What happened after word spread that the Proud Boys did karaoke in a West Philly bar

from Mainstream Media

What happened after word spread that the Proud Boys did karaoke in a West Philly bar

So a group of people armed with Proud Boys swag walk into a West Philly bar.

Among the string of events that happened next: a boycott, a meltdown in online review sections, an interview on conservative talk radio, a projectile through a window, a complaint about Antifa, and a karaoke master who says he’ll never return.

It’s been a long couple of weeks for the Millcreek Tavern.

The West Philadelphia dive bar has been under fire and called a haven for hate by both longtime patrons and people who have never set foot in the place since Nov. 15. That’s when a group maybe affiliated with the Proud Boys, a far-right organization designated as a hate group, showed up for the weekly karaoke night and left their branded materials — including a mouse pad and fliers — lying around.

It wasn’t the first time the Millcreek Tavern and its owner, Jack Gillespie, have made headlines. In 2017, the bar was in the news for apparently booking a metal band known for its anti-Semitic lyrics. Once folks caught wind of the concert, they flooded the bar with phone calls and the show was canceled — Gillespie says it was a big misunderstanding.

He took a similar tack this time around, posting on Millcreek’s Facebook page three days after the incident that he had no idea who the Proud Boys were when there were concerns they were inside his bar. Then he wrote that the group wasn’t actually the Proud Boys at all, but from Turning Point USA, a conservative student organization.

Philadelphia Proud Boys’ only response to The Inquirer was to say “Lol boycotting?” via email and point out that someone threw something through the Millcreek window. TPUSA’s local chapter didn’t respond to requests for comment.

Gillespie, for his part, said he acted in good faith and doesn’t know what he’d do if the Proud Boys came back. He said that he might ask them to drink somewhere else, but also that he’s “not going to discriminate” and believes in their First Amendment rights.

The Proud Boys are self-identified “Western chauvinists” and designated by the Southern Poverty Law Center as a “general hate” group. Its male-only members have espoused anti-Muslim and misogynistic rhetoric.

Some of the group’s members have been aligned with extremists and appeared at the 2017 Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Va., that promoted white supremacy and neo-Nazism and resulted in the death of Heather Heyer. Two of the group’s members were convicted earlier this year of attempted gang assault for taking part in a violent brawl in New York, while others reportedly made a threatening late-night visit to the Philadelphia home of a critic.

Gillespie said the bar got a phone call on Nov. 15 from someone claiming they wanted to bring in a group of Republicans to partake in karaoke. No problem, Gillespie said. He was in the bar starting at about 9:30 p.m. and saw two groups, each of about 10 people, that he didn’t recognize. They were “well-behaved,” he said, and drank, ate, and did karaoke. He noticed there was “a Proud Boy file” and “a Proud Boy logo” on one of his tables, but said he hadn’t heard of the group and thought nothing of it.

Gillespie said he went to bed around 1 a.m. and the night was without incident.

Others at the Millcreek that night remember it differently, including Vashti Bandy, a writer and liberal activist who lives in South Philly. She’s faithfully sung karaoke at Millcreek every Friday for at least six years. In 2017, Bandy gave Gillespie the benefit of the doubt and publicly defended Millcreek during the anti-Semitic-metal-band debacle.

Her loyalty was for the same reasons that made this whole incident sort of unexpected: The bar attracts a crowd that’s diverse in every way imaginable. It’s a stone’s throw from the yoga studios and vegan snack shops on Baltimore Avenue. And this is West Philly we’re talking about — Gillespie, on a radio show, called it a “bastion of liberalism,” and few would argue.

Bandy was in the bar with a group of friends and regulars when they spotted the literature. Among the materials on one table: a folder with fliers and a mouse pad that said “Philadelphia Proud Boys.” On an adjacent table were signs and stickers with TPUSA literature, including stickers and buttons with slogans like “Socialism Sucks” and “Yay for 2a,” a reference to the Second Amendment.

Patrons of the Millcreek Tavern found materials related to the Proud Boys, a far-right hate group, on tables at the bar on Nov. 15. Since then, the bar has lost regular patrons and its longtime karaoke master while groups online have flooded its reviews.

