Genuflecting to Antifa

The original "Black Bloc" marches on Rome.

Chris Matthews recently said on MSNBC that he cannot accept Trump until and unless the latter “genuflects to the fact that he lied” about Barack Obama not being born in the United States.

Strange use of the word "genuflect." And strange use of the word “lied.” Trump has never said Obama was not born in the United States. Of course Trump has no special knowledge of where Obama was born. He made no claim that he did. He expressed doubt that Obama was born in the US, based on the same evidence available to us all.

So, it seems, to some on the left—many on the left, for Matthews is hardly a fringe figure-- to “lie” means only to cast doubts upon their preferred view of things. They too, after all, cannot really know whether Obama was born in the US. It is an article of faith then--explaining, perhaps, the word "genuflect" here.

This provokes another obvious question: if “lying” is simply suspecting something the left does not want to believe, what is “truth”?

And here, I think, you have the key to much of what is going on in American politics and culture today.

This concept of “lying” is based on the idea that “truth is relative.” As we see and hear in postmodernism, cultural relativism, the human potential movement, Castaneda’s separate reality, all that Sixties stuff, which can in fact be traced back earlier, through the Frankfort School, Nietzsche, and, not incidentally, Fascism. It has been bubbling through the culture for some time now; it owns the academy; it is having its effect.

According to this intellectual tradition, there is no objective truth. That means truth is whatever you want to be true. “Reality is a function of belief.” “Truth is a social construct.” It follows that “reality” is a contest of wills. Whoever has the strongest will gets to impose his or her reality, his or her construct, on everyone else, making it so. The obvious and necessary tactic for one’s life and all one’s acts is to fight any dissent towards one’s preferred “narrative” aggressively. For example, calling the slightest doubt or dissent “lying.” Which is an assertion of the absolute truth of whatever you choose to believe.

This philosophy is exhilarating, liberating. Which is why it has had such success in the past century. Everything is possible! There are no limits! You get, in effect, to be God—or that is the possibility held out to you.

Antifa

It is, to use the Nazi phrase, the triumph of the will.

Of course, it must also inevitably crash and burn in the end. No, you cannot fly because you want to. You cannot force everyone else to submit to your will, and treat them like objects, once they realize what you are trying to do.

Antifa is a manifestation of this strand of contemporary thought, surely. Of course they are “anarchists.” All government is a restraint on one’s will. No restraint on one’s will is tolerable. One must smash it, whatever it is.

However, this is only a first step. Should one be in the position to do so, the same philosophy suggests that one must impose one’s own government on all others, one’s own reality on all others, and it must be totalitarian. Hitler had to overthrow the social order in the streets before he could impose his own. So did Mao, or Pol Pot. Once oneself in power, anyone who disagrees with your preferred reality is “lying.” There can be no “free speech,” because no expression of opposing views can be tolerated. Opposing views are fatal to a purely constructed reality. Anyone who dissents is labelled a “Nazi,” and must be met with violence. Since there is no objective standard by which to measure or evaluate views, there is no possibility of reasoned debate. Reasoned debate is “Fascist,” because it is a restriction on the will.

Of course, there can be no morality, no religion, for these too are a restraint on the will. This relativism is accordingly a doctrine attractive to sexual libertines, porn stars like “Moldylocks,” of recent “Battle of Berkeley” fame. It gives you license to do whatever you want, to anyone, so long as you can get away with it: smash windows, abort babies, hit peaceful people with bicycle locks, kill the Jews and take their stuff. And, obviously, it gives you full license to lie—reality, after all, is anything you want it to be. Lying is simply disagreeing with you, and anything you say is the truth because you say it. Moldylocks apparently lies like a trouper in interviews.

Fighting "Hate Speech" in Berlin.

In order to deal with this tendency, we need to understand it. I think too many good, decent, people don’t. Too many think that rules still apply, that truth matters to the other side, that we can all with good will still get along.

This was the mistake made at Munich.

And, Godwin to the contrary, I think this is exactly what we are dealing with.

Antifa Anticlimax?

It looks as though the clashes between Antifa and Trump supporters may not be the clear and present danger they appeared.

Note the Antifa flag, seen everywhere at their riots:

According to YouTuber Sargon of Akkad, who seems to know about this stuff, this is the flag of anarcho-communism. And that does not mean, as I first thought, a coalition of anarchists and communists. It means a subgroup of anarchists who also believe in communism.

