“I warn you not to betray or I will eat your ears!”
On Saturday February 1, a few members of the antifascist magazine 0151, decided to attend an open (to-all-genders-and-sexualities) gig organized by the collective Punkhurst Mutants Show (P.M.S), taking place at their squat at the School of Polytechnics, in Athens. Our presence there ended violently when a member of the P.M.S. kicked out a member of our magazine, declaring that they did not want “the solidarity of those who throw mud, calling them anti-Semites”. The person who banned our comrade was referring to our text “The Ear-Jew: when reversing the inversion is not necessarily right” in the 17th issue of 0151.
The aforementioned text criticized the anti-Semitic illustrations featured in the graphic novel “Rebecca”, published by former members of the antifa str to financially support the P.M.S. collective, in March of 2019. More specifically, “Rebecca”, originally written in Italian and first published on 1970 (Brandoli & Queirolo), included a traditional antisemitic caricature of a stingy, vicious Jew with hooking ears and a crooked nose, serving in the whole story as ‘the traitor’. It was precisely this Jewish iconography that our critique focused on.
Our text, bringing the issue of antisemitism to the fore, posed a question and a concern regarding the political discourse of a queer squat, with which we otherwise thought we had common grounds, recognizing common narratives, such as anti-state discourse, identity politics critique, antisexism as an inseparable part of antifascism etc. In particular, our text highlighted the importance of the struggle against antisemitism, and served as a call for discussion, urging PMS to a dialogue publicly. After all, the act itself of publishing a graphic novel is a political act per se.
Unfortunately, though, supporting the exchange of views, as well as the discussion over disagreements among assemblies, is far from being taken in fact as a political practice; it seems that expressing criticism and using a collective signature is regarded as “throwing smud”. Moreover, it is sometimes considered so aggressive to do so, that the team facing it, feels that it must be protected from it and eliminate the threat; in our case, a member of the PMS banned/kicked out one member of the 0151 magazine from the squat. Instead of a reply to our critique, so that the dialogue could proceed, PMS preferred to cut off the relationships between us, leaving no space for political discussion and chose the easiest solution, namely, to ban one of our comrades from a queer squat. In other words, they reacted lightheartedly, treating a political dispute the same way as they would in (hetero)sexist or racist incidents (or any other behavior that would lead to kicking out someone from their space). The idea that “anyone who publicly disagrees with us has no place here” indicates something much more unpleasant, which goes beyond the specific relationships of the antifa magazine 0151 with this squat. In effect, it shows that individual ambitions are put above collective practices.
At this point, there is one more thing that we want to address. Despite the fact that several members of the 0151 magazine were attending the gig, the member of the PMS decided to kick out only one of our comrades who, at the same time, happens to be a cis-male, ignoring the 0151’s female and queer representatives that were there as well. In other words, a distorted image prevailed around the gender identity, focusing exclusively on the male member. Thus, we saw PMS putting forward a rigid form of identity politics; one that just points to identities, instead of reflecting on them introspectively, trying to find whish is “worse”, or, in other words, which is more privileged, so as to attribute to it a priori, natural belligerent character. But still, when gender identity is used merely as a essentialist means, any need for elaboration coming from our critique is left unseen; and so does, any conversation on the political points that are on stake here, since what would conquer in the end –if the female and queer representatives of the magazine hadn’t also responded by leaving the space immediately- is that it “just a man that got kicked out of a queer squat”. At the same time, by depriving from the female and gender members of the anti-fascist magazine their accountability on their political, collective views, such as the critique against anti-Semitism, the PMS came to reproduce pure sexism, making them seem like “second class” members.
All things considered, the political notion of standing against antisemitism got transformed from a necessary political stance into slander, and from a collective statement to a personal -male- spite. Whoever has ever read ‘0151’, even a little bit, knows very well that we strongly defend the idea that we can’t talk about antifascism without first talking about Auschwitz, bringing this way out antisemitism as an issue and creating a conversation space around it. At this point, we wonder on how this conversation can continue, when the response to our criticism is being replied with the dictate “do not call us anti-Semitists”, omitting the suffix “even though we…” How can there even be a discussion, when we are called to dispute whether or not the depiction of a ‘money-hungry Jew with hooked ears and a crocked nose’ is antisemitic, or when ‘betrayal’ is associated with a ‘vicious usurer’? In which way are we supposed to discuss with others that their discourse on antisemitism is limited in a vague statement against it, that they do not have any intensions at all to look deeper in its context and history, that they are not willing to take a collective and personal responsibility towards it?
It is not the first time we are held liable for our choice to address anti-Semitism and point out the reasons that reproduce it. In the past, members of our collective have been threatened physically and psychologically and even beaten; this time though, the suppressors are not collectives and persons carrying dominant identities, but a queer assembly – the only queer assembly left in Athens. This fact alone is bound to put us into concerns about our choices and the limits that they ultimately pose. For us, it is certainly not enough to solely enlist a plethora of “anti-” statements and presenting them afterwards as a political agenda. On the contrary, there is a necessity to shed light into opposition towards nation, (hetero)sexism, racism and antisemitism, and to see how these inter-relate afterwards into a broader narrative, which is grounded to reality and highlights the connections between them throughout time.
What the Punkhurst Mutants Show did on the 1st of February is denying any further dialogue. We, on the other hand, will still defend our political relationships and our collective practices, by emphasizing that there is an elephant in the (greek) room, antisemitism, and by holding fast to our political stance:
You cannot speak against fascism, without speaking against anti-Semitism!
0151 antifascist magazine against the greek experience / 12-04-2020