"Not a Nazi" Willis Cleared in Assault Case

First of all, holy crap! You mean to tell us that it took this long to come to trail and reach any kind of verdict?

William "Willis" Miettinen is the shirtless dude (hell,
he's pretty much always shirtless for some reason) seig
heiling with Robert Reitmeier, Terry Tremaine,
John Marleau, Chris Waters (big guy wearing the
white tent) and other assorted boneheads in a photo
taken after the 2008 "White Pride" march in Calgary

Second, "suspected white supremacist"? Oh, we do believe we've cleared that one up on a few occassions already (such as here, here, here, and here).

Alleged cameraman attacker cleared

By Kevin Martin,Calgary Sun

First posted: Monday, June 25, 2012 07:31 PM MDT | Updated: Tuesday, June 26, 2012 07:33 AM MDT

A camera-shy suspected white supremacist charged with assaulting a cameraman at an anti-racism demonstration has been cleared of wrongdoing.

Defence lawyer Adriano Iovinelli said the Crown is staying the charge against William Kaiser Miettinen.

Interesting Bill Noble Update

ARC hasn't spoken much about Bill Noble, though we have noted that he has left his son and that son's mother back in Calgary when he relocated to Winnipeg. He's still active in the movement, if operating a mostly moribund webform for a group who's leader is currently in jail is active. But he's still giving young up-and-comer "boneheads" advice:

But there has been something interesting that has happened.

Bill has a new girlfriend who seems to be exercising some level of influence on him.

For example, between May 25 and June 3, Winnipeg celebrated it's 25th annual Gay Pride week. One wouldn't expect a well known (at least in our world) neo-Nazi to attend a Gay Pride event, but that's just what Bill did.

And he seems to have had a good time too.

I can't blame him. I've had a blast at every Gay Pride event I've ever attended. Great music, wonderful people, and at least the one's I've gone to have had great street food.

But it will be interesting to see how Bill, if he still claims to be an active, "bonehead" will explain his attendance to people less open-minded than we here at ARC.

June 2012 Bits and Bites

Bernie Farber wrote an excellent article on Richard Warman yesterday regarding his campaign against cyber hate and the resulting vitriol directed at him as a result:

Vilified Internet hate crusader was the real hero

Friday, June 22, 2012

By Bernie Farber, The Ottawa Citizen

With the repeal this month of Section 13 of the Canadian Human Rights Act (CHRA), which dealt specifically with hate speech on the Internet, regulating poisonous and hateful attacks against minorities is now left to the Criminal Code. Where in the past S13 was a less intrusive and at times educational method of dealing with hate speech, now any such complaints will be handled by police with jail time and a criminal record as a possible outcome.

A key figure who utilized S13 to help defend ethnic and faith minorities against toxic speech is a friend and a person I consider a hero, Richard Warman. Sadly instead of gratitude Richard was victimized for his efforts.

Quoted in "Maclean's"

When we wrote that we had a discussion with a person from "Maclean's" about Sec. 13 and the implications of it's demise, our favourite stalkers seemed to take notice as well:

Unfortunately, they appear to have been left disappointed:

Whateva! I Do What I Want!

Some of our readers might remember this story:

Mr. Levant railed against Chiquita Brands International in December, after it said it would stop using fuel from Alberta's oil sands. Mr. Levant challenged the company's ethical record, but the Canadian Broadcast Standards Council was more concerned with a portion of the show when he stared into the camera and told a company executive "Hey you, yeah you, Manuel Rodriguez. Chinga tu madre."

Translation: "go fuck your mother."

We can summarize Ezra's response to the CBSC as follows:



Though we aren't sure that Ezra looks quite as good as Cartman does in drag:

Expose and dispose of censor board

By EZRA LEVANT, QMI Agency

Last Updated: June 19, 2012 8:34am

Did you know that a secretive group called the Canadian Broadcast Standards Council is censoring what you hear on the radio and see on TV?

I bet you didn't. Because they truly are secretive.

Unlike a real court, or even the kangaroo courts of Canada's human rights commissions, the CBSC doesn't hold open meetings when it gets together to censor TV and radio. 

