…and Brisbane, and Melbourne, and Sydney, and Perth…
Above : Australian band ‘Open Season’ play a right ‘orrible song called ‘Australian National Socialist’. Open Season played Melbourne on September 12; the band is scheduled to play next year on the Gold Coast (a few days before Adolf Hitler’s birthday), along with Melbourne band ‘Ravenous’ and, apparently, a foreign group of neo-Nazi string-pluckers, tub-thumpers and warblers. Oh yeah: some of Open Season’s other song titles include ‘Kill the Poofs’ and ‘Nigger Hunt’, which suggests — and I admit that I could be wrong — that the boys may harbour some degree of hostility towards homosexuals and blacks…
White supremacist group operating in Adelaide
Sam Rodrigues The Advertiser
November 3, 2009
AS racial tensions in Adelaide escalate, a white supremacist group is planning family fun days and using music to lure young people to its cause.
The South Australian chapter of “white racialist” group Blood and Honour Australia will hold a Christmas barbecue for like-minded people this month, in a “family-friendly environment”.
The group is promoting the event as its “white Xmas”.
The like-minded apparently excludes Asians, Africans, Indians, Jews, Arabs and other racial groups, as well as those with partners from these groups.
The national group, linked to international chapters, promotes music as the “powerful medium” of white resistance.
“We hold regular gigs around Australia for all those interested to attend and subsequently help a strong resistance grow,” its website said. “We must secure the existence of our people and a future for white children.”
Social Inclusion Commissioner Monsignor David Cappo has highlighted racism as a growing issue.
YouTube clips linked to Blood and Honour Australia feature violent clashes and highlight anti-Australia protests overseas – apparently to justify vilifying ethnic groups.
“In these dark times it’s our children’s future that is paramount and ultimately that’s what we’re all working for,” the website said. The group also holds regular “community building functions”.
Forums on its website and others linked to it have drawn comment on the stabbing death of Sudanese father Akol “Alex” Akok, 25, at suburban Ottoway last month. A spokesman for acting state Multicultural Affairs Minister Paul Holloway said he was reluctant to comment and give publicity to any such group.
Police could not say if they were monitoring the group, or its website. The group did not respond to interview requests yesterday.
Blood and Honour South Australian Section did not respond to email requests from The Advertiser for comment yesterday.
Melbourne media reported this weekend on a meeting of the group attended by members from across the country, particularly Adelaide, describing it as “resembling a scene from Romper Stomper”.
Of course, anyone interested in finding out more about Blood & Honour Australia could do worse than examine their forum, hacked and uploaded onto Wikileaks in March. 76 members of the forum nominated Australia as their place of residence. See also : Nicole Hanley : For Blood & Honour, April 6, 2009.
The fired host of Good Game says he wants the war of words with the ABC to end, but he is sticking by his claims that he was kicked off the show because of his gender.
The show’s founding host, Jeremy Ray, was fired earlier this month, with viewers informed via a statement on the TV show’s online message board last week.
Ray, also known as the Junglist, says that statement failed to mention the true reason he was let go.
He says he was told in a meeting almost three weeks ago that he was going to be replaced by a woman because the ABC wanted the video gaming show to garner “mass appeal”.
Ray, who was born in Australia but lived in the United States for most of his childhood, says there was “a lot of internal politicking” going on behind the scenes, but that was not the reason for his dismissal.
“In the meeting, the only reason they gave was that they wanted a female presenter,” he told ABC News Online.
“There were comments made in that meeting that it would be great if the audience assumed, seeing as there is only four or five weeks left in the season, that I was sick or on holiday and that this whole thing was my idea.
“It was even suggested [at a different time], that I say on air that I’m going back to the States, which I found a little offensive because I’m an Australian citizen.
“Those sorts of comments made me worried that I was going to be misrepresented.”
Ray’s departure caused backlash from fans on Twitter. A website and Facebook groups also quickly popped up in support of him.
One of those Facebook groups, Save Junglist! – Support the Former Good Game Host Through His Mistreatment by the ABC, already has more than 5,000 members.
“The poor handing of the situation made the backlash even bigger than I thought it would be,” Ray said…
See also : Good Game: ABC TV Show and online communities, Laurel Papworth, October 30, 2009, for an analysis from a ‘social media’ critic (“Laurel is one of Australia’s top social media strategist[s], a renowned keynote speaker and respected thought leader on the business of being social”).
THERE is no place in a modern multicultural society such as ours for race-hate groups.
Sadly, they do exist. One that has recently come to our attention is an insidious neo-Nazi group calling itself the Australian chapter of Blood and Honour.
Members of this group profess hatred for Africans, Asians, Jews, Arabs, Indians and Pakistanis – in fact, all non-white races. They detest Barack Obama, multiculturalism and refugees, while paying homage to the memory of Adolf Hitler and the symbol of the Holocaust – the swastika.
About 30 members of the paranoid hate group came from around the nation to a secret meeting at the Tivoli German Club in Windsor on September 11. In appearance, they were mainly stereotypes.
Many had shaved heads and wore bomber jackets. Some had racist slogans tattooed on their bodies. They came to share their hatred of “the enemy” and to meet with potential new members.
The Tivoli Club, now expressing regret for unwittingly hosting the meeting, said it had a “no-swastika” policy.
It is inappropriate for the Tivoli Club, or any local community venue, to allow neo-Nazis to gather at their premises.
The extremist groups, according to human rights groups, are becoming more dangerous because they can now use more sophisticated means of communication in the cyberworld and link internationally.
It is bad enough that the internet allows such groups a vehicle to peddle race hatred, misguided beliefs and poisonous propaganda.
But it is perhaps even more disturbing to realise that a neo-Nazi group can gather in a renowned Melbourne community venue to spew hatred.
Only four years after race riots in the Sydney suburb of Cronulla, we must come to terms with the reality that groups of white supremacists also exist in our part of the country.
