Anaheim vs. Klanaheim
February 28, 2016 9:29 AM Subscribe

Yesterday, a Ku Klux Klan rally in Anaheim, CA left three people stabbed and over a dozen arrested. Unfortunately, Orange County is no stranger to white supremacist groups, though headlines like this aren't common. Photographer Heather Davini Boucher offers an up-close photographic account of the confrontation from start to finish.
posted by scaryblackdeath (185 comments total) 19 users marked this as a favorite

I'm not ready to condemn stabbing at this point; we need to do more research.
posted by selfnoise at 9:30 AM on February 28, 2016 [40 favorites]

They see themselves as a “Klan without robes” and model themselves after David Duke, the Louisiana-based former grand wizard of the Klan, Levin said.

least sexy disrobing ever
posted by escabeche at 9:43 AM on February 28, 2016 [10 favorites]

That Facebook link is not a public link and so is only available to view if you have a Facebook account.

Or I am guessing that is the problem. I don't have a Facebook account, so I can't look at it.
posted by hippybear at 9:49 AM on February 28, 2016 [8 favorites]

Lots of pictures on the photographer's SmugMug account if you're too smug to have a Facebook.
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 9:50 AM on February 28, 2016 [13 favorites]

(I'm smug enough that I only log into Facebook from incognito windows)
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 9:51 AM on February 28, 2016 [1 favorite]

I play pacifist a lot, but it somehow seems like the only appropriate response to the KKK is to hit them with bats.
posted by dis_integration at 9:54 AM on February 28, 2016 [19 favorites]

Ah. Yeah, I suspected that the fact it's on Facebook might cause some sort of problem. Sorry about that. Thanks much for the save, RobotVoodooPower!
posted by scaryblackdeath at 9:55 AM on February 28, 2016

Trump Won't Condemn KKK, Says He 'Knows Nothing About White Supremacists'
posted by Artw at 9:56 AM on February 28, 2016 [13 favorites]

The klan looks like a sad old bowling team trying to look badass.
posted by srboisvert at 9:58 AM on February 28, 2016 [17 favorites]

... Levin said he pushed the Klan leader away as the violence continued and a protester was stabbed.

Levin said he asked Quigg, “How do you feel that a Jewish guy just saved your life?”

“Thank you,” the Klan leader replied, according to Levin.

I'm gonna sit with that for a while. I hope the Klansman does, too, but I won't hold my breath.
posted by Countess Elena at 9:58 AM on February 28, 2016 [3 favorites]

So many images of getting-closer-to-the-grave white men wearing shirts ripped off from the First Order in The Force Awakens... It's sad to see people old enough to know better doing terrible cosplay in the name of a bullshit worldview.
posted by hippybear at 9:58 AM on February 28, 2016 [13 favorites]

ok, excuse my naivete, but which are the kkk? the people with the red circle on black shirts? or are they police / ambulance? the guy in the black leather jacket? or just that bald guy in the baggy white t shirt that i imagine could have been wearing a hood?
posted by andrewcooke at 10:03 AM on February 28, 2016 [1 favorite]

Relevant to this is the 3-year-old article from the OC Weekly about all of the places in Orange County, CA named after Klansmen.
posted by sleeping bear at 10:10 AM on February 28, 2016 [9 favorites]

> which are the kkk?

The white guys dressed like the one facing the camera in this photo.

Interesting that their new-era uniforms are not modeled after secret societies or the military, but after police.
posted by ardgedee at 10:11 AM on February 28, 2016 [43 favorites]

oh, well, sleeping bear's link answers my question. it's anyone wearing teh red circle.
posted by andrewcooke at 10:12 AM on February 28, 2016

Violence is wrong. Think of MLK.

That said, note the excellent form. But, move a little closer to the target and punch through it. Otherwise, very good -- eyes up, balanced, good weight shift, good shoulder snap. I give it an A-.
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 10:19 AM on February 28, 2016 [34 favorites]

All that while wearing skinny jeans. What a time to be alive.
posted by Potomac Avenue at 10:21 AM on February 28, 2016 [20 favorites]

Does anyone know what document the "Exalted Cyclops" has around his neck in this photo? I'm guessing it's an EMS workflow document, what with the red cross, and the middle section labeled "EM wristband".
posted by zamboni at 10:22 AM on February 28, 2016

I believe the Exalted Cyclops has a Necklace of Medical Enchantment (+2 HP), and the Grand Dragon is wearing some Boots of the ElderJack (+1 AC, +1 AGI, -3 WIS, -2 INT).

LARPing has gotten really weird lately.
posted by 0xFCAF at 10:29 AM on February 28, 2016 [63 favorites]

appropriate response to the KKK is to hit them with bats

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZTT1qUswYL0
posted by Heywood Mogroot III at 10:33 AM on February 28, 2016 [3 favorites]

I blame Beyoncé.
posted by Lyme Drop at 10:34 AM on February 28, 2016 [1 favorite]

This one was reminding me of something I couldn't quite place... and then it hit me like a flagpole to the eyeball
posted by saturday_morning at 10:35 AM on February 28, 2016 [1 favorite]

There's a famous photo from the Boston busing riots of a white man attacking a black man with an American flag. It came to mind immediately.
posted by Countess Elena at 10:40 AM on February 28, 2016 [14 favorites]

Interesting that their new-era uniforms are not modeled after secret societies or the military, but after police.

They look like the shirts you used to see at full-service gas stations, too.

The only time I personally saw a neo-Nazi march was in Europe; I've read of them in the US but it has never been near where one was actually happening. It seems bizarre to me that these bozos are still around, though obviously in very small numbers.
posted by Dip Flash at 10:41 AM on February 28, 2016 [1 favorite]

There's a famous photo from the Boston busing riots of a white man attacking a black man with an American flag. It came to mind immediately.

I knew I had seen that photo but I couldn't make the connection to where it had been.
posted by Dip Flash at 10:42 AM on February 28, 2016 [1 favorite]

Does anyone know what document the "Exalted Cyclops" has around his neck in this photo?

Triage tag
posted by un petit cadeau at 10:43 AM on February 28, 2016 [3 favorites]

Is there ever a point when violence is morally sound? Black people are being killed nonstop, Muslims are being harassed, but they aren't allowed to be violent back? I sincerely don't understand that. I know leaders have said to be non-violent but do those viewpoints evolve ever? Is there a political or sociological theory about using violence against people who are predominantly violent? It's the KKK for fucks sake.
posted by gucci mane at 10:44 AM on February 28, 2016 [10 favorites]

Anaheim sits at a weird kind of crossroads -- geographically, historically and socially. It doesn't have much of a history, but is "older" than most other cities in the county. Honestly, it was little more than orange groves until Disney showed up, and then suddenly, it's a major city with a highly visible big employer, professional sports teams (that didn't want to use Anaheim in their names), a big convention center, etc. But it is not the county seat, not a very "hip" place to live, and it kind of sits between the lower- and upper-income areas of the county. Between low income suburbs like Garden Grove, and the south Orange County from movies and TV -- Irvine, Newport, Laguna, etc.

Anaheim has a little bit of everything. Including racist jackasses.
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 10:44 AM on February 28, 2016 [6 favorites]

Is there ever a point when violence is morally sound?

For what end? In self-defense? In war? Yes and yes.

But, do you hit a KKK member with a bat merely because he is shouting like a lunatic? Is that a war footing? A self-defense scenario? Or do you then risk becoming like a former president, who insisted that we must make war so that others do not make war against us first?

I do so love the KKK jackass getting punched. But I'd like to think I'd be above it. Probably not. But this guy was:

“The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy, instead of diminishing evil, it multiplies it. Through violence you may murder the liar, but you cannot murder the lie, nor establish the truth. Through violence you may murder the hater, but you do not murder hate. In fact, violence merely increases hate.

Returning violence for violence multiplies violence, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.”

-- Martin Luther King, Jr.
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 10:50 AM on February 28, 2016 [47 favorites]

I love these F*CK THE KKK signs. Like someone really hates the KKK but was concerned that their unexpurgated message might offend someone, so they censored it!

Seriously though, fuck the KKK.
posted by Cookiebastard at 10:51 AM on February 28, 2016 [14 favorites]

One the one hand, yeah. On the other hand, look where it got him.

Malcolm X was a more cogent and coherent leader for black liberation than MLK.
posted by koeselitz at 10:52 AM on February 28, 2016 [2 favorites]

No one changes their mind about an issue because of people being violent towards them. Only when they can see that their preconceived notions about that issue are wrong. Perpetuating violence in the name of "They deserve it!" only makes people dig in further.
posted by downtohisturtles at 10:55 AM on February 28, 2016 [8 favorites]

Re: Malcom X: On the other hand, look where it got him.
posted by Cookiebastard at 10:55 AM on February 28, 2016 [12 favorites]

That guy who was about to get punched probably wasn't about to get his mind changed on the issue by the guy punching him, regardless of what approach was taken to the matter.
posted by 256 at 11:00 AM on February 28, 2016 [1 favorite]

One the one hand, yeah. On the other hand, look where it got him.

Looks to me like King won.

Did he turn everything into rainbows and unicorns? No. But he knew that was never gonna happen in his lifetime. He knew the struggle for racial justice would be a long, hard slog, and I don't think he'd be surprised at all to find that it's still a struggle today.

But the dude won an awful lot of victories where the other approach plainly wouldn't have worked at all.
posted by scaryblackdeath at 11:00 AM on February 28, 2016 [6 favorites]

Anaheim has a little bit of everything. Including racist jackasses.

Orange County (and Anaheim) has a long history of racism and a long history of having, harboring, and supporting racist jackasses.

So, no, Orange County and Anaheim don't have "a little bit of everything." They both have a lot of racism, and always have.
posted by blucevalo at 11:01 AM on February 28, 2016 [5 favorites]

Malcolm X was a more cogent and coherent leader for black liberation than MLK.

Sorry, can't agree with you at all. I know there's been trillions of words on the subject, in either direction, and even a very cool play I recommend to anyone interested, but I come down on the side on the guy with the dream, not the guy who said it was time for martyrs to die.
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 11:02 AM on February 28, 2016 [4 favorites]

At least the Klan members here in Indiana have respect for tradition and still wear their dress whites in public.
posted by Thorzdad at 11:03 AM on February 28, 2016

It just appears to me that there's a certain type of exaltation when it comes to violence. When it's workers and labor rising up against their bosses it's good, when it's kids in the streets being pissed about racists it's bad. Why is that? Is violence "allowed" after a certain threshold? For example, if this had been a gigantic protest and violence broke out would it be more morally sound, or is it because so few people were there it's "bad"? At what point is violence "okay"?
posted by gucci mane at 11:04 AM on February 28, 2016 [1 favorite]

It's also very telling to me that there's no visible police presence in these photos until the violence is well underway. The cops knew this was coming. It was in local media before the rally.
posted by scaryblackdeath at 11:06 AM on February 28, 2016 [4 favorites]

And is it because they aren't wearing armor or paramilitary clothing? When people in large groups are throwing rocks at the police in Europe during protests against any number of things no one seems to mind.
posted by gucci mane at 11:06 AM on February 28, 2016

"People who are following me are very passionate," said Trump.
posted by Naberius at 11:08 AM on February 28, 2016 [7 favorites]

At what point is violence "okay"?

