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Striking a blow for liberal democracy ... detail from Marvels Captain America, issue No 1. Photograph: Courtesy of Marvel

Comics have never shied away from punching a Nazi. Captain America socked Hitler himself on the jaw in his first issue back in March 1941, with Superman and Batman also stepping up to fight the Fhrer that same decade.

But long after the Third Reich was toppled, Nazis and fascists continued to make good villain fodder for superheroes. For Captain America, Marvel created out-and-out Nazi agent Red Skull (who also became a communist in the 1950s), as well as the green-garbed fascist, terrorist, criminal organisation Hydra. In DC Comics, there was Captain Nazi genetically altered by his scientist father to fight for Hitler who was sent by the Nazis to fight American superheroes, and there were evil groups like Hive and Kobra.

Even during the 1990s, Marvels Avengers West Coast had a team of supervillains called the Lethal Legion that included demonically enhanced versions of Heinrich Himmler and Joseph Stalin (renamed Coldsteel).

Today, comic-book writer Jeff Lemires new title for publisher Valiant, Bloodshot Salvation, is putting the alt-right in the villain role. Living in a world in which humans are transformed into enhanced killers through a controlled infection, Bloodshot has super-strength, speed and endurance. But the current incarnation Ray Garrison, who is attempting to settle down with his girlfriend Magic, is faced with in-laws you wouldnt want over to dinner: a cruel and sadistic clan of white supremacist criminals.

Set to debut in September with art by Lewis LaRosa and Mico Suayan, Bloodshot Salvation was announced at Comic Con in Seattle as [carrying] strong anti-fascist overtones as Bloodshot confronts the resurgent white supremacist underground of modern-day America.

Lemire, who is Canadian, told CBR.com that the man-made plague that sparks mindless violence in its victims was his take on Americas far right, saying: America is a scary place and I say that as one of your neighbours from the north who is equal parts terrified, appalled and saddened on a daily basis by something new going on, not the least of which is the rise of Trump.

Like most of us, Lemire didnt think there would be any more superheroes socking Nazis, 75 years after Captain America first took on Hitler. I dont think I would have ever anticipated the things that have happened over the last couple of years, Lemire told the Washington Post. I never really thought Id be commenting on this stuff the way I am or feeling compelled to, thats for sure.

So the real-world dramas of Trumps presidency are getting an airing on the page. Comic-book shenanigans it all might be, but with the USs new commander-in-chief firing off executive orders like Spider-Man slings webs, the fist-shaking cartoon baddies of yore simply wont cut it for todays comic-book audiences. The comics market is wider than its ever been before, and crucially, it has a far greater proportion of female readers. Competing for attention with the likes of Netflix, they have to be at least as sophisticated and well-written. These days, Spider-Man doesnt pull on his tights just because the Green Goblin has decided to rob a bank; Spidey today is a mixed-race teenager who has to deal with school drama, family drama, survivors guilt. For a long time now, weve been getting more depth to our heroes and now we look for credible reasons why the bad guys are so malign.

So while punching Nazis might suddenly be more relevant than it has been for decades, heres to hoping that comic books can deal with fascism and the far right in a far more nuanced way than a cheeky right hook to Hitlers face.

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Alt-right comic book villains? Comics have moved on from punching Nazis - The Guardian (blog)

How do you punch a Nazi in Yiddish?

Maybe deliver a khsime, or signature, as in putting a signature on someones face. Or give them a shmir, an open-handed smack to the face, like lathering schmear on a bagel. Or maybe it takes der gubernator, the governor, jabbing your thumb into a persons ribcage.

Obscure? To be sure. But you might find yourself becoming more familiar with such terms, if a growing number of Jewish antifa activists have their way.

In response to an energized American white nationalism, some Jews are gravitating toward anti-fascist activism. Theyre embracing the idea that the best way to combat your enemies in this case, white supremacists is through direct confrontation, even violence. Organizers say their members number in the thousands. Though on-the-ground organizing on that scale has yet to materialize, one recent protest attended by many Jewish anti-fascists drew hundreds, and organizers say they are planning more actions.

