Starting Tomorrow: Keystone United Exposed

  • September 9, 2018 9:34 am

from Philly Antifa

This has been a long time coming. For the next 30 days, every day, we will be profiling/exposing a member or supporter of Keystone United (KU) and Keystone State Skinheads (KSS). We will be largely concentrating on Pennsylvania fascists, with a few exceptions.

Every fall, KU/KSS comes to our city in secret and attempts to hold a march, rally and party to varying levels of success. They hold this event under the auspices of a “Leif Erikson Day Celebration.” Their logic being that Leif Erikson was (allegedly) the first “white” man (even though whiteness as a label was not a thing at the time, and Erikson would have considered himself Norse with no allegiance to Whiteness) to form a settlement in this hemisphere, and therefore began what they see as the rightful domination of these lands by the settler-colonial empires of Europe.

This year’s Leif Erikson day is October 9th, a month from today. The actual holiday, not the KSS rally, which they refuse to announce publicly anymore due to fear or mass opposition. Starting tomorrow, we will release a new article each day. We will be exposing KU/KSS members, former members, associates and supporters. We will reveal their homes, workplaces, criminal histories and other personal information.

Many of those we are exposing have gone to great lengths to hide their associations and cultivate a personable image, and the truth will likely be a shock to those around them. Many of them appear to be normal parents or friends, co-workers or neighbors, but moonlight in one of the most notorious neo-nazi organizations in the U.S. Keysone Untied especially loves to infiltrate general conservative circles and subtly move people more into the racist extreme or just normalize those ideas in the dialogues there.

We realize this is a controversial practice for some, so here is a brief summary of this group’s history and current activities to put it in perspective…

Keystone State Skinheads was founded in late 2001 at a Waffle House in Harrisburg, PA. KSS was part of a push to form state-based White Nationalist Skinhead crews in all 50 states that began in Indiana with the Hoosier State Skinheads, previously known as the Outlaw Hammerskins, who would later also go by the name Vinlanders Social Club and spread that brand around the country. Arizona (Canyon State Skinheads), Maryland (Maryland Skinheads aka MDS), and Ohio (Ohio State Skinheads) were just some of the other states where the idea found root.

An early pic of Keystone United.

KSS was one of the more successful iterations of the statewide skinhead crew idea. Though they suffered an early defeat in York, PA in 2002, when Antifa and local residents teamed up to chase the nazis out of town, KSS persisted and picked up steam into the late 2000’s, when they engaged in several large rallies around Pennsylvania, including the 2008 Leif Erikson Day, which drew 70+ hardcore Neo-nazis from all over the country (at a time when rallies of that size were extremely rare), including members of the Vinlanders Social Club and Volksfront, groups that had previously been hostile to each other. During this period, KSS ramped up attacks around the state, including in Philly. Assaults, harassment and vandalism against left wing community spaces were common.  Many pitched battles occurred in the Punk and Hardcore to keep KSS from gaining a foothold in Philly, as they had in many other cities in PA.

Also around this time, the KSS label was avoided in favor of “Keystone United,” which allowed KSS to organize with White Nationalists and Neo-nazis who did not meet the male skinhead criteria that KSS was founded under. Basically, all members of KSS can be considered members of KU, but only male bonehead members of KU can be “patched in” members of KSS. Outright Neo-nazi activities, such as the White Power show being organized for September 15th somewhere in PA, are organized as Keystone State Skinheads.

White power concert being organizing by KSS this month.

Political advocacy and demonstrations are organized as Keystone United. It is also a common strategy to “remove” anyone accused of a crime from KU, embracing them as KSS instead, allowing them to keep the image of KU sanitized for the media. For the forthcoming profiles, we will at different times refer to people as members of KSS and/or KU, but for all intents and purposes, the difference is a matter of public image, and the groups are essentially the same.

KU/KSS members rally against refugees in Harrisburg.

During this period, KU/KSS began to do things like bring dozens of neo-nazis to an NAACP organized community meeting in response to the vandalism of a synagogue in Wilkes Barre by nazi teens who were friends with members of KU, in order to intimidate opposition and dominate the discussion with the fruitless act of debating nazis. Keystone United also brought out a large contingent to support an Anti-Immigration rally in Harrisburg, and its members attended the National Policy Institute conference, for at least one year.

KU/KSS has strong ties with Matthew Heimbach, formerly of the Traditionalist Worker’s Party, and hosted a secret conference for Trad Worker’s “Traditionalist Youth Network” in Philly in 2016. Heimbach attended with Paddy Tartleton and several TWP members, but the bulk of the attendees were KSS/KU members.

Traditionalist Youth mid-Atlantic gathering in Philly in 2016

The threat represented by KSS/KU is a dual one. Firstly, they engage in White Nationalist activism and political work. Steve Smith, a co-founder of KSS, is in his 2nd term as Republican Committeeman in Luzerne County. He was elected the first time as a write-in candidate, but campaigned for his 2nd term and gathered over 70 votes. He has been joined this term by KU member Ryan Wojitowicz, who was also elected to the same position. Keystone United actively campaigned for both candidates.

Not only has Luzerne County’s GOP neglected to try and campaign anyone against this nazi incursion, but both Keystone United members have become regular attendees at GOP party functions in Luzerne County. They are often joined by “Joe Mulligan,” a Pennsylvania KKK leader who is friendly with Smith, a former klansman.

