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Today we send out a very interesting and troubling essay
published first in the book Everything You Know Is Wrong. Despite
its obvious value, we could not find it on Internet and had
to scan the book. The pre-9/11 essay proves that the regime of
Patriot Act did not land out of blue, but was carefully prepared
by ADL and its satellites, the 'anti-hate' organisations. There is
a direct link from Waco mass murder to Falluja, from spying on
anti-Zionists to spying on everybody, from watchdogs of 1990s to
Patriot Act of 2000s; and this is ADL that is behind the link.
WATCHDOG NATION
by CLETUS NELSON
Introduction:
Hating Those Who Hate
Racial
prejudice, like most social pathologies, is an irrational social
force that has dogged our species since the origins of tribal
society. While we can study it, observe it, and decry it, the
dynamics which compel a man to despise his neighbor seemingly defy
the cold logic of scientific inquiry. Yet, in a well-intentioned
effort to solve this intractable problem, we now define racism as
a political malevolence fomented by a far-reaching conspiracy of
cultural terrorists. The chief adherents of this widely accepted
theory are a select body of "experts" who earn their
livings by interpreting the sinister permutations of the far
right. We call them "watchdog groups," and this small
minority of powerful anti-racist advocacy groups unwittingly
shapes our collective perception of organized racism and
anti-government dissent.
Typically,
these organizations reside in the upper echelon of the nonprofit
public policy milieu, which presents an onerous problemas their
financial existence is closely tethered to the rise and fall of
ethnic intolerance, one cannot help but question the objectivity
of these renowned political soothsayers. Moreover, the marked
dislike these modern-day demagogues display toward the subjects of
their research further erodes their fayade of scholarly
detachment. As political researcher Laird Wilcox remarks,
"There is an anti-racism industry entrenched in the United
States that has attracted bullying, moralizing fanatics, whose
identity and livelihood depend upon growth and expansion of their
particular kind of victimization.'"
While
their passionate defenders will certainly object to such a charge
by citing the threats posed by America's expanding political
fringe, such protests fail to address the questionable methodology
and often politically motivated criteria used by these media-savvy
experts to classify unconventional social and religious movements.
As we shall soon see, one needn't stockpile weapons or espouse
reactionary beliefs to fall under the watchful eye of these
formidable private surveillance networks. Indeed, imputing racist
motives to alleged enemies of the State has become a notorious
tactic among prominent watchdog groups such as the Anti-Defamation
League of B'nai B'rith (ADL), the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC),
and other purveyors of fear. To our detriment, this unchallenged
"information disease"2 has unleashed an unprecedented
expansion of State power. With this uncomfortable thought in mind,
it is imperative that conscientious civil libertarians rethink the
real threat pose by the extremists in our midst and closely
examine watchdog tactics.
REASSESSING THE FAR RIGHT
Despite
their similar agendas, each of these organizations has a different
method of promoting its central message. Spokesmen for the
Seattle-based Northwest Coalition for Human Dignity (NWCHD)
consider themselves experts in youth-related topics and primarily
focus on issues ranging from racist skinhead gangs to the
controversial "Black Metal" subculture. The SPLC and the
Atlanta-based Center for Democratic Renewal (CDR) adeptly play
upon Northern stereotypes of the deep South with tabloid-style
headlines decrying the allegedly fearsome motives lurking behind
rural political movements. Mark Pitcavage, the chief researcher
for the Militia Watchdog Website, adopts an intellectual tone and
employs a rich academil argot to decry militia conspiracy theories
and their supposedly racist subtext. Yet there is one unifying
theme that permeates watch dog literature: "Violent
"hate groups" are metastasizing at unprecedented
levels."
The
motive behind this clever marketing strategy isn't difficult to
fathom: Combating the dark forces of "hate" has become a
perpetual money-making machine. By issuing teeth-chattering
prediction of impending racial terror, the more visible
anti-racist groups gain access to an endless supply of lucrative
foundation grants and stream of donations from terrified
constituents. Struggling at the lower end of the watchdog spectrum
is the NWCHD, which never theless boasts a yearly budget of some
$600,000. Further up the scale is the ADL, whose annual
expenditures exceed $30 million. However, for sheer wealth, few
can match the SPLC, which enjoy combined assets of over $136
million, with a yearly take of nearly $40 million.