At the same time, they are celebrating their Jewish identity. Those Yiddish fighting words are a good example.

Jewish Antifa

Activists who call themselves antifa, short for anti-fascists, are inspired by early 20th-century responses to European fascism. They say they are influenced by militant left-wing and anarchist politics.

Facebook

A graphic shared by the Jewish Antifa Facebook page presents the German camp of Auschwitz as a justification for why its OK to punch a Nazi in the face.

A handful of loosely organized groups have cropped up to confront white nationalism online. There is the Jewish Antifa Facebook page, which promotes the Jewish history of confrontational protest (this is where the string of Yiddish punch descriptors appeared). Then there is the allied group MuJew Antifa, a collaboration between Muslim and Jewish activists. And there are dozens of other individuals who are active from their own social media accounts.

The Jewish Antifa page has fewer than 60 members, but the MuJu Antifa network boasts more than 2,000, one organizer said. Jews who identify as anti-facists could also be involved in groups like Black Lives Matter or other left-wing Jewish groups without belonging to one of these two antifa groups.

One MuJu event last month brought a couple hundred people into the street to protest President Trumps immigration ban. Activists marched down the street in Manhattan, carrying signs against Trump and chanting in Yiddish.

Were seeing an increase in far-right activity the activity of people identifying as white supremacists and even Nazis, said activist Michael Gould-Wartofsky, who is also the author of the 2015 book The Occupiers: The Making of the 99 Percent Movement.

Gould-Wartofsky said there are a range of opinions on tactics among Jews who might call themselves antifa: With a massive rise in the climate of violence, some people [say] that it takes confrontation to combat far-right activity.

There is a growing interest in learning physical self-defense among Jewish activists, Gould-Wartofsky said, adding, People want to have the skills necessary to defend their community and other communities that are also under attack.

Some Groups Are Naive

This activism marks a sharp break with mainline Jewish organizations such as the Anti-Defamation League. While the ADL has for decades monitored and advocated against anti-Semitism, it does not encourage confronting groups such as white supremacists head-on, nor does it do so itself.

Some antifa activists think thats exactly what it takes.

For example, when a masked antifa activist dramatically clobbered alt-right figurehead Richard Spencer, the image sparked debate but it was celebrated widely in more left-wing circles as a direct repudiation of mainstream liberalism.

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I disagree with liberal tactics, Bethany Benny Koval, a New Jersey-based activist, wrote in an email to the Forward. Some groups are naive enough to believe that if we display the nude white supremacist onstage, the crowd will simply laugh him away.

In the eyes of these Jewish antifa activists, mainstream advocacy groups need to do more than condemn far right-wing groups like the alt-right.

Twitter

Benny Koval, at right, is one of a handful of Jews who identify as antifa activists. At a protest against President Trumps travel ban, she carries sign commemorating Anne Frank.

The purpose of these groups is to condemn hate and violence, Raphael Dreyfuss, a Los Angeles-based activist, wrote in a message to the Forward. But the thing about Nazis is, they dont care if theyre being condemned. You can condemn and condemn and condemn until youre being marched towards a gas chamber they dont give a damn.

The best way to confront?

The only thing that can stop the growth of fascism is building power, Dreyfuss wrote. That means confronting fascists in the streets but it also means building up community defense organizations, it means revitalizing our unions, it means confronting the material issues that create fascism in a way that liberalism is fundamentally unable to.

At left, a traditional antifa emblem. At right, a Jewish take featuring a golem, a Star of David and a biblical call to justice.

Heritage

For these antifa groups, their activism is an affirmation of Jewish identity both religious and secular.

Many of us take inspiration from Bundism and the explosion of secular Yiddish socialism that happened at the turn of the century, Dreyfuss said, but many are also inspired by their spirituality.

