Von Brunn may have been the only one who pulled the trigger, but the well of his nauseating hate contains the droplets of many others, some not so far away...
The Age Newspaper reports:
"A white supremacist accused of gunning down a black security guard in Washington targeted Australia in hate writings and had links with an Adelaide-based group that denies the Holocaust. James von Brunn has been charged with murder after allegedly walking into the Holocaust museum in Washington DC on Wednesday and shooting dead the security guard.... The 88-year-old war veteran once wrote in a book he penned that Australia had been "over-run by hordes of non-Whites and mongrels". Von Brunn also had links to the Adelaide Institute formed by Holocaust denier Frederick Toben, once convicted and jailed in Germany under the country's Holocaust laws for "defaming the dead".... In his book, Kill the Best Gentiles!, von Brunn wrote: "Europe, former fortress of the West, is now overrun by hordes of non-Whites and mongrels. The same is true of Australia and Canada."... Toben, the Adelaide Institute's founder, is currently appealing a three-month jail sentence for contempt of court. He was sentenced in the Federal Court in Adelaide last month for refusing to remove Holocaust revisionary material from the group's website."
Toben (a former teacher) actually refutes that he is a holocaust denier, but even a cursory look at his position makes that refutation untenable. If he is claiming that six million Jews were not in fact murdered by the Nazis, then by definition he is in the business of denial. The Adelaide Institute describes Von Brunn's actions as "unfortunate".
Make of that what you will.
Von Brunn's own son states "For the extremists who believe my father is a hero: it is imperative you understand what he did was an act of cowardice...To physically force your beliefs onto others with violence is not brave, but bullying. Doing so only serves to prove how weak those beliefs are. It is simply desperation, reminiscent of a temper tantrum when a child cannot get his way"
Would that the father had heeded the son.
To a much lesser extent, the denialism of Von Brunn as one of theirs by the right mirrors the Holocaust denialism. I suppose to be an extremist at either end you would have to give short shrift to reality. Once you get toward the fringes, these characters do seem to meld a bit. The argument that he was a lefty might have more heft, though, if he had been frequenting animal liberation or extreme environmental sites rather than the ones he has been reported to have been affiliated with. The problem with being a liberal is the tendency to actually consider insane arguments like "Von Brunn is left wing."
ReplyDeleteI didn't realize you had groups in Australia denying the Holocaust as well. No surprise that there are anti-Semites alive and well in all places. My "favorites" are the "Christians" who love the Jews only because they want to see them all die as part of God's plan.
Very nice site here, QuietMagpie.
ex DLB,
ReplyDeleteAustralia has had some tiny fringe groups who are racist and/or religious fanatics. They represent and consist of no-one but a handful of bizarre individuals, but they cast a long shadow in an otherwise peaceful land. That said.. no way would something like the KKK, for example, be allowed to openly operate here. They'd be raided, disarmed, and prosecuted in a heartbeat. Or if they weren't, the press would eat the authorities alive for failing to act.
The conservatives with whom we often cross swords are wrong to be defensive about calling Von Brunn "far Right".
Von Brunn exhibited exactly the same patterns of hate as the Nazis, who were fascists, ergo Von Brunn is of the extreme Right.
Me or anyone saying that is NOT an assault on American conservatism. Indeed conservatives should be in our camp on this. Fascism is an anathema to us all.
I don't truck with the far Left either, and yes the far Left is just as capable of producing murderers, mass murderers, despots and terrorists (Red Army, Shining Path, Khmer Rouge... etc.)
However Von Brunn is not a "Christian-hating socialist". THAT is precisely the same opportunism and falsification that some conservatives are accusing their ideological opponents of.
They are simultaneously insisting that he acted alone and "oh but" he is also a Lefty, to which I say "well was he acting alone or wasn't he? Which is it?"
I like your last comment. Ironic that we godless heathens are actually often the only ones who are pressing 'Christian' ideals in arguing with hawkish twits.
Thanks for coming by.
As an aside, it is interesting to note that Frederick Tobin, founder of the Adelaide Institute is a known associate of holocaust denier Hutton Gibson, father of Mel Gibson.
ReplyDeleteI'm not sure how I feel about your government being so proactive in dealing with the fringe groups on your soil, quietmagpie (that's really disconcerting, by the way. I know that it's probably not your real name but can I still call you VZ? Just asking).
ReplyDeleteI suppose I just don't like any government taking any group down that hasn't done anything dangerous or illegal to date. I know that this kind of freedom brings with it some inherent risks but I'm OK with that as long as I can live in a free society with full civil rights.
Sure JBW, you can call me VZ.
ReplyDeleteIt beats hell out of "liberal wise-ass" and "secular collectivist" etc.
I get your viewpoint there, but I guess we don't start from some atavistic fear that we are a heartbeat away from tyranny.
Perhaps it's because we never had a revolution.
All we had to do is survive being at 'the ends of the Earth' (where it was till the 20th century), in a sometimes harsh land.
This is partly why I'm so acid on rhetoric like "the price of liberty is endless vigilance".
No-one I grew up with felt that is what freedom is. We thought freedom was "not being constantly afraid someone wants to kill you".
I still think that.
What we do fear is that we'll import someone else's war.
If xenophobia is to some extent universal, then that's how our version of it works: we don't want someone else's problem.
There could be a sign up at the immigration counter: "dump your ethnic cleansing, holocausts, 100 year grudges, jihads and schisms before proceeding past this point. You're in Australia now. Have a BBQ and chill out.".
Legally speaking, you can get sued for defamation. Or for threatening behaviour.
If some group is creating a climate of hate against another group then I want the spotlight on them and have the law enforce our feeling that this is not how we want to live. You may or may not recall that I pasted Grace over her putting up pictures of abortionists and then hoping God would 'do something' about them, on the grounds that it was incitement.
If this was all about individuals... and I (for example) spun lies to you that gave you homicidal feelings about someone else, then that other person has every right to feel wronged and get legal justice.