Reminder to US activists and bloggers in these fucked up times:
Canada, Australia, Europe, etc. all have their own fascists trying to take power right now. Pretty much all of them are just as terriffying as Trump. At the same time we’re got a lot of our own horrible government-imposed shit already going on. Please do NOT put us forward as examples of nice progressive countries with great health care and human rights. It’s bullshit and it makes it really difficult for us to draw attention to our own very real problems.
Reminder to
Europeans, Canadians, etc
in these fucked up times:
Don’t let the US-centrism of the online world get to you. Don’t use Trump as an excuse to convince yourself that things are not so bad here. Don’t close your eyes to the dangers of fascism and capitalism in your own country. Just because your own home grown flavor of fascism doesn’t deny climate change or doesn’t focus on banning abortion doesn’t mean they’re not just as brutal and just as dangerous.
ausfailure’s clinical, bureaucratic, impersonal – but incremental – fascism is pretty fucking terrifying, tbh.
It might be helpful to make a list of every countries’ most prominent fascists to get an idea of the many ways it manifests. The raving baffoon, the purity obsessed preacher, bureaucratic clinical system of slow death, the islamophobes on a crusade, etc.
Fascism in the Netherlands is the
islamophobes on a crusade: focussed on “all foreigners are bad, all muslims are terrorists and all borders need to be closed or we will lose our culture” bullshit. It’s extremely cliche and people still fucking fall for it.
Each country has multiple of these movements and each of these movements warrants a long analysis on how it works and how to fight it, but it might be good to make an overview so people can focus from there. .
In Greece it’s mainly patriotism. Golden Dawn’s symbol is an ancient greek decorative pattern and they’ve tried to pass off their nazi salutes as ancient greek ones. They use immigrants as scapegoats and claim they’re threatening our racial purity (which we have apparently. news to me). They give people someone to blame for today’s awful situation and promise they can fix it, and return the country to an idealised past. They’ve also organised charity events that excluded immigrants and other stuff like that to boost their “true friend of the people” narrative.
In Spain the alt right discourse is: “lets prioritize Spanish people before foreigners” and “lets deport those who come from África through the Mediterranean”, as well as a revival of our own fascist dictator, franco, when dealing with the nationalism and independentism from some parts of the country. After the events this fall (Catalonia making an illegal referendum and saying they would declare independence), there was a lot of people coming out with Spanish flags, but some showed up with the flag of franco’s regime. Most includes reactions when confronted with anti racism, feminism or pro lgtb+ activism.
It’s been a while since this post, so little update on the Netherlands: while we’ve still got the fascist islamophobes here we’ve seen the rise to popularity of the fascist pseudo-intellectuals. These are highly educated middle- and upperclass fascists who claim to reject populism and who seem polished and polite, but who will politely suggest that maybe we need to have a new scientific debate about whether intelligence is tied to race. Make no mistake, these are nazis and they’re dangerous.
The Danish brand is very similar to the Dutch, in that it’s focused on immigrantion and Islam. They’re trying to move all asylum-seeking out of the country to “Danish-run centers” in iirc northern Africa; and that’s just the politicians in our parliament.
Our Nazis are (as nazis are want to be) obsessed with ethnic identity. Some (mis)use Norse Mythology and runes and shit to tie that together (to the point that the one recognised asatru organization has become fully völkisch), others are ~intellectuals~ like the ones described in reference to the Netherlands.
It helps to become farmiliar with different far-right movements so you can identify your own variety quickly. Some examples:
– Identitarians: do not talk about race and try to avoid symbols and language that directly reveils them as fascists. Claim ‘our culture’ or ‘our identity’ is being treatened by Muslims, immigrants, etc. Often try to take advantage of recent events and claim to care about women’s rights or lgbt rights when it suits them to attack Islam that way.
– Classic fascists: do talk about race openly, use original nazi symbols (often SS runes). Argue with each over whether Mussolini or Hitler was the true visionary. Often collect WW2 memorabilia. Often educated types. Rarely respond to current events.
– Boneheads: fit the neonazi stereotype, aggressively macho, shaved head and combatboot types, unite around a music scene or sports team, not big on theory.
– Alt-Right: use popular culture and online organising. Always claim to be joking or playing devils advocate. Often start out with identitarian talking points and bring up race once they have normalized their earlier opinions. Combo of intellectuals and trolls.
Knowing which group you’re dealing with helps you predict what they’ll do. Identitarians and Alt-right tend to try to play it legal, Boneheads tend to go looking for fights. Identitarians avoid Boneheads but may work with Alt-Right and there is an overlap in members between the two. Classic fascists feel superior to boneheads but may strategically ally with them sometimes. Most seek out international cooperation with groups of their own movement. Etc etc.
QueerAnarchism 