Social Justice Mobs : The New Face Of Fascism

 

The citizen in the Fascist State is no longer a selfish individual who has the anti-social right of rebelling against any law of the Collectivity.

| Benito Mussolini |

Fascism is alive and well and it was on full display on the UC Berkeley campus Feb. 1 when rioters set fires, broke windows and attacked attendees of a scheduled Milo Yiannopoulos speaking event on campus. The Breitbart.com editor had to be escorted off campus by police and the event was subsequently cancelled. The Berkeley appearance was supposed to mark the end of his nationwide “Dangerous Faggot Tour” of university speaking engagments. Yiannopoulos, a gay conservative, has long been reviled by leftists who have regularly and repeatedly labeled him a Fascist and a Nazi. Ironically, it’s not Milo, but those who rioted over his appearance at Berkeley who actually bear the earmarks of Fascism.

No doubt some will reject this statement based on the common understanding of Fascism as a “right-wing” nationalist ideology with beliefs that seemingly fly in the face of left-wing values. Fascism cannot possibly be the political model of the progressive, social justice left in America. Right?

Benito Mussolini, Hitler-allied Italian dictator and founder of Italian Fascism, said “Fascism, besides being a system of government is also, and above all, a system of thought”. It is a system of thought, a collective mindset, an identity. It is rigid, inflexible, and intolerant of any and all opposition to the collective narrative.

The collective narrative of the progressive left is rooted firmly in identity politics. They believe their collective identity that of the disadvantaged vs. the privileged – the oppressed against the oppressors.

Social justice warriors have designated certain groups as privileged oppressors; I.e. Whites (particularly males) and the wealthy and identify other groups as being oppressed by them; I.e. Minorities and women. And within the echo chamber of progressive orthodoxy, no one is permitted to exist outside their designated category. Progressive identity politics is little more than a brush bristled with soft-bigotry whose broad strokes necessarily paint over differences between individuals within perceived “in-groups” and “out-groups” alike.  In the world of leftist identity politics, there is no room for  acknowledging individual differences in experience or belief. Individual merit has no place in the progressive system of thought. You’re either arbitrarily in or you’re arbitrarily out.

This is no different than nationalism. Just like nationalists, the social justice left have set up an ideology where there is a distinct in-group and a distinct out-group. Any ideology that predicates it self on such beliefs will actively seek to oppress the perceived out-group when it gains social and political power. Hence the rise of the social justice warrior.

At the core of  Fascism lies a belief that political ideology has a transcendent power to triumph over human nature thereby creating a better, blended, and harmonious society. A society in which all members share common goals and opinions and class struggles and social conflicts have necessarily been eliminated. However, in order to unify society and rid it of its perceived social ills, Fascism also rids society of one other, minor thing – Free thought. And the best way to control thought is by first controlling speech.

Enter the social justice torch and pitchfork mob.

With cries  of “Hate speech is not free speech” they attempt to blur the lines between words and violence. In fact, to a social justice warrior, words ARE violence. There is no apparent distinction drawn between the two as evidenced by a Jan. 31 post to the website of left-wing campus activist group BAMN (By Any Means Necessary), who have since taken credit for organizing the Berkeley “protests”. The post claims that Milo is a “twisted psychopath and defender of rape” and his appearance on the Berkeley campus represented an “imminent physical threat to the students and faculty of UCB”. And there it is; That’s their excuse for violence.

Violence is acceptable as long as it’s in self-defense against “an imminent physical threat”. According to the post, Milo “riles up a lynch-mob mentality in his audiences, promoting violence, rape, harassment, and repression against minorities, women, and immigrants.” The post goes on to say that Yiannopoulos aims to create a climate which is “hostile” to free speech in which civil discourse will cease to exist. The irony, of course, is that it is groups like BAMN, not Milo, that are making free speech and civil discourse impossible. It’s the SJWs who are willing to use actual violence to suppress the speech of those with whom they disagree.

The ultimate aim of SJW violence is to create a public environment in which opinions that deviate from the progressive left’s sociopolitical vision are subject to strict, and sometimes violent, censorship. Isn’t that what we saw at Berkeley; Full-blown, violent censorship? And on the campus that was once home to the student Free Speech Movement of all places. How times have changed since the 1960s.

The BAMN post also curiously encourages prospective attendees to “Wear a white t-shirt and blue jeans to show solidarity and ensure safety for protestors on our side”. How exactly would wearing a white t-shirt and jeans ensure one’s safety?  Unless protester originated violence was expected, in which case this wasn’t really a call for solidarity but a “how to not get your head bashed in” notice. With such a statement prominently featured at the top of the post, it begs the question whether this event was a protest or a knowing attempt to stir up a lynch-mob among leftists on campus? Isn’t that something the post accuses Milo of, by the way? Stiring up violent lynch-mobs? There’s that irony again.

 

The post further states that the group will hold University Chairman Nicholas Dirks and his administration “directly responsible” for allowing a “neo-fascist” to endanger students and for any fallout that may follow. Translation: BAMN will refuse to accept any responsibility for their own actions at the event, violent or not. It is not they, but those who would dare provoke them, or allow any one near enough to provoke them, who are to blame for the violence and mayhem that ensues. If anyone challenges the leftist group-think on a university campus, they must be shut down. Period. It’s Fascism 101 – Silence any and all opposition to the collective mindset by any means necessary.