These extremist groups are small in number, but their fist-clenching hatred is real. They are dedicated to recruiting new members into their armies, sometimes through seemingly innocent rock concerts.
We urge police to keep a close watch on all white-supremacist and neo-Nazi groups in our midst. All reasonable Victorians, who celebrate our multiculturalism, will be opposed to their existence.
B&H has been operating in Australia for many years.
The meeting on September 11 at the German Tivoli Club took place the day before B&H — together with their neo-Nazi comrades in the (Southern Cross) Hammerskins — organised a gig to commemorate the death in 1993 of B&H co-founder (with similarly dead bonehead Nicky Crane) Ian Stuart Donaldson (‘ISD’). The gig took place at an undisclosed venue, and featured local neo-Nazi bands ‘Open Season’, ‘Ravenous’ and at least one and possibly two other bands. In 2008, the annual ‘ISD’ gig took place at ‘The Beaconsfield Hotel’ in Beaconsfield; in 2007 at the ‘Melbourne Croatia Social Club’ in Sunshine; in 2006 (and in previous years) at ‘The Birmingham Hotel’ in Fitzroy. (Note that The Birmingham has since undergone a process of de-Nazification, following what, according to Doug Smith — of Bulldog Spirit / Marching Orders / Skin Heads Neither For Nor Against Racial Prejudice — was “a pretty unsuccessful boycott”.)
In Victoria, the principal organiser / ‘state representative’ for B&H is Justin O’Brien. Justin manages a tattoo shop in Burwood: ‘Hold Fast Body Art’. On Monday, September 28, Justin and three of his comrades paid a visit to the ‘Melbourne Anarchist Resource Centre’ in Northcote, where they interrupted a meeting of a group campaigning against sexual violence. According to witnesses, Justin stated, inter alia, that he wanted to know my location — and not, I think, in order to exchange recipes for lemon cheesecake — and threatened those present, and any other group — in fact, all other users of the space, and ‘antifa’ generally — with (continued) violence if anti-fascist activity in Melbourne did not stop.
This activity would include, presumably, my own blogging on the subject.
Thus far, Justin’s visit has received minimal publicity — only one local newspaper reported on it. On the other hand, news of his declaration of war upon all those in Melbourne who may not be kindly disposed towards Nazism — and those, like Justin, who continue to celebrate its legacy — has been spread around various local activist communities, and the general consensus, it seems, on my estimation, is that this action was neither big nor clever.
Speaking of neither big nor clever, John Kopko, one of the men involved in a knife fight during a speech given by Holocaust revisionist David Irving in Florida several days ago, was reportedly a member of ‘Crew 38’, the subsidiary mob for prospective members of the Hammerskins.
Of the four men who attended MARC on September 28, one was equipped with a ‘Crew 38’ patch.
German Club Tivoli / Deutscher Verein Melbourne Inc.
291 Dandenong Road
Windsor VIC 3181 [email protected]
Telephone: +61 3 9529 5211
Facsimile: +61 3 9510 5271
NB. http://www.youtube.com/user/genocidal88 is the YouTube channel for Jesse ********, the principal organiser for the Hammerskins in Victoria (and hence a close comrade of Justin’s). Oddly, Jesse has recently decided — or perhaps been forced? — to remove his videos from circulation on YouTube. Also removed from circulation, sadly, is the song Jesse sang titled ‘Oh no here comes an Abo’; a song recorded with members of the Belgian neo-Nazi band ‘Kill Baby Kill’ while they were on tour (2008).
Finally, note that B&H and the Hammerskins are organising a gig on the Gold Coast a few days prior (April 17) to Hitler’s birthday (April 20). Scheduled to jackboot on stage are Jesse’s band ‘Ravenous’, the proudly (neo-)Nazi ‘Open Season’ and some foreign (neo-)Nazis.
Definitely one for the diary.
Sieg Heil!
Bonus!
Neo-nazis meet
Eleni Hale and Liam Houlihan Sunday Herald Sun
November 1, 2009
VICTORIA Police has warned race-hate groups they will face the full force of the law following revelations of Melbourne’s neo-Nazi underworld.
In September, neo-Nazis met at a gathering organised by members of Blood & Honour at the German Club Tivoli in Windsor.
There they openly vilified minorities, encouraged each other to target non-whites with violence and showed off swastika tattoos.
The scenes have prompted authorities to remind the fascist groups their hate speech is illegal.
“Victoria Police does not tolerate unlawful racial and religious vilification and will use available legislation to pursue anyone who commits or incites such behaviour,” a spokeswoman warned.
The president of the German Club Tivoli, which hosted one of the neo-Nazi meetings, said he would now issue direct written instructions to staff not to accommodate members of the group.
Eddie Reichman said the booking was made in a man’s name and the staff member responsible was no longer with the club.
“If they’ve been in here, it’s been without our knowledge and against the policy of the club,” Mr Reichman said.
He said no swastikas were allowed at the premises.
“We’re following the guidelines that we’re getting from the Consular Department and the embassy (saying) what the German Government’s policy is and it’s just not on,” he said.
“That particular group is known to the club as some tattoo club, I was told.
“They were wearing all different tattoos, not particularly just swastikas, I was told.”
Anti-racist group Fight Dem Back said mainstream businesses hosting neo-Nazis was completely unacceptable.
Added Bonus!
Inside look at racist group
Eleni Hale and Liam Houlihan Sunday Herald Sun
November 1, 2009
The gathering resembles a scene from Romper Stomper.
A skinhead in his late 20s shows off his newest “art” – a 30cm wide swastika tattooed across his chest, with a written tribute to Adolf Hitler below.
He is not out of place. About 30 men and women in their early 20s to late 40s – most with shaved heads, bomber jackets and tattoos on their arms and necks – are here.
