this post was submitted on 30 Jan 2024
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It's crazy how many people just on this meme think antifa is an actual organization. π€¦
How else they are paying their demonstrators money for each demonstration?
Soros, Bill Gates and the Bilderbergs, I guess? Probably also that Davos guy who Alex Jones et al TOTALLY aren't fixated on for antisemitic reasons either, nuh-uh!
/s in case it isn't abundantly clear
It's a movement, isn't it? That's still a form of organization.
No it's not. It has no members. It had no leaders. It's just an idea. What do you think an organization is?
The NAACP?
A movement can have members and leaders even without formal organizational hierarchy. It just won't look the same as something like a corporation, nonprofit, or government. The person who noticed that the Proud Boys were coming to town and rallied people to a counter-protest? Definitely a leader. The people who show up on a cold rainy Saturday instead of staying indoors with a warm cup of tea? Members. Just because membership and leadership is more amorphous doesn't mean it isn't there in some form.
Nahh you got that wrong. What usually happens is that a lot of people who are into politics (which left-extreme people often are) hear about this at the same time (through some press release, some proud boys twitter account who's rallyin their followers, etc.).
From that point the information spreads over friendsgroups, small discords, tweets, whatsapps, in person, slowly but steadily.
Any left-extreme person who hears this immediately thinks "I'm mad, I wanna show those guys that they're not welcome". Granted, some of us think about much more extreme things, but back to the point. The first reaction from that thought is often "is there a counter protest?". People are then doing the same thing but the other way around, as now everyone is trying to find some tweet, event, whatsapp message screenshot, whatever, of someone saying where the meeting point for an event would be. If none are found, someones gonna create something, which is usuqlly someone who's got a lot of connections with other left-extremists. Often there's multiple people creating the same counterprotest, which gets super messy at times, but somehow everyone manages to meet up in some general spot.
Worst case you just have a bunch of friends groups going to the meeting spot of wherever the initial event is happening.
That's "the antifa". A massive network of friends and friends of friends of friends who are all pretty aligned in their political views (which is "fuck Nazis") but who often don't know more then 5 other antifacists.
This is kind of my point, in a way. It was maybe simplistic to use one person. There is leadership, but there are many leaders, and they don't have a badge with "Antifa CEO". Though someone really needs to make stickers with "Antifa CEO". One of my former managers came from activist circles like antifa. She will always be my favorite manager because she is so great at making sure even shy people feel heard.
People are just nitpicking the meaning of the word Organization. Antifa is an organization in a very loose definition of the word. If you want to be more accurate, you'd call it a Network. Organizations (in the stricter sense) has a single leader and has a very tree-like structure with more power on top (like Corporations!), which Antifa obviously is not.
Though you're correct in that Antifa is a "movement".
In my opinion it would be a movement if facism was the status quo. Given most people are discussing Western nations, which while adopting facism at an alarming pace; are not yet facist. Antifa is not a movement nor an organization. Since not being facist is the status quo and antifa means that you're not going to support facism, in my opinion antifa is the current "establishment" and being facist is an effort to move the status quo. Aka a movement.
I find this comment thread horribly ironic, and I hope I can show you why without starting an argument because this is genuinely kind of funny.
Fascism is when a state achieves (or attempts to achieve) totalitarianism through corporatization. All corporations are chartered and controlled through the state, and private industry becomes corporatized.
One of the ways they did this was through legitimizing specific channels of distribution, and labeling all who take a more independent route as illegitimate. Farmers, for example, were coerced into selling their products to state distributors, and pressured out of independent channels. Likewise, farmers who weren't part of the state organization were often treated with suspicion and derision.
Basically, if you were a _____ and did _____ things, but were not part of the _____ organization, then you weren't a real ______ no matter how good you are at _____.
Anyway, antifa is a real thing that exists, and that's the thing people here are talking about. They're a group that has identifiable goals, and they work together under the label. It's really funny to me that so many here are appealing to "they're not even a real org" in the face of dissent, because that's one of the most fascist mind sets that exist commonplace today.
There is a huge overlap between people who would participate in Antifa and Anarchists, so you can imagine the problems getting a structured organization setup and keeping on task and purpose.
I'm sure that's part of it. Antifa is definitely not well structured, and anarchists could probably be opposed to any official organization.
Let me put it this way, the post talks about a journalist who investigates antifa, which the op of this comment chain mocked because they're not an organization. But, this is an argument of semantics, and the post didn't use that word to begin with. Regardless of what you call antifa, he's trying to investigate and see what they're about.
It's a very dishonest way to deride people. If you don't mind me asking, if you don't think the word organization is appropriate, what's better? I mean I just say group, can't really be wrong going that general but it also doesn't say much. Like, when you said "people who participate in Antifa...", what type of thing are those people participating in?
It's more of a cause or a movement than an organization. I guess I don't know why that should be difficult to understand.
I think you missed the point.
Organizations do not necessarily require structure, association is a synonym for a reason. Decentralized organizations and associations are a thing. Decentralized workers solidarity movements and co-op/community strengthening initiatives can be/are "organizing" even if no one is in charge. You don't need to be a member of a union or an official neighborhood association to be part of an organization, there just needs to be general or vague common intention among a group and something of a shared identity. You might not get as much done a fast when not structurally organized, but you also don't not exist if your not a card carrying member. I don't understand the desire to divorce Antifa from being an organization or even existing. It's like saying that the Deadheads aren't a real thing because no one was directing the vast majority of fans who packed up and followed the band across the country.
Oh so now you are arguing that deadheads were an organization too? Really? In what universe?
I haven't argued anything before that post, but this conversation about the semantics of the word organization means is interesting to me. To answer your question, I'd say Yes? Deadheads were a group of people associating with each other under common interest and intent. They didn't particularly have leaders or any hierarchical structure, but they gathered in locations of common interest (concert venues and the surrounding local) based solely on individual discussion and desire, participated in the event alongside and with the group, and almost everyone participating identified as a deadhead. I really don't understand the problem with them falling under the edge of the umbrella of the term organization.
They were an organization when viewed as an association or society: in this case a voluntary association of individuals for common ends. Deadheads were a distinct subculture in and of themselves, and I don't understand in what universe that wouldn't qualify. Keeping with the musician fandom, I'd say the same for the Juggalo's. Being on the outer edge of the Venn diagram is still part of the whole picture.
Lol you saying they are not? You are funny
Would you like to tell me the name of the official antifa organisation?
Obviously its AntifaΒ© inc. Everyone learns that in first gradeπ