NSW Labor MP Stephen Lawrence has said if the only thing that can save us from neonazis is an unworkable law banning them, then god help us. Marcus Strom backs him in, calling on the labour movement to oppose anti-democratic measures against political organisation.
The reappearance of the cosplay neonazis of the National Socialist Network (NSN) on the steps of the NSW parliament has sent governments, commentators and sections of the left into a spiral of confusion. Let’s get a few things straight.
The NSN is repugnant. Their stunt outside parliament was an open display of antisemitism – chanting Hitler Youth slogans and identifying Jews as the “problem”. But let us remember that for two years, senior political figures have strained to paint the Palestine solidarity movement as antisemitic and failed, precisely because that movement is not based on hatred of Jews but on solidarity with Palestine and includes many anti-Zionist Jews. Yet under their noses an explicitly antisemitic mobilisation occurred, and the state gave it the go-ahead.
The other thing we need to be straight on – we do not call for the state to ban the demonstrations of these groups, nor seek tighter laws to prevent neonazis displaying their own ideas and symbols. Not only is this – as one NSW Labor MP has said – playing ‘whack-a-mole’ against an ideology, any such laws would be used against the left. The workers’ movement and the left must rely on its ideas and organisation to defeat racist thuggery, not the establishment, which is a completely unreliable ally in this fight.
It’s important to remember that while these boneheads perform their fascist cosplay, they pose no serious threat of building an actual fascist mass movement in this country. While they are a threat, calls for a ‘White Australia’ can never become the majority in multicultural, migrant Australia.
What is fascism?
Fascism is not simply a set of ideas or some idiots in black shirts: it is the naked, violent rule of capital when the ruling class needs to smash the organised working class. And unfortunately, we must face up to the fact that the organised working-class movement today is a shadow of its former self and certainly not conscious of its own revolutionary potential. If the Australian capitalist class ever wanted to go down that road, it would never come draped in swastikas. It would come wrapped in the flag, in the language of “order”, “security” and “responsibility”, and with the full backing of the state.
That does not mean the labour movement can ignore the far right. Migrant communities, First Nations people, LGBTQ people and leftwing organisations must be defended if they are targeted. But this requires serious organisation – unions, community groups and workplace committees prepared to mobilise when necessary – not small groups of activists chasing neonazis around in their own “anti-fascist” cosplay. We defend our people when needed; but it must never become the main axis of our political work.
Anti-democratic laws a bigger threat
A far bigger danger to democracy today comes from the anti-democratic measures being pushed through by the NSW government and used by the federal government to deport people or to seek to have them removed from employment. After all, these people attended a lawful assembly with a police permit, no less.
The NSW government has been limiting the right to protest, a fact registered by civil liberty groups. Its attempt to ban protests ‘near places of worship’ was thrown out by the NSW Supreme Court last month. Now, under the pretext of ‘cracking down on Nazis’, NSW Premier Chris Minns has foreshadowed attempts to reintroduce such laws. The federal government has also said more laws are on their way.
At the first press conference after the NSN stunt, Minns told media: “It’s likely the case that we need to give the police more legislated powers to stop this kind of naked hatred and racism on Sydney’s streets.”
The reality is such laws will almost certainly be turned against the Palestine solidarity movement, trade unions, the left and other progressive social movements.
It is refreshing that some Labor MPs understand this. Stephen Lawrence MLC rightly warned that relying on bans shows a lack of confidence in the community and risks handing Nazis a platform they could never win on their own.
On social media he wrote: “This [approach] typifies people terrified of the Australian community, convinced they can’t be trusted to deal with nazis at the ballot box…. If the only thing that can save us from nazis is an unworkable law banning them, then God help us.”
We should have more confidence in the working class – and organise to arm the movement against racist, nationalist and neonazi ideas.
You can’t ban an ideology
Another NSW Labor MP, quoted anonymously by The Sydney Morning Herald, noted the impossibility of banning ever-shifting symbols and slogans, likening it to a game of ‘whack-a-mole’. The banning of the swastika and the nazi salute in NSW has not achieved anything other than temporarily salve middle-class anxiety.
That MP noted: “Fundamentally, you can’t ban an ideology.”
Exactly. You cannot defeat Nazi ideas by outlawing them. You defeat them politically – by confronting their arguments, by fighting for working-class unity and, if required, by physically defending those they threaten.
We should also oppose the state deporting people based on their political views. The irony that an “anti-immigrant” neonazi has had his visa revoked … because he is an immigrant should not blind us to the principle.
Consistent democrats, socialists and Marxists must oppose state powers that determine which political views are acceptable. Any power used to expel neonazis today will be used against the left tomorrow – because, yes, we want to “contest the constitutional order”. A serious workers’ movement will challenge the monarchy, the standing army, the Governor-General, the Senate, the entire machinery of capitalist rule.
It is worth remembering that the federal government is constrained from banning political parties precisely because the referendum to outlaw the Communist Party in 1951 failed. That defeat remains one of the most important democratic victories in Australian history.
Finally, the NSN stunt was a legal assembly with a police permit. The fact that the state is now pursuing people for attending a lawful protest should chill anyone who values political freedom. While we have no personal sympathy for these hateful racists, the police response once again shows why the labour movement can never rely on the cops or the state to protect us. They turned a blind eye to the neonazis; they will not turn a blind eye to us.
The labour movement must be prepared to organise in defence of our communities. But we must reject the establishment push to expand state powers under the guise of fighting the far right. Those powers will be used against us – unless we stop them.