Tag: white supremacy groups

Researcher who tracks racist far-right groups fears the possibility of a ‘post-democratic’ society in America’

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During the Trump era, researcher Emily Gorcenski has been carefully tracking far-right extremist groups — including the Proud Boys. Gorcenski discussed her findings in an interview with The Guardian, and they are incredibly disturbing.

The Guardian’s Sam Levin explains, “Using court files and other public records, the anti-fascist researcher has catalogued hundreds of criminal cases, connected the dots of dangerous neo-Nazi networks, and revealed links that journalists and authorities have missed. These days, it can be difficult to keep up. Far-right violence has escalated dramatically under Trump, who has ignored his own government’s domestic terrorism warnings and encouraged vigilante violence against leftists.”

Here’s the ironic part. Fearing for her safety, Gorcenski has left the United States and relocated to Berlin, Germany — a city that was overtaken by fascists during the 1930s. But in 2020, ironically, Gorcenski feels safer in Germany than she does in the United States. Continue reading.

White supremacy groups are hoping to leverage George Floyd’s death into their longed-for ‘race war’

AlterNet logoThe protests that have spread across the nation in the wake of the murder of George Floyd have attracted a diverse group of supporters that go beyond local Black communities and national organizations. At events in Washington, New York, Minneapolis, and elsewhere, community activists have been joined by allies, by groups supporting Latinos, Indian groups, and even groups of Mennonite farmers speaking out in support and showing up for protests.

But, with dozens of buildings burned and Donald Trump preparing to bring in the military, there’s a growing sense that the violence in many cases isn’t originating from within the local Black community. In multiple instances, there have been incidents that seemed to spring up on the periphery of peaceful protests, leading to violent confrontations and property destruction. And increasingly, there are reports that these events are not originating organically from the protests or from confrontations between protesters and the police. There is a very real feeling that white supremacists are using this moment to create incidents designed to justify still more violence and suppression.

With dozens of protests across the nation, not every event is the same. For example, it’s not hard to see what sparked this incident Atlanta, where a police officer slams a bicycle into a Black woman for having the audacity to wave a finger at him while saying “Don’t touch me.” It’s clear that the violence in this particular moment originated direct from the police. Continue reading.