But this is not a scene from a movie.
It is a secret meeting organised by members of the Australian chapter of Blood & Honour in a private room at Windsor’s German Club Tivoli – whose president has since denied knowledge of the meeting’s neo-Nazi roots – held on Friday, September 11.
It was witnessed by sources and relayed to the Sunday Herald Sun.
Those attending have come from across Australia, including many from Adelaide.
The room is adorned with two chandeliers, white table clothes and shiny cutlery.
There are menus in German and jugs of water on the tables, which are joined in a large U-shape like a boardroom.
But their words are far from civilised. There is fist-clenching and vein-throbbing.
They hate Africans, Asians, Jews, Arabs, Indians, Pakistanis, any women who partner men from those races and any resulting offspring.
They hate multiculturalism, Barack Obama and refugees.
And with the same intensity they love white skin, Hitler, ethnic cleansing, guns, the “brotherhood” they share … and the blonde German tourist present – a perfect specimen, they comment.
After dinner they debate the David and Goliath battle they face.
In their world, David is trying to “secure the future existence of our people and a future for white children”, while Goliath is non-white migration.
“I know an Irish girl with red hair and blue eyes who can’t get a visa here and yet they let every Asian or Indian who raises their hand invade our country,” one complains.
“That is treason, pure and simple.”
“The Immigration Minister should be hung for crimes against his own kind.”
A man says: “It’s not the Arabs you have to worry about. They always f–k things up for themselves.
“It’s the Indians and Pakis you need to watch because they fit in, keep their heads down and multiply.
“At work they think I love multiculturalism because I get to know the bastards. You have to know the enemy.”
Another describes his anger at a T-shirt worn by an Indian youth stating: “I haven’t seen a kangaroo around here for years.”
“I should have bashed the c—,” he says.
“I followed him for a bit, but I didn’t realise what it meant until I thought about it later. They are taking over this country and rubbing it in our faces.”
Another man nods.
“That’s why I have my gun licence. I am just waiting for one of them to break into my place, then I’ll have an excuse to blow their heads off,” he says.
Another man replies: “Maybe your gun will go missing – pop, pop, pop – and then I’ll disappear.”
Everyone laughs except the gun owner whose face remains stony.
“I’ll tell police I was robbed, they broke into my safe,” he says.
They also hate the Australian school system.
“I would home school my kids because all they need to know is how to read, write and shoot a target at 800m,” one says.
“There is no way I am sending them to class to write 1000 word essays about how great multiculturalism is.”
One boasts about dropping anti-migration leaflets in inner city locations.
The leaflet drops are organised by the Nationalist Alternative, which has campaigned against the building of a mosque on Blenheim Rd, Newport.
The meeting and extremist websites are evidence that neo-Nazism is flourishing in Melbourne.
Blood & Honour’s website, which promotes white power music, says: “We believe there is a need to provide White youth with an alternative to the ‘hip-hop’ culture so eagerly promoted by the Zionist controlled media.”
Another site is run by affiliated group, the Southern Cross Hammerskins and there is even a Women for Aryan Unity site.
Another site, Nationalist Network, encourages people to put “business cards in library books” – “learn to use and maintain all weapons at your disposal” – and even “recruit the elderly living in multicultural neighbourhoods”.
There has been a disturbing growth in racist groups and associated violence globally, including attacks on Asian shopkeepers in the UK recently.
Back in Windsor, the meeting ends with ominous whispers of “some action”.
Extra Added Bonus!
In January 1941, Australians fought their first major land battle in World War II when men of the 6th Division AIF, and other Allied troops, engaged Italian forces at the town of Bardia on the coast of Libya. On 3-5 January 1941, the Italian positions were attacked and Bardia was captured. Over 40,000 Italian prisoners were taken.
Advancing west along the Libyan coast, the 6th Australian Division captured Tobruk from the Italians on 21-22 January 1941 and the town became a garrison for the Australian and British forces. In early March, one of Hitler’s best generals, Erwin Rommel with his Afrika Korps, came to the aid of their Italian allies in Libya. By April, German forces had begun to cut off and surround Tobruk. For eight months, from April to December 1941, Tobruk was besieged and Australian forces, notably the men of the 9th Division, the 18th Brigade of the 7th Division and RAN ships of the famous ‘scrap iron flotilla’ played a prominent role in the town’s defence.
The year 1941 was a dark one for the Allies. The Germans conquered all before them but Tobruk held out against Rommel and stood in the way of his advance towards Egypt and the Suez Canal. The defiance of the defenders of Tobruk raised morale in the countries of the British Empire and Commonwealth. Those who served there became known as the ‘Rats of Tobruk’, so-called because the German radio propaganda broadcaster ‘Lord Haw Haw’ described them as rats living in the ground.
“The toughest but least disciplined troops in North Africa” ~ Lt General Erwin Rommel, GOC Deutsches Afrika Korps, on the 9th Division.
Two more urban guerrilla attacks occurred in Athens and Salonica respectively within 24 hours of the armed attack against a police station in Athens [see : Police station attack tests Greek government, John Hadoulis/AFP, The Sydney Morning Herald, October 28, 2009]. A time-bomb hit the house of a leading conservative politician in Athens and another explosive mechanism hit the Spanish consulate in Salonica. At the same time confusion reigns over the communique with which a new armed group appears to be claiming responsibility for Tuesday’s attack.
Within only 24 hours of the Tuesday armed attack against the police station of Agia Paraskevi in Athens which has left 6 police officers seriously wounded (two remain in intensive care), two more attacks, with explosives this time, have come to add up tension to the already heated social and political climate in greece.
