"Hammerskin Nation"?!
I think that's the odd one out - it's not a Neo-Nazi group, it's a gay fetish group!
Wikileaks is in the process of making a cache of documents and files from eleven different neo-Nazi organisations readable, and readily available, online. The membership records and private messages are currently being formatted to make them easy for non-techies to read and will be released on the Wikileaks site shortly. The …
Freedom of speech and right to privacy are two different amendments. A leaker/publisher has the right to free speech and a citizen has a right to privacy. But the courts protect civil speech over a right to privacy. It's not really a privacy issue-- it would be libel. If the citizen objects, privacy will not help. The first defence for libel is the truth. So if the leaker has proof that said citizen is a member of such group, then it's not libel. Privacy is not an issue here.
I don't mind Wikileaks being used to make information available that the powerful don't want known. But... is this what they're doing?
Helping the establishment -- the powerful -- harass tiny and powerless groups of people hated by the establishment... this all seems rather like the SA in Nazi Germany. Who can doubt that Jews would be the victim of this sort of thing, in another age; "Wikileaks publishes lists of influential Jews..."?
We've been in no manner of danger from a Nazi takeover since 1945. Most of these groups are tiny in numbers. Indeed there have been cases of left-wing groups ORGANIZING 'nazi' groups, based around some nut, just to scare people into passing "anti-Nazi" legislation that stifles free speech.
People talk about hate; well, you have to hate people quite a lot to get them sacked from their jobs for their politics.
Let's presume all of these people are Nazis (we have only the word of their enemies for it). So? What do we care? If these people want to wear jackboots at the weekend, why not let them? What consenting adults do in the privacy of their Fuhrer-bunkers is their business, surely? (Max Mosley could advise, I'm sure) Arranging for them to be sacked for their politics, or their friends, is, well, Nazi.
Live and let live.
*** "Indeed there have been cases of left-wing groups ORGANIZING 'nazi' groups, based around some nut, just to scare people into passing "anti-Nazi" legislation that stifles free speech." ***
Citation required please. And i do not mean a white power website either.
Just what I said above about the free speech nuts.
Just because the nazi's were defeated does not mean we should be lax. Never again should scum like that come to power ever.
You plead to live and let live, which is all very saintly and righteous and all (and I mean that without sarcasm) but the problem is that your righteousness will not be returned by the average neo-Nazi. These people aren't generally harmless loons, dressing up as Goering at the weekend; they hanker after the days when fascism could form an international Axis and prosecute warfare and genocide. I don't see that any political group should be allowed to plot in private. If individuals conceal themselves in a job where extreme political views represent a breakdown of trust with their employer, then they should be dismissed. In the UK at least, the employer would have to be on secure ground in doing so. Employment tribunals here are also open to neo-Nazis, a freedom that people fought and died for in the last century.
I can't help but feel that they're stepping over a line here. As long as these people don't harm anyone, its their own business what forum or organisation they belong to.
Alternatively, if they are going to persist with this, I hope that wikileaks will also put the same effort into exposing left wing hate groups.
Everyone has the same right to privacy, even scumbags.
However, I don't read Wikileaks much, so I can't be certain that the content on there isn't actually balanced, and it's just that media outlets pick up on the exposures of right-wing groups, so that's what we hear about coming from the site. Did that make any sense at all? I need another cider.
And lots of gullible sods sucking it right up, from the sounds of it. Nazis always try to justify their crimes by claiming they are necessary under the pressure of an external threat, DUH, did you learn NOTHING from history?
So come on then, let's have it: WHAT fucking "left wing hate groups"?
We have had trial after trial after trial of neo-nazis, in particular BNP members, going through our courts for being in posession of weapons and bomb-making chemicals and crude home made explosives. David Copeland the nail bomber? That guy caught at a train station just the other month with tennis-ball bombs? The guy down in the west country with enough barrels of chemicals to annihilate a small city? There are more, many many more of them, it's easy enough to google if you want so I won't bother compiling an exahaustive list here; but the point is: there is no conspiracy mongering here, no rumours or paranoia, we have real hard facts proven in a court of law and the convictions to go with them.
But where are the corresponding trials of "left wing hate groups"?
There aren't any.
