Be clean-cut, work in secret, appear reasonable, don’t use memes
March 7, 2019 9:10 AM Subscribe
“One person last February invited members to help build a national College Republicans Discord server, which would be run by Identity Evropa members, who were told not to use “overtly alt right usernames of profile pics.” Some members said they were either current lawyers or plan to attend law schools in an effort to provide legal support to the group, while at least a dozen people said they are currently or formerly in the military. One member asked, “What are our long range goals? Other than taking over the GOP and spreading white identity? What is the end goal for IE?”
Unicorn Riot is releasing more than 770,000 messages from chat servers associated with Identity Evropa. This is the first report in a series about this large US-based neo-Nazi organization. (CW: antisemitism Neo-Nazism, hate speech and images) Leaked Discord Chats Show Plan By Alt-Right To Infiltrate Local GOP (Splinter) Chats Outline Plot To Keep Steve King Elected (Washington Post)
I keep telling my friends that there are white people, even in New York City, quietly joining the military, becoming lawyers, cops, and government officials to give themselves cover, and access to weapons, to learn tactics and devise "legal" methods in order to literally kill us over the tribal "our people are better and we deserve all the goodies" bullshit in their lizard brains that's run amok—and they think I'm exaggerating.
Some Identity Europa dudes held a march last autumn in Fort Tryon Park, in upper Manhattan, and people thought they were a joke. Sounds familiar.
Thank you for giving me some proof to show my friends that this isn't a joke.
posted by droplet at 9:43 AM on March 7, 2019 [50 favorites]
Some Identity Europa dudes held a march last autumn in Fort Tryon Park, in upper Manhattan, and people thought they were a joke. Sounds familiar.
Thank you for giving me some proof to show my friends that this isn't a joke.
posted by droplet at 9:43 AM on March 7, 2019 [50 favorites]
I got an invitation to join an openly white nationalist group on discord a few months ago With bots it's easy to cast a wide net.
posted by subdee at 10:07 AM on March 7, 2019 [3 favorites]
posted by subdee at 10:07 AM on March 7, 2019 [3 favorites]
Nazi Republicans. Mild shock. This is just taking the mask off.
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 10:26 AM on March 7, 2019 [1 favorite]
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 10:26 AM on March 7, 2019 [1 favorite]
Y'know the thing that keeps bothering me about this ideology - aside from the BLATANTLY F'N OBVIOUS part - it occurred to me while reading this - what's the draw? I mean really. They idealize and glorify and want to be like a bunch of people who lost. They LOST. Their heroes are a bunch of losers. The vaunted "supreme race" lost to the so-called "mongrel inferior races" they fought against, their leaders committed suicide or were tried and convicted, the ENTIRE GODDAMN WORLD united to crush the idiocy they espoused.
And yet... they persist in believing they are somehow better than the people who won.
I don't get it. Lost Cause moaning and weeping. I don't see how this actually attracts people to join. I don't see how or why they want to have losers as their heroes. There is some twisted psychology here where they identify with the losers I guess?
posted by caution live frogs at 10:29 AM on March 7, 2019 [16 favorites]
And yet... they persist in believing they are somehow better than the people who won.
I don't get it. Lost Cause moaning and weeping. I don't see how this actually attracts people to join. I don't see how or why they want to have losers as their heroes. There is some twisted psychology here where they identify with the losers I guess?
posted by caution live frogs at 10:29 AM on March 7, 2019 [16 favorites]
What is an Evropa?
posted by Reasonably Everything Happens at 10:37 AM on March 7, 2019 [1 favorite]
posted by Reasonably Everything Happens at 10:37 AM on March 7, 2019 [1 favorite]
This is active measures slowly but surely doing their magic.
But as an eastern european living in the US a few years back I always felt a little bit weird about the fascism being ingrained in American minds from a young age. I mean Americans make little children swear loyalty to a flag every morning from age 7. Maybe this isn't so surprising?
posted by mit5urugi at 10:38 AM on March 7, 2019 [38 favorites]
But as an eastern european living in the US a few years back I always felt a little bit weird about the fascism being ingrained in American minds from a young age. I mean Americans make little children swear loyalty to a flag every morning from age 7. Maybe this isn't so surprising?
posted by mit5urugi at 10:38 AM on March 7, 2019 [38 favorites]
What is an Evropa?
It's an advanced culture that couldn't carve a u in stone.
posted by srboisvert at 10:50 AM on March 7, 2019 [38 favorites]
It's an advanced culture that couldn't carve a u in stone.
posted by srboisvert at 10:50 AM on March 7, 2019 [38 favorites]
They idealize and glorify and want to be like a bunch of people who lost. They LOST.