White Supremacists in Canadian Military

Long time readers of this blog will know that we have discussed white supremacist/nationalist who are either active members of the Canadian military or who wish to enlist. As a reminder, might we suggest these articles:

• More Trouble For Boneheads Planning on Attending Calgary Rally
• Paulie Plays Fast and Loose With the Truth
• GermBrit Comments on ARC

There are others that we've learned about who we haven't discussed here on the blog (for example, Bruce comes to mind) but in many of those cases we have forwarded the information to the DND.

So it really shouldn't be much of a surprise for the military to receive this kind of intel:

Canadian Forces warned of possible infiltration by white supremacist group 

By DAVID PUGLIESE, The Ottawa Citizen June 18, 2012 

OTTAWA — Canadian Forces intelligence officers have been warned that a U.S. white supremacist group is expanding into this country and that military members could be attracted to the organization. 

Officers with the National Counter-Intelligence Unit were told about the expansion of such groups into the Canadian Forces, as well as the attraction these groups have for members of the Forces, during a meeting of specialists looking into hate crimes and extremists movements. “Many of the conference speakers and attendees were aware of serving or retired DND/CF members that are part of these groups,” the counter-intelligence summary report from January 2011 pointed out. 

The Citizen obtained the report through the Access to Information law. 

The name of the white supremacist group expanding into Canada was censored from the documents for reasons of national security. 

Asked about the counter-intelligence reports, the Canadian Forces issued an email noting, “The beliefs held by white supremacist groups are not compatible with the ethics and values of the CF.” 

“The men and women of the Canadian Forces are held to high ethical standards and the Canadian Forces has a zero tolerance for white supremacist or otherwise racist behavior,” the email stated. “Any reports of members being associated with white supremacist groups would be thoroughly investigated.” 

But the report noted that military intelligence specialists were following up on the information they were provided about military members and their affiliations with extremists groups. 

In addition, in a July 2011 counter-intelligence report, the officers provided an update on an ongoing operation against extremists based in Edmonton, Alberta. All the details, including the code name of the operation, were censored from the records for reasons of national security. 

The presence of white supremacists in the ranks of the Canadian Forces has been an issue that has dogged the military over the years. 

In March 2011 the military launched an investigation into the activities of a Winnipeg-based soldier who planned to attend a white pride rally in Calgary. The 17-year-old reservist denied he was a racist, although he acknowledged posting comments on racist websites and planned to travel to Calgary to watch the rally. 

In 2003 the military launched investigations into allegations that six members of the Canadian Forces were involved with white supremacist groups. 

In 1997 the Canadian Forces kicked out a 25-year-old soldier from Canadian Forces Base Petawawa after he was involved in theft and found to have hate literature among his possessions. Just weeks after his removal from Petawawa, Nathan LeBlanc took part in the fatal beating of Nirmal Gill, 65, on the grounds of a Surrey, BC Sikh temple. 

LeBlanc received a 12-year sentence while some of his fellow neo-Nazis involved in the attack received 15 years in prison. The judge called them “unrepentant racists.” 

During a subsequent investigation, four other privates in LeBlanc’s company were identified as having possible racist involvement. No charges were laid, but all four were the subject of administrative action such as mandatory probation and counselling. 

The counter-intelligence report obtained by the Citizen acknowledges that white power and neo-Nazi groups are “attractive to some members of DND/CF.” 

“Major recruiting tools used by these groups are social networking sites such as Facebook and YouTube,” the report stated. “The music is also known to be a major recruiting tool.” 

“Groups such as the (censored) could potentially cause an individual to change allegiances from the (censored),” the report added. “Belonging to a White Power/Skinhead/Neo-Nazi group could foster the spread of hate for minorities within DND/CF.” 

The National Counter-Intelligence Unit is responsible for identifying and dealing with threats to the military from a variety of sources. Those include foreign spies, terrorists, extremist organizations and criminals. 