These
substantial sums beg an important question: How big a threat is
the far right? When viewed objectively, the rising diversity of
the nation's population coupled with public intolerance toward
racial beliefs is greatly undermining the influence and popularity
of organized racism. Even watchdog groups are coming to terms with
this uncomfortable (yet reassuring) reality. "We are talking
about a tiny number of Americans who are members of hate groups-I
mean Infinitesimal," SPLC spokesman Mark Potok conceded in a
1999 Associated Press article.
Potok's
assertion is echoed by Wilcox, who edits the wellresearched Guide
to the American Right (now in its 24th edition) and Guide to the
American Left (now in its 21st edition). Contradicting watchdog
claims that hundreds of violent racist groups stalk the American
political landscape, the Kansas academic asserts that "in
terms of viable groups ie., groups that are objectively
significant, are actually functioning and have more than a handful
of real members.. .the actual figure is about 50." Out of a
national population which now exceeds 280 million, Wilcox
estimates that "the Ku Klux Klan are down to about 3,000
people," with an additional 1,500 - 2,000 members of
organized fascist groups."
By
contrast, the SPLC (which is considered an irrefutable source by
the mainstream press) lists over 600 "hate groups" on
its Website. Yet when closely scrutinized, this authoritative
directory is quite suspect. Little or no information is provided
beyond the name of a purported racist group and the city in which
it is located. With no contact information or mailing'address, who
can verify these individuals or groups even exist? Having closely
examined this data, Wilcox asserts that "a large number"
of organizations included on the SPLC's list "are either
unconfirmed or consist of a single individual.".
In
some instances, watchdog groups will even contradict previous data
in order to promulgate a culturally constructed "rise"
in white nationalism. One such example is a 1999 report issued by
the NWCHD entitled "Hate by State." According to the
widely publicized study, the state of Oregon is undergoing a
"rise" in white nationalist activism substantiated by
the presence of some thirteen hate groups. Among the groups listed
are "patriot" folk singer Carl Klang (who apparently
constitutes a one-man white supremacist group), the avowedly
anti-racist Southern Oregon Militia (SaM), a record label, and
other questionable entries. However, this alleged proliferation of
racist beliefs in a state best known for its bottle-throwing
anarchists and tie-dyed hippie subculture is at odds with data
from the organization's precursor, the Coalition for Human Dignity
(CHD). The CHD issued a similar report in 1990 which documented
some three-dozen well-organized "skinhead,"
"Christian Identity," "Christian Patriot," and
"Nazi" groups in the same locale." Based on these
numbers-from 36 to thirteen-it would appear that Oregon is
witnessing a marked decline in far-right political activism.
Due
to the underlying ethical considerations, few reporters would dare
cite a study commissioned by the Philip Morris Company for an
article discussing the health risks of smoking. Yet when otherwise
well-meaning reporters regurgitate this type of tendentious
watchdog research, their journalistic efforts are no less
compromised. In some cases, the publication of unsubstantiated
watchdog misinformation has enduring consequences. A 1996 media
blitz conducted by the Center for Democratic Renewal (COR)
provides a cautionary tale as to the perils of publicizing
watchdog allegations.
ANATOMY OF A HOAX
It
was a dramatic tale straight out of a John Grisham screenplay. In
the spring of 1996, a team of investigators affiliated with the
CDR crisscrossed the South in order to examine a troubling series
of church fires. Despite the allegedly malevolent presence of
hostile red necks, corrupt small-town sheriffs, and indifferent
townspeople, the dedicated researchers pressed on. By summer, the
disturbing truth was revealed: Since 1990, scores of
African-American churches had been set aflame as part of a racist
conspiracy. JoAnn Watson, CDR's president, was unequivocal in
denouncing the unspeakable attacks. "This is domestic
terrorism," she announced to the press. "It is not an
isolated phenomenon. It's an epidemic."" This
"epidemic" would later appear some 2,200 times in the
popular press and become an operative metaphor for America's
growing racial disunity.
