Hey, it’s RNC Week, so why not have a few slaps and tickles about Antifa?
I can see an annual Pilgrimage to Portland some day, where men and women, well, likely still boys and girls at heart, dressed in black, will trek throughout the city to stand and kneel before the many shrines of the downtown that once was Portland; the City Hall, the Police Station, the federal buildings, all burned out shells of their former selves, like a Roman ruin. And before each monument a hymn will be hummed, a wreath or other garlands laid to signify what deeds were done those “90 days of Portland”; where Sheri got tear-gassed, and fair Billy his arm bruised from being squeezed too tightly, and poor Sheila was maliciously tripped and broke a finger, her cursing finger, all caused by the gendarmeries of the fascist.
Words will be spoken, some hushed, others screeched, but there won’t be prayers, for few have ever prayed. Nor did any one of them go to hospital with wounds. Jail was little more than a sleepover, but without benefit of cellphones. Philistines!
And twenty years later, I can even see them bringing their children, the few that are able to bear them (sic), and each of those bratlings may wear a badge of their local chapter of LADS (League of Arrested Development).
I can see a Feast Week of Portland arising from of this Kabuki pilgrimage, a Santiago de Compostelo en Vano
This day is call’d the Feast of Portland.
He that outlives this day, and comes safe home,
Will stand a tip-toe when this day is nam’d,
And rouse him at the name of Portland
He that shall live this day, and see old age,
Will yearly on the vigil feast his neighbours,
And say “To-morrow is Portland.”
Then will he strip his sleeve and show his scars,
And say “These wounds I had on Portland’s day.”
Old men forget; yet all shall be forgot,
But he’ll remember, with advantages,
What feats he did that day. Then shall our names,
Familiar in his mouth as household words-
Brown the Skirt, Wheeler the Wuss, Soros the Purser,
and Holt and Stelter, the Pimps,
Be in their flowing cups freshly remembred.
This story shall the good man teach his son and daughter
And Portland Day shall neer go by,
From this day to the ending of the world,
But we in it shall be remembered–
(My apologies to the Bard but this actually is how heroically they see themselves.)
The vigils will be like how Confederate Memorial Day was observed each April following the Civil War, and as “veterans”, when they make those pilgrimages they will wear some sort of display to show off their participation. Badges, ribbons and medals. Things they can’t wear in public today.
You may not know this, but Antifa manages their troops like military units. They have at least two, possibly three, levels of command on the ground, with specialized teams (e.g., lasers and shock troops) so a pecking order, rank, is present. Just think of that tall guy giving commands to the squirts holding the shields in the feature photo.
Back at the bus, or other places they congregate, there are attaboys, real commendations to be passed out. They likely even have a newsletter, and it would look something like this:
And that newsletter would “mention in the dispatches” (an old Imperial British military “attaboy”) the names of the various troops who did well.
Have you ever seen this?:
(There are dozens of these, and if you’ll look closely, those little 7-star emblems are from the Multnomah County Sheriff’s Office, not the Portland City Police.)
But to the kid that was arrested these are all badges of honor. Proof of Merit.
And not just anyone can get one of these. It is the principle star in the crown of an Antifa veteran that he can show his mates upon the Feast of Portland.
I’ve made some assumptions based on the observation that the key to Antifa’s ground-level success has been the size of the mobs of young men and women, some just screaming curses, others running around in packs of three or four, finding old men in wheelchairs to tip over, or lately, just standing in a “police-line” behind metal, painted shields, as if they were guarding the Gate at Thermopylae. (See the photo.)
Anytime you have a group of militarized vandals who carry out basic ground operations, you have to have 1) a steady supply of cannon fodder (warm bodies) dressed like we see here, to keep local police distracted and shielded from the more serious criminal activity of tossing Molotov cocktails and 2) you have to have a pretty sizeable truck to carry all that gear.
That means 3) they have to have a supply “sergeant” who doles that equipment out, and he’s usually the first one to see the potential for profit.
A lot of the Antifa photos you see are posed, much like school class photos. With an ANTIFA official stamp/seal they can be sold for $50/$100 apiece around the country to smaller Antifa/BLM groups, who would fit the general profiles in the photos. Several types are available. And they can sure impress the gang at Wendy’s. In the 60s, P J O’Rourke, at the time a paid Anti-War demonstrator, said that beer, weed and getting laid was standard payment for a day’s services.
Since 80% of any staged Antifa event is composed of apprentice-grade cannon fodder, paid by the same class of people who funded the anti-war and race riots of the 60s-70s, you can bet the set-up is the similar.
(So stay leery about the potential for stagecraft, including mobs standing in front of some simpatico local politician’s house in the suburbs. They’re everywhere in Oregon. I live two miles from a mostly black middle class neighborhood where a house boldly hangs the American flag upside down, at half mast. I’ll bet local BLM could cut all sorts of shines in front of that house…if they were in Oregon. But National Anthem-loving black Virginians also live there, I know, and are well-armed. Oregonians not so much. So I don’t worry. Sky determines.)
But for serious Merit Badges, you have to begin with the imprimatur of the local police department, and that mug shot, above. It’s golden. That makes it official. That’s what raises a Antifa troop above Tenderfoot. (Note: an enterprising supply sergeant could set it up with certain cops in Portland so that a kid can fly in from Pittsburgh on Thursday, be on-site that night, be arrested, booked and mug-shot, then meet the judge and be back on the flight back east by Friday, and back to work at Karl’s Pizzeria by Saturday… with the sweetest mug shot of himself with that 7-star certified seal of authenticity from the Multnomah County Sheriff as proof that he is a real badass.)
How many rich kids are out there who would pay $500-$1000 for a honey-magnet like that? Street cred.
But for the real Antifa wannabe, knowing that his unit captains were at the Wall Street Occupy camp in 2011, it’s like a buck private seeing the Bronze Star plus service ribbons for Iraq and Afghanistan on his platoon sergeant.
But, since these are just video-game trolls I’ll use the Boy Scout merit badge to club them with instead of the emblems of real men.
You’ve seen (well maybe you haven’t) Eagle Scouts, with their sash,
Antifa’s Merit Badges wouldn’t look like this.
In Scouting, where outdoor skills such a Swimming, Lifesaving, First Aid, Camping and Hiking were at the top of the heap, while Chemistry, Drafting and Chess were more sedentary pursuits, Antifa Merit Badges would extol the skill and manliness of clocking a fellow from behind with a bicycle lock and chain, or pushing an old geezer in a wheelchair down a flight of steps on the sidewalk, or a 5-on-1 beatdown in the street, and at least for the time being, the now-infamous kick-to-the-head of a man that is down:
I think Stick-Men Merit Badges work best. Don’t you?
