So a marginally employed (by choice it would appear) conspiracy theory adherent suggesting the COVID vaccine will kill people is totally normal right? 1/7
Also totally normal? When the mayor of a village in Saskatchewan, albeit one who barely got more than 30 out of 56 votes... 2/7
...who comment on Wayne's post suggesting mass executions of politicians? Medical professionals? 3/7
And who himself shares conspiracies about the virus he thinks will kill people but that the Liberal government is incompetent for not getting vaccines out sooner. 4/7
AND, of course, who has supported a violent insurrection and a failed coup that left 5 people dead. 5/7
For more information on Jay Riedel, I posted a thread discussing him and others a while back. You can look at it here if you are so inclined to do so. 6/7
Yesterday @EdmontonAgainst tweeted a clip of a @CalgaryPolice officer interacting in what appears to have been a deferential manner towards Brad Carrigan. 1/16
Carrigan is one of the individuals planning a rally at the Edmonton Leg on February 20 along with Calgary street preacher Artur Pawlowski. The imagery on the promotional material includes a torch march from the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville (August 2017) 2/16
That is the rally in which a woman was murdered and several others injured when a car driven by a right-wing extremist rammed into the crowd. 3/16
Rick Boswick also appeared to document the event. Yesterday he was very excited in his videos prior to seeing the turnout. It is telling he doesn't appear to have shared any of his videos of the event on FB yet. 3/12
Meet Artur Pawlowski (here with Rob Anders). If you are unfamiliar with the name, he is a far-right preacher in Calgary who is associated with groups like the Soldiers of Odin, Northern Guard, III%ers and Worldwide Coalition Against Islam among others. 1/21
Here are a few examples from the blog that feature Artur:
"Calgary Soldier of Odin Leader Posts Antisemitic Memes and Linked to Overt Racists" 2/21
This thread is based on older posts from June 2020, but they are still useful in understanding the mindset of the hatriot groups in Canada I and others have covered for years.
Before that though, I have two older video clips from June 3, 2017 to provide some context. 1/20
2/20
The Worldwide Coalition Against Islam (WCAI) was mainly an Internet group, though the two leaders, founder and president Joey DeLuca and VP Jesse Wielenga and a handful of other members participated in and organize real world events. 3/20
While @erinotoole has stated that it was the result of a series of controversies, the straw that broke the camel's back was accepting a donation from neo-Nazi Paul Fromm (@FrommPaul). 2/24
Now Paulie's influence in far-right extremism has waned significantly (a reason why he has tried to attach himself to more contemporary movements; Proud Boys, Yellow Vests, anti-lockdown, etc), which probably means being in the news is a bit of a thrill. 3/24