Keystone United will also engage in political activism around issues of immigration, refugees, gun rights, and support for President Trump. They regularly participate in “Overpasses Across America” rallies on highway overpasses to protest against immigration and accepting refugees.

KSS members participate in an anti-refugee protest as The “European American Action Coalition,” one of many front groups

KSS is under the Blood and Honour USA umbrella, and have alliances with those crews as well as The Traditionalist Workers Party (until that groups implosion earlier this year) and the Pennsylvania State Militia (whom they have rallied with at Overpasses Across America events).

In late 2016 in Harrisburg, KSS members were in the area during a National Socialist Movement rally to provide security for the event since one of the speakers was Matthew Heimbach of the TWP. At the time both the NSM and TWP were members of “The Nationalist Front,” which, along with League of the South, Vanguard America (the group James Fields was marching with in Charlottesville 2017 before he plowed his car into a crowd of protesters, killing Heather Heyer and injuring many others) and other smaller nazi orgs.

Nationalist Front marching Charlottesville at Unite the Right 1.

The Nationalist Front made up the single largest Fascist bloc at Charlotesville, and were heavily involved in the fighting that occurred. In the fallout of UTR1, The Nationalist front has been largely reduced to an NSM front, with the dissolution of TWP, the re-branding of Vanguard America to Patriot Front, and the recent departure of League of the South.

The second threat is that, behind the veneer of “gentle” white nationalism, KSS/KU is still a bonehead crew. In their over 15 years of existence, their members and supporters have been involved in countless acts of violence.

Here is a timeline of just some of the known attacks by KSS:

In June 2002, KSS members Robert Gaus, Douglas and Joseph Hoesch were arrested by police outside the Suburban Diner in Feasterville, near Philadelphia, for assaulting a man who asked them to stop throwing food at his table. The victim was struck several times and left on the diner’s floor. All three pleaded guilty to a charge of simple assault and were given suspended sentences

In September 2002, KSS members Todd Sager, Jason Hayden, and Christopher Keough, beat a former member, Christopher Morosko, who refused to return his KSS “colors”. The three pleaded guilty to assault on March 3, 2003, and were all released for time served.

On March 23, 2003, KSS members Keith Carney (Carney has since left KSS), Steve Smith and Steve Monteforte were arrested on ethnic intimidation charges in Scranton, Pennsylvania, for assaulting an African-American man who, according to police, was walking home in the early morning

In April 2003, two associates of the Lancaster Keystone State Skinheads were arrested and charged with ethnic intimidation and terroristic threats for making racist and threatening comments to three black patrons in a Lancaster-area bar.

In January 2006, KSS members Edward Robert Locke and Todd Clair Sager were charged with multiple counts in connection with a violent bar fight in March 2005 in New Stanton. Police claim Locke stabbed two men. Locke was charged with attempted homicide and four counts of aggravated assault while Sager was charged with criminal solicitation to commit homicide and criminal solicitation to commit aggravated assault.

Also in 2006, KSS members attacked several Anti-Racists outside a show at Mojo 13 (bar name later changed) in Delaware.

In January 2007, KSS members Kenneth Hoover and Charles Marovskis were arrested for beating two homeless men to death in Tampa, Florida in 1998. Hoover pleaded guilty to second-degree murder and racketeering. Charles Marovskis, of West Pittston, Pennsylvania, but originally from Tampa, Florida, pleaded guilty to two federal charges of second-degree murder.

In October, 2007, KSS members attacked Anti-Fascists down the street from a Floorpunch Show at first Unitarian Church in Philly, injuring 3 before fleeing.

On September 7, 2008, Philadelphia police officers arrested KSS member Andrew Boyle at a Philadelphia bar for being in possession of a knife. At the time of his arrest, Boyle was out on bail, awaiting trial on another matter. Boyle, along with co-defendants and fellow KSS members Carney and Doug Caffarella, and Atlantic City Skinhead Vincent DeFelice, were charged with assault and conspiracy in the alleged attack of another skinhead outside a Philadelphia bar in 2007.

In May 2014, KSS associate Vincent Pellegrino, brother of KSS member Nunzio Pellegrino, sexually assaulted a woman and stole her car, crashing it into a wall while being persued by police. Pellegrino died at the scene.

In October 2017 following their disrupted attempt to rally in Philly’s boathouse row, 10 KSS members attacked 2 Anti-Fascists in FDR park, injuring them both before aborting their party and fleeing the scene. KSS went on to celebrate the event with their event t-shirt.

In July 2018, 6 members of KSS were charged for attacking a Black man at a bar in Avalon, PA. According to the victim, KU members told him they were going to exterminate Black People “one by one” and called him the N-Word. They also injured an employee who tried to intervene. Others were involved, but the 6 charged were Natasha Dawn Bowers, 33, of Roaring Spring; Terrence Raymon Stockey, 40, of Beaver; Jeremy L. Ingram, 35, of Hollidaysburg; Travis Lee Cornell, 43, of Marianna; Crystal Lynn Shields, 23, of Tarentum; and James Edward Kryl, 45, of Pittsburgh’s North Side.

Just a few weeks ago, KSS associate and KU member Christopher Croumbley attacked an Anti-Racist outside the chameleon club in Lancaster for wearing clothing identifying themselves as Anti-Fascist.