The original actors lost. The ideology merely took a hiatus and went underground, quietly spreading its roots into the very forces that “won” the first round, just waiting for the world political environment to once again evolve into one that offers a sympathetic home.
posted by Thorzdad at 10:52 AM on March 7, 2019 [6 favorites]
The original actors lost. The ideology merely took a hiatus and went underground, quietly spreading its roots into the very forces that “won” the first round, just waiting for the world political environment to once again evolve into one that offers a sympathetic home.
posted by Thorzdad at 10:52 AM on March 7, 2019 [6 favorites]
Seems very American to me. Reminds me of sports fans who remain loyal to a team, even if the team had a bad year, or a bad decade, or longer.
I mean you've also got all those confederate flags..
posted by Space Coyote at 11:06 AM on March 7, 2019 [6 favorites]
I mean you've also got all those confederate flags..
posted by Space Coyote at 11:06 AM on March 7, 2019 [6 favorites]
But as someone who reads about the Paris Commune I can't specifically fault them for nostalgia separate from what they are nostalgic for.
posted by Space Coyote at 11:07 AM on March 7, 2019 [4 favorites]
posted by Space Coyote at 11:07 AM on March 7, 2019 [4 favorites]
The Leaked Chats That Show How a Far-Right Group Is Trying to Infiltrate the GOP
Is their fiendish plan to shift the GOP to the left? Because the far right captured the GOP a few cycles back..
posted by chavenet at 11:15 AM on March 7, 2019 [9 favorites]
Is their fiendish plan to shift the GOP to the left? Because the far right captured the GOP a few cycles back..
posted by chavenet at 11:15 AM on March 7, 2019 [9 favorites]
The original actors lost. The ideology merely took a hiatus and went underground, quietly spreading its roots into the very forces that “won” the first round, just waiting for the world political environment to once again evolve into one that offers a sympathetic home.
It's literally the plot of Captain America: The Winter Soldier.
posted by Strange Interlude at 11:28 AM on March 7, 2019 [17 favorites]
It's literally the plot of Captain America: The Winter Soldier.
posted by Strange Interlude at 11:28 AM on March 7, 2019 [17 favorites]
I feel at fault, somehow.
posted by The Whelk at 11:43 AM on March 7, 2019 [3 favorites]
posted by The Whelk at 11:43 AM on March 7, 2019 [3 favorites]
In before it actually turns into a happy story about basement dwellers accidentally improving their lives as part of a conspiracy and being clean cut, working hard and getting solid public sector jobs with union benfs leads them to being productive members of society.
posted by Damienmce at 11:55 AM on March 7, 2019 [3 favorites]
posted by Damienmce at 11:55 AM on March 7, 2019 [3 favorites]
The original actors lost. The ideology merely took a hiatus and went underground, quietly spreading its roots into the very forces that “won” the first round, just waiting for the world political environment to once again evolve into one that offers a sympathetic home.
It's literally the plot of Captain America: The Winter Soldier.
In H.Y.D.R.A's defense, they're evil, but they're not racist. Just look at Jasper Sitwell.
posted by leotrotsky at 12:23 PM on March 7, 2019 [5 favorites]
It's literally the plot of Captain America: The Winter Soldier.
In H.Y.D.R.A's defense, they're evil, but they're not racist. Just look at Jasper Sitwell.
posted by leotrotsky at 12:23 PM on March 7, 2019 [5 favorites]
One of the few messages related to where I live was this brag about an Identity Evropa sticker still being up after a year. I recognized the general location and with a little Google Maps sleuthing figured out exactly where it was. I went to check it out but someone had already removed the sticker. So that's something at least.
posted by jedicus at 12:33 PM on March 7, 2019 [18 favorites]
posted by jedicus at 12:33 PM on March 7, 2019 [18 favorites]
They idealize and glorify and want to be like a bunch of people who lost. They LOST. Their heroes are a bunch of losers.
The mythology of the lost cause has always been a variety of the Dolchstoßlegende. From the very beginning—as Eric Foner has stated
posted by octobersurprise at 1:14 PM on March 7, 2019 [6 favorites]
The mythology of the lost cause has always been a variety of the Dolchstoßlegende. From the very beginning—as Eric Foner has stated
"The traditional or Dunning School of Reconstruction was not just an interpretation of history. It was part of the edifice of the Jim Crow System. It was an explanation for and justification of taking the right to vote away from black people on the grounds that they completely abused it during Reconstruction. It was a justification for the white South resisting outside efforts in changing race relation because of the worry of having another Reconstruction."Southern whites—and any one who cares to identify with southern whites—have gloried in and obsessed over their loss for over 150 years. It is at the heart of white southern identity and culture. And it's certainly a characteristic that's made the region especially receptive to ideologies which have appealed to those ingrained, imagined grievances.
