[Vision2020] Officials Counter Racist Acts

[Paul Rumelhart]

I'm not sure this is the best way to handle this. By mobilizing and 
making a big thing out of it, you are legitimizing them to some extent. 
This does nothing but make them redouble their efforts. It makes them 
out to be more than they are, and acts as a lightning rod for those who 
agree with them.

They are trying to intimidate people and they only succeed if you become 
intimidated.

I wonder if the best way to handle this isn't to simply throw the 
pamphlets away that show up on your lawn, and to laugh a little and 
decline the ones they hand out in person. If they become a big joke 
instead of a dark presence then maybe fewer people will support them. 
Let them speak their messages of hate in obscurity, and crack down on 
them if they break the law.

Paul

Tom Hansen wrote:
> Courtesy of today's (August 22, 2009) Spokesman Review.
>
> -------------------------------------------------
>
> Officials counter racist acts
> Flare-ups galvanize area leaders, who promise resistance
>
> Criminal citations and civil lawsuits are options. But a recent rise in
> racist activity is best handled by a unified community dedicated to
> rejecting discrimination and hate, leaders from across the Inland
> Northwest said Friday.
>
> “We have been vested with the authority and the power to take action, and
> I assure you I will use that power and authority to take a stronger stance
> of boldness,” Spokane police Chief Anne Kirkpatrick said. “People who are
> hateful are bold. But stand by to stand by, because we are more bold than
> they are.”
>
> City leaders and law enforcement from around the region joined members of
> the Kootenai County Task Force on Human Relations to respond to racist
> fliers that have been appearing in residential yards since April.
>
> A man with extensive ties to hate groups, Paul R. Mullet, moved to Athol
> from Ohio about five months ago and has promised to resurrect the Aryan
> Nations. The group moved its headquarters from Hayden Lake after the death
> of its founder, Richard Butler, in 2004.
>
> Mullet and Kevin McGurre, who’s listed in police documents as a Manhattan,
> Mont., resident, were ticketed for littering and Todd Weston, of Athol,
> for aiding a misdemeanor Aug. 8 after neighbors in Coeur d’Alene
> complained about the fliers to police.
>
> “We will not be known as places that allow hatred to dwell,” Spokane Mayor
> Mary Verner said.
>
> Racist incidents crop up
> The Kootenai County task force is credited with dismantling Butler’s
> Hayden Lake compound with a civil lawsuit that bankrupted the Aryan
> Nations in 2000. The land is now a peace park.
>
> But racist activity has persisted quietly in the region. In 2007, a man
> claiming Aryan Nations ties interrupted a talk by task force founders Tony
> Stewart and Norm Gissel at the Human Rights Institute. Three others stood
> outside the building handing out pro-Aryan literature. That summer, two
> men reportedly screamed racial slurs and neo-Nazi mantras at Hayden Lake,
> and Silverwood Theme Park near Athol ordered a group of men with swastika
> tattoos to cover the markings or leave. The men left.
>
> In April, Coeur d’Alene residents awoke to fliers advertising the Aryan
> Nations in their yards. Residents in Spirit Lake have gotten them, too.
> Earlier this month, Coeur d’Alene police ticketed Mullet, McGurre and
> Weston after a neighbor said they’d thrown the fliers to children playing
> in a yard. Less than two weeks later, Spokane Valley yards were littered
> with the fliers, police said.
>
> ‘Speaking out’
> At Friday’s press conference, Spokane Valley Mayor Richard Munson
> encouraged citizens to reject Mullet and his “type of vitriolic nonsense.”
>
> Officials from Rathdrum, Spokane Valley, Dalton Gardens, Post Falls, Coeur
> d’Alene, Liberty Lake, Spokane, Sandpoint and the Coeur d’Alene Tribe
> attended the press conference, which was held off Interstate 90 near the
> state line.
>
> “We believe that where there’s hate speech, good speech is essential and
> it wins out in the end,” said Stewart, task force secretary. “… I
> think it comforts the people in the neighborhoods. They know we are
> speaking out.”
>
> Two assaults have been reported in Spokane and Coeur d’Alene in the past
> month that police think may have been racially motivated, but detectives
> say they have no reason to suspect members of the Aryan Nations. Idaho’s
> hate crime law makes it a felony to “intimidate or harass another person
> because of that person’s race, color, religion, ancestry or national
> origin.”
>
> Washington’s malicious harassment law can be used to prosecute racial
> intimidation.
>
> Mullet said in a prepared statement his organization will not violate the
> law.
>
> “For far to long ALL other groups have been able to spread there messages
> unchallenged and nay encouraged to have free speech but one group the
> WHITE RACE!” the statement reads. “The media blitz this morning is nothing
> more than them stirring up a population of people to do nothing more than
> attack us for having the willingness to speak truth, granted to us under
> the constitution of the United States!”
>
> Mullet has promised to fight the littering citation filed this month.
>
> ----------------------
>
> Tony Stewart, of the Kootenai County Task Force on Human Relations, speaks
> Friday at a press conference attended by police and human rights
> activists. “We believe that where there’s hate speech, good speech is
> essential and it wins out in the end,” he said.
>
> http://tinyurl.com/n4awq
>
> -------------------------------------------------
>
> More on Paul R. Mullet, Minnesota leader of the Aryan Nations can be found
> at:
>
> http://www.rickross.com/reference/hate_groups/hategroups326.html
>
> Seeya at Farmers' Market, Moscow.
>
> Tom Hansen
> Moscow, Idaho
>
> "The Pessimist complains about the wind, the Optimist expects it to change
> and the Realist adjusts his sails."
>
> - Unknown
>
>
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