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Twitter Hashtag For Far-Right Group Taken Over By Gay Men (cnn.com) 257

"The Proud Boys hashtag, which members of the far-right group have been using, was trending Sunday," reports CNN, "after gay men on Twitter hijacked it and flooded the feed with photos of their loved ones and families and with memes."

On Thursday 83-year-old George Takei (who'd play Sulu, the helmsman of the starship Enterprise, on the original Star Trek TV series) had suggested the hijacking to his 3.1 million followers on Twitter — and CNN describes what happened next: Matt Dechaine, one of the men who pitched in with photos of himself and his husband in efforts to overtake the hashtag, said his goal was simply to spread joy. "Seeing the hashtag was so uplifting," Dechaine, who is from England, told CNN. "It feels like the movement for positive change for all is gathering momentum all the time and I'm glad to be a small part of it. By coming together rooted in respect and love for each other, the world can be so much better!"

But Enrique Tarrio, the leader of the Proud Boys, said he doesn't see what the men are trying to accomplish. "I think it's hysterical," Tarrio told CNN. "This isn't something that's offensive to us. It's not an insult. We aren't homophobic. We don't care who people sleep with. People think it's going to bother us. It doesn't."

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Twitter Hashtag For Far-Right Group Taken Over By Gay Men

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  • Comment removed (Score:5, Informative)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Sunday October 04, 2020 @03:38PM (#60571872)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion
    • by Iamthecheese ( 1264298 ) on Sunday October 04, 2020 @03:48PM (#60571910)
      Once again, "troll" is not the "I don't like these facts" mod.
    • Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)

      by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Sunday October 04, 2020 @04:11PM (#60571970)
      Comment removed based on user account deletion
      • by rsilvergun ( 571051 ) on Sunday October 04, 2020 @04:31PM (#60572042)
        right here [twitter.com].
        • by superwiz ( 655733 ) on Sunday October 04, 2020 @09:28PM (#60572718) Journal
          You know Gavin McInnes is a comedian, right? He often does characters which either go overboard or which criticize the actual Gavin, the person. You might as well pull up footage of "The Great Dictator" and claim that Charlie Chaplin was spewing Hitler's propaganda.... while Chaplin was actually mocking Hitler.
        • by superwiz ( 655733 ) on Sunday October 04, 2020 @09:37PM (#60572732) Journal
          Or better yet, you should point to a clip of Borat and then claim it's what Sacha Baron Cohen actually thinks.
      • by Okian Warrior ( 537106 ) on Sunday October 04, 2020 @04:31PM (#60572046) Homepage Journal

        And this is the problem with the left wing position: they don't bother to debate the right.

        Your post is filled with un-person labels meant to prevent discussion. Discussion is very much preferable to the alternative, it's how we sort out our differences. The alternative is violence.

        So my question is: what are the exact policies that the Proud Boys expound that are wrong?

        Here's a technique that I think is really appropriate:

        First, recount their position in a way that they agree is accurate. If they disagree, go back and try again. Repeat until you have an accurate accounting of their position.

        Next, explain why that position is wrong.

        Finally, explain what remedies should be taken: should their position be made illegal? Should they be deplatformed, shadow banned, arrested? Why

        The number of times people and groups have been mislabelled by the left is truly astounding. Milo Yiannopolis, Brett Weinstein, and Jordan Peterson are all wildly mis-represented online.

        Many on the right have offered to debate the left on the issues, including the three above, and in no cases has the left taken them up on it.

        Stop mislabelling people, stop un-personing people, and tell us what you think their specific views are.

        And if they disagree with your rendition, modify your rendition until it's accurate.

        NB: Just finished listening to two Joe Rogan interviews of Gavin McInnes, because I wanted to find out why his views are so dangerous. Know what? His views need to be addressed, because they're very convincing to someone not versed in the nuances of the position.

        You can address political views head-on, or make them "forbidden knowledge".

        You can guess which one will be more popular.

      • by Kernel Kurtz ( 182424 ) on Sunday October 04, 2020 @04:41PM (#60572084)

        OTOH its leader made a video three years ago, now pulled down, called "10 things I hate about the Jews" which was an antisemitic as it sounds, and is a holocaust denialist. You say it has a vetting policy aimed at discouraging white supremacists from joining, but it has allied with white supremacists, and it was a former high up that organized the 2017 "Unite the Right" rally.

        As a Canadian I can assure you we are glad he is your problem now.

        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]

      • by raymorris ( 2726007 ) on Sunday October 04, 2020 @07:31PM (#60572508) Journal

        Your claims are directly opposite of the actual facts.

