Fascism, like racism, gives simple answers to real problems. No work? Blame the black family in the next close, not the boss who fired you. It's an easy thing to do. It requires no thought.
But a moments thought shows how wrong it is. Working class people (black or white) have no say in the decisions that determine whether a company will invest in an area. If the company can make more profit elsewhere, then it will go elsewhere. If we get too "selfish" and fight for better wages and conditions then again the company will move. Unless we do what we are told, then business will invest somewhere else (usually in places where state repression has destroyed all forms of working class organisation). Capitalism, not immigration causes unemployment. Same with the other problems we face. We live in a society where our needs are way behind making profits.
This explains why we see racism, like sexism, institutionalised. The Tories don't prattle on about passing the "cricket test" (which most Scots and Welsh would fail!) just because they are sad bastards. The tabloids don't stir up racism by spending lies about immigration (while "condemning" racism's more "extreme" element like the BNP) just for the sake of it. Racism is needed by the system we live under.
What easier way is there to divert people's anger than onto scapegoats? Anger about bad housing, no housing, boring work, no work, shit wages and conditions, no future. Instead of attacking the real causes of these (and other) problems, people are encouraged to direct their anger against people who face the same problems!
Racism, like fascism, tries to turn class hatred into race hatred. Classes exist in all communities, black or white. Racism tries to get us to think that if a landlord rips us off its because he's black not because he's a landlord. The success of the BNP recently in Tower Hamlets was due to them turning the (bad) housing issue into a race issue. In reality, black people in the area had worse housing than whites and less chance of getting a council house. But like with the papers, reality is always something that gets in the way of idealogy.
Part of the problem with anti-fascism is that it can ignore class issues and just concentrate on the (real) problems caused by fascist groups like the BNP or NF. But racist attacks occur where such groups do not exist. Anti-fascists often ends up supporting the system which creates the evil they are trying to fight. How often have we heard anti-fascists ask the state to ban nazi groups? Once the state bans the far right, the "far left" will be next.
The simple fact is that the state exists to protect the system that causes all our problems to begin with. It is not our friend. Unless we realise this and combine fighting fascism with fighting the class war we'll get nowhere.
Fascism was born to protect capitalism. In Italy fascism only grew after workers had occupied their factories and ran them their selves. The bosses, seeing their power and profits disappearing, turned to the fascists as the answer to their fears. The fascists acted and kicked our class back into its "rightful place" (aided by the state). Resistance by anarchists and other sections of the workers' movement failed as the socialist party and trade union leaders sat on the fence and their members (too used to someone telling them what to do) sat back and did nothing. Fascism was a "preventive counter revolution" in the words of one anarchist at the time. Its no coincidence that fascism grew in the 1970's after the miner's brung down the Tory government's. Without the backing of business, fascism is nothing.
At the present moment, the Tories are going a good enough job for the ruling class. Fascism is not needed when you've got the Criminal (In)Justice Act! In fact, the bonehead's associated with the BNP are a bit of a liablity. The powers that be don't need them at present, although this may change if the class struggle heats up.
But fascists cannot be ignored. They are a danger to us all. They attack revolutionaries, blacks, gays, anyone that challenges their "ideas" or makes them unsure of their assumptions. Its easier not to think. As Orwell said, "ignorance is strength". Its no coincidence that the tories are attacking education and imposing a "national" cariculum which forces students to answer questions in the correct way, to think in the correct way.
All that fascism means is that we worker harder, for less. That we live in fear of our neighbours and relatives in case one of them grasses us in for having the "wrong" ideas or taste in music. They'll get rid of unemployment by getting us to build concentration camps (and why is it those who claim that the camps did not exist are those who wish they had?). If you think the Tories are bad, try fascism!
Fascism, like racism and sexism, must be fought and fought hard. We have seen what happens when anti-fascists do not resist - fascists kill them. The many examples of asian and black communities which have organised their own self-defense is an example of what is possible. We cannot rely on our enemies to fight for us (particularly when state officials seem to have more in common with the fascists!). Direct action and solidarity are our only friends. We need to do it ourselves by organising ourselves and fighting for ourselves.
We need to hammer home the message - racists are not welcome in our communities and workplaces and must not be tolerated.
But we cannot turn this struggle into yet another "single issue". Racism in our class is no accident. It's there to divert the class struggle. We need to combat these ideas and encourage a new way to look at the world, one that does not accept the logic of capital and the state. One that realises that an injury to one is an injury to all. The rise of the far right is caused by the failure of the far left. If all socialists have to offer is middle class moralism and voting labour (with or without illusions) then socialism will become even more the plaything of the "concerned" middle class than it already is. In such situations fascism could appear like the radical alternative for the white working class. Let Tower Hamlets be a warning to us all!
We need to combine anti-fascism with clear class analysis and class politics. We need to encourage the spirit of revolt and heat up the class struggle. We working class socialists must take back our ideas from the "radical" middle class who have preverted them and apply them where we live and work. Its our lives and communities that are being destroyed by capitalism and the state. Its our fight, no one else's.
Once we become aware of our own strength then fascism with its "strong leaders" and false answers will no longer be able to con parts of our class. Free people govern themselves, its slaves who need leaders and governments.
The struggle against fascism and racism cannot be separated from the struggle for a free society. Anarchists have been resisting fascism from the day it first appeared. We will not rest until it and the sick system that spawned it are no more!