THE BLACK RIFLE

The Militia Movement Gets a Woke Counterpoint

AS FAR AS NAMES GO, the Not Fucking Around Coalition has it down. With a title like that, they could be an experimental jazz band, an intramural sports team, or a political reform movement.

The Not Fucking Around Coalition is a militia. They might describe themselves as a political reform movement—founded in Atlanta, the NFAC claims to defend human rights and protect victims from crime. But they do that with guns.

Lots of guns. Like other militias today, they are expanding rapidly, with a mixture of former veterans (like the founder, an Army vet) and up gunned amateurs. There are a lot of crazy names in the militia world—old school designations (Pennsylvania Lightfoot) are popular, along with anti-Islamic boasting (“Infidels”), new-school designations (the Boogaloo Bois and their Hawaiian shirts), and erroneous history (the “3 Percenters” believe that just three percent of colonists actually made the American Revolution happen). The Not Fucking Around Coalition has a completely different sound.

And color. The NFAC is black.

While all those other groups are exclusively or overwhelmingly white, the NFAC has arisen to counter the threat of racist attacks, and is made up exclusively of armed black people. Assembled from the same 2nd Amendment beliefs as their white counterparts, they are a striking riposte—black men and women in black boots, pants, shirts, and masks, armed with mostly black guns. They also appear extremely disciplined—while at least one member has been charged for accidentally discharging his fire arm, when someone fired shots near an NFAC deployment in Lafayette, Louisiana, the members calmly took a knee and waited out the confusion. NFAC has also withdrawn rather engage in direct confrontations with white militias. Founder John Fitzgerald Johnson says he is simply defending black lives, not waging a war on the US government, as so many white militias seem to feel is necessary. While dedicated to the 2nd Amendment position, their orientation is effectively left, and anti-racist. Recent statistics show a huge majority of political violence and domestic terrorism in the US is being committed by the right—which is, despite exceptions, allied with white supremacy.

Perhaps the NFAC is less of a threat because of their orientation, but I doubt it. The “black rifles” (the M-16s and AR-15s and Bushmaster and Sig Sauer killing machines) are now icons of American violence. A black man with a black rifle is not in the end that different. He may point his gun in a different direction, but who is defending what becomes meaningless once bullets are flying. Even a small accident can create a cycle of martyrs, extremism, and “defensive” counterattacks. I have the same message for the NFAC that I have for every militia: put those six guns in the ground.

But it is America. The guns aren’t going away. I learned overseas, covering conflicts from the Lebanon to Colombia, that once the rifles are here, they do not go away, ever.

Even if “nothing happens” in this election cycle, we are normalizing the presence of roaming paramilitaries with different agendas and no accountability. I don’t care if you are black or white, or why you take to the streets armed. If you bring a gun, it is a gun fight. We need political fights.

Here’s a good CNN report on the NFAC and its agenda.

I’ve noted before that some (white) militias have been riven by a dispute on which side to choose, between police and protestors. They are effectively choosing between racial and non-racial visions of America. This was a serious debate as the Boogaloo Bois movement arose earlier this year to public prominence in Michigan and other places, with some Bois declaring sympathy for BLM protestors, and founders of the Three Percent movement and the Proud Boys trying to claim they are non-racist while filling their ranks with rank racists. But that level of dispute is largely over now, resolved in favor of racism and white grievance. White militia members and paranoid gunmen around the country have been looking for invisible Antifa looters and secret arsonists paid by George Soros to burn America down. Now some white militias are openly salivating over the prospect of a fight with the NFAC. For those whites who dream of race war, I fear that the NFAC will simply serve as a gift.

Next up, for paid subscribers, is a micro-podcast of my September article on the Portland protests for YahooNews. This will be a straight read of the article for those who prefer dialing in an audio experience of the news.