It is worth considering that there is a pattern of high profile violent incidents, (which we assume to occur at times when non-reported acts of violence are at a peak) occurring at times when Keystone United’s “respectable white advocacy” is also more active. After the departure of a major organizer in the late 2000’s, Keystone United went relatively dormant for a few years and so did reports of violent attacks by it’s members. This flies in the face of the claim that allowing nazis in the public space for debate will redirect their energies and minimize violent assaults and murders. As nice as it would be to just let them “talk it out of their system,” when nazis and Fascists feel legitimized in the public sphere, they are emboldened, and attacks increase.

In addition to outward violence and their attempts to gain state power to enact large scale violence, KSS/KU is involved in fostering a Neo-nazi subculture in Pennsylvania that is larger than the group itself. They have organized Neo-nazi music festivals, usually in conjunction with Label 56, run by Rick Haught of Maryland Skinheads, including the “Uprise Festival,” which ran for several years, and shows by The Blue Eyed Devils, Aggravated Assault, and other popular Neo-nazi bands. They are hosting another Blue Eyed Devils show somewhere in PA on September 15th. The Blue Eyed Devils’ song titles include:

Bomb the Cities
Beating and Kicking
Hate Filled Mind
We Will Fight
Final Solution
Holocaust 2000
White Violence

Which feature lyrics such as :

During German nights and days
Adolf Eichman would lead the way
For the cause of White salvation
Victory, for our race and nation
The plan has started, no turning back
From the entire world, you’re under attack
A New Worlds Order for the Aryan man
Regain control of the European lands

Too many problems, too many lies
Too much of what you despise
Implement the only plan
Eradicate the so-called chosen man
The final solution!
White revolution!

This is a group with 2 Pennsylvania GOP politicians as members, promoting the show on their blog, alongside long articles claiming to be “white advocates” who “are like the NAACP for white people.” Who do these nazis think they are fooling… you?!

KSS makes it policy to show up at European heritage celebrations, St. Patrick’s day parades, and similar events. They do this both to recruit, and to normalize their presence in those spaces, making it harder to dislodge them later.

Each forthcoming article will come with a call to do some small action to make that KSS member’s life as a nazi a little bit harder. When it’s hard to be a nazi, some of them find a reason to quit. Others can’t do it as well as they had been. It creates divisions. Victories make them grow, defeats make them shrink.

Take the time to call their employer and demand they be fired. KSS has largely survived based on the ability for their members to travel around the state to swell numbers as needed. Gas is expensive. If the call is to help us get more info, ask your friend who is good at research but isn’t necessarily plugged into this world. If we mention that they hang out in certain places or areas, and you feel like you can do it safely, make up some flyers and post them around so that they have no anonymity. Someone should not be able to attack someone for their race on Saturday, then walk their dog to the park Sunday with no repercussions. We may feel better being ignorant of the nazi down the street, but it doesn’t actually make as any safer. Quite the opposite.

So remember to check back on the site every day. We are striving to put out each article first thing each morning, but it may be later some days. While standing our ground, defending ourselves, and physically shutting down Fascists in the street is an indispensable and crucial part of this work, the next 30 days is about showcasing how much we can do to disrupt neo-nazi organizing using research and communication.

Nowhere to hide for nazis,

Black August Letter Writing

  • August 20, 2018 5:43 pm

from Facebook

Philly ABC is doing a Black August Letter writing event on a bit of a different schedule than normal. This letter writing is the last monday of the month instead of the first.

This month we will be writing letters to Black Liberation Army members Sundiata Acoli and Dr. Mutulu Shakur.

A New York Black Panther, Sundiata Acoli endured two years of prison awaiting trial for the Panther 21 Conspiracy Case. He and his comrades were eventually acquitted on all the bogus charges. The case was historic and a classic example of police and government attempting to neutralize organizations by incarcerating their leadership. As a result of this political attack and because of the immense pressure and surveillance from the FBI and local police Sundiata, like many other Panther leaders went “underground.” On May 2, 1973, Sundiata Acoli, Assata Shakur and Zayd Shakur were ambushed and attacked by state troopers on the New Jersey Turnpike. Assata was wounded and Zayd was killed. During the gun battle a state trooper was shot and killed in self defense. Sundiata was tried in an environment of mass hysteria and convicted, although there was no credible evidence that he killed the trooper or had been involved in the shooting. He was sentenced to thirty years. Sundiata was ordered released on parole by a state appeals court in New Jersey in September 2014 when the court ruled the parole board had “acted arbitrarily and capriciously” when it previously denied him parole. The State of New Jersey has appealed the decision. More information: sundiataacoli.org

In 1987 Dr. Mutulu Shakur was sentenced to 60 years imprisonment for his role in the Black Liberation Movement. In March 1982, Dr. Shakur and 10 others were indicted by a federal grand jury under a set of U.S. conspiracy laws called Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organization (RICO) laws. These conspiracy laws were ostensibly developed to aid the government in its prosecution of organized crime figures; however, they have been used with varying degrees of success against revolutionary organizations. Dr. Shakur was charged with conspiracy and participation in the Black Liberation Army, a group that carried out actual and attempted expropriations from several banks. Eight incidents were alleged to have occurred between December 1976 to October 1981. In addition, he was charged with participation in the 1979 prison escape of Assata Shakur, who is now in exile in Cuba. After five years underground, Dr. Shakur was arrested on February 12, 1986. While he was on the street, Dr. Shakur challenged the use of methadone as a tool of recovery for addicts. He believed in natural remedies instead and, based on those beliefs, founded the Black Acupuncture Advisory Association of North America. Many people credit Shakur with saving their lives. Dr. Shakur has worked to free political prisoners and to expose government abuses against political organizers. While in prison, he has struggled to create peace between rival gangs. More information: mutulushakur.com

we look forward to seeing you there!