Then Bandy saw a group of about 10 white men clad in golf shirts and khaki pants. They stuck out like sore thumbs. The normal Friday-night crowd is “a mixed group,” Bandy said, “but they’re not generally the khaki-pants-golf type.”

Bandy, 40, said she then got on stage and, into the microphone while Gillespie was nearby, dedicated Lily Allen’s “F— You” to “the Proud Boys” and said something to the effect of: “We know who you are. Get out of the bar.” The group went upstairs.

Meanwhile, regular patrons alerted bar employees that there was a possible hate group in the house, and conferred with Stanley Gravitt, a karaoke administrator who’s been running the Friday-night show at Millcreek for six or seven years. Gravitt, who said he was fearful partly because he is black, said he felt unsafe and uncomfortable all night long.

And that night was only the beginning.

Gravitt, 39, said he won’t be returning. Ditto for some of the Friday-night regulars. Bandy said she can’t support a business “that at best cannot be bothered to have basic respect for regular clientele to do a minimum level of vetting to make sure you’re not bringing in hate groups.”

Online mobs on both sides flooded Millcreek’s Facebook and Yelp pages with reviews, leading to arguments in the comments. Yelp temporarily disabled posts to Millcreek’s page due to “unusual activity.”

A screenshot from Yelp showing the website suspended posts to Millcreek Tavern's Yelp page following a flood of reviews over the last couple weeks.

And a few days after the incident, Gillespie woke to find someone had thrown something heavy and metal through the front window of the bar. Police confirmed a report of vandalism was filed on Nov. 20.

Without proof, Gillespie has blamed Antifa, a loosely defined, leftist, antifascist organization that’s a frequent presence at protests in Philadelphia. Antifa has before engaged in physical confrontations with people it believes are fascists or Nazis. (SPLC says it doesn’t consider Antifa a hate group because it doesn’t “promote hatred based on race, religion, ethnicity, sexual orientation or gender identity.”)

And then Gillespie stoked more outrage when he appeared a week after the incident on “The Dean Malik Show,” a local conservative talk radio program on Talk 860 WWDB-AM, and didn’t apologize or condemn the Proud Boys.

Malik defended the Proud Boys, saying organizations like the SPLC have “started supporting the cause of the progressive left.” To end the segment, he encouraged listeners to go to the Millcreek Tavern “and have a big, big, tall glass of freedom while you’re there.”

Bandy said she and her friends will be having their glasses of freedom elsewhere.

“This was not some random death metal band that no one has ever heard of,” she said. “Charlottesville made it abundantly clear to me who the Proud Boys are and what they are about.”

Norman “Chris” Henk, Proud Boys Recruit in Pennsylvania

from It’s Going Down

[This post only contains information relevant to Philadelphia and the surrounding area, to read the entire article follow the above link.]

[Twitter post]

Twitter troll @SylvioHunt was exposed this week as Norman “Chris” Henk, a Proud Boys recruit.

Online, Henk posts Anders Breivik memes and various Proud Boys propaganda, and engages in the harassment of leftist activists.

Currently, Henk works as a Conductor for New Jersey Transit. You can tweet to them @NJTRANSIT.

Matthew Guse, Lackawanna College Student in Scranton, Pennsylvania, Exposed as White Nationalist

from It’s Going Down

[This post only contains information relevant to Philadelphia and the surrounding area, to read the entire article follow the above link.]

Panic! in the Discord exposed Lackawanna College student Matthew Guse as a member of white nationalist group Identity Evropa, recently renamed the American Identity Movement.

In the leaked Discord chats, Guse used the handle fgtveassassin, where he posted over 2500 messages discussing his activism, including leaving white nationalist recruiting materials at the Albright Memorial Library in Scranton, Pennsylvania.

Guse is a student at Lackawanna College in Scranton, Pennsylvania. You can tweet to Lackawanna College at @LackawannaEDU, or contact them via their Facebook or Instagram.

A Discussion on the Growth of Black & Anti-Colonial Anarchist Formations

from It’s Going Down

[Listen here]

In this episode we were lucky enough to speak with two people on the growth of Black, New Afrikan, and anti-colonial anarchist formations. One of the people joining us in the discussion is a part of the Philadelphia chapter of the Revolutionary Abolitionist Movement and the other person is from the Afrofuturist Abolitionists of the Americas.

