Split Thread Are Antifa and violent leftists the cause of everything wrong in America?

[Opcode]

This is the sort of garbage argument Christians love to use regarding atheists too. We see Christians volunteering/ donating/ etc all the time but not atheists. Yeah because those Christians groups are specifically doing it under that banner and promoting themselves and their organizing. Atheists volunteer too but they largely just do it, rather than as an atheist group while promoting that group.

Christians don't just volunteer at the local soup kitchen. They create the soup kitchen. What's more, they go into the most forbidding, hostile places in the world and set up hospitals to render aid to people who nobody else cares for.

In the same vein antifa is largely only going out under the antifa label to disrupt fascists and their agenda.

Prove that the people that Antifa (which I'm assured doesn't exist) attacks are fascists, and not just people who Antifa (which I'm assured doesn't exist) hate.

Why the ◊◊◊◊ would people with anti fascist ideology print matching t-shirts and volunteer at a food bank?

Maybe because there is more to life than just rioting.

Their good deeds are the pushback they give against fascism.

Prove they are doing anything about fascism.

But I suppose those who support fascism world certainly have a hard time seeing the good they do.

It's questionable that they are doing any good. They are just thugs.

 

[Opcode]

A small remnant of the anarchists that initially arose in Portland during the protests against the WTO.

It's hardly a movement.

Lots of cities have similar groups. That would be a movement.

 

[Opcode]

This reminds me a lot of "debating" forum troll 16.5 back in the day, when he would argue tooth and nail that atheism was a religion because somewhere on a college campus someone tried to start an "atheist get-together/group." The mere existence of one single flyer advertising the first (and only) meeting anywhere was used as proof by him that atheists get together under the banner of atheism to practice atheism just like Christians get together as a church to practice worshipping their God.

That sounds like Unitarianism. However, I saw an atheist student organization advertised on the school's bulletin board at a junior college. I knew the professor who sponsored it.

 

[Opcode]

Of course, as has been pointed out already in this thread, there were destructive riots some years ago following protests, but the thing about protestors is that they generally do not, with very few exceptions, consider themselves to be the bad guys or intend to riot. Rioting is what you get when you police a protest wrongly.

Doesn't matter what the protest is about, BLM or Jan 6th or whatever. It's just people being people, and crowd control 101.

Protesters believe they are in the right. They are exercising what they see as their moral right to stand up for what is right and good and is being ignored or trampled down. You may or may not have ever been on a protest but I would invite you seriously to imagine what sort of issue could make you actually do so. You would be doing it because it was the moral thing to do and you would be ashamed not to join.

Policing a protest goes wrong if the police seem to be interfering with the crowd's lawful, moral right to protest peacefully. If the crowd sees what looks like their moral rights being oppressed they are going to be outraged and defiant. Doesn't matter if some stupid jerk on one or other side "started it", the police need to be the disciplined professionals who know about de-escalation and not the bullies who wade in and break heads to stamp their authority on everything. If the police wade in, some people will panic and run away, others will stand and push back. Just people being people.

The unfortunate extra contribution this time is that it's not just the police on the side of the authorities. It's some less professional and less trained and less disciplined folk too. What could possibly go wrong?

One of the complaints made by the opposition to Antifa was that the police often ignored Antifa when it misbehaved. Quite often, the police either had stand-down orders or actually left the area if Antifa had the upper hand.

 

[Opcode]

That was done by bogaloo boys pretending to be antifa, see the convictions. But you just love a false flag I see.

No Boogaloo Bois were convicted in Portland.

 

[Opcode]

What a remarkably dishonest way of spinning things. By that blinkered logic, every single No-Kings protest around America was only protesting against a King of that particular city.

One would hope that protesters would not cause $4 million in property damage to a city that is innocent of the cause of the protest. One would hope that protesters would not set fire to whichever random city in which they happen to be marching... though, that is possible with certain hot-heads!

 

[Opcode]

There were also a lot of profa violence at the time but you are ignoring that, I guess because the cops also ignored it so effectively it never happened.

But you need to provide some clear evidence about the people who committed those acts, we know there were false flags like the boogaloo boy from Texas who went to Minneapolis to shoot at cops, while I am sure you count him as antifa no one else does.

Why does Minneapolis keep coming up in discussions about Portland or other cities?

 

[Opcode]

These guys?? These stupidly-masked kids wearing "black lefty uniforms" with kicker boots, sitting in front of a red-and-black German "antifa" banner and some weight-lifting kit beside what looks like a garage?

LOL! Yeah, sure! They are definitely organised lefty antifa hippies right there!

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The modern Antifa movement adopted the WWII-era German Antifa flag, along with some other appropriation. The modern group doesn't have an unbroken lineage to the WWII-era group, but they are ideologically connected.

 

[Opcode]

You're right. Us antifa HAVE commited "political violence." A shocking massive amounts of violence. We firebombed the ◊◊◊◊ out of Dresden, dropped two nuclear weapons on two different Japanese cities, sent fascists to their deaths by hanging and by firing squad. We hung Mussolini, and killed fascists and their defenders by the MILLIONS. And I am proud that both of my grandfathers heroically took part in wiping out that ideology from the face of Europe. My one grandfather was a Sicilian partisan that violently opposed Mussolini's illegal takeover of Italy, and my other grandfather valiantly defended his bomber as a tail gunner for 25 full missions while they annihilated entire cities. And I will forever regard them as heroes and men of great honor! And I WILL commit myself to following in their footsteps should traitors actually successfully and fully establish such regimes in MY country, here in the United States of America. Currently, our institutions are STILL strong enough to keep them in check. But you better damn well believe I am in full situational awareness mode.