柔術

"Jū" can be translated to mean "gentle, soft, supple, flexible, pliable, or yielding." "Jutsu" can be translated to mean "art" or "technique" and represents manipulating the opponent's force against himself rather than confronting it with one's own force.
posted by Heywood Mogroot III at 11:08 AM on February 28, 2016 [7 favorites]

Fighting for liberation will very often end in your death. So: let's be up-front about the means by which we are willing to work to liberate and bring respect and civil rights to all humans. Is it just by some means? By certain non-violent means? Or – by any means necessary?

The Malcolm X / MLK debate was probably not the best to bring up. But: I share your admiration for the black kid punching the KKK dude, CPB – and moreover I think we need to see that in some times and places intoning softly about non-violence might not be the right way. As Dick Gregory once put it: "I committed to non-violence; but I'm sort of embarrassed by it." I am not an advocate of the violent overthrow of white supremacy, but won't begrudge those who are, and I won't sit in judgement of those who end up finding that the only way they have to fight those powers is to stand up and fight.

downtohisturtles: “Perpetuating violence in the name of 'They deserve it!' only makes people dig in further.”

Indeed. So if we engage in violence, we must make it a spiritual practice to try to make sure we aren't doing it to punish, but rather to bring liberation. Violence in the name of punishment or revenge will not fix the world. But if we're willing to be violent in the defense of respect and honor for those who deserve it, in defense of the unprivileged and downtrodden, then maybe we can make the world a better place.

In particular, that violence just might be called for when the KKK comes to town bringing knives and apparently willing to stab people.
posted by koeselitz at 11:09 AM on February 28, 2016 [9 favorites]

Visited a small local County Historical Museum yesterday. Turned a corner and found myself staring at a display of KKK regalia. Hood and robe. And was reminded again about the sorry history of Oregon in the 1920's. The whole West Coast has a terrible history with regards to the Klan. And it's all too sad that it continues.
posted by jgaiser at 11:10 AM on February 28, 2016 [4 favorites]

Interesting that their new-era uniforms are not modeled after secret societies or the military, but after police.

It's what they had around the house.
posted by Naberius at 11:11 AM on February 28, 2016 [49 favorites]

The whole West Coast has a terrible history with regards to the Klan.

I read an article recently (that I can't immediately find) that talked about Portland's original charter and how no black people were allowed to let the sun go down on them within town limits, or something. The panhandle of Idaho used to have a white supremacist enclave not too long ago. The whole race thing has deep roots throughout and across the US, and it still hasn't been dealt with in any meaningful way that changes the culture.
posted by hippybear at 11:15 AM on February 28, 2016 [1 favorite]

Re: Malcom X: On the other hand, look where it got him.

...about the same thing that it got MLK.
posted by wuwei at 11:17 AM on February 28, 2016 [1 favorite]

To be perfectly honest, my first kneejerk thought when I saw the story was that I regretted that none of the Klansmen were killed. I felt bad for thinking that immediately afterward, but it was the first thing that crossed my mind.

I dunno. Maybe its just that I'm already angry and depressed over other things going on in my life, but while I understand and even agree intellectually with the argument against violence here, it has no real emotional grip on me.

Black lives still don't matter, the cops are still daily beating and killing people just because they can, the Republicans are voting purely on bigotry and xenophobia and are about to nominate either Trump, Cruz, or Rubio, all of whom are racist xenophobes of the highest order.

Maybe what it takes is beating the shit out of some Klansmen so they STFU and go away. Probably not, but at this point, here and now, that makes more sense to me emotionally than King's appeals to reason and non-violence do.

I've often wondered if the non-violent form of social change depends on having the threat violence around as the alternative if society chooses not to allow the non-violent to succeed. Could King have done what he did if Malcolm X hadn't been there, visibly, as the violent alternative?

Maybe what BLM is lacking to help it get real traction is the credible threat of violence from a different group if society chooses to ignore BLM?

That's an awful thought, but I can't help but think it has validity.
posted by sotonohito at 11:17 AM on February 28, 2016 [9 favorites]

> All that while wearing skinny jeans. What a time to be alive.

Those pants are too baggy! Those pants are too tight! Too bad the guy resorting to violence wasn't wearing pants just right.
posted by cjorgensen at 11:18 AM on February 28, 2016 [9 favorites]

Maybe what BLM is lacking to help it get real traction is the credible threat of violence from a different group if society chooses to ignore BLM?

A lot of the anti-Black Lives Matter people already think they're violent without evidence to back it up. They won't have better success by making that threat real.
posted by downtohisturtles at 11:22 AM on February 28, 2016 [2 favorites]

> To be perfectly honest, my first kneejerk thought when I saw the story was that I regretted that none of the Klansmen were killed.

I get the sentiment, but that's not going to help. In fact, I think it would just make the klansmen feel vindicated.

When if comes to protest and discourse I am on the side of the people not using violence. The Klan are shitbag dickheels, but in a free country they have a right to march and protest. If you don't want a free country, if you want a country where the press is constrained and protestors arrested, then Trumps your guy. If not, you have to denounce violence. If you don't protect the rights of the people you disagree with, no one can protect yours when you want to speak.
posted by cjorgensen at 11:22 AM on February 28, 2016 [14 favorites]

As a journalist, I covered a Klan rally in Louisville, KY about 25 years ago. It was held downtown, and to get to where the klan was, you hadda go through a metal detector. There were a hundred times as many protesters as klan people. Maybe even more. Like a thousand good folk to 40-50 klansmen.

The fact that the klan has a presence in California is so fucking weird to me. And scary that this shit is going on right now.
posted by valkane at 11:24 AM on February 28, 2016 [2 favorites]

Orange County is a big place, and I promise you there are plenty of us here who aren't racist, don't support the KKK, and aren't even conservative. Plenty. I don't know anyone in my circle of friends here who would be anywhere near supporting this kind of garbage. Please don't tar us all with the same brush...
posted by primethyme at 11:27 AM on February 28, 2016 [3 favorites]

To be perfectly honest, my first kneejerk thought when I saw the story was that I regretted that none of the Klansmen were killed.

I am extremely glad that nobody will be going up for murder over some Klan loser. And I only hope that any charges against the protesters in this mess are either dropped or are minimal at best.
posted by scaryblackdeath at 11:28 AM on February 28, 2016 [6 favorites]

Please don't tar us all with the same brush...

Welcome to my continual struggle on MetaFilter when the conversation turns to "flyover country".
posted by hippybear at 11:29 AM on February 28, 2016 [21 favorites]

Maybe it is better to indicate where the klan isn't? I'm thinking Harlem, maybe Chicago's south and west side ...?
posted by Chitownfats at 11:31 AM on February 28, 2016 [1 favorite]

Cicero, which is the first Chicago suburb over the western border, was historically the home to the headquarters of the American Nazi party.
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 11:35 AM on February 28, 2016

A lot of the anti-Black Lives Matter people already think they're violent without evidence to back it up. They won't have better success by making that threat real.

A lot of people seem to think that black folks should shut up and hold peaceful protests in out of the way places where they won't so much as affect their commute to work. Keep on peacefully asking for us to respect your right to live and we'll get there eventually, in our own time. How many generations should they wait before looking for another, perhaps more violent, answer?
posted by The Hamms Bear at 11:36 AM on February 28, 2016 [19 favorites]

...I promise you there are plenty of us here who aren't racist, don't support the KKK, and aren't even conservative.

All of this is true. The whole reason I found these links was because they were shared by a white friend who lives in OC. I lived there for several years myself. My family is still there. Several of my research projects as a college history major were directed at OC's history and makeup.

I noted OC's history with white supremacy for perspective, and in part I hoped it would surprise some people, because it surprised me when I first learned of it (from said friend, who was an OC punk musician). It would legitimately surprise a lot of people. OC is not remotely a monolithic entity. There is diversity, and that diversity includes whites (liberal and even conservative) who would be appalled if they knew just how strong white supremacist groups are in OC, because they usually keep a lower profile than this.
posted by scaryblackdeath at 11:36 AM on February 28, 2016 [7 favorites]

Trump Won't Condemn KKK, Says He 'Knows Nothing About White Supremacists'

That's pie bullshit, because he condemned David Duke for precisely that reason in 2000.
posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 11:37 AM on February 28, 2016 [2 favorites]

A lot of people seem to think that black folks should shut up and hold peaceful protests in out of the way places where they won't so much as affect their commute to work.

If that's how you read my words, I'm sorry. But don't dare try to tell me I'm prejudiced because I don't support violence.
posted by downtohisturtles at 11:38 AM on February 28, 2016 [1 favorite]

Perpetuating violence in the name of 'They deserve it!' only makes people dig in further.

And what if I'm not interested in educating a Klansman or getting them to see the nuances of the race discussion? What if my goal is to make it really loud and fucking clear that they are not at all welcome in my neighborhood?

I'm sorry, but I am so very, very tired of being scolded at by moderates to play nice and think of MLK when literal, actual fascists are beating and killing PoC every day. Asking nice, saying pretty please, and peacefully protesting hasn't done a damn thing to turn the tide. If they can't and won't listen, then physical resistance is not just understandable; it's damn near a requirement.
posted by Aya Hirano on the Astral Plane at 11:40 AM on February 28, 2016 [37 favorites]

Those pants are too baggy! Those pants are too tight! Too bad the guy resorting to violence wasn't wearing pants just right.

I don't think Potomac Avenue was being critical of the skinny jeans. That seems like an uncharitable reading to me. It's hard to do anything, like, athletic in restrictive clothing.
posted by escape from the potato planet at 11:43 AM on February 28, 2016 [10 favorites]

I think it's worth at least considering the possibility that publicly kicking the shit out of these guys when they try to hold a parade IS the correct solution.

How do you think any POC is going to sleep soundly in a neighbourhood where the Klan are allowed to parade around unmolested? Frankly, that this is protected speech is sort of admirable in terms of the (selective) American commitment to certain core freedoms, but it's also pretty twisted. Pointing a loaded gun at someone isn't protected speech, and committing violence against someone who does so is self-defence even if they never fire the weapon. Given the history of the KKK, I don't see marching through the streets in Klan garb making a show of force as being substantially different to pointing a loaded gun.

I think that anyone who took a swing at these guys, knowing they would get arrested for doing so, is probably a hero.
posted by 256 at 11:44 AM on February 28, 2016 [21 favorites]

maybe it helps to think of violence as just one way in which power can be used / one way that people have power.

that leads to the idea that violence may be acceptable when it's used by those without access to other kinds of power.

the idea that violence is off-limits in some way, in a world where there are plenty of other coercive processes, seems naive - it's the kind of moral simplification that serves (and so is likely propagated by) those who can coerce people in other ways.

edit: isn't this the logic behind the second amendment?
posted by andrewcooke at 11:47 AM on February 28, 2016 [4 favorites]

What if my goal is to make it really loud and fucking clear that they are not at all welcome in my neighborhood?