That's because there is no such thing. It is a pure bald-faced lie. There aren't any fucking communist cells running around killing people or blowing things up. There's maybe half-a-dozen arseholes from the ALF who firebomb things now and again and that is IT for anything that can remotely be called left-wing violence in this country.
It is absolutely bog-standard nazi strategy to lie and manufacture a supposed threat. You have seen it time and again in history; they even bloody admitted it for crying out loud, there's that faomous quote from Goebbels about how the population can always be led to war.
You have more than enough evidence to NOT give the nazis the benefit of the doubt over this one. It is a complete fantasy, a bald-faced lie, utterly unrelated to anything in reality.
So come on then, let's have it: WHAT fucking "left wing hate groups"? If you can't name them and come up with the same kind of proof, then maybe you shouldn't just gullibly believe whatever you're told by a bunch of sociopathic thugs and murderers, maybe?
"It is absolutely bog-standard nazi strategy to lie and manufacture a supposed threat. You have seen it time and again in history; they even bloody admitted it for crying out loud, there's that faomous quote from Goebbels about how the population can always be led to war."
Methinks you are being a little economic with history here, as the majority of the terror groups based in Europe who actually blew people up and fired guns at people over the past 50 years were left-wing. The Red Army Faction (RAF), Baader-Meinhof, ETA, PIRA, CIRA, RIRA, INLA, INRA, The Red Brigades, FRC (Italy), Epanastatikos Agonas (Greece), ELF (UK), The Angry Brigade (UK), Red Terror (Spain), among many others. I think little old Belgium had their own left-wing terror group at one time, which says a lot.
The quote is actually from Herman Goering at the Nuremberg trials
"Of course the people don't want war. But after all, it's the leaders of the country who determine the policy, and it's always a simple matter to drag the people along whether it's a democracy, a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism, and exposing the country to greater danger."
NuLabour to a T, I reckon.
Makes you wonder if 911 was just an excuse, doesn't it?
Work it out for yourself.
Extreme politics, and that is what it is, gets extreme views.
Sinn Fein, extreme views backed up by gun law. Now power sharer, work that one out. Nazi or communist, which one truly is the worst.
Next week, one slightly fire damaged Rolls Royce for sale, and stop whinging, it did used to be yours, but now it belongs to the state.
Extremist views: Self Determination for the Irish People.
Equality for Irish People.
Extreme to say the least.........
That's the thing about democracy.... everyone gets a vote. Even people you don't like and don't agree with.
Sinn Fein have never been a secret organisation
Yes, but didn't they have a secret army that conducted freedom-fighter acts against civilians? Some of those acts could be considered extreme surely?
I don't think there are many plaudits to be had from being a member of the IRA, but I suspect there are even less so for the British government that created and perpetuated the situation that forced some Irish people to take up arms against their oppressors.
Racism is an easy target. Woopie-dingle. All this hoopla does is cloud our vision and thus we
miss the Nazi political "leaders" within current world government. These are the real sleeper cells. Calling themselves socialists abroad or democrats in the US. Those that will save us
from ourselves are always leaving out one disease, themselves.
Start reading about the great war... WWI and after, till about 1946. Then from there follow the
success to the 1990's. Are we better off?
echoing some of the comments here, I start to get a little uneasy at the singling out of the shaved headed simians. We don't seem to get the same enthusiasm for lists of other fanatical forum members such as the extreme left. animal rights, religious fundies, or our old frinds at the scientologists.
don't get me wrong, the BNP sought to get elected so should be dragged into the light but the nutters on the right seem to be the only ones targetted in this way. I'd like to see all nutters exposed
Wikileaks is the conduct, and as such they don't judge or at least claim they don't judge the content except for the criteria on their website that deals with disclosing stuff, not caring about the source, or the impact. This makes wikileaks in fact quite a dangerous tool, but IMO a useful tool. They claim they try and verify genuity, but they could in fact unwittingly end up publishing damning lies.
As for the ethics of ``exposing'' right-wing extremists, what consenting adults do in their Führer-bunkers is only up to them as long as what happens there, stays there. This tends to not be the case for these groups.
But all the same, if you find member lists of various militant left wing organisations, then hand them to wikileaks, if you feel the public good is served by doing so. I think that overall you would be more likely to serve our good friends the government, but since I have no such information to leak, it's not my judgement call to make.