On the early hours of Friday 30 of October, a time-bomb hit the entrance of the house of a leading conservative politician, Ms Marietta Giannakou, causing material damage but no human injuries, as a phone-call by the urban guerrillas to the press had warned of the explosion. Ms Giannakou is the leading MEP of the now in opposition New Democracy right-wing party, and was the Minister of Education during the massive movement against educational reforms in 2006-2007. The attack against Ms Giannakou’s house has been claimed through a long communique by the Nuclei of Fire Conspiracy who amongst other things used the opportunity to communicate their views against anarchist participation in educational protest marches, professing once again their self-proclaimed nihilist platform.
Earlier this week the Minister of Public Order, Mr Chrisochoidis, has gone public urging the 6 persons wanted in relation to the Nuclei of Fire bomb campaign to surrender, arguing that the State will show leniency due to [their yoof].
The same night in Salonica, the Spanish Consulate was hit by an explosive mechanism. A communique by a first appearing group has claimed the attack was in solidarity to Amadeu Casellas, a long-term anarchist prisoner in Spain. [According to one source, “the attack in Thessaloniki has been claimed by the “international chamber for the diffusion of revolutionary violence”…”.] Last week more explosive mechanisms in Salonica had hit several MP offices, including the office of the Deputy Minister of Public Order, Mr Vougias, as well as the house of the extreme-right minded Archbishop of Salonica.
The new attacks come to add to the climate of escalating tension in the country, to which considerable confusion was added by a communique published on Friday in the daily press, claiming responsibility for the Tuesday attack against the police station of Agia Paraskevi. The communique which employs long quotes from the Communist Party leader during the Civil War, Nikos Zachariadis, as well as from the Communist International, is signed by the acronyms OPLA, the name of the Communist Party “Groups for the Protection of People’s Struggle’, [Organization for the Protection of the People’s Struggle (Greek: Οργάνωση Προστασίας Λαϊκού Αγώνα, abbreviated ΟΠΛΑ – OPLA)] an elite corps of combat units and intelligence teams during the Civil War, notorious for assassinations of both monarchofascists and political opponents within the communist movement. Besides changing the acronym to now mean “Groups of Popular Proletarian Self-Defense”, the communique consists largely of paraphrases of the original text announcing the forming of OPLA in the 1940s, urging “the organisation of structures of mass popular self-defense” against state and parastate repression. The Communist Party of Greece has responded angrily, denouncing the communique as a provocation and a mockery of history and the armed struggle of the Democratic Army of Greece (DSE). The authenticity of the communique remains highly disputed and controversial.
I was stopped by a soldier, said he, “You are a swine”
He beat me with his baton and he kicked me in the groin
I bowed and I scraped, sure me manners were polite
But all the time I’m thinking of me little Armalite…
Sure a brave RUC man came up into our street
Six hundred British soldiers were gathered round his feet
“Come out, ye cowardly Fenians”, said he, “Come out and fight”
But he cried, “I’m only joking”, when he heard the Armalite
One of the men involved in a knife fight at David Irving’s recent lecture at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in Florida is apparently a member of or associated with ‘Crew 38’, the subsidiary mob for prospective members of the neo-Nazi skinhead organisation the (Confederate) Hammerskins.
In Australia, the (Southern Cross) Hammerskins have recently launched their own, local version of ‘Crew 38’ — http://www.myspace.com/crew38australia // http://schammerskins.org/crw_38.html — and last month one of its supporters — along with three other men — paid an unscheduled visit to the Melbourne Anarchist Resource Centre. The group’s leader, Justin O’Brien of ‘Hold Fast Body Art’ (aka the Blood & Honour state representative for Victoria), allegedly stated, inter alia, that if there were any future ‘anti-fascist’ activity in Melbourne, he and his kameraden would be back to kick the heads in of whomever they happened to find in the space at the time. (At the time these gentlemen came calling, a group campaigning against sexual violence was holding a meeting.)
I’m not entirely sure why a small businessman like Justin would want to declare war on a group of strangers / Melbourne’s anarchist community in this fashion, but then again, I think you probably need to be a little bit unconventional in your thinking to want to be a neo-Nazi activist in the first place amirite?
According to Hatewatch, in the US, trouble is brewing between rival neo-Nazis belonging to the Hammerskins and Volksfront. In Australia, however, it’s one big happy family, with members of both groups — as well as members of the ‘Australia First Party’, ‘Blood & Honour’, ‘One Nation Party’, ‘New Right’, “national anarchists”, and assorted other fascists — sitting down in peace and harmony last month at the Petersham RSL — extremely proud hosts of the ‘2009 Sydney Forum’. There, they presumably paid tribute to Australia’s returned servicemen and women — and, coincidentally, further plotted how to rid the country of Asians, blacks, homosexuals, Jews, leftists and other Untermenschen.
In what may be the latest sign of simmering tensions in Florida between two prominent racist skinhead groups, two men suffered knife wounds this week during a speech by Holocaust denying historian David Irving at a luxury Palm Beach County hotel.
Irving spoke to about three dozen invited guests in a conference room he booked at the Ritz-Carlton hotel south of Palm Beach. During his talk on “decoding the Nazi message,” two men, Christopher Nachtman and John Kopko, stepped outside to argue and one of them pulled a knife, police say. A fight ensued. Furniture was broken and a carpet was bloodied. Both men were taken to nearby hospitals for treatment of knife wounds. No charges have been filed yet.
Irving is a longtime Holocaust revisionist. In 2000, he sued Emory University professor and Holocaust expert Deborah Lipstadt for libel in his homeland of Britain, after she accused of him of deliberate falsification. A London court declared Irving a pro-Nazi anti-Semite and “active Holocaust denier” and ordered him to pay all court costs. In 2006, he was imprisoned in Austria after pleading guilty to telling audiences that there were no gas chambers in the Nazi concentration camp of Auschwitz. Irving subsequently backed off those claims. Earlier this year, he set up a website selling Nazi memorabilia. His visit to South Florida was the latest on a surreptitious speaking tour in the United States, in which Irving informs attendees of his venue at the last minute so as to thwart protestors.