posted by octobersurprise at 1:14 PM on March 7, 2019 [6 favorites]
"For every Southern boy fourteen years old, not once but whenever he wants it, there is the instant when it's still not yet two o'clock on that July afternoon in 1863, the brigades are in position behind the rail fence, the guns are laid and ready in the woods and the furled flags are already loosened to break out and Pickett himself with his long oiled ringlets and his hat in one hand probably and his sword in the other looking up the hill waiting for Longstreet to give the word and it's all in the balance, it hasn't happened yet, it hasn't even begun yet, it not only hasn't begun yet but there is still time for it not to begin ... "
— William Faulkner, Intruder in the Dust.
"The past is never dead. It's not even past."posted by octobersurprise at 1:24 PM on March 7, 2019 [11 favorites]
— William Faulkner, Requiem for a Nun
Meanwhile in Canada: Neo-Nazis Want Canadian Military Training
posted by lookoutbelow at 2:10 PM on March 7, 2019 [1 favorite]
posted by lookoutbelow at 2:10 PM on March 7, 2019 [1 favorite]
“Lost Cause Religion,” David S. Williams, New Georgia Encyclopedia, 15 May 2005 (Edited 2017)
posted by ob1quixote at 2:55 PM on March 7, 2019 [1 favorite]
posted by ob1quixote at 2:55 PM on March 7, 2019 [1 favorite]
I keep telling my friends that there are white people, even in New York City, quietly joining the military, becoming lawyers, cops, and government officials to give themselves cover, and access to weapons, to learn tactics and devise "legal" methods in order to literally kill us
This is why I no longer trust any white member of the military or law enforcement. And I'm confident that we'll get to a point where soon, any blatantly-Nazi cop won't get fired. He'll go on paid leave until the social media firestorm dies down. His coworkers will talk about how he's got a "good heart" and next thing you know, he'll show up on in one of those social media posts being adorable, and Americans will be taught to normalize Nazis.
posted by sobell at 10:21 PM on March 7, 2019 [9 favorites]
This is why I no longer trust any white member of the military or law enforcement. And I'm confident that we'll get to a point where soon, any blatantly-Nazi cop won't get fired. He'll go on paid leave until the social media firestorm dies down. His coworkers will talk about how he's got a "good heart" and next thing you know, he'll show up on in one of those social media posts being adorable, and Americans will be taught to normalize Nazis.
posted by sobell at 10:21 PM on March 7, 2019 [9 favorites]
I was an admin and moderator on a Discord server with a few thousand members. Each server is only as good as the worst person it tolerates. I had to quit because the server owner tolerated one of the moderators being an alt-right troll and that was one of the better servers I had been on.
The other problem is that there seems to be no enforcement of Discord's rules by Discord. And the reporting mechanism is terrible. You have to like find a special code that's attached the post and copy and paste that to Discord, and it's all buried in non-obvious places.
posted by runcibleshaw at 6:39 AM on March 8, 2019 [3 favorites]
The other problem is that there seems to be no enforcement of Discord's rules by Discord. And the reporting mechanism is terrible. You have to like find a special code that's attached the post and copy and paste that to Discord, and it's all buried in non-obvious places.
posted by runcibleshaw at 6:39 AM on March 8, 2019 [3 favorites]
Every now and then I take a walk near the US Capitol at lunch. I usually find at least one Identity Evropa sticker on public property and peel it off. It's good exercise, I get fresh air, and also, fuck you, you goddamn Nazis, you can't spell for shit.
posted by duffell at 7:27 AM on March 8, 2019 [3 favorites]
posted by duffell at 7:27 AM on March 8, 2019 [3 favorites]
you goddamn Nazis, you can't spell for shit.
But surprising good at grammar and soup.
posted by peeedro at 9:13 AM on March 8, 2019 [3 favorites]
But surprising good at grammar and soup.
posted by peeedro at 9:13 AM on March 8, 2019 [3 favorites]
What I don't understand is why more people on our side don't become lawyers, join the military, or take over the Democratic party. Are our ideals not worth the dedication? Tolerating intolerance is not an effective strategy.
posted by ambulocetus at 10:27 AM on March 8, 2019 [2 favorites]
posted by ambulocetus at 10:27 AM on March 8, 2019 [2 favorites]
Mod note: This needs to not become a screaming derail about the history of the US military, thanks.
posted by restless_nomad (staff) at 10:53 AM on March 8, 2019 [1 favorite]
posted by restless_nomad (staff) at 10:53 AM on March 8, 2019 [1 favorite]
White nationalists have infiltrated the military, government (no link, just look at the President), and police. These are people whose ideology is a violent one. Police brutality and murder is already out of control. Right wing terrorism is on the rise, including the recent case of a white nationalist Coast Guard member planning domestic terrorism.