          [Reagan] believed deficits didn't matter, and while he reformed the tax code a little he never suggested upper tiers should be as low as they are today.

        The Reagan tax cut of 1986, along with cutting rates for everyone, cut the highest Personal Income Tax rate from 50% to 38.5% immediately decreasing to 28% in the following years. It's currently 37%. Reagan got 28%. That's what Reagan did, despite a Democrat-controlled House.

        That's after he did the Balanced Budget and Emergency Deficit Control Act of 1985. Yeah, deficits were an emergency to him.

        Here's nine minutes of him telling exactly what he thought about multi-billion dollar deficits:
        https://youtu.be/_9TD6ejrVrA [youtu.be]

        Of course now we have deficits into multiple trillions, vs not billions. The fact that the Democrat Congress spent doesn't mean Reagan thought deficits don't matter.

        The only use of the phrase "don't matter" remotely related to Reagan is that years later somebody said that Reagan's re-election in 1984 despite not eliminating the deficit proves that deficits don't matter (in elections).

      • by Pseudonym ( 62607 ) on Sunday October 04, 2020 @08:58PM (#60572662)

        Regardless, it's not the left who are saying this. It's the media.

        Don't forget the FBI, who classified them as an extremist organization in 2018.

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by nomadic ( 141991 )

      I'm always a little surprised about how worried some of my fellow liberals/leftists are of these guys; has anyone actually seen these guys in action? Their members are not exactly the most intimidating specimens...I mean, they're adult men who named their little gang after a Disney movie song which should tell you everything.

      • by Whatsisname ( 891214 ) on Sunday October 04, 2020 @05:54PM (#60572282) Homepage

        You don't need to be intimidating to buy a gun and pull the trigger. Combine that with a lot of police being on "their side" doesn't help.

        • by Darinbob ( 1142669 ) on Sunday October 04, 2020 @07:22PM (#60572474)

          The worry is the wannabe attitude; wannabe a soldier, protector, defender. Wandering around assuming that something evil is happening from those left of center (or even in the center), and that someone with a gun needs to guard against that, and then you set things up for a bad "accident". Add to the attitude that it's ok for police to shoot first as long as they felt a twinge of threat onto a group of self proclaimed wannabe policers.

          If there's a political rally, please leave the guns at home. It's just stupid and asking for trouble to bring guns along in an era where political divides are so amazingly heated. You can much more easily recuperate from a fist fight than from a gun fight.

          • by amxcoder ( 1466081 ) on Sunday October 04, 2020 @08:25PM (#60572608)
            Not advocating anything specific, but I don't remember seeing armed people guarding rallies (on a normal basis) until the likes of Antifa and other Anarchists started bringing Molotov cocktails, fireworks, explosives, bricks by the pallet full, helmets/body armor, batons/bats/skateboards, and guns and any other item they could use as a weapon or to cause damage, and actually did start causing damage and violence against random property and people.

            What I find disturbing, is you mention to leave the guns at home when talking about "far right" groups, but you don't include all the other weapons (including guns) that the left is bringing to their "mostly peaceful protests".
            • Bricks were not brought by the paletteful. There was a picture of a palette of bricks but it was from a different day and for the construction. Memes can fool both sides remember.

              Anarchists have been around causing problems for over a hundred years too.

              • Well,

                as an antifa myself, and a lefty, albeit a poor one, I would make sure that before protests starts, I buy a few thousand truck loads of pallets with bricks.

                The pallets would be placed strategically on every road crossing for easy pick up and resupply.

                I also would make sure all bricks are cut in half or even three pieces for more easy throwing.

                And on top of that obviously I would put a sign on each pallet "Strictly for leftwing and Antifa - looters will be shot at".

                And if you dare to make a picture of my stuff and post it somewhere my lawyer will hunt you for the rest of your life for copyright infringement and personal rights violation!!!

    • by jrumney ( 197329 ) on Sunday October 04, 2020 @04:48PM (#60572100)

      From what I've read about the group, they seem to fit the definition of Incels more than they fit the definition of white supremacists. Maybe we should call them that instead. But as much as they try to skirt around being a "White Supremacy" movement, one of their core beliefs is "Western Culture Supremacy", so I do find this skirting around the label to be somewhat of a deception, as other white nationalist groups seeking political legitimacy have always used to keep the extremism somewhat hidden from public view.

      • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

        by Stoutlimb ( 143245 )

        That's just daft. It's easy and right to treat people of all races the same, and yet acknowledge that not all cultures are created equal. Western culture has spacecraft and the Internet. Other cultures have female genital mutilation, throw gays off of roof tops, or think think sleeping with virgins will cure AIDS. When judging people, or groups of people, the only proper way is to judge by their actions and the content of their minds. Western supremacy makes sense, we prove it simply by living our live

        • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

          by Darinbob ( 1142669 )

          Remember, Western European Culture believed that sleeping with underage virgins would cure syphilis. I'm not talking about some obscure central European duchy, but Merry Old England in the 1800s. Western European Culture still believes in male genital mutilation in large part. Many of those in Western European Culture believe in throwing gays off of roofs as long as no one is watching, and it was within most of our memories when being gay was a crime in most european countries, and you could play smear t

          • by Bert64 ( 520050 )

            Merry Old England in the 1800s

            Well that's the whole point...
            Over a century ago, we lacked a lot of the scientific knowledge we have now. People did stupid things driven by superstition and religion, but western culture has advanced beyond that. Some other cultures have not.

            Also, "not very superior" is still better than "inferior". Western culture is not without its flaws, but there are many other cultures with significantly worse problems.

            • Meanwhile Western culture contains vaccine deniers, moon-landing deniers, homeopathy and other miracle cure believers (who promote and benefit from the scam in a very capitalist way), and all sort of other bullshit.

              "Advancing beyond that" seems to be a personal trait, not a cultural one. All cultures are sensitive to the problem and may have people capable of overcoming it.

      • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

        by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

        They are a very modern far right group. They put out a lot of memes, in fact the name is a reference to a Disney movie. At the core though it's the same old crap from 90 years ago.

      • by Pseudonym ( 62607 ) on Sunday October 04, 2020 @09:11PM (#60572684)

        one of their core beliefs is "Western Culture Supremacy" [...]

        "Western" has always been defined in terms of what it is not. First, it was "not the Eastern Roman Empire" (which included all of Greece and half of Italy). Next, it was "not the Islamic world" (which included a lot of what is now Spain). Then, it was "not Communist Eastern Europe".

        Whatever "Western" is supposed to mean today, it sure as hell isn't geographic. It certainly isn't about a shared cultural heritage which includes the bits of Europe that they don't like.

    • by hey! ( 33014 ) on Sunday October 04, 2020 @05:11PM (#60572164) Homepage Journal

      Social scientists who study groups like the Proud Boys or skinheads report that there's actually a diversity of viewpoints in the movements when it comes to race. There are both racist and anti-racist Proud Boys.

      However the effort by organizers like McInnes to distance the movement from white supremacist are largely rebranding. They hold largely similar positions to White Supremacist but with express them superficially different terminology ; the labels are different but the in- and out-groups are for the most part the same.

      I've spent some time on racist and white nationalist sites to see what goes on there, and a lot of it is training in dog-whistling. Newbies join, express extremist views, and the leaders don't contradict them, they train them to say the same thing in ways that would be less familiar and alarming to the general public.

    • by Misagon ( 1135 )

      And I'd bet that they get so very surprised and appalled every friggin' time yet another one of their members gets discovered as a former member of (another) white supremacist group, for saying something racist, for doing something racist, etc. etc.

    • They're not racist, they just really enjoy pointing out which ethnicities commit more crime relative to their population size.
    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by gizmo2199 ( 458329 )

      And this is a far-right wing organization that:

      1. Has a vetting policy aimed at blocking white supremacists from joining.
      2. Has plenty of non-whites in its ranks.
      3. Advocates tradition Regan-era conservatism for the most part.
      4. Is run by an Afro-Cuban.

      So clearly fungible with the Traditional Workers Party and Atomwaffen.

      Yes, it's kind of crazy that the media has portrayed or conflated "Proud Boys" with white supremacist organizations and more generally that they characterize pro-second amendment counter-protestors as "right wing" protestors, but the BLM protestors are just "peaceful protestors" and never left-wing protestors or rioters.

      It's like if I didn't know any better, I'd say that the elite media (ABC, CBS, CNN, MSNBC, NY Times et al.) comprise some kind of quasi-propaganda machine carrying water for the American Lef

    • by gweihir ( 88907 )

      The "Proud Boys" have some fascist characteristics, but generally they seem to be fuck-ups that have no clue how things work and their initiation is more of a parody of anything real. They seem to be a dark joke gone seriously wrong because some people took it seriously.

  • by Rick Zeman ( 15628 ) on Sunday October 04, 2020 @03:38PM (#60571874)

    ...but George Takai is a national treasure.