The reports obtained by the Citizen covering 2010 and 2011 also contain details about possible espionage but the incidents appear minor. They include reports of individuals possibly taking photographs of military personnel or equipment. Another report outlines warnings to Canadian government and military personnel that hotels in a particular country might be outfitted with listening devices. The name of the country is censored from the documents but the report contained warnings that military personnel should be careful what they discuss with each other when travelling to that nation. 

In one of its reports, the intelligence officers also provided for “situational awareness” a synopsis of the October 2011 Occupy protests in various cities in Canada. It pointed out that such protests were peaceful and did not pose any threat to DND or the Canadian Forces. 

“Protestor numbers increase on weekends and in the evenings when supporters are not working,” according to the report. “Many Occupy camps appear to have attracted the local homeless population in addition to the core protestors. 

© Copyright (c) The Ottawa Citizen

But there are those who don't think this is really anything to be concerned about:

You know something? Free Dominion member "Smaug" is right. We mean, why should anyone be concerned about violent racists with combat training and access to powerful weaponry being in the military?

Well, okay. We suppose there is that.

Oh, and then there's that.

Hmmm, almost forgot about this.

You know, perhaps there might just be a problem after all?

UPDATE: Our friends at Free Dominion and elsewhere are critical of the fact that we included a photo of Clayton Matchee who is of First Nations heritage.

And?

Read for content, boys and girls:

You know something? Free Dominion member "Smaug" is right. We mean, why should anyone be concerned about violent racists with combat training and access to powerful weaponry being in the military?

We wrote, "racists." We didn't make a distinction of what kind of racists.

Unless, of course, the good folks at Free Dominion believe only Caucasians can be racist? That seems sort of bigoted.

Oh, as soon as you can show us that radical Islamic extremists or hardline communists are infiltrating the Canadian military and are committing violent acts, we'll certainly be happy to jump on board in condemning them as well.

We happily await the evidence that this is a significant problem.

Rodney King Dead at 47

Twenty-one years ago I was in high school when the video of Rodney King being beaten by members of the LAPD made international news.

I had already been following news stories about racist groups in Canada and the United States. The Heritage Front had started making headlines and was fast becoming the most influential hate groups Canada had experienced since the Saskatchewan Klan of the 1920s. In Saskatchewan, Carney Nerland of the Aryan Nations had just killed a First Nations trapper, Leo LaChance (he would later be convicted of manslaughter). In the United States, Years before that, neo-Nazis affiliated with Ton Metzger's White Aryan Resistance had murdered Ethiopian immigrant Mulugeta Seraw; W.A.R was subsequently bankrupted as a result of a lawsuit filed by the Southern Poverty Law Center in 1990 because Metzger's influence was proven to be a key factor in the murder.

However, it wasn't until the beating of Rodney King made headlines that I came to understand that systemic racism was pervasive in institutions that were supposed to be color blind.

Rodney King wasn't a saint. He himself admitted that he struggled with demons and in one of his last interviews he stated that he would always struggle with sobriety. In other words, he was as human as any one of us. But the assault he endured on March 3, 1991 did serve to make very public a reality that primarily Black men had been systematically targeted because of their ethnicity.

We here at ARC hope that Rodney King finds the peace that he struggled to find in life.

Congratulations Dr. Dawg

Our friend and fellow blogger Dr. Dawg has won his appeal:

Baglow v. Smith

Dawg has also been awarded costs.

The case will now proceed to trial.

Response to the Demise of Sec. 13 in "Maclean's"

Earlier today, we were contacted by "Maclean's" and asked about our take on the demise of Sec. 13. We responded as follows:

We think that the government was incredibly short sighted in their decision to eliminate Sec. 13. It was a useful and cost-effective tool in the effort to eliminate some very vile, hateful, and potentially dangerous rhetoric online and in the public sphere. Now we have only the criminal code which, in a few cases, is like using a machete when a scalpel would have been more prudently utilized. 

Those individuals and groups who were called before the Human Rights Tribunal and who were found to have violated Sec. 13 were not innocent lambs who were victimized by Big Brother. They were people and groups who were causing real harm in their communities. Their words did result in harm, and I don't mean hurt feelings. People's homes were vandalized. People have been assaulted. And these criminal acts had, in many cases, began with the dehumanization of fellow Canadians for no other reason than their ethnicity, religion, gender and sexual orientation. 

