Radical Dance Faction (RDF) come out as pro fascist

[souljacker]

What a prick. And to be fair, with hindsight...

 

[mojo pixy]

He seems OK with being in league with the devil as a defence against criticism. IDK maybe he's just being more kind of poetical political

 

[weepiper]

What a boring narcissist.

 

[zedr]

Maybe someone should contact the venue and ask them

looks like the gig was on Saturday. have let the promoter know tho.

 

[newme]

No idea as not heard of them but happy to be proved wrong, guess I hear about the bad ones.

Just realised they actually were the first CD I bought, fucks sake.

 

[hitmouse]

His latest post from 2 days ago -


On my mind lots . I’ve taken down or rather sent to archive (didn’t get offered delete) two posts .they were enabling a lynch mob to get itself formed and whipped up . I left them longer perhaps than I should have . Believing in free speech as strongly as I do I thought no let them roll , engage honestly to the best of your ability ; but the time it consumed , I just don’t have it . After all the anti fascist events I’ve attended over the years , starting before most of you were in nappies but with with this little crew it all counted for nothing . I’m not going to labour it. I , don’t have the time but there were 3 particularly wanted or rather want to bring it on me . The thing that really mattered to me though was the people who stepped up to defend me , knowing me to be a good human being , warmed my heart . I love you , thank you and am blessed to have you in my corner . You know who you are . Thank you . Someone who I respect who advised me to remove the posts so I could move on also suggested I block comments to this post to help further stifle this hate manifesting any more . It’s my page, he said, I can have who I like coming on it or not . But I’m not going to block comments , free speech after all . I like debate , I haven’t been trained at it but I like it . I’ll finish with a simile , if that’s the right word cos one of these haters kept pointing, jabbing more like, at background and where schooled, at me and others. He didn’t go exclusive on me, Think that’s a simile peasant, I can see his brain spewing . But I of course digress, , so the simile. I think that fire is a very useful thing . I suspect the devil would agree with me . Am I now in league with the devil?….i’ll add a picture of a beautiful friendship that’s developing and post …are you dancing at the back , I’ll be looking out at Endorset today and see who’s doing just that….

Fuck me, I reckon we should get likesfish or someone to give him some training on how to write a clear and easy-to-read post.

 

[BassJunkie]

It looks like he's become a Surplus Person



sorry.

 

[bellaozzydog]

It looks like he's become a Surplus Person



sorry.

Not what the order wants?

 

[planetgeli]

An excellent band who got some grief over the Gaddafi musical, iirc, was it seen by some as being favourable to the beloved oddball dictator?

That's the only controversy can (badly) remember...

The grief they got was because it was largely terribly done. Chandrasonic was my housemate at university. Extremely talented guitarist with a deep political knowledge. A fascination (but nothing else) with Gaddafi. And knew nothing about opera. It was shit but it definitely wasn't favourable to Gaddafi. It showed how he was helped created by oil and western powers, slammed by the same people, and then feted once more by Blair shortly before he was offed.

It was shit, but definitely no paean to Gaddafi.

 

[Shippou-Sensei]

It looks like he's become a Surplus Person



sorry.

Radical Surplus Faction

 

[krtek a houby]

The grief they got was because it was largely terribly done. Chandrasonic was my housemate at university. Extremely talented guitarist with a deep political knowledge. A fascination (but nothing else) with Gaddafi. And knew nothing about opera. It was shit but it definitely wasn't favourable to Gaddafi. It showed how he was helped created by oil and western powers, slammed by the same people, and then feted once more by Blair shortly before he was offed.

It was shit, but definitely no paean to Gaddafi.

Cheers, that sounds more like it.

 

[pointless_walks]

It does make for a slightly confused read. The lynch mob comment

 

[krtek a houby]

 

[pointless_walks]

I think this post title is a little over the top tbh. The comments were made by Chris Bowsher alone and should not be attributed to the whole band. It's a bit like blaming The Fall for a Mark E Smith bar brawl. I think it's paramount Bowsher clarifies his position after what he's said (preferably with any attached comments' section blocked) before this gets worse for him. He did profess to be poorly-informed about Robinson/Yaxley-Lennon when he made the remarks, but as for the rest of what he said, well yes, he's clearly shown a susceptibility to far-right talking points via ye olde algorithms this past fortnight, hasn't he. Does that make the guy a racist though? Looking at his history of anti-fascist activism I think not.. At worst, his comments have been judged by a significant number of onlookers as 'fascist-apologist' but the way he has pushed back - attacking the messengers in many cases - hasn't helped him at all, because the vast majority of them flagged those words up in good faith as fans and/or friends of the band, but instead of taking their sentiments on board with good faith himself, he seems to have resorted to appealing to any other friends & allies who will listen to come back with character references, credentials and such, which sadly only looks a little desperate, especially coupled with describing the former as resembling a "lynch mob"..."the real fascists", etc.

RDF have already been pulled off the bill by at least one summer festival (Convoy Cabaret - Naughty Corner Festival). What can be salvaged depends on a] his ability to take a long hard look in the mirror and b] the advice he chooses to take - or discard - from here on in.

 

[RevolutionSound]

Maybe the band should publish a statement disowning Bowsher's comments.

Or Bowsher could publish a statement owning what he said and apologising.

 

[pointless_walks]

Maybe the band should publish a statement disowning Bowsher's comments.

Or Bowsher could publish a statement owning what he said and apologising.

