Antifa and Free Speech

[Thirsty Crow]

I see what you mean - I was thinking of public gatherings and an individual's rights to express an opinion. I agree that, in a worker-controlled society, pro-fascist and pro-capitalist gatherings should be closely monitored for outside (reactionary) influence. However, I also consider suppressing an individual for his expressing his/her own opinions to be entirely unacceptable.

Two things:

1) I don't see why there would be a blanket ban on expressing certain kinds of opinions outside situations of immediate political character (I would most certainly advocate a ban on any kind of pro-capitalist political organization) as was that hypothetical example of a guy talking to his neighbours or co-workers.

2) However, I do think that an immediate reaction, with unpleasant consequences, is to be expected and I is not to be discouraged by means of coercion. This ties in to what you brought up in the final paragraph of your post so I'll elaborate on it there. More or less the same goes for gatherings of more of a spontaneous nature, but organized opposition to workers' power is to be fought by almost all means necessary, and that includes, as I've said, political organizing of any kind

It goes without saying that violence against the worker's society should be met with violence and any organizations that participate in it should be banned, no exceptions.

I would go further than this and say that any opposition that claims peaceful means is in fact employing pacifist rhetoric as an ideological tool and is not to be trusted.

In other words, what I believe is this: A man should be allowed to write a song with a pro-nazi slant and submit it to a radio station. But a real socialist state - one where there's democratic control over the radio stations - would never play that song. If it would, then something is obviously wrong with the state's socialist character.

That's a nice example ushering in the question of social ostracism which was touched upon above.
I also agree with the main thrust of the argument, that workers' in charge of the service/production in question should be empowered to deal with such issues as they see fit, with proper responsibility to the wider community.

[DarkPast]

Alright. I find myself mostly in agreement with you, except for one thing. Let me ask you a simple question: Would you feel it justified to use force against a strictly non-violent opposition group?

[Anarchist Skinhead]

probably not, but i cant see what sort of opposition would be "strictly non violent".

[Vanguard1917]

The 92 fatalities in Norway are empirical proof of what happens when you give political margin to these scum.

No, the killing spree of a lone maniac in Norway is not proof that we need further restrictions on free speech and democratic rights.

There's a lot of macho muscle-flexing in this thread, but, ironically, what most of it is motivated by is a pathetic irrational fear of irrelevant groups on the far-right and a breathtakingly cowardly readiness to hide beneath the skirt of the bourgeois state by condoning it having even greater powers to police political life in order to protect us from a few evil skinheads in extremely marginal sections of rightwing politics.

For Marxists, it's definitely not the correct position to call for or ignore bourgeois censorship against the far right, because we know that such state powers will ultimately be used against socialists. And while physical force by socialists against the far-right is an entirely legitimate and correct tactic under certain circumstances, as is 'no platform' in some situations, such tactics are not abstract laws or sacred principles. Debate is also an entirely legitimate tactic under certain circumstances. Why on earth should an intelligent socialist be afraid of entering into a debate with a member of the BNP if challenged to do so? When UAF's Weyman Bennett refused to tear apart (assuming he was capable of doing so) a BNP leader's arguments on a political radio show, making the old 'no platform' excuse for his refusal, deciding to make a mockery of himself rather the donut on the other side, and shouting 'Turn the BNP into HMP' (i.e. imprison the BNP in Her Majesty's Prisons), how did that make the 'anti-fascist' activist come across to the public? Favourably?

[Sasha]

i dont know about other groups but we @ AFA never call for state intervention.
yes we inform the state about the finer points of their fascist problem, and yes we use the then obvious failure/unwillingnes of the state to protect the community as propaganda when we do go on the offensive.
but it should be cristal clear that imho when people call on this forum for action against the fash you are meant to understand this as an call for leftist/communual action not state/bourgeois action.
while we dont care when the state arrests fash we dont call for it, we call for their demo's ect getting done over by us, not the cops.

[Dogs On Acid]

People who oppose freedom don't deserve freedom.

It's the ultimate oxymoron.

[ColonelCossack]

freedom isn't freedom if it compromises the freedom of others- the internationale hits the nail on the head when it says, "Freedom is merely privilege extended, unless enjoyed by one and all".

[noble brown]

Look I've been this king on this a little. Its occurred to me that I want freedom because it should be mine, a priori. It belongs to all of us in all aspects. The only way you can restrict someones freedom is if they ve entered into an exPlicit social contract. At least that's the ideal.

More practically though the current social structure allows for easy manipulation of great swaths of the population. I'm not worried bout the odd little fascist to stupid to think critically about what he's saying but I'm worried about the fascist that control the media, schools and our general social enviroment. This is the shit that's got to be stopped bY any means necessary. U can call it what you want; restricting someonesfreedom or doing freeing the ppl.