This is as much a bit of a PSA to Anti-Racist Canada's allies as it is a spotlight on Islamophobic bigots.
I'm going to post the screen shot of a fake Facebook group:
Whoever created this group has no affiliation with anti-fascists in the city of Calgary. It is in fact one of a number of fake sites created (we know of ones in British Columbia, Edmonton, and two additional fake page in Calgary) over the past couple of weeks. The consensus amongst activists is that these sites are intended to both gather intelligence on anti-fascist supporters as well as to smear the anti-fascist movement:
"Naed Nayr's" profile photo is a symbol used by the ridiculously named Canadian Combat Coalition, a group (such as it is) affiliated with WCAI Canada. The head of the group was once a member of the Soldiers of Odin but, as has been happening frequently during the past several months, broke (or was kicked out, depending on whom one believes) and started his own hate group.
The fake Calgary antifa group was taken down by Facebook, but not before images such as this were posted to the site and disseminated in Islamophobic and racist circles:
While anti-fascists have been wary of such disinformation campaigns, our opposition is far more naive it seems, as evidenced by Meir Weinstein who appears to accept without question a tongue-in-cheek article making fun of the idea that George Soros is cutting checks for every leftist protester who is able to participate in a drum circle:
There has been an effort to push back against this campaign, though the effort is more focused on keeping anti-fascists in the loop since the bigots tend to believe whatever confirms their biases anyways:
Again, the consensus is that Pegida Canada Watch is on the right track:
The fragmenting of the SoO has been pretty ugly (CBC has even taken up the story). The idea that some elements within the Islamophobic movement who are unhappy with the decision by the SoO to divorce it's self from the founding Finnish chapter are now engaged in a disinformation campaign to discredit the SoO by associating the membership with the hated antifa isn't exactly far fetched.
Considering this additional information, it isn't far fetched to suggest that this effort is targeting other Islamophobes while also trying to dig up information on our side:
Meet Karen Forsyth. And I do mean meet her because for a lot of anti-fascist activists, her friend request on Facebook was the first time anyone had ever heard of her. Her Facebook profile seems to be a very recent creation, but she has been busy adding people she thinks are antifa supporters as friends.... or at least trying to add them. She is also associated with one of the fake Edmonton anti-fascist groups and was organizing a rally to oppose a KKK march in the city, though the page announcing the KKK march was almost as recent a creation as Ms. Forsyth's profile and no one has ever heard of a Klan group in Edmonton. Not this blog and not any of the activists who we are in contact with.
Seems like we've heard this somewhere before:
Oh, right.
Now, we don't know who exactly is responsible for what appears to be a pretty transparent sock puppet, but it looks like our side isn't the only group being targeted:
We've profiled Doerksen and his United Patriots of Canada in the past. He has had a number of rather acrimonious break-ups with former Islamophobic allies such as PEGIDA Canada and Canadian's United 4 Canada. Joey DeLuca and the rest of WCAI used to get along really well with Doerksen, however is seems pretty clear that this relationship has soured based on DeLuca's "liking" of the scathing commentary and fellow WCAI member "Stu Gotz's" own responses.
Coincidentally, this exchange started being disseminated widely around the same time:
The target of Doerksen's violent threats is Ms. Karen Forsyth.
Now, if this true then Doerksen has entered into overt criminal behavior that could result in him getting into a heap of trouble. But there are reasons to be somewhat skeptical of this exchange. First, the grammar, spelling, punctuation, and capitalization is better than I've ever seen resulting from Doerksen's posts. Second, there's a chance that he might not even be capable of accessing his profile is this is to be believed:
Now, is it possible that Doerksen is responsible for those messages? Sure. I for one didn't find a fake profile when I looked online, though it could have been taken down before we came across the exchange. But the folks here seem to think that the messages are part of a campaign to discredit Doerksen in the Islamophobia movement in Canada, and their suspects aren't on our side.
Seems like this is all about a clash of egos, and people are becoming a bit nervous about where it all might end:
A shame Mr. Jeffeson isn't as concerned about the threats being leveled at Muslim-Canadians and members of the federal and some provincial governments, but that sort of empathy might be a bit much.
I believed it was a matter of time before these groups started turning on one another. Because of the numbers that these groups have attracted, the founders (many of whom lead rather nondescript and one might add mundane lives otherwise) have had had their egos inflated to the point they believe that they are part of a larger, perhaps global, initiative. And when those egos come into contact with other egos, there is an inevitable clash as each person tries to protect and nurture their own personal fiefdoms. Add to the mix a membership of conspiracy theorists, racists, and gullible people (and it isn't unusual to see all of these characteristics in single people) who often appear to be lacking of any social skills but who are empowered by the medium they are using, well, things can, and appear to be getting, pretty nasty.
