Why are Marxists organising protests against Southern and Molyneux?
If you’ve been reading carefully you know that the protests against Lauren Southern and Stefan Molyneux in Melbourne were organised by a group calling itself the Campaign Against Racism and Fascism (CARF for short). CARF was founded as a front in 2015 by members of the Revolutionary Marxist groups Socialist Alternative (SAlt) and the Freedom Socialist Party (FSP).
As a quick illustration of just how much these groups dominate the organisation one only needs to look at their end of year shindig in 2017 whereof the twenty people who confirmed attendance in advance via Facebook, only two were not activists, members or associates of SAlt or the FSP. The facade really is paper thin. Almost every time a spokesperson from CARF talks to the media they turn out to be a well-known member of one of the two organisations, be it Jerome Small https://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/nation/victorian-police-brace-for-mosque-violence-on-day-of-protest/news-story/934a1707b552fb5d64358c095c00ecba , Roz Ward http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3955060/Anti-bullying-advocate-Safe-Schools-founder-Roz-Ward-harassed-Trump-supporter-Melbourne-rally.html, Tess Dimos https://www.9news.com.au/national/2018/06/24/17/25/protesters-clash-in-melbourne-cbd or Chris Di Pasquale http://www.abc.net.au/radio/melbourne/programs/mornings/far-right-protests/9226498 of SAlt or Debbie Brennan https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/far-right-group-to-rally-in-melbourne-as-springvale-fire-tragedy-fuels-racism-on-social-media-20161119-gst16k.html of the FSP.
The protests were organised and held in other cities are much the same, regardless of the name scrawled on the banner the activists and groups behind it are almost uniformly members of Australia’s radical Marxist fringe. Sometimes the organisers come from Socialist Alternative alone, sometimes in conjunction with Socialist Alliance or the “Victorian Socialists” or more rarely the “Solidarity” group.
All of the above groups and activists are hard-core Trotskyists. That is to say they represent that sad and generally unloved group of people who have somehow managed to convince themselves that the Soviet Union would have turned out perfectly fine if only Trotsky rather than Stalin had been in charge of the secret police (the sailors of Kronstadt would disagree if they could, but they can’t, Trotsky killed them).
This begs the question: why are so many Marxists so intent on organising against the visit of two politically incorrect Canadians? Just to oppose these events alone hundreds, possibly thousands of collective man hours of activism have been invested. Similar potentially violent protests are planned for the visit of former UKIP leader and MEP Nigel Farage as well as the return of Milo Yianopolous later this year.
So why are they doing it?
Partially, of course, it’s about making sure that the right of centre views are under constant pressure, unable to book venues or attract attendees to events without the threat of violence. The far left assumes correctly that this helps to push the window of acceptable opinion in Australia to the left, away from their opponents and towards themselves.
But there’s a deeper and longer-term objective as well.
Debbie Brennan, a sallow-faced lady with an, unfortunately, grating American accent has been the primary spokeswoman for CARF since its inception. In an article written on the website of the Freedom Socialist Party in October of 2016, she outlines the history of the birth of CARF as a power struggle over control within the left wing anti-Reclaim Australia protests.
Ms Brennan describes how CARF was victorious in that struggle and laid out the superior nature of their vision for the organisation as the centre of something called a “United Front”. For watchers of the extreme left that’s a telling use of terminology.
The basic theory of the United Front tactic among socialists was first developed by the Comintern, an international communist organization created by communists around the world in the wake of the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution. The idea is you organise as many “working class” groups together under your leadership to fight for a popular cause. After you’ve pulled enough people in to protest about “fascism” (the theory goes) you can then recruit them into your groups by explaining that “fascism” is a product of Capitalism and the only cure for that is Communism.
I know, sounds stupid hey? Well, apparently there are enough stupid people on the left falling for it to keep this old tactic viable.
It also explains why two libertarians from Canada are being described as “fascists”. It illuminates why these groups are so eager to call everyone a fascist; from Milo Yianopolous to Geert Wilders, from Tony Abbott to Donald Trump, from Nigel Farage to Pauline Hanson.
They have to be fascists you see. Otherwise, the plan won’t work. Without fascists, there’s no reason to have a united front against fascism, and without a united front against fascism, mainstream left of centre people (outside university campuses at least) go back to ignoring the otherwise small and inconsequential Trotskyist groups just as they were before.
As usual with Socialism, it always comes down to power. Who has power, how to get power, and the lies you need to tell to make people do what you want them to do?

Author Details
Lucas Rosas
Lucas Rosas has spent years monitoring far left extremists so you don’t have to. He lives in a secure location with multiple large and hungry guard dogs.
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Lucas Rosas
Lucas Rosas has spent years monitoring far left extremists so you don’t have to. He lives in a secure location with multiple large and hungry guard dogs.
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