The people who are celebrating this are the extremists on Stormfront and VNN and a host of other racist webforums, but as we wrote on our blog they should consider that now there is only the criminal code and the penalties are more severe than anything Sec. 13 dished out. It should also be noted that racists aren't content with only Sec. 13. Paul Fromm, for instance, has said he and his group will next focus their attention on the criminal code sections regarding hate crimes.

We get the impression that the "Maclean's" in which Sec. 13 will be discussed is coming out this week. We don't expect that our entire response will be published, or if any of it will be for that matter, but if it is we thought we'd include the entirely of our response here.

And as for the responses from the boneheads, we present a small selection:

Paul Fromm: Campus Alternative and "Countdown"

We continue to receive photos and documents from our readers as we proceed with our project to document the history of the early racist movement in Canada. A few days ago, we received the following message:

I saw your call out for old documents from the white supremacist movement, so I'm sending you pictures for two documents I came across that I thought might be of interest.They're anti-Edmund Burke Society/Western Guard flyers from the 1970s created by a Toronto group called the Revolutionary Marxist Group and feature good ol' Paul Fromm fairly prominently.

This is truly great stuff. Not a lot is known to us about what Paulie was up to after he left the Western Guard. We know that he began another short-lived group called Campus Alternative (membership numbers unknown) and publishing a newsletter called, "Countdown" but that was about it. This sheds a little more light on this period. The documents themselves we suspect are from 1973 or 74.

Sec. 13 Repealed

Not all that much of a surprise:

Conservative government votes to repeal sections on hate speech from human rights code

It still needs to pass through the senate, but we're sure that is likely a formality.

A bit short sighted, but not exactly the end of the world either.

We understand the boneheads might be very happy, but they should consider the fact that Sec. 13 and the CHRT were used instead of the criminal code in many cases.

Acts of hate speech are serious crimes that should be investigated by police officers, not civil servants, he said, and the cases should be handled by “real judges and real lawyers,” instead of a quasi-judicial body like the human rights commission.

Be careful what you wish for. ;)

Ray Douglas Bradbury (August 22, 1920 — June 6, 2012)

I first came across Ray Bradbury as a child on the Movie Channel. "The Ray Bardbury Theater" was an anthology based on his short stories. They were scary, eerie, funny, and filled me with a sense of awe about the mysteries of the universe that we never really think about. Later I devoured his short stories and novels. In fact, they were the first books I chose to look for and read when I was allowed to go to the, "grown up" section of the library. Ray Bradbury is who caused me to fall in love with books.

At 91 years old, it isn't a surprise that he passed on, but it still hurts. More than I had thought it would.

A few of my favourite childhood memories of Ray Bradbury:

They Got Him.

Luka Magnotta arrested in Germany

Dennis Mahon and the Canadian Connection

Dennis Mahon was convicted of
sending a bomb in the mail and
sentenced to 40 years in prison.

As we continue our project of gathering historical documents about the Canadian racist movement, we will also continue to comment on contemporary news stories related to that project, such as this story on American extremist Dennis Mahon.

On February 26, 2004, Don Logan of the Scottsdale, Arizona Office of Diversity and Dialogue, severely injuring him. After a 5 year investigation, Dennis Mahon, his twin brother Daniel and one other man were arrested on June 26, 2009 and charged in the mail bombing. On May 22, Dennis Mahon, who had been found guilty in February, was sentenced to 40 years in prison. At 61 years, he is likely to die in prison.

Luka Magnotta. White Nationalist???

When we first heard that Luka Rocco Magnotta was the prime suspect in the murder and dismemberment of Jun Lin, there were a few things we knew for certain. Such as the fact that he was a gay pornstar who dated Karla Homolka once she was released from prison.

Except, as it turns out, we really don't know all of this to be a fact.

There is not any significant evidence he appeared in pornography, be it straight or gay. No evidence he was a model. No evidence that he date Homolka. Nothing other than what he, himself, has claimed.

And, if we are to be honest, the evidence that he was a, "White Nationalist" isn't exactly clear either.