Philadelphia, PA: #OccupyICE Gives Trust-Fund Troll Charlie Kirk First Bath Without Maid Present

  • August 8, 2018 3:45 am
from It’s Going Down

This morning, August 6th 2018 at 7:20 am, members of met at the corner of 8th and Cherry in front of the regional ICE office and Governor Wolf’s Philadelphia office in order to shut shit down and distribute information about the Berk’s Detention Center to people on their way to work. Berk’s County Residential Center is one of 3 family detention centers in America. They are a prison that has a history of assault from their “caretakers” towards the imprisoned children, medical neglect of infants and verbal abuse, not to mention they are operating without a license! Governor Wolf has the ability to order an emergency closure, and has proven to us and many other organizers, his bark is worse than his bite, considering he hasn’t done a damn thing. You’d think in an election year he’d at least try, right?

Once we shut down the road in front of the offices and distributed literature to everyone there, we moved further up the road to a busy intersection at 8th and Vine and blocked traffic for roughly 45 minutes. We reminded people in their cars that if they felt inconvenienced being stopping in traffic, imagine what life is like as a detained child in the Berks detention center for years? One guy left his car and joined in the protest, chiding people cursing us out that Black Lives Matter and we need to ! We are planning on seeing him again at an action tomorrow.

We received word from a comrade in center city that Charlie Kirk was having a pleasant meal with Candace Owens at a local brunch spot in the gayborhood and decided we were going to give them our best Philly welcome we could muster so early! We took the streets and marched there chanting “ABOLISH ICE” “SHUT DOWN BERKS” “WHOSE STREETS, OUR STREETS” and more. Once we got to where Charlie and Candace of Turning Point USA fame, also known as Coded Rascists USA, were eating we gave em a lil wave and immediately started chanting “1,2,3, Fuck the Bourgeois 4,5,6 Fuck the Bourgeois” until they came outside. We let them know just how much we appreciated their visit to Philly with a nice cold drink of water down Charlie’s head and an over easy egg to boot. Hope y’all had a great brunch! Police escorted Charlie and Candace away while we chanted, “NO GOOD COPS IN A RACIST SYSTEM” until they were gone.

We then took to the streets again and marched up Broad Street back to our camp, reminding everyone we passed Berks must be shut down and we must put an end to stop and frisk!

Charlie Kirk Drenched and Egged While Eating Breakfast

  • August 6, 2018 5:52 pm

from Instagram

A story of Turning Point USA in Philly; maybe they should turn away now (ya’ get it?) #NoFascistsinPhilly

Anti-Muslim Group ACT! For America Plans Pro-Police Rally in Philly

  • July 27, 2018 8:57 pm

from Ida Vox

When:
August 4, 2018 @ 11:00 am – 2:00 pm
Where:
National Constitution Center
525 Arch St
Philadelphia, PA 19106
USA
ACT! For America doesn’t do anything that doesn’t involve demonizing and undercutting the rights of Muslims in this society, so naturally they are going to big up those they think are their shock troops in this endeavor. The event in Philly is being organized by one of their members, Scott Ryan Presler, who is also putting one together in St. Cloud, MN for the same day. His Facebook and Twitter account is basically nothing but fanboy adulation for Donald Trump, and that pretty much seems to be his life. But he hates Muslims and sometime finds to hate Hispanics from time to time, so yeah, he wants to hold rallies where he will find a lot of both and not too many Trump supporters.

Further Clarification Regarding Alex Stein

  • July 23, 2018 4:01 pm

from Philly Antifa

Philly Antifa recently issued an alert about a dangerous individual named Alex Stein.
Alex is absolutely, unequivocally a rapist. We refuse to go into detail because:
A. First and foremeost, we believe survivors. Their Words are enough for us.
B. Exposing details poses danger to the numbers of people he has assaulted.
However we will say there are a number of people, in completely separate circles, that have come forward. His behavior is not isolated – it shows a pattern. Patterns repeat.
A stance of “he provides good intel and he never acted a sort of way in my presence” equates to rape apologism. If this has been in anyway part of your commentary you are complicit in silencing survivors and empowering perpetrators. Do some reading and work on yourself.
Next, Alex proclaims openly to cooperating with the police and providing them information. Here is an open admission by Alex (George Bailey is one of his aliases):
In any context, in any scenario, never ever talk to the police. By his own admission, he went to the police alone, without a lawyer and cooperated with them. We reject and dispute his story of the manner in which that interrogation went, but in the end, we don’t care about directly responding to his lies. Never, under any circumstances or for any reasons do you work with the police. You are a state conspirator, your help and submission to them is akin to being a cop yourself.
The last point we will address is the questions and disbelief around his possibly being a fascist. The following screenshots were obtained from a sock account Alex used in far-right discord servers. This was one of several accounts that were discovered after Alex had been blacklisted from organizing spaces in Philly for being a rapist and for repeat instances of sexual misconduct and unnecessarily reckless behavior with no attempt and outright refusal to engage in any accountability process. A notebook of his was acquired in a space that he had been for a few months, and it listed several of his usernames and passwords inside. Sam PA is Alex, and here he is speaking to Jack Corbin, who was too stupid to know who he was talking to. Alex confirms identities to Corbin who would go on to doxx large amount of antifascists. Alex is also setting up phone calls with Corbin, where he is offering to provide more information to be used to harm and expose anti-racists:
 What might be confusing to some is that Alex was doxxed along with us, but Corbin had his name and identity already, Corbin had already identified Alex. In an act of trying to muddy the waters in his complicity and do exactly what is happening, Alex confirmed his own identity to Corbin, and this fact seems to confuse many. That’s by design; that’s the type of creature Alex is. He will do anything to survive and keep doing whatever it is he is up to. We can’t say for certain if he is fascist, and we never did. But he sure is eager to help them try and wipe us out, be it white supremacists or the state, and that sounds pretty fash to us.

