Tagged with Melbourne Antifa

On Troll Hunting (Ginger Gorman)

Troll Hunting by Australian journalist Ginger Gorman is a new book which examines the world of online hate and its human fallout. Along with interviews with a small number of trolls and general reflections upon this hateful world, Gorman’s book includes a number of case studies of trolling, some of which are relatively well-known while others not: all make for disturbing reading. While it’s of general relevance, many of the characters and events which populate this world would be especially familiar to (Australian) readers, or at least those who take an interest in such matters: on the one hand, ‘GamerGate’, convicted terrorist Joshua Goldberg, Andrew Auernheimer (AKA ‘weev’) and GNAA; on the other hand, those subject to what Gorman calls ‘predator trolling’, including writer Van Badham and lawyers Josh Bornstein and Mariam Veiszadeh (among others). Gorman’s book is well-written and engaging, and weaves together the author’s own experience of being ‘trolled’ with those of others, along with some examples of ‘troll hunting’ and ‘troll hunters’, the latter category including journalist and lawyer Luke McMahon. As well as being of general interest, the text is of particular interest to me because of the ways in which the ‘world of online hate’ has been ‘weaponized’ by elements of the far right, a theme explored in more detail in the anthology Cyber Racism and Community Resilience: Strategies for Combating Online Race Hate (Palgrave, 2017). At a little over 250 pages long, the text includes endnotes, which are useful, but — rather annoyingly — no index.

Gorman’s book is divided into three parts: ‘Trolls’, ‘Targets’ and ‘Troll hunting’. The first part examines the evolution of online trolling, the emergence of ‘predator trolls’ in particular — which Gorman defines (p.18) as those who set out to do real-life harm — and details the author’s lengthy conversations and interactions with several of its enthusiastic practitioners. In the second part, Gorman provides case studies of predator trolling and investigates the ways in which law enforcement has responded, or more precisely failed to respond, to these activities. Gorman also explores how social media giants like Facebook and Twitter have dealt with trolling and cyberhate generally — which is argued to be less-than-adequate. The third and final part of the book explores how some trolls, including Goldberg, came unstuck. Throughout the text, Gorman reflects upon her journey into this ‘world of online hate’, and how her interactions with the creatures which inhabit it change her understanding of them, their world, and its relationship to broader social and technological trends, especially racism and misogyny and the central place of social media in everyday life.

‘Trolling’ IRL

While the second part reveals varying degrees of incompetency and indifference on the part of tech companies, after documenting the systemic failure of law enforcement to address cyberbullying, Gorman does detect a more hopeful sign (pp.119–120):

Some stories are emerging of more appropriate, and effective, responses to cyberbullying complaints. Take comedian and writer Catherine Deveny. After making controversial comments on Twitter and Facebook about Anzac Day in 2018 — describing it as ‘Bogan Halloween’ and a ‘fetishisation of war and violence’ — she was doxed multiple times. Her home address was posted all over the internet and she received an avalanche of credible rape and death threats. She was the focus of several facebook hate groups. One night, five men in a ute turned up to her house. One of them knocked on her door and videoed himself doing it.

Within forty-eight hours of Deveny’s original comments being posted — and the resultant blow-up of public vitriol — Victorian counter-terrorism police reached out to her. They got her statement and started investigating. Police patrolled outside her house and work events. An investigator from the Office of the Federal eSafety Commissioner also got in touch. In contrast to many who’d gone before her, Deveny received significant and appropriate support. After hearing so many dire stories, it’s great to hear one like this. Wouldn’t it be amazing if all predator-trolling victims could rely on getting this kind of assistance?

LOL.

For what it’s worth, I remember when this incident took place, and at the time made brief reference to it on the blog. In which context, a few things. First, those responsible for paying Deveny a nocturnal visit included right-wing activists Julian de Ross (AKA ‘Hugh Pearson’), Rino ‘Bluebeard’ Grgurovic and Ricky Turner. Secondly, whatever became of the intervention by Victorian counter-terrorism police and the Office of the Federal eSafety Commissioner, the boys carried on as before. Thus one month later, members of the same crew — on this occasion consisting of Paul Exley and Danny Peanna/Parkinson from Sydney, together with the Melbourne-based Grgurovic, Logan Spalding, and their ringleader Neil Erikson — filmed themselves disrupting a church service in Gosford; in June, Erikson, Turner and several others paid another nocturnal visit to a private address, on this occasion that of rival right-wing entrepreneur Dave Pellowe. While it’s unclear if those responsible for attending Deveny’s and Pellowe’s address faced any legal repercussions (it seems not), for his part in the disruption of the church service Erikson at least was later charged under an obscure law making it an offence to ‘obstruct a member of the clergy in the discharge of his or her duties’.

