Kiwi supremacists who echo shooter’s mindset
The alleged Christchurch mosque shooter outlined his motivation in a manifesto that’s now banned. His racist views are aligned with those espoused by a group of young white supremacists who have, until now, openly campaigned against so-called ‘‘immigrant
As New Zealand grappled with the scale of the terror attack on March 15, yet to learn that a 28-year-old Australian shot dead 50 Muslim worshippers, a Wellington-based group hastily shut down its website and announced a ‘‘hiatus’’.
Members of the secretive Dominion Movement, who hide their identities online, have deleted posts and Facebook accounts touting their message.
The group has previously claimed to be growing across the country, ‘‘bound by blood’’ and unwilling to surrender New Zealand to ‘‘immigrant masses’’.
But a leading member of the group, identified by Stuff in some of its earliest published material, hung up when contacted last week and has not responded to further requests for an interview.
While the group publicly opposes violence and illegal activity, experts warn its white supremacist politics are inherently harmful.
Professor Greg Barton, chair of global Islamic politics at Australia’s Deakin University, says the group’s material follows the same European identitarian ideology that appears to have motivated the Christchurch mosque shooter.
‘‘They don’t want to project themselves as being white supremacists but, of course, when you dig deeper that’s what you get,’’ Barton says.
The political activist scene in New Zealand is small, which leads Barton to believe the shooter would have known of the Dominion Movement.
‘‘Given he’s been around [New Zealand] the last [two] years, I’m sure this is something the authorities are following up.
‘‘You would expect a group that’s operating above ground, at least until recently, would by definition profess to be nonviolent; that’s part of the challenge for the authorities.
‘‘They profess to be standing up for victims, they see themselves as victims of a grand conspiracy . . . but of course you then have off-shoots going off and doing violent things.
‘‘That’s part of the challenge for authorities, to spot some body who says, ‘Bugger this waiting around . . . I’m going to go do something’.’’
The group’s website, closed to those without a log-in on March 15, initially displayed a message saying that it in no way condoned the attack, would cease operations immediately, and never ‘‘had any communication or association with the perpetrator’’.
The pledge to close the group then became ‘‘a hiatus’’, before the message disappeared entirely.
A common thread in the group’s material, still visible on a cached version of the website, is a shared sense of victimhood and seeking a ‘‘rebirth of traditional Kiwi society’’ – or what amounts to a white nationalist state.
Immigrants are described as ‘‘unworthy’’ imports; white New Zealanders overrun by multiculturalism and denigrated by both government and media.
‘‘We are building a brotherhood of New Zealanders bound by blood, culture, and flag, committed to fulfilling our duty to our nation.
‘‘We say: not here. This is our home. We refuse to surrender it to immigrant masses, foreign political saboteurs, Chinese oligarchs, and the forces of international finance.’’
The group enthuses about positive, communityoriented work – members are pictured collecting rubbish and scrubbing graffiti – along with working out at the gym and drinking at Wellington bars.
Drug users and transgender people are objects of both humour and disgust.
The dedication to environmentalism and personal betterment is strongly reminiscent of views expressed in the Christchurch shooter’s manifesto. The shooter described himself as a eco-fascist, was said to have obsessively worked out at a Dunedin gym, and encouraged violence against drug dealers.
Members of the group first announced their presence in February last year but the website was registered years earlier.
Members also attended rallies for controversial Canadian Right-wing speakers Stefan Molyneux and Lauren Southern in 2018, and have been pictured at a rally at Parliament.
They have been active on the website of prominent white nationalist group the National Front, and have earned the support of a senior figurehead of New Zealand’s nationalist movement.
Material published by the group claims numerous members in Wellington, Nelson and
‘‘The loss that they’re feeling is either imagined, or not something that they deserve to take back.’’ Independent Research Solutions researcher
Auckland, and it’s claimed a connection has been made with like-minded white nationalists in Australia. Stickers and posters prompting people to visit the group’s website have also been seen in Hamilton and Palmerston North.
On the Monday after the attack, about 30 stickers were removed from the Nelson Marlborough Institute of Technology and police were notified.
Police did not respond to questions about the Dominion Movement. A spokesperson said it would not comment on specific groups.
Independent Research Solutions researcher Ben Elley, who has studied the rise of the alt-Right online, says the Dominion Movement presents a ‘‘nice face’’ similar to that seen in public-facing altRight chapters overseas.
‘‘They’re using a lot of the language about whiteness and the white state that other altRight groups that are into ethnostates do.
‘‘For them it’s not so much about white supremacy, it’s about getting back what’s lost or what’s been taken from them.
‘‘The loss that they’re feeling is either imagined, or not something that they deserve to take back.’’
Elley says such groups attract young white men who feel disenfranchised by millennial quandaries: the global financial crisis, worsening economic and employment prospects, and widening inequality in Western nations.
The group’s material frequently refers to democracy, consumerism and international finance as a threat.
‘‘If you combine that with efforts towards multiculturalism and feminism . . . they see it as a threat to them because it’s taking privilege away from them,’’ Elley says.
As with the Christchurch shooter, the group is preoccupied with a claimed white genocide.
Members held a ‘‘Save the Boer’’ banner at an All Blacks match against South Africa in
Wellington, referring to a false far-Right claim that white Afrikaner farmers are being systematically murdered.
Elley says the group’s insistence on non-violence means it can escape any accusation of being terrorists.
‘‘But those politics have outcomes that are awful, but they’d like to be able to gloss over that. What they’re talking about is actually incredibly harmful and violent.’’