A document advertising a Feb. 6 group meeting makes it clear that the riots “sent a clear warning to racists and sexists and anti-LGBT bigots that they cannot dare come out of their holes and carry out their thug attacks”. This statement proves my point. How dare a conservative thinker come out of their hole and challenge us? How dare you incite us to violence? This Is War! (Those words were displayed prominently at the event on a banner carried by actual masked thugs) Once again BAMN drowns in irony as the only “thug attacks” on the part of anyone came from the so-called protesters themselves, not Milo or attendees of his event.

The flyer also claims that Yiannopoulos had planned to use the event to expose the names of illegal immigrant students at the university, an allegation that the Breitbart editor denies. It seems the group has followed through on their earlier promise to hold Chancellor Dirks responsible for any fall-out from the Milo visit, as they have called for his immediate resignation.

 

The Berkeley riots weren’t really about Milo Yiannopoulos, his viewpoints, or his scheduled appearance on campus. The purpose of the riots was to send a resounding message to universities across the country to think twice before they allow conservative and libertarian speakers to visit their campus.
The social justice left has lost on the battlefield of ideas. They are selling a globalist, authoritarian dystopia that reasonable people of all political backgrounds have largely refused to buy. They have lost the battle of words and have exchanged them for clubs.

To a word-wounded SJW lefty, physical violence is a perfectly acceptable response to dissenting language because to them words are a form of violence. Words like Milo’s hurt the fragile snowflake sensibilities of SJWs and force them out of their precious ideological safe-spaces. It is therefore acceptable to beat and pepper spray people, smash ATMs with rocks and hammers, and set fire to buildings because their collective beliefs about the world around them must be protected from the swords of opposing ideologies. If members of the social justice collective are exposed to alternative views, their group-think ideology may fracture, and eventually the collective could cease to exist. For the far-left, silencing opposition is key to their very survival on the political spectrum.

Open and honest debate of the issues is truly a threat to the left and their globalist ambitions, and they will do whatever it takes to avoid genuine discussions and challenges to their views. The regressive left as a whole has no sound arguments to defend their irrational viewpoints. Since effective debate requires critical thinking and the ability to carefully craft logical arguments, and members of the regressive left typically lack one or both of these, their only solution becomes to violently suppress the words of the opposition. The left then wins the debate by default because no debate was permitted to occur. As Ayn Rand said, “There are only two fundamental methods by which men can deal with one another: by reason or by force, by intellectual persuasion or by physical coercion, by directing to an opponent’s brain an argument—or a bullet.” A fascist will always choose a bullet.

The regressive, social justice left has become a full-on Fascist regime, complete with black-shirted thugs, a brainwashed herd of devoted adherants, and near absolute control over information spread by the mainstream media. And as in any Fascist regime, individual thoughts and opinions must always conform to the regime’s collective social narrative and vision of the future. Dissent will not be tolerated.

Though BAMN is proudly proclaiming victory over Milo Yiannopoulos (and free speech), the plan to silence Milo seems to have backfired, as sales of his book “Dangerous” skyrocketed 12,740% on Amazon immediately following the riots, becoming the 5th ranked best-seller on the site. As is always the case, when something is labeled forbidden fruit, people just can’t help eating it. When a message is forcibly silenced, it just makes more people want to hear it.

But, the left is far from done with their attempts to silence Milo. Today, reports began circulating that he once advocated for pedophilia and condoned relationships between adult men and young boys on the Drunken Peasants podcast last year. During the course of the show, Yiannopoulos spoke about “coming of age” relationships in which “older men” help “young boys” discover who they are. Milo has denied that the views he expressed in any way support pedophilia. He says that his statements, though perhaps poorly worded, were never intended to endorse sex with underage boys.

In a statement posted to his Facebook page today he denies the allegations, saying in part, “I am a gay man, and a child abuse victim. I would like to restate my utter disgust at adults who sexually abuse minors. I am horrified by pedophilia and I have devoted large portions of my career as a journalist to exposing child abusers.”

In the resulting fervor over Milo’s scandalous commments – Comments so scandalous in fact that they went virtually unnoticed by the media for over a year – he has been disinvited from speaking at the Conservative Political Action Conference and his forthcoming book has been cancelled by Simon & Schuster.

In my opinion, it’s difficult to imagine a scenario in which this isn’t a blatant attempt by the left, in concert with the mainstream media, to sabotage the obvious upswing of interest in Milo since the openly fascist, anti-free speech debacle that was the Berkeley riots. Regardless of whether Milo’s comments were a highly inappropriate endorsement of adult-child sexual relationships or mere “sloppy wording” as he claims, it should be noted that the revealing of these year-old, public comments likely constitute a coordinated media “hit”. Milo gained worldwide attention because of the Berkeley riots, sales of his book soared, and he was scheduled to speak at CPAC where he would no doubt garner even more interest and (dare I say it?) support. For the far left and mainstream media, what better time could there be to try and completely destroy Milo?

The regressive left’s plan to silence Milo’s message with their rocks, bats, and pepper spray failed. In fact, it utterly backfired. Now there’s a new plan in action – If you can’t silence the message, destroy the messenger. The regressive left, like every Fascist regime before it, will silence the opposition by any means necessary.