With
the poll-conscious Clinton White House demanding immediate action,
a full-scale task force was mobilized to catch the craven
perpetrators behind this "conspiracy." However, when the
investigation was completed in 1997, it painted a far different
picture than the sinister tableau depicted by the COR. "We
have not seen hard evidence to support the theory of a nationwide
conspiracy," asserted Assistant Treasury Secretary James E.
Johnson." Indeed, it was found that the fires occurred
against a "backdrop of widespread arson against houses of
religion of all kinds, including white churches, mosques and
synagogues."" As skeptical reporters began to delve
deeper into the facts, it would soon be revealed that the only
"conspiracy" in evidence was hatched by the CDR and its
allies.
Michael
Fumento, a former attorney with the US Commission on Civil Rights
and a notorious debunker of media myths, closely scrutinized the
initial CDR report and found the document fraught with selective
omissions and factual errors. After discussions with fire
officials in several Southern states, Fumento learned that the CDR
had "regularly ignored fires set by blacks and those that
occurred in the early part of the decade, and labeled fires as
arsons that were not - all in an apparent effort to make black
church torchings appear to be an escalating phenomenon."'.
Citing statistics from the National Fire Protection Association,
Fumento noted that in actuality Americans were seeing a radical
decline in the number of church arsons, from 1,420 in 1980 to just
over 500 in 1994.
As
the story unraveled, other publications began to question the
CDR's dubious claims. But the damage was done, and the profits
were in: The anti-hate group and its affiliate, the National
Council of Churches (NCC), secured a multimillion dollar windfall
in donations. To this day, many still believe in this malicious
urban myth which subsequently unleashed a series of copycat crimes
by opportunistic racists. Therein lies the ultimate irony of this
disturbing saga: By disseminating this ill-founded claim, the CDR
spread terror among black churchgoers, fostered fear and
resentment among varying racial groups, and actually contributed
to an upsurge in racially-motivated violence toward
African-American places of worship. "That which the Ku Klux
Klan can no longer do, a group established to fight the Klan has
done for them," Fumento observed.
In
the aftermath of this obvious hoax, the credibility of the press
suffered little. Yet to discerning observers, this unsavory
incident revealed the symbiotic relationship watchdog groups enjoy
with sympathetic members of the media.
WHEN TRAGEDY STRIKES
The
aforementioned sham illustrates the tendency among watchdog groups
to divine racist subcurrents behind highly publicized events.
Thus, when the Alfred P. Murrah building exploded in Oklahoma
City, Oklahoma, on April 19, 1995, these high-profile nonprofits
unleashed a sustained offensive against the nascent citizen
militia movement. "We warned Attorney General Janet Reno six
months before the Oklahoma City bombing that private militia
groups posed a serious threat," bragged SPLC founder Morris
Dees in a selfaggrandizing fundraising letter.18 "Our Militia
Task Force," Dees continued, "has been able to provide
critical information to federal and state agencies investigating
the Oklahoma City Bombing."
Few
bothered to question the accuracy of this "critical
information," especially in light of the fact that militia
groups have yet to be implicated in the 1995 blast. Indeed,
following one of the most exhaustive investigations in FBI
history, federal officials were unable to establish a direct link
between citizen militias and the bombing plot. In fact, since
1999, FBI agents across the country have been involved in an
innovative effort to build a trusting relationship with patriot
and militia groups. "The idea we're pushing is that it's not
a crime to be a member of the militia," FBI agent Bill
Crowley remarked to the Associated Press." Among the agents
taking part in the outreach program is Danny Defenbaugh, the
former head of the Oklahoma City investigation. Nevertheless, in
the wake of the OKC attack, the SPLC, ADL, and other groups, in
concert with the media, waged a heated information war against
allegedly racist patriot groups and their sympathizers.
With
no shortage of experts available to validate the most lurid
claims, reporters were uninterested in anyone willing to depart
from their institutional bias against patriot groups. "The
militias-whoever the fuck they are...are a ticking time bomb
composed of paranoid lunatics," remarked a reporter from the
Washington Post seeking an interview with writer and publisher
Adam Parfrey after the OKC bombing. When Parfrey offered a more
balanced (and less hysterical) assessment of this evolving
political phenomenon, his observations fell on deaf ears.
