Fight Dem Back
Encyclopedia
Fight Dem Back, often abbreviated FDB, is an Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

n and New Zealand
New Zealand
New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...

 anti-racist group. It claims to concentrate its attention on the Australian & New Zealand white nationalist, fascist and neo-Nazi scenes.

Name

The group is named after a reggae song by Linton Kwesi Johnson
Linton Kwesi Johnson
Linton Kwesi Johnson is a UK-based dub poet. He became the second living poet, and the only black poet, to be published in the Penguin Classics series. His poetry involves the recitation of his own verse in Jamaican Patois over dub-reggae, usually written in collaboration with renowned British...

 http://www.fightdemback.com/about/our-name.

Politics

The group was founded by a collective of internet activists from across Australia and New Zealand in late 2004. In Sydney, these people included the lawyer Mat Henderson, generally known as 'Darp', who prior to starting the group was mainly known as a prolific blog
Blog
A blog is a type of website or part of a website supposed to be updated with new content from time to time. Blogs are usually maintained by an individual with regular entries of commentary, descriptions of events, or other material such as graphics or video. Entries are commonly displayed in...

ger, winning best NSW blog in the 2005 Australian blogging awards. In Melbourne, the organisation was headed up by Cam Smith, a multimedia producer and radio journalist. In Perth, Donald Oorst, a part-time academic and author helped build the group up. In New Zealand, the public faces of the group were Robert Trigan and well known community activist and anarchist Asher Goldman from Wellington whilst many other individuals toiled away under the guise of their online pseudonyms. Trigan left FDB and New Zealand in July 2005 for New York http://fightdemback.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=439

In some European countries there has been mutual dislike between more moderate (or 'liberal anti-fascist') groups, for example Searchlight, and more radical (or 'militant anti-fascist') ones, for example Anti-Fascist Action
Anti-Fascist Action
Anti-Fascist Action was a militant anti-fascist organization founded by members of Red Action and other left-wing groups in the United Kingdom in 1985....

 (AFA). The main areas of difference could be summarised as follows:
  • willingness to work with the State: groups such as Searchlight will generally, for example, pass on information to and work with the police, groups such as AFA generally will not.
  • analysis of fascism as either a form of, or opposed to, capitalism: groups such as AFA generally take the view that the difference between fascist groups and mainstream political parties is one of degree, whereas more moderate groups generally take the view that the difference is a clear difference of kind. Similarly, groups such as AFA as less likely to make a distinction between fascism and extreme conservatism.
  • generally speaking, groups such as AFA will use what they call direct action and what their opponents call violence, whereas more moderate groups will use legal means.


By these criteria, Fight dem Back should be compared to the more moderate groups such as Searchlight, as it describes its operations as purely intelligence gathering and dissemination. However the split between moderate and radical anti-fascists does not seem to have happened in relation to the group. For example they interviewed, with implied approval, two former members of the British Anti-Fascist Action
Anti-Fascist Action
Anti-Fascist Action was a militant anti-fascist organization founded by members of Red Action and other left-wing groups in the United Kingdom in 1985....

 http://www.fightdemback.org/2005/08/09/no-retreat-drive-the-fascists-from-the-streets/, and there has been little or no criticism of the group from the left. They also ran an approving article marking the anniversary of the 'Battle of Cable Street
Battle of Cable Street
The Battle of Cable Street took place on Sunday 4 October 1936 in Cable Street in the East End of London. It was a clash between the Metropolitan Police, overseeing a march by the British Union of Fascists, led by Oswald Mosley, and anti-fascists, including local Jewish, socialist, anarchist,...

' http://www.fightdemback.org/2006/10/02/no-pasaran/. Fight dem back officially espouse a non-sectarian platform. The group draws its membership from traditional left-leaning cliques but also directly from the various ethnic community groups who are affected by race-hate activism.

Free speech

Henderson and FDB in general do not take the view that racists have a right to free speech. For example they have generally been supportive of laws prohibiting racist speech, and have been particularly active in having internet companies remove neo-Nazi websites. Their website states that "There are some on the racist-right who contend that Fight dem back! is a campaign against free speech. We fully accept that freedom of speech is a fundamental human right, but one that shouldn't be abused. If you argue that you should be allowed the freedom of speech to promote policies that deny that very same right on the basis of skin colour or nationality, then actually no, we don't believe you have a legitimate complaint when your posters are torn down and your meetings picketed." http://www.fightdemback.com/about/mission

The view is by no means unanimous however, as Goldman is staunchly opposed to hate-speech legislation.

FDB's position may be contrasted with that of the ACLU for example, who occupy a similar position on the political spectrum but whose activity often involves defending the right of racists to promote their views.

Membership policies

Compared to similar groups, FightDemBack seems to give a low priority to recruiting new members, and to 'screen' potential members more rigorously. A 2006 post on their discussion forum authored by Henderson http://www.fightdemback.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=2845 was "just a gentle reminder dear readers that being 'IN' FDB comes as a result of the senior and founding members voting you in", and stated that there are only thirteen members in Australia and New Zealand.