Our discussion covers a lot of ground, but we speak heavily on a workshop that the comrades are presenting across the so-called US on black anarchism, the recent theoretical Anarkata statement, as well as everything from anti-police and prison abolition organizing, to the impact of the Ferguson rebellion, survival programs, and much more.

One of the themes that came up several times, is finding “little a” anarchism or simply anarchy, in the day to day self-organization and revolt of everyday people in the face of the American plantation and finding ways to build solidarity and action with these organic forms. Our guests also stress the need for the anarchist movement to stop looking just to European groups, history, and movements for inspiration, and instead draw from the rich history of resistance to settler colonialism, slavery, and industrial capitalism in the so-called Americans, in order to better inform our organizing.

Music: Sima Lee and Black Star

For Info: Set up a workshop by getting in touch with Philly RAM here or via email (ramphilly@protonmail.com), read Anarkata statement, Black Rose reader on Black Anarchism here, and Burning Down the American Plantation from the Revolutionary Abolitionist Movement here.

Reading Recommendations: 

As Black As Resistance by William C. Anderson and Zoé Samudzi

The Progressive Plantation by Lorenzo Kom’boa Ervin

Anarchism and the Black Revolution by Lorenzo Kom’boa Ervin

A Soldier’s Story: Revolutionary Writings by a New Afrikan Anarchist by Kuwasi Balagoon

Burn Down the American Plantation by the Revolutionary Abolitionist Movement

Black Fighting Formations by Russell Maroon Shoatz

The Dragon and the Hydra by Russell Maroon Shoatz

No Bail for Unite the Right 2 Organizer Fred Arena

from It’s Going Down

[This post only contains information relevant to Philadelphia and the surrounding area, to read the entire article follow the above link.]

Fred C. Arena, of Salem, New Jersey, was charged last week with falsifying a security clearance application in January 2019.

Arena is a member of Vanguard America, the neo-Nazi organization that James Fields marched with in August 2017, shortly before he drove a car into a crowd of anti-racist protesters, murdering Heather Heyer at the Unite the Right rally.

Nonetheless, Arena helped plan the Unite the Right 2 in 2018, under the pseudonym “McCormick Foley.” He was exposed in June 2018 by Unicorn Riot, after antifascists infiltrated the planning group and leaked the chat logs.

In August 2018, Arena was questioned by the FBI about his involvement in Vanguard America, which he denied during the interview. In January 2019, he applied for a security clearance to work at a Navy yard not named in court documents, and again failed to mention his ties to the neo-Nazi group.

If convicted, Arena faces up to 25 years in prison. He is currently being held at the Federal Detention Center in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

RIP David Jones

Submission

Over the Grey’s Ferry bridge.

Jovi Val Shouted Down by Antifascists, Tagged with Gritty Sticker, Escorted Out by Cops in Philadelphia

from It’s Going Down

[This post only contains information relevant to Philadelphia and the surrounding area, to read the entire article follow the above link.]

Unregistered gun-haver Jovi Val was detained by law enforcement Saturday in Philadelphia, when he showed up to troll the March to End Rape Culture (formerly known as the SlutWalk). Val was escorted away by police for blocking the entrance to a Marriott hotel. He refused initial orders to leave because he was surrounded by antifascist protesters, and was eventually led away by law enforcement.

Val wore a Proud Boys hat and carried a bizarre sign reading “Trump is a Jew – Everything.”

Prior to Val’s detainment, an antifascist managed to tag his sign with a sticker of antifa icon Gritty.

In April of this year, Val organized a “Fash Bash” celebration of Hitler’s birthday in the Poconos, along with the neo-Nazi New Jersey European Heritage Association. In mid-September, Jovi Val was a featured speaker at a pro-Trump rally in Dalonega, Georgia, which was organized by neo-Nazis, even though Val claims to no longer be involved in the MAGA movement.

RAM Philly Statement on ‘What Will Bring About Our Freedom’ Presentation

from Revolutionary Abolitionist Movement

RAM Philly Statement on 'What Will Bring About Our Freedom' Presentation

On August 31st, in so called Illinois, in the tradition of Black August revolutionary learning and growth, RAM members facilitated “What will bring about our freedom”, a discussion/workshop on Black anarchism that we plan to replicate across the country.

