Submission from some anti-fascist longhorns
On Tuesday, November 13th, the UT chapter of Turning Point USA will host a speaking event by white nationalist British “journalist” Katie Hopkins. While the choice of speaker is not surprising, it is a bold escalation from the more disguised racism that TPUSA typically traffics in under the banner of conservativism. Katie Hopkins’s racism is not disguised.
First, she is a prominent proponent of the myth of “white genocide” in South Africa. This conspiracy theory has been a prominent rallying point for white supremacists worldwide, who fear that the White settler-colonizers in South Africa may lose their power to Black South Africans. Globally, this fuels a white nationalist fear of white people becoming minorities or having their racial purity “diluted” by immigration. Similarly, she proclaims to be anti-multiculturalism, and blames multiculturalism for increases in crime (read: she thinks black & brown people bring crime).
In 2015, Hopkins wrote a column which compared migrants to “cockroaches” and “feral humans” that were “spreading like the norovirus.” Her dehumanization of migrants went so far as to advocate the use of gunships to prevent migrants from crossing the Mediterranean to enter Europe. The UN High Commission for Human Rights condemned her rhetoric, comparing it to that used leading up to genocides such as the Holocaust and Rwanda genocide. She has defended Trump’s Muslim ban and spread racist lies about Muslim “no-go” areas in London. After a bombing, she called for a “final solution” for Muslims, and shortly afterwards called for internment camps for Muslims. Her rhetoric has incited increased hate crimes against Muslims and migrants across the UK.
She has explicitly stated that “racial profiling is a good thing, call me racist.” In July 2017, she joined the Defend Europe movement on a ship attemping to hinder the work of “search and rescue” vessels in the Mediterranean, which aim to save migrants and refugees at sea. Defend Europe is a white supremacist movement with ties to KKK Grand Wizard David Duke and Neo-Nazi group Stormfront. On this trip, Hopkins took a trip with Peter Sweden, a white nationalist & Holocaust denier. After the anti-semitic shooting at the Tree of Life synagogue Pittsburgh, Hopkins blamed the massacre on the Chief Rabbi’s support for migrants.
Hopkins demonstrably has little interest in dialogue and truthfulness, as tends to be with white nationalists. Her dehumanizing rhetoric has little basis in reality. She has suffered numerous libel lawsuits, and when confronted on issues such as the existence of these “no-go” zones in London cannot substantiate her claims. Instead, her rhetoric serves the explicit political purpose of advancing white nationalist hatred, violence, and domination.
We do not debate white nationalists. Nor do we wait for institutions like UT to stop white nationalists—we know that UT will always protect white nationalists, and white supremacy itself was built into UT from its inception. It is up to us to to organize and de-platform white supremacists when they attempt to claim space on our campus. When white supremacists attempt to invade UT, we will show & tell them that they shall not pass.
Show out to the backside of Patton Hall (formerly the CLA building) at 6 PM next Tuesday. We’ll be meeting near the ROTC memorial. Check out the full event here if you’re on Facebook (or here if you don’t use Fedbook) and share it to everyone you know.
¡No pasarán!
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