I don't think we'll be seeing the end of this infighting. If anything, it is likely to get worse.
I'm going to post the screen shot of a fake Facebook group:
Whoever created this group has no affiliation with anti-fascists in the city of Calgary. It is in fact one of a number of fake sites created (we know of ones in British Columbia, Edmonton, and two additional fake page in Calgary) over the past couple of weeks. The consensus amongst activists is that these sites are intended to both gather intelligence on anti-fascist supporters as well as to smear the anti-fascist movement:
"Naed Nayr's" profile photo is a symbol used by the ridiculously named Canadian Combat Coalition, a group (such as it is) affiliated with WCAI Canada. The head of the group was once a member of the Soldiers of Odin but, as has been happening frequently during the past several months, broke (or was kicked out, depending on whom one believes) and started his own hate group.
The fake Calgary antifa group was taken down by Facebook, but not before images such as this were posted to the site and disseminated in Islamophobic and racist circles:
While anti-fascists have been wary of such disinformation campaigns, our opposition is far more naive it seems, as evidenced by Meir Weinstein who appears to accept without question a tongue-in-cheek article making fun of the idea that George Soros is cutting checks for every leftist protester who is able to participate in a drum circle:
There has been an effort to push back against this campaign, though the effort is more focused on keeping anti-fascists in the loop since the bigots tend to believe whatever confirms their biases anyways:
Again, the consensus is that Pegida Canada Watch is on the right track:
The fragmenting of the SoO has been pretty ugly (CBC has even taken up the story). The idea that some elements within the Islamophobic movement who are unhappy with the decision by the SoO to divorce it's self from the founding Finnish chapter are now engaged in a disinformation campaign to discredit the SoO by associating the membership with the hated antifa isn't exactly far fetched.
Considering this additional information, it isn't far fetched to suggest that this effort is targeting other Islamophobes while also trying to dig up information on our side:
Meet Karen Forsyth. And I do mean meet her because for a lot of anti-fascist activists, her friend request on Facebook was the first time anyone had ever heard of her. Her Facebook profile seems to be a very recent creation, but she has been busy adding people she thinks are antifa supporters as friends.... or at least trying to add them. She is also associated with one of the fake Edmonton anti-fascist groups and was organizing a rally to oppose a KKK march in the city, though the page announcing the KKK march was almost as recent a creation as Ms. Forsyth's profile and no one has ever heard of a Klan group in Edmonton. Not this blog and not any of the activists who we are in contact with.
Seems like we've heard this somewhere before:
Oh, right.
Now, we don't know who exactly is responsible for what appears to be a pretty transparent sock puppet, but it looks like our side isn't the only group being targeted:
We've profiled Doerksen and his United Patriots of Canada in the past. He has had a number of rather acrimonious break-ups with former Islamophobic allies such as PEGIDA Canada and Canadian's United 4 Canada. Joey DeLuca and the rest of WCAI used to get along really well with Doerksen, however is seems pretty clear that this relationship has soured based on DeLuca's "liking" of the scathing commentary and fellow WCAI member "Stu Gotz's" own responses.
Coincidentally, this exchange started being disseminated widely around the same time:
The target of Doerksen's violent threats is Ms. Karen Forsyth.
Now, if this true then Doerksen has entered into overt criminal behavior that could result in him getting into a heap of trouble. But there are reasons to be somewhat skeptical of this exchange. First, the grammar, spelling, punctuation, and capitalization is better than I've ever seen resulting from Doerksen's posts. Second, there's a chance that he might not even be capable of accessing his profile is this is to be believed:
Now, is it possible that Doerksen is responsible for those messages? Sure. I for one didn't find a fake profile when I looked online, though it could have been taken down before we came across the exchange. But the folks here seem to think that the messages are part of a campaign to discredit Doerksen in the Islamophobia movement in Canada, and their suspects aren't on our side.
Seems like this is all about a clash of egos, and people are becoming a bit nervous about where it all might end:
A shame Mr. Jeffeson isn't as concerned about the threats being leveled at Muslim-Canadians and members of the federal and some provincial governments, but that sort of empathy might be a bit much.
I believed it was a matter of time before these groups started turning on one another. Because of the numbers that these groups have attracted, the founders (many of whom lead rather nondescript and one might add mundane lives otherwise) have had had their egos inflated to the point they believe that they are part of a larger, perhaps global, initiative. And when those egos come into contact with other egos, there is an inevitable clash as each person tries to protect and nurture their own personal fiefdoms. Add to the mix a membership of conspiracy theorists, racists, and gullible people (and it isn't unusual to see all of these characteristics in single people) who often appear to be lacking of any social skills but who are empowered by the medium they are using, well, things can, and appear to be getting, pretty nasty.
I don't think we'll be seeing the end of this infighting. If anything, it is likely to get worse.
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