Report Back from Dover 17.08.24
Around 300 Antifascists gathered this morning in Dover for a demonstration called by Kent Anti Racism Network and supported by Stand Up To Racism, the Queer and Disabled Block and several crews of autonomous antifascists and anarchists coming from across Kent and well as London and Brighton.
On Wednesday 7th Anti racists in Dover had been heavily outnumbered by the far right and were targeted by the police, bucking the trend across the country, so if was felt that it was essential to prioritise mobilising in Dover to make sure this couldn’t happen again.
The far right called off their planned demonstration along the sea front at the last minute however around a dozen fascists still showed up. SUTR held a demonstration marching in a circle and avoiding the fascists while the Queer and Disabled Block, supported by movement for justice and autonomous anarchists went out on a separate march to confront the fascists on the sea front.
Fascists present included a live streamer called Alfie Audits, paper sellers from the Holocaust denying conspiracy rag “The Light”, individuals from GB News, Reform UK, Make Britain Great Again, Paul Golding and a handful of activists from Britain First as well as several local crackheads. A man also drove by and shouted racist abuse in a van belonging to Emmanuel Plumbing & Heating. The fascists were silent when surrounded and outnumbered by antifascists and despite their claims to believe in freedom of speech, refused to answer any questions on what they believed in or why they were there.
One of the fascists was wearing a tee shirt with a Spitfire logo and when confronted with the fact that spitfires had shot down Nazis in WW2, and if he actually supported the spitfires then he was on the wrong side of police lines, tried to deny this and claimed that the spitfires had never shot down any Nazis. These fascists could potentially benefit from political education and consciousness raising as well as basic history lessons.
The police attempted to collude with the far right and move on the antifascists but people held our ground and refused to move until eventually the police were forced to cave in and move away the far right. Dover has historically been an NF stronghold and the EDL splinter group SEA rioted in Dover in 2015 and 2016. More recently Dover has been haunted by Active Patriot and “migrant hunters” looking to boost their online profiles. It is clear that the far right cancelled their “stop the boats” protest due to threat of overwhelming numbers of antifascists, and if people hadn’t got organised and come together the far right may well have rioted in Dover again today.
Antifascists split up and made their way home early in the afternoon believing the far right threat to be over. However as we were on our way home reports started coming in of the Britain First presence, as well as groups of fascists remaining in pubs. People came in on early trains to hold the ground first and it’s understandable that most people don’t have the energy to stay out all day and evening. One learning could be to call for more crews to come out in the late afternoon and evenings to replace earlier groups and help ensure fascists are never able to control the streets unopposed and potentially run riot and carry out racist attacks.