Our discussion drew on the work of Zoe Samudzi, William C. Anderson, Russell Maroon Shoatz, Lorenzo Kom’boa Ervin, Kuwasi Balagoon and Ashanti Alston in addition to the experiences of many of the black folks taking part in the discussion.

Major discussion points included the need for a anarchist movement that does not center whiteness, how traditions of resistance against the state have been part of the black freedom tradition far before the first anarchist arrived to the United States and the need for black anarchist collectives to emerge.

We are hopeful about the future. We will burn down the American plantation. In the tradition of our ancestors and martyrs, we will continue to fight for our liberation.

If you are interested in bringing this workshop to your community, please contact us at phillyram@riseup.com

Help Shut Down a Neo-Fascist Event in New Jersey

from It’s Going Down

Background: On August 31, the Broadway Theatre in Pitman, NJ, will play host to variety of speakers from the far-right, including Carl Benjamin, aka Sargon of Akkad, who helped fuel the anti-feminist harassment of GamerGate.

Other speakers include Mark Meechan, aka Count Dankula, who was found guilty of violating anti-hate legislation in the UK; Aydin Paladin, a Holocaust denier; and Andy Ngo, a Quillette editor who recently pushed a conspiracy theory about journalists that inspired an Atomwaffen-affiliated kill list and has made a career off of promoting literal fake news about the antifascist movement.

Action: Call the Broadway Theatre at (856) 384-8381 and ask them not to let fascists use their space to organize. Be polite and offer to explain the context of the event.

Sample Script: Hello, I’m calling on behalf of No Hate NJ to ask you to cancel the upcoming MINDS New Jersey event that will be held at your theater on August 31. The speakers include Carl Benjamin, who helped inspire a campaign of harassment and terror against feminists during GamerGate; Mark Meechan, who was convicted of a hate crime in the UK; Aydin Paladin, a Holocaust denier; and Andy Ngo, a conspiracy theorist who recently inspired a neo-Nazi kill list with his lies. Thank you so much for your time.

This Week in Fascism #21: When Antifascism Means Giving Blood

from It’s Going Down

[Philly Anti-Capitalist note: only content relevant to Philadelphia has been repost here. To see the entire post follow the link above]

Bruce McClay, Firefighter Proud Boy in Havertown, Pennsylvania

AntiFash Gordon identified Bruce McClay, a Lieutenant at the Bon Air Fire Company in Havertown, Pennsylvania, and member of the Philadelphia Proud Boys.

The Philadelphia Proud Boys have recently escalated their violence, paying a midnight visit to the home antifascist researcher Gwen Snyder. Snyder was not home at the time, so they confronted her neighbor.

“You tell that fat bitch she better stop,” one of them told her neighbor.

You can contact the Bon Air Fire Company via their online contact form.

Researchers in Philadelphia have set up a website, PhillyProudBoys.com, to track the members of the group.

Embarrassing Turnout for Philly Militia Rally

About a dozen militia members, including Unite the Right’s Tammy Lee and Gary Sigler, paraded around historic Philadelphia on Saturday under heavy police escort.  They’re doing these “Patriot Pride” marches as a series of weekend rallies, they were in Chicago last weekend.  Look for them in your city soon.

Antifascist Alert! Far-Right March Saturday

from It’s Going Down

Community alert that a far-Right march will take place on Saturday in Philadelphia.

WHITE NATIONALISTS, ISLAMOPHOBES and other assorted FASCISTS are planning to show themselves in Philly on 8/3, for a late-announced march under the guise of “Patriot Pride.”

Organized by Houston resident Chris White with local the event doubles as a publicity campaign for White’s “Freedom Hard” lifestyle brand. As part of an attempted national campaign White marched in Chicago on July 27th to a paltry turnout, had planned to hold similar events in DC and Philly, but seems to have canceled his DC event for lack of interest.

But what White and friends either don’t know or care about, is that this march’s registered attendees include members of hate groups such as the Proud Boys, Three Percenter Militia, Chester County KKK, white supremacist Asatru practitioners and other assorted far right CHUDs.

As seen nationally post-Charlottesville, many far right groups have retreated from attempts to organize in the open, and recruit covertly inside more milquetoast right wing groups. This was widely exposed leading up to last year’s “We The People” rally, similarly organized under the guise of innocuous patriotism but actually planned and attended by Three Percenter Militia and Proud Boys members.