The
ensuing anti-militia crusade would crescendo with the passage of
the Anti-Terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996, a
repressive statute which relaxed laws governing the use of
electronic surveillance, expanded the State's right to investigate
politically suspect individuals or organizations, and implemented
other Orwellian measures to ferret out alleged domestic
terrorists.
In
the years since this well-orchestrated campaign to demonize
primarily law-abiding constitutional militias, watchdog groups
have now come to embrace the federal government's highly dubious
"lone wolf" theory, which ascribes responsibility for
the mass murder to convicted bomber Timothy McVeigh and his
confederate Terry Nichols. However, a substantial body of evidence
has surfaced which ties an armed, well-organized hate group known
as the Aryan Republican Army (ARA) to the blast. "It is now
believed the ARA financed and helped to stage the bombing,"
reports Andrew Gumbel in a special investigation for the
Independent of London." The marked silence emanating from the
watchdog camp in regards to this grave development would suggest
that their initial preoccupation with uncovering a far-flung
rightist conspiracy behind the blast was far from sincere.
Four
years later, the Columbine High School mass-shooting provided yet
another avenue for watchdog advocates to cynically exploit yet
another inexplicable act of violence. Within weeks of the
highschool shootings, the NWCHD began placing a racially-charged
spin on the highly-publicized murders. Citing "evidence of
Hitler worship as a component of their motives," Coalition
Research Director Robert Crawford inveighed in an editorial
appearing in the Portland Oregonian that both Dylan Klebold and
Eric Harris "were known to hate African-Americans and
Hispanics and speak adoringly of Hitler."" Crawford
further alleged that the two teenage gunmen had been poisoned by
"Neo-Nazi" music.
While
the murder of African-American student Isaiah Sholes provides a
thin veneer of justification for this sweeping (and
sensationalistic) version of events, the argument falls apart
under close scrutiny. If the Columbine killings were an act of
racial terror, why were the vast majority of the victims white,
suburban teens? Moreover, even if it is conceded that there was a
modicum of racism lurking behind Harris and Klebold's deadly
attack on the Colorado school, it would seem their alleged
"hate" wasn't limited by the confines of racial
identity.
A
Time magazine analysis of a series of videotapes made by Klebold
and Harris prior to their murderous spree depicts the two teens
assailing every racial group on the face of the earth. This
sustained verbal bombast displayed an "ecumenical"
hatred that often bordered on the self-referential, as the two
denigrated various minority groups, along with Christians, whites,
and Jews." There is also evidence which indicates that both
Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold had little interest in racism. One
might even argue that Harris possessed the virulent anti-racism
notorious among watchdog groups.
"Don't
let me catch you making fun of someone just becasue [sic] they are
a different color because I will come and break your fucking
legs," the deceased shooter wrote on his Webpage prior to the
killings." After investigating the adolescent killers, Salon
reporter Dave Cullen asserted, "The biggest myths about the
tragedy have to do with the question of who Harris and Klebold
were really targeting in their rampage. Jocks, African-Americans
and Christians have been widely described as their chief targets.
Not a scrap of evidence supports that conclusion.""
Further imperiling allegations of Nazi inclinations are Dylan
Klebold's Jewish background, which would certainly undermine any
purported affinity with National Socialism.
Although
a prolonged sociological autopsy has severely undercut allegations
of racist intent behind this disturbing incident of mass murder,
the NWCHD (and later the SPLC) continued to propagate the
misguided notion that the perpetrators were part of a highly
organized crypto-fascist "Black-Metal" subculture. Yet
there is utterly no evidence to prove the two youths were even
remotely connected with the "extreme music" scene. In
fact, Harris and Klebold enjoyed the German electronic group KMFDM,
who consider their creative efforts a "statement against war,
oppression, fascism and violence against others."'.
Unfortunately, these types of inconvenient facts have never proved
an obstacle to watchdog propaganda efforts.