  • by Sebby ( 238625 ) on Sunday October 04, 2020 @03:38PM (#60571876)

    But Enrique Tarrio, the leader of the Proud Boys, said he doesn't see what the men are trying to accomplish. "I think it's hysterical," Tarrio told CNN. "This isn't something that's offensive to us. It's not an insult. We aren't homophobic. We don't care who people sleep with. People think it's going to bother us. It doesn't."

    It's not to piss you off, it to piss off your followers/base.

    • by quonset ( 4839537 ) on Sunday October 04, 2020 @03:48PM (#60571904)

      And he's lying out his ass. They're another of the many white supremacist groups in this country who are homophobic.

      As an aside, one of their "policies" is you can only masturbate once per month. Yes, really.

      Also, as another aside, it's always amusing when folks like this say, "It was the white man who built everything you see" then turn around and deny they have any responsibility for the outcome. It's as if accepting responsibility for their actions never enters into the equation. It's always someone else's fault.

      Sound familiar?

      And know you know, the rest of the story.

  • by bistromath007 ( 1253428 ) on Sunday October 04, 2020 @03:40PM (#60571890)

    I know several trollish internet righties personally. They're all gay as hell.

    • Homoeroticism has been a big part of ultra-right wing nationalism for a long time. A lot of these proud boys sure look like self loathing homosexuals to be, just like their Brown Shirt forebearers.

      • No, not self-loathing. Just gay. And out. Proud, even. You really do not understand the kind of person you're talking about.

  • Hahaha, I take great joy in my brother's victory.

  • This entire thing is Benâ(TM)s fault. If he would have been just kind if assertive, there wouldn't have ever been a âProud Boysâ.

  • by joe_frisch ( 1366229 ) on Sunday October 04, 2020 @04:13PM (#60571984)

    I think its pretty biased to assume that only straight men can be white supremacists.

  • by 93 Escort Wagon ( 326346 ) on Sunday October 04, 2020 @04:26PM (#60572022)

    But this is pretty freaking hilarious. Way to go, proud people!

  • the "pride" branding from the LGBTQ community. Similar to what they did with Pepe the Frog. [wikipedia.org]

    Nice to see it backfire so spectacularly.
  • by cygnusvis ( 6168614 ) on Sunday October 04, 2020 @04:34PM (#60572060)
    Time to stop coming to Slashdot
  • Those talking about what happens on Twitter are wasting their time.

  • Republican Senators and Representatives are confused if they should use the hashtag for their racist or gay posts. Getting it right is super important for airport bathroom hook-ups.

  • Solidarity (Score:5, Insightful)

    by LainTouko ( 926420 ) on Sunday October 04, 2020 @05:13PM (#60572168)
    All the traditionally oppressed groups know (or at least, many of the people in them know) that they're all in danger should fascism solidify its hold on the US. Such solidarity is excellent to see. Even if the Proud Boys may not be explicitly homophobic, they will undoubtedly happily support a fascist government which persecutes homosexuals. Crushing fascist groups is important to any of the potential victims of fascism, as well as any other decent and informed people.
  • Trumps idea (Score:5, Funny)

    by burtosis ( 1124179 ) on Sunday October 04, 2020 @05:21PM (#60572196)
    Donald trump was the one who originally suggested this. During the debate, I clearly heard him tell the proud boys to stand back and stand bi.
  • Anybody who's been on Twitter for a few months or so immediately recognizes this as just one of many examples of K-pop Stan [usatoday.com] activity. It's become so predictable that whenever you see something even vaguely pro-right trending on Twitter, you automatically assume that hash tag has been 'stanned.

    It's not even an effective tactic. It just reveals the flaws of Twitter's trending algorithm, like how SEO ruins search results to the point where you can't trust anything. It's one of many arguments that might lead

  • Now they're stealing twitter accounts.

  • Using the pejorative term hysterical [wikipedia.org] historical used against women shows just how butt hurt he really is, which is ****ing hilarious.

    • Do you really think his vocabulary is that deep such that he would understand the literal definition of the words he uses?

      Or do you think this narrow-minded fool thought he was using a "big word" for funny?
  • "The Proud Boys are a far-right, neo-fascist, and male-only organization affiliated with white supremacists - that promotes and engages in political violence." - Wikipedia ... but not homophobic, you say. Ok. Thank you for making that distinction clear.

    It still puts you in the Asshole Hall of Fame. Just away from the homophobes. There's that.

Heisenberg may have been here.

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