These nazis are opportunists, so I'm not surprised that they're trying to infiltrate the major party whose politics most closely aligns with theirs.
posted by runcibleshaw at 11:20 AM on March 8, 2019 [3 favorites]
These nazis are opportunists, so I'm not surprised that they're trying to infiltrate the major party whose politics most closely aligns with theirs.
posted by runcibleshaw at 11:20 AM on March 8, 2019 [3 favorites]
@RoseCityAntifa and @Identify_Evropa are two twitter accounts identifying members of IE.
posted by octobersurprise at 1:34 PM on March 8, 2019 [5 favorites]
posted by octobersurprise at 1:34 PM on March 8, 2019 [5 favorites]
How Many Cops Are Nazis?
posted by the man of twists and turns at 1:55 PM on March 8, 2019 [5 favorites]
posted by the man of twists and turns at 1:55 PM on March 8, 2019 [5 favorites]
Update : Slack records reveal Neo-Nazi organist plans
“Among other things, the chats reveal that IE's secret conference is being held this weekend at Dale Hollow Lake State Resort Park in Kentucky.“ they’ve also been organizing around a mayoral candidate in Philly.
So the Nazis are doing mass flagging of UR’s social media accounts and attacking thier server to try and get this stuff off the internet , although some of it is backfiring cause a lot of them are ...banned from a lot of social media.
posted by The Whelk at 2:18 PM on March 8, 2019 [1 favorite]
“Among other things, the chats reveal that IE's secret conference is being held this weekend at Dale Hollow Lake State Resort Park in Kentucky.“ they’ve also been organizing around a mayoral candidate in Philly.
So the Nazis are doing mass flagging of UR’s social media accounts and attacking thier server to try and get this stuff off the internet , although some of it is backfiring cause a lot of them are ...banned from a lot of social media.
posted by The Whelk at 2:18 PM on March 8, 2019 [1 favorite]
“The leaked chats from members of white supremacist group Identity Evropa show a gross degree of sycophancy for Fox's Tucker Carlson that includes active fantasizing for a Carlson presidential run”
posted by The Whelk at 5:04 PM on March 8, 2019 [3 favorites]
posted by The Whelk at 5:04 PM on March 8, 2019 [3 favorites]
How Many Cops Are Nazis?
As we say in Germany, if there’s a Nazi at the table and 10 other people sitting there talking to him, you got a table with 11 Nazis.
posted by Space Coyote at 6:36 PM on March 8, 2019 [12 favorites]
As we say in Germany, if there’s a Nazi at the table and 10 other people sitting there talking to him, you got a table with 11 Nazis.
posted by Space Coyote at 6:36 PM on March 8, 2019 [12 favorites]
"#BREAKING: After Unicorn Riot reports leaked troves of internal records from the neo-Nazi group Identity Evropa, fascist leader Patrick Casey has announced that the group “is no more” and “IE operations will cease forever”.
Casey is attempting to pivot into re-branding a new neo-Nazi group called ‘AIM’ or ‘American Identitarian Movement’.
The AIM acronym is already taken by the American Indian Movement, known for its historic role in indigenous resistance across North America."
thread
posted by The Whelk at 10:24 PM on March 8, 2019 [3 favorites]
Casey is attempting to pivot into re-branding a new neo-Nazi group called ‘AIM’ or ‘American Identitarian Movement’.
The AIM acronym is already taken by the American Indian Movement, known for its historic role in indigenous resistance across North America."
thread
posted by The Whelk at 10:24 PM on March 8, 2019 [3 favorites]
Casey is attempting to pivot into re-branding a new neo-Nazi group called ‘AIM’ or ‘American Identitarian Movement’.
The AIM acronym is already taken by the American Indian Movement, known for its historic role in indigenous resistance across North America."
Fuck a bunch of Nazis but I guess this is pretty on brand for these a-holes. How is this significantly different from the Christian Identity Movement?
posted by ActingTheGoat at 11:53 PM on March 8, 2019 [1 favorite]
The AIM acronym is already taken by the American Indian Movement, known for its historic role in indigenous resistance across North America."