It’s possible, I suppose, to characterise this behaviour as ‘IRL trolling’ — but there’s certainly other interpretations. One critical difference is that, while it may be performed for teh lulz, unlike almost all of the examples of ‘trolling’ Gorman provides in her book, such actions are not really all that anonymous. In fact, while there’s occasionally some effort made to disguise the identities of those responsible, for the most part it’s very public — and by public I mean ‘filmed and then published by/on Facebook’. When de Ross, Grgurovic, Turner & Co. visited Deveny’s home; Exley, Peanna, Grgurovic, Spalding and Erikson disrupted a church service; and Erikson, Turner & Co. visited Pellowe’s home; these actions were undertaken precisely in order to be documented and distributed via Facebook. So too, the numerous other occasions upon which Erikson in particular has undertaken the role of a serial pest, from disrupting council meetings and various left and ‘multicultural’ events to stalking and abusing various public figures he happens to dislike. (Note that Grgurovic is due in Melbourne Magistrates’ Court on February 26 over assault charges; Erikson, along with his kameraden Ricky Turner and Richard Whelan, have a date on May 13 over similar.)

All of these acts have been performed publicly and for the benefit of his Facebook audience, the corporation having granted Erikson permission to do so for at least the last four years. Thus, it was only in the space of the last few days that Facebook, for unknown reasons, banned a number of Erikson’s accounts. (It’s possible that the pest may have come unstuck upon announcing the re-launch of the ‘United Patriots Front’ by creating an event page for a February 16 rally at Federation Square — the UPF collapsed after Facebook banned its page in May 2017.) Still, there are hundreds if not thousands of very similar pages on the site, and it remains the critical tool for far-right organising in Australia and elsewhere. (See, for example, Fraser Anning’s Neo-Nazi connections (The White Rose Society, January 11, 2019) and Facebook Fueled Anti-Refugee Attacks in Germany, New Research Suggests (Amanda Taub and Max Fisher, The New York Times, August 21, 2018) for two among innumerable other instances.)

More broadly, while Gorman makes fairly short work of the corporate pablum spewed by Facebook and Twitter concerning their commitment to combating trolling and ‘hate speech’, if Facebook in particular is understood as being a massive private data-collection agency — one which derives a substantial proportion of its profits from selling this information to advertisers (and whoever else can pay for it) — it’s possible to cut through this nonsense fairly easily. Further, like corporations generally, Facebook is able to use the enormous financial and political power at its disposal to ensure the forms of regulation which might inhibit its continued growth and profitability are kept at bay. And while YouTube/Google doesn’t feature in Gorman’s account, its role in promoting racist and fascist propaganda, along with anti-Semitic conspiracy theories, rivals that of Facebook, and has long been understood as a key node in the distribution and promotion of race-hate and other forms of hate speech (see, for example, ‘Fiction is outperforming reality’: how YouTube’s algorithm distorts truth, Paul Lewis, The Guardian, February 2, 2018 and ‘Alternative Influence: Broadcasting the Reactionary Right on YouTube’, Rebecca Lewis, Data & Society, September 9, 2018).

In any case, to return to Goldberg and Veiszadeh (pp.218–219):

Towards the end of 2014, [Veiszadeh] publicly voiced her outrage that a Woolworths supermarket in Cairns was selling singlets printed with the Australian flag alongside the tagline,’If you don’t love it, LEAVE’.

Three months after her tweet, the far right anti-Islam group The Australian Defence League posted her tweet to their Facebook page. From there, it was picked up by the alt-right Daily Stormer website. Chillingly, The Daily Stormer post about Veiszadeh, written under the byline Michael Slay, demanded of its thousands of followers: ‘Stormer Troll Army … assemble!’ ‘We need to flood this towelhead subhuman vermin with as much racial and religious abuse as we possibly can,” the spite-filled post reads …’

(Note that a few weeks ago the former ‘President’ of the ADL, Ralph Cerminara, was found ‘guilty of two counts of intimidation and one count of common assault’ after attacking his neighbour in Sydney.)

In addition to being attacked on The Daily Stormer, Veiszadeh’s tweet also triggered a Queensland woman, Jay-Leighsha Bauman, to send Veiszadeh messages calling her a “whore”, a “rag-head” and [telling] her to return to her own “sand dune country” — Bauman was later sentenced to 180 hours of community service for the crime. A few months later, an Ordinary Mum™ and Reclaim Australia supporter was charged with threatening to slit Veiszadeh’s throat. On these and other occasions, it seems the chief fault of those charged was not bothering to anonymise their threats; the fact that Bauman’s threats were reported on by both the BBC and CNN may also have prompted authorities to take a closer look. That said:

Later in 2015, Luke McMahon and Elise Potaka reported in Fairfax newspapers that Michael Slay turned out to be not one person, but two. One of those two men was Joshua Goldberg, whose main trolling preoccupation was preserving freedom of speech. As the troll hunter explained earlier, this was how he ended up choosing targets such as Josh Bornstein.

