No Gary, No! More on neo-Nazism @ The Birmy

Following last month’s article on The Birmingham Hotel (Cnr. Johnston & Smith Sts, Fitzroy, 9417 2706) detailing its hosting a gig organised by two local neo-Nazi groups, The Melbourne Times has published another; this time reporting the racial abuse of a lone woman — by a group of seven men — on the same night, in Johnston St..

‘Victim of white supremacist abuse returns to join protest chorus’
Marika Dobbin
Melbourne Times
October 18, 2006

A LOCAL woman who was intimidated and racially abused by a group of men last month will attend a protest against neo-Nazism outside a Fitzroy pub.

A coalition of local groups is organising the “peace movement” in response to a neo-Nazi concert at the Birmingham Hotel on Saturday, September 23, held to commemorate the death of British white supremacist Ian Stuart.

Ian couldn’t drive a car
As we all know
He trusted too much in all his gods
And though he was a human being
We don’t feel any sorrow for him

Now we got rid of one of those cunts
He’s been one of our most important enemies
So we forget our respect for life
Cause all he did was senseless shit

[…]

Now we’re here and having our fun
Having our fun and thinking about him
He’s been the one who misused the word Skinhead
He himself was never one – he was a fucking Bonehead

Blondien (not her real name) says she was walking alone to her car on Johnston Street the same night when she was surrounded by about seven men. She says the men screamed abuse at her, calling her a black c..t and forcing her to repeat the insults.

“It’s disgusting that people would single out one person and you have to say stuff about your race to get out of it,” Blondien said.

Music is planned for the protest on Saturday, October 28, at 1pm outside the Birmingham.

Hotel co-owner Gary (who wouldn’t give his surname) said: “I’m not getting involved in someone else’s bullshit.”

Anti-racism network Fightdemback, one of the organisers, has called on the Tote Hotel to cancel a gig this Friday night by Brisbane satanic-black-metal group Gospel of the Horns.

Gospel of the Horns’ songs include Vengeance is Mine, Call to Arms, Slaves and Trial of Mankind.

Fightdemback member Cam Smith said the band had links to neo-Nazi groups and had played at white supremacist gigs.

However, Tote manager Lance Petrie said it was “bonehead rock”, not neo-Nazi music.

“We don’t let people in with swastikas on their coats,” Mr Petrie said. “I know one member of the band and it’s all long hair and leather, he’s certainly not into Nazism.”

Protesters at the rally will hand out local flyers about neo-Nazism and ask shopkeepers to put anti-racism stickers in their windows.

A women’s collective representative helping to organise the event said it was important to send a message that racism was not welcome locally and make the Birmingham accountable.

And of course, one of the simplest ways of making The Birmy accountable is to drink elsewhere; an option which a number of local punks failed to take when the annual punk pub crawl eventually wound its way to The Birmy last month. On the other hand, thus far, only a small number of local punk bands — Marching Orders and Slick 46 from Melbourne and The Assailants and Standard “Our slogan is unionism not racism”! Union from Adelaide — have actively scabbed on the boycott, and at least one band — to their credit — has cancelled a performance at the pub. Further, word is slowly circulating — both among locals but also among others in the hotel and music industry — that a boycott of the pub has been called for.

Disappointingly, the pub owner Gary (whose surname I won’t publish — yet) has further entrenched his reputation for contempt for the local community: racial abuse is, apparently, “someone else’s bullshit”. This attitude is, of course, precisely what a growth in racism and fascism depends upon. (Gary isn’t a woman walking alone to her car, so why should he care?) That, and the provision of a platform from which to promulgate such doctrines; a platform which Gary has been only too happy to provide, and which some local punks (a/k/a scabs) have been only too happy to support… although presumably only after (cheerfully) having agreed to being stuffed head first into a disembraining machine.

And on a lighter note…

Paling into significance

NEO-NAZIS hate a lot of people, communists in particular.

So it is no surprise that Socialist-about-town Steve Jolly is particularly reviled by local Nazis, especially given his comments in our article three weeks ago about their get-together concert at the Birmingham Hotel in Fitzroy. Jolly’s gripes that Neo-Nazi groups were “dangerous fruitcakes” and into “genocide politics” have provoked angry responses on white nationalists’ internet chat sites [ie, Scumfront].

One furious chatter from NSW posted the councillor’s photograph on the site and labelled him Steve “I never get out in the sun much” Jolly, referring to his pasty complexion.

“Contact the healthy looking, ruddy-cheeked councillor” the chatter sarcastically implores his fascist mates.

Jolly certainly is pale, but Metropolis is confused, isn’t a porcelain skin a plus in neo-Nazi-land?

Which Side Are You On?
by Florence Reese

Come all of you good workers
Good news to you I’ll tell
Of how that good old union
Has come in here to dwell

(Chorus)
Which side are you on?
Which side are you on?
Which side are you on?
Which side are you on?

My daddy was a miner
And I’m a miner’s son
And I’ll stick with the union
Till every battle’s won

They say in Harlan County
There are no neutrals there
You’ll either be a union man
Or a thug for J.H. Blair

Oh, workers can you stand it?
Oh, tell me how you can
Will you be a lousy scab
Or will you be a man?

Don’t scab for the bosses
Don’t listen to their lies
Us poor folks haven’t got a chance
Unless we organize