Dogpatch Press

Fluff Pieces Every Week

Tag: altfurry

February 7, 2018

A deep dive into the Altfurry mission to “redpill” fandom with hate – Part 2

by Patch O'Furr

In their own words.

Part 1 gives background about how the Altfurry hate group works. Now here’s the screenshots.

The source is “Altfurry Mead Hall,” a Discord server that grew after the neo-nazi march at Charlottesville.  It documents months of chat from late 2017, specifically from their private channel for trusted staff. That filters out memes and filler and shows what they’re really about. The server is run by Casey Hoerth/”Len Gilbert”, AKA “The Furred Reich”. These chat logs add to a long mission of hate shown by previous leaks from his Altfurry Discord group.

Screenshots are duplicated in imgur galleries for another reading option. One user named Kilton had their ID blanked when this leaked.

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February 7, 2018

A deep dive into the Altfurry mission to “redpill” fandom with hate – Part 1

by Patch O'Furr

Background of a hate group.

Fandom is about imagination, but it’s made of people with a real community. Having a healthy community means discussing issues in it like grown-ups, from politics to risks. That includes happenings in the wider culture that affect a subculture full of loveable college-aged oddballs. These stories connect to “Altfurry”:

The alt-right is a racist fringe group that defines itself in opposition to others (like the mainstream, minorities, and people who aren’t racist). It can’t exist on its own, so they try to creep in, recruit and manipulate for power. Like two-faced chameleons, they wear an outer face to hide a disturbing inner narrative. They sugarcoat it, but the end goal is hateful bigotry. You can see through it when you know what “cryptofascism” is and how it works.

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January 3, 2018

Furry Raiders attack a nonfurry business, get chased off with a positive solution for hate.

by Patch O'Furr

  • Raiding: A hostile invasion or forcible entry to destroy or steal something; predatory warfare.
  • Furry Raiders: a Colorado-based and online group that overlaps with “altfurry”, a fringe of furry fandom with a goal to connect racist hate groups inside and outside it.

It’s 2018, and many people have New Years resolutions to accomplish. But a few people are stubbornly against being better. That means the Furry Raiders. This week they gained attention for violent threats meant to silence criticism – (because when they say they want “free speech,” it’s only for them). Their threats followed labeling themselves as “Nazis” – (a look at their member activity in the altfurry chat logs proves it’s really true). Until now their trolling has mostly been inside fandom. But then there was the time when they targeted innocent non-furry outsiders.

We did Nazi that coming! 

On Halloween of 2017, a Colorado event space had a “Big Gay Costume Party”.  Foxler and Kody, the Furry Raiders founder and partner, went in costume with nazi armbands that replaced swastikas with paws.  With nobody else’s help, the staff recognized what the symbolism stood for. The Raiders were kicked out for bringing hate to their space.

Foxler and Kody’s excuses like “it’s just a paw” didn’t work. Anyone can see they’re making a clear reference to nazi iconography. This is good evidence that trolling isn’t just a fandom issue with “both sides” fighting and so-called “SJW’s” inside. Outsiders know these trolls are the source of the problem.

When a business kicks someone out, that’s free market power, freedom of association, and free speech opinion by staff. (A protected social class can claim discrimination, but Nazi isn’t a class.)  Reasonable people would move on and drop it.  But reasonable people doesn’t include a troll whose name means “Fox Hitler”. Again, when they say they want “free speech,” it’s only for them. 

The Furry Raiders retaliated by trolling the business with bad reviews. The review bombing was spread from their Facebook group by trolls who are active in alt-right hate activity (including their member Vetus, who supported trolling FurAffinity with hate images). The story was twisted by people who had never been there; they lied that there was no hate symbolism and pretended a “Big Gay Costume Party” rejected them for being gay.

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December 12, 2017

“Confederate fursuiter” Magnus Diridian arrested at Midwest Furfest – what’s the story?

by Patch O'Furr

Update: Here’s an in depth interview discussing Magnus being an FBI crime suspect.