Nathaniel Jacob Sassoon Sykes

The ‘other’ Michael Slay was of course Jewish neo-Nazi and toy-doll enthusiast Nathaniel Jacob Sassoon Sykes, who was exposed by McMahon in April 2017. Like Goldberg, Sykes contributed scores of articles to The Daily Stormer, inter alia attacking Veiszadeh along with Badham, Bornstein, Dr Tim Soutphommasane and yours truly. Currently, Sykes is the chief writer for the ‘United Nationalists of Australia’ blog, the online shitsheet of the ‘Australia First Party’. In that capacity, Sykes attacks the various enemies of the AFP on the left as well as the right. Sometimes, this creates legal difficulties. Hence, after publishing an article in June 2017 by party leader Dr Jim Saleam which detailed alleged crimes committed by members of rival fascist groupuscule ‘Klub Nation’, in May 2018 legal action against Saleam and the blog was apparently taken by various persons associated with KN. (Member of this radical right-wing network are also implicated in an attempt to infiltrate the Young Nationals in NSW last year.) Beyond this, members of the neo-Nazi ‘Lads Society’ and, more recently, a man called Michael Freshwater, have also been attacked by Sykes on the UNA blog. While Sykes was dismissed by ex-UPF and Lads Society organiser Tom Sewell as a ‘divisive little Jew’, Freshwater, it’s alleged, has been part of a conspiracy to undermine AFP, embracing elements of the Liberal Party as well as neo-Nazis like Mark McDonald, the leader of the Lads Society in Sydney and former leader of neo-Nazi groupuscule ‘Squadron 88’.

Notes

• Joshua Goldberg (as ‘Moon Metropolis’) published a statement on Medium on December 28, 2018 which provides a defence of sorts to his actions: ‘It was always my intention to infiltrate online jihadist spheres so that I could eventually become either a journalist, an FBI agent, or both.’ The statement also refers to … when I got Milo Yiannopoulos to publish that “expose” on Shaun King, I did it purely to see the shitstorm that I knew it would create, not because I actually care in the least about anything involving either Shaun King or Milo Yiannopoulos (both of those people are complete and utter clowns as far as I’m concerned). The article, ‘Did Black Lives Matter Organizer Shaun King Mislead Oprah Winfrey By Pretending To Be Biracial?’ (Breitbart, August 19, 2015), is dissected in this blogpost on Internet Famous Angry Men. Yiannopoulos is of course a very well-known troll who for several years was able to translate his trolling activities into sponsorship by wealthy right-wing reactionaries and sought to acquire more filthy lucre by conducting (semi-)lucrative tours. In fact, Yiannopoulos, along with Gavin McInnes and Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, are supposedly being brought to Australia by Penthouse Australia publisher Damien Costas next month (March 9–14) for a speaking tour. For his part, Costas is currently embroiled in a legal battle with publicist Max Markson regarding alleged unpaid debts; there’s also allegedly been some fisticuffs. See also : Here’s How Breitbart And Milo Smuggled White Nationalism Into The Mainstream, Joseph Bernstein, BuzzFeed, October 5, 2017 (A cache of documents obtained by BuzzFeed News reveals the truth about Steve Bannon’s alt-right “killing machine.”).

• Gorman makes reference (pp.199-200) to a category of trolling known as ‘media fuckery’, and cites US academic Whitney Phillips who defines it as ‘the ability to turn the media against itself … by either amplifying or outright inventing a news item too sensational for media outlets to pass up’. This brought to mind two things. First, a recent example of ‘media fuckery’ in which a fake Facebook page titled ‘Melbourne Antifa’ applauded the 2017 Las Vegas shooting. This later featured in an article in The Daily Mail by Stephen Johnson (‘Melbourne Antifa extremists praise Las Vegas shooter’, October 2, 2017), was fact-checked by FactCheck.Org and Snopes and in May 2018 also triggered a bizarre interaction between myself and a right-wing blogger in the US. Secondly, the phrase immediately brought to mind similar terms such as ‘culture-jamming’ and ‘subvertising’, political practices which pre-date both ‘media fuckery’ and teh intarwebs as a whole. See : How To Make Trouble And Influence People.

