The Southern Poverty Law Center’s Hatewatch blog reports on a “Preserving Western Civilization” Conference held in February near Baltimore:
Its aim: to defend “America’s Judeo-Christian heritage and European identity.” But not much civilized was said there. Rather, the discussion centered around claims that blacks are not as intelligent as whites, immigrants are destroying America, and Islam is no religion of peace — it’s expansionist, intolerant, militant, and seeks to destroy.
The conference was convened by Jewish astrophysicist Michael Hart, author of the racist book Understanding Human History, which focuses on alleged differences in intelligence between various ethnic and racial groups. In the past, Hart was a regular at the biannual conferences put on by American Renaissance, a racist publication that wrote, in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, that “[w]hen blacks are left entirely to their own devices, Western civilization — any kind of civilization — disappears.” Though few in number, Jewish academic racists were active in American Renaissance right from the start, welcomed by that group’s leader, Jared Taylor, who even once arranged for kosher meals.
However at a 2006 American Renaissance conference (attended by the BNP’s Nick Griffin, among others) there was an incident that blew the US white-racist movement wide open:
The conflict was triggered by former Klan boss and professional anti-Semite David Duke, who attacked Jews, telling the crowd, “There is a power in the world that dominates our media, influences our government and that has led to the internal destruction of our will and spirit.” Though Duke didn’t directly say Jews were that power, everyone in the crowd, which included several members of the neo-Nazi National Alliance, knew exactly who he meant, and many cried for more.
Hart couldn’t take it. He stood up and yelled at Duke, “You fucking Nazi, you’ve disgraced this meeting!” and stormed out. As many as 50 people at the conference then began to jeer and point at the rapidly disappearing Hart.
Hart and other Jewish academic racists left American Renaissance shortly thereafter, when Taylor declined to explicitly ban anti-Semites. But Hart was apparently not ready to give up public discussion of the superiority of the white race. Hence, “Preserving Western Civilization,” Hart’s Jewish-friendly replacement for the American Renaissance conference.
Judging from the accounts of the February conference at Hatewatch and Searchlight, anti-Muslim rhetoric– of the kind which too often infests our comments boxes– dominated the proceedings. But at least one speaker went beyond the usual ravings of even our most obnoxious and unwelcome commenters:
[J. Philippe] Rushton, the soft-spoken psychology professor at the University of Western Ontario and a leading figure among academic racists, went even further, contending that Islam was not just a cultural, but a genetic problem. According to Rushton, the Muslim problem is not just a condition of their particular belief system. Instead, he argued that Muslims have an aggressive personality with relatively closed, simple minds, and are less impervious to reason than one might expect.
Among the foreign guests at the conference was Patricia Richardson, a Jewish member of the BNP, who was elected in 2004 to a council seat in Essex.
When Richardson announced that she was from the BNP, cheers rang out. She ran through several news items to paint a picture of Muslim immigration as a demographic catastrophe. “If they’re not plotting and planning unrest, they’re planning how to get your money,” she noted.
The Anti-Defamation League has information on some of the conference participants. As the ADL noted, the conference’s focus on “America’s Judeo-Christian heritage and European identity… set it apart from similar events that attract anti-Semites because they generally focus on European-American identity.”
Hatewatch reported:
The lowlight of the conference was a banquet on Saturday night featuring entertainment in the form of Jewish comedienne Julia Gorin, a self-proclaimed “conservative” joker who also writes for Jewish World Review. Gorin’s routine was filled with anti-Muslim and anti-Obama jokes, which were real crowd pleasers. To wit: “But you see, to a Jew there is no greater accomplishment than getting a black man into the White House. The thinking goes: ‘Our work is done. It’s OK if the Muslims come kill us now.’” In another skit, Gorin joked that Osama bin Laden was probably already dead — “from laughing his ass off.” Fittingly, many of Gorin’s jokes are featured in the Complete Idiot’s Guide to Jokes.
Ms. Gorin, fittingly, is on the advisory board of the American Council for Kosovo, which would be more properly called the American Council Against Kosovo– or at least the (largely secular-minded) Muslim majority thereof.
(Hat tip: modernity)