ALERT: Dangerous Predator and State Collaborator Alex Stein

  • July 19, 2018 1:05 pm

from Philly Antifa

Alex Stein (or whatever alias he goes by these days) is a dangerous person.
Alex Stein is an danger and must be avoided at all costs.  He also goes by Woody, Terry, Felix, and George. His phone number is ‭(609) 992-3587‬.
He is a rapist and a serial sexual predator. He has assaulted a number of people and all signs point that he will assault more.
He has freely gone to the police, cooperated with them and helped them identify people and provided them information.
He has confirmed and identified a large number of antifascists to racists and neo-nazis. Those he helped have then started publishing doxxes on anti racists and put people’s lives in danger.
He had been completely cast out of all organizing circles in Philadelphia for a while but is now trying to reach out to different regions. He is trying to spread disinformation, entrap antifascists, and recruit people into risky situations. He is a state conspirator and might just be an outright fascist infiltrator. Whatever / whoever he is stay far away from him.
His name is Alex Stein.
His number is (609) 992-3587

Keystone United/KSS Nazis Attack Black Man in Avalon, PA

  • July 18, 2018 12:32 pm

from Philly Antifa

The Jackman Inn in Avalon, PA, where KSS attacked a black customer and a bartender on July 7th.

Coming a few weeks after holding a picnic in the area, Keystone United members were cited by police (but tellingly not arrested or charged) following an unprovoked attack on a regular patron of the Jackman Inn in Avalon PA on July 7th.

According to a local news report:

“An alleged neo-Nazi group is being accused of targeting an African American customer, assaulting him and using racial slurs against him at the Jackman Inn…

It happened when the victim, patron Paul Morris, walked into a backroom where a group of men were playing pool. The men allegedly used a racial epithet against the victim.

Police say the group of men may have been from Keystone United, which they describe as a racist neo-Nazi group formerly known as the Keystone State Skinheads…

when the bartender asked the group to leave, they attacked Morris…

‘Eight of them jumped Paul,’ (the bar manager) said. ‘He was hit in the face. He bent down to pick up his glasses. He was hit again’…

Morris is now California, but KDKA’s Andy Sheehan spoke with him on the phone. He says one member who called him the n-word said his group would eradicate blacks one-by-one, and then he attacked.

‘They attacked me because they had hate in their hearts. I didn’t do anything to these people,’ Morris said.

Avalon Police detained some members of the group, but did not charge them. Avalon Police Chief Thomas Kokoski said he believes they will be charged, but the incident is still under investigation….

The incident happened on July 7, and Morris’s lawyer, Fred Rabner, questions why no arrests have been made, saying they should be charged, not only with assault but with ethnic intimidation.

‘This is a hate crime, there’s no doubt about it,’ said Rabner. “

Fortunately, Morris received no serious injuries, nor did the bar employee, who was also attacked when they intervened.

It is unknown which KSS members were involved in the attack, but the event is not dissimilar from an attack on a black man by 3 KSS members in Scranton, PA back in 2003, one of whom was Luzerne County republican committeeman and co-founder of KSS Steve Smith.

Steve Smith is a longtime Neo-Nazi. He is a former Klansman, co-founder of KSS and Luzerne county republican committeeman.

Smith was in attendance at the KSS picnic in the area at the end of May, but it is unknown if he was involved in the attack on the 7th.

We could go on forever about state/cop bias in favor of white supremacists (and white people in general), for example, participating in an Anti-Racist march where some windows got broken can get you arrested and looking at 70 years while attacking 2 people during a hate crime gets you cited with no charges. Or we could belabor that those who equate Antifa with Nazis, or claim we have “Anti-White Bias” would be hard pressed to find an incident where Antifa randomly attack a white man for his race when he comes into a bar to deliver a thank you note to one of the employees, but we won’t.

This was a horrific attack that could have ended in much more serious injury or even death, as attacks by KSS members have in the past. We are glad Mr. Morris and the bar employee escaped serious injury.

Keystone United/KSS have been a blight on PA for too long. If we can hope for any silver lining to this attack, it is that people in this state will start taking the threat they represent seriously again, and that the years of PR spin KSS has employed to try and convince people that their “old days” of randomly attacking People of Color, Queers and Anti-Racists were behind them in favor of “positive white activism” have been debunked.