• Gorman also makes reference (p.47) to local neo-Nazi activist Blair Cottrell in the context of a discussion regarding ‘hate leaching into the mainstream’ and Cottrell’s appearance as a very special guest on Adam Giles’ show on Sky News in August last year. As noted elsewhere, Cottrell – following an appearance on Sky News – told his 25,000 Twitter followers he might as well have raped presenter Laura Jayes on air because “not only would she have been happier with that but the reaction would’ve been the same”. In which context, a few things: first, while Facebook has banned the UPF and Cottrell, such commentary is considered acceptable by Twitter (to which platform Cotrell shifted after being kicked off Facebook). Secondly, his kamerad Neil Erikson made a similar remark directed at another female journalist, Jodi Lee, in November last year: ‘Jodie [sic] Lee acted like I had raped her on live TV….. She wishes!’ Thirdly, Cottrell has an extensive criminal record, mostly revolving around his stalking of an ex-girlfriend. Finally, Cotrell, Erikson and fellow white nationalist Chris Shortis were convicted in September 2017 of inciting hatred for Muslims; Cottrell is appealing the conviction on the grounds that the Victorian Act under which he was convicted (The Racial and Religious Tolerance Act 2001) is in fact un-Constitutional, and will be appearing in the County Court in Victoria on February 19.

• While Gorman devotes relatively little space to d0xing, it’s relevant in several instances. In her chapter on weev, ‘A Professional Racist’, for example, Gorman notes (p.232) that weev appeared on a neo-Nazi podcast with Mike Enoch and Christopher ‘Crying Nazi’ Cantwell. Later in the chapter (p.236), Gorman also refers to ‘Azzmador’, who along with Daily Stormer publisher Andrew Anglin wrote a post for the site encouraging their fellow neo-Nazis to attend the murderous ‘Unite the Right’ rally in Charlottesville in August 2017. As it happens, Mike Enoch is in fact Mike Peinovich, who got d0xxed in January 2017, while ‘Azzmador’ is Robert Warren Ray. (According to a November 2018 report, Ray is currently a fugitive after being charged with a felony allegedly committed at the rally.) As for Cantwell, late last year he voiced an audio version of local neo-Nazi Ryan Fletcher’s tract ‘From HEMP to Hitler’, which has been promoted on David Hiscox’s AltRight website XYZ. See also : The far right, the “White Replacement” myth and the “Race War” brewing, Julie Nathan, ABC (Religion & Ethics), February 12, 2019:

The potential for violence which such online posts portend was graphically demonstrated in the United States in October 2018 by Robert Bowers, who wrote on Gab, a Twitter-like platform which is a haven for extremists and racists, “Screw your optics, I’m going in.” Shortly afterwards, he entered the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and murdered eleven Jews. Afterwards, Bowers told police that he was motivated by his belief that “the Jews” were “committing genocide to my people.”

Chillingly, these words were echoed by another Gab user, an Australian named Ryan Fletcher, who wrote, “I think its [sic] about time to say ‘f*** your optics I’m going in’.” Fletcher has a dark history of calling for the murder of Jews in Australia and worldwide, and of posting images of Jews being killed, on his Gab account. Fletcher subscribes to the myth: “#White gentiles are waking up to the agenda of #ZOG (which is #WhiteGenocide).” “ZOG” stands for “Zionist Occupied Government,” a term used to insinuate that “the Jews” control the United States and other Western governments. Fletcher also writes articles for XYZ.

• Speaking of neo-Nazis, Gorman notes that inre her own experience of being trolled in 2013 (pp.10–11), Six days after Newton was sentenced in 2013 came the second frightening moment. Don found a photo of our family on the fascist social network Iron March. The now-defunct website carried the slogan ‘Gas the kikes’ on its homepage. Iron March was of course the birthplace of Australian neo-Nazi groupuscule ‘Antipodean Resistance’. Its British cousins, National Action, have been proscribed as a terrorist organisation (see : See Graham Macklin, ”Only Bullets will Stop Us!’: The banning of National Action’, Perspectives on Terrorism, Vol.12, No.6 (2018) [PDF]). See also : Extreme neo-Nazi ‘death cults’ drawing in children as young as 13, report warns, Lizzie Dearden, The Independent, February 17, 2019 (‘Exclusive: Children as young as 13 being drawn into ideologies ‘harder, darker and more committed than ever before’’).