DEFENDERS OF THE REGIME
While
these vigilant defenders of "tolerance" will typically
concede that racism permeates every stratum of society, rarely do
these staunchly pro-law enforcement, pro-government groups ever
address instances of State-sanctioned racism. If they are looking
for examples of racial injustice, they need only review the tragic
effects of the "War on Drugs," which has dealt a
crippling blow to minority communities.
According
to the Justice Policy Institute, the number of nonviolent
offenders in American prisons has exploded due to the escalating
Drug War. A recent study reports that the incarceration rate for
African Americans has skyrocketed due to "increases in drug
sentencing over the past two decades: At a bare minimum, 1.4
million African-America men - over 10 percent of the black male
adult population - have lost the right to vote due to their brush
with the criminal justice system'. To echo Fumento, even the most
diabolical Klansman couldn't have dreamed of a more repressive
policy to disproportionately punish minorities!
Obviously,
taking on moribund Klan groups or cynically hyping another racist
scare offers greater rewards than dealing with uncomfortable
topics which threaten the legitimacy of the Beltway power elite.
Indeed, in many instances watchdog groups have aided and abetted
abuses of State power. The 1993 paramilitary siege of the Mt.
Carmel religious complex in Waco, Texas, offers substantial
evidence of watchdog complicity.
According
to a report from the Committee for Waco Justice, the ADL worked in
concert with federal officials by providing "precise
documentation" on the Davidian "cult" and "how
it operated in the past."" Although we can only
speculate as to the nature of this intelligence, the inherent
brutality of the initial raid conducted by the Bureau of Alcohol,
Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) and the subsequent tank assault which
led to the tragic death of over six-dozen members of a multiracial
spiritual community suggest that this questionable information was
of an inflammatory nature.
The
role of quasi-governmental watchdog groups didn't cease once
bloodthirsty ATF agents cravenly raised their flag above the
smoldering Mt. Carmel complex. As Washington officials braced for
Congressional hearings and the possibility of answering a number
of difficult questions regarding the alleged
"disappearance" of key pieces of evidence, watchdog
groups stepped forward to wholeheartedly endorse the law
enforcement debacle.
"I
am more concerned with the victims of militia terrorists than with
FBI or ATF excesses," SPLC figurehead Morris Dees remarked
glibly, while failing to articulate a single instance of
militia-sponsored terrorism.'" Nevertheless, SPLC
"experts" repeatedly attacked those willing to question
the Justice Department's factually untenable (yet
media-sanctified) "mass suicide" theory. Mark Pitcavage
of Militia Watchdog similarly assailed the allegedly sinister
agenda of determined Waco investigators. "These guys have
ulterior motives," whined the pro-government activist to
Salon magazine." Tragically, few reporters bothered to
question the "ulterior motives" of these well-connected
Waco apologists who played a crucial role in the ensuing cover-up,
which continues to shroud this unprecedented atrocity.
Five
years later, the SPLC would wage a similar attack against those
who attended the 1999 World Trade Organization demonstrations in
Seattle, Washington. In its quarterly publication, Intelligence
Report, the Alabama watchdog group made the stark allegation that
the protests were thoroughly infiltrated by the "hard-edged
soldiers of Neo-Fascism." Providing utterly no credible
evidence to substantiate this charge. the anonymous author
asserted that the WTO protests represented a convergence of the
far left and far right in America, made possible by the increasing
willingness of avowed Nazi and racist groups to co-opt traditional
leftist stances on issues such as economic inequality and global
trade policy.
These
well-calculated attacks display how watchdog groups have long
departed from their once progressive beliefs in order to curry
favor with the National Security State. The ADL has been at the
forefront of this disquieting trend.
COINTELPRO REDUX
It
has long been believed that controversial government
counterinsurgency operations such as the FBI's COINTELPRO program
were disbanded during the brief era of reform which occurred in
the wake of the Watergate scandals. While it is true that federal
guidelines which curtailed government spying on political groups
were adopted in the late 1970s, watchdog groups have allowed law
enforcement to effectively sidestep these administrative
prohibitions. Indeed, operatives for the ADL have played a key
role in spying on suspected political dissidents from across the
political spectrum.
