January 2020 Bits and Bites: Mathews Apprehended, Vanderweide Angers Vets, Northern Guard Defection, Are Ronny Cameron and Steven Lane Okay?

It's been a minute, so we decided a nice round-up of January, 2020 was the appropriate way to get back into it. Keep your eyes peeled for some other changes too, which are just around the corner. 

Patrik Mathews, the former Canadian Reservist who was exposed last summer as a member of the accelerationist neo-Nazi group The Base was arrested earlier this month along with 2 other members of The Base in Maryland and Delaware. They were allegedly planning on traveling to Virginia to attend a pro-gun rally with the intent of kicking off the boogaloo (their parlance for a civil war.) 

Three more members of The Base were arrested a day later in Georgia, US, for allegedly planning to murder an anti-fascist couple. The same 3 members were also allegedly planning on double crossing Mathews and murdering him as they considered him a liability. 

Mathews was denied bail and remains in federal US custody. 

The stories are wild, and we encourage everyone to read the affidavit leading to Mathews' arrest. In the meantime, we are planning on a more comprehensive piece detailing the events surrounding Mathews. We also recommend Nick Martin's fantastic breakdown here. 

Jason Wilson of The Guardian also identified the leader and founder of The Base as Rinaldo Nazzaro, an American national living in Russia. There is a lot of speculation surrounding his involvement and intentions, so we will reserve our judgment until more information comes out.

Rinaldo Nazzaro

It turns out that The Base had been infiltrated by an antifascist for some time.  It is presumably this antifascist who took over their Telegram channel and began making it better.

Now that's a makeover 

Jacob Kaderli, one of the three Georgia Base members arrested for an alleged murder plot of an antifascist couple 

Chris Vanderweide angered Canadian veterans recently when he posted a picture of himself wearing a vest with Urban Infidels patches and a pair of jump wings.

It was pointed out to Chris that he should not have that patch since he did not earn it, however he felt that the veterans would be on his side.

Veterans were very much NOT on his side. Stolen Valour Canada found out and they were not having it. Many contacted Vanderweide to request he remove the wings, which they have now posted he's done.

Screenshot: Stolen Valour Canada, with names redacted 

Despite Vanderweide agreeing to remove the jump wings, he was still what we would consider disrespectful.

Georgie Fagan defected as the VP of the Northern Guard, and is now speaking out against the group:

Then this New Year’s Eve, Georgie messaged me an apology. He wanted me to know that he had left the Guard some months ago, that he renounced their hate, and that he was sorry for the harm he had caused. He wanted to make amends to his community. 

Since leaving the Northern Guard and speaking out against them, he has faced threats both against himself and his nine-year-old daughter. He knows people will think he is a rat, he told me, but he thought that staying silent was the same as supporting hate, and he did not want to do that. He hopes that by telling his story, and how he was lured into the group, he can prevent other people from making the same mistake.

Fagan has also posted a video to Facebook detailing his departure and threats made against his daughter by remaining Northern Guard members. We've linked to the video in full, as we feel it's a powerful testimony.

While we believe these numbers to be inflated, Fagan also advised the Halifax Examiner that Northern Guard's leader, Nick Gallant, is making bank off the backs of his members.

He has at least 1200 members. Plus there’s 100 dollars a year dues. He’s collecting 120,000 plus tax free money a year. Somebody else said to me, he don’t care about us anyway. He just wants 120,000 tax free dollars, so that’s the greatest scam I ever heard of. I said, you know what? Come to think about it, you’re right. He’s using other people’s feelings, weaknesses, or whatever the case may be to develop his own. And then our dues were twenty dollars on top of that to buy sandwiches or do stuff or go places, buy more patches. But not the head. The head leader gets 100 dollars from each member, and right now there’s over 1200 members from Maritimes to BC.

George Fagan's defection from the Northern Guard appears to be very genuine, and if he happens to read this we want to congratulate you on leaving that life behind. We hope you continue to work against hate groups in Canada, and find peace and happiness in your life. If you have any information that you wish to disclose about Northern Guard, please contact us.

Ronny Cameron was messaging his supporters, asking for cash, and had a run-in with Toronto based fascist Gavin David.

Grab a snack, because this is a ride.

Finally, we have Steven Lane, president of SOO-offshot Urban Infidels (and Vanderweide's boss, we guess?) behaving rather strangely. 

