To The Editor:
Paul Hanke is totally correct. Removing the flags was not an act of civil disobedience. Thoreau and Martin Luther King were sending a message to their fellow citizens that their government was taking actions that were deplorable. The removal of the flags is more akin to the communists in mid 1930s Germany or the Antifa of late 1940s England or 21st-century Antifa in the U.S. Civil disobedience is directed at the government’s actions. The communists of 1935 Germany were fighting against the Brown Shirts who were supporting the Nazis but weren’t a part of the government.
We, who are Antifa, are disrupting any organizations that support hatred of our fellow citizens for no reason other than skin color, religion, ethnicity or language. Just as the swastika was a sign of this hatred then, now MAGA and “All Lives Matter” are used as the swastika: hatred of our fellow citizens. We, Antifa, will continue to disrupt any group that professes the same beliefs that killed six million “undesirables” in Nazi Germany. Though I, personally, think violence and theft are poor strategies, I support the condemnation of hatred of our fellow citizens.
Robin Lehman
Warren