Below : Nathaniel Jacob Sassoon Sykes (Australia First Party/United Nationalists (of) Australia; Jacob Hersant (Antipodean Resistance/The Lads Society):

See also : Online abuse of women in the media, Justine Landis-Hanley, The Saturday Paper, February 16, 2019 | Meet The Woman Giving A New Face To Troll Hunting, Jamila Rizvi, Future Women, February 2019 | The ‘Canary In The Coalmine’ Link Between Terrorism And Trolling, Alex Bruce-Smith, Ten Daily, February 5, 2019 | Internet trolls are not who I thought — they’re even scarier, Ginger Gorman, ABC, February 2, 2019 | Troll hunting: a journey to the dark side, Karen Hardy, The Canberra Times, February 2, 2019 | Twitter, the barbarian country, or how I learned to love the block button, Van Badham, The Guardian, January 31, 2019 | Troll Hunting review: Ginger Gorman goes in search of the online bullies, Jonathan Green, The Sydney Morning Herald, January 18, 2019 | Staring down the trolls: Mute, block or resort to ‘digilantism’?, Ginger Gorman, The Sydney Morning Herald, June 16, 2017 | Cyberhate With Tara Moss, ABC, 2017 | Misogyny Online: A Short (and Brutish) History, Emma A Jane, SAGE (2017) | Hacker, Hoaxer, Whistleblower, Spy: The Many Faces of Anonymous, Gabriella Coleman, Verso (2014). As well as providing some further detail regarding weev’s activities prior to his going full nazi as an editor for The Daily Stormer, Coleman’s book also contains important background on the various (sub-)cultural contexts from which the ‘predator troll’ emerged. (Note also that, in conversation with weev in August 2010, Coleman writes (p.22): ‘His denunciation of “the repulsive order of the financiers” had the ring of truth, given the recent financial mess their recklessness has engendered, so I found myself, only minutes into my first bona fide conversation with a world famous troll, in agreement with him.’ LOL.)

antifa notes (may 21, 2018) : anti-semites goto church in gosford /// bigly league politics

Briefly:

‘Cooks Convicts’ ~versus~ Jesus Christ


L to R : Neil Erikson; Paul Exley; Rino ‘Bluebeard’ Grgurovic; Danny Peanna/Parkinson.

‘Cooks Convicts’ — on this occasion, being repped by Neil Erikson, Paul Exley, Rino ‘Bluebeard’ Grgurovic, Danny Peanna/Parkinson and Lachlan/Logan Spalding — disrupted the 6pm service at Gosford Anglican Church on Saturday night. Dressed as Jesus(?!), the convicted anti-Semite and racist Erikson talked shit thru a megaphone while the priest, Father Rod Bower, asked them to leave and to stop harassing the dozen or so old people who’d joined him in prayer. Exley and Peanna/Parkinson were members of the now-defunct micro-Party for Freedom (PfF), which in August 2016 staged a similar disruption. On that occasion, Exley and Peanna/Parkinson were also present. (See : Anti-Islam group ‘Party for Freedom’ disrupts Sunday service in ‘racist stunt’ at Gosford’s Anglican church, Danuta Kozaki, ABC, August 2016.) Note that the PfF has recently completely fallen apart, and the remnants — including Nick Folkes, Toby Cook and Matt Lowe — have gone ‘full nazi’. Also: oddly, ex-PfFer George Jameson didn’t take part in Erikson’s latest stunt but was in Melbourne, where he joined Avi Yeminem and a tiny clutch of ‘Australian Liberty Alliance’ members in a counter-rally the ALA organised in response to a Palestinian solidarity rally outside the State Library. As for Erikson, on May 11 he got another slap on the wrist for contempt of court. See : Neil Erikson, who ambushed Sam Dastyari on video, avoids jail for contempt of court, James Oaten, ABC, May 11, 2018.

See also : The priest whose blunt billboards have gone global, Frances Mao, BBC, May 19, 2018 /// Right-Wing “Terrorists” Interrupted An Evening Mass To Scare And Intimidate Church Goers, Brad Esposito, Buzzfeed, May 21, 2018 /// “Neo Nazis” Allegedly Intimidate Gosford Church, Triple M, May 21, 2018.

BIGLY League Politics

Huh. That was weird. On Friday, I received a message from some body called Pete D’Abrosca, who asked ‘Whatever happened to the old Melbourne Antifa page that caimed [sic] the Vegas shooting?’, to which I replied ‘I assume it got deleted.’

Pete D’Abrosca: ‘Is there a way to know for sure that it was a hoax? Or do I have [to] trust “real antifa” and Snopes?’
slackbastard: ‘Well I reckon it was a hoax. And I should prolly know.’
Pete D’Abrosca: ‘How?’
slackbastard: ‘For a no of reasons: I live in Melbourne; I’ve been participating in anti-fascist activism for years; I know other anti-fascists in Melbourne; I read it; like other fake pages, it was a garbagefire; it appeared along w a slew of other such pages.’

