I’m With Antifa

The New York Times is worried about people taking the side of the rioters. We are silenced. I am not allowed to comment on riots in America although I have been to most of them. The riots are like America because the riots are America. Kenosha feels like Minneapolis. And Minneapolis feels like Portland. And Portland feels like Washington, DC. America is a failed state. The New York Times is afraid.

I am compelled to document the background context of ANTIFA.

That, too, is not unlike the violence I see from one end of the country to the next. To join in multiple riots is only acceptable if you don’t talk about it. To articulate how a riot works and why, is considered inappropriately uncivil. Sweep it all under the cultural rug. Report on uncivil activity with the spin it is an afterthought. Republicans on Zoom are more important than riots on the streets of America. To critique journalism is uncivil.

There must be a way to speak to you about how a simmering rage is an America you do not know. Are you getting the whole story. The simmering is not a few fragments. It is ubiquitous. ANTIFA is able to take that rage, and coordinate it, whip it into shape, link it to more mainstream Americans who only need a small push from protest to another brick in the wall. ANTIFA is the very best at creating defensive tools like Spartan shields that will protect you from tear gas containers hurled directly at your head. The system is allowed violence. But we are the uncivil criminals.

https://ello.co/timbarrus