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Occupy Wall Street offered a neat reprise of the same tactic. There was the recent event in Montreal, where a bunch of antifas worked some considerable havoc. I’ll give a sample from three news reports of the actions of the counter-protestors and ask, in all seriousness: If this is anti-fascism, what is fascism?

If this is anti-fascism, what is fascism?

“Fireworks were thrown and smoke bombs were placed in garbage cans, as well as a rolling dumpster, as police and demonstrators clashed in encounters on nearby streets.”

“Some protestors… threw chairs taken from the terraces of restaurants in Old Quebec.”

“At least two journalists were attacked by demonstrators, and in one incident, damaged camera equipment.”

Pictures from various newspapers and newscasts will show the ugly scenes. Meantime, the actual far-right racist group spent much of their protest cowering in a garage and hiding from the rampage of those who came to protest them.

Meantime, the actual far-right racist group spent much of their protest cowering in a garage

It should not need to be said, but the existence and public presence of a group that all agree is both contemptible and malevolent is not in itself some free pass to those who wish to oppose them, to act like thugs, to beat people up, to attack news reporters, to hurl smoke bombs — and in every particular play the very part of fascist behaviour they are claiming to counter.

Nor will it do — as one of the leaders of the counter-protest did — to drag up that hoary old excuse that the street thugs were a “fringe element” that “hijacked” the protest. As far as I could tell from the news, they were, in fact, the protest.