It might work. But it might not. Historically, violence on the part of oppressed groups against their oppressors has been met with brutal and crushing retaliation. While the KKK are not part of the mainstream of oppression, the mainstream of oppression is bolstered by their extremism. So...it's a gamble. Sometimes (The Battle of Cable Street is an example) it pays off, and sometimes it doesn't. Violent resistance is one tool among many, but I'd suggest that its potential costs mean that we should always be at least wary of employing it.
posted by howfar at 11:48 AM on February 28, 2016 [4 favorites]

primethyme: "Orange County is a big place, and I promise you there are plenty of us here who aren't racist, don't support the KKK, and aren't even conservative. Plenty. I don't know anyone in my circle of friends here who would be anywhere near supporting this kind of garbage. Please don't tar us all with the same brush..."

I really don't think there's much danger of Orange County getting a reputation for being wall-to-wall racists. There's more danger of people forgetting - or never being aware - that Orange County, like a lot of unexpected places in the US, has a long and unfortunate history tied up with racist institutions.

I mean - I'm from Colorado, a great state that I love full of very good people. But there is plenty of racism in Colorado, and it has a long history there too: the KKK was basically in full control of Colorado politics from 1920 to 1940. They never taught me that in Colorado History class when I was a kid, so I think it's good to point it out so we don't forget it.
posted by koeselitz at 11:48 AM on February 28, 2016 [18 favorites]

You're not wrong, Walter.
posted by cjorgensen at 11:49 AM on February 28, 2016 [2 favorites]

Did he turn everything into rainbows and unicorns? No. But he knew that was never gonna happen in his lifetime. He knew the struggle for racial justice would be a long, hard slog, and I don't think he'd be surprised at all to find that it's still a struggle today.

But the dude won an awful lot of victories where the other approach plainly wouldn't have worked at all.

MLK advocated the nonviolent approach not only for philosophical reasons but because he felt the only way for Black people to demonstrate their plight to Whites was if Whites saw the brutality of Jim Crow laid out on the line, with non-resisting Black people being beaten by violent mobs. It was political expedience.

The #1 challenge to White supremacy, housing integration, only occurred after riots scared politicians shitless: first the 1967 riots prompted the Kerner Commission, and then the 1968 post-assassination riots prompted politicians to actually take the Kerner Report seriously.

The idea that the Civil Rights Movement made its strides solely through non-violence and kum-ba-yah is one that tends to be perpetuated in public school history classes that prefer to reduce the message of the movement and its messy, complicated, brilliant history to the worship of a few figureheads and some lessons about staying quiet.
posted by Anonymous at 11:52 AM on February 28, 2016

There were only about 5-6 kkklucksters there. Latinos from my Cali connections boasted they took out the rally. One kkk guy got left behind in the rout and was mauled. Small, nasty confrontation on both sides. But, the racist side is nasty, right up front, some things in their personal histories make it impossible for them to learn from history.
posted by Oyéah at 12:00 PM on February 28, 2016 [1 favorite]

I love these F*CK THE KKK signs. Like someone really hates the KKK but was concerned that their unexpurgated message might offend someone, so they censored it!

My theory on the signs: it was a way to help ensure the media would show them. If the signs said "FUCK THE KKK" the media would have blurred it out.
posted by el io at 12:01 PM on February 28, 2016 [15 favorites]

Violent resistance is one tool among many, but I'd suggest that its potential costs mean that we should always be at least wary of employing it.

This is the reason I get uneasy about it. It's not like I don't understand the impulse to beat the shit out of someone who is a raging racist asshole. God knows they deserve it for saying and doing the things they do. God knows they have been violent and murderous.

But from a strategic side, it often serves as an excuse for the authorities to clamp down hard and for people who might be allies to look away. It can end up derailing or delaying change.

But then sometimes the threat of riots is the only effective way to make changes happen.

The trick is to walk that razor-thin line and decide what sacrifices to make and when and there's no way to ever be sure what is right to do in the long run. You don't want to be stuck forever but you also don't want to descend into widespread civil unrest that's going to kill lots of people.
posted by emjaybee at 12:10 PM on February 28, 2016 [4 favorites]

To add some more context to the situation in Anaheim-- I dated someone who lived/worked in the area during undergrad and after. She's Latina. We were discussing places to live in the Southland and she ruled Anaheim out right away -- said it was mostly controlled by white politicians and businessmen, despite the large number of Latinos who live there. She said that she never felt comfortable in Anaheim going to stores in the "nicer" part, and that it was really clear that the store owners wanted her out. Moreover, she said the police in Anaheim were known to shoot/kill/beat up Latinos in the area and that was another reason that she tried to avoid it.

It looks like the ACLU actually is suing the city under the Voting Rights Act because of a history of bad election practices that disenfranchise Latinos.
posted by wuwei at 12:20 PM on February 28, 2016 [7 favorites]

Somehow it's fitting that this is the home of Disneyland.
posted by Lyme Drop at 12:36 PM on February 28, 2016

Eh. If they were really trying to get clever with the sign, I think "FKKK the KKK" is probably funnier.

That said, the image of the KKK guy using an American Flag to stab counter-demonstrators is just about the best possible metaphor for racial violence these days.
posted by Archelaus at 1:00 PM on February 28, 2016 [1 favorite]

Except it was in self-defense from getting curb stomped by violent anti-racists. That complicates the metaphor.
posted by jpe at 1:07 PM on February 28, 2016 [1 favorite]

Great photography. The defeated looks on the faces of the klansters, the unbridled rage of the protesters; this one seems to capture it all. Particularly in light of the next three, where you see it's likely the blood of the Latino guy in the leather punk jacket, stabbed by the flagpole.

It says a lot about where we are politically that the name of the Republican frontrunner can be used as a racist epithet and implicit threat. While I fear the cycle of increasing reciprocal violence (the looks on the faces of some of the attacking protesters in those photos!), I can't see how standing meek in the face of increased racist rhetoric and violence helps us as a society.
posted by Existential Dread at 1:19 PM on February 28, 2016 [1 favorite]

Yeah, how would letting protesters protest without violently suppressing it help anything?
posted by jpe at 1:27 PM on February 28, 2016

I knew some folks who, along with others, protested the yearly neo nazi march in Phoenix one year by dressing as clowns. It was a much better way to protest them than trying to incite violence. (The police were also out in force to protect the racists, but that's Maricopa county for you.)
posted by Catblack at 1:28 PM on February 28, 2016 [1 favorite]

edit: isn't this the logic behind the second amendment?

The lack of guns was the first thing I noticed in the photos. I was really surprised that none of the Klan guys was carrying, or a counter-protester might have been armed. Instead it was a knife or two, some sticks, and fists. Even the photos of the police facing off with people show the police using batons only, rather than pulling their guns.

In that one respect, this is a delightfully civilized and European-style moment of political theater, rather than the usual US bloodbath.
posted by Dip Flash at 1:38 PM on February 28, 2016 [6 favorites]

Is there a political or sociological theory about using violence against people who are predominantly violent? It's the KKK for fucks sake.

Is there a theory that our emotional responses have to be as morally correct as our actions? I have no problem feeling a bit of satisfaction that KKKers got their asses kicked, without being proud of that feeling, or evening wanting a different outcome than that the people stabbing KKKers go to jail. From where comes this pressure to not only act rightly but to feel rightly too?

I'm okay letting some dark and unworthy thoughts have a moment in my head. Doing so doesn't sanction them or guide me, and I have no problem dismissing them as such. It's been a helpful stress reliever over time.
posted by fatbird at 1:40 PM on February 28, 2016

Please don't tar us all with the same brush...

Yeah, I grew up in Orange County, and while it is a cultured and multi-cultural place in many ways, it has been a hotbed of racism since it's early beginnings.

The term "behind the Orange Curtain" exists for a reason, because much of it's initial success as fast growing bedroom community suburb in the late 60s and early 70s was directly related to the white flight from LA after the Watts Riots.

Even in the early 1990s when I was in high school the student body was very rigidly divided by race and class, and white kids mainly didn't hang out with Latin or African-American kids at all, and vice versa.

There were even a number of full on police-fueled race riots on high school campuses during my years in HS, at my own campus, most of the campuses in my district and in local districts all over OC.

And racist/fascist Nazi skinheads were a huge thing in the OC music/punk scene. Fights between racists and anti-racists at punk and ska shows were common. I've unfortunately seen knife fights, bottlings and even a curb stomping.

There's a reason why I (naively) claimed SHARP and Two Tone as a young adult. I actually got randomly shot at once* for sporting checkerboards and Two Tone ska regalia by some nazi punks behind "Old World Village" where the Nazi skinheads liked to hang out because, duh, it looked like Germany and they were tolerated there for some insane reason.

(*cheap pea-shooter of a 22, at a distance, running down rail road tracks, and thankfully they were drunk, so it wasn't that much danger.)

But Orange County as a whole has been very, very racist for much of its history as a county, all the way back to Spanish Colonialism, Manifest Destiny and even the Irvine Company and agricultural history.
posted by loquacious at 1:47 PM on February 28, 2016 [16 favorites]

un petit cadeau: "Does anyone know what document the "Exalted Cyclops" has around his neck in this photo?

Triage tag"

Is it weird I don't work in emergency medicine, but have a triage app on my tablet?
posted by Samizdata at 1:53 PM on February 28, 2016

In that one respect, this is a delightfully civilized and European-style moment of political theater, rather than the usual US bloodbath.

Also, it's cool to see some punks back in the anti-racist action. Reminds me of high school.
posted by Existential Dread at 2:03 PM on February 28, 2016 [3 favorites]

Yeah, beating people for speech sure is cool.

Your mature, fascist perspective is so needed these days.
posted by jpe at 2:04 PM on February 28, 2016 [2 favorites]

I actually got randomly shot at once* for sporting checkerboards and Two Tone ska regalia by some nazi punks behind "Old World Village" where the Nazi skinheads liked to hang out because, duh, it looked like Germany and they were tolerated there for some insane reason.

(*cheap pea-shooter of a 22, at a distance, running down rail road tracks, and thankfully they were drunk, so it wasn't that much danger.)

This kind of thing makes America sound like a freaking sci-fi dystopia to outsiders.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 2:06 PM on February 28, 2016 [16 favorites]

Gotta say, long-haired brown guy getting stabbed in the side with a spear would be considered an over-the-top Christ analogy if it showed up in a TV show.
posted by emjaybee at 2:06 PM on February 28, 2016 [4 favorites]

Yeah, how would letting protesters protest without violently suppressing it help anything?

If they were dressed normally and carrying placards saying things like "Repeal the Civil Rights Act" or "Go Back To Africa," I would say that letting them look like idiots was the appropriate reaction.

But they are marching through the street making a show of force that is a direct implicit threat of lynching. There is a very real danger to not violently suppressing it, which is that they feel they have enough support and power in the community to carry out their threat.
posted by 256 at 2:13 PM on February 28, 2016 [6 favorites]

I think something has changed in the past couple of years.