Now, if this is true, just how large is their pool of potential supporters?

I really don’t think that the number of anarchist communists in America is that large.

At least, then, if it comes to blows, the Antifas should quickly be crushed.

It is also heartening to see that prominent leftist politicians like Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren have publicly distanced themselves from Antifa. The left is not on board. This is just a lunatic fringe.

Ann Coulter is now planning to speak outdoors in Berkeley’s Sproul Plaza, which, probably not coincidentally, offers maximum potential for a street brawl.

That’s bad, but then it might be over.

Storm Warning

In addition to Anne Coulter, Milo Yiannopoulos has now announced an intention to head back to Berkeley. He intends to hold a “Free Speech Week.”

The right is itching for a fight now.

In the meantime, the hackers at 4Chan and elsewhere on the net have been taking up the challenge of identifying some of the masked Antifa brawlers at the last Battle of Berkeley. The guy who was filmed reaching an arm out from behind a woman to hit someone on the head with a bicycle lock turns out to be a college professor. A woman next to him is a public school teacher. It turns out the mayor of Berkeley follows her Trotskyite Facebook group. A woman who was punched in the forehead is a nude model.

These are not members of the proletariat. These are often people who have their hands on the levers of power. They are all upper or upper middle class.

It is staggering arrogance and cluelessness on their part to nevertheless try to take it all to the streets and use mob force. It seems almost deliberately suicidal.

Now, inevitably, discussion on the Reddit anarchist forum is that Antifa needs to get guns and a strong leader.

Some comments:

“A shocking number of our comrades went in there with absolute no combat training. We need to set up seminars or something of the sort.”

“what is our opinion on a ‘leader’ someone to rally our troops, direct the flow and keep everything organized?”

“Having a leader could immensely improve tactical organization and can prevent the amount of disorganization that happened today. Having someone to help with the commandeering of resources could help us greatly.”

You may have heard of this notion before. It is the Fuhrer principle.

“we need more than flags and bats. We need to take notes from the John Brown Gun Club and get firearms and training.”

Great. Armed battles in the streets. It has worked so well for Syria.

At this point, and given that the local authorities are in on the fight, it seems to me that the only chance to avert civil chaos, not to say civil war, is for Trump to send in the National Guard.

The Battle of Berkeley

Although it does not seem to have been covered in most media, there is a lot on YouTube about the recent “Battle of Berkeley.”

Somebody held a “Free Speech” rally featuring pro-Trump speakers. Antifa showed up—you have heard of “Antifa”? They’re the guys who show up in gangs all in black, just so everyone knows they’re the bad guys, and wearing masks, so nobody knows who they are, like the KKK, and try to disrupt any right-wing events. The name is supposed to be short for “Anti-fascism,” but they seem themselves to be fascist in their thinking and tactics. Their black and red flag suggests communism and anarchism. I guess they are “anti-fascist” in the same way the Berlin Wall was “anti-fascist.” “Fascists” has long been the communist word for anyone who is not communist.

Whoever staged the rally surely expected Antifa to show up. They always show up, and especially in a place like Berkeley. There have been two previous “Battles of Berkeley,” notably the one about a month ago where a guy was shot and a talk by Milo Yiannopoulos was cancelled. But this time, it seems, the right wing was prepared. They were organized for this, they fought back, and, as they tell it, they drove the Antifa guys off.

And so it begins. The other side has now finally begun to organize. After years of provocation by Antifa and Black Lives Matter and students shouting down speakers on campus. How does this not end in a Weimar Republic, or a Northern Ireland, rival gangs fighting in the streets, situation? Each side, to defeat the other at the next confrontation, must get better organized. They must bring stronger and stronger weapons.

People are going to get killed, and politics will no longer be possible. It will be might makes right. You can see in the YouTube videos that the right wing is now excited. They have tasted blood, and it is thrilling. They want more.

It seems to me almost a certainly that the left will lose. But they brought this on. And the right wing organization that wins is almost sure to involve some elements of fascism, given fascism’s taste for violence. It will not be the religious right, nor the libertarian right, which rises through this.

I swear, I have seen this one coming since the early 1970s. And it was always the left’s doing. This was inevitable as soon as a large body of people embraced moral relativism.