This was apparently sufficient for D’Abrosca to pen an article for a nü right-wing site called ‘Big League Politics’. Titled ‘FACT CHECK: Did Snopes Source an Anonymous Blogger to Challenge the Veracity of an Established News Source?’ (May 17, 2018), D’Abrosca writes:

Mr. slackbastard gave a number of reasons why we should believe him and Snopes’ version of the events.

He lives in Melbourne. (Obviously he knows everyone in Melbourne).
He’s been “participating in anti-fascist activism for years.” (One can only imagine the amount of brain damage caused by such activity, which actually tends to discredit his claims further).
He “knows other anti-fascists in Melbourne.”
Finally, the page was a “garbagefire.” (Garbage fire spelled as one word).

LOL. In any event:

• I pegged the ‘Melbourne Antifa’ Facebook page as an exercise in trollery six months prior to when The Daily Mail‘s Stephen Johnson used it as the basis of a fraudulent claim;
• ABC-TV’s ‘Media Watch’ program examined the avalanche of fake news generated by the Las Vegas shooting, including the idiot claim inre ‘Melbourne Antifa’, in the episode broadcast on October 9, 2017;
• There’s good reason The Daily Mail has been tagged as ‘unreliable’ by Wikipedia.

On ‘Big League Politics’, see : Roy Moore Consultants’ New Project: A Conspiracy-Theorizing Pro-Trump News Site, Lachlan Markay, The Daily Beast, February 28, 2017 (”Big League Politics’ editor in chief has called Alex Jones ‘my Walter Cronkite.’ Its new owners think the site is the future of journalism.’). See also : Did ‘Melbourne Antifa’ Claim Responsibility for the Vegas Massacre?, Kim LaCapria, Snopes, October 4, 2017 /// Hoaxes, fake news about the Las Vegas massacre, Louis Jacobson, Emily Tanaka, Miriam Valverde, Politifact, October 2, 2017 /// No Evidence Linking Vegas Shooter to Antifa, Saranac Hale Spencer, FactCheck, October 5, 2017. On Stephen Paddock, see : New documents suggest Las Vegas shooter was conspiracy theorist – what we know, Jason Wilson, The Guardian, May 19, 2018.

Antipodean Resistance

The local Hitler Yoof done a coupla banner drops over the Eastern Freeway today. More on them laters …

antifa notes (october 25, 2017) : #lulz w Shayne Hunter +

Briefly:

1)

[UPDATE (October 30, 2017) : Confessions of a homegrown ‘terrorist’, Media Watch.]

In a BiZaRR0 interview with news dot com dot au, local comic Shayne Hunter has announced his retirement as CEO of ANTIFA (‘I established a terror movement in Australia, and I quit’, Shayne Hunter, as told to Corrine Barraclough, news.com.a, October 24, 2017: ‘SHAYNE Hunter established the far-left and violent Antifa movement in Australia. After four years the Brisbane man quit. Here’s why.’).

It’s kinda barmy but presumably folks in Brisbane and Sydney who’ve had dealings with Shayne will respond in time.

[EDIT : The following statement is being shared by anti-fascist groups in Australia:]

news.com.au has recently published an article by right-wing writer Corrine Barraclough, interviewing the self-described founder of the “Antifa” movement in Australia.

It goes without saying that anti-fascist movements have existed in this country for many, many decades previous to this person’s involvement in “far-Left” politics, and that their account of their own participation is delusional.

In reality, after being excluded from numerous leftist spaces in Australia due to his erratic behaviour and a history of sexual assault, we have seen this individual move towards a right-wing politics; one which better suits his hateful narratives about gender-diverse people, people of colour, and women.

Our advice to comrades would be to avoid this individual. Our advice to the media would be to apply even the smallest grain of salt when reporting on fantastical claims. Anybody with a genuine interest in the origins and history of anti-fascism would be advised to consult Mark Bray’s Antifa: The Anti-Fascist Handbook (Melbourne University Press, 2017).

See also : antifa notes (october 4, 2017) : Stephen Johnson, The Daily Mail Australia, ‘Melbourne Antifa’ and more … .

FWIW, among the blizzard of writings on anTEEfa in 2017, more srs treatments of the origins and history of (militant) anti-fascism may be found in Mark Bray’s Antifa: The anti-fascist handbook (2017) and Mala Testa’s Militant Anti-Fascism (2015). See also : Street Fighting Men: Antifa’s Origins in the ’60s and ’70s, Luca Provenzano, LA Review of Books, October 21, 2017 | Author Mark Bray Responds to Chris Hedges’ Criticism of Antifa (Video), truthdig, October 5, 2017.