Bundism was a secular, non-Zionist Jewish movement that was founded in the Russian Empire in 1897 and sought to organize the working-class Jews of Russia, Poland and Lithuania.

In a widely circulated meme, one activist offers a particularly Jewish spin on an antifa emblem.

The logo traditionally reads Good night white pride and pictures a neo-Nazi being kicked to the ground.

But the new Jewish version reads Good night alt-right, and pictures a Star of David; a cartoon golem, the vengeful creature of Jewish folklore and a biblical reference from Deuteronomy: Tzedek, tzedek, tirdof or Justice, justice, you shall pursue.

Contact Sam Kestenbaum at kestenbaum@forward.com or on Twitter, @skestenbaum

Link:
Pulling No Punches In Fight Against 'Alt-Right' And Neo-Nazis - Forward

White House chief strategist Stephen K. Bannon and White House chief of staff Reince Priebus spoke at the Conservative Political Action Conference, Feb. 23. Bannon said the media is "adamantly opposed to" the president's agenda. (The Washington Post)

Leading conservatives have taken to pretending that the alt-right is a fringe movement that they and President Trump have disavowed. In recent interviews and at a high-profile conservative conference last month, conservatives have taken great pains to distance conservatism and the Trump administration from any alt-right influence.

But heres the reality: The alt-rights deep influence over this White House is on display daily in Trumps rhetoric and his administrations policies. The alt-right influence on Trump matters: it means the most powerful man in the world is under the influence of a racist and white nationalist movement. And conservatives should reckon with this more forthrightly.

For instance, note this podcast that the Washington Posts Jonathan Capehart conducted with American Conservative Union president Matt Schlapp. Capehart pointed out that Stephen K. Bannon and Stephen Miller are Trumps top White House advisers, and asked: Doesnt that mean, that despite the concerns, the alt-right is now mainstreamed, if not the power within the White House? Schlapp flatly denied that the alt-right had been mainstreamed in this manner.

Bannon who is now Trumps most influential adviser told melast summer, when he was chairman of Breitbart, that his site was the platform for the alt-right. Capehart questioned Schlapp about this, but Schlapp argued, implausibly, that this is not as significant as it appears. Schlapp insisted that when Bannon said that Breitbart is the platform for the alt-right, he wasnttrying to endorse the racist ideology of that group. Yet Breitbart was and remains one-stop shopping for readers looking for anti-immigrant, anti-Muslim, anti-refugee rhetoric and disinformation, as well as stories about black crime.

This echoed similar head-in-the sand denials that were on full display last month at the ACUs Conservative Political Action Conference. For instance,Dan Schneider, the ACUs executive director, delivereda speech denouncing the alt-right but not as the far-right white nationalist movement that it is, but rather as garden variety left-wing fascists. By attempting (not very convincingly) to pin the movement on the left, Schneider sought to portray the alt-right as an interloper thatis not exerting any influence over Trump or his conservative supporters.

But hours later, Schlapp welcomed Bannon for an interview on the CPAC main stage. Schlapp didnt ask Bannon a single question about the alt-right or about what Bannon meant when he claimed that his web site was a platform for it.

The reality is that itisunder Bannons influence that the administration has taken its actions that most thrill the alt-right, most notably his moves to step up deportation of undocumented immigrants, and ban refugees and migrants from Muslim-majority countries.

When Bannon and I spoke this summer, he tried to deny to me that the alt-right is a white nationalist movement, although he did concede that white nationalists and anti-Semites could be attracted to some of thephilosophies of the alt-right. But, as I have writtenafter Trump tapped himto head up his campaign, Bannon nonetheless praised the deeply Islamophobic ethno-nationalism on the rise in Europe, like the National Front in France, led by far-right presidential candidate Marine Le Pen.

No, they aren't just pranksters and they aren't an extension of European nationalism. Reporter and author Olivia Nuzzi tackles five myths about the alt-right. (Adriana Usero/The Washington Post)

And then theres Trumps choice of Jeff Sessions as Attorney General. During the transition, alt-right leaders were delighted with the Sessions pick, pointing to his opposition to immigration as well as their hope that he would stop enforcing civil rights laws and might even prosecute Black Lives Matter protesters.