As I've said elsewhere here, it has long been the custom in MPLS that when the Klan or skinheads or neo-nazis try to show up, we run them out of town using as much or as little force as necessary. I have never been to a protest of this nature here that has needed violence - even on those rare occasions when we didn't outnumber them twenty or thirty to one, it's been easy enough to shout them down, stare them down or just make fun of them until they pack up. Before I got here, in the early nineties, there were some famous street fights (or famous in activist circles, anyway) that resulted in neo-nazi protesters getting beat up.

Basically, it always seemed that the white supremacists were not only pathetic in their beliefs, but pathetic as individuals - cowardly, bad planners, no organizing skills. And fundamentally, they had no real desire to do violence; they just wanted to posture. I never saw any of these situations where anyone was armed with anything besides maybe a baseball bat, and I frankly can only think of one time where I seem to recall those.

Then we had those shootings by those racists from the reddit chatroom at the Black Lives Matter protest last year. Those guys obviously weren't the most skilled, best planners ever - the whole thing was pretty dumb, which was part of what was so scary - but they actually had guns, they had some minimal planning skills and - unlike almost all the other neo-nazis I've ever seen - they came from money.

That's different.

I think things may be shifting to the point where using violence against the white supremacists is going to be a lot more dangerous and a lot more unwise. It's one thing where we're basically talking nothing worse than a lot of posturing or a fistfight, but I keep thinking of the Greenboro Massacre.

My main concern about it isn't principle - white supremacists are a cancer on the social body and I'm not upset if they get cut out - but winning. The thing about these people is that they are nasty but also stupid, so you can't rely on them to think "hm, shooting someone probably isn't the most convenient way to achieve my aims". They're nasty, stupid, inflamed by Trump and his ilk, they have access to weapons - unless you're ready to confront them with violence and know you will beat them - and then face the legal consequences, which will be severe because a state that doesn't care if a neo-nazi hurts you will care very much for the wellbeing of that neo-nazi - you have to find another way.
posted by Frowner at 2:14 PM on February 28, 2016 [11 favorites]

jpe your comment presupposes that such "speech" that amounts to provocation and intimidation by a terrorist group infamous for violence is not in itsself a violent act. You may very well disagree with this perspective but to suggest that anyone who thinks otherwise is a fascist is over the top.
posted by mikek at 2:14 PM on February 28, 2016 [10 favorites]

But they are marching through the street making a show of force

Wait, lawfully marching is now a "show of force" that justifies a violent crackdown?
posted by jpe at 2:16 PM on February 28, 2016 [1 favorite]

your comment presupposes that such "speech" that amounts to provocation and intimidation

No. I think - gasp! - that speech and lawful protest should be protected, whether from the state or violent scumbags.
posted by jpe at 2:19 PM on February 28, 2016

Wait, lawfully marching is now a "show of force" that justifies a violent crackdown?

In Klan uniforms? I'd argue probably yes.
posted by 256 at 2:22 PM on February 28, 2016 [6 favorites]

Sure! Let's give them the same tiny, fence enclosed, away from the intended targets Free Speech Zone the people speaking against the RNC convention in NY got
posted by Slackermagee at 2:23 PM on February 28, 2016 [12 favorites]

So we can violently suppress marches when we're scared by clothes?

Good lord.
posted by jpe at 2:23 PM on February 28, 2016 [2 favorites]

Sure! Let's give them the same tiny, fence enclosed, away from the intended targets Free Speech Zone the people speaking against the RNC convention in NY got

Fine. Do you see how that's different from "let's try to kill them"?
posted by jpe at 2:24 PM on February 28, 2016

At what point is violence "okay"?

When it is violence that white people can imagine ourselves doing.
posted by Pope Guilty at 2:25 PM on February 28, 2016

That's a perfectly defensible point of view, I happen to disagree somewhat, although I'm not interested in arguing it out here. My point is that you're being rather hyperbolic and uncharitable to those who have a different point of view.
posted by mikek at 2:26 PM on February 28, 2016 [1 favorite]

My family moved to OC from Los Angeles when I was a teen, and promptly got introduced to the local white supremacists when one of them wrote "Jews get out" on our driveway. ("Yeah, there are skinheads around here," said the cop.) At least some of the obvious racial tensions were exacerbated by what was, at least thirty years ago, a really pronounced insularity: most of my fellow schoolmates had never visited Los Angeles for any reason other than to go to LAX, and regarded it as a city from an entirely different planet.
posted by thomas j wise at 2:27 PM on February 28, 2016 [1 favorite]

I tend to be uncharitable to those that support violence against free speech.
posted by jpe at 2:27 PM on February 28, 2016

Or: I'm not charitable to fascists.
posted by jpe at 2:28 PM on February 28, 2016

So we can violently suppress marches when we're scared by clothes?

Marching as a paramilitary terrorist organization (and the Klan has never been otherwise) is not content-free speech that does nothing. It is a show of force and intimidation. It is a threat.

Sometimes I am confused as to why free speech types think speech is so important to defend, since they tend to downplay its potence. Speech is a verb. To speak is to act. And when your speech is a violent threat (as all expressions of white supremacy are), to defend it is to attack those who have been threatened.
posted by Pope Guilty at 2:28 PM on February 28, 2016 [31 favorites]

I have kind of a weird position on this - I understand how individual protesters/antifa may have felt it was appropriate to use violence against the KKK, and I don't hate or dislike or think they're WrongBad for doing so. At the same time, I hope the police still arrest them for assault - because I'm not comfortable with the state deciding who "deserves" stabbing and who doesn't.
posted by corb at 2:37 PM on February 28, 2016 [6 favorites]

Several comments deleted; jpe, do not call other mefites fascists.
posted by Eyebrows McGee (staff) at 2:38 PM on February 28, 2016 [5 favorites]

jpe: would you mock someone who reacted violently to someone else saying "I am going to kill you" for being afraid of words?
posted by 256 at 2:47 PM on February 28, 2016 [2 favorites]

I hate Anaheim Nazis.
posted by persona au gratin at 3:06 PM on February 28, 2016 [8 favorites]

I know an Asian woman married to a Latino guy, both of whom live in Anaheim. They're very aware of the racist element around there. It comes up in messages left ln mailboxes and on doors, and in things said to children.
posted by persona au gratin at 3:10 PM on February 28, 2016

jpe is being very uncharitable, but he has a point. Free speech sucks, but its also important. And there are exceptions, but again, I think we want them all read very narrowly. Because anytime someone has something important to say, there are going to be other people who think that even saying it is dangerous. I don't know what all happened yesterday in Anaheim, but if the Klan was just spouting off bullshit ideas, I cannot agree that the right approach is to beat them until they stop thinking that way.
posted by rtimmel at 3:14 PM on February 28, 2016 [1 favorite]

wuwei: it's still controlled by white people. Latino groups are bringing a VRA suit to try to get even a modicum of nonwhite representation.
posted by persona au gratin at 3:17 PM on February 28, 2016

I don't know what all happened yesterday in Anaheim, but if the Klan was just spouting off bullshit ideas, I cannot agree that the right approach is to beat them until they stop thinking that way.

Okay, two things.

spouting bullshit ideas

This isn't about ideas. People like to talk about speech like it's meaningless and nothing on its own and its own category of action which isn't really an action at all, but organizing to strip people of their human rights is not "spouting bullshit ideas", as if making a show of force and intimidation was just a group of people peacefully making a contribution to the national discourse which we all must interrogate and think critically about. Violent white supremacists marching and spreading the ideology of white supremacist violence are are doing white supremacist violence, inciting white supremacist violence, working to normalize white supremacist violence. The idea that the only acceptable response is "I disagree! Not that thing!" as if this discourse existed purely in the realm of ideas unconnected to everyday life is absurd.

stop thinking that way

The point of antifa violence isn't to bash their brains into a shape that will think differently. There's a variety of objectives, but the popular ones include

Putting a price on white supremacist organizing
Showing in the clearest way that violent white supremacy isn't tolerated or supported
Disrupting the image of strength that fascist organizing trades on

posted by Pope Guilty at 3:33 PM on February 28, 2016 [31 favorites]

And "putting a price on white supremacist violence" is precisely why you should only act when you can win. There was a protest outstate a few years ago now against some neo-nazis, and it was a terrible mess, and the people who went down there to mix it up with the fascists lost, and it left everyone in a much worse position - much worse. I hate to think of it even now. When you fight and lose, you've shown the limit of your strength.

I wonder what it will take for people to get that words have effects (as Pope Guilty is pointing out). The open white supremacy that has become respectable in this country in the past few years has become respectable precisely because small incidents of white supremacy have not been shut down. When I was a teen or even in my twenties, the idea that we'd have a serious major party presidential candidate who refused, in the national media, to condemn neo-nazi violence - that just couldn't happen. No matter what a shitty human he might be, no matter how far to the right, it wouldn't happen. It happens now because millions of little white supremacist words have been spoken and it's been normalized, like being an avowed racist is just another political position.

Consider too how it seemed, back in the early 2000s or the nineties that the far right was against abortion, but not against birth control. That would be stupid, right? Just because they didn't want to give teens condoms didn't mean they'd actively want grown women not to be able to get the pill. That was just ridiculous. The people who said that it would be abortion first and birth control later were considered to have read Handmaid's Tale a few too many times. And yet here we are.

Each time these people march and aren't shut down, they are making white supremacy a normal and respectable political position. Being in the Klan should be a career-ender. It should be something so reviled and hated that you wouldn't be able to stay in town. Let's not forget that the Klan is an organization with a history of torturing and murdering people of color, dissidents, race-mixers and queers. If you join a group with that history, you're joining it because that history appeals to you. What level of hate crimes and pervasive violence does it take before we stop seeing the Klan as some kind of political equivalent to a businessman's association or some other pedestrian conservative project?

Also, free speech is a constructed thing. It's never an absolute - we have plenty of law that places limits on speech.
posted by Frowner at 3:55 PM on February 28, 2016 [24 favorites]

People who think the KKK was being peaceful need to look at the photos again. Dude that got stabbed and was bleeding all over the sidewalk wasn't KKK - and that happened before any of the other violence. I think it's remarkably charitable to the KKK to ignore photo evidence to the contrary and insist that they were just peaceable protesters not lashing out. All the evidence suggests that they're the ones who brought the knife - and given the fact that at least three of the KKK guys appear to have gotten arrested (which is what, half of them?) the police seem to agree.
posted by koeselitz at 3:58 PM on February 28, 2016 [3 favorites]

There seems to be some confusion in this thread.

The KKK guys stabbed the protesters, not the other way around.
posted by Sys Rq at 4:01 PM on February 28, 2016 [8 favorites]

What if my goal is to make it really loud and fucking clear that they are not at all welcome in my neighborhood?

If the Klan were beating you to make it clear you're not welcome in their neighborhood that would be cool then? Like it or not they have every right to be in your neighborhood just as you do in theirs.
posted by MikeMc at 4:01 PM on February 28, 2016 [1 favorite]

That's a pretty huge false equivalency. It's not like these Klansmen came to do some shopping.
posted by Sys Rq at 4:04 PM on February 28, 2016 [6 favorites]

The operative question seems to be - if the Klan was stabbing people in your neighborhood, would it be fair play to fight back?
posted by koeselitz at 4:04 PM on February 28, 2016 [3 favorites]

If the Klan were beating you to make it clear you're not welcome in their neighborhood that would be cool then? Like it or not they have every right to be in your neighborhood just as you do in theirs.