Midwest Furfest 2017 broke the attendance record of all furry cons by the margin of a small con itself. It raised an eye-popping $86,000 for an animal charity that was previously in the red and is now funded for years. Twitter was on fire about the smashing success for the fandom. Among many ecstatic posts by attendees, of course there had to be some kind of drama too. It came with a fursuiter being arrested. Here’s the story pieced together by claims on twitter:

Scene: a hotel lobby. A black, red and white wolf fursuiter with a German WW1 style Pickelhaube helmet is parading around. People taking photos are greeted by offensive behavior like saluting with a “Sieg Heil” and shouting racist things. It causes hotel and/or con security to pursue him, and he flees and gets cornered in some bushes until the police come. They make him take off his suit, and he’s taken away in underwear. He was previously banned from the con and hotel, and the charges involve trespassing and assaulting a staff member before his arrest.

Some of those claims may be disputed (especially the nazi part), so let’s look deeper for the truth. Here’s an arrest record. Associates confirm the fursuiter who matches it is Magnus Diridian, AKA Rob Shokawsky (real name Robert Sojkowski). What is Magnus known for in furry fandom?

  • Fake Lemonade Coyote: At Anthrocon 2014, Magnus gained notoriety with a “bootleg” fursuit made to imitate a furry who died on duty as an EMT. People mourning his death were unhappy about exploitation of his image, which continues in 2017.
  • Confederate flag fursuit: At Anthrocon 2017, Magnus caused more anger with a flag-design fursuit and a Trump sign. It was a protest of takedown of the flags around the USA due to their racist association, following national attention on hate crime murders by Dylann Roof. The story was covered in a Dogpatch Press article: The Confederate fursuit incident shows how you can’t be a troll and a victim at the same time.
  • Grimace McWendy’s: Custom suits show that Magnus puts a lot of effort into these events. If it’s not just calculated to troll, isn’t that’s a loveable quality? The same is said by people close to him who are earnest about defending him as a nice guy. I have to admit that this fursuit makes me laugh and I have to admire the creative humor. (Suiting video).

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November 29, 2017

How low can they go? Altfurry is grooming kids to retaliate against critics.

by Patch O'Furr

Last week was a very bad week to be a nazi furry. (Every week is bad for that, but this one was exceptional). Call them the Incel ISIS, or just a bunch of trolls, but the week kept bringing reminders that the furry fandom is past the limit of tolerance for their hate. There was a wave of critical attention:

  • Newsweek published a deep look at the racist alt-right origins of alt-furry.
  • Dogpatch Press posted an expose by a mole inside the Furry Raiders, and their hate group activity led former members to repudiate it.
  • @Deotasdevil posted an essay about neo-nazis recruiting in nerd groups. It reached far outside of fandom, including 41,000 watchers of Sonicfox5000.
  • More evidence was found in a video from Casey Hoerth/”Len Gilbert”, an altfurry recruiter/bottom-feeder. He soon regretted his words in the video and tried to bury it with a whack-a-mole game of DMCA claims. His rare moment of candor was too revealing about their private narrative.

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November 22, 2017

What I learned from lurking the Furry Raiders chat – guest post by Aristide

by Patch O'Furr

Update: Foxler, founder of the Furry Raiders, was arrested for sex offenses in April 2019.

What I learned from lurking the Furry Raiders chat

Hi, I’m Aristide, and I’m a narc. For the past several months, I’ve had a sockpuppet account in the Furry Raiders Telegram, Skype, and Discord groups and periodically leaked screenshots of them to @edgedestroys. I chose Edge in order to protect the credibility of my sockpuppet account, and because I work in a sensitive workplace and worry about being doxxed. Most speculation about the Raiders – that they’re Nazis, they’re Alt-Right, they’re losers – is generally correct. I want to provide a better picture of what we, as a community, are dealing with.

Same Losers, New Politics

The general population of the Raiders community is a combination of old-school 4Chan racists, conspiracy theorists, new wave white supremacists, and impressionable but misled minors. Racist memes from a long-forgotten era of /b/ populate the chat in equal measure to WorldNetDaily or YourNewsWire links. Several dozen in the chat subscribe to the Daily Stormer and similar neo-Nazi websites, while a refrain against “fake news” rings against any news source that is not part of the alt-right media ecosystem. Lost in this mix are impressionable minors, 13 to 17 year old kids that found their way to the Raiders one way or another. Some of them joined because they hated SJWs – (the GamerGate to Alt-Right pipeline is well documented) – others were actively recruited by Foxler, Kody, and other de-facto leaders in the Raiders.

The first commenter left the group with a statement at bottom of article.