As Emily Bazelon writes, Sessions has long been a devoted Breitbart reader, and met regularly with the sites writers. Trumps dark vision of America as besieged by inner city crime, immigrants, and refugees, Bazelon notes, provides clear justification for policies that will advance Sessions, Bannon and Millers divisive nationalism. Justice Department policy, under Sessions, she adds, aims to strengthen the grip of law enforcement, raise barriers to voting and significantly reduce all forms of immigration, promoting what seems to be a longstanding desire to reassert the countrys European and Christian heritage.

Indeed, Sessions is altering the core mission of the Department of Justice to one with less of a focus on civil and voting rights. Trumps false claims about voter fraud are straight out of the ugly maw of alt-right meme-making, portraying supposed voter fraud as a scourge perpetrated by African-Americans and undocumented immigrants a possible signal that a crackdown on voting rights is coming, one that Sessions would likely help carry out from the Justice Department.

Despite the determined spin, the reality is that Trumpism would not exist without the alt-right. Conservatives can pretend its fringe and has little to no influence on the Trump administration but the proof is in the policy.

Read more here:
Conservatives insist Trump is not influenced by the alt-right. Here's why they're wrong. - Washington Post (blog)

Faculty talk Alt-Right movement

By Benjamin Bassham, News Editor March 8, 2017 Filed under Campus Beat

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A faculty-led Flex workshop, intended to be an open forum to discuss the Alternative Right and its ideologies with students and faculty was held from 3-5 p.m. in the Fireside Hall on Feb. 27.

Philosophy professor Asad Kabir hosted the event and presented his interpretation of what the Alt-Right is, and questioned what roles students and faculty should have in the current political climate.

Kabir used a PowerPoint presentation to deliver his impression of the Alt-Right, their interests, and examination of where they overlap with (Steve) Bannon and with (President) Trump.

Kabir skipped most of his prepared material from the Alt-Right and went through their detractors material about the repugnance of their white supremacy.

In particular, Kabir focused on Bannon, assistant to the president and former editor-in-chief of Breitbart News. Kabir said Bannon believes that America is due to go through a period of crisis but Bannon has a plan for the country.

Bannon is the brains of the current government preparing for a crisis. This frame of mind makes them go out to create crisis, Kabir said.

The other participants of the discussion, apart from sharing their dislike of Trump, focused almost exclusively on immigration, sanctuary and concerns over deportation.

English professor Elvia Ornelas-Garcia said, As educators we have to resist.

Kabir bowed to the crowds choice of topic, contributing to plans to resist ICE (Immigrations and Customs Enforcement), and plans for later community resistance against Trumps immigration policies.

ESL professor Anoosheh Borhan said, They can still come into our classrooms. What can we do? What legal aid can be given to students?

ESL professor Susan Marvin said, There have been reports in the news all weekend about people who have been rounded up without proper authority.

Ornelas-Garcia said, ICE agents cannot enter if they do not have a subpoena. A proposed solution, in the event of ICE arriving at a classroom to make an arrest, is to close the door in ICEs face until the end of class and have students call every media outlet possible.

There was even discussion of the possibility of closing down campus to draw media attention.

History department Chairperson Manu Ampim said, This is a nation of laws when it is convenient, and thats always been the case. Citizens need to go out and seize the rights. People have to be willing to put what they have on the line.

Speakers expressed some disquiet that the motion that was passed to make the Contra Costa Community College District never mentioned the word sanctuary, but Ornelas-Garcia said, I believe they (the District Board) received legal advice to stay away from the word sanctuary.

Ornelas-Garcia had a single copy of a card with various advice and notes legal advice, tailored for undocumented immigrants. She suggested similar convenient note cards could be distributed at CCC.