Irving told Florida television station WPBF that Kopko initiated the attack, and that the fight had nothing to do with his lecture. He said his assistant witnessed the incident. “She said that she saw four people chasing one member of the audience out and beating him to the floor, and she said she thought they were going to kill him, but he pulled a knife from nowhere and stabbed one of these men repeatedly,” he told the TV station. “It was a personal feud, apparently, which goes back over the years, and I gained the impression, or so I was told, that three or four of these people had come in there with the intention of roughing him up,” he said. He doesn’t know Kopko personally, Irving added.
Postings on Stormfront, the leading white supremacist website, imply that Kopko, 43, is associated with Crew 38, the support group for the Confederate Hammerskins. A Stormfront poster using the screen name of “White Racialist” wrote after the incident, “John is a good man and a true soldier for the Cause, and has been for 20+ years … As for the lowly coward that pushed a knife into John’s BACK, no fate is too awful for you. You have to try a lot harder than that to kill Crew 38!”
Kopko was an official of the National Socialist White Workers Party in 1992 when he led a protest outside a West Palm Beach bookstore on the premise that the business sold pornographic material that promoted race mixing and homosexuality. That same year, he tried to get neo-Nazi publications placed in Palm Beach County libraries. A newspaper reported that he showed up at a meeting dressed like a Nazi storm trooper.
Nachtman, 31, is a former member of the once-prominent neo-Nazi group, National Alliance. He has used the screen name “Blutfahne” – German for “blood flag” – on Stormfront and VNN Forum. The latter is an online forum of Vanguard News Network, whose motto is, “No Jews. Just right.” He also posts under the screen name “Teutonic Legion” on Stormfront, and his avatar is the Volksfront logo. He has promoted Volksfront and Confederate Hammerskins events, and helped organize the February 2007 Volksfront Victory Achievement Conference in Missouri, where he spoke.
There have been numerous recent confrontations in central Florida that suggest a war is brewing between former longtime allies Volksfront and the Confederate Hammerskins. Michael Lawrence, one of the original founders of the Confederate Hammerskins in 1987, switched his allegiance to Volksfront in 2007, and became the group’s unofficial leader in Florida. Randal Krager, who co-founded Volksfront in 1994 while serving a prison sentence, moved from Portland, Oregon, to Florida with his wife and son to live next door to Lawrence.
Since Lawrence’s defection, his longtime friend and Confederate Hammerskins member, Richie Myers, has steadily gained power throughout the state as the group’s Orlando leader. Myers and his second-in-command, Coby Stonecypher, regularly associate with the Outlaws Motorcycle Club gang. Lawrence and Krager do not. A public indication of trouble brewing between Confederate Hammerskins and Volksfront appeared in a Stormfront posting advertising Volksfront’s annual Martyr’s Day event, to be held this year in Pensacola. The announcement said the gathering was “family friendly [by that we mean no drunks, no non-racial ‘clubs’, no deviate or degrading behavior].” Many readers took that as disapproval of outlaw motorcycle clubs attending recent white supremacist gatherings, which has happened at Confederate Hammerskins events.
A woman using the screen name of “Vidgis” hinted on Stormfront this week that the stabbing at Irving’s lecture reflected an escalation in tensions between the two skinhead groups. She wrote, “…the saddest part is how the various White Pride organizations are at war with one another. If we would turn that rage towards the real enemies, we’d be making real progress.”
Knifings and neo-Nazis aren’t the sorts of events or people that show up often in Manalapan, the affluent little coastal town where Irving spoke at the Ritz-Carlton. It has been home to the likes of famed criminal defense lawyer F. Lee Bailey, New Age musician Yanni and boxing promoter Don King. The 52-room oceanfront mansion of the widow of publishing heir Randolph Hearst fetched $22 million at a foreclosure auction last year. Monday’s fracas presumably was an atypical event at the Ritz-Carlton, whose website says it “has catered to the world’s most discerning guests,” and describes it as having “refined beauty” and a “graceful atmosphere.” The presidential suite runs a cool $3,000 per night. Hotel officials say the conference room where Irving spoke was reserved under the name of his book publisher in Great Britain, and they knew nothing about Irving.
Irving told local media that he was “deeply ashamed that this happened.”
NB. Irving was obviously not referring to the Holocaust.
From the Departments of While You’re Reading This Children Are Starving & Sh*t Just Got Real comes:
Good Game presenter claims ABC gender bias after axing
Asher Moses
[Fairfax]
October 30, 2009
An evil pixie at the ABC has decided to sabotage the ratings success of Good Game by ordering management to sack, without warning or explanation, one of its presenters — ‘Junglist’ (Jeremy Ray) — and to replace him with a virtual unknown: the poisoned chalice in this instance going to someone called ‘Hex’ (Stephanie Bendixsen).
Personally, I’d like to see both presenters (including ‘Bajo’ / Steven O’Donnell) axed and replaced with B-grade TV celebrities ABC management’s children inform them are like, totally hot right now. But like, only after a private consultancy firm has been hired to do some hideously-overpriced market research on what the yoof are like, really watching on TV.
And stuff.
One extremely-talented performer that immediately springs to mind — to be precise: cartwheels, fire-breathes and juggles his way into my consciousness — is Dylan Lewis. He’s crazy, funny, wacky and zany — and The Kids love him!
Mad skillz!
Anyway, there’s been plenty of online back-and-forth in the meantime, both about the decision to sack Junglist, and the future of the show. The actual decision to sack Junglist appears to have taken place on or about October 23 (according to David Wildgoose @ Kotaku), but the shit has really only hit the fans this week, after the first episode featuring Bajo and Hex went to air (October 26).
