Showing posts with label Proud Boy. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Proud Boy. Show all posts

Saturday, March 28, 2020

Racist Poster Campaigns Gaining Momentum Across Canada Thanks to Telegram

A recent article from Omar Mosleh detailed a number of racist poster campaigns across Canada, focusing on the latest shift from ID Canada towards ecofascism. From The Base to Proud Boys to ID Canada, to more generic (on the surface, anyway) posters and stickers, the issue has grown - and it proves that the international fascist movement is collaborating with each other.

Prior to the internet, flyering and postering was the norm. In 2020, with platforms like Gab, Telegram, streaming service DLive, and others, one would think a more effective method would be solely online, yet fascists around the world are opting for relatively low-tech recruitment and radicalization methods while organizing on, and driving people to, the fascist-friendly platforms that will have them. These campaigns serve as a calling card to others; at times a dog-whistle and other times overt. They are a way to signal to like-minded people and antifascists/anti-racists alike - "we're in your community."




Based in the UK, the Hundred Handers, have been around for some time, but have recently made the news for co-opting Extinction Rebellion branding as their own to promote ecofascist and hateful content. This is nothing new for them - since January 2020 they have been co-opting XR branding and putting up outrageous stickers and posters to reduce XR's credibility. Their latest archive has 11 XR fakes.

A Hundred Handers post from early January on Telegram



A Proud Boy-run Canadian Telegram channel has also promoted this tactic, within a post of this specific incident. The irony of "Prosemitic Groyper" referencing the "logical evil conclusions" of leftist efforts while ignoring the fact that calling for a "white" country means either mass deportation or genocide isn't lost on us.



The Hundred Handers been kicked off Twitter, but claim they don't care - Telegram is much more effective. 

Their MO is to release an "archive" of stickers every month. Included is regional/country specific stickers as well as "unaffiliated" stickers, such as "It's Ok To Be White," and others. It's unknown at this time how many IOTBW have been distributed by their following. They also target feminists, the LGBTQ+ community, run-of-the-mill conservatives, and others. Some of their stickers reference the JQ (Jewish Question) and "Blood and Soil." Others are rather benign, and include a QR code. Many are in other languages, such as German and Spanish. 

They have produced Canada specific content - including the demographic poster recently found in both Whitby, ON in early February and Saskatoon, SK in early March. The poster is titled "The Great Replacement," and is found in a folder titled "Canadian Demographics" in their March archive - an indicator that there is enough support here to warrant country-specific content, along the lines of Italy, Germany, and Spain. 

There are other examples, too. Recently stickers attributed to them were found in the Port Credit Go Station, which they erroneously attributed this to France on Telegram. We were able to confirm from the ad in the background that this is, in fact, in Port Credit. Also, the ad language and the train schedule is in English. 
The erroneously attributed post on Telegram 
Even more recently, stickers attributed to the Hundred Handers, and referencing The Noticer were found in Edmonton: 

The Noticer is an antisemitic, white supremacist Telegram channel that exists to antagonize and harass Jews, and they appear to have officially collaborated with Hundred Handers.



Hundred Handers often troll and mock people for calling them racist, and on a YouTube live stream have stated they give tips and make efforts to "stay on the right side of the law," and anything that goes beyond that are "bad actors" trying to impersonate them. This isn't surprising - fascists will always accuse their opposition of doing exactly what they do. 

One major problem that often occurs with these postering and stickering campaigns is that in a blind attempt to portray "all sides," media will provide these groups a platform. As a result, groups like Hundred Handers have declared that media is doing promotion for them.

Comments in the livestream in which the Hundred Handers participated on YouTube



Hundred Handers, pleased with the media attention

The Hundred Handers are one of many fascist groups happy with the attention they're provided by media. The Proud Boys were thrilled when CTV aired their full, offensive, and outrageously fallacious statement - unchallenged.

Proud Boys, pleased that CTV ran their statement during a story about their posters



This serves as a stark warning for media - by allowing a statement without challenge, you are providing them a platform.

On Telegram, the Canadian Proud Boys channel (likely run by Tim Kelly) regularly shares their postering and stickering campaigns - and boosts others, such as ID Canada. It seems ID Canada is quite reliant on the Proud Boys boosting their efforts, since their own Telegram channel is rather stagnant at a whopping 38 members.  






There is a secondary Proud Boy affiliated Telegram channel, run by Tim Kelly (aka "Rick the Man") and "Blayze," another Proud Boy, and whose members include Dean Clifford, Joey DeLuca, and Andre Chiasson.

"Blayze," one of the admins of the offshoot Telegram group along with Tim Kelly

 The group has also promoted the Hundred Handers, an international, loose collective of white supremacists that put up posters and stickers in various countries around the world. The first mention of Hundred Handers in the Proud Boy offshoot Telegram group was on March 23, 2020, however instances of Hundred Handers has been spotted around Canada in the months prior. 

A promotion of Hundred Handers with content obscured 

The offshoot Canadian Telegram group itself is a mish-mash of Canadians and some Brits, with a few of the most prolific users sharing antisemitic and racist content while complaining that people call them racist.  