The discussion ran until nearly 5:30 p.m. Kabir tried to draw interest to Bannons racial motivations, but didnt pull much interest. One late-coming guest, who missed the earlier section about the Alt-Right, ventured his opinion the Africans are the dominant race.

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The Advocate : Faculty talk Alt-Right movement - The Advocate

By Anne Applebaum

The issues under debate in this year's French presidential election are broad and varied: terrorism and trade, the retirement age and social security, the legacy of France in Algeria and the future of France in Europe. But in truth, only one issue really matters: Can the heady cocktail of fear-mongering, nationalism, nostalgia, resentment, pro-Russian foreign policy and big-government economics a philosophy that is described, unsatisfyingly, as "far right" or "populist," that takes a particularly virulent online form and that has contributed to recent electoral victories in the United States and Britain be defeated in a major Western country? And if so, how?

At least until scandal began to damage his campaign, Franois Fillon, the candidate of the center-right Republican party, offered what looked like the safest formula: steal the populist issues from the "far right" Marine Le Pen's National Front and make them mainstream. In choosing this strategy, he was emulating Theresa May, the conservative British prime minister who has defeated the upstart U.K. Independence Party by announcing she will leave all European trade structures (as UKIP would have done) and make immigration control her priority (as UKIP does already).

Fillon's version is slightly different he has called for a halt to immigration from outside Europe, tougher borders and tougher language on assimilation of French Muslims but the idea is the same. Like Le Pen, whose campaign has been funded with Russian money, he speaks of friendship with Russia. He talks openly about his Catholicism in a bid to lure France's "family values" voters away from Le Pen, too. But alas, it seems that Fillon's version of family values included putting his wife and sons on the state payroll, a story that just won't go away.

That leaves the contest in the hands of Emmanuel Macron, a 39-year-old social and economic liberal whose strategy is quite different. It's been clear for some time that the old left-right split in European politics doesn't reflect real social divisions, and that the new fault lines are better described as "integrationist" versus "nationalist," or, more bluntly, "open" vs. "closed." But although the "closed" voices parties such as Le Pen's National Front or UKIP are long established, Macron is the first major European politician to attract mass support by putting up a vigorous, active and angry defense of "open." "I defend Europe," he told a British journalist. "If you are shy, you are dead."

His strategy, so far, has been built on defiance of ideological stereotypes. Macron has a background in banking but speaks about "collective solidarity." He served as a minister in a Socialist government but has said that "honesty compels me to say that I am not a socialist." Instead of a traditional political party he has his own movement, En Marche a rough translation might be "Forward" that he launched, to widespread skepticism, in 2016. He has invited U.S. scientists, especially those working on climate change and clean energy, to come live in France. He wants to roll out the red carpet for British academics and businessmen marginalized by May's retreat from Europe, too.

He also attracts enemies. Because his victory would strengthen both the European Union and NATO, Macron's campaign has naturally attracted the attention of those who want to destroy them. Both WikiLeaks (which claims to have "secret documents" on all the candidates) and the Russian propaganda channel RT have attempted to show sinister links between Macron and Hillary Clinton. The predictable whispering campaign is conspiratorial ("Macron is part of a secret cabal"), anti-Semitic ("Macron works for the Rothschilds") and personal ("Macron is gay"). That kind of negative campaigning based on slurs and hysterical allegations has worked brilliantly in other countries, and there is plenty of time left for it to succeed in France.

Macron's success will depend on whether he can withstand the coming smear campaign, and then pull off a trick that has so far eluded his British, Dutch and other counterparts: Unite the center-left and the center-right behind a single banner, and run a campaign that is patriotic as well as "open," tough on terrorism as well as "integrationist."

The stakes are high. If he loses, muscular liberalism will disappear from France for a generation. But if he wins, he will have many eager imitators, not only in France but also across the continent and around the world.

The Washington Post News Service & Syndicate

See more here:
National View: Can the alt-right be stopped in France? - SouthCoastToday.com