I think at least one band member (backing singer) stated support of his characterisation of all this, which is understandable, but we'll see. True friends sometimes have to tell you what you need to rather than want to hear. The other problematic development was that, early on, Bowsher did accept that he'd made a mistake, but sadly he then seemed to push back, perhaps irked by wider criticism, kinda knee-jerk style. Sad to have seen it unravel in that way it only can on social media. So yeah, if he does publish a statement, I hope he seeks advice from the right person/people in his circle. I wish him the very best, having seen too many good people end up flailing at the bottom of a whirlpool of their own making thanks to bad faith operators taking advantage of what starts out as a misunderstanding or simply lack of knowledge in a contentious area shall we say. Thankfully Chris isn't a Twitter/Xer, that place is the worst.

 

[pointless_walks]

I think at least one band member (backing singer) stated support of his characterisation of all this, which is understandable, but we'll see. True friends sometimes have to tell you what you need to rather than want to hear. The other problematic development was that, early on, Bowsher did accept that he'd made a mistake, but sadly he then seemed to push back, perhaps irked by wider criticism, kinda knee-jerk style. Sad to have seen it unravel in that way it only can on social media. So yeah, if he does publish a statement, I hope he seeks advice from the right person/people in his circle. I wish him the very best, having seen too many good people end up flailing at the bottom of a whirlpool of their own making thanks to bad faith operators taking advantage of what starts out as a misunderstanding or simply lack of knowledge in a contentious area shall we say. Thankfully Chris isn't a Twitter/Xer, that place is the worst.

I edited my original comment btw; it's only been - to my knowledge - the one promoter to have dropped RDF from a bill, 'Convoy Cabaret' being one stage at Naughty Corner Festival rather than separate events. Hope it stops there, pending that statement.

 

[ska invita]

bad faith operators taking advantage of what starts out as a misunderstanding or simply lack of knowledge in a contentious area shall we say.

reread his posts....you are being way too generous...this is not a "misunderstanding" or "simply" anything other than defending, excusing and whitewashing violent racists

you're shifting the blame on supposed "bad faith actors" - theres only one person to blame here, and it the one making out Tommy Robinson to be a persecuted saint.


"just a little hot headed sometimes"

 

[Pickman's model]

It's really disappointing to see this - back 12, 14 years ago rdf played a benefit for antifa but clearly bowsher's gone down some rabbit hole in the meantime, likely during the pandemic.

 

[Sir Belchalot]

I edited my original comment btw; it's only been - to my knowledge - the one promoter to have dropped RDF from a bill, 'Convoy Cabaret' being one stage at Naughty Corner Festival rather than separate events. Hope it stops there, pending that statement.

Naughty Corner festival is organised by Convoy Cabaret. They do stages at other festivals which they do not organise themselves.

 

[danny la rouge]

It's really disappointing to see this - back 12, 14 years ago rdf played a benefit for antifa but clearly bowsher's gone down some rabbit hole in the meantime, likely during the pandemic.

It’s alarming how much that happened.

 

[RevolutionSound]

Bowsher has made other posts that appear to be of the anti vax/covid was a conspiracy type thinking. Unfortunately quite a lot of people from that scene (convoy/traveller/festival) have gone down that rabbit hole. It's only a short distance from there to the far right.

 

[pointless_walks]

Naughty Corner festival is organised by Convoy Cabaret. They do stages at other festivals which they do not organise themselves.

Gotcha. So CC dropped them from that bill.

 

[pointless_walks]

Bowsher's main complaint - I think - is the fact he lost control of his own narrative, and the safety and care of his own fanbase all of a sudden depends upon whether they're 'on-side' or not...which has unsurprisingly pissed off quite a few. I used to go to their gigs way back c.1982 when they were Military Surplus, and attended a recent-ish one which was a stonker. RDF have always had something special. Great band.

 

[pointless_walks]

reread his posts....you are being way too generous...this is not a "misunderstanding" or "simply" anything other than defending, excusing and whitewashing violent racists

you're shifting the blame on supposed "bad faith actors" - theres only one person to blame here, and it the one making out Tommy Robinson to be a persecuted saint.


"just a little hot headed sometimes"

I see what you're saying. What I meant by "bad faith actors" is people out there who would love to drag someone like Chris Bowsher further down some ugly rabbit-hole when perhaps his friends/supporters can still catch him by the scruff of the neck before that happens. I'm certainly not blaming anyone else though; he's got to own it now.

 

[belboid]

It would not be that surprising that someone who considered themselves anti-fascist might still have some racist views, hardly the first time its happened. Islamophobia is absolutely rife and some can hide behind a pseudo-right on condemnation of it while actually just reinforcing its crude racism.

Fuck Bowsher. And fuck the rest of the band if they defend him.

 

[skyscraper101]

It’s alarming how much that happened.

Indeed. Dee Fearon from Baby D went down a massive hole during covid and continues to post dodgy stuff about vaccines. Ian Brown turned into a bit of a knobber over it too, though that was probably less surprising.

 

[PTK]

I have never heard of this man and his band. I just looked up “Landing Party” on Youtube, and I quite liked it.

It seems to me that too often political movements do not do enough education. It is assumed that people are more politically clued-in than they are.

 

[krtek a houby]

Clearly the opinion of londonkid is required

 

[zedr]

It would not be that surprising that someone who considered themselves anti-fascist might still have some racist views, hardly the first time its happened. Islamophobia is absolutely rife and some can hide behind a pseudo-right on condemnation of it while actually just reinforcing its crude racism.

Fuck Bowsher. And fuck the rest of the band if they defend him.

Definitely. Had a few conversations recently with people involved in antifascism in the 70s/80s who are now swayed by Islamophobic rhetoric. They have claimed that its not inconsistent to be critical of Islam and to be antifascist because Islam an inherently conservative religion. Now, obviously that's bollocks, but it can be quite hard to counter because its politics based on vibes not reality.