You understand, right, that you're inside the liberal state frame when you make this arugment?
posted by wuwei at 4:06 PM on February 28, 2016

The operative question seems to be - if the Klan was stabbing people in your neighborhood, would it be fair play to fight back?

No, no, POC must act as perfect angels, and only turn the other cheek as white dudes go about their unfettered business of white-dudeness. To do anything other than that is fascism.
posted by Gyre,Gimble,Wabe, Esq. at 4:07 PM on February 28, 2016 [12 favorites]

The point of antifa violence isn't to bash their brains into a shape that will think differently.

It's to get your rocks off beating people up. "Antifa", what a joke. A violent thug by any other name...
posted by MikeMc at 4:07 PM on February 28, 2016 [1 favorite]

That's a pretty huge false equivalency. It's not like these Klansmen came to do some shopping.

It doesn't matter what they're doing as long as they stay within the confines of the law.
posted by MikeMc at 4:09 PM on February 28, 2016 [1 favorite]

Is stabbing people within the confines of the law? The Klan guys got arrested, if that helps you sort this out.
posted by koeselitz at 4:10 PM on February 28, 2016 [10 favorites]

It doesn't matter what they're doing as long as they stay within the confines of the law.

So maybe fix the law?
posted by Sys Rq at 4:10 PM on February 28, 2016

I don't exactly know what all happened in Anaheim and wasn't really commenting on that. But when we, as the good guys, starting saying that words are powerful and so must be controlled and shut down (as Frowner does), or start listing as Pope Guilty does three objectives of violence that , if the words "white supremacist" was replaced with "civil rights worker" looks exactly like the game plan in Mississippi in the early 1960's, I get worried. The Klan sucks on every level, but being the good guys is supposed to mean something.
posted by rtimmel at 4:16 PM on February 28, 2016 [3 favorites]

This thread.
posted by swift at 4:16 PM on February 28, 2016 [3 favorites]

being the good guys is supposed to mean something

Not being an armed racist paramilitary terrorist organization parading down a residential street like you own the place would probably be a good start.
posted by Sys Rq at 4:22 PM on February 28, 2016 [6 favorites]

I cannot agree that the right approach is to beat them until they stop thinking that way.

Who said anything about changing their thinking? If you're in the KKK I'm pretty sure that's pretty low on the priority list anyway.
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 4:31 PM on February 28, 2016 [1 favorite]

rtimmel: "I don't exactly know what all happened in Anaheim and wasn't really commenting on that. But when we, as the good guys, starting saying that words are powerful and so must be controlled and shut down (as Frowner does), or start listing as Pope Guilty does three objectives of violence that , if the words 'white supremacist' was replaced with 'civil rights worker' looks exactly like the game plan in Mississippi in the early 1960's, I get worried."

I totally get that, as a pure exercise, if we posited a group of people who espoused violent racist rhetoric without ever once acting on that rhetoric, it would seem fair to let them do that, without any response beyond a quiet refutation, because we value free speech.

And it would be awesome if we lived in a world where pure free speech were a thing we could talk about.

But - if you're made uncomfortable by Pope Guilty's list, note that all three are predicated on stopping, not speech, but actual violence. Because that's what we're dealing with here - actual violence. I don't want to speak for Frowner, but I think a large part of her point is that this doesn't happen in a vacuum; violent racist rhetoric is accompanied by violence every single time. So we need to stop mouthing encomiums about letting people exercise their speech, and be prepared to defend our lives and the lives of those we value. This threat isn't chimerical; women and people of color are dying every day at the hands of racist and sexist goons, and there is no time too soon to try to stop it.

I know you were speaking in the abstract, but this case in Anaheim was a great example. We didn't have to wait for the white supremacist goons to get violent. It happened. I for one am proud of the people who were there to defend themselves and their neighbors who were at risk. We can't speak about these things anymore without accepting that violence is not only likely but inevitable.

And it might help to start by recognizing that, just as we recognize and criminalize concrete threats against (well, white) individuals (which are called assault and banned in the United States) concrete threats against minority groups are similarly dangerous and unworthy of government protection. Particularly since such threats are obviously rarely idle.
posted by koeselitz at 4:33 PM on February 28, 2016 [4 favorites]

It's not about changing their thinking it's about deterring them from coming into Anaheim and continuing the harassment of people of color and leftists.
posted by wuwei at 4:33 PM on February 28, 2016 [1 favorite]

Meanwhile, in Indiana: 3 young Muslim Americans killed in mysterious 'execution-style' murders

Days After 3 Young Muslim Americans Shot ‘Execution Style,’ Indiana Governor Still Silent
posted by homunculus at 4:34 PM on February 28, 2016 [1 favorite]

But when we, as the good guys, starting saying that words are powerful and so must be controlled and shut down (as Frowner does), or start listing as Pope Guilty does three objectives of violence that , if the words "white supremacist" was replaced with "civil rights worker" looks exactly like the game plan in Mississippi in the early 1960's, I get worried.

"White supremacist" and "civil rights worker" are not morally interchangeable and the idea that your reaction to a situation must be the same no matter what that situation and its context are is silly. Moral consistency does not mandate a refusal to evaluate reality.
posted by Pope Guilty at 4:42 PM on February 28, 2016 [19 favorites]

I don't know Pope, I respect you but I think we just disagree on this point. I think you really have to pay attention to how you treat those that you think are repugnant. If things like free speech are ever destroyed, it's going to happen against those that are saying horrible things, not those we we respectfully disagree with. Look at the Apple/DOJ kerfuffle - it only comes to a head when there is a very bad guy involved.

I have also been thinking and a lot of it may be a difference in how we see the KKK these days. I'm probably one of the older people here, and the Klan I grew up with was very different than the Klan today. The Klan I grew up with did not march in parks on Saturday afternoon -- they marched down the street on Tuesday night right to your door, pulled you out of your house and and hung you from a tree and lit you on fire. All knowing full well that no one would do a thing about it, either out of agreement or fear. The Klan these days is barely a shadow of that, they seem like a tiny bunch of pathetic nobody's just hoping something happens so people will pay attention to them again. That's not to say that I think racism is any less prevalent, its just more insidious and the KKK is just not central to it. And so they don't bother me in the same way they bother you.
posted by rtimmel at 5:15 PM on February 28, 2016 [3 favorites]

"Cicero, which is the first Chicago suburb over the western border, was historically the home to the headquarters of the American Nazi party."

Precisely because of its juxtaposition to (the entirely different) west side of Chicago.

In my original comment I was making with the joking, but, seriously, is there a Klan-free state in the union?
posted by Chitownfats at 5:24 PM on February 28, 2016

I guess the difference is that I don't think that those days are actually gone, just resting. I see Donald Trump giving legitimacy to fascist garbage on the national stage, and I think that's going to legitimize the sort of violence you're talking about, especially with him refusing to condemn violence not only against protestors but simply against random Latinos. I view the violent suppression of the street-level organizing as one of the things necessary (alongside the national campaign against trump) to ensure those days don't come back. I view the semi-regular demonstration that the Klan and those like them aren't a powerful, invincible force which acts with impunity as part of what keeps it down. Their ability to recruit based on their desired image of strength is damaged by being beaten down.
posted by Pope Guilty at 5:26 PM on February 28, 2016 [2 favorites]

is there a Klan-free state in the union?

SLPC doesn't list any hate groups at all in Hawaii.
posted by hippybear at 5:33 PM on February 28, 2016 [1 favorite]

I knew some folks who, along with others, protested the yearly neo nazi march in Phoenix one year by dressing as clowns...

... the one thing more hated and feared than nazis. Genius!
posted by um at 5:36 PM on February 28, 2016 [1 favorite]

This tendency toward total moral relativism about free speech is...really weird, to say the very least. Free speech is an enlightenment value that became codified into law as an exercise of value made tangible, not just a rule that floats around independent of other rules. It's not a foundational proposition, it's a example of a result from the foundational principle.

Free speech exists in a world of people functioning as rational agents, making important moral distinctions about the world. Limiting the representation of these moral decisions is a very bad thing, especially when a government does it to the citizenry in a social contract. The State just doesn't have the perspective on whether is is a Good Thing that the citizenry has, because the State has to defend it's own interests in the concrete and the citizen's in the abstract. When shit gets a little too abstracted away from what we consider to be good as rational actors who have the capacity to self determine what our virtues are, clearly my ability to communicate about my Good is very important. When the concept of the Good is rooted in some abstract garbage about race or ancestry or economic power, and then is manifested as power over Others that has no relationship to the complex intellectual process of self-determination..that is actually not Good at all, the beings attempting to seize this irrational power are fucking up in clearly identifiable ways, and they functionally never actually had the right to spew their nonsense around.

Telling the KKK that they have no fucking right to say things are morally right when there is literally no rational ethical basis for their claims is essentially defending what speech actually is. Speech is the manifestation of a rational being's agency. What the KKK does is so inconsistent with the purpose of the social contract that they're not speaking, they're assaulting.
posted by zinful at 5:41 PM on February 28, 2016 [1 favorite]

Everyone crying about MLK and the BLM movement debasing themselves by becoming violent, please look at the actual photographs and raw footage of this event, and stop making false equivalences about the kinds of violence that went down here. A more accurate headline would be "Three people stabbed by the KKK at Anaheim rally." One speared by the fucking American flag, two others by the knives we see the police handling in that photoset. You also may want to consider that the Klansman that the young kid in skinny jeans punched in the face is almost certainly old enough to have participated in the murders and beatings rtimmel remembers. I'm guessing that young black man has some family memories of the same kind of KKK activity as well.

Please let's not get it twisted, these men might look old and pathetic, but they are not wide eyed innocents trying to exercise their freedom of speech and indulging in abstract ideas of racism. They are weathered members of a gang/domestic terrorist organization. They have a violent history and committed near-deadly violence at the rally in Anaheim. They came armed and prepared to commit the same kind of physical assault on POC they have been participating in for many, many years. You are all looking at photographic evidence of these old white KKK members stabbing three young black and brown men and shaking your heads about what a shame it is that the BLM movement has lowered itself to violence. Please. This kind of prim concern trolling is sick and shameful.
posted by moonlight on vermont at 5:44 PM on February 28, 2016 [49 favorites]

Or the short version: People can in fact be SO WRONG that their right to share that wrong doesn't apply, and we can actually rationally evaluate whether they're wrong. Being relativistic about this ("Well, they'd say YOU'RE wrong!") doesn't scan, because my ethical argument is actually coherent and has a basis in personhood as agency, whereas their definition of personhood/citizenry is based in arbitrary empirical things that have nothing to do with the ability to speak, act, live, believe, or make ethical claims.
posted by zinful at 5:45 PM on February 28, 2016

zinful: “This tendency toward total moral relativism about free speech is...”

... no such thing. Please read the comments you appear to be responding to.
posted by koeselitz at 5:54 PM on February 28, 2016

What the KKK does is so inconsistent with the purpose of the social contract that they're not speaking, they're assaulting.

