Jody Issel, Soldiers of Odin Moose Jaw President, Isn't Even Trying Anymore

You know, if there's one positive thing about Trump's election is that the racists we've been covering here for years have become refreshingly honest about their views. Take this guy for example:

Now this is admittedly an older photo of Jody Issel, but it does sort of capture a particular moment in time, specifically the time he tried to start up an unauthorized chapter of the Aryan Nations' in Saskatchewan. That effort didn't pan out so well, so he threw in his lot with Kyle McKee and the Aryan Guard in Calgary for a while, attending at least one of their "White Pride Day" marches.

A few months after we reported Issel's efforts to start an Aryan Nations' chapter, he contacted us to first beg, then threaten us, to remove his information. We didn't and we still haven't, but at that time he seems to have recognized that being associated with the racist movement wasn't good for his career prospects.

Over the years we kept an eye on him. He was careful, locking down his Facebook from our prying eyes, but there were still a number of times he forgot himself:

Then when the Soldiers of Odin movement found it's way across the Atlantic, Issel found himself in an interesting position in that he lived in Moose Jaw, the SoO were looking for a Moose Jaw city president, and the SoO doesn't actually seem to vet their members or individuals aspiring to positions of leadership. Thus:

Recently, Issel and his merry band of SoO members (four by all accounts) decided to take a stroll about Moose Jaw (at least long enough to snap some photos) to protect the fine folks of that particular prairie community:

The problem here is who will protect the fine folks of Moose Jaw from the people who claim to want to protect them?

Bill Daniels, SOO Provincial President in BC

It's funny, because although he claimed that he wasn't hiding, at the time Issel posted these messages on his other profile, it was locked up tighter than gnat's chuff.

But things have changed on both of his profiles, although this one is the more interesting of the two right now:

So why does Issel feel more comfortable openly expressing his racism?

Take a wild guess:

Andrew Benson Reappears With Interesting Friends

It seems that in addition to the Goudreau, who recently came to our attention after a lengthy absence, another character whom we had once been keeping close tabs on but whom we lost track of has reappeared on our radar:

Andrew Benson has been somewhat of a political chameleon over the years. He started out as a self-proclaimed Trotskyist....

.... followed by a lengthy stint as a bonehead:

The last time we heard from Benson, he had begun to style himself as a free market libertarian acolyte of Ayn Rand and Ron Paul, though his association with Richard Spencer's National Policy Institute certainly strongly suggested he retained his antisemitic and racist views:

“I am not a fan of political correctness,” said Andrew Benson, 28, who had traveled from Canada to attend. Wearing a black suit vest, red collared shirt and black cargo pants, he looked more like he’d come to his conclusions as part of a teenage rebellion. “I have always had an odd attraction to things that are taboo.”

No kidding?

It seems that Benson is still enamored with this particular brand of nationalism and like other members of the so-called "alt-right" (who are, at the core, neo-Nazis) is a supporter of Donald Trump:

Benson with Milo Yiannopoulos. Photo first posted on Benson's page July 2016.

We found Benson again quite by accident, but we immediately recognized him despite his Russified name as it now appears on Facebook:

Wildrose Party Leader Brian Jean Photographed with Aryan Guard/Blood & Honour Associate

Okay, the title of this article could rightfully be accused of being click bait and of being  unfair to Brian Jean, but it is also an accurate title.

Much like the late Rob Ford was photographed a an event with an individual well known to those familiar with the racist movement in Canada, so too was Brian Jean, leader of the Wildrose Party of Alberta who posed for this photo with Jonathan Besler we presume at the Calgary Stampede:

Given Besler's attitude toward the current NDP government in Alberta, perhaps we shouldn't be too surprised that he would gravitate towards the Wildrose Part as an alternative....

Neo-Nazi Members/Supporters of the Soldiers of Odin

Back in March we ran an article linking Canadians United 4 Canada to the Soldiers of Odin, a movement that started in Finland but which has spread to a number of other countries including Canada.