Here’s what ‘Bajo’ had to say after having completed his first show with ‘Hex’ (Stephanie Bendixsen):
Author Bajo (Presenter)
Date/Time 29 Oct 2009 8:10:07pm
Subject Re: Statement from the team…
I would very much like to do that again, one of the best days I’ve ever had on this show!
If you’ve ever worked in any sort of organization you’ll know that as much as it sucks, work related issues cannot be discussed outside the work place, it’s just as simple as that, and I wish we could tell you more – but we can’t and that can’t change and it’s not going to. It feels unfair to us that we can’t say our side of the story, but that’s the position we’re in and we understand and respect why these rules are in place in our workplace, or any.
[NB. When Bajo writes “I would very much like to do that again, one of the best days I’ve ever had on this show!”, he is not referring to shooting the show with Hex, but to an ‘Open Day’ GG had previously arranged. Seethis comment for further clarification.]
Well actually, exactly who is responsible for ‘Junglist’ being removed from the show is slightly unclear. ABC management reckons they took the decision and it was because Junglist was a slack bastard behind the scenes — an under-performer. But the remaining cast and crew — possibly as a result of the laws which govern how the script unfolds on that long-running soap opera Workplace Relations — also appear to be completely supportive of Junglist’s sacking. Here’s the Good Game statement:
Dear GG’ers
You can’t help but have noticed we’ve been quiet regarding Junglist’s departure from the show which has really sucked because we’re used to having such an honest and open relationship with you.
For all sorts of reasons we are unable to tell you things that have happened over many months inside Team Good Game which have impacted on the production. That’s just real life folks. We know it leaves many questions unanswered but we have reached that point where we really can’t say any more than that.
But we can tell you this much…
The decision to take Junglist off air was not forced upon us by ABC Management and it’s one that is fully supported by all the GG team. We are gutted that it has come to this but in our opinion it absolutely had to happen.
It’s strange for us to read that so many of you think this is because we have suffered a raging case of political correctness gone mad or a wish to dumb the show down. That’s absolutely not right. We, as ever, will continue our quest to bring you the show for gamers by gamers but this has to be our last word on this – we have shows to make!
Finally, we genuinely wish Junglist all the best, and we hope he finds a medium for his awesome analysis and presenting skills that works for him.
Team Good Game Out
(Syd, Bajo, Moe, Tuk, Gog, Mafia, Jeremy Pencil, Palindrome)
And here’s how Junglist responded:
Author Junglist (Reviewer)
Date/Time 29 Oct 2009 4:48:18pm
Subject Re: Statement from the team…
I can tell you that this is a lie. There was no vote taken, no consensus reached. In fact, the GG team was completely unaware of the change until the same day I found out. The same confidentiality clause that prevented me from saying anything publicly, prevented management from telling them anything.
I have spoken to members of the GG team who clearly DON’T support this, but can’t say anything publicly. Of course they’ll tow the party line. They have to.
Up until now the situation has just been poorly handled. But to now LIE to your own audience, in an effort to save face for replacing an experienced reviewer/presenter with an inexperienced one, is quite simply the lowest thing I’ve ever seen ABC management do.
I feel now as if I’m being professionally attacked, so here’s a truth bomb. In the meeting where I was told I would be replaced, the reason given was they wanted a girl on the show. “Mass appeal” was a direct quote from that meeting. After a half-hour of explaining how they’ll lose their hardcore following, they responded that yes, they knew this, but expected to make up the numbers with a new following. “A show can grow beyond its hardcore base”, is another direct quote.
The decision was forced by ABC management, for a mass appeal direction, and will naturally be dumbed down for the loss of experience. Case in point: Monday night’s show. Both Forza 3 and Kingdom Hearts clearly written by people with no idea about those franchises. Hell, no one on the team even thought to correct the presenters on how to pronounce “Forza” correctly? Expect a lot more of that…
And so on…
one
Author Junglist (Reviewer)
Date/Time 29 Oct 2009 5:16:31pm
Subject Re: Statement from the team…
“We have felt personally attacked by some of the posts by Jung, and others, with the inability to reply due to confidentiality.”
Actually, I’ve been very supportive of Hex, and pointed out that all she ever did was accept a cool job. What possible truth bomb could YOU drop? I’m not trying to be a White Knight, I’ve made mistakes too. I’ve disagreed with the ABC on reviewing policies, which sometimes resulted in footage being handed in late. And it’s a shame that the Christmas special was decided on around the same time I booked an overseas trip, and neither party were flexible enough to change plans.
But at the very, very least, I want to be honest with the community. Realise it or not, Good Game has a responsibility to show younger Australian viewers what the ABC is about. I think the appropriate term here is, “epic fail”.
two
Author Syd (Series Producer)
Date/Time 29 Oct 2009 5:35:21pm
Subject Re: Statement from the team…
This could easily degenerate into a he said she said we said… none of us were in that meeting after all… BUT the GG team is here with me in the office right now…
Jung mate, I’m sorry to say it but you are wrong… no one on the team feels we have to tow the party line here – no one has been coerced into doing or saying anything they don’t want to. Sure we didn’t all find out till you did – but that does not mean we don’t feel it’s the right thing to do for the show. That’s the truth we need to swallow here… as bitter a taste as it might leave in our mouths.
Regardless of what Jung might say GG will NOT be dumbed down and I state again, the decision was nothing to do with bringing in a girl… FFS – I’m a girl and I started this show – I don’t care about the gender of the presenters – I just care about having the best ppl working on it.
Guys… I totally acknowledge Jung[‘]s contribution to GG – and yeah I can see how it feels like we’ve stabbed a mate – and what’s the Aussie thing to do? Stand up for a mate in a fight right? But this show is more than just one person – is and always has been.
GG has been my life for the last nearly four years… why on earth would I want anything to hurt it?
Syd
three
Author Junglist (Reviewer)
Date/Time 29 Oct 2009 5:43:42pm
Subject Re: Statement from the team…
“GG has been my life for the last nearly four years… why on earth would I want anything to hurt it?”