No affiliation, AFAIK, IANAL, TINLA, YMMV, prohibited where void, batteries not included, etc. etc. etc.
It seems to be treading an awfully fine line here. Yes, what happened under the Nazi in Europe was terrible and should never be allowed to happen. But then you don't see people frothing at the mouth over, say, Christians after the crusades, or indeed the British when we were in our more "exhuberant" colonial days, or the catholics after the inquisition?
Well you do, but not on this scale. All I'm trying to say is, it's a fine line to single out one group for hostility like this, especially when if you think about it, it makes you no better than the people you are accusing, since by singling them out for hatred, you are infact a member of a hate group yourself, hating somebody for their beliefs which is supposedly what you're against.
I'm no psychologist so I can't explain it in proper flowery terms, but I think the above makes my point?
that few people are donning their armour and heading towards Jerusalem on horseback to kick those Muslims out of the Holy City, and neither do you see many people planning to take back India, Pakistan, and assorted bits of Africa. In other words, neither movement has a greater than microscopical presence in the current time. And funnily enough, if there were such movements, you would see a large overlap with the Neo-Nazis, who _do_ have a visible (if not exactly threateningly credible) presence.
And you seem to be saying that atrocities commited by some nation in the (far) past would still reflect on their current judgment of atrocities in the not so far past by others. Well, disband those war crimes courts then, because every nation involved has done despicable things at some time.
First off, if there was actually some danger of a resurgence in popularity of the crusader party, or the catholic church proposing a return to the inquisition and witch-burnings, I think people would be up in arms about it. But that's not remotely likely; those things are part of ancient history. Fascism on the other hand is present here and now, has been a significant force that has caused massive harm in the very recent past, and is actively represented and promulgated by current political formations which have been enjoying some resurgence of popularity recently. So it's perfectly reasonable for people to be more concerned with something that is a present threat rather than worrying over ancient historical injustices.
Secondly, and speaking only for myself now, you've totally misunderstood the objection to these groups. I don't hate them for "hating people for their beliefs": I hate them for hating people because of unalterable not-voluntarily-chosen aspects of their genetics and descendency. I think it's often perfectly reasonable to hate people for their beliefs, since those beliefs can quite easily be objectionable, offensive, unreasonable, irrational, immoral, repugnant and/or actually harmful if ever put into practice. I think it's an entirely different thing to hate people for things they didn't chose about themselves.
I think the criteria should probably be something along the lines of;
Has this political view ever resulted in tyranny, war, or mass murder?
Which pretty much leaves out non political views (so 'Jewishness' won't get outed Mr Anon Coward)
The greens probably escape (although I will admit not having real light bulbs does smack of tyranny)
But the Nazis, and the Communists both get their lists published.
Personally I'd also out all and any religious groups on the arbitrary basis that I'm not a fan of religion, but I can't come up with an objective justification, other than perhaps the Scientologists on the basis of attempts at tyranny, if you count hundreds of nutjob lawyers attempting to stifle debate and criticism as tyranny.
BNP - well that was just funny.
Well, Wikileaks have managed, in my eyes, to reduce themselves from an interesting source of info about large scale frauds, deceptions, and general things the public should be knowing about to the new Redwatch, which was a group of hard right fanatics that concentrated on outing and identifying far left individuals and politicians (significant people, in the main).
Wikileaks has actually managed to break the Human Rights articles that are meant to provide protection to everyone, thus showing themselves to have a significant agenda, and applying the age old "Everyone has their rights. Except you, because we don't think you should have any" that gave rise to the worst of the evils committed throughout history. This means I can never take them seriously, as they've shown affiliation with an extremist segment (hard left), and have emulated the behaviour of another much reviled extremist group (Redwatch).
If someone is doing something contrary to the law, you use the law to counter them. If they get off on a technicality, you can expose them (which a lot of Wikileaks past 'outings' have done).
Turning round and exposing personal information about people who may have particular beliefs, but don't act on them (due to law) to counter extremists (who all it takes are one or two who will act) is making a far, far larger problem than already exists. This isn't in the public interest, it's forcing the hard right to become more active. It also polarises some of the 'middle ground' who really don't care about the issue to actively support the offended side (i.e the hard right).