Anyone with information about this attack, specifically which KSS members were involved, should contact us. We plan to identify those involved and release their names, which is more than the state could be counted on. No one should be able to commit a racist assault on Saturday and go back to anonymity on Sunday.

Time to shut these fucks down. More to come.

As Black as Resistance: Finding the Conditions for Liberation

  • June 1, 2018 11:10 am

from Google Calendar

A discussion with authors Zoe Samudzi and William Anderson.

In the United States, both struggles against oppression and the gains made by various movements for equality have often been led by Black people. Still, though progress has regularly been fueled by radical Black efforts, liberal politics are based on ideas and practices that impede the continued progress of Black America. Building on their original essay “The Anarchism of Blackness,” Samudzi and Anderson show the centrality of anti-Blackness to the foundational violence of the United States and to the racial structures upon which it is based as a nation. Racism is not, they say, simply a product of capitalism. Rather, we must understand how anti-Blackness shaped the contours and logics of European colonialism and its many legacies, to the extent that “Blackness” and “citizenship” are exclusive categories.

As Black As Resistance makes the case for a new program of self-defense and transformative politics for Black Americans, one rooted in an anarchistic framework that the authors liken to the Black experience itself. This book argues against compromise and negotiation with intolerance. It is a manifesto for everyone who is ready to continue progressing towards liberation.

When
 Fri Jun 8, 2018 7pm – 9pm Eastern Time
Where
 Wooden Shoe Books, 704 South St, Philadelphia, PA 19147, USA (map)

Technological Progress & The Modern World

  • May 15, 2018 3:56 pm
from Anathema

In an interview about his new book on precision and the modern world, Simon Winchester questioned whether we had gone too far. When making things to withstand such incredible tolerances, the components have to be incredibly precise, otherwise you have the example he gave of an airplane wing becoming irreparably damaged in flight due to a fraction of a millimeter of an error. He elaborated that we might be “in danger of fetishizing precision,” constructing our lives around it, and losing respect for simple skills and hand-made things.

You might notice that we don’t usually advocate half-measures in these pages. The life of an anti-capitalist under capitalism is often a life of compromise, for fear of imprisonment or death at the hands of the state, but we aspire to be so much more – and those times that appear as compromise may only be a disguise to keep us free as we continue to escalate our conflict. The recent spate of communiques surrounding May Day seems to attest to that.

During one of the May Day speeches beside City Hall, a member of the the Radical Education Department suggested that, “we need to go on the offensive” – and they are more right than they know. But with the continuation of absolute atrocities against the earth and its inhabitants (e.g. poisoned water, poisoned air, massive deforestation, indigenous genocide, racist murders by police), we would have a long way to go before we overcame our defensive position – meaning it is only more necessary that we attack, and do so by every means available.

“By insurrectional practice we mean the revolutionary activity that intends to take the initiative in the struggle and does not limit itself to waiting or to simple defensive responses to attacks by the structures of power.” – For an Antiauthoritarian Insurrectionist International

In a recent report by Counterpunch, it was put forth that environmentalists contribute to deforestation due to their consistent compromises with the state, maintaining the course of removing what very little remains of an already decimated landscape. Similarly, marching in the streets over those aforementioned atrocities, and asking the authorities in charge of those that committed them to address that “injustice,” doesn’t even begin to get to the point. Relying on accrued examples of earth-devastating malfeasance by a drilling company, as some residents are doing in “opposition” to the Mariner East 2 pipeline, again, doesn’t halt the problem – and doesn’t really address the the technological advances that allow for horizontal drilling, which has similarly made new advances in further contaminating our groundwater.

And what do they gain for their sacrifices? “Electronics-recycling innovator is going to prison for trying to extend computers’ lives.” On April 29th, it was reported that “Mahwah, NJ is fining Ramapough [Lenape Indians protesting proposed pipeline] up to $42,500 per day for prayer and sacred altar retroactively since March 29, 2018.” Bureaucracy prevails, as Mumia can’t even get a new trial under progressive DA Larry Krasner, despite lying and tampering by cops involved in testimony and evidence gathering, and overt racism by the judge. Whether or not you believe he did it (which really shouldn’t matter anyway), by the state’s own logic he should get a new trial.

The food and water in prisons, among other conditions in those modern slave plantations, have contributed to riots occurring in recent months – months ahead of a proposed prison strike beginning in August.

Meanwhile, the food and water we consume on the outside is also less nutritious than the wild foods that persisted before agriculture, and incredibly tainted. Industrial food production has recently contributed to E. coli outbreaks in Romaine Lettuce and ready-to-eat salads produced in PA, listeria contamination of milk in Lancaster County, staphylococcal enterotoxin and clostridial toxin contamination of beef, the contamination of sausages and beef in two different states with hard pieces of plastic – and that’s only since our last printing.

“Nearly 70% of Chicago’s tap water tested positive for brain damaging lead,” reads a headline, in the continuing tradition of poisonings that still affect Flint, MI; Chester, PA; and Philadelphia, among so many others.