2)

On this month’s episode of ‘Floating Anarchy’ on The SUWA Show (5.30pm, Friday, October 27, 2017, livestreaming on 3CR///855AM), Dr Cam and I will be talking to Peter D, the individual recently d0xxed by Brisbane altright figure David Hilton (‘Moses Apostaticus’) and falsely claimed to be the author of my blog …

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

antifa notes (june 13, 2017) : andrew bolt glitters edition

glitter!

Reactionary commentator and convicted racist Andrew Bolt was a special guest at a book launch at Il Gambero restaurant in Carlton this time last week. Organised by a group called The Unhinged The Unshackled, the event was intended to promote a paean to Donald Trump penned by RMIT academic Steven Kates. Called The Art of the Impossible, ‘The entire book is comprised of blog posts on my own website: www.lawofmarkets.com some of which were also then published on my shared website: www.catal[l]axyfiles.com.’

Sounds riveting.

In any case, prior to the launch two people accosted Bolt outside the restaurant, and one of them poured sparkles on his suit. This triggered Bolt, and there was a brief scuffle, captured on both CCTV and by a photojournalist. Or as Kates puts it on his blog: Violent thugs attack speaker at Art of the Impossible book launch. Thus far, Bolt himself has managed to squeeze out a mere 14 blog posts on the subject (and counting), the first titled ‘ON THE FASCISTS WHO ATTACKED ME’ (June 6): ‘Watch the fascist Left attack me and get clobbered. Luckily the cameras do not capture me kicking one between the legs.’

From here the story quickly snowballed into an heroic epic in which Bolt became an Antipodean Alt-Knight bravely battling the fascist anti-fascists with his bare fists (e.g.: Here’s A Thug’s-Eye View Of That Antifa Attack On Andrew Bolt, The Daily Caller, June 8, 2017; Watch Conservative Commentator Beat Down Leftist Thugs Attacking Him Over Trump Book, FrontPageMag, June 8, 2017; Thunder Down Under: Aussie Columnist Fights Off Antifa, National Review, June 8, 2017).

A writer unlikely to ever win a Walkley, in one post Bolt quotes ‘Melbourne Antifa’ as having assumed responsibility for the glitter-bombing on behalf of their ‘family’:

Of course, the one slight problem with this claim is that the Facebook page to which Bolt links — https://www.facebook.com/antifamelb — is a fake account, created by one or another species of nazi troll. In fact, as I’ve noted previously, ‘Melbourne Antifa’ is one of several such accounts on Facebook and Twitter (a recent addition is ‘ANTIFA Toowoomba’: legit accounts are Antifascist Action Brisbane, Antifascism Tasmania, Anti Fascist Action Sydney and Melbourne Antifascist Info). Such trollery, especially when performed for a gormless reactionary like Bolt, often works, but not always: the nazi(s) trolling Socialist Alternative in Perth being a case in point (‘Fake’ anti-Semitic Socialist Alternative posters appear in Leederville, Natalie Richards, The West Australian, June 12, 2017). Rather, generally speaking, these fake accounts only manage to fool teenyboppers, the ignorant, and the naif … and occasionally professional trolls like Bolt (when it suits them). See : Houston Chronicle, KPRC Duped by Alt-Right Trolls Over Sam Houston Protest, Craig Malisow, Houston Press, June 1, 2017; Fake Antifa Twitter Accounts Are Trolling People And Spreading Misinformation, Craig Silverman, BuzzFeed, May 31, 2017 (‘This is part of a coordinated campaign to create fake accounts in an attempt to troll and discredit anti-fascist activists’).

See also : Andrew Bolt sprayed with dye and glitter by masked men outside Melbourne restaurant, ABC, June 6, 2017 | Some Dudes Tried To Glitter Bomb Andrew Bolt And It’s All On Camera, Rob Stott, Buzzfeed, June 7, 2017 | Andrew Bolt Got Glitter Bombed In Melbourne And Is Very Upset About It, Tom Clift, Junkee, June 7, 2017 | Andrew Bolt assault: Third man on the scene says he is ‘just a photographer’, Neelima Choahan, Liam Mannix, The Age, June 8, 2017.

nazis!

Nazis have been a bit more active of late. Leaving aside the nipsters of Antipodean Resistance, their various attempts to gain publicity (pro-tip: try Bolt), and the wreckage of the zombie Aryan Nations, Combat 18 has been rearing its head again in WA. But more on that later … in the meantime, this article by Spencer Sunshine about ‘The Growing Alliance Between Neo-Nazis, Right Wing Paramilitaries and Trumpist Republicans’ in the US of A (Colorlines, June 9, 2017) is essential reading:

I have been following Far Right movements for more than a decade as a researcher and journalist. Over the past few months, I’ve seen an increase in the visibility of a new, violent, right-wing street protest movement that I call “Independent Trumpism.” It unites neo-Nazis, members of the alt-right, Patriot movement paramilitaries and Trumpist Republicans.