I completely believe that you have the best of intentions, Syd. It’s you that holds this show together. And I likewise believe you when you say it has nothing to do with bringing in a girl.
But it’s not up to you, is it? This change comes from higher up.
As I said, I’ve spoken to team members who contradict what you say about “supporting the ABC’s decision”, so this is damage control, pure & simple.
four
Author Bajo (Presenter)
Date/Time 29 Oct 2009 7:42:17pm
Subject Re: Statement from the team…
Hi guys,
I can’t stress enough to scrub ‘mass appeal’ from your minds. The words are ridiculous to me, and the team and no one has ever felt that it’s even remotely where we are heading. If you find you can’t scrub it than at least take a look at the show over the next few weeks and you’ll see that we’re not changing focus/direction at all. Yes there is some change obviously, but not to the content and definitely not to our attitude to how we present gaming information. No one is understating the loss we’ll feel without Junglist[‘]s excellent reviews and input to the show, but we will find our groove again, with your help and the help of our very hardworking team who have come from so many different places from magazines to other shows to freelance game journos to just plain gamers that we thought were awesome and needed to work on the show. No one has any interest in dumbing anything down, the thought of it makes me vomit on Gog’s keyboard. Amongst other people keyboards and chairs.
From outside looking in it’s easy to jump to conclusions and assume lots of things, so try to trust that we really do care about you, we troll every day, and we feel your words. We are going to deal with this change in the best possible way we can with the tools we have, with the best possible team we can find. We are still filling our team up behind and in front of the scenes, and it’s only growing as the year turns into the next. Like Syd said, we have two shows next year, and GGSP is focused on tween, which allows us to put MORE adult content in the regular GG, something we have always wanted to do and have always fought to do.
Despite all this hate and flame, just take a deep breath. Now, exhale, and think about games for a moment, which is why we are all here. I’m not trying to make light of an obviously hard and awful conversation we’re having, but games are awesome.
Their awesome juice will seep into our souls, and we’ll be awesome again, and show you this juice as it transforms into words. The juice will then flow out of our pores, into our actual drink of juice (possibly pineapple) and then that juice will be drunk again, only doubling the effect of awesome juice which is all from games in the first place.
I very much wish I could be next to you all to talk about this in person. It’s hard to express my frustration about the misconceptions I keep seeing here. I would like to give you all a real hug… please accept this internet hug ‘O’ for now.
Those of you whom are doubtful, I do hope you choose to stay, and at least give us a chance. The show is really important to me, and us, and we just want it to be epic as it once was, with all the tools we have.
five
Author Junglist (Reviewer)
Date/Time 29 Oct 2009 8:43:18pm
Subject Re: Statement from the team…
“I can’t stress enough to scrub ‘mass appeal’ from your minds.”
That’s because “mass appeal” is the truth. You’re asking for a lot of trust in that statement when trust is clearly an issue right now. I actually believe that you believe what you’re saying, but you weren’t the one who talked to upper management for 30 minutes about their new mass appeal plan.
“Yes there is some change obviously, but not to the content.”
Explain then why I’m only contributing 1 token review a week? And quite possibly those reviews won’t even make it into the show? A proven reviewer over 3 years has been replaced with a less experienced one. The content HAS changed, already.
As ever Baj it seems like you couldn’t wait to just get on with things… fair enough if you don’t care about this whole thing, but asking everyone to just forget about it by promising fruit hats and horse heads is insulting peoples’ intelligence.
For my part, I’ve been honest about my own weaknesses in my role. There is no more “we can’t say anything”. I’ve said it. So have at me bro, if that’s what you feel like.
From the Department of “Hips Don’t Lie… But Can They Win Votes?”:
Zahra Stardust eyes up Brendan Nelson’s seat of Bradfield
Tony Wright The Age
October 29, 2009
Politics requires an ability for contortion, but one of the new candidates for Brendan Nelson’s seat of Bradfield takes acrobatics to a new level.
A young woman named Zahra Stardust is the latest to add her name to the huge field jostling for the seat, which goes to the polls on December 5.
And her pre-politics job? She’s a pole dancer.
Ms Stardust is backed by the Australian Sex Party. She also has her own website, though we should perhaps offer the warning that those with dicky hearts ought to think twice before checking it out.
Nominations close at midday on Thursday, November 12, 2009.
I should note that my heart was broken when Warwick Capper promised and then failed to nominate for the seat of Beaudesert in the Queensland state election in March, 2009.
PS. Did you know that Brendan Nelson is a medical doctor? Certificate and everything.
Following the police shooting on October 24 of a kind and caring neo-Nazi named Jeff Hughes in Nanaimo in Canada, John Kopko and Christopher Nachtman, two angry Aryans in attendance at one of nutzi historian David Irving’s speeches — delivered on October 26 at the Ritz-Carlton in Manalapan, Florida — decided to clarify their political differences by stabbing one another.
This is not an uncommon practice among members of the far right.
Irving is currently on tour in the US, and his speaking engagements are apparently being booked by his publisher, ‘Focal Point Publications’ (or as ‘Focal Point Productions’). His current tour, taking him from Florida to South Carolina to North Carolina, then to Richmond, Virginia, Washington (DC), Baltimore, Philadelphia, New Jersey, New York, New Haven (CT), Manchester (NH), Niagara Falls (NY) and Indianapolis is scheduled to end in Chicago on November 23.
Whether there will be any more stabbings remains to be seen.
In Germany: “An 88-year-old former Waffen SS fanatic went has gone on trial accused of the wartime execution of three civilians in the Netherlands during the Second World War”, while elsewhere a German woman is keeping Berlin clean of neo-Nazi propaganda, a mission inspired by her encountering a sticker 20 years ago: ‘”I was angry that I hadn’t scratched the sticker off,” she recalls. She returned that evening and it was still hanging there. She couldn’t understand why the many people who had waited at the bus stop that day hadn’t bothered to remove it. “So I decided to stop looking the other way,” she says.’