Take this information as you will; vulnerable folks seeking to avoid Center City tomorrow is totally understandable. But if you’re willing and able to help keep Nazi’s and their ilk off our streets, any resistance is encouraged!

Tomorrow’s unpermitted “Patriot Pride” march includes plans gather at 11AM the Liberty Bell, and then march at noon to an unspecified location.

NJ Boneheads Tried to Cause Trouble at Philly I.C.E. Protests

from Idavox

L-R, Dan D’Ambly of the NJEHA and Ron Sheehy

Ron Sheehy and Dan D’Ambly led a crew of four people to harass members of the Jewish community and their supporters protesting Trump’s concentration camps. Gee, whatever got their dander up?

PHILADELPHIA, PA – Neo-Nazis, two who were readily identified as participants in the 2017 “Unite the Right” Rally in Charlottesville, were seen at an anti-ICE protest at Independence Hall today.

Jewish-American organizations across the country organized this week to be a national “Never Again Week of Action,” and are holding similar marches across the U.S., linking the current immigration enforcement tactics employed by the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to the Holocaust. “As Jews, we’ve been taught to never let anything like the Holocaust happen again,” the Facebook event page reads. “Now, with children detained in unacceptable conditions, ICE raids targeting our communities, and people dying at the border while seeking safety in the US, we are seeing the signs of a mass atrocity. We refuse to wait and see what happens next.”

During the march, four White men identified as neo-Nazis were heckling the passing protesters with anti-Semitic language. Of the four, two were identified because of their notoriety. Dan D’Ambly of the New Jersey European Heritage Association (NJEHA), raised the Betsy Ross American flag while shouting at passers-by, while Ron Sheehy, once of the Advanced White Society joined him while videotaping those he was heckling on his cell phone. According to a since deleted post from his “Tremley” account on Stormfront, the other two were members of NJEHA.

Sheehy also said the four of them later attempted to lay a wreath emblazoned with NJEHA decals on the grave of Ben Franklin but was met with opposition. “We all paid $3 each to get into the Cemetery, and we asked if we can lay a Reef (sic) on Ben Franklin’s Grave Site so we can take a Picture,” he wrote. “(T)hey said ok, but once we did, 2 queer guys who worked there flipped out and tried taking the Reef (sic) away from us. A lot yelling back and forth with them calling us White Supremacist and stuff, so we left after that.” Sheehy also went to an anti-I.C.E. protest earlier this week at the offices of Rep. Tom Malinowski where he heckled the protesters while videotaping them. It is not known at this time if anyone joined him there.

D’Ambly is best known for attempting to hold a rally in Princeton, NJ but failed to show once the residents learned of his plans. The NJEHA seldom, if ever, hold public rallies, opting instead to post flyers on telephone poles in various cities around the state. Sheehy has been seen often at anti-immigration events over the past decade in the New York City area, and just like D’Ambly was photographed at the rally in Charlottesville which cost this life of 32-year-old Heather Heyer, who was killed when White Supremacist James Fields plowed his car into a crowd of protester. D’Ambly was also identified as one of the participants of the “Unite the Right 2” rally the following year in Washington, DC, with his NJEHA organization.

Dozens of protesters were arrested during the Fourth of July Parade while marching through demanding those being held in what has been referred to as concentration camps be removed from such establishments, one of them being in Berks County, PA.

Slouching Towards The Ethnostate: Inside The American Identity Movement

from Unicorn Riot

[Philly Anticap note: This post only contains the sections of Unicorn Riot’s article about Philadelphia. To read the entire post visit the link above.]

While [American Identity Movement] exact plans have not yet been announced, recent actions by the American Identity Movement’s core members provide a likely template. In May 2019, a few members of AmIM targeted crowds at a baseball game in Philadelphia, and brought a vinyl banner celebrating Kate Smith, a former singer of the National Anthem at the Philly stadium whose statue was recently removed due to her history of making racist comments.  The small group of white supremacist activists brought the banner into the crowd arriving for the game, and managed to entice several unsuspecting passerby into posing with them in footage later released in a propaganda video.