I don't think this needs to even get into the semantics of ethics at all, it's just a practical description of what is happening when a violent organization makes a public appearance like this in any neighborhood full of people they have a historic conflict with. AFAIK, gangs making a show of strength in their colors to claim a neighborhood as their turf is NOT legally considered free speech. The KKK is essentially doing the same thing-- a physical show of claiming this neighborhood as a place they can operate (ie, target POC) with impunity.
posted by moonlight on vermont at 5:54 PM on February 28, 2016 [2 favorites]

For me, it has less to do with whether the Klan has moral equivalency or whatever the fuck, and more to do with "how comfortable are we allowing the state to decide that once they believe a group a terrible one, it's okay to let other people beat them?"

Because that's where the rubber meets the road. If you're on top, culturally, are you willing to bet it will always be that way? Because income inequality shit is in vogue now, are you willing to bet that no cops, anywhere, would just love to find a precedent to let future Pinkerton equivalents beat you?

The laws and standards we create or tolerate will not just be applied to those we create them for. Eventually, they will come around on us. And I, for one, would like to be able to protest the Trumpocalypse that now seems likely for the next few years without being dragged away by his brown shirts while the police stand idly by.
posted by corb at 5:55 PM on February 28, 2016 [3 favorites]

Actually, I agree about that bit about how what the KKK does isn't speaking anymore, but assaulting, so maybe I've misunderstood what you were saying, zinful.
posted by koeselitz at 5:56 PM on February 28, 2016 [1 favorite]

Also on a less moral high ground note, the biggest and most proud UP THE PUNX to that crust punk kid kicking the shit out of the Grand Dragon.

I'm sure crust punk, the skinny jeans boxer, and that very epic black guy striding along with a 2x4 are going to be facing criminal charges, as well as the three guys who got stabbed. Does anyone know if there's a legal fund for them going up anywhere?
posted by moonlight on vermont at 6:04 PM on February 28, 2016 [4 favorites]

corb: “For me, it has less to do with whether the Klan has moral equivalency or whatever the fuck, and more to do with ‘how comfortable are we allowing the state to decide that once they believe a group a terrible one, it's okay to let other people beat them?’

Oh, I don't know about all that. In my reading, this was never about a State exercise of power; this conversation started because some people looked at these photos where a KKK member stabbed someone in the street, and people of color responded with defensive violence, and wondered if maybe it's better for people to be non-violent in their protests of the KKK. That's what we're generally taught – that non-violence should be the response of the oppressed in every case – but on my end it seems fair enough to say: yes, when the KKK is stabbing people in the street, it's okay for you to punch them in the face, particularly if the cops were slow to show up or are slow to protect people who need protecting.

And in a general sense, that holds. It'd be cool if we could all live in a society where, no matter how violent the rhetoric people use, at least they can be counted on to be peaceable. But that society doesn't exist; at the very least, it isn't our society.

So: when white supremacists hold rallies specifically and explicitly in support of their white supremacist ideals, people need to be there who are willing to protect themselves and each other against the violence which is inevitably going to happen. I don't think the state will do that. If anything, the state is likely to be on the other side.
posted by koeselitz at 6:05 PM on February 28, 2016 [9 favorites]

And I, for one, would like to be able to protest the Trumpocalypse that now seems likely for the next few years without being dragged away by his brown shirts while the police stand idly by.

Thing is, you can already be dragged away while peacefully protesting. And that will likely be by the cops (in Chicago, particularly) rather than some extrajudicial brownshirts.

These Klan guys aren't just some "up with white people" shitstirrers. They're the face of a domestic terrorist organization that has been perpetrating violence against PoC for well over a century. They have committed countless atrocities, and they have wanted people to know that it was them. They are committing a terrorist act by showing up, armed, in a display of force.

I don't agree the counter-protesters owed the Klan a nonviolent protest when they were likely to be assaulted in return. From the photos, it's not clear who started the fighting, but the Klan were certainly no peaceful protesters. Once the cops showed up, they showed remarkable restraint, and afforded the Klan more respect than e.g. the protesters in Ferguson received. I think that's progress, at least.
posted by Existential Dread at 6:17 PM on February 28, 2016 [6 favorites]

Frowner, you rule.

We do as a culture decide that some speech is Too Fucked Up To Be Allowed, and when there are reasons for this based in articulations of rights and virtues and citizenship and agency, we call those legitimate limitations. If speech is limited because we don't like how you talk or where you're from, that fundamentally undermines the whole point. The KKK does not have the right to wander around threatening people with their frankly evil claims and history. What they do is not really speech at all, since freedom of speech contains within it the assumption that you're not actually harming anyone but instead expressing your agency as a person.

When the State itself is a racist, ableist, classist, sexist shitshow, we reserve the right to tell the State it's failing just like if other citizens are being exclusionary about basic civil rights. Trying to limit my ability to be a person is not supported by the right to speech in this country! Saying "but what if it happens to youuuuuu?" is really well articulated by Frowner above this comment--the society we live in does do this and unfairly! But we know when and why it's unfair based on foundational ethical principles! The KKK and the racist cops and the fucked up judiciary system that's weighted against the defendant in certain types of crime all feed into a dehumanization that's Wrong for the same reasons, and stopping those things from happening is Right based on the exact same principles that make Free Speech an important value.

This is why thinking in terms of abstract values and social contracts and ethics has to do with the everyday garbage of being stabbed by a fucking racist douchebag during a protest. Actions taken to prevent certain types of speech acts are measurable against the abstract value we place on Speech itself. Speech for the purpose of exclusion or harm based on empirical categories that have no relevance to speech or agency themselves is indefensible and needs to be vehemently resisted lest it seem to be morally equivalent to what the purpose of speech really is.

Sorry, everyone. I'm grading a ton of papers about natural virtues right now, so I'm way more excited about articulating these things than I normally am...
posted by zinful at 6:46 PM on February 28, 2016 [2 favorites]

This is because the state is not neutral. The state is right-wing, the state is racist, the state is on the side of the rich. I have been annoyed by activists and activist culture for virtually the entire time I've been doing activist stuff, but let me tell you, it isn't a patch on how I feel about the state..

Exactly. The key foundational myth for liberals is that the state is neutral, or can be made neutrali-ish, by the operation of law. This completely elides the existence of political struggle, i.e. all kinds of direct action, whether within the bounds of the law or outside it. The state is never neutral, and either we fight for what we want, or we can be sure to have another order imposed on us. Law itself, whether statutory or decisional is inherently an exercise of power and a set of negotiations between various elements of society.

When you give up the idea of the state as the neutral arbiter that exists outside of power relationships, then you realize how much the discourse of ''just wait for the law to work this out" is often a thinly veiled argument for the status quo. And when the status quo in a place like Anaheim is institutionalized white supremacy, then the argument of "just wait for the law to work this out" is equivalent to saying "just wait for white supremacists sort it out."

And white supremacists are never going to sort out the Klan. That's our job.
posted by wuwei at 6:52 PM on February 28, 2016 [10 favorites]

Hence my earlier thought about the American Flag -as a weapon- being a perfect metaphor for institutionalized racist violence.

If just reason or time was gonna sort the Klan out, it's had well over a hundred years to do so. Hell, if just -violence- was gonna sort the Klan out, again, it's had a lot of time to do it. (Recall that the military has been USED on the Klan in our history!)

I want more done, and I'm not sure what it needs to be, but "wait for the law to work this out" is definitely not an acceptable answer.
posted by Archelaus at 6:56 PM on February 28, 2016 [1 favorite]

One of the ways we can tell how power is aligned or applied is that it wasn't explicitly named that it was the KKK doing the stabbing, even though it's apparent from the photos.

Violence that aligns with social norms is normalized or hidden, violence that moves against norms is decried - this is why we don't talk at all about the people stabbed by the KKK, but we do talk about how important it is that the KKK not be the targets of violence, even in self-defense. This is how white supremacy functions.

Yes, in this conversation, you will have to explicitly say that you're not OK with the KKK stabbing protestors. There is no doubt for you to have the benefit of.
posted by the man of twists and turns at 6:57 PM on February 28, 2016 [15 favorites]

And that is my problem with the sort of hypocritical psuedopacificism that's so common in these discussions- when you're okay with the violence that underpins the state and your life and just don't even bring it up when talking about political violence, it undermines your ability to condemn political violence aimed at, say, the Klan.
posted by Pope Guilty at 7:10 PM on February 28, 2016 [3 favorites]

I think that's an unfair charge, Pope Guilty. I think a lot of us aren't okay with state violence at all, and would prefer the state not to even exist. I'm not endorsing the state when I say I would like the state as it exists to not have prejudices as though it were a person.

I don't bring up how much I hate the state in every conversation because I would prefer that people not think of anarchists as like the Crossfit or vegans of the political world - unable to shut up about their pet belief. It doesn't mean I love the state.
posted by corb at 7:21 PM on February 28, 2016

it seems fair enough to say: yes, when the KKK is stabbing people in the street, it's okay for you to punch them in the face,

Well, not to defend the guys on the disgusting side here, but is that really a fair characterization of what happened? You make it sound like the KKK jumped out of the truck and started a-stabbing. Best I can tell is the KKK was stirring shit (as they do) and a bunch of people surrounded them threatening to beat their asses, maybe pushing them around a bit. That could totally feel like a life-threatening situation (of their own making, sure) and in the heat of it, someone gets stabbed with a ~~trident~~ flagpole.

That's not exactly what I want happening in my neighborhood, despite how much the KKK richly deserves to have their asses kicked.
posted by ctmf at 9:54 PM on February 28, 2016 [1 favorite]

ctmf: “Best I can tell is the KKK was stirring shit (as they do) and a bunch of people surrounded them threatening to beat their asses, maybe pushing them around a bit. That could totally feel like a life-threatening situation (of their own making, sure) and in the heat of it, someone gets stabbed with a ~~trident~~ flagpole.”

Nah, in my reading of the photos it wasn't the flagpole-stabbing-thing that was the actual stabbing. That was apparently just a scuffle. The stabbing I meant was an actual stabbing, with an actual knife. The order of the photos might make this slightly unclear, but this blood didn't apparently come from a flagpole-stabbing but a knife-stabbing. This was the guy who got stabbed. (This guy doesn't look too good, either.) This handcuffed KKK member has blood on his hands. A cop is carrying a knife, apparently confiscated, in this photo.

However it went down, I really don't think all this damage was done by the head of a flagpole, although I admit it's hard to know exactly what happened.
posted by koeselitz at 10:11 PM on February 28, 2016 [2 favorites]

This photo shows a KKK member holding an open knife with blood on his hands.
posted by soundguy99 at 11:34 PM on February 28, 2016 [1 favorite]

Klan members realeased.

Seven people who remained in custody were seen beating, stomping and attacking the Klansmen with wooden posts, Sgt. Daron Wyatt said.

A police statement said the clash, which erupted after six Klan members arrived at a park Saturday for a planned anti-immigration rally, was started by a larger group of 10 to 20 counter-protesters who had "the intent of perpetrating violence."

Police said the Klansmen stabbed three counter-protesters with knives and the decorative end of a flag pole.

