"The retreat of the US's most infamous white nationalist didn't happen on its own," charges Maximillian Alvarez, co-founder of the Ann Arbor chapter of the Campus Antifascist Network. "It didn't happen because people just ignored the imminent threat of 'alt-right' bile and fascist violence. And it didn't happen because administrators at Michigan State University somehow outsmarted all the white supremacists who showed up to East Lansing on March 5. It happened because, on that day, and for months prior, campus and community organizers resisted."
University administrators' entreaties to just "ignore" the Traditionalist Worker Party -- and hope for the best -- only emboldens the white supremacists and neo-fascists invading American college campuses, says Alvarez. The Michigan universities that chose to "play the sly card" with Spencer's demands endangered communities they're supposed to serve. And catalyzed the necessary response by collective grassroots groups who share commitments to "equality, justice and protecting thy neighbor."
"Perhaps it is because of the threat that these coalitions pose to the top-down administrative power structure at universities that many administrators are rushing to co-opt and pass off community organizing victories as their own," concludes the author, prodding campus communities "to provide for themselves what university and municipal authorities won't."
"If we understand and come to grips with the character of the problem we face, we can find and work on the solution," offers RefuseFascism.org. In the Name of Humanity, We REFUSE to Accept a Fascist America.
