“Nazis. I hate Melbourne Nazis.”

In just a few short weeks, on October 13 — and as I’ve been attempting, vainly, to draw other’s attention to for the better part of three months now — a large group of perhaps as many as 1-200 neo-Nazis will be gathering in Melbourne to attend a gig. The gig will * three local neo-Nazi bands — Bail Up!, Fortress and Quick and the Dead — in addition to at least one act from overseas. The gig will allegedly be Fortress’ last performance, and as one of the world’s leading neo-Nazi bands, is expected to draw a crowd far in excess of the 50 or so boneheads who attended last year’s Ian Stuart Donaldson memorial gig (among whom numbered Welf Herfurth).

By way of background, here’s two recent reports of anti-Semitic incidents in Marvellous Melbourne:

Hoons mar first Shabbat of year
Melissa Singer
Australian Jewish News
September 17, 2007

A CARLOAD of hoons who drove through St Kilda East shouting anti-Semitic comments through a megaphone has marred the first Shabbat of the new Jewish year, according to security personnel. The Community Security Group (CSG) said the car passed the Yeshivah Centre and Chabad House Caulfield on Saturday around 6.45pm, with the men shouting “F***ing Jews” and other insults through a megaphone. While several congregants from Yeshivah pursued the car, they were unable to obtain sufficient information to identity the offenders. The car later returned to the area and its passengers reportedly pelted eggs at Jews who were walking the streets…

Anti-Semitic attack at golf club
Grant McArthur
Herald Sun
September 20, 2007

JEWISH golfers are outraged at vandals who carved a large swastika and KKK into the green of a historic Jewish golf club. The anti-Semitic attack destroyed parts of the Cranbourne Golf Club’s fourth green on September 12, the first night of the Jewish New Year. The club was founded by Jewish golfers in 1954 after they were excluded from other golf clubs, and general manager Sean Constable said members were distressed by the latest attack. “It certainly upset some of our members, but hopefully it was just local kids who have nothing better to do,” he said. “It’s not the first time. We have had big swastika done on the greens in the mid-1990s and we had to replace a whole green.” About $4500 damage has been caused by vandals at the club this year, including another anti-Semitic attack on the 13th green…

A month ago, on August 18, a Jewish teenager was assaulted on Carlisle Street. Last October, footballers from Ocean Grove abused and assaulted a Jewish pedestrian in Caulfield. One of three men to be charged, Simon Christian, pled guilty and was convicted of making a racist taunt (“Go Nazis!”); happily, he later won the Bellarine Football League’s reserves grade “best and fairest” award, while “Another footballer charged over the incident, James Dalton, 29, was runner-up in Bellarine League’s best and fairest senior grade awards” (Racist footballer awarded best and fairest medal, Mark Dunn, Herald Sun, September 1, 2007). On the other hand, “The cricketer who set up a page on a social networking site that sledged the Maccabi Ajax Cricket Club has been suspended from the sport for eight years”, which together suggests that while hatred of Jews may be expressed by the best and fairest in the world of football, as far as the Victorian Turf Cricket Association (VTCA) is concerned, it’s just not cricket.

Most recently, in fact just a few days ago, a teenage fascist from Melbourne — one who traveled to Sydney to take part in the neo-Nazi black bloc at the APEC summit protest — commented, on Stormfront, in response to the publication of new photographs of Nazi staff at Auschwitz, and a photo of “Nazis having fun in the sun” in particular:

They are celebrating the girl[‘]s graduation from Jewish strangulation school? Haha, jokes, haha!

Elsewhere, but on a related note, in the world of local music, ‘Chunga’, the singer for local Melbourne fashion punk band The Worst states, in relation to local neo-Nazi venue The Birmy:

And yes… I know there have been a couple of Nazi gigs there in the past… but to be honest… I couldn’t give a left nutsack what bands have played there before! […] All these tossers that care sooo much about shutting down The Birmy need to get a fucking life!!! Them accusing us [of] supporting racists for playing at a pub… is no better than being a [N]azi! […] The crusty wankers who think they’re so good for being anti-racist are no fucking better than the [N]azis… They think they’re better than everybody!!! And they dislike anyone who doesn’t share their beliefs… Fuck off you cocksuckers and get a life!!!

Apparently then, according to Chunga, I’m a tosser who cares too much, has no life, is a crusty wanker, is morally equivalent to the Nazis, superior, intolerant and a cocksucker. All because I support a boycott of a pub in Fitzroy called The Birmy — which has served as a venue for neo-Nazis for almost a decade — and describe punk bands who’ve played there as being scabs. Judging by the slight tone of upset in Chunga’s otherwise measured response, I’d have to say it’s working.

But speaking of ‘fucking off’ and ‘getting a life’, in New Zealand / Aoteraoa:

A juror in a white supremacist kidnapping trial who received a drawing of a swastika with the words “not guilty” is leaving New Zealand so he can protect his family. The note was left on the doorstep of his Hutt Valley home on July 13.

Lloyd James Bowling was ordered yesterday to stand trial for being party to an attempt to corruptly influence the juror, but no explanation has been given for how the juror’s home address was traced. The juror, whose name was suppressed, said his first thoughts were for his family then he rang the High Court at Wellington where the trial was being held… He said he was taking steps to protect his family, “as best I can”. He would not stay in New Zealand.

Police searching the Stokes Valley home where Bowling, 40, was living, found photographs of the kidnapping victim from the trial in which the juror had been sitting. Nazi propaganda and obscenities had been written over the photos. One of them included: “Lucky you didn’t die”. Bowling, unemployed, was remanded in custody to appear in the High Court on October 15, when a trial date may be set. Bowling’s lawyer, Keith Jefferies, had said there was no certainty about who wrote the note and no evidence about who delivered it. For the police, lawyer Grant Burston said it was alleged Bowling had helped or encouraged the crime. He was a close associate of the four men – Jaydon Russell Borland, Jason George Gregory, Mark Alexander Gage and Benjamin Peter McPadden – on trial for kidnapping and robbing Canadian tourist Jeremie Kawerninski in April last year. Gage was discharged, and the other three have been sentenced on various charges… ~ Swastika threat juror to flee NZ, The Dominion Post, September 8, 2007