were "firms." Surely you know the difference.

"The SWP are out of touch with working class people" - because they're all students and can't relate to football I suppose.

"The SWP are lead by middle class intellectuals" - obviously because that's what students become, and working class people have no use for theory, or even Marxism come to that.

"The SWP are mostly uni students" - where have you been for the last four years? If anything, I'd say the SP has overtaken them in the student stakes [which IME is saying something]. At a guess and from limited local and demo/Marxism experience I'd put their average age somewhere in the 40's.

As for the "dominating and fucking up" campaigns trope, that's just weak. If it were true they wouldn't routinely get campaigners from such as Hillsborough, Orgreave, Bradford 12, Rotherham 12, and many others to speak at events like Marxism. This happens because over many years they've provided consistent support and assistance, not because they fuck things up. But if what you say is true surely we'd see far more successful "people's struggles" in the vast areas where they have no presence. So do we?

And recruiting as a crime? Oh deary me how these political parties keep trying to grow by getting more members. Do grow up.

 

[ddraig]

oh dear! the cult is strong in this one!

 

[ddraig]

fuck the swp, then and now
they were the same when i was in uni in the 90's, co opting and sucking life out of causes and movements, and "building", still the same shit

 

[19force8]

oh dear! the cult is strong in this one!

No, I'm a member of the Labour Party.

I get fed up with lazy people talking out of their arses about the SWP just because it's easy to run out the usual streotypes without questioning them.

 

[19force8]

fuck the swp, then and now
they were the same when i was in uni in the 90's, co opting and sucking life out of causes and movements, and "building", still the same shit

I've offered an answer to that - do we see many more successful campaigns where they aren't?