City Bans Anarchy Symbol – Officials Call It “Hate Speech Similar To Swastika”

 Ontario, Canada – Last week, officials with the City of Hamilton  legally ordered a local anarchist group to remove the anarchy symbol  from the front of their headquarters, under the pretense of fighting  against hate speech. 

According to CBC News,  city officials called the symbol “hate material similar to the  swastika,” citing property damage caused by an extreme group of  black-bloc anarchists during recent protests. 

“The anarchist symbol is considered hate material by the City of  Hamilton and Hamilton Police Services and as such, must be removed,” City spokesperson Marie Fitzpatrick told CBC News. 

Ironically enough, the anarchist headquarters that is being asked to  remove the symbol from their storefront was itself a victim of  vandalism, and the symbol in question is painted onto a piece of plywood  that is covering the shop’s broken window.

Surprisingly, the anarchists complied with the order not long after  they were asked to remove the symbol from the storefront. Still, many  experts feel that the local government is using the hate speech loophole  to suppress the free speech of political dissent. 

“Most anarchy groups in the past have been seen as anti-racist or anti-hate. They are pro-people and anti-government,” said Princewill Ogban, an anti-racism activist in Hamilton. 

Even the local police are a bit confused about this new hate speech  designation, saying that they see this as more of a “radical” symbol  than one representing hate. 

Const. Jerome Stewart of the Hamilton police said that this new order  from the local government does not line up with his training. 

“It does not meet the threshold of a hate crime. To the best of  our knowledge, it is classified as an extreme left sign. So I don’t know  where the direction came that Hamilton police have identified it as a  hate crime sign, because as per our hate crime co-ordinator, that is not  the case,” Stewart said. 

Hamilton Mayor Fred Eisenberger defended the order on Wednesday in a statement to the Hamilton Spectator. 

“Certainly the anarchists that have locally presented themselves  have done things that would be considered to be inappropriate, so if you  tie the two of them together, I would say that’s a symbol of  destruction and mayhem and causing a crisis to a particular area. Is  that hateful? I think it is,” Eisenberger said.

 Unlike many flags and banners waved by different collectives, the  anarchy symbol does not represent some monolithic movement or  organization but instead represents a general idea that is a common  ground for people from a wide variety of cultural and political  backgrounds. Some anarchists are left-leaning or communist, others may  be more righting leaning and capitalist thinking, and there is a wide  spectrum of anti-authoritarian philosophies that fall in between, and  many of these groups are represented by the same anarchist symbol. 

The  “black-bloc” anarchists who are famous for rioting actually represent a  very small percentage of the people in the world who identify as  anarchists. 

This situation is a perfect example of the slippery slope that is  created with hate speech laws, showing how easily these laws can be used  to target people who are speaking out about injustices in the system.  

Although many of us agree that racism and bigotry is a horrible thing  that should be discouraged, in a democracy policies are shaped by the  whims of politicians, special interest groups, and the uninformed  masses. 

With that being said, when it is time to actually define “hate  speech” in a democracy, that definition will be determined by those  aforementioned groups, which could have many unintended consequences, as  we are seeing play out in Hamilton. 

Think about how Alt-right groups call Black Lives Matter a “terrorist  organization,” or how anti-gun activists use that exact same term when  referencing the NRA. 

Racism and bigotry may be objectively wrong, but  what classifies as “hate speech” is often subjective and determined by  people who cannot be trusted, which is why it is so dangerous to trust  the legal system to solve these types of social problems. 

As we have  seen recently with the racist New York lawyer who lost his office space after a public outburst or the woman who became a meme  after calling the police on a family having a picnic, the court of  public opinion handles these types of social issues far better than the  court of law. 

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AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY:

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My name is John Vibes and I am an author and researcher who organizes a number of large events including the Free Your Mind Conference. I write for numerous alternative media websites, including The Free Thought Project @tftproject and The Mind Unleashed. In addition to my first book, Alchemy of the Timeless Renaissance, I have also co-authored three books with Derrick Broze @dbroze : The Conscious Resistance: Reflections on Anarchy and Spirituality, Finding Freedom in an Age of Confusion and Manifesto of the Free Humans

I just won a 3-year-long battle with cancer, and will be working to help others through my experience, if you wish to contribute to my medical bills, consider subscribing to my podcast on Patreon.