Thursday, July 12, 2007

Harmon Leon/Neo-Nazi Update

AC Note: The blogospere controversy over Harmon Leon began here last week with my repost of Leon's "How to Infiltrate a White Supreacsist Hate Group." This was the epicenter of the furor:

http://alexconstantine.blogspot.com/2007/07/how-to-infiltrate-white-supremacist.html

The story originally appeared the the San Francisco Weekly in 1995. The Weekly and its readers chime in on the controversy:

Harmon's Dinner at Applebee's With White Supremacists -- Follow Up
http://blogs.sfweekly.com/thesnitch/2007/07/harmons_dinner_at_applebees_with_white_supremacists_follow_up.php
Jul 10, 2007

A couple years back, one of our intrepid (or perhaps not so intrepid) reporters sat down with a quaint family of white supremacists at Applebee's, and then wrote a very long story about it. Who gives a shit, you ask? Well, some people do. The story's been thrown around the blogosphere recently, and lots of angry and confused readers have made their way to our site to comment, not only on the story, but on the very nature of hate crime, hate groups, and how best to attend to such groups in the media. Some highlights:

From Rose — June 27, 2007 @ 02:13PM

I did not read your full article for I found the gist of it pretty sarcastic and immature, but will say this...IT IS A SERIOUS PROBLEM. OUR RACE IS DYING!
From Jim Oehlerking — April 6, 2007 @ 09:06AM

But of course their is no logic for why Americans and people of all ethnicities across the world have organized anti-Semetic and racial groups, other then the mass crime rate Africans produce and disturbing views they instill in our youth, the illegal immigration of Mexicans, and those of the Jewish faith who pollute the media and extort this country like parasites.
From Joel Crump — April 23, 2007 @ 12:27PM

I really like how they put fliers on cars at a *Metallica* concert, of all things. Metallica's message from the very beginning has been a not-so-subtle hint at *countering* neo-Nazis with their "Metal Militia". (The "Seinfeld" episode where a fictional Nazi leader has written a book named "The Big Game" also hints at what that is about.) Some will know what that means, others won't - but in any event, it's funny that this family seems not even to be on the level of hardcore Nazis. More like schizophrenic, wannabe Nazis.

If this sounds interesting to you, feel free to join in the fun. For what it's worth, we left a voice message with Harmon earlier today, but he hasn't yet returned our call. We'll let you know if he does. -MS

Tags: Applebee's, Harmon Leon, Metallica, sf, SFWeekly, white supremacists