Virginia Set for Showdown at Gun Rights Rally

[Charlie T Waite]

[Subdeacon Joe]

Things are getting weird in VA

 

The comment of my FB friend who posted it:
"Rolling Stone is bashing CNN. CNN is bashing Pelosi. Michael Moore is bashing Elizabeth Warren.
And now Antifa is siding with the 2A protestors in Virginia against the Democrats’ proposed new anti-gun laws.
WHO STARTED THE GAME OF JUMANJI 2.0: POLITICAL CHAOS??!!!"

https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/akwv4k/why-antifa-is-siding-with-thousands-of-pro-gun-conservatives-in-virginia?fbclid=IwAR27aMminRpiBXI1bcvME1j63oQ1jKC5L6q37xHjl__uFidkHDOM1Az7M4w

 

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When gun lovers rally in front of the Virginia Capitol in Richmond next week, the local chapter of antifa will be there too. But their members won’t be wearing all black, and they don’t plan to douse right-wingers in milkshakes or Silly String.

Instead, local antifa will join thousands of conservatives who are expected to descend on Richmond that day in protesting pending gun-control legislation introduced by Democratic lawmakers.

Antifa Seven Hills, based in Richmond, are opposing the slew of gun bills introduced by the newly Democratic Legislature since November, because they say those types of laws are used primarily to criminalize poor people, minorities, and leftists — and to bolster law enforcement’s power.

“I think it’s been pretty important for us to focus on the fact that gun control in America has a legacy of racist enforcement,” said Antifa Seven Hills spokesperson James (who asked that his name be withheld to avoid getting doxxed online). “Like taking guns away from black people, because black people were perceived as a threat to property and the sanctity of the state.”

 

 

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Antifa and conservative gun-rights activists would seem to be unlikely bedfellows; anyone who’s tuned into cable news in the last few years has watched scenes of political violence unfold between the hard-left and right-wingers in places like Portland, New York City, Boston, and Berkley. But in the case of Antifa Seven Hills, they believe they’ve got more in common with working-class white Virginians, regardless of their political bent, than they do with many of the moderate Democrats who helped their party win control of the Legislature in November, for the first time since 1994.

The shared skepticism of political moderates and authority is why Antifa Seven Hills sees the January 20 rally as an opportunity to extend an olive branch to other gun owners — at least those who don’t align with the far-right militias or white supremacists who are also expected to show up to the event.

It’s also a reminder that “antifa” is not a monolithic movement. James said that antifa chapters tend to vary regionally in their goals, activities, and organizational structures. For example, antifascists in some parts of the U.S. have embraced “black bloc” protest tactics, which were imported from Europe and entail activists wearing all black and concealing their faces.

While that tactic is often associated with antifa in places like Portland, where antifascists sometimes show up in the hundreds to counter far-right groups, James says it’s not as well suited to the South. “I think what’s particular about the South is that we have to be a bit more creative and sensitive to the people around us — instead of fulfilling some sort of meme of what antifa is,” said James. “That’s really what we’re trying to work against right now, especially by talking to conservatives and showing we aren’t just a black-clad group of rabble-rousers who are out for attention and have jobs funded by George Soros.”