Activities

FDB have conducted a number of disruption campaigns against allegedly racist organisations and their supporters. FDB's campaigns have included attempts to reveal the identity of a person responsible for an anti-immigration campaign in Toowoomba, QLD; and general campaigning against the Australia First Party
Australia First Party
The Australia First Party is a minor far-right political party in Australia that is federally registered and is also registered to contest local elections in New South Wales. The Party is led by Jim Saleam. Saleam is the Chairman of the Party in New South Wales but plays a major role in the Party...

, the Patriotic Youth League
Patriotic Youth League
The Patriotic Youth League was a youth organisation in Australia. They described themselves as 'radical nationalists', however the media and other groups labelled them Neo-Nazis. Their logo was the Eureka Flag....

 and the New Zealand National Front
New Zealand National Front
The New Zealand National Front is a small white nationalist political party in New Zealand.-First formation:Mirroring developments in the UK, a group called the National Front evolved out of the New Zealand branch of the League of Empire Loyalists in 1967...

. These campaigns have resulted in a number of reprisals from radical organisations which have ranged from libel to vandalism and death threats.

Effect

The effectiveness of FightDemBack's activities is difficult to assess objectively. Naturally, the group claims to have had significant impact on the white supremacist movement, and equally naturally white supremacists downplay their significance.

Criticism

As noted above, FDB has been criticised by left-wing or liberal groups far less than similar groups in other countries.

The far-right groups who they target have been highly critical. Much of this criticism has focused on Darp as an individual: for example he is of Jewish ancestry (see for example http://ausfirst.alphalink.com.au/thestruggle/darpism.html). A similar common theme of far-right critics of FDB is that Darp is gay, although this may be being used as a general term of abuse as Darp is known to have a girlfriend. (for example "Darp, you are a raving homosexual" - http://www.fightdemback.com/about/threats-and-hate-mail). Flyers and posters have been placed in several neighbourhoods in Wellington accusing Goldman of being a "danger to any community" and stating that "Asher Goldman is a threat to your safety".

A second common theme of criticism is that Fight Dem Back is, or 'must be', funded by or working for or with agencies such as ASIO
Australian Security Intelligence Organisation
The Australian Security Intelligence Organisation is Australia's national security service, which is responsible for the protection of the country and its citizens from espionage, sabotage, acts of foreign interference, politically-motivated violence, attacks on the Australian defence system, and...

 or Jewish organisations - for example one right-winger rhetorically asked "Darp why don't you just admit that you're only the ANZAC figure head for MOSSAD
Mossad
The Mossad , short for HaMossad leModi'in uleTafkidim Meyuchadim , is the national intelligence agency of Israel....

" http://www.fightdemback.com/about/threats-and-hate-mail. FDB openly say that they will report crimes to relevant authorities, but dispute any hidden connection, including any funding, between them and those authorities.

A third theme is that FightDemBack are hypocritical in that they purport to fight fascism, but use the technique of pressuring authorities to restrict particular forms of political speech. FDB's main response to this argument is that the critics are themselves hypocritical, for example in that they use the rhetoric of free speech while opposing the concept in practice, or that they use patriotic imagery such as that of the ANZACs, while supporting regimes which the ANZACs fought against.

This leads to another main area of argument between FDB and those they target: FDB asserts that the far-right subculture centred around the Stormfront
Stormfront (website)
Stormfront is a white nationalist and supremacist neo-Nazi Internet forum that has been described as the Internet's first major hate site.Stormfront began as an online bulletin board system in the early 1990s before being established as a website in 1995 by former Ku Klux Klan leader and white...

 website is entirely fascist in belief, even though elements of it distance themselves from fascist (especially Nazi) imagery. The targets of their criticism assert that their distancing themselves from fascism and Nazism is a genuine ideological difference, not just a strategic choice.

See also

  • Anti-Defamation League
    Anti-Defamation League
    The Anti-Defamation League is an international non-governmental organization based in the United States. Describing itself as "the nation's premier civil rights/human relations agency", the ADL states that it "fights anti-Semitism and all forms of bigotry, defends democratic ideals and protects...

  • One People's Project
    One People's Project
    One Peoples Project is an organization founded in 2000 to monitor and publish information about alleged racist and far right groups and individuals...

  • Southern Poverty Law Center
    Southern Poverty Law Center
    The Southern Poverty Law Center is an American nonprofit civil rights organization noted for its legal victories against white supremacist groups; legal representation for victims of hate groups; monitoring of alleged hate groups, militias and extremist organizations; and educational programs that...

  • Searchlight Magazine
  • Anti-Fascist Action
    Anti-Fascist Action
    Anti-Fascist Action was a militant anti-fascist organization founded by members of Red Action and other left-wing groups in the United Kingdom in 1985....

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