Queers bash back

In case you missed it, I launched a new website where you can find a longer view calendar and more resources for those in anticapitalist and labor movements. These newsletter issues will still be hosted at solidarity.substack.com.

Fascists organizing on Pride day in Eugene

This Saturday, August 10, the Eugene-Springfield Pride Festival is happening. This will be a significant Pride Festival for numerous reasons. This year marks the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall riots and in honor of that Eugene-Springfield Pride is holding its first Pride march.

This year you have seen the rise in “straight pride” events, which to no surprise are a front for hate groups. The latest attempts to organize are happening in Modesto, California, where the organizers are calling for a “superiority of whiteness”.

In Eugene, on the same day as the Pride Festival, far right groups are planning an open carry rally. This is not promoted as a direct confrontation or response, and organizers are pleading that they did not know Pride was happening at the same time, but they know now. Their rally will is scheduled for 1 PM at Wayne Morse Free Speech Plaza, after the march and in a different neighborhood than the Festival. This doesn’t mean that they won’t seek to disrupt the march and cause a generally unsafe environment for those in town, especially those of marginalized identities. They have noted that they want to target liberal Saturday market goers, which is going on at the same time right across the street.

One of the co-organizers listed on the Facebook event, under the pseudonym Jon Baker, is Andrew Allwander. Allwander is a martial arts instructor who has openly discussed assaulting antifascists. Also among those that have marked they are going is David Willis, who was named in the Cider Riot lawsuit and urged his Twitter followers to “cleanse the streets”. Michelle Yates who helped organize the “Oregon Women for Trump” rally in Eugene, has also said she plans on going to the rally.

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