Steven Lane, National President of Urban Infidels Canada, having a completely normal one - then deleting it. (1/)@VestsCanada @ARCCollective @JaneQCitizen @agtbloodrayne pic.twitter.com/xxbBco6MR0

— EdmontonAgainstFascism (@EdmontonAgainst) January 27, 2020

 He did, indeed, keep going.

...? pic.twitter.com/VKQBgkyhhF

— EdmontonAgainstFascism (@EdmontonAgainst) January 27, 2020

And that's January, 2020.

It's good to be back. 

💗

Van Hamme vs. Vanderweide and Stuart: Douchageddon OR Cringefest 2020

This may be considered to be a non-canon sequel to, "Cameron vs. Van Hamme: Battle of the Douchebags" as Ronny only makes a single cameo appearance.

If there is one think that has become apparent since I first began this blog in 2007 it is that the people we monitor on these pages have a spectacular inability to get along with one another. I bring to you dear readers the most recent installment of righties behaving badly.

First, let me introduce the parties primarily involves:

Alex Van Hamme, the proprietor of Free Bird Media who seems to have become decidedly disenchanted with the troglodytes with whom he has become associated with over the years.

Chris Vanderweide, a troglodyte whose biggest life success ever appears to have been bashing people in the face with a helmet when they weren't looking because, you know, Chris is a real man.

Leigh Stuart who contributes to the conspiracy website Press For Truth who is probably best known for believing the conspiracy that Syrian refugees were butchering goats in the bathrooms of a Toronto Radisson and along with Ronny Cameron and then bf Georges Massaad trespassed to prove it. She's also now dating Vanderweide which calls into question her judgement because.... really?!?!

We also have "TrueHusky" who is giving off some Bryan Trottier vibes (though I admit that's only a guess on my part and I could easily be convinced othrwise) and special guest Gus Stefanis of the Canadian Nationalist Party founded by Travis Patron who is currently awaiting trail for assaulting two women in Regina.

Your's truly also makes an appearance as I sometimes like stirring the pot a bit.

We begin, as we often do, with a conspiracy theory presented as truth or perhaps truth by a credulous believer:

Of course it isn't true and an actual journalist would have done the requisite research before posting this but then Ms. Stuart isn't a journalist as much as she is an ineffective and somewhat incompetent propagandist. Still it is what we've come to expect from her.

What wasn't expected what Van Hamme's response would precipitate a petty argument that is ongoing as of the writing of this article when four days later Vanderweide decided to chime in:

I became aware of this slow motion train wreck when ARC was tagged:

But it wasn't deleted. It went on from there and like a horrible accident I could look away.

Though we should replace "horrible" with "hilarious" and "accident" with "circular firing squad".

This and the preceding parts come primarily from the main thread of the discussion, however I will include some of the "discussion" that branched out from it later (as well as a few of those branches to help provide context for the overall narrative). Suffice it to say it is long, painful to read (the ridiculous subject matter, Chris' inability to communicate above the level of a 5 year-old, etc), and will leave you walking away muttering to yourself and shaking your head.

In other words, enjoy the show. :)

 

There's a chance I might have been a bit of a jerk in this next exchange. I can live with myself however:

We finally have some mention of Ronny Cameron whose own ability to alienate people is second to none. It should be noted that neither Van Hamme nor Stuart seem to like Cameron at all, and yet his toxicity infects this exchange as well.

At which point Stefanis of the neo-Nazi Canadian Nationalist Party chimes in:

Hey, he wasn't wrong.

It probably isn't surprising for any of the readers to see that the whole exchange eventually results in trying to arrange a physical fight somewhere.

FINALLY Ronny makes his single appearance before seeing his shadow and heading back into his hole. This part refers to Cameron getting chased away from a protest supporting Don Cherry in front of the CBC where he hadn't worked for about a decade because 2019 was a hell of a year.

But back to the 12 year old posturing:

This part though is rather interesting:

You see, we have a discussion between Stuart and Cameron (posting as Pam Cellia which is a profile he uses when his main one is suspended) which might potentially cast some doubt on her claim not to support an ethnostate:

"Ronny, why would I debate you about something that I don't completely disagree with you..."

Why indeed? Might be interesting to get some clarification on this.

I've included a few of the threads that branched off the main one but I figure, what the hell!? Here are the rest of the ones I collected:

I have no doubt that this show will continue, however I think this is probably sufficient.