"By
the mid-1980s, the ADL was swapping files with hundreds of
'official friends,' the organization's euphemism for US law
enforcement and intelligence sources," writes Robert I.
Friedman in the Village Voice. The organization doesn't limit
itself to merely observing and identifying political
dissidents-this human rights group frequently uses paid informants
to infiltrate and gather information on various political
factions.
In
one instance during the 1980s, a Michigan ADL operative named
James Mitchell Rosenberg penetrated the extreme right and became a
leading member of the Ku Klux Klan and other white supremacist
groups. This shadowy agent provocateur even gave racially
inflammatory speeches at white nationalist rallies until another
organization, People Against Racist Terror (PART), spoke out about
his involvement, which "crossed the line from collecting
information which is vital and necessary in dealing with
violenceprone racists, to acting as an initiator of racist
organizing and proponent of racist violence."
Despite
the progressive rhetoric which inundates ADL publications, the
organization is no less dedicated to monitoring the other end of
the political spectrum. The sheer scope of this
counterintelligence effort was briefly brought to light in January
1993 when a San Francisco police investigation linked Roy Bullock,
a self-admitted ADL spy, to Tom Gerard, an SFPD intelligence
officer. Apparently Gerard had provided Bullock with access to
confidential police files, and as the story unfolded, it was
revealed that the seasoned ADL operative had subsequently compiled
files on nearly 10,000 individuals and more than 950 political
organizations. To the horror of the West Coast progressive
community, it was learned that on behalf of the ADL, Bullock was
covertly monitoring the National Association for the Advancement
of Colored People (NAACP), the American Civil Liberties Union
(ACLU), the Center for Investigative Reporting (CIR), and a
surfeit of other left-leaning groups.'.
Yet
one needn't traffic in the political milieu to gain the attention
of police-connected ADL officials. The organization's adversarial
and confrontational tactics leave anyone open to charges of race
hatred and the possibility of arrest. In the fall of 1994, a
Colorado ADL affiliate transformed a seemingly innocent
neighborhood dispute into a scorched-earth campaign to jail and
ruin a middle-class couple.
The
escalating feud, which began over an alleged dog attack, reached
its apex when William Quigley drove his car recklessly (and
illegally) in a threatening manner toward his neighbor Candice
Aronson. In retaliation, Mrs. Aronson and her husband, Mitchell,
began recording the Quigleys' cellular phone conversations by
listening to a police scanner. In a highly emotional conversation
in which Dorothy Quigley vented her frustrations over the dispute,
she made a number of grossly insensitive remarks, such as her
sadness that the Aronsons hadn't been on a bus "blown up by
terrorists."
Although
Mrs. Quigley immediately regretted making these statements and, in
the same conversation, admitted that her comments were
"sick," the Aronsons grew alarmed and took steps to
initiate legal proceedings against their neighbors.'. After
contacting the ADL that October, the couple was encouraged by
League officials to continue taping the phone calls (which is
illegal under federal law). In December, the Aronsons filed a
federal lawsuit against the Quigleys, and within days, the local
District Attorney charged them with several counts of ethnic
intimidation. As the controversy spun out of control, an ADL
spokesman accused them of "perpetrating the worst
anti-Semitic incident in the area since the slaying of Jewish
talkshow host Alan Berg."
However,
there was little evidence to back up this hyperbole. After closely
examining the evidence, Jefferson County D.A. David Thomas
sheepishly concluded that the entire episode was "a basic
garden-variety neighborhood dispute" and "the ethnic
part of it came as an outgrowth, not a cause of it." Indeed,
this was far from a onesided affair. Reporter Eric Dexheimer notes
that "both families volleyed verbal insults that would make a
prison guard blush." Nevertheless, the ill-conceived
prosecution conducted "under pressure from the ADL" had
dire results for the Quigleys, who were publicly accused of
conducting a virulent anti-Semitic campaign against their
neighbors:'
Facing
an uncertain financial future with their reputations effectively
ruined, the Quigleys launched their own legal offensive, which
ironically charged the League with defamation and other offenses.
