{"id":753,"date":"2007-07-05T16:58:39","date_gmt":"2007-07-05T06:58:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/slackbastard.anarchobase.com\/?p=753"},"modified":"2007-07-06T22:22:18","modified_gmt":"2007-07-06T12:22:18","slug":"ku-klux-klowns-in-townsville","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/slackbastard.anarchobase.com\/?p=753","title":{"rendered":"Ku Klux Klowns in Townsville"},"content":{"rendered":"<ul><strong>Update<\/strong> : Two further articles have appeared regarding the KKK in Australia. As well as being dead easy to join, the sheet-wearers are apparently raising their pointy hooded heads in Geelong in Victoria as well.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.geelongadvertiser.com.au\/article\/2007\/07\/06\/5218_news.html\">Race-hate Klan spreads &#8216;poison&#8217;<\/a>, Kerri-Ann Hobbs, <em>Geelong Advertiser<\/em>, July 6, 2007: &#8220;WHITE supremacists in Geelong have joined a national recruitment drive by extremist group the Ku Klux Klan. Their emergence has outraged community leaders who labelled them racists and cowards who hid behind robes of anonymity. Yet the group was not motivated by racial hate but was about empowering white Christian Australians, the Victorian president  known as the Exalted Cyclops Bwian told the <em>Geelong Advertiser<\/em>&#8230; Geelong MP John Eren, who migrated to Australia from Turkey as a boy, warned there was no room in the city for extreme racist groups. &#8220;I think if they&#8217;re not afraid of what organisation they belong to and what beliefs they hold they should come out instead of hiding behind these frocks,&#8221; Mr Eren said&#8230;&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.townsvillebulletin.com.au\/article\/2007\/07\/06\/4422_hpnews.html\">KKK: easy as ABC<\/a>, Liz McKinnon, <em>Townsville Bulletin<\/em>, July 6, 2007: &#8220;JOINING the Ku Klux Klan is as easy as sending an email to the group, filling out a basic form and purchasing a custom-tailored robe. To climb the ranks as a cell leader, all you need is two mates as klansmen to nominate you&#8230; <a href=\"http:\/\/cam.bluexo.net\/\">One Melbourne reader<\/a> wrote that he had been following the White Legion Knights [since their inception]. He revealed the Aboriginal community had nothing to worry about. &#8220;Across the entire state of Queensland they wouldn\u2019t have more than 10 members,&#8221; he wrote. &#8220;And if what rival Klan leaders tell me is true, they\u2019re not exactly the cream of the crop &#8212; apparently they\u2019re mostly unemployed and thick as bricks.&#8221;<\/ul>\n<p>Local haberdashery reports minor spike in sales&#8230;<\/p>\n<p><em>See also<\/em> : <a href=\"http:\/\/slackbastard.anarchobase.com\/?p=624\">The KKK took my perspective away<\/a> (March 14) | <a href=\"http:\/\/slackbastard.anarchobase.com\/?p=610\">White Loser Knights and Australia First<\/a> (March 6) | <a href=\"http:\/\/slackbastard.anarchobase.com\/?p=582\">KKK is the Australian Way?!?<\/a> (February 5) | <a href=\"http:\/\/www.catholicleader.com.au\/index.php?id=3544\">KKK is not a force in Toowoomba<\/a> (<em>Catholic News<\/em>, March 9) | <a href=\"http:\/\/www.worldnewsaustralia.com.au\/region.php?id=137862&#038;region=7\">Qld row over Hurley trial<\/a> (<strong>SBS<\/strong>, June 21) | <a href=\"http:\/\/www.guardian.co.uk\/usa\/story\/0,,2103860,00.html\">Ex-KKK man guilty of 1964 murder of black teenagers<\/a> (Ed Pilkington, <em>Guardian Unlimited<\/em>, June 15, 2007) | <a href=\"http:\/\/slackbastard.anarchobase.com\/?p=748\">No sell out<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.townsvillebulletin.com.au\/article\/2007\/07\/05\/4382_hpnews.html\">Fear of KKK cell<\/a><br \/>\nLiz McKinnon<br \/>\n<em>Townsville Bulletin<\/em><br \/>\nJuly 5, 2007<\/p>\n<p>A KU Klux Klan cell is rumoured to be operating in Townsville.<\/p>\n<p>A group is reported to be operating from a Castle Hill address, sparking fear within Townsville&#8217;s Aboriginal community. It follows reports there is a recruitment drive occurring for the white supremacist group across the state.<\/p>\n<p>A Cairns-based KKK member went public on national television yesterday revealing the <strong>White Legion Knights<\/strong> group was operating in the city and in other parts of the State. The man appeared via phone with his voice digitally distorted but photographs were shown illustrating the group with an Australian flag.<\/p>\n<p>The <em>Townsville Bulletin<\/em> discovered later in the day that <a href=\"http:\/\/www.villagevoice.com\/news\/0724,tucker,76913,2.html\">a separate body<\/a> known as <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/slackbastard.anarchobase.com\/?p=356\">Stormfront<\/a><\/strong> was allegedly meeting at a Townsville address in the upmarket Castle Hill area. It follows reports earlier this year the group was handing out leaflets across the state and that Townsville had been targeted along with Toowoomba, Rockhampton and Cairns.<\/p>\n<p>The group runs under the tag `White Pride World Wide&#8217;.<\/p>\n<p>Currajong Aboriginal woman Pauline Geary said it was old news and stories had been circling for a long time that they were meeting somewhere in Castle Hill. The grandmother of four said her community felt threatened by the recent rise of the group. &#8220;We want respect in our own country and we are not getting it,&#8221; Mrs Geary said. &#8220;There is not enough happening on stamping it out. I don&#8217;t have faith in the police but this is an illegal operation, isn&#8217;t it?