I very much doubt that anybody from the US in WWII would have flown the Antifa flag or identified himself as Antifa. You are playing word games.

 

[Jack by the hedge]

One of the complaints made by the opposition to Antifa was that the police often ignored Antifa when it misbehaved. Quite often, the police either had stand-down orders or actually left the area if Antifa had the upper hand.

Are you talking about people who identified themselves as Antifa, or people whom others labelled as Antifa, or do you just mean protesters generally? And whose assessment was it that the police ignored misbehaviour?

I can't help wondering if you are actually just describing the views of someone who regarded all protesters as evil Antifa and wanted the police to wade in and break heads, and who was frustrated to see the police try to de-escalate tensions instead.

 

[Opcode]

No, I am thinking that Portland isn't "burned down".

I didn't say it was. I said that burning down cities is an act of terrorism. Setting fires to buildings is also known as burning down cities, especially when it happens over multiple nights to multiple buildings. Your denials and evasions demonstrate how desperately you and your political associates are to evade scrutiny and accountability.

You accept ruining the economy, health, and environment in order to have the satisfaction that the Liberals are weeping?

Naw, I don't want the Leftists weeping. I want their organizations destroyed! I don't want them ever able to do what they've been doing for at least the last decade or so.

 

[Opcode]

A quick Google search tells me that the budget of the City of Portland, Oregon in 2020 was $8.64 Billion. A little basic arithmetic tells me that the property damage you are citing is ~0.0463% of the city budget for that year.

Oh, well, that makes it OK, then! I'll point out similar mathematical comparisons when Dallas issues me a fine for some infraction, as I'm sure nothing I could do would match the City's budget.

 

[Opcode]

Wrong. That there is an organised antifa movement in the US is what has been claimed all the time.

Nobody cares if terrorists are organized in one, national group. Daesh isn't. That doesn't stop us from designating them as terrorists.

 

[Opcode]

Absurdly wrong.

Time for an easy question: When Donald Trump referred to Antifa as a singular entity multiple times, was he incorrect?

Nothing in that press release says anything about Antifa having a centralized command structure or national headquarters.

 

[Opcode]

The bastards! And to think I have been a lefty for well over 60 years, and those bastards have hidden all this from me, and pretended to be all about equality, solidarity, human rights and improved living conditions for everyone in society...

Yes, that's where the moniker of "useful idiots" comes in. A lot of people empowered the rise of Communism in various countries for exactly this reason. A lot of people voted for Hitler for this reason. That's the problem with radical groups. They make a lot of promises just to get you to support them, until it's too late for you to stop them.

 

[dirtywick]

promises about tariffs and immigrants for example

 

[dirtywick]

OpCode's bad argumentation. It went from there, because Antifa's still a right-wing boogeyman and scapegoat that those so inclined are happy to scream about to avoid the much more complicated and unpleasant reality of things.

well it was rightfully split then, fair enough. this is a huge distraction from a real problem

 

[Opcode]

i didn’t say that antifa doesn’t exist,

You might not, but at least two people on this thread did, in addition to Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-NY). I saw nobody else confront the people on this thread on that denial, so it is important that we establish this basic fact.

in fact i linked a video of an interview. a couple people made fun of it and didn’t watch it unfortunately.

to be clear you don’t have it right either though.

Antifa exists and engages in acts of physical intimidation to advance its political agenda, aka, they are terrorists.

getting a little too excited about it

It felt good, though.

regardless ice actions are well known. there’s a bunch of links to incidents in the thread this was split from you can examine yourself.

I know that people who have physically assaulted ICE have been charged and are facing trial for interfering with the lawful duties of law enforcement agents. Predictably, the people who think that just anybody (especially Leftists) who wants to cross into this country should have free reign to do so are upset that the government is putting a stop to it.

i hate it when you guys do that, make evidence demands like i’m supposed to drag you kicking and screaming through the whole thing. if you’re curious the info is there, if you’re not then that’s on you.

Welcome to my world! I can't even get an admission from most of the opposition that Antifa even exists, much less that it engaged in terrorist activity! Yet, I'm supposed to just accept that anybody who is targeted by these people is fascist!

 

[Opcode]

Sure. Three people who conduct coordinated activities at a certain place and time has a certain level of organisation, but you well know that this is not what Trump and his handlers are talking about. In fact, they claim that every activity against Trump anywhere is organised by "antifa". Remember the "No Kings" demonstration? That was claimed to be "antifa", and Trump said that they were looking to ban the organisation. Good luck with that!

I haven't taken the time to read what anybody has done in relation to the "No Kings" protests. I usually don't pay much attention to anything that Trump says, anyway.

 

[arthwollipot]

No, that's word games. Opposition to fascism doesn't make one Antifa.

It's... it's literally what the word means. Literally. Anti-Fascism. Anti-Fa. Antifa.