The New York Times reported last month that a Sperm Whale was killed by 64 pounds of trash that clogged its intestines and stomach, further stating that “as the amount of plastic in the ocean grows every year, some scientists believe that debris might kill more animals than the effects of climate change.” Yes, more than climate change: the human-induced mass-extinction event.

“Today’s ecological crises are a warning sign that capitalism itself is not sustainable. The problem is not that we lack reformist legislation; the problem is that our economic system fundamentally disconnects us from the environment.” Additionally, those technologies developed alongside the growth of that economic system contribute to our alienation from the natural world and to the economic system’s control over our lives.

The potential expiration of “Net Neutrality” on June 11th is not the end of freedom on the internet. Being conceptualized as a “right,” provided by the large corporations that provide the necessary infrastructure for that communication, means that legal use of the internet is already mediated and therefore not free. Freedom means having power – not the power to control other people or their means to communicate (consider how internet service providers already slow down your connection over particular downloads), but the power to control the circumstances of one’s own life. You do not have freedom if anyone else has power over you, no matter how benevolently, tolerantly and permissively that power may be exercised.

“Facebook harvested 3.5 billion Instagram images without warning their owners” until much later, as they built an Artificial Intelligence photo recognition system. French police were recently revealed to also be using AI to “predict protests and neutralise them,” and “Facebook terms now ban posting photos of undercover agents infiltrating your political group, protest, etc.” – those very same infiltrators that have entrapped activists leading to long prison sentences when no crime had been committed (e.g. Eric McDavid).

“Compromise continues the trajectory and we can’t afford to stay the course.”

“Five journalists arrested while covering Standing Rock still face charges – more than one year later,” reads a headline from two weeks ago, and 59 J20 defendants are still suffering the stresses and costs of fighting decades in prison for attending a protest. It’s a wonder anyone attends protests at all considering the potential costs incurred for so little return. But I guess a student walkout at Temple University in favor of sanctuary status on May Day in a state that “is a free-for-all” for cops that want to arrest undocumented immigrants is really the least you can do.

The two black men being arrested in a local Starbucks minutes after arriving, as they awaited the arrival of another member of their party, is not a new development, but its sensationalism has contributed to this common trend becoming news-worthy. Recent nationwide reports of white people calling the cops on black people having a cookout, on a black Yale student for napping in a common area, on black teenagers for shopping at a Nordstrom, on black folks for checking out of their Airbnb, on five black women for not golfing fast enough at a country club, popularly exhibit the racial profiling that leads to the higher rates of incarceration and murder by police. Take the example of the black man murdered outside of a California Walmart when cops fired 30 rounds into a vehicle after he was suspected of theft, and also wounded one of the passengers. Or the Democracy Now! report that a “black teen [was] sentenced to 30 years in prison for a murder committed by cop.” Then there were the examples of “Native American brothers pulled from campus tour after nervous parent calls police,” and the “young Santee Sioux man shot by police officer while being dragged on the ground.”

This seems an appropriate time to remember that on May 13, 1985, the Philadelphia Police dropped a bomb in a residential neighborhood that killed five children.

Those old fall backs of modernity that claim we’re better off now, as life is safer and easier than it once was, seem mostly unfounded by this only partial round-up of recent news reports. Even before mentioning that the World Health Organization is now warning that “common infections and minor injuries which have been possible to treat for decades may once again kill millions” due to the overuse of antibiotics. Those complex surgeries and cancers that the developed world has been so triumphant in treating, even though it has been the creator of many of the causes of those illnesses, are suddenly becoming extremely difficult to treat. And to add insult to injury, Business Insider reports that “the average American worker takes less vacation time than a medieval peasant.”

The so-called popular alternatives presented to us and advocated for in order to reach the masses, defer to the same Bernie Sanders who once advocated for the dissolution of the CIA, but now just appeals to have a less overtly offensive head for the organization that notoriously contributed to assassinations and torture as a matter of course. Socialist mouthpiece Jacobin can write a whole article on Brexit without mentioning its racially motivated anti-immigrant policies. Local “independent” news site, the Philadelphia Citizen, can propagate its founder’s opinion that we need Amazon to build its HQ2 in Philly to keep the college transplants here, despite the consequent gentrification that will continue to force out already marginalized residents. These are continuations of the path that have lead to the deadly-serious, alienated reality that we currently suffer.

Compromise continues the trajectory and we can’t afford to stay the course.

Insurgent SupremacistsThe US Far Right’s Challenge to State & Empire

  • May 9, 2018 3:00 pm

from Instagram

 

A major study of movements that strive to overthrow the U.S. government, that often claim to be anti-imperialist and sometimes even anti-capitalist yet also consciously promote inequality, hierarchy, and domination, generally along explicitly racist, sexist, and homophobic lines. Revolutionaries of the far right: insurgent supremacists.

In this book, Matthew N. Lyons takes readers on a tour of neonazis and Christian theocrats, by way of the patriot movement, the LaRouchites, and the alt-right. Supplementing this, thematic sections explore specific dimensions of far-right politics, regarding gender, decentralism, and anti-imperialism.

Intervening directly in debates within left and antifascist movements, Lyons examines both the widespread use and abuse of the term “fascism,” and the relationship between federal security forces and the paramilitary right. His final chapter offers a preliminary analysis of the Trump presidential administration relationship with far-right politics and the organized far right’s shifting responses to it.