A message in the American Identity Movement’s private online chat for members, posted by ‘Konrad-MD,’ requested donations to recoup costs paid out of pocket to pull off the small media stunt.

Kurtis Buckingham aka ‘Konrad’ solicits donations for racist activism in the American Identity Movement’s MatterMost chat server.

Unicorn Riot has identified ‘Konrad’ as Kurtis Bailey Buckingham, an active member of AmIM’s Maryland chapter who appears at most of the group’s national actions. Buckingham is one of the newer hardcore members of the group, with leaked Discord logs showing that he joined Identity Evropa in August 2018.

Kurtis Buckingham aka ‘Konrad-MD’ at the white nationalist American Renaissance conference in May 2019.

The Philadelphia Proud Boys: An Introduction

from Dox Your Local Proud Boy

Remember, Gritty is always watching.

Philadelphia Proud Boys- 1. John Lombardo, 2. Joseph Ruff, 4. Tom Moermann, 5. Nicholas J. Magner, 9. Sonny Sullivan, 10. Donovan Chiarlanza, 11. Zachary Rehl, 13. Stephen Hartley, 14. John David Williams
More Scum- 2. Tyler Yamaguchi, 5. Jason Wiltsley, 6. Sean Curran, 7. John David Williams, 8. Mark Anthony Tucci, 9. Stephen Hartley, 10. Nicholas J. Magner

Philadelphia’s chapter of the Proud Boys has existed since mid-2017, though they have for the most part tried to remain out of the public eye and off the radar. Their attempts to hide however, have been decidedly ineffective.

So what is the point of exposing a group with no real public presence or visible effect on the world? The real question one should be asking is why wait until this group has caused harm to act? The Proud Boys on a national level have very clear intentions and are responsible for a rash of violent incidents across the country, like gang beatings in New York, and Portland. They are founded on carefully coded white supremacist and misogynist rhetoric, bigotry that makes them rotten to the core and often flares up among individual members despite PR efforts by the group as a whole to simply appear as conservatives. By willingly accepting the name and associations of the Proud Boys, this Philadelphia chapter has made their intentions clear. They have seen what the group has done across the country and decided that they too wish to be a part of that. They have made their clear and conscious decision, a decision that makes their state of mind and eventual goals apparent, and they should be responded to accordingly. Why wait until they’ve committed violence?

The first mentions of this chapter were in the spring of 2017, when prospective members began to organize on reddit. Among the initial organizers were president Stephen Hartley and vice president Tom Moerman, who began mentioning their membership on social media around this time. The group steadily gained numbers behind the scenes throughout 2017 and into 2018. Almost all of their activity up to this point was social in nature, consisting mostly of drinking outings and outdoors activities like rafting or boating. During this time, members like John Williams and Stephen Hartley cavorted with prolific national personalities in the far right like Gavin McInnes, Milo Yiannopoulous, and Sal Cipolla, attending national Proud Boy events like parties in New York, or their music festival, West Fest.

 

Some of the Philadelphia Proud Boys on a rafting trip with other chapters

They began to intersect with other portions of the Philadelphia Far Right, namely the group Sports, Beer, & Politics (On facebook, Sports, Beer & Politics II), led by Zach Rehl and Sonny Sullivan. Sports, Beer, and Politics and their connections to other Far Right groups has been outlined before http://archive.is/8CIpg. Zach and Sonny first began to appear as known members of the main chapter of the Philadelphia Proud Boys in the Summer of 2018, though how long they had interacted before this is unknown. It should be noted that another group, the Fraternal Order of Alt-Knights, was active in Philadelphia and is considered an offshoot of the Proud Boys. Members of this group organized closely with Sports, Beer, and Politics in 2017 and provided the personal security detail of Neo Nazi Augustus Invictus in Charlottesville. The Alt-Knights have not been very active in quite some time and their associations with the main group that refers to itself as the “Philadelphia Proud Boys” is unknown.