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October 25, 2017

Hate Addiction and What Furries Can Do About It – guest post by Tempo.

by Patch O'Furr

Tempo (Tempe O’Kun) is a furry author in North Dakota.

~ ~ ~

If you support white supremacy…

If you play dress-up in the uniforms of genocide…

If you mock people who just want the same rights you enjoy…

…you don’t belong here. Not in my fandom. Not in my country. Not in my world. You cannot possibly play the victim enough for me to consider your murderous opinions valid. So cry all you want, but we’ll be here in the furry fandom having fun without you.

To the rest of you, to actual furries: this is our fandom, a place on the Internet that’s nobody’s but ours. We decide who gets to play here, and what the rules are. The offline world’s pretty messed up right now, but kicking the Nazis out of furry is a concrete, realistic, and powerful move toward justice.

I’M JUST HERE FOR THE TALKING ANIMALS

Let me tell you why to care.

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October 16, 2017

“We Want Politics Out of Furry Fandom” is a political statement, and here’s a good response.

by Patch O'Furr

“We Want Politics Out” is politics.

It’s a popular complaint. This fan group is supposed to be for interest in anthropomorphic animal media and nothing more. That boils down to lowest-common-denominator consumerism. It’s like everyone is a bottom-feeding plecostamus in their own fish tank, and what they consume is just random scum growing on the bottom. Who cares where it comes from? Just be a dumb fish.

An unpopular fursona.

The problem is, reductionism doesn’t tell the whole story. There’s a community attached to the way members consume things. And the complaint often comes with attacking care about how things work there. (Stop asking questions about the delicious scum!)

Everyone who’s here in good faith has some kind of care beyond themselves. It can range from management of websites or cons, to health and safety, or being a loose support network. You see it whenever a member gets help with money or a place to live, or even with complaints about FA’s management. When it’s time to talk about bigger stuff, complaining against politics is half-baked activism for the status quo. Here’s why.

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October 2, 2017

A furry’s brush with fascism – authorities “don’t understand the seriousness of the threat.”

by Patch O'Furr

(Comment from blog linked below.)

Sugar-coating helps fascism worm its way inside a community. Even with cartoon animals when Altfurry brings Trojan-horse hate to furry fandom. See tagged stories here.

A regional furry organizer shared this story.  ID is withheld so their job can be discussed. They’re an airport terminal worker.

“Just encountered something that I never expected to see.

A line of badged, patched, and uniformed fascists just came through my airport. Like any other passenger group, I was assisting them. Noticing their crossed hammer imagery in red and white, I thought… maybe I was mistaken.

I asked them if they were Pink Floyd fans (imagery from The Wall). I got blank stares, followed by laughter.

“No” one of them said, “We’re humanitarians, on our way to go clean up Puerto Rico!”

Laughter from the others.

“We’re plumbers too, and carpenters, gonna rebuild this place!”

More chuckles.

Noticing the very particular tattoos a few of them bore, I knew. Still, I asked. “Oh cool, glad you’re reaching out, what organization are you with?”

One of them winked at me. Pointed at his patch. “How about you look this up. We’re doing great work”.

Fair enough. Finished helping him and the five others. And then researched the image they bore.

Hammerskins. A white supremacist group that’s been planning a rally in the area.

I just came face to face with hate. And. I still feel uneasy inside. Especially as they found it amusing that I politely pretended not to recognize what they represented.

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September 15, 2017

Here’s the Altfurry blocklist – a powerful tool to reduce hate spam.

by Patch O'Furr

Have you ever hung up the phone on a jerk? Frozen out a bully who acted like a wasp in your hair?  Rejected a stalker who can’t stop asking to sniff your socks?  Shut the door on a creep who wants to get you into a crackpot religion, or to sign a petition to legalize hunting at zoos? Blocked spam to sell you a miracle cure for crotch rot, made from the powdered toenails of a peruvian jungle sloth?

Good. You stood up for yourself like an adult and moderated a nuisance. And now the power is yours to do it better than before. At least with one hate group.

The Altfurry Twitter blocklist (updated 9/24/2017 – now on Blocktogether)

 

  • Download the file. Go to Twitter: Settings > Blocked Accounts > Advanced > Import.
  • Preview allows screening by eye.  It’s your choice to verify each block.
  • The blocklist is often updated. Check this page for fresh info or subscribe to Blocktogether.

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