I spent a good part of my teenage years running with a punk crowd, and the mortal enemies of any punk worth his salt are Nazis. As I've grown older, more accomplished, and less colorful, I'm suprised to find that my feelings towards Nazis haven't changed much. They're a usless group of mental rejects and bloodthirsty perverts who don't deserve any of the consideration that I give to other people whom I disagree with.
I like to think that there's a group of leather-jacketed and mohawked young men living in Madison who agree with me.
"I spent a good part of my teenage years running with a punk crowd, and the mortal enemies of any punk worth his salt are Nazis."
So did I. But, today, a fair number of self-styled "progressives" associate the punk scene with NeoNazis. I have gotten into many near-arguments trying to get the point across that the two were diametrically opposed. But, there's no harder head than a self-righteous liberal on a soapbox.
Punk crowd....hey, you don't want to know what sort of crowd I was running with in those days, the bottom line is that everyone has the right to an opinion and not everyone necessarily has the obligation to agree. That's one of the features of a thing we call democracy. I do get your point if you say that you want to oppose these self-confessed, self-proclaimed "Nazis" with whatever means you can come up with, however, before you do such a thing, have a closer look at them. Quite a few of these people would not be able to explain to you what their ideology is made of, let alone the historical connotation.
A lot of left-wing groups that resort to organised militant violence to push their ideas to the forefront and proudly (or:arrogantly, provokingly) wear "their" red, five-pointed star, claiming to stand up for the rights of the oppressed lower classes of society, are just as guilty of historical denial, and would never, ever admit to the gruesome dictatorships and butchering of innocent people on a scale incomparable with any other, all in the name of, well, socialism....? By wearing that red star, they wear the Gulag, they wear the prisons, they wear the torture, they wear the hypocrisy, they wear the exploitation, the corruption, the lies, the whole shebang. The same goes for those that wear swastika's. Those signs are contaminated for the centuries to come.
You can run with punk crowds ot with whatever crowd you like, for as long as you like, as colourful as you like, but watch your step if you want to make a stand for what you think as an individual. By forceful rejection of your adversary's ideas, you just might give him a right and a reason to exist in the first place. Personally, I would not do that.
Save your breath for the real enemy and have a nice day!