&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Aboriginal activist Gracelyn Smallwood also wasn&#8217;t surprised by the news and revealed she was happy it had publicly come out. She argued it would bring international attention, like the Hurley case, and show that Townsville and Australia was racist. &#8220;This is what I have been fighting for 40 years, my father for 50 and the grandparents before him. It&#8217;s a 220-year fight for the very issue of racism,&#8221; Ms Smallwood said. <strong>&#8220;The thing is now what are we going to do about it? It&#8217;s not what the Aboriginal community is going to do, it&#8217;s what are non-indigenous people going to do about it? This is a positive for the black community. At least the whole world will find out what is really going on in this country.&#8221;<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The racism debate is not new to Townsville.<\/p>\n<p>Only last month the city was labelled the KKK capital of Australia by activist <a href=\"http:\/\/www.abc.net.au\/message\/radio\/awaye\/ms_opera\/murrandoo_interview.htm\">Murrandoo Yann[e]r<\/a> in the wake of Senior Sergeant Chris Hurley being cleared of the manslaughter of Palm Island man Mulrunji Doomadgee. In 2000, a photograph of soldiers at Lavarack Barracks dressed as members of the KKK to humiliate their black comrades made national headlines.*<\/p>\n<p>Catholic Bishop Michael Putney said he had never heard of a Townsville link and he hoped people would have more sense than to get involved. &#8220;To get tied up with something that kind of carries the name of a group that did such terrible things in the United States, it wouldn&#8217;t make sense that anyone would identify with a group with that name,&#8221; Bishop Putney said. &#8220;I find it very hard to think anyone would be so foolish. It would be very sad people who do that.&#8221; He said the track record of the group was `pure evil&#8217;.<\/p>\n<p>Townsville Police Crime Co-ordinator Detective Inspector Warren Webber said he had never heard of the group and at this stage was not making any investigations. Townsville Mayor Tony Mooney and Thuringowa Mayor Les Tyrell both refused to comment on the rumoured branch.<\/p>\n<ul>\n* &#8216;Extremists can serve in forces: defence chief&#8217;, <em>The Age<\/em>, December, 20, 2000<\/p>\n<p>Australia&#8217;s Defence Force chief yesterday defended the rights of soldiers to support neo-Nazism and other forms of political extremism, saying they should not be expelled over their beliefs. <a href=\"http:\/\/www.abc.net.au\/7.30\/content\/2002\/s492465.htm\">Admiral Chris Barrie<\/a> said the community would be affronted if the forces had <a href=\"http:\/\/sunday.ninemsn.com.au\/sunday\/feature_stories\/article_996.asp?s=1\">a system to weed out people on the basis of their political views<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>His comments followed revelations that three former members of an elite army regiment were in a hard-rock neo-Nazi band, <strong>Blood Oath<\/strong>. Admiral Barrie said two of the band members had left the elite 3rd Battalion of the army&#8217;s Royal Australian Regiment while the third was no longer in the army.<\/p>\n<p>He said the ADF was apolitical. &#8221;We don&#8217;t make a statement about people&#8217;s political beliefs. Australia is a country that&#8217;s recognised throughout the world for its freedom of belief and the freedoms we give our ordinary people.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>A racist website, <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/slackbastard.anarchobase.com\/?p=681\">Blood and Honor Australia<\/a><\/strong>, names the former military members of Blood Oath as Harry, Shane and Brain. The fourth member, a civilian, is Gideon McLean, revealed in 1998 as a member of <strong>Pauline Hanson&#8217;s One Nation<\/strong> party. In an interview published on the website, the band members describe themselves as &#8221;white power&#8221; musicians, while Mr McLean and Shane list Adolf Hitler as a hero.<\/ul>\n<div align = \"center\" ><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/farm2.static.flickr.com\/1252\/723882130_77d37e6fed_m.jpg\"><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Update : Two further articles have appeared regarding the KKK in Australia. As well as being dead easy to join, the sheet-wearers are apparently raising their pointy hooded heads in Geelong in Victoria as well. Race-hate Klan spreads &#8216;poison&#8217;, Kerri-Ann &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/slackbastard.anarchobase.com\/?p=753\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-753","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-anti-fascism"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6AyE-c9","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/slackbastard.anarchobase.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/753","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/slackbastard.anarchobase.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/slackbastard.anarchobase.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/slackbastard.anarchobase.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/slackbastard.anarchobase.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=753"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/slackbastard.anarchobase.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/753\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/slackbastard.anarchobase.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=753"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/slackbastard.anarchobase.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=753"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/slackbastard.anarchobase.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=753"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}