"Regardless of an individual or groups' beliefs or ideologies, they are entitled to live without the fear of physical violence and have the right, under the law, to defend themselves when attacked," the statement said.
posted by Reggie Knoble at 4:42 AM on February 29, 2016 [1 favorite]

From the photos and the story that was published in the NYTimes yesterday, my understanding (which may turn out to be incorrect as more information comes out) is that the anti-klan protestors attacked the Klan first. During those attacks, three people were stabbed by KKK members -- whether that was self-defense or not is for the police and courts to decide, but it does seem to look that way. Like I said above, it is amazing that no one was shot.

I'm not a pacifist and I think that there are things worth meeting with violence. A protest by six or eight elderly KKK relics is not one of them, and there is something particularly gross in that one photo of a young guy about to punch the old guy with the beard. Surround them with louder counter-protesters, like the Patriot Riders did when the Westboro Church was protesting at military funerals, or otherwise silence and embarrass them, but beating them with sticks is not appropriate if all they are doing is holding up signs. Offensive and awful speech is still protected and mob violence is not a good response.
posted by Dip Flash at 4:54 AM on February 29, 2016 [3 favorites]

Is there a political or sociological theory about using violence against people who are predominantly violent?

"Alternatives to Non-violent Conflict Resolution."
posted by BinGregory at 5:11 AM on February 29, 2016 [1 favorite]

Is there a political or sociological theory about using violence against people who are predominantly violent?

see just and unjust wars, maybe, although i suspect you're thinking of violence on a smaller scale.
posted by andrewcooke at 5:25 AM on February 29, 2016

On the one hand, I agree in principle that having the state declare, by electing not to prosecute people who attack group X, that group X is fair game is generally not a good idea. Generally the people the state decides its open season on are the minority groups being oppressed, not the oppressors.

That's the sort of thinking that leads to the situation in Russia where gay people are attacked by hooligans and the police stand by and watch and laugh and never arrested the attackers.

I get that argument intellectually. It makes sense and is reasonable. corb, my forebrain says, has the right of it.

On the other hand, my emotional response here is still with the counter-protesters. Yeah, it can be done non-violently, but the Klan is/was a terrorist group with a history of committing thousands of murders and hundreds of thousands of acts of torture. Why waste the effort to be non-violent on them, or so says my hindbrain. They well and truly had it coming and maybe if a few more get the snot kicked out of them they'll STFU and stay in their lairs rather than coming out and inflicting their evil on us all.

Again.

Don't forget that for a while the Klan ruled large swaths of America as a sort of old school ISIS, doling out torture and murder to anyone who violated their rules or who just looked kind of like they might. Fear of that coming back, what with Trump, Rubio, and Cruz looking like serious candidates for President, isn't entirely unreasonable. They rose once and did great harm. Why should I think they're safe now?

I think I'm in the position where I will, reluctantly and only by consciously and moment by moment overriding my emotional response, support the prosecution of those who attacked the Klansmen. But I'll also hold them up as heroes doing something necessary. They were engaging in uncivl disobedience, and perhaps as with civil disobedience that requires a willingness to break the law and accept the penalties for doing so in the name of a greater good.

So I stand, I think, with the attackers despite agreeing very reluctantly that they should be prosecuted. If I were on a jury in that trial I'm not sure I could bring myself to vote guilty. Because the Klan isn't just marching, they aren't just speaking, they're still out there plotting and scheming and attacking people and burning crosses. And that strikes fear into my heart and spurs a desire to stomp out the flames they seek to fan.
posted by sotonohito at 6:33 AM on February 29, 2016 [2 favorites]

Look, we as a society already say that certain kinds of speech are harmful and must be restricted - by the state, no less! not through just some citizens trying to push other citizens to take their speech elsewhere. We don't defend child pornography as free speech. We don't defend libel.

This argument is the same kind of sophomoric logic that gets you 'hey, sometimes you're allowed to kill people, look at war, therefore murder doesn't exist'. You can do this with any rule or crime, since all legal categorizations are socially defined. Sometimes you're allowed to take stuff, sometimes it's robbery. etc. None of that means that murder or robbery don't exist or that a society which permitted murder or robbery would be better. Likewise, the fact that sometimes speech is restricted doesn't mean that free speech isn't an extremely meaningful and valuable concept, nor that nations don't differ in how much of it they permit.

We routinely shut down speech on allegations of terrorism, often very loose allegations. Certain kinds of people can't say certain things in certain roles - if I were a teacher, for instance, I would not be able to talk about my opinions about the drug war, and in certain states I would not be able to say anything positive about homosexuality.

These examples should not make you more positive about limiting free speech.

We already do not have free speech, because we as a society agree that certain kinds of speech produce bad results - you and I may differ over which kinds of speech produce actual bad results and which kinds of speech produce results inconvenient to the state, but it's clear that our society does not actually consider total, unfettered speech a foundational right.

No, actually we do and should consider it a foundational right, and its status as a foundational right gives the only grounds we have for resisting the very considerable incursions and limitations on free speech that have existed and continue to exist in America. Various incursions on free speech in American law -- such as for example the 'material assistance to terrorism' laws that could end up penalizing you for supporting Palestinian rights -- need to be resisted, and the committment to free speech in the Constitution and in our civic values give us the material to do that. There are many areas in US law where free speech principles have a very valuable effect. For example, U.S. libel laws for example are very narrow, much more so than those of other countries, precisely because we are concerned about its impact on free speech -- a win for anyone concerned about the ability to criticize public figures.

The nihilistic logic of 'hey, sometimes the state itself wants to limit free speech, therefore we should give up on defending the principle' -- that's a great way to lose all your rights.

In terms of "the state letting people get beaten": look, this happens already. The state routinely, routinely turns its back on violence against protesters from marginalized groups, when the state itself is not actively beating them. The state routinely supports white supremacists and lets marginalized groups get injured, or selectively arrests members of marginalized groups

Once again, let's let the worst state behavior set our principles and values, so we can replicate the state's attitude toward violence in whoever we define as our ideological enemies? This is a bizarre argument both morally and practically. Also, as an aside, state violence is broad scale and doesn't just hit your allies and leave everybody else alone; there has been plenty of state violence against right-wing groups, and 70 percent of those killed by police are non-black (almost half are white non-Hispanic). The state would be more than glad to intervene in street fights between the far left and far right by turning the authoritarian screws even deeper on everyone.

The bottom line is that violence that is not absolutely necessitated by the need for self-defense is immoral, in and of itself. And hearing someone speak ideas that you find noxious does not necessitate violence. Because we are so saturated in violence in our popular culture, we have built up a powerful fantasy life around the idea of doing violent harm to our ideological enemies. Such fantasies glorify violence, which is in itself a harmful development. There is a deep contradiction between valuing universal human potential, which is what a healthy progressive politics ought to be about, while simultaneously fantasizing about drawing blood and breaking bones. The internet, which encourages people to live in fantasy, doesn't help matters.
posted by zipadee at 6:53 AM on February 29, 2016 [6 favorites]

Interesting that their new-era uniforms are not modeled after secret societies or the military, but after police.
It's always about maintaining "order" in the face of "those people," isn't it?
posted by milnews.ca at 6:56 AM on February 29, 2016 [2 favorites]

zipadee: “The bottom line is that violence that is not absolutely necessitated by the need for self-defense is immoral, in and of itself. And hearing someone speak ideas that you find noxious does not necessitate violence.”

If someone says the words 'I am going to kill you,' in a way that is convincing, is that speech or violence? If you arm yourself against someone who repeatedly tells you 'I am going to kill you' in a convincing way, and make it clear that you're willing to resort to violence if necessary, are you acting in self-defense, or are you being a belligerent agitator?
posted by koeselitz at 8:06 AM on February 29, 2016 [2 favorites]

Frowner: “Look, we as a society already say that certain kinds of speech are harmful and must be restricted - by the state, no less! not through just some citizens trying to push other citizens to take their speech elsewhere. We don't defend child pornography as free speech. We don't defend libel.”

zipadee: “This argument is the same kind of sophomoric logic that gets you 'hey, sometimes you're allowed to kill people, look at war, therefore murder doesn't exist'. You can do this with any rule or crime, since all legal categorizations are socially defined. Sometimes you're allowed to take stuff, sometimes it's robbery. etc. None of that means that murder or robbery don't exist or that a society which permitted murder or robbery would be better. Likewise, the fact that sometimes speech is restricted doesn't mean that free speech isn't an extremely meaningful and valuable concept, nor that nations don't differ in how much of it they permit.”

No, it's actually clear and correct logic. Sophomoric logic would be insisting what you're insisting here: that freedom of speech is the most absolute of all rights, that upholding freedom of speech is more important than preserving any of the other rights. This is clearly not true. None of the rights that are or ought to be guaranteed by our Constitution is an absolute; all of them are limited in some way. To believe otherwise is to sacrifice the balance in which all of them are held, and thus to threaten all the rights we enjoy.

Frowner: “We already do not have free speech, because we as a society agree that certain kinds of speech produce bad results - you and I may differ over which kinds of speech produce actual bad results and which kinds of speech produce results inconvenient to the state, but it's clear that our society does not actually consider total, unfettered speech a foundational right.”

zipadee: “No, actually we do and should consider it a foundational right, and its status as a foundational right gives the only grounds we have for resisting the very considerable incursions and limitations on free speech that have existed and continue to exist in America. Various incursions on free speech in American law -- such as for example the 'material assistance to terrorism' laws that could end up penalizing you for supporting Palestinian rights -- need to be resisted, and the committment to free speech in the Constitution and in our civic values give us the material to do that. There are many areas in US law where free speech principles have a very valuable effect. For example, U.S. libel laws for example are very narrow, much more so than those of other countries, precisely because we are concerned about its impact on free speech -- a win for anyone concerned about the ability to criticize public figures.”

But the fact that we have libel laws at all demonstrates that you're completely wrong when you say that total, unfettered freedom of speech is a foundational right in the United States. It is clearly not. It was never a foundational right. When the Constitution was written, it wasn't even intended to be universal – no part of the Bill of Rights was. The effect of the 14th Amendment – perhaps the most important amendment ever passed, and the cause of the greatest changes ever enacted upon our regime – was to elevate the Bill of Rights to a level that stood above all the states, as an ideal of complete freedom. It should be remembered that, in the minds of the founders, things like speech and religion can and should be limited by the states in the name of morality and decency; the Bill of Rights only declared that speech and religion couldn't be limited by the federal government. And even since incorporation, all the freedoms listed in the Bill of Rights have been limited, if only for the simple reason that no right can be absolute lest it completely obviate all the others. Speech is like the rest. Religion is another one; you cannot indulge in human sacrifice and claim you're simply exercising your right to freedom of religion, and in fact we've had a lot of very good debates about where the limit to freedom of religion lies. The fourth amendment, preventing "unreasonable searches and seizures," is absolutely vital, but even the most libertarian American will admit that there are limits – that when a man who is splattered with blood is seen walking quickly away from a dead body in the street, the police are right to stop him and search his person for weapons, seizing any they find. All the rights are limited. That means the right to freedom of speech is limited, too.