A post featuring The Noticer, an antisemitic channel that collaborates with Hundred Handers
 


As always, if you come across posters or stickers, please cover them up or remove them, if it's safe to do so. Also, please keep in mind that efforts have been made to spread fakes targeting both other organizations and antifascists.
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Tuesday, December 10, 2019

A Re-examination of An Old Story: Jake Logan Findell

It has been more than a year since Ricochet published a piece linking a UCP staff member to an overly racist online military surplus store:

Adam Strashok (left) with former Saskatchewan premier Brad Wall
The story of Adam Strashok turned out to be a bit of a rabbit hole in that it exposed the the light of day a rot withing Alberta conservative campus political groups tying some members to white supremacist groups such as ID Canada or, in the case of Keean Bexte, an employee of Ezra Levant's Islamophobic and conspiracy driven Rebel Media:
Not long ago I started to look into other members of Alberta campus conservative clubs primarily in Calgary one of whom has become of primary interest due to his current status as a staff member of Jason Kenney's UPC (it should be noted that Strashok also worked for the UCP and Bexte endorsed Kenney while a member of the Calgary Conservative Club and has used his position as a Rebel Media personality to promote Mr. Kenney and his government):




I'm thinking that this might perhaps warrant a future article?

In the meantime I thought I would cover material that I hadn't included in the previous articles from last autumn.

We know that Strashok posted on social media using a few different pseudonyms in addition to his real name. Two of those names were highlighted in the Ricochet article. He used the pseudonym "Alexei Kuznetsov" primarily on Facebook but he also posted on the Vibrant Diversity channel on Discord as "Guynumber7" where, thanks to the Discord leak, we were able to find gems of wisdom such as these screeds:



Strashok wasn't a prolific poster in this channel (perhaps more from a yet unreleased Discord channel will one day be added to the leak) but the same can't be said for the person who advocated for his membership:


"Adrien Arcand" (the user having named himself after the Quebecois fascist leader of the 1930s and 40s) is one of two known pseudonyms used by Jake Logan Findell on social media (this one was used on both Discord and Twitter) who has been discussed on ARC:



In fact Findell was the subject of an earlier story in September 2018 when he and a still unknown individual were caught in the act of disseminating ID Canada materials on the grounds of the University of Alberta:



We had been told that Findell was not a member of the Calgary Conservative Club and may not have even been a university student. Even if he didn't he was very much an associate of that particular group:


Let's get back to the "Adrien Arcand" pseudonym Findell used on various social media platforms. Note please that I will be bouncing back and forth between Findell's Twitter and Discord posts:


Findell appears to have been closely following the Fireforce Ventures story, particularly the focus on Strashok. In fact Findell was angry at the UCP when a Twitter user supporting Bernier's PPC suggested that people like Strashok had no place in the party (though subsequent evidence supports the contrary view):


Findell not surprisingly didn't always feel this way:


Not long after ARC helped break the story concerning Keean Bexte's own involvement with Fireforce Ventures, Findell responded to a Tweet by the NDP defending the online military surplus store:


Findell's sarcasm seems disingenuous in light of this post on Discord concerning a brick and mortar store in Calgary selling Nazi paraphernalia:



In another discord chat he seems to know exactly what both the Confederate and Rhodesian flags represent:




In fact Findell is quite a fan of flags:


This photo was taken at a Worldwide Coalition Against Islam rally at Calgary City Hall on June 3, 2017 attended by hate groups including WCAI, the Canadian Combat Coalition (prior to Ryan Dean being booted), and Soldiers of Odin. Also in attendance was Paul Fromm:


The next month Findell posted this in response to criticism leveled at Fromm whose use of the Red Ensign has tainted the flag and a half-hearted disavowal of Fromm by the Proud Boys:


 And of course we can't forget his affinity for Generation Identity/ID Canada iconography:




Having looked at Findell's activities online is seems fairly evident that he has likely been responsible for a significant amount of the far-right materials found at the University of Calgary:


For example, Findell had taken special interest in The Rocks outside the MacEwan Student Centre:



And while I can't say for certain that he was directly involved in this effort....


.... he was certainly associated with people who probably would have.

Other revelations are also quite interesting:



We do now know that Findell was responsible, either on his own or with others, for a spectacularly clumsy effort to defame Calgary-based antifascist groups. At this time a fake Facebook profile was created that fooled no one except for the credulous far-right such as Never Again Canada who, by coincidence, are mentioned in this recent article, "Inside the hate factory: how Facebook fuels far-right profit":




Findell has a great deal to say about Jews too, including this representative sample:







As such we probably shouldn't be especially surprised that he followed the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville. Findell spent much of the next three days retweeting the days' events:


He did find the time to post his own witty retort directed towards an opponent of the event:


Then this happened:


Findell didn't comment on the murder of Heather Heyer by one of his fellow travelers directly on Twitter, though he did continue discussing the event and how poorly the racists were treated:


On Discord, Findell posted this:


I understand that discussing Findell now more than a year after he was exposed by the blog might be seen as less relevant, however Findell can be seen as a bit of a case study of the kind of person who is attracted to this movement. It also helps to remind our readers that despite their claims, people like Findell are racists who celebrate their hatred when they think no one can see it.

Suffice it to say I think exposing Jake Findell and people like him to the light of day continues to serve the common good.
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