Fascism Is a Scavenger, Not a Hunter: We Can and Must Defend the UK's Sikhs

The UK is sliding fast. 

Having seen it play out in multiple countries, there’s a fairly predictable script for how fascist attacks on liberal democracies go. In its hysterical press coverage of illegal migrants, brutal crackdowns on legal ones, opting out of international law, implementing a national anti-trans bathroom ban, and its skyrocketing rates of racist harassment and violence, the island nation is following this script in a dull, mechanical way. The lines are delivered without improvisation—the targets are largely the same, as are the arguments. Even specific culture war cases are imported without adaptation. If you’ve seen it before, it’s all very predictable. 

But the speed with which we’re rushing through it is alarming. Sections of script it took Americans two decades to read though, we rushed through in two years. Rollbacks of rights that would be bitterly contested for years in the US, we’ve blasted though in months, or even weeks. 

Two weeks ago I published an extended critique of the Labour government radically reversing progress on trans rights. I made the case that, while this should be opposed for its own sake, it should also be viewed in the context of wider attacks on liberal rights and freedoms. That it was never just one minority targeted. 

Who would be next? No way to know for sure. Other gender and sexual minorities were an obvious target. Judging from the US, I also speculated neurodivergent people could easily be subject to press attacks. 

But I found myself thinking that all these, in a way, made too much sense. We’d get to them eventually no doubt, but I was taking the face level arguments of fascism much too seriously. As if their alleged grievances were in any way real. I asked the question again through the lens of the politics of humiliation: If I were a fascist, who would I go for next? Not for any instrumentally rational reason, but simply to prove that I could? What came to mind was:

Say it was Sikhs. They’re about the same percentage of the population as trans people (just under one percent). Say the right wing press went on an absolute crusade against them. This could be driven by a very small number of people. Would the centrist or liberal press aggressively oppose this? Given their pathetically weak and non-existent response to anti-immigrant and anti-trans propaganda respectively, we’d have to assume not. 

This felt a bit far-fetched. There was no provocation here. Sikhs are often described as a “model minority.” A problematic phrase to be sure, but surely a sign that the community wasn’t in any real danger. But then, from the perspective of my model of fascism this is a feature, not a bug. They want people to be afraid. Everyone. They think this is intrinsically good and strengthens the fabric of the state. It is one of the core goals of their ideology. It also matches their standard strategy of testing everywhere for weakness. 

Naturally, many felt I was being over the top. A number of centrist academics and commentators felt my “critique of UK democracy [was] exaggerated." The anti-trans political push wasn’t great, but it was something we brought on ourselves. Trans campaigners “got overconfident, and tried to ram through a maximalist position” and this “generated a backlash.” Based on this logic, there was no reason to think a more well-behaved minority would be victim to a similar attack. Much less that our centrist politicians and press would go along with it.

A week later they came for the Sikhs.

As is so often the case, the excuse was an individual act of violence by a member of the community. Last December, Vickrum Digwa, a Sikh man, stabbed a white teenager, Henry Novack. Novack would later die from his wounds. Digwa was recently given a life sentence for his crime, but of course in fascist logic the crimes of one individual member of a minority group condemns all of it.

They were also able to seize upon the police response; officers had initially not understood the extent of Novack's injuries and had detained him too. Placing him in handcuffs for “about a minute” and then attempting CPR, not realizing he had significant chest wounds.

A devastating error to be sure. To the far-right however, this has become proof that the police are systematically racist against white people. That DEI has gone too far, and now white ‘native’ Britons are persecuted in their ‘own country.’ To be clear, there is no evidence for this. Indeed, various reports, investigations, and testimonials from members of the public suggest the UK police, like many forces around the world, are institutionally racist the usual way. 

Whipped up by the hate mongers whose perspective our country now centres, angry crowds have clashed with police, throwing stones, bricks, and furniture. “This has gone on so long,” Tommy Robinson, an Elon Musk backed far-right thug with a long history of convictions for assault, fraud, and stalking told them. “White people, we’re treated as second-rate citizens by our own government, by our own police force.”

And conservative media immediately threw its weight behind this narrative. Anti-white systemic racism was real, Alister Heath wrote in the Telegraph, predicting more murders "until it’s crushed”. The Times and Spectator concurred. There have also been calls to specifically target Sikhs, for instance to ban the kirpan (the ceremonial dagger that it is a religious requirement to carry). Reform leader Nigel Farage called for “pure cold rage” in response to the murder. 

As expected, our more centrist media has stood by without challenging this narrative. The BBC, in a phrase that will be grimly familiar to American anti-Trump liberals said Novack’s murder “raises … questions” about race and policing in an article largely devoted to laundering fascist talking points. Or, in Sky News’ words it “highlighted the debate on whether the police are anti-white.”

And all this had been accompanied by harassment and vigilante violence. In the last few days “At least 15 people have been accosted on the streets by collectives of white individuals surrounding Sikhs” Amandeep Singh, a charity educator, told the Guardian. 

