So here is the thing I'm struggling with about antifa at the moment

[kaberett]

It is all very well to say "if you are not with the [explicitly violent] antifascists, you're with the fascists" but what these explanations do not seem to include is actual detailed discussion of how or why I can operate on the assumption that these people won't decide that I'm the next target. "Because you're not a fascist!" Okay, right, no, try again. Try again. I have been told, by people still substantively respected and liked in my geographically local community, that being visibly autistic in public is oppressive. I want to know what the fuck system of rules you're working with that means I won't be deemed unacceptable and I won't be deemed an appropriate target.

"Try not being a fascist!"

Yeah, thanks, see above about "me being visibly disabled in public is oppressive". See every interaction I've ever had where my disabilities are an inconvenience to The Cause.

Try again.

I'm really not comfortable with the extent to which people seem to want to shout me down on this one, using that well-known abusive tactic of telling me that if I don't unquestioningly support them in spite of grave reservations rooted in, like, bare minimum historical literacy plus personal experience, I am all that is Bad and Evil.

I am struggling to articulate this any better because of the sheer visceral horror I'm experiencing at a lot of the rhetoric that's happening. But, like, if you want to engage with me on this -- and I am, very definitely, open to being talked to -- please consider starting from a point of "I see your concerns and they're valid, here's why I'm convinced", not "you're a bad person for having doubts".

If, however, you want to ask me how Very Dare I tone-police you on this, I request that you sit this one out.

Comments

[alatefeline]

I will be coming back to this because I am also struggling currently with the dichotomy between 'I know and respect some folks who self-ID as antifa and I don't actually disagree with a lot of what I see being coherently articulated by the few public antifa websites I am reasonably confident aren't fronts that I have actually read and I don't want to let fascism have the say on how the conversation works' and 'I am kinda scared by the rhetoric I see taking place and the contemplation of violence as a go-to tactic rather than something that comes up in a conversation around defense' and BUT BUT BUT. However, I am barely coming up with the energy for School Job, so coming back to this will likely be this weekend.

[alexseanchai]

*hugs?*

[alatefeline]

yes hugs good

thx

*HUGS*

[kaberett]

Yeah. I have possibly not made clear: I do not think antifascist violence is inherently bad or wrong; I'm completely cool with the idea that tolerance is not a moral precept, and this here on the topic of what a functioning society looks like.

I'm just really scared by a bunch of the rhetoric I'm increasingly seeing around it, and not seeing equivalently strongly countered.

Luck with your week. <3

[alatefeline]

<3