So, let’s go back to the chronological order of events. After the first news announcing the Nazi march in Belgrade, Minister of police does not react. After the Antifascist campaign is formed, in time taking a form of a more serious self-organised civil project, therefore gaining more publicity, minister of police, Ivica Dačić, decides to put a ban on both fascist and antifascist gatherings due to the safety reasons, describing them as events with a high level of risk. Neither does the minister stop for one moment to think that this very act is actually the act of equating fascism with antifascism, nor does it cross his mind that he is practically legitimizing the notorious disheveled Politika’s analyst’s theory, a theory which he has been trying to prove for a year now, claiming that both parties are just extremists and social outcasts, and that there is no fascism in Serbia. However, let us not be malicious, it takes the minister 24 hours to realize the mistake he has made and withdraw the ban on the antifa march (which would have happened anyway, ban or no ban). A mistake the minister does not put right, and it’s something that would have made it all easier for everyone, is the fact that, instead of having thousands of members of riot police collecting “patriots” in the streets of central Belgrade, immediately before “the event with a high level of risk” (34 arrested, ten of them foreign citizens), in this way causing fear and confusion and limiting freedom of movement, he should have, if required, temporarily arrested the leaders of the groups the Ministry of Internal Affairs itself pronounced clerofascist, so that Belgrade could have had only one march on that day.

And so, who are those “great Serbian Patriots” threatening the non-violent civil antifa protest with violence and purge, and what does the minister warn us about once again on that Saturday morning, 11th October:
On the Internet site of one of the unregistered neo-Nazi organisations “Krv i čast” (Blood and honor, Serbian section) there is an ongoing discussion about  attending the banned fascist rally. On the Internet site of the Nazi-fascist “Nacionalni stroj” there is still a call to attend the prohibited fascist march.

Clerofascist group "Obraz" which does not take part in the Nazi rally itself, announces that its members would be patrolling the steeets due to their “action” named “With the faith in Christ against the Communists”. “Obraz” informs the public that they would be joining the protest against the arrest of Radovan Karadžic, organized by another cleropatriotic group “1389” at Republic square, in the very centre of Belgrade. In the evening, there is a football match Serbia-Lithuania, therefore the possibility of having football hooligans in the streets is also great.

None of the before-mentioned stopped the antifascists in their intention to still gather for the protest in front of the Faculty of Philosophy (the venue previously intended for the fascist march) and have the protest march to Terazije square, paying the respect there to all the victims of fascist atrocities.

The gathering itself and the first part of the protest went well, not being very dinamic however. The speakers addressing the protesters, as well as the groups within Antifascist campaign, were numerous, but brief and precise, each of them speaking from their own experiences and politics. There was a great number of journalists and newspaper photographers, not to mention the police, so I don’t have a precise impression when it comes to the protesters’ turnout.

The second part of the protest, that is the protest march to Terazije square was peaceful, with brief verbal provocations (the patriots saluted the protesters in fascist style and put orthodox anathema on the blasphemous crew, using their three fingers in  Christian Orthodox manner, at the same time angrily and furiously yelling “ Ustasha, ustasha*!” and “We love Serbia”, while one of the antifa activists replied to them in a very calm, relaxed, singing manner with an ironic, situationist, montyphytonesque “The fuck with u and your Clinton” and “Go fuck yourselves with your Madlen Albright!”, which caused quite a confusion in the fascist ranks). There were no direct physical contacts between the two parties, except for an isolated attempt of one member of “1389” to throw a burning torch at the protesters.

Antifa protest ended at Terazije square, with activists placing the flowers on the monument from the ll World War, in memory of all the victims of fascism, while the members of ultra- right-wing organizations moved on to the St. Sava church to pray.

Queer Beograd was a part of an informal affinity antiauthoritarian postleft queer/anarchist/punk/libertarian - in the broadest sense of the word - block, which represented an autonomous whole within the organized campaign/protest. In view of the before-mentioned, Queer Beograd had a critical, but also visually cheerful and glittery queer banner, paraphrasing the well-known Horkheimer’s maxim, additionally paraphrased to criticize the event from the antifa march in Novi Sad last year, when two female participants of the march were asked by some antifa football supporters to put down the gay-lesbian flag: You don’t talk about homophobia? Then shut up about antifascism! The other banner said: Antifascism - a fight for freedom. Against racism, sexism, capitalism and power! There were also pink queer anarchist flags, as well as black flags.

I am of the impression that the whole protest and our participation in it went well, with a few minor slips within the informal block, like the incoherence of the group (the lack of better coordination and cohesion), not being precise enough about the politics of action within the block, the attitude towards violence (there had been a general consensus regarding violence, however it was not accurate enough), how to act in extreme situations and how to handle problematic individuals within the block. Furthermore, one of the issues within the block was also ill communication - a group of antifa activists that had not been present during the preliminary meeting and talks and had probably not been aware of some of the mutual decisions of the block, appeared and joined it. And so it happened that there were some ideas of using physical violence to provoke a fight with fascists which was completely out of place.

Viewed as a whole, the block could have been more colorful, more cheerful, more carnival-like (that’s where Queer Beograd jumped in, queering up the whole block;). However, there were some of the established rules and practices, which I hope might change in the future.

Taking the protest against the escalating fascisation of Serbian society to the streets, Queer Beograd expressed its attitude that the fragmentation of politics should be perceived as a serious issue of the contemporary activism. It was also our statement that queer should not be perceived solely as an issue of sexuality and/or gender, but also as a form of radical politics, which sees the interconnectedness of all systems of domination.


See you at Belgrade Queer pride, soon!

 
ps. Media coverage of the events that took place in Belgrade on the 11th October, is mostly biased, ideologically determined and scant, which in part I belive is a product of the desire for sensationalism, that is, the lack of violence pushed the news  of antifa protest into the background – that reminds one of the reports we had from Novi Sad antifa march last year, when there had been violence. Therefore, the pro-European TV stations presented the protest as predominantly pro-European, the far right newspapers reported the news, exclusively with the photos of far right  extremists, etc.

Photoes: Facebook, Tanjug, private archive

*Politika is the most prominent, traditionally conservative, pro-regime, nowadays rightwing daily Serbian newspaper, and the before-mentioned political analyst is one of the leading champions of its politics and the guy who I unfortunately, keep bumping into in my neighborhood on my way to the market.

*Ustasha – a member of Croatian fascist army in the Second World War, and also a favorite insult of a Serbian patriot, intended for another Serb, deemed not Serbian or patriotic enough