For the Philadelphia Proud Boys, their public debut was at the “We the People Rally” in Philadelphia, on November 17th, 2018. Zach Rehl, one of the members, was one of the main organizers of this event and welcomed Proud Boys both local and national, with open arms. While Proud Boys initially openly pledged allegiance to this event, they quickly backpedaled after the negative press that came out after a weekend of violent incidents and arrests in New York and Portland. They were instructed not to show up in their distinct uniform of Black and Gold Fred Perrys, and not to appear in any organizational capacity, but just as “patriots”. The still referred to themselves as Proud Boys in the security organizing chat leading up to the event though. Such duplicitous behavior is a trademark of organizer Zach Rehl. Indeed many of them showed up to the rally on the 17th, thinking they could disguise themselves in Plain Clothes. Several of them are seen together at a cigar bar after the rally, some of them apparently having changed into their Proud Boy uniforms. After a concerted doxing campaign on twitter, many of them panicked and went quiet and it seems the ranks were shuffled a bit. Zach Rehl would attempt to organize several fascist rallies in the Northeast, with a rogues gallery of boomer militias, meathead goons like Alan Swinney, and hardcore fascists like American Guard. All of these events fell through due to a mix of infighting and extreme incompetence on the part of everyone involved. Nonetheless, small crews of Philly Proud Boys would show up to various events in Philly later in the spring, with a contingent of them showing up to harass protesters outside a speech by Candace Owens at UPenn, and another group of them showing up to an anti-abortion rally. Most recently, Thomas Savasta seems to be rising through the ranks, even attending a national event where the Proud Boys declared a defamation lawsuit against the SPLC. Their most recent appearance was at Philadelphia pride- ostensibly for the purpose of participating with their gay members and appearing nice and liberal and tolerant. Of course, this is all a trick of optic’s sake- don’t be fooled. They are still working with the same base material of a group founded in bigotry, no matter how much they try to deny it. A polished turd is still a turd.

This attempt to manifest publicly was alarming and set in motion a concerted effort to root out and expose the members of this group, as a counter to their attempts to remain out of the spotlight. They will be dragged into it. Knowing who is organizing this group and who is involved in it allows us to defend our communities from any violence they may commit or invite in the future.

In general, their ranks seem to be drawn from men in their late 20s-early 40s, with most of these ‘boys’ being in their mid 30’s (Imagine calling yourself a ‘Proud Boy’ at that age… absolutely pitiful). Almost all have an inclination towards right-libertarian politics. This chapter appears to be much more optics conscious than other chapters, trying to maintain a sanitized image free of overt bigotry. This is done to the point of even being regarded as “liberal” by other members of the far right across the country. Indeed they only let their bigoted views loose in settings they believe are private or unwatched, or under different names. They love to play the game of plausible deniability, watching their tongues carefully to try and prove they aren’t racist. It must be remembered that joining into an organization with White supremacist roots, that is heavily laden with hardcore white supremacists, bolsters their actions and violence, and makes you complicit.

One strain of bigotry that seems to run consistently through the group and on the surface is Islamophobia- considering the massive spike in Islamophobic violence since Trump got elected, it is reasonable to assume that this group is a danger to Muslims in Philadelphia. Many of them seem to be drawn from the Pop Punk/Metalcore/Easycore/Metal fandoms and people who actively participate in those are warned to keep an eye out for them.

Please note that addresses given are, as a result of the data collecting method used, not confirmed as entirely true unless there is some form of on the ground evidence that that person resides there.

So who are the known members of the Philadelphia Proud Boys? Some of the key figures have provided a glut of information on their lives and activities, while others are more halfhearted about their dedication to the group and their public image, so of course there is a lot more information on some rather than others.

Matthew Missimer of Downingtown Identified as a Fascist

from It’s Going Down

Chicago Antifa identified Matthew Missimer, of Downingtown, Pennsylvania, as far-Right Twitter troll @Mathaeus-M. He frequently retweeted neo-Nazi and white nationalist accounts, including former Traditionalist Worker Party co-founder Matthew Parrott, white nationalist website VDARE, and Identity Evropa, and made frequent misogynistic and transphobic statements. After being publicly identified, Missimer promptly deleted his Twitter account.

“We are the account killers,” quipped Chicago Antifa. “3rd one this week.”

According to his LinkedIn profile, Missimer is an Invoice Processor at Aerotek, a staffing services company in Downington, Pennsylvania. You can let them know about their employee by tweeting @Aerotek.

[twitter post]

[Philly Anticap note: We have only included a locally relevant fragment of the original post. To read the whole post follow the link at the top of the post.]