Morning Briefing: Neo-Nazis Stage Protest in Florida and White Supremacists Continue to Spread Propaganda
Morning Briefing: Neo-Nazis Stage Protest in Florida and White Supremacists Continue to Spread Propaganda
Neo-Nazis and White Supremacists staged a protest in Florida, and White Supremacists continue to spread propaganda from Florida to Montana.
Morning Briefing: Neo-Nazis and White Supremacists “spread antisemitic, white supremacist and anti-LGBTQ messages outside Disney World and in the nearby Orlando, Florida,” and the groups reportedly “carried flags with swastikas, performed Hitler salutes and shouted out hateful slogans.”
In Okeechobee County, Florida, White Supremacist and antisemitic propaganda were distributed in several neighborhoods, and local law enforcement reportedly “discovered more than 100 packets had been thrown into people’s yards.”
In recent weeks, there has been an increase in White Lives Matter racist propaganda in Great Falls, Montana, and the stickers and other paraphernalia is reportedly “being placed on street signs, utility boxes, and art installments throughout the downtown and surrounding areas.”
Stephen Parshall, who has ties to the violent extremist Boogaloo movement, was sentenced “to life in prison with the possibility of parole for a conspiracy to cause violence during 2020 Black Lives Matter protests.”
There is a growing number of “U.S. Capitol riot defendants who absconded and became fugitives after their arrests or initial court appearances,” and “at least six became – or were — fugitives over the course of this summer.”
Must Reads
Jared Holt writes that “at least five known neo-Nazi groups appeared to be active around Orlando this weekend and there was little, if any, notable resistance to their presence. But for all the allegations that ostensibly mainstream conservatives make that these neo-Nazis and others like them are ‘feds’ staging fake protests to sway public opinion or entrap conservative activists, they offer remarkably scant evidence to support their claims. Most appeal to ignorance, encouraging their target demographic audiences to understand an assumed lack of personal experiences with right-wing extremists as a truism about the world at large. And like most good conspiracy theories, they often contain grains of truth that are spun to support other nonsense claims. The neo-Nazis participating in these protests represented groups that extremism researchers like myself have been tracking for years. They are real, organized, and serious about what they are spreading: ideologies that inspire bloodshed and violence, often against minority communities. The fact that they exist as a fringe, even among the far-right, says nothing about their capabilities to produce harm—especially when left unopposed.” [The Daily Beast]
Jason Wilson reports that “a high-end hotel in the liberal Texan enclave of Austin is playing host to a conference whose theme is boosting global birth rates, but which will in fact feature racist and eugenicist internet personalities and far-right media figures. The Natal conference – whose website warns that ‘by the end of the century, nearly every country on earth will have a shrinking population, and economic systems dependent on reliable growth will collapse’ – is scheduled to be held on 1 December at the Line Hotel. Natal’s website claim the conference has ‘has no political or ideological goal other than a world in which our children can have grandchildren’, but the Guardian can reveal its organizer Kevin Dolan has been promoting the event on the far-right podcast circuit, and has explicitly linked the conference’s ‘pro-natalist’ orientation to eugenics. Dolan was at one time a social media influencer connected to the far-right Mormon ‘Deznat’ or ‘Deseret nationalist’ subculture and has himself linked the conference’s theme with eugenics in interviews.” [The Guardian]
Chrissy Stroop writes that Elon Musk “denounced the ‘woke mind virus’ and even taken a dig at the free online encyclopaedia Wikipedia, calling it ‘Wokipedia’ (presumably because of its editors’ attempts to maintain fact-based objectivity). This ‘anti-wokism’ is bad enough, of course. It’s a position that clearly animates the American right at its core and all the way to its extremes (even if some who style themselves centrist or liberal have also adopted an ‘anti-woke’ stance in recent years). A case in point: Florida’s notoriously authoritarian governor and Republican primary presidential candidate Ron DeSantis loves to boast that ‘Florida is where woke goes to die.’ But Musk sometimes goes further than broad-brushed ‘anti-woke’ sentiments – for example, in highlighting supposed threats of genocide against white people. He is also a very open supporter of racist commentator and ex-Fox News presenter Tucker Carlson, a key figure in the American mainstreaming of the white supremacist ‘great replacement theory’.” [openDemocracy]
What to expect from Radical Reports: Morning Briefing provides a daily round-up of reporting on the Radical Right; Extremist Links offers a weekly round-up of extremists activities including the white supremacist and militia movements; Narratives of the Right delivers weekly analysis of the current narratives in far right online spaces and promoted by right-wing media; and Research Desk provides monthly highlights research and analysis from academia on the Radical Right.
We must stand up to hate and racism. To be silent is to be compliant.
And not one word from the GOP, DeSantis