Wednesday, November 30, 2016

Nine Years

Yep, we've been plugging along for nearly a decade, though as recent article we posted noted we had planned on this being the last post we would make on the blog. Instead, we decided to continue in wake of the events of the past month, a decision that the remaining members are increasingly comfortable with.

And besides, how could we leave our biggest fan and most loyal reader without his fix?


Oh, Tommy.

How could you think we would ever leave you? How much more empty would your already empty existence be without our presence in what you consider to be your life as a 41 year old living in his mother's basement?

We know you can't quit us.

Besides, we have so much more that we want to share with you and all of our dear readers.

We have a few articles in the planning stages, but in the meantime this writer is going out for beer and chicken wings.

Stay tuned.

Sunday, November 27, 2016

Montreal Anti-Facists Shut Down Far-Right Concert

Well, in the midst of working on an upcoming article on McKee's Blood & Honour in Calgary, we received some welcome news in an entirely different part of the country.
Le concert d'un groupe d'extrême-droite à Montréal annulé 
Publié le 26 novembre 2016 à 17h17 | Mis à jour le 26 novembre 2016 à 21h09
We have someone who said that he would be willing to do translations for us so this may be more precise in a future update (now updated), but here is the gist of it:
The performance on Saturday night by the far-right metal group Graveland at the Plaza Theater was canceled according to the Facebook page about an hour before the performance was to have begun. 
The organizers of the festival reported taking this decision "for security reasons". They added that the owners of the Plaza Theatre and they had "done everything that was in their power to reach a solution."
The arrival of this group whose members had already expressed racist and anti-Semitic remarks in an interview sowed controversy. Groups had demanded the cancellation of the concert organized as part of a metal rock music festival. 
A few hours before the show, thirty people had gathered in front of the Beaubien metro station, located near the theater, to protest against the group's visit.
....
Among the protesters was the MP for Rosemont-La-Petite-Patrie, NDP Alexandre Boulerice, whose district is located in the neighborhood where the show was to take place.
 
"I am concerned that there may be groups who have affinities with fascism or have about that resemble white supremacism that are here in my riding in Montreal," he explained.
A more complete account can be found here.

Suffice it to say, boneheads feel aggrieved!

Aggrieved, I tell's ya!


You know, I've a feeling that Montreal anti-fascist groups aren't all that worried. I further expect that they are going to continue being among the most active and successful anti-fascist movements in North America.

But that's just my take on the situation.

Saturday, November 26, 2016

James Sears and Paulie Pimping Out Troubled Teen

Meet Veronica Bouchard.


Our readers have likely already heard of her already. Using the pseudonym "Evalion" (because these types always seem to enjoy engaging in self-aggrandizement), 19 year old Bouchard has made a bit of a name for herself in the neo-Nazi online speaking circuit, at least so far as YouTube and Twitter go. As such hate vloggers are a dime a dozen, her notoriety primarily stems from the fact that she is young, reasonably attractive, and most importantly, female.

In other words, in the sausage party that is the white nationalist movement, she stands out as a novel distraction.

But notoriety amongst white nationalists inevitably results in notoriety amongst decent people.

So this happened:
Ontario teen who called for ‘white’ Canada has laptop seized by CBSA 
By Christina Stevens Senior Reporter Global News
And this:
Formal hate crimes complaints filed with police over GTA teen YouTuber 
By Christina Stevens Senior Reporter Global News

Sunday, November 20, 2016

Status of ARC Collective Onward

So....

Anything interesting happen during the past few weeks?

Yep, the events of November 8 and onward have sort of sucked and we would be lying if we didn't say we were profoundly disappointed. The election of Trump has had reverberations throughout the world and has given a boost of adrenaline to the far right in North America and Europe. Canada, sadly, is not immune to the toxin:
And so on.

Trump's election has energized the individuals and groups we follow closely as well. PEGIDA, Canadians Against Justin Trudeau, Canadians United 4 Canada, III% Canada, Soldiers of Odin, Fromm, Banerjee, Ruhe, Sears, McKee, Beattie, and all the rest, including some whom we haven't profiled but are keeping an eye on, cannot contain their glee that "their man" was just elected to the most powerful office on the planet. They hold out further hope that the Trump phenomenon will metastasize and spread to other countries, including Canada.

 And who's to say they are wrong given the political earthquake that occurred?

Among the purposes of this blog is the effort to highlight a movement that much of the msm and Canadian public have often ignored or minimized. We've always said that the movement was much larger and more dangerous than was widely accepted. We've sometimes been accused of sensationalizing "isolated events" in an effort to make the racist movement in Canada appear to be less fringe than it actually was.