Both for its analysis and as a guide to our opponents, Insurgent Supremacists promises to be a powerful tool in organizing to resist the forces at the cutting edge of reaction today.

[May 16 at 7PM at Wooden Shoe Books & Records 704 South Street]

White Nationalist Christian Engel AKA DJ Eisdriver Living in Philly

  • April 21, 2018 10:35 am

from Instagram

Philly ABC April Letter Writing to Janet and Janine Africa

  • March 27, 2018 3:30 pm

from Facebook

On 04/02/18 Philly ABC will be hosting a letter writing event to Janet and Janine Africa, 2 members of the MOVE 9. Please join us in writing letters to these rad folks.

” The August 8, 1978, police attack on MOVE followed years of police brutality against MOVE and was a major military operation carried out by the Philadelphia police department under orders of then-mayor, Frank Rizzo. Mayor Rizzo’s reputation for racism and brutality was and is well known–it followed him up through the ranks of the police department to the police commissioner’s office to the mayor’s office.

During this attack, heavy equipment was used to tear down the fence surrounding our home, and cops filled our home with enough tear gas to kill us and our babies, while SWAT teams covered every possible exit. We were all in the basement of our home, where we had 10 thousand pounds of water pressure per minute directed at us from 4 fire department water cannons (for a total of 40 thousand pounds of water pressure per minute). As the basement filled with nearly six feet of water we had to hold our babies and animals above the rising water so they wouldn’t drown. Suddenly shots rang out (news reporters and others know the shots came from a house at 33rd and Baring Street, not our home, because they actually saw the man shooting) and bullets immediately filled the air as police throughout the area opened fire on us. Officer James Ramp, who was standing above us on street-level and facing our home, was killed by a single bullet that struck him on a downward angle…Nine of us were charged with murder and related charges for the death of James Ramp.” (http://onamove.com/move-9/)

Keep Reardon On The Run!

  • March 14, 2018 3:04 pm

from Philly Antifa

Oh gee the life of a neo-nazi sure is a rough one!
Ex-Philadelphian Mark Daniel Reardon can’t seem to catch a break. After we exposed him in 2017 for flyering Nazi propaganda on college campuses, immense community pressure and good works quickly evicted him from his apartment and he was fired from his job. Great work neighbors!
Typically stupid as Nazis are, Reardon did not learn the lesson that there are consequences for hate mongering. He continued his trashy Nazi path by travelling down to Charlottesville and taking part in Leif Erikson Day here in Philly. All the while spreading tons of racist, bigoted, sexist views from his badly done fringe cartoons he composed hidden in an even shittier apartment in Voorhees, NJ. After more good works by Antifascists of exposing his new address and his Nazi ideology being revealed so publicly, poor Mark felt the heat and has fled the country. YAY!
But, he STILL hasn’t learned.
He has set up a support account to fund his existence, which we think is rightfully bankrupt.
MakerSupport should be made aware that they are creating a safe space for Nazis, and that is an outrage and needs to stop!
And tell them to shut down:
CW if you click VERY offensive racist, anti-semetic, violently homophobic/transphobic/sexist content

CORRECTION: Jack “Pale Horse” Corbin Previously Falsely ID’d – Is Actually Daniel W. McMahon of Brandon, FL!

  • March 10, 2018 12:30 am

from Philly Antifa

Daniel William McMahon, aka Jack “Pale Horse” Corbin, of Brandon FL
Jack “Pale Horse” Corbin posting the video above discussing his role as leader of Open Carry Florida. This is from the leaked discord chat logs courtesy of Unicorn Riot.

As many of our readers are probably aware, in the aftermath of the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, VA in August, there was a huge push among Neo-Nazis, especially those associated with 8chan’s nazi-infested “Pol” board, to dox and harass Anti-Fascists who participated in protesting the rally.

One nazi in particular, going by the alias Jack “Pale Horse” Corbin, was especially prolific in doxxing Anti-Racists and Anti-Fascists. Eager to unmask Pale Horse, Anti-Fascists within the TORCH network, as well as independent Antifa, rushed their research and made a critical error by falsely identifying Corbin as Jake Loubriel of Dania Beach, FL.

To be fair, not only is Loubriel a far-right racist Trump supporter, he has participated in doxxing Antifa, just not under the alias Jack Corbin.  Corbin stole pictures of Loubriel from social media and intentionally used them as a red herring to throw off Antifa.  This was an deliberate deception by Corbin; not an oversight by Antifa. Loubriel and Corbin are both living in Florida and have intersected on open carry and 2nd amendment pages.

Loubriel also appears to support Corbin doxxing and threatening Anti-Racists and Antifa. So while we should always strive for 100% accuracy in our reporting, and those who rushed to identify Corbin as Loubriel should take a serious lesson from this, they can take solace in knowing that the person falsely accused of being Jack Corbin is still a piece of shit far-right racist who has participated in the doxxing of Antifa, just not this Corbin piece of shit in particular.

For our part, we would like to apologize to our readers for re-posting and blindly accepting the dox of Loubriel.  The information seemed legitimate and the source was trusted, but, obviously, we should have independently confirmed it as such.

After learning that Loubriel was not Corbin via an infiltrator, our intel department went to work trying to positively ID them once and for all. After much research, we are prepared to name Jack “Pale Horse” Corbin as Daniel William McMahon of Brandon, FL.