A Whiter Shade of Christmas

By Maria Luisa Tucker, AlterNet. Posted December 19, 2005.

The holiday song "White Christmas" is a favorite among the white supremacist set, for obvious reasons. May your days be merry and bright / And may all your Christmases be white. Put into the context of white nationalism, the tune becomes a jolly anthem for white pride and privilege. And don't think that racist activists can't be jolly or share a little holiday cheer.

In fact, there is an international organization of white supremacist women who devote their energies to holiday activities such as sending Christmas cards to their incarcerated "brothers," and raising money for needy Aryans. This year Women for Aryan Unity (WAU) is holding its 15th annual Yulefund, which has purportedly raised $2,000 over the last three years to buy gifts for children of incarcerated white supremacists. Women for Aryan Unity also publishes a cookbook, sends welcome packages to new mothers, and runs an Aryan Clothing Drive.

The idea of a nurturing neo-Nazi or a charitable skinhead is incompatible with most people's conception of racist activists. After all, a hate group is all about hate, right? Well, yes and no. For many women in the white supremacist movement, their public actions involve the nurturing of their own group. These facilitators of fundraisers, contributors to clothes drives, and community builders represent the "softer side" of hate. They are the "housewives who hate" as one person sarcastically noted on a white nationalist message board. While their actions may be more benign than that of their male counterparts, they are not necessarily less harmful.

WAU's charitable activities are "a way to try to keep the racist movement alive and try to paint [racist inmates] as heroes," said sociologist Kathleen Blee, a leading researcher of hate groups. With the supportive admirers and mother figures WAU provides, prisoners are encouraged to stay active in their racist groups and continue their attacks on blacks and Jews from inside the walls of prison. Perhaps worse, the children of the incarcerated men are ensured a continuing Aryan influence. Women for Aryan Unity, and other female activists, are nurturing new generations of white supremacists in the spirit of a favorite Nazi Party maxim, "In the hand and in the nature of woman lies the preservation of our race."

Diversity Among Racists

Women for Aryan Unity is based in the most urban and international of places, Brooklyn, New York. The group itself is a testament to the ironic fact that, despite its disgust for multi-culturalism and diversity, the world of white supremacy is diverse. Racist activism crosses geographic, class and gender lines perhaps now more than ever before.

"The stereotype of racist groups all being like the Klan -- rural and southern -- is not true anymore," said Blee, noting that the largely urban Nazi and skinhead groups are the most active part of the white nationalist movement. A fast-growing online message board called Stormfront White Nationalist Community is a testament to this new generation of racists.

Stormfront's online community acts as a virtual meeting place for all types of white supremacists, and represented on its pages are all flavors of racist, from those who prefer not to join any organization to the committed members of the National Socialists. While everyone adheres to a doctrine of white supremacy, they have differing ideologies and tactics. Some are supposedly Christian-based, others are more pagan. Some play with radical ideas like joining forces with black separatist groups in order to gain more legitimacy; others berate anyone who has sympathy for the "enemy" races. Gender roles and feminism are hot topics -- one recent string of posts argued over the validity of New York Times columnist's Maureen Dowd's book "Are Men Necessary?"

Clearly, white supremacists are not a monolithic group. During research for her 2002 book, "Inside Organized Racism: Women and the Hate Movement," Blee found that the public's preconceptions about racist activists, and specifically about racist women, were skewed. After interviewing 34 white nationalist women, she wrote that "many did not fit common stereotypes about racist women as uneducated, marginal members of society raised in terrible families and lured into racist groups by boyfriends and husbands." In fact, most of Blee's research subjects were educated middle-class women with decent jobs, and many came to racist activism on their own.

Reportedly, the numbers of women involved in hate groups has risen. In 1980, Klansman David Duke launched a campaign to recruit women to the white supremacist movement. Others followed suit, hoping that a new influx of members would reinvigorate their ranks. It was believed that women would be less likely to become police informants, since they are less likely to have criminal records.

Maria Luisa Tucker is an AlterNet staff writer.

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