The ADC has expressed its deep concern at reports that a ‘white pride’ group is actively recruiting members in regional Victoria and by public displays of neo-Nazism in the Grampians National Park and Wilson’s Promontory, Last week an Ararat city council worker published an advertisement recruiting people who were in interested in alliance’ based on ‘white pride’. The advertisement was placed by Steve Stranks, who runs Southern Pride Boxing Club in Beaufort. Last month, neo-Nazi group ‘Antipodean Resistance’, which describes itself as “the Hitlers you’ve been waiting for’, conducted a ‘ three-day ‘radicalisation camp’ in The Grampians National Park, in Wilson’s Promontory and the south Gippsland region, hiking and openly waving a flag bearing the Nazi swastika. According to ASIO, which monitors the group out of a concern it may turn violent, members of this group, “are willing to use violence to further their own interests.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7NIVR0kmXbs
Dr Dvir Abramovich, Chairman of the ADC, issued the following statement:
“It is chilling that in today’s Australia there are hate groups that remain determined to push their bigoted agenda and online activities to the real world, marching in Victoria with Nazi flags, and seeking to recruit likeminded individuals to their vile cause. We need to name the bigotry and to acknowledge that we are facing a newly emboldened and energised white supremacist and neo-Nazi movement that is capable of violence, that is redoubling its efforts across the nation in an effort to intimidate and frighten, and that is rallying people to their radical cause and beliefs through titles such as the ‘Alt Right’. This surge in not an aberration and is part of the attempt to sell and normalise bigotry under benign labels. While their fundamentalist ideology and rhetoric is still a fringe element of Australian society, we cannot be complacent about their growth and activities, and we must be vigilant in protecting every community that is targeted by them“White identity and nationalism” are central to the extreme right’s agenda. This is an aspect often found in the loose network of the so called ‘Alt Right’ movement , and its adherents promote their blatant racism and anti-Semitism by arguing that they are simply trying to preserve their European-Christian identity, race and culture that are under threat from migrants and minorities. This is a tactic to make their message more palatable to the average white person, and to bring their dangerous message into the mainstream by making it more respectable. But this re-branding cannot mask the fact they reject pluralism or multiculturalism in any form and that they traffic in fear, stereotypes and violence.”
For further information please contact Dr Dvir Abramovich on (03) 9272 5677.