1. #1

    Antifa focused more on social democrats than nazis

    Interesting thing I found on Wikipedia:

    Under the leadership of Ernst Thälmann, the KPD had become a staunchly Stalinist party, and it had been largely controlled and funded by the Soviet leadership since 1928; the party had adopted the position that it was "the only anti-fascist party" while it regarded all other parties, and especially the Social Democratic Party (SPD), as "fascists." The KPD did not view "fascism" as a specific political movement, but primarily as the final stage of capitalism, and "anti-fascism" was therefore synonymous with anti-capitalism. The KPD stated that "fighting fascism means fighting the SPD just as much as it means fighting Hitler and the parties of Brüning."
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antifaschistische_Aktion

    A bit I found interesting

  2. #2
    The Undying Cthulhu 2020's Avatar
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    Not really surprising. A lot of the fringe left is going after the middle left, because the social Democrats incorporate some forms of capitalism into mixed market economics. And as both the far left and far right tell us, neo liberalism is EBIL AND GOING TO RUIN THE WORLD!!!!11one
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  3. #3
    Titan Grimbold21's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by NED funded View Post
    Interesting thing I found on Wikipedia:



    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antifaschistische_Aktion

    A bit I found interesting
    An dishonest exercise:

    If the antifa supporting posters like to lend it credibility by claiming soldiers of WW2 were antifa by virtue of fighting Nazi Germany, does this mean then that Antifa is Stalinistic too?

  4. #4
    You mean the anarcho-communists don't like people who aren't anarcho-communists? I am shocked, just shocked.

    Does this mean we can stop having right wingers insist that Democrats are somehow responsible for Antifa?

  5. #5
    Quote Originally Posted by Grimbold21 View Post
    An dishonest exercise:

    If the antifa supporting posters like to lend it credibility by claiming soldiers of WW2 were antifa by virtue of fighting Nazi Germany, does this mean then that Antifa is Stalinistic too?
    Tbh, it's a pretty pointless exercise since the Antifa that this article talks about is an organization that didn't even exist for a decade. Today's antifa supporting posters probably support modern movements inspired to some extent by that organization, not the organization itself. It's best to judge the movement they support today on its specific views and tenets, rather than some precursor. Also would help to recognize that there isn't one definite 'antifa' today, either. It's really just as weird as pretending that there is one 'left' and one 'right or anything to begin with.

    I personally don't have a generalized opinion about the movements and the groups associated with it due to that. Some are good people protesting for what they think is right in a civil manners, others just want to rebel against whatever system they perceive to suppress them, and then others just want to cause chaos. I'm not sure how how I could make a single statement that is valid for all of them.

  6. #6
    Quote Originally Posted by Nelinrah View Post
    You mean the anarcho-communists don't like people who aren't anarcho-communists? I am shocked, just shocked.

    Does this mean we can stop having right wingers insist that Democrats are somehow responsible for Antifa?
    The interesting part is that the Antifa of the time considered the Nazis less of a threat than social democrats. Not that they don't like anarcho-communists, which I don't think they were? Don't quote me on that one tho

  7. #7
    Titan Grimbold21's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Kiri View Post
    Tbh, it's a pretty pointless exercise since the Antifa that this article talks about is an organization that didn't even exist for a decade. Today's antifa supporting posters probably support modern movements inspired to some extent by that organization, not the organization itself. It's best to judge the movement they support today on its specific views and tenets, rather than some precursor. Also would help to recognize that there isn't one definite 'antifa' today, either. It's really just as weird as pretending that there is one 'left' and one 'right or anything to begin with.

    I personally don't have a generalized opinion about the movements and the groups associated with it due to that. Some are good people protesting for what they think is right in a civil manners, others just want to rebel against whatever system they perceive to suppress them, and then others just want to cause chaos. I'm not sure how how I could make a single statement that is valid for all of them.
    Well, the quoted paragraph doesn't define an Antifa, just a Stalinistic party claiming to be the only one truly anti fascist. I don't think that equates with define itself as the original Antifa.

    My dishonest attempt at mockery had more to do with the fact that some of today's Antifa supporters like to lend it credibility by associations with past struggles. If that is the case, then ironically, the criticism made of it and them has an once of truth, because due to the association with a Stalinistic party, they're prone to authoritarianism too.

