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Antifa's Determined to Prevent a Book About Their Tactics From Being Published

Beth Baumann
Beth Baumann  |  January 11, 2021 7:20 PM

Antifa members in Portland, Oregon are doing their best to take down conservative journalist, Andy Ngo, who has been covering their violent behavior for years. In fact, back in 2019, Ngo was attacked with a cement milkshake simply for documenting Antifa's protests and riots that almost always turn violent.

Ngo has written a book about Antifa's thuggery, called "Unmasked," about how they target people and how their actions threaten our democracy. The book is available for preorder and is set to be released early next month.

When Antifa received word that Ngo's book was for sale at Powell's bookstore, they decided to show up and demand that the local chain cease selling it all together. 

Powell's responded by releasing a cushy statement saying they wouldn't sell the book in stores but it would be available for purchase online. It was their version of the "middle ground" even though they don't agree with the content of Ngo's book.

At Powell’s, a lot of our inventory is hand-selected, and hand-promoted. And a lot of our inventory is not. With several million titles available online at any given moment, complete hand-curation is not possible. Unmasked by Andy Ngo came to us through an automatic data feed via one of our long-term and respected publishers, Hachette Book Group. We list the majority of their catalogue automatically, as do many other independent and larger retailers. We have a similar arrangement with other publishers.

This book will not be on our store shelves, and we will not promote it. That said, it will remain in our online catalogue. We carry books that we find anywhere from simply distasteful or badly written, to execrable, as well as those that we treasure. We believe it is the work of bookselling to do so.

Decades ago we received credible bomb threats for selling the work of Salman Rushdie, and yet we carried on. We cannot behave any differently today when we feel differently about the book or writer in question.

Of course, Antifa wasn't happy with it. A bunch of them gathered outside the bookstore in Portland, once again, making the demand that the store no longer sell Ngo's book in any capacity. 

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One of the people who showed up outside of Powell's bookstore said people need to show up every day until the store decides to stop selling the book. She compared the book to Mein Kampf. 

"I completely understand those criticisms saying [Powell's] sells Mein Kampf, they sell these things – but they don't sell the Anarchist Cookbook – but anyways, I see that argument, but at the same time, this is active fascism," she explained. "There's a difference between the historical value that we get from 'Mein Kampf,' to not repeat that. This is different. This is active fascism that we can do something about right now." 

Another known Antifa member, Dustin Ferreira, vowed to do whatever he could to get Ngo's book pulled from every outlet possible. The goal is destroy Ngo's career. 

This whole thing is ironic. Antifa says Ngo is being a fascist for writing a book... about Antifa's crazy tactics that resulted in him being repeatedly attacked.

Let's look at the definition of fascism. 

From Webster's Dictionary:

a political philosophy, movement, or regime (such as that of the Fascisti) that exalts nation and often race above the individual and that stands for a centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader, severe economic and social regimentation, and forcible suppression of opposition

Antifa complains Ngo is being a fascist. Antifa wants Ngo's book pulled. That is the definition of "forcible suppression of opposition." Antifa – the so-called anti-fascists – are engaging in fascism themselves.

And they wonder why most people don't take their demands seriously?