I don't say this because I think freedom of speech is awful. Neither does Frowner. But you need to recognize that, legally and juridically, there are important questions concerning the limits that are and must be placed on the freedom of speech. This isn't a relatively academic question, as it generally is in libel cases, which I would agree ought to be kept at a minimum in order to preserve the freedom of our citizens to say not-nice things about each other even if those things are extraordinarily not nice. It's an immediately practical question, because we're talking about cases where we have speech that could very easily be construed as a bodily threat. And, as free as speech is in the United States, we have always legally regarded bodily threats as assault, not speech.

If you think it's ridiculous to see a potential threat in a group of six aging Klansmen – well, think about it contextually. I agree that, in this case, it was a bad idea to meet them with violence – if only because, in the end, the Klansmen walked away unharmed, having stabbing at least two people and left them to bleed. The people who showed up at the rally should have gauged the situation better, should have tried to turn the KKK with taunts rather than fighting. But in the United States today we face a situation where the Right in particular has taken to violence on a scale unknown before now, while the left generally still tries to engage in peaceable protests; the uniform peacefulness of the Black Lives Matter protests, aside from police violence, is a testament to that fact. It was only a few years ago that the Tea Party protests brought borderline threats along with their guns to rallies across the United States. Even now, these so-called "open carry demonstrations" have people walking into restaurants displaying large weapons. These can very often be construed as threats. You say that there's "plenty of state violence against right-wing groups," but you say that knowing and acknowledging tacitly that state violence against the right is vastly less than violence against the left and against non-whites and women. Yes, it happens, but it happens disproportionately to those who aren't conservative, white, or male.

So when there are demonstrations by the right which carry messages that can easily be construed as mob threats against certain minority groups – and when the demonstrators appear willing in many cases to act on their violent threats – and when furthermore the police seem disproportionately less likely to prevent them from doing so – it makes some sense to be prepared for those threats, right?

The fact that the KKK in Anaheim are a pathetic and meager group more worthy of disdain than preparedness for violence doesn't mean that preparedness for violence isn't usually a good idea when we're talking about right-wing demonstrations against non-whites. And the fact that we believe generally in the freedom of speech doesn't mean we're idiots about it. When people make promises of violence, we need to take them seriously.
posted by koeselitz at 8:47 AM on February 29, 2016 [4 favorites]

> Anaheim... mostly controlled by white politicians and businessmen, despite the large number of Latinos who live there.

who got sick of police shooting with impunity in 2012. more.
posted by morganw at 8:53 AM on February 29, 2016

> I was really surprised that none of the Klan guys was carrying
In California,"Open carry is generally prohibited except in unincorporated areas where the county has not made open carry illegal". Article with map
posted by morganw at 9:05 AM on February 29, 2016

There is in fact online fundraising going on for Antifas members' legal expenses.
posted by Maaik at 1:16 PM on February 29, 2016

Ctrl-f "trump"
...
Uh oh. He's literally Nathan Bedford Forrest now. I guess the Hitler and Mussolini comparisons weren't having the desired effect. I would recommend trying Justin Bieber next.
posted by stavrogin at 1:57 PM on February 29, 2016

I just want to add, long after the conversation has passed to other topics, that I basically agree with corb. I think the right way to meet a KKK demonstration is with violence. But I also think that those who do so need to be prosecuted under the law.

I also largely feel that, in a perfect world, KKK demonstrations would be prohibited under the law, but I recognize that that simply can not fly within the beautiful high-school-idealism that America is founded on.
posted by 256 at 2:37 PM on February 29, 2016 [1 favorite]

stavrogin: "He's literally Nathan Bedford Forrest now. I guess the Hitler and Mussolini comparisons weren't having the desired effect."

Huh? Who said he was Nathan Bedford Forrest? All anybody here has said was the exact same thing everybody in America is saying right now: that Trump refuses to say bad things about David Duke and the KKK, saying they might be very nice people and he'd have to do "research," in an interview. Whatever you might think, it's pretty obvious that that's a play for votes, right?
posted by koeselitz at 2:44 PM on February 29, 2016

" that I basically agree with corb. I think the right way to meet a KKK demonstration is with violence."

A Mennonite town in Indiana, upon finding out they could not stop the Klan from marching, declared a town holiday, closed everything, and held a diversity celebration picnic at a nearby fairground at the same time instead, leaving the Klan to march through an empty downtown where everything was closed, with only a few cops to make sure the Klan didn't smash any windows. While the whole town barbecued and fellowshipped and partied out at the fairground.

The Klan never went back, while Diversity Day is still celebrated every year.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 2:47 PM on February 29, 2016 [23 favorites]

Also in Los Angeles:

The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department said they received numerous calls around 4:30 p.m. from people reporting white supremacists attacking people at Stephen Sorensen Park.

Police said the men were screaming “Heil Hitler” and racial slurs — and waving a wallet with a Confederate flag — as they taunted and assaulted three Hispanic teens.

A family tried to intervene in the scuffle, but the white supremacists pulled out knives and threatened them, police said.

“They just started beating them up,” the father of that family, who wished to remain anonymous, explained to NBC Los Angeles. “They started coming towards us, and they pulled out some knives, and they were saying they would kill us.”
Link

posted by wuwei at 7:12 AM on March 1, 2016

What's with the knives all of the sudden?
posted by Artw at 7:20 AM on March 1, 2016

Artw-- California knife laws are actually relatively open. As long as it is single edged, any length of folding knife is legal to carry, concealed or openly. Fixed blades are legal for open carry, again, any length.
posted by wuwei at 7:35 AM on March 1, 2016

But presumably they could have actual guns if they wanted, like other nazis?
posted by Artw at 7:40 AM on March 1, 2016

Sure. But guns are also more expensive than knives.

There's also a pretty big knife culture among the white supremacist prison gangs, for obvious reasons.
posted by wuwei at 7:48 AM on March 1, 2016 [1 favorite]

Then there's the town of Wunsiedel's solution to neo-Nazis.

I'm a free speech advocate. I served 6 years in the military, so I think I have some cred when I say, I'll think you an asshole for stepping on (or burning) the flag, but I'll fight for your right to do so (for a while I would even have taken a bullet). I also put my money where my mouth is. I've donated cash to a trans blogger being sued by a faith healer. I've donated to a family brewery being sued by a corporation. I've donated to student groups and faculty that have had their speech suppressed. I've donated to the defense funds for comic book artists (and I don't give a shit about comics). I've donated to a handful of politicians that have put forward anti-SLAPP legislation. And I've donated to various defense funds of POC and to BLM activists. I've honestly forgotten most of what I've contributed to. Hell, I'd donate to Apple to fight the government if they put up a gofundme page.

The answer to bad speech is more good speech. Not violence.

I am going to come down on the side of the peaceful protestors every single time. I may "disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." (Some French dude.)

This shit is important. In a day when we have a presidential front runner talking about rolling back libel laws so you can't say negative things about him it's important. When you have to have groups like FIRE it's important. When you have a faculty member fired for hindering a student journalist without remorse it's important. I could go on, but for those who argue it's not a slippery slope I would point out if this were true we'd really not have a need for anti-SLAPP laws. We wouldn't be firing young a young woman for making blog posts pointing out she's a wage slave.

Like I said, I am a free speech advocate. That's different than being a First Amendment advocate. I want people to be able to get their message out even if it's a vile cowardly racist message. Only when debated in the marketplace of ideas can such speech either be denounced or validated. I am not advocating for speech without repercussion, but if you think violence is the acceptable response, then I am going to say you're wrong.

If we only defend the rights of those who we agree with, if we only stand up when it is easy, then it becomes too easy to limit the speech of our weakest members. There are still places in the US where one can be fired for marrying a same-sex partner.

No one says you have to listen, but people do have a right to speak. You can counter-protest and you should. Be vigorous in the defense of those things you believe in and trust that others will support you. Advocate, agitate, demand justice, demand equality, be an activist (or financially support them). Nothing changes without conflict. But don't resort to violence. If you do the other side wins. Don't give them the satisfaction.
posted by cjorgensen at 8:11 AM on March 1, 2016 [3 favorites]

That said, I really hate the policy of throwing every possible lawbreaking they can to see if it sticks. Assault, yes. Felony elder abuse? Not even kind of. That is not what that law is for.
posted by corb at 8:52 AM on March 1, 2016 [2 favorites]

So I guess the reason they have knives is because you're allowed to stab people if you're a nazi?
posted by Artw at 2:54 PM on March 1, 2016

Everyone is now home safely
posted by amapolaroja at 12:53 AM on March 2, 2016

So I guess the reason they have knives is because you're allowed to stab people if you're a nazi?

I don't know the law in CA, but in most states you're allowed to have knives because they are legal. There are also laws that govern when and how you can use them.
posted by cjorgensen at 6:05 AM on March 2, 2016

But it helps a lot if you're on the same side as the cops.
posted by Artw at 6:20 AM on March 2, 2016

It is well worth reading the article that haltingproblemsolved links, as it bears out pretty much what you'd expect:

Thomas Kielty, who is representing the three protesters arrested near Pearson Park on Saturday, said Hugo Contreras suffered a broken arm as police took him into custody. Kielty said his clients were attempting to detain a klansman who had stabbed another protester and that police mistook them for aggressors when they were arrested on suspicion of elder abuse.

Contreras, a 38-year-old Hawthorne resident, was arrested along with Mark Liddell, 26, of Los Angeles, and Nicole Rae Schop, a 24-year-old high school teacher with the Los Angeles Unified School District.

Kielty criticized the Police Department's response to the violence, which broke out when a group of counter-protesters swarmed a small group of KKK members outside the park about noon.

There did not appear to be any uniformed officers in or around the park when the klan members first arrived, and a lengthy video of the brawl shot by a California State University professor shows officers arriving on the scene several minutes after the klan members were attacked.

“He’s treated like a filthy dirty criminal, and then [the police] are very polite and civil to these KKK guys, who have stabbed three people. All Mr. Contreras did was try to help his friend," Kielty said. “It was almost like this was set up in part by the police, for not showing up."

In Minnesota, there's always been cops around whenever there's been an announced neo-nazi/white supremacist event. Admittedly, just as here, they've been more interested in hassling the counter-protesters, but it's very odd to me that the cops weren't on site.

Also:

Levin, who directs the university's Center for Research on Hate and Extremism, said Quigg is the self-described leader of the West Coast contingent of the Loyal White Knights, the klan's largest remaining faction. The group often attempts to gain publicity by staging rallies in neighborhoods where they know they will draw a furious response.

"The Loyal White Knights is really about inciting conflict. They were the ones who tried to put together something in support of the Mother Emmanuel Massacre shooter," said Levin, referring to the racially-motivated killings of nine people at a South Carolina church last year. "This is the loathsome level that this group seeks to descend. They like publicity and they like turning conflict around to say, 'See our point is proven.’”

The moral of the story is, to me, to make sure that whatever you do against the Klan results in winning. I tend to think that three stabbing victims on the counter-protesters' side and a lot of liberals making excuses for the Klan probably isn't winning.
posted by Frowner at 6:30 AM on March 2, 2016 [5 favorites]

Shades of Greensboro for real.
posted by beefetish at 2:11 PM on March 3, 2016

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