Stomp out Hate and Fascism, Join Together in Love and Solidarity

Pensacola DSA responds to racist, antisemitic, anti-LGBTQ attacks on our community

August 25th, 2023

On August 13th, 2023, members of the Pensacola Democratic Socialists of America (PDSA) joined with organizers and volunteers from Strive (The Socialist Trans Initiative) and the Party for Socialism in Liberation (PSL) to engage in cleanup of vile antisemitic Nazi vandalism marked around the Graffiti Bridge in Pensacola, Florida.

In the past weeks and months we have seen antisemitic, racist markings on the rise in Pensacola. Swastikas and other racist propaganda have cropped up in our neighborhoods and communities. These have no place here in our home, We emphatically reject their proliferation and the hateful ideology that fuel them. Threats and actions from fascist agitators have not been limited to symbols. In July, bricks covered with white supremacist markings including "no jews” were thrown through the window of the Chabad Jewish Center in an attack on Pensacola's Jewish community, while earlier this month swastikas were painted over a PSL community center, along with markings which according to the ADL show praise for Adolf Hitler.

Leading up to the vandalizing of the center, socialists have faced escalating attacks from fascist agitators. A rally on March 8th of this year for International Women's Day was met with Nazi salutes and the display of fascist flags. Prior to being arrested, the four fascist teenage culprits reportedly also vandalized an Islamic community center and a number of other locations.

The left had also been attacked and confronted by these fascist agitators in the year prior. At a February 2022 rally organized by high school students in opposition to the infamous Don't Say Gay bill, the Nazi teenagers tried to intimidate the hosting students, They made violent threats against their peers and insulted them for being LGBTQ, not leaving the group alone until the arrival of PDSA and other members of the public. With the balance of support and opposition no longer in the favor of the agitators, the event was able to proceed on and the agitation left, although LGBTQ people present received toxic insults and encouragement to self harm and suicide.

On May 1st, 2022 this group screamed racial epithets at children at a May Day celebration jointly hosted by PDSA and PSL and anti-socialist flyers were left at the park. On platforms like Twitter, threats to obstruct events were repeatedly made against the two groups, including threats of violence. The fascists attempted to infiltrate PDSA by posing as members of the public interested in joining the organization.

On May 20th, 2022, Martin Luther King Junior Square in Downtown Pensacola was flyered with papers which read "commies off our streets" during the mutual aid free food distribution Food Not Bombs. In November 2022, organizers with PDSA and its Mutual Aid Working Group were threatened when putting on another free food distribution at a homeless encampment. Members met at one of their homes rather than the publicly stated location as a precaution, and prior to PDSA's arrival at the encampment, camp residents reported that young fascist agitators who showed up had claimed they were there to protest PDSA and its 'gay agenda.'

It's clear that the fascist elements that have been attacking our community in Pensacola have felt free and unencumbered in their escalating path of cruelty and hatred. Many people were subject to harassment and intimidation, whether queer, trans or non-binary, black and brown, Jewish, Muslim, socialist, although socialists and Jewish people have been particularly targeted. Our hearts are torn for those who have endured attacks and we offer our solidarity and support. A few things stand out as notable, such as that adults are playing a role, with platforms like Telegram being used to foment radicalization. We’ve seen that when confronted with overwhelming numbers that hate cannot stand alone and their message is diffused. Mobilization, solidarity, and safety in numbers are needed to counter threats from the far-right as their ideology targets all of us in some way. Racism, queerphobic, anti-transgender animus and red-baiting anti-communism and anti-socialism were mixed in a devil's brew of toxicity immersing the lives of the teenagers who have made this hateful impact.

We have to consider what could have primed this course of action and what is propping it up. Assuredly, the minor's parents may have played a role, but these attacks have come at a moment in Florida where history denial is entrenched in our public education system and race massacres are denied by curriculum. Teachers face punishment and retaliation for teaching about historic injustices against black and queer people, for referring to students by chosen name and pronouns and even for being transgender themselves.

Where clear facts about injustice are stripped away, in their absence, conspiracy theories and fabrications of history can be cultivated. Our young people deserve to be able to learn from the mistakes of the past so reactionary opportunists cannot fill this void of education with revisionism and fabrication. It's also evidently necessary to keep an eye on extremist organizations on platforms like Telegram and to counter those attempting to radicalize young people.

At the same time as these teenagers bullied and intimidated their neighbors, threatening peers and strangers with physical violence, the state of Florida forged a more bigoted history by eliminating gender care for minors and restricting adults from covering transition-related expenses through our state's Medicaid system. A sweeping purge of children's and teen's books have been enacted, with books about queer lives cast as pornography while Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye was also given the boot.Property rights have been restricted for Chinese citizens, collective bargaining rights have been curtailed, black and brown Floridians were arrested for voting, and anti-LGBTQ hostility was formalized as the guiding principle of education for the state GOP, as a part of their wholesale efforts to dismantle it entirely.

Ron DeSantis has demanded that our country "stop the invasion" – of asylum-seekers from countries devastated by imperialism and the drug war. He has kidnapped and illegally trafficked asylum-seekers, appropriating state funds to do so. Latino civil rights have been suspended and families further criminalized in an effort to push them out of the state while curriculum about racism, gender identity and sexuality, and African American studies have been stripped away. Rick Scott, a Senator whose rule as governor was marked by racism, attacks on the poor, and voter disenfranchisement, warned socialists not to come to Florida in response to legitimate travel advisories being issued for LGBTQ people, immigrants, and people of color.

Our current governor, who has clung to power after imposing a poll tax on voters enfranchised by popular referendum, appears to share much of the ideology advanced by the vandals arrested this month. DeSantis and Republican legislators enacted these attacks on black and brown, queer and transgender people, immigrants, women, people needing abortion, and many others as a show of their power to disrupt and shatter the lives of Floridians whom they disapprove of—which encourages and emboldens extremist vigilantism and expression of prejudiced views.

In his bid for the White House, Desantis’ campaign team has shared videos with white supremacist neonazi imagery through a staffer who praised neonazi Nick Fuentes, while another cheered LGBTQ families being forced to flee Florida.

Well, we are not going anywhere. Not from this state, and not from our homes and families. We stand in solidarity with all of those targeted in bigoted attacks by fascists, whether in the streets or from our government. We stand with all members of our community who have had the experience of being targeted because of their identity. Hatred distracts us from coming together to address the dire concerns facing all of us. We are all jeopardized by climate change, further curtailment of democracy and the dismantling of our public institutions. We are put at considerable danger by the rise of neofascism in this country and around the world as democratic governments fall to autocracy. It is necessary for us to listen and depend on those around us who we may not understand but who are our neighbors. When all of our people are fed and housed and our children play together, that is how we defeat fascism.

The Pensacola Democratic Socialists of America emphatically rejects the advancement of fascist, racist, sexist, transphobic, antisemitic violence and policies and their normalization. We denounce the Nazi vandals and their supporters who have attacked our city. State leaders must decisively state their rejection to Nazism and fascism and cease in their attacks on us through the state and its weaponized institutions.

The answer to hate is mobilization of the people to stand up for their neighbors, both when they are attacked and when they are hungry and without shelter. The best way we can make ourselves resilient and protected against fascism and its rise is to come together across communities and to mend past wrongs. The far-right finds unity in their hatred of those who they think should be eliminated. We can stop fascism by standing in the unity of love.

For comment or inquiry, contact info@pensacoladsa.org.