  8. #8
    Quote Originally Posted by Grimbold21 View Post
    Well, the quoted paragraph doesn't define an Antifa, just a Stalinistic party claiming to be the only one truly anti fascist. I don't think that equates with define itself as the original Antifa.

    My dishonest attempt at mockery had more to do with the fact that some of today's Antifa supporters like to lend it credibility by associations with past struggles. If that is the case, then ironically, the criticism made of it and them has an once of truth, because due to the association with a Stalinistic party, they're prone to authoritarianism too.
    That's probably why the OP only quoted that part, not the very sentence before that which makes it clear that it was a short-lived organization with that name, haha. As for the argument, I guess? Bringing up the past to validate things of today is almost always a rabbit hole that leads to detrimental statements.

    Quote Originally Posted by NED funded View Post
    The interesting part is that the Antifa of the time considered the Nazis less of a threat than social democrats. Not that they don't like anarcho-communists, which I don't think they were? Don't quote me on that one tho
    It's really not surprising to those that know German history, to be honest. This Antifa was pretty much just an arm of KPD, which itself had been a long-term enemy of the SPD to begin with. They pretty much associated capitalism with fascism to begin with, the SPD was in power and had just used that power to shut down the KPD's paramilitary organization, while creating their own in the Iron Front.
    The Nazi party was rising in power, but, well, they weren't in power yet at that point and they were also opposed to the SPD. It's kind of an 'enemy mine' situation where two adversaries tentatively work together/form an armistice to defeat a perceived greater evil. The Nazis, after all, at that point were underestimated by pretty much anyone in Germany. This was all before Hitler came to power and before they started dismantling the nascent democracy.
    The Nazis basically turned an ongoing fight between more capitalist SPD and the communist party into a three-way conflict. Naturally, the two old enemies hated each other more than that scrappy, violent party that seemed like it just wanted to start fights all over the place. It was fairly natural that those two sides considered one another the bigger threat.

    Those were pretty wild days, to be honest. But most people don't know about it, since most education with regards to German history tends to focus on the time after 1933.

  9. #9
    Quote Originally Posted by NED funded View Post
    The interesting part is that the Antifa of the time considered the Nazis less of a threat than social democrats. Not that they don't like anarcho-communists, which I don't think they were? Don't quote me on that one tho
    Well, the Social Democrats still stood to their ankles in blood, for allying themselves with the Freikorps, far right, anti democratic soldier groups, cracking down on communists killing hundreds and outright murdering their leaders without any form of conequence by the social democrat government.
    The actions against the communists in 1918-1920 would remain a black mark in the SPDs history.

  10. #10
    Scarab Lord downnola's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Kiri View Post
    Tbh, it's a pretty pointless exercise since the Antifa that this article talks about is an organization that didn't even exist for a decade. Today's antifa supporting posters probably support modern movements inspired to some extent by that organization, not the organization itself. It's best to judge the movement they support today on its specific views and tenets, rather than some precursor. Also would help to recognize that there isn't one definite 'antifa' today, either. It's really just as weird as pretending that there is one 'left' and one 'right or anything to begin with.

    I personally don't have a generalized opinion about the movements and the groups associated with it due to that. Some are good people protesting for what they think is right in a civil manners, others just want to rebel against whatever system they perceive to suppress them, and then others just want to cause chaos. I'm not sure how how I could make a single statement that is valid for all of them.
    You really need to clam down with all of those good-faith arguments and reasonable logic. We don't take kindly to that kind of thing around here.
    Populists (and "national socialists") look at the supposedly secret deals that run the world "behind the scenes". Child's play. Except that childishness is sinister in adults.
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  11. #11
    Quote Originally Posted by NED funded View Post
    The interesting part is that the Antifa of the time considered the Nazis less of a threat than social democrats. Not that they don't like anarcho-communists, which I don't think they were? Don't quote me on that one tho
    The article explains that the KPD equated fascism with late stage capitalism and the SPD were more competent than the Nazi party which made them more of a threat. Antifaschistische Aktion was set up largely as a reaction to the SPD's own paramilitary group but later found itself fighting Nazis more often.

    The confusion about anarcho-communists might come from you referring to Antifaschistische Aktion as Antifa which in the modern day refers to the anarcho-communist group that took inspiration from the 1930s communist/socialist group.

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