In April 2000, a jury agreed, declaring that ADL statements at a
news conference and on talk radio were both defamatory and
"not substantially true." They awarded the embattled
husband and wife a judgement in excess of $10 million."
Although
the Quigleys enjoyed their proverbial day in court, how many
average citizens could afford to retain counsel in order to defend
themselves against such charges? Moreover, it is unlikely that
this ephemeral moment of justice will curtail the extralegal
surveillance efforts of dossier-compiling watchdog advocates. In
fact, the SPLC still brags of its "unique computer
database," which is considered the "largest in the
United States"" and contains flies on thousands of
Americans accused in absentia of possessing political views deemed
suspect. According to US News and World Report, on any given day
"[f]ourteen researchers with the SPLC's 'Intelligence
Project' spend long hours in front of computers, crossfiling data
from press reports, hate-group literature, and web sites."
In
essence, the SPLC constitutes a "virtual arm of the state..
.acting as an informant, a chronicler, and a clearinghouse for
information to be placed at the disposal of federal
agencies," remarks anti-war activist Justin Raimondo. While
smaller organizations such as the NWCHD may lack the elaborate and
sophisticated surveillance apparatus of their wealthier peers,
coalition members are not above attending rightist functions in
order to take down license plate numbers and "photo
document" alleged thought criminals for possible use by law
enforcement.47
This
disquieting nexus between watchdogs and the State has become so
pervasive that spokesmen for other watchdog groups are beginning
to register their dissent. "If you claim to be a broadbased
human rights group you should not have a backdoor relationship
with police," comments John Foster "Chip" Berlet of
Political Research Associates (PRA), a Massachusetts think tank
which studies right-wing extremism".
A THREAT TO FREEDOM?
You
will find almost no reporting on these disturbing issues in the
mainstream press. Why? Watchdog groups are extremely aggressive in
pressuring members of the media to toe the official line. Indeed,
those who dare deviate from scripted watchdog propaganda run the
risk of offending this highly intolerant and politically powerful
lobby. Nevertheless, remaining silent will only serve to embolden
these determined enemies of freedom. While a vast segment of the
population may find it difficult to find common cause with
militias, gun owners, and even outright racists, history tells us
that it is the opinions which many may find objectionable that
most deserve protection under the US Constitution. However, so
long as the public believes that we are besieged by church-burning
"conspiracies," anthrax-wielding militia terrorists, and
metastasizing "hate groups," Americans will remain under
the iron heel of the watchdog nation.
_____________________________________________________
Endnotes
1. Wilcox, Laird. The Watchdogs: A Close Look at Anti-Racist
'Watchdog" Groups. Olathe, KS: Editorial Research Services,
1999: 3. 2. The writer's use of this term is taken from Conway and
Siegelman's Snapping: America's Epidemic of Sudden Personality
Change. (Philadelphia & New York: JB Lippincot & Company,
1978: 154.) The condition is described as a "sustained
altered state of awareness" resulting in "narrowed or
reduced awareness." A major symptom of this intellectually
myopic state is the severe impairment of an "individual
ability to question" -a cognitive lapse which has become
prevalent among watchdog-friendly reporters! 3. 'Northwest
Coalition for Human Dignity Cutting Staff: Seattle Gay News
On-Line 23 Feb 2001. <www.sgn.org/2001/02/23Inw.htm>. 4. Op.
cit., Wilcox: 26. 5. Better Business Bureau Philanthropic Advisory
Service, Charity Reports;Dec 2000 <www.give.org/reports/splc.asp>.
The SPLC was rebuked by the Bureau for expending a mere 35 percent
of its yearly take on actual program expenses. 6. Levinson,
Arlene. "Hate Groups, Crimes Said Rare in the US."
Associated Press 8 July 1999.-7. Op cit., Wilcox: 49. 8. McCain,
Robert Stacy. "Researcher Says Hate 'Fringe' Isn't as Crowded
as Claimed." Washington Times 9 May 2000. 9. Op cit., Wilcox:
49. 10. Northwest Coalition for Human Dignity. "Hate by
State." 1999: 5-6. 11. Coalition for Human Dignity.
"Organized White Supremacists in Oregon." 1990: B. 12.
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