Which was, of course, her first mistake.
There’s a moral to this story, what it is I cannot say
Oh maybe it’s the ancient curse, crime it will not pay
If you ask Wee Willie McFadden, he’ll say “You’re kind, you know”
If you want to pinch a record player, do it up the Shankill Road
If you want to pinch a record player, do it up the Shankill Road
‘Bakers Delight’ is the name given to a chain of bakeries around Australia, mostly franchises. The company was established in 1980, and its co-founders, Roger and Lesley Gillespie, are now sometimes to be found on Australia’s Rich List. In September, Roger Gillespie (who last made the Rich 200 in 2004 with a fortune of $100 million) bought the Victorian discount grocery chain, NQR.
Their own corporate profile reads:
Bakers Delight is Australia’s most successful bakery franchise.
Over the past 29 years this Australian owned company, has grown to over 700 bakeries across three countries, serving 2.5 million customers each week.
Every day, in every bakery, Bakers Delight bakers create a range of traditional and gourmet breads. All products are baked from scratch, fresh daily on the premises.
Bakers Delight bakeries are distinctive in appearance, branding, product quality and customer experience.
The company’s philosophy underpins every action: Delightful Environment, Delightful Service, Delightful Product.
Also, in the case of Bakers Delight stores in St. Helena, Diamond Creek and Laurimar: No Penalty Rates, No Guaranteed Hours, No Sick Pay and No Holiday Pay.
The friendly sales assistants at Bakers Delight stores in St. Helena, Diamond Creek and Laurimar (Victoria, Australia) are currently negotiating a new workplace agreement. So far their employer, Wayne Price, has offered them an agreement that does away with penalty rates, guaranteed hours, sick pay and holiday pay in exchange for a tiny bit extra in the base rate. Mr. Price has also refused to include yearly pay increases to cover the cost of living. On top of this the workers are being bullied and told they are not allowed to discuss the agreement or talk to the union. They are under constant video surveillance and feel intimidated by Mr Price. They would really appreciate your support! All the workers are asking for is to receive Award entitlements like penalty rates for working nights and weekends, security of hours and sick pay and holiday pay. Currently they don’t receive these entitlements, with some workers receiving as little as $9.29 an hour! While you pay top prices for your bread, the employees are working under conditions that undermine industry standards.
Let Bakers Delight know that you will not tolerate the exploitation of young workers. The workers are fighting for:
Penalty rates on evenings, weekends and public holidays;
Guaranteed shifts and security of hours;
Sick pay and holiday pay;
Guaranteed pay rises every year to cover the cost of living;
An end to workplace bullying and over-supervision.
These are the conditions other workers in the retail industry enjoy.
Bakers Delight’ workers deserve them too!
For more infos on this and other industrial campaigns in the retail and services sector, please see the UNITE website.
Everyone is welcome to come to the Calendar Launch on Friday, November 13 at Readings Bookshop in Carlton at 6pm for free wine and talk! [Readings is located at 309 Lygon St, Carlton, Victoria: Phone (03) 9347 6633.]
Face Up To The Future! with 3CR’s fifth Seeds Of Dissent Calendar. 3CR asked 12 artists who are part of Australian activist culture to contribute an artwork that reflects their idea of the future.
In 2006, 3CR created a Seeds of Dissent! Calendar to celebrate 3CR’s 30th birthday. The full colour, nationally distributed calendar teemed with radical dates, ideas and inspiration for social change. The calendar sold out of its 2000 copies. Since then 3CR’s Promotions Sub Committee’s Calendar Team has produced a yearly calendar, each with a fresh theme.
Face Up ToThe Future! — 3CR’s fifth Seeds Of Dissent Calendar — looks ahead to imagine a future we want to live in, while also celebrating Australia’s radical history. We asked 12 artists who are part of Australian activist culture to contribute an artwork that reflects their idea of the future. Some artists have created images that imagine the ideal future and some have chosen to depict issues we need to address today in order to achieve it.
Australian history re-envisioned with a cheeky female bushranger, uranium mining and the need to recognise the interdependence of ecology, the tyrannical expectations of female beauty, the return of tumbling as a form of transportation (!), Indigenous people at the heart of popular culture… these are the some of the issues explored by artists such as Arlene Texta Queen, Deborah Kelly, Bindi Cole, Adam Hill, Tom O’Hern, Mitch [? sorry Mitch], Jo Waite, Rayna Fahey, Tom Civil, Mickie Quick, Lachlan Conn and Paul J Kalemba.
Cross-stitched samplers, stencils, felt pen drawings, collages, cartoons, illustration, computer art… these are the media the artists use to take us into the future of the 2010 Seeds of Dissent Calendar.
is a wonderful new book by some trouble-making bloke called Iain McIntyre, and is published by the redoubtable and not-at-all nervous Breakdown Press.
Launched in Newcastle at TINA — where L kindly grabbed me a copy — it will be launched again, kicking and screaming, in Melbourne on THURSDAY the 5th NOVEMBER at the BELLA UNION BAR (Victorian Trades Hall, cnr Victoria and Lygon Streets) between the hours of 6 and 8pm.
The book compiles tales of unconventional political dissent included in three previously-published pamphlets — How To Make Trouble And Influence People (1996), How to Stop Whining and Start Living (1998) and Revenge Of The Troublemaker (2003) — and, as an EXTRA! ADDED! BONUS!, interviews with a number of pranksters, photos galore, and er, other stuff.
Two Greek anarchists are making molotov cocktails. One says to the other: "So who will we throw these at then?" The other replies: "What are you, some kind of fucking intellectual?"