Among those Finnish members are this guy:

Mr. Johansson's friend list might be of interest to readers on this side of the Atlantic:

Our original article on the SoO focused specifically on the Quebec wing and noted the Quebec group consisted of a number of overt neo-Nazis. Not surprisingly SoO members and supporters denied being members of an overt hate group, going so far as to print leaflets promoting their non-bigoted bona fides:

Later, a journalist writing for VICE picked up on the story (while also kindly linking to our article on the SoO) resulting in some concern from at least one provincial SoO wing:

 

 

 

 

 

 

Btw, if Blake Cunliffe is concerned about how SoO might be portrayed in the media, he might decide to desist advocating political assassinations:

While we are no longer privy to the Soldiers of Odin's BC wing as they appear to have removed our dummy Facebook profile, we did notice that no one really ultimately challenged the underlying claims made in the article. Had they done so though, they might have had to explain this fella:

PEGIDA Canada: "We're Not Racists" (UPDATED)

Earlier Sunday PEGIDA Quebec participated in a protest against Bill 59 and were met by anti-racist and antifascist groups. When one is challenging groups such as PEGIDA Canada the accusation that the membership and supporters of similar groups hold racist views is countered by the statement that, "Islam is not a race." In our view, there's a lot of parsing of the terminology going on here, however when we refer to the views held by the membership and supporters of groups like PEGIDA Canada who target Muslims we usually refer to them as bigots to avoid that argument. That term is challenged as well, as PEDIDA Canada suggest they are not against Muslims, but are in fact opposed to Islam. That claim is frequently made on the PEGIDA Canada Facebook group page, examples of which follows:

Not found on the PEGIDA Canada page, but on the page of a member.
More on Diane Hunter in the update at the bottom of the article.

Really?

A second statement found on the Facebook group's page also makes a similar claim lamenting the accusation of racism, but the underlying message seems clear enough to all who can read it:

We decided to take a closer look a PEGIDA Canada to test their claim that they are not in fact racists or bigots. Though we will inundate you, our dear readers, with screenshots from the PEGIDA Canada Facebook page that dehumanize Muslims (foreign, immigrant, refugee, and Canadian citizens) and which celebrate violence against Muslims (and anti-racists for that matter), we really could summarize the collective will of the members and supporters of PEGIDA Canada with this single post:

Yeah, they are racists and bigots, though we don't think this will really come as a significant revelation to many.

Immediate Aftermath of PEGIDA Canada Rally

We've spent much of the day watching the fallout from the PEGIDA Canada rally that took place yesterday. One thing that seems clear is that the folks who organized the rally (1) were disappointed by their own turnout (2) were taken completely by surprise regarding the reaction of people opposed to their views, and (3) were horribly naive concerning who would be drawn to their message.

ARC decided to do some informal interviews of members and participants on the PEGIDA Canada Facebook page to get their reaction to what went down and to the involvement of Ron Banerjee:

Southern Ontario Skins: A Cast of Stooges Part VII

It would appear that McKee's Blood & Honour and Hynes' Southern Ontario "Skinheads" have decided to continue their little spat on our blog. Truth be told, we are more than pleased to facilitate their intellectual jousting, though referring to the bluff and bluster as "intellectual" might be to stretch the meaning of the word:

Ah, Max's "crew." On that note, it seems that our previous article in the "stooges" series featuring one of the latest recruits to Max's "crew" has turned out to be quite popular. And one of those who has taken notice is our superfan Tomasz "Still Lives in Mommy's Basement" Winnicki.

Winnicki and Hynes in fact know each other. Both were in attendance at a Pauli anti-immigrant protest back in 2010....

....and Winnicki attended the ill-fated White Pride march organized by Hynes back in 2012. So one might think that because of their ideological views and the fact they both live in the same city that perhaps Hynes and Winnicki support each other.

Well, that may not be the case.

Andrew Benson: “I am not a fan of political correctness”

During the summer when we wrote about a far-right and antisemitic Catholic organization's list of speakers at an upcoming event in Canada we noted that one of the speakers was American libertarian and frequent presidential candidate Ron Paul. We also noted in one photograph that standing beside Mr. Paul was an individual well known to our readers:

Andrew Benson, who had tried to ingratiate himself to Marxists before sliding into fascism, seemed to have shed another skin and had repackaged himself as a disciple of Ayn Rand as further indicated by his other photographs:

"Rub a bald Ludwig von Mises for luck?"