Fuck a bunch of Nazis but I guess this is pretty on brand for these a-holes. How is this significantly different from the Christian Identity Movement?
posted by ActingTheGoat at 11:53 PM on March 8, 2019 [1 favorite]
Who knew that the specter of Nazi Clowns would be so simultaneously terrifying and hilarious
Well...everyone, I guess? 'Nazi Clowns' is pretty on the nose. Does what it says on the tin and everything.
posted by schadenfrau at 6:11 AM on March 9, 2019 [2 favorites]
Well...everyone, I guess? 'Nazi Clowns' is pretty on the nose. Does what it says on the tin and everything.
posted by schadenfrau at 6:11 AM on March 9, 2019 [2 favorites]
I just realized not everyone uses "clowns" as a synonym for "incompetents," but at this point I'm also expecting literal Nazi Clowns at any moment so I suspect this will be an evergreen comment anyway
posted by schadenfrau at 6:28 AM on March 9, 2019 [2 favorites]
posted by schadenfrau at 6:28 AM on March 9, 2019 [2 favorites]
Casey is attempting to pivot into re-branding a new neo-Nazi group called ‘AIM’ or ‘American Identitarian Movement’.
The youtube channel Innuendo Studios that makes videos on gamergate and the alt-right has a video on white fascism that pretty much predicts how this played out:
The youtube channel Innuendo Studios that makes videos on gamergate and the alt-right has a video on white fascism that pretty much predicts how this played out:
The history of fascism is one of atrocity, followed by failure, followed by disgrace so modern fascists operate in a cycle of constant reinvention as they try to distance themselves from the movements that came before. The ideology doesn't change but the rhetoric does, primarily by stealing rhetoric from the left because it's flatly more popular. White nationalists calling themselves "identitarians" is an appropriation of progressive identity politics. The rhetoric of white power is an intentional bastardization of black power movements... This appropriation of rhetoric is how each generation of fascists rebrands itself, "We're not like those fascists who got hanged for what they did, we're young hip and successful. Come back baby, it'll be different this time."posted by peeedro at 8:30 AM on March 9, 2019 [5 favorites]
That video was interesting but I disagree with the fundamental approach of steering away from "the envisioning of storm troopers", and getting into all sorts of academic details while still not mentioning what fasces are and how they relate anyways.
They're being so incredibly blatant about the regular old violent dystopian storm trooper stuff... Trump proposing to round up immigrants by the tens of millions and put them in camps, to round up undesirables and remove them from society and put them... somewhere... on the other side of the border, the actual cover story for the Holocaust; citing FDR's wartime executive orders for rounding up Asian-Americans as justification after Obama using EOs for things like reshuffling prosecution priorities at the DoJ was decried regularly as tyranny on the right for years; banning Muslims when banning Jews would unambiguously allude to Nazism; making lists of Enemies of the People involving lots of journalists; "military eminent domain"...
We should not be skipping over directly comparing our fascists to Nazis and other totalitarians because of some rhetorical premise that it would be patently absurd and pejorative to make such a comparison, because it isn't. We do not need to detour into explaining what fascism is and why it's bad historically, at least not first before making the comparison, as Innuendo Studios seems to regard as still necessary.
posted by XMLicious at 12:28 PM on March 9, 2019 [1 favorite]
They're being so incredibly blatant about the regular old violent dystopian storm trooper stuff... Trump proposing to round up immigrants by the tens of millions and put them in camps, to round up undesirables and remove them from society and put them... somewhere... on the other side of the border, the actual cover story for the Holocaust; citing FDR's wartime executive orders for rounding up Asian-Americans as justification after Obama using EOs for things like reshuffling prosecution priorities at the DoJ was decried regularly as tyranny on the right for years; banning Muslims when banning Jews would unambiguously allude to Nazism; making lists of Enemies of the People involving lots of journalists; "military eminent domain"...
We should not be skipping over directly comparing our fascists to Nazis and other totalitarians because of some rhetorical premise that it would be patently absurd and pejorative to make such a comparison, because it isn't. We do not need to detour into explaining what fascism is and why it's bad historically, at least not first before making the comparison, as Innuendo Studios seems to regard as still necessary.
posted by XMLicious at 12:28 PM on March 9, 2019 [1 favorite]
Meet Bennett Bressman, field director for Nebraska Governor Ricketts' successful 2018 reelection campaign.
posted by peeedro at 9:49 AM on March 11, 2019 [1 favorite]
posted by peeedro at 9:49 AM on March 11, 2019 [1 favorite]
Exclusive: 7 U.S. Military Members Identified As Part Of White Nationalist Group
posted by The Whelk at 10:34 PM on March 17, 2019 [1 favorite]
posted by The Whelk at 10:34 PM on March 17, 2019 [1 favorite]
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posted by Nelson at 9:25 AM on March 7, 2019 [7 favorites]