This is almost always part of the fascist push against a minority. The anti-trans turn was accompanied by increasing harassment of trans people, gender non-conforming people, and even service workers felt to be insufficiently exclusionary. After several years of sustained pressure, this reprehensible behavior has now gotten the endorsement of the Labour Government. Equalities minister Seema Malhotra, explaining how the bathroom ban would work in Parliament, said that people should “step in where necessary" and “alert a member of staff” if they see a trans person entering a single-sex space. The sheer cowardice of this statement, as many have noted, perfectly summarized Labour’s approach: segregation by speaking to the manager, making a lower status person do the ugly work of enforcement, while you pretend you’re still a good person. 

Would you see a similar simpering surrender if the fascists really committed to an anti-Sikh campaign? Do you doubt it? Whether it’s Labour or the next government, how long until we are told to inform the serving staff when you see someone with a turban or ceremonial dagger?

I predicted, in sketching an anti-Sikh panic, that political parties would cave to pressure “Enthusiastically in Reform’s case, awkwardly and abjectly in Labour’s.” Just as I was finalising edits to this article, Andy Burnham, currently the party's preferred successor to Starmer, was asked about removing the exemption that allows Sikhs to carry small ceremonial knives. “I think it needs to be looked at” the supposedly centre-left alternative replied. He even managed the “awkwardly and abjectly” part, waffling about how forcing a minority to choose between a religious duty and leaving their homes would have to be done “carefully.” Never mind that legislating based on one incident is virtually never a good idea. Never mind that the knife used to kill Novack was nothing like the small kirpan most Sikhs carry. Those in power just cannot seem to tell the fascists no. 

But none of this is inevitable. “What’s next? British commentators ask in shock. Will the mainstream media be discussing global plots to replace the white race? Yes. That’s what comes next. I’ve been saying this for some time. It’s less ‘pattern recognition’ and more ‘recognising there is a pattern.’ If we don’t start to coordinate a response it's that, then concentration camps, then death camps. 

If.

You’d never know it, but Reform is actually pretty vulnerable right now. They have about a quarter of the vote and seem stuck there. This is not the will of the true volk, but an ugly, angry minority with the support of international elites. A sustained, aggressive, pushback from our mainstream press, or real public outcry against them, could prove devastating. They are a creature of press hype, and could be destroyed by the favourable terms our elites have given them being withdrawn. 

And that’s the thing about fascism: it needs collaborators. In 2015, Trump’s movement was probably a similar percentage of the country. They required the cowardice of traditional conservative leaders and institutions, or the media ‘both sides’ing his fascism and Hillary’s failings. The ideology is very, very dangerous indeed, but it can’t really get traction without centrists dismissing the danger, without the media sanitizing it, without the public at large muttering some disapproval and moving on. 

For that reason, it’s an opportunistic predator. More scavenger than hunter, despite its ferocious self-image. At least in its early stages, it prefers to attack the weak, isolated, members of the herd. Safety lies in closing ranks against it, leaving no one behind. 

Fascist strategy, both nationally and internationally, is something like ‘reconnaissance in force’: attack lightly everywhere, then concentrate on where your opponent falls back. Remember when Republicans were obsessed with changes to a Dr. Seuss book? They were really outraged for a bit, then just . . . moved on. This is how they operate. It can seem chaotic in the moment but there’s a logic to it. 

This is one of the reasons attacks on trans people have been central to them on every front they’re fighting on. Partly this is ideological—they believe in innate gender roles and trans people's very existence is a refutation of that. More mundanely though, it’s the minority the center-left the world over has shown the most willingness (and at times enthusiasm) to abandon. So that’s who they go after. 

The same logic applies in their international strategy. The UK is now very clearly the most ‘at risk’ democracy after the US, precisely because we’ve stood up to it the least. We have the most compliant media, the center-left party most committed to appeasement, the public most willing to turn a blind eye. International fascism is throwing a lot of money at anti-trans groups in the UK, likely because of the amount of influence they’ve been able to have on the media and government. Elon Musk has intervened in many countries' politics, but seems increasingly focused on the UK. Again, probably because his racist conspiracy theories are gaining the most ground here. 

The eye of Sauron is upon us, but in many ways it’s because we’ve invited it. 

Reconnaissance in force is a simple enough strategy. Opposing it is also simple—hard work, but not conceptually complex. For all that they project strength, fascists will usually back off a target if they don’t make headway. So create a united front. Show strength across the line. And then punish your opponent for overextending. Go on the counterattack whenever possible. Their strategy is based on moving forwards, they’re not good at defending. 

We’re in a lot of danger right now. But it’s worth being clear-eyed about it. All too often fascism’s resurgence can feel inexplicable, and hence unstoppable. If we think of it as some mystical demon of the old world, sent to punish us for our sins, our first instinct will be to assume it cannot be real, our second to cower before it. Again and again, British elites have demonstrated this abject mixture of denial and cowardice. 

But it’s a movement of people like you and me, motivated by dumb and dangerous, but easily debunkable, ideas. Their political strategy is simple and workmanlike. Effective only when you haven't clocked how they proceed. We face a predator to be sure, but a wolf, not a werewolf. We need to stop superstitiously offering up villagers to the beast, one by one, as part of some ritual our abusive elders insist upon. And, instead, gather everyone up to trap and kill it.

Featured City Sikhs Team hosting the Sikhnet Team from America in the UK Parliament, by Englishseva