The stupidity of this just never ceases to amaze me. Do wikileaks not think beyond their own bloated egos and political agenda to see what this is likely to stoke up? Idiots.
You hypocrite. You're an apologist. You're trying to mitigate what Redwatch does by suggesting that it's somehow to some extent justified if the people involved are "significant".
That is bullshit of course. This is a bloody democracy and we have the right to our own beliefs and to engage in political action. Redwatch is an attempt to prevent people from exercising their democratic rights by intimidation. This democratic right is an absolute; it's not something that you can take away from people because you think they are "significant", by which you can only possibly mean that their engagement in political action is somehow *effective*. So, you believe that people's democractic right to involvement in the political life of their society extends only as far as the point when they actually start to *exercise* it, and the minute they actually *do* something it can be taken away again? Clearly, you are not a supporter of democracy yourself.
What wikileaks does or does not do is utterly irrelevant in this context, because two wrongs never make a right. This is a second attempt by you to mitigate what Redwatch does by the invalid argument that "other people do it too".
And, although it is beside the point, and nobody's rights to political engagement may be denied, regardless of whether or not someone thinks them "significant", I'd just like to point out another thing: That's a lie. There's nothing "significant" about the people who Redwatch targets, and I know that, because I AM ONE AND I'M NOBODY.
Fire up your TOR (see? A legitimate use for anonymity online!) and go here:
http://www.aryanunity.com/redwatchonline/eastanglia.html
Scroll down. See all the photographs of random stop the war demonstrations or peaceful anti-captitalism protests. Ordinary people, standing around holding posters and signs, demonstrating, exercising their ordinary everyday right to be involved in the political life of their society.
This is what the BNP believes should be stopped. Because they are believers in dictatorship and lovers of tyranny. Authoritarian absolutists who realise that they'll never succeed in winning sufficient converts to their vicious hate-filled creed by persuasion since it is repugnant, yet rather than realise how wrong they are they just become bitter and twisted and come to believe that since democracy does not agree with them it is democracy that is wrong.
'Never again should scum like that come to power ever.'
Funny that, i thought exactly the same about the lot that are in power at the moment.
What i can't understand is that left-wing socialist authoritarianism seems to be OK, but right wing national socialist authoritarianism is not.
I don't know where you are but, in the UK, our formerly "left of centre" party has veered severely to the right over the last decade. To keep friends with Rupert Murdoch, they decided to become anti union, anti immigrant, anti refugee and anti public ownership. They decided to become pro prison, pro ID cards, pro CCTV, pro privitisation and pro US republican.
Once, the UK had a left (Labour), centre (Liberal) and right (Conservative). Now we have a Centre (LibDem), right (Labour) and vanishing into the distance (Conservative).
The reason more right wing stuff is revealed is that this part of politics is more active. Our political system has become unbalanced. Even the word "liberal" which means moderate and generous is now frequently used in the bizzare US context of meaning extreme left wing.
In a world where we are exposed to a constant stream of PR bullshit, disinformation, and government secrecy Wikileaks stands out like a shining beacon where whistle-blowers and disaffected insiders can lodge information that is considered too sensitive for the ordinary mortals who, as usual, are the guys who have to pick up the tab.
You would certainly want to know if your neighbour was a paedophile, so why wouldn't you want to know if he was a murdering, racist psychopath who dreams of stuffing your family into a gas chamber and incinerating their remains.
Knowledge macht frei. Long live Wikileaks.
These people aren't being outed for their views, as such, they are being outed for their participation in groups intended to promote and, most importantly, realise those views.
I couldn't care less if someone wears swastika pajamas to bed, and prays to Hitler for guidance, if they do it quietly at home. Getting together with a like minded bunch of would be stormtroopers is a fish of a different odour, however.
I am please to read the comments of rabid anger towards these disgusting free speech nuts and privacy psychos!
All Nazis must be crushed!
Anyone voicing any form of racist sentiment should be wiped from the face of the earth and any subversive "free-speech" fool that says otherwise should be drained of all their blood and hanged upside down from lamposts throught the nation!
Only when all rightist elements have be purged can we unite as a one-world Utopia of peace and happiness.