Two things set Independent Trumpism apart from usual right-wing politics. First, the group’s rallies are in support of the president, but are organized outside of the Republican Party structure. Second, mainstream Republicans are appearing alongside open White supremacists, especially at events billed as “Free Speech” marches …

See also : Confronting the Nationalists and Their Police: A Full Report from Portland on June 4, CrimethInc, June 6, 2017; Is there a neo-Nazi storm brewing in Trump country?, Lois Beckett, The Guardian, June 4, 2017 (‘Can national socialism, repackaged as ‘white identity’ politics, earn votes in rural counties that voted for Trump?’). More generally, see : It’s Going Down and Antifa International for news, views, and links to local organising.

Oh, and finally, I suppose I should also note the recent death of Bob Whitaker, Presidential candidate for the fascist American Freedom Party and author of the slogan ‘Anti-racist is a code word for anti-white’.

vigilantes!

On June 11, a small group of local far-rightists gathered in Dandenong in order to discuss the establishment of a vigilante gang to protect the ‘burb from marauding African kidz. While this is not the first time that fascists and the far-right have openly discussed taking the law into their own hands — the Soldiers Of Odin were gamely compared by The Age to Guardian Angels, and the UPF once discussed covertly organising some Right Wing Death Squad Entertainment — the participation of an actual registered security organisation in the project is novel, as well as ambitious.

Spearheaded, seemingly, by a patriotik fella called Daniel Purton (who’s the leader of a nü gang called A26A), those at the meeting included ‘True Blue Crew’ lvl boss Kane Miller, some Soldiers Of Odin, and various other minor characters on the far right. Police kept an eye on things, as did members of a new security company called Asolate Security, who’ve expressed full support for the budding vigilante campaign. This seems rather odd behaviour for a licensed security company, but then we live in interesting times.

See also : Expect More Murders: Why the Radical Right Kills, Spencer Sunshine, truth-out, June 2, 2017.

antifa notes (may 23, 2017) : The Three Stooges (United Patriots Front) Go To Court +++

The Three Stooges

The Three Stooges — Blair Cottrell, Neil Erikson and Chris Shortis — made a brief appearance in Melbourne Magistrates’ Court today for a contest mention. The three have been charged with four offences — serious religious vilification, defacing property, willful damage and behaving in an offensive manner in public — following a UPF publicity stunt outside Bendigo council offices in October 2015. The circus returns to court on September 4.

According to Ben Hillier, more than 50 people attended court in order to support the trio, while another few dozen protested in opposition outside the court. The Five Flag General dominated proceedings outside, while inside Neil Erikson demanded Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews and Police Commissioner Graham Ashton be subpoenaed to appear. Last week, his co-accused, Blair Cottrell, called upon his followers to be prepared to stage an occupation of the court room in the event that they were found guilty. A very odd proposal, given that it was a contest mention, and one which begs the question: stupid, or just plain liar? In any case, beheading a dummy is a big step up from attempting to decapitate his ex-girlfriend’s boyfriend, so fair play.

See : Comedy Company at the Magistrates’ Court as fascists wait for hearing, Ben Hillier, Red Flag, May 23, 207 | Punches thrown as supporters of far-right group clash with protesters outside Melbourne court, 9news/AAP. May 23, 2017.

Snakes On A Plane? Boneheads On A Train!

In a rare sighting, two boneheads were spotted on a train on the Ballarat line yesterday. (It’s unknown if the bones have any relation to the bones spotted in Ballarat back in March.)

Fakes and AltReich Creeps

As mentioned previously, there’s been a few fake antifa soc.media accounts created recently. Recent entrants include Brisbane Antifa (Twitter), Hobart Antifa (Facebook), Melbourne Antifa (Facebook), Sydney Antifa (Facebook/Twitter).

Fair dinkum accounts are : Antifascist Action Brisbane /// Antifascism Tasmania /// Anti Fascist Action Sydney /// Melbourne Antifascist Info.

STRAYA follows Yanqui fashions, and the AltReich trend is no exception, from Breitbart to Proud Boys to various patriotik deformations. One bizarr0 publication, called xyz.net.au, features the musings of former hemp crusader Ryan Fletcher. For reasons best known to himself (possibly because of one too many knocks to the head?), of late Ryan has dropped HEMP for Hitler.

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

See also : Hiding in plain sight: how the ‘alt-right’ is weaponizing irony to spread fascism, Jason Wilson, The Guardian, May 23, 2017 (Experts say the ‘alt-right’ have stormed mainstream consciousness by using ‘humor’ and ambiguity as tactics to wrong-foot their opponents).