Tommy Mair…not alone, unfortunately.
As much as the media and the right might be trying to spin Jo Cox’s assassin as a “loner”, a different portrait of the pro-EU British MP’s killer is already emerging. And it shows that while his ties to Britain First (whose name he allegedly shouted, repeatedly, while attacking and murdering Cox) are still being strenuously denied by the organization, his ties to other right-wing, fascistic and white-supremacist/nativist organizations are many…and damning.
According to the Southern Poverty Law Centre, Tommy Mair has been a member of the National Alliance, a neo-Nazi organization:
According to records obtained by the Southern Poverty Law Center Mair was a dedicated supporter of the National Alliance (NA), the once premier neo-Nazi organization in the United States, for decades. Mair purchased a manual from the NA in 1999 that included instructions on how to build a pistol.
Mair, who resides in what is described as a semi-detached house on the Fieldhead Estate in Birstall, sent just over $620 to the NA, according to invoices for goods purchased from National Vanguard Books, the NA’s printing imprint. Mair purchased subscriptions for periodicals published by the imprint and he bought works that instruct readers on the “Chemistry of Powder & Explosives,” “Incendiaries,” and a work called “Improvised Munitions Handbook.” Under “Section III, No. 9” (page 125) of that handbook, there are detailed instructions for constructing a “Pipe Pistol For .38 Caliber Ammunition” from components that can be purchased from nearly any hardware store.
The NA may be best-known for the work of its now-deceased founder, William Pierce, a former physics professor who also wrote racist novels. One, The Turner Diaries, tells the post-apocalyptic fictional story of a white man fighting in a race war that may have provided inspiration for Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh.
Neo-Nazi ties — and terrorist how-tos stemming from them? Yup. Witnesses say Mair was wielding a “homemade or antique” pistol. My money’s on homemade, since he specifically bought instructions on how to build one. This is damning not just for him, but for this neo-Nazi group he’s tied to, because it makes it explicit that “lone wolf” terrorism is very much on their collective agenda.
And that’s not all. According to the UK Independent, he was also tied to a South African far-right group:
The link between Mair and the Springbok Club goes back ten years when its online magazine, the Springbok Cyber Newsletter, was inquiring about the whereabouts of “Thomas Mair, from Batley in Yorkshire [who] was one of the earliest subscribers and supporters of “S.A. Patriot” who has moved from his address in the Fieldhead Estate district of the town.”
The leading article for June 2016 Springbok Cyber Newsletter, which describes itself on its website as being pro-free market capitalism and patriotism and anti-political correctness, was, however, devoted to Britain and the referendum. It started: “On Thursday, 23rd June 2016 all British voters will have the opportunity to vote on the future of their country. They can vote either to remain entrapped in the artificial and retrograde European Union, or to regain their sovereign independence….”
The article ends by declaring: “But we should not only be concentrating at the negative aspects of remaining in the EU. Our campaign should be primarily positive and optimistic for a future outside the EU. The motto of the Patriotic Forum (an umbrella grouping of patriotic organisations which the Springbok Club is part of) is “Out of Europe and into the World”. There is a golden future waiting for Britain out there once the country returns to its traditional vision of looking towards the Open Seas and its ethnic brothers and sisters in the Commonwealth around the globe. The days ahead will inspire us!”
“Britain First! Britain First!” Gee, he’s sounding less lone by the minute, eh?
But of course, the “he was mentally ill and a loner” narrative will still carry the day. Why?
Because Tommy Mair is white.
Because when white men go bad, everyone in the major media races to absolve them of all charges of terrorism, even when terrorism is obviously what they have committed.
And because the thought of actual, home-grown, white supremacist terrorists who commit hate crimes in the name of fascist agendas is still too terrifying for the media and the masses to face and confront as they should.
Because this is THE biggest terrorist threat the western world faces, and we are not being accurately informed of that fact by the people we trust to be our eyes and ears.
Shame on them for their silence. And shame on them for their complicity.
PS: There is a petition (unfortunately, only for Britons) to declare Britain First a terrorist organization. Sign if you can.