If there is a bright spot in the November 8 election, it's that no one is complacent at the moment. The media is publicizing the significant uptick in racially-motivated attacks and vandalism that have occurred since the election. Social media platforms such as Twitter and Facebook might now be taking some action to minimize the amount of false news disseminated online and shut down profiles used to attack and intimidate ideological opponents and journalists. People are protesting in the United States, Canada, and around the world. 

The question is whether or not this will all continue into Trump's first term or, much like the Occupy Wall Street movement, will devolve into a muddled message, competing egos, and ridiculous factionalism.

At the end of this month, Anti-Racist Canada will celebrate 9 years of online activism. We've never been so naive as to believe that we had the same kind of pull and influence as the msm, however we have been able to find a niche and have contributed in the fight in a positive manner. The last few years has seen ARC being used as a source by some msm journalists delving into the subculture we have profiled since 2007; the rise of the Soldiers of Odin have seen a significant upswing in the number of media requests to ARC. We also know that our presence has helped some individuals get out of the movement. Many times those individuals have reached out to us, including the individual who sent us the following a few days before the election:
A sweet sensation of false belonging with a harsh reality and many regrettable tattoos and scars. I was originally recruited into a gang at the age of 18 after taking off without notice from my home and family. I spent 4 years with a questionable identity on my name while running with some of the most outwardly heartless people. 
Since I was already estranged from my family, a functioning binge drinker with unaddressed and untreated mental health, not much effort had to be made on their part to recruit me. I was a wild card, there for an asset to them. My personal demons were played on and had been convinced that my family didn't love me. I was offered toxicity to fill that void and started rolling at full swing with it. 
Though I never took part in recruiting others, I saw how they would go about it. Young kids from the ages of 16-20 would come around and were isolated from their families. If these kids had a problem at home, that's when the recruiters made their emotional attack. They would give the offer of protection and a sense of security while convincing these young people that they were never wanted by the people who truly loved them. 
I sported hate themed tattoos (one of which was laser removed upon leaving the subculture), so I was essentially a walking billboard. Going back to my mental health related experiences, what goes up must come down. I ended up turning myself in, was diagnosed, given medication and offered therapy and support. I was also advised to stop drinking. 
I went back to see the members of the gang and was discouraged from accepting the help. Stability and sobriety did not benefit them at all. I took the medications, but was not compliant with the rest of the doctors orders. 
Many incidents occurred that proved to me that these people were not my friends. This included a traumatic brain injury, public humiliation, and lastly seeing a picture of my dad (who has passed away) ripped up right infront of me. All acts done by those whom I was associated with. 
Within the skinhead culture, there are rival gangs who believe the same ideology but have personal beef with each other. I switched from one gang to another after being harmed a number of times by the first crowd of individuals. 
After I came back to my family, I went to college but was still associated with the movement. For the most part I didn't talk about the beliefs in front of my family, though they definitely knew what it was really about. 
My skinhead days came to an end at the age of 22. Not many are lucky enough to have a wake up call, however I am. A guy whom was involved in that subculture was stabbed to death as a result of his association. His mother posted a heartfelt letter and was not holding back the tears. Something had finally clicked and I realized that I was hurting the people who really loved me and whom I really cared for. So on September 1st 2012, I chose to become sober, take stability for serious and cut ties with the subculture. Slowly but surely I tackled all areas at once. 
It's been 4 years and not a day goes by unappreciated. I've had the pleasure of meeting a lot of genuinely good people over this period of time as well. Black, white, grey, blue, green, purple, I could care less now. Even those with a sketchy past, obviously I can not judge them at all. I only look at who someone is in this present moment.
Still, the work has been grinding. Exposing one's self to the worst of society has a tendency to beat one down after a while. There's also the sad reality that the "collective" part of the ARC Collective isn't quite as collective as it once was, leaving more work for the very few who remain. Finally, 2016 has been an especially difficult year for this writer on a personal level. It was time to consider our options.

Those of us who remained had decided that, come November 30, we were going to post one final article announcing Anti-Racist Canada members were ending our work after nearly a decade of activism. We had decided that we had fought the good fight and that others with more energy and drive could take up the banner from that point and onward. It's not as if we didn't put our all into the project; this writer started with ARC in her early 30s and is now in her early 40s. That's a long time to devote to the cause and we don't believe that anyone would have begrudged our decision to step back.

But November 8 and the fallout from that event has resulted in a change of that plan.

Some of us decided that we couldn't yet surrender the field when the battle had just intensified. So while some of the remaining ARC members has still decided they needed to step away, a few have decided to stick around for a while longer. How much longer we don't know. A year? Four years? More or less? Time will tell.

As there are even fewer of us our articles may be much more sporadic than in the past, but we will continue to do our part so that we remain one more candle in the darkness. Melodramatic? Maybe, but over the next four years we think we're going to have to find light where we can while struggling to brighten the world again.

We however remain optimistic: