Thread: Report shows hate groups

Study conducted by the Southern
Poverty Law Center
Updated: Thursday, 26 Feb 2009, 10:17 PM EST
Published : Thursday, 26 Feb 2009, 4:27 PM EST

Janice Allen
FORT WAYNE, Ind. (WANE) - A report issued by the Southern Poverty Law Center shows the number of hate groups in the U.S. in on the rise. One group cited in the report is located in Roanoke, just southwest of Fort Wayne.

NewsChannel 15 traveled to to the small town Thursday night to see what people had to say.

"It is a little bit shocking, but no big surprise, it's a small town," says Sean Hiebel, a Roanoke resident for eight years.

Another resident, Becky Beal says,"You're kidding, no way is my thought, I just can't imagine it."

The report lists WTM Enterprises as a White Nationalist group located in Roanoke. It also lists a Neo-Nazi group known as the White Aryan Resistance as being located in Warsaw.

The Southern Poverty Law Center's "Year in Hate" issue of its Intelligence Report was released Thursday morning. It indicates the number of hate groups in the United States has increased by 54 percent since 2000. The rise is attributed to immigration fears, a failing economy and the successful campaign of Barack Obama.

"We've had a steady increase, four,five,six percent since 2000. In 2000 we had 202 hate groups. This year we're up to 926. So, it's been like a step ladder of hate," says Heidi Beirich, Director of Research and Special Projects for the Southern Poverty Law Center.

The rise is attributed to immigration fears, a failing economy and the successful campaign of Barack Obama.

Beirich explains, "Even as we make those strides, there are people who are going to react negatively against them, people who do hold deep racist views."

The center finds most of the hate groups online, through websites and advertisements.

The center also relies on things like fliers, magazines, and tips from police to locate these groups and put them into their database.



http://www.wane.com/dpp/news/local_wane ... 0902261627

SPLC again.... Although they do list a couple of local groups who don't sound very savory, it seems they think anyone who gets angry over the current state of our nation is a "hater"...lol I think they're funny as they try to justify their existence.

Do they ever talk about the racists in the Black and Latino communities? Or do they only consider "whites" in the hate group category. Never do I hear them mentioned. Gee I wonder why.......

I know for a fact it's true. There must be several new ACLU chapters started recently.

SPLC is almost a bigger joke than our government.

One day, someone with some time and talent is going to go looking for all these "hate groups" listed by the SPLC and expose them for reporting groups that do not exist and groups that are just individuals and not really groups at all.

W

It is getting boring listening or reading to SPLC with it's millions of dollars.

Did anyone see FAIR on that list? If so, please tell me what state it was listed under. I want to read it for myself.

One of our local pro-illegal activist leaders has quoted SPLC as identifying FAIR as a hate group, along with any and all of their affiliates. Now we all know that simply isn't true, but since when has the SPLC let truth get in the way?

Strangely enough this was addressed on Lou Dobbs yesterday. They reported that the FBI does not recognize hate groups with the same criteria SPLC does and in fact their statistics show that even hate crimes have drastically reduced over the past year. As usual SPLC has their own hateful agenda spreading their own version of hate.

Well, the Southern Poverty Law Center tonight. They're back. They're claiming there's an increase in the number of hate groups in this country, and a number of media organizations are just lapping it all up. They say there are now nearly 1,000 active hate groups in this country. That would be an increase from last year.

The problem is, those numbers don't tell the story. In fact, they could be an outright distortion. Kitty Pilgrim has our report -- Kitty.

KITTY PILGRIM, CNN CORRESPONDENT: The Southern Poverty Law Center says absolutely hate crime -- hate groups in America are growing. They say the debate over immigration, the recession and the election of Barack Obama, the first black president, is animating more hate groups. But the director of the Southern Poverty Law Center today admitted there are no data on the increased recruitment of hate groups.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MARK POTOK, SOUTHERN POVERTY LAW CENTER: It is a kind of perfect storm of factors that at the very least favors the growth of these groups. You know, whether they are actually able to translate all of these things into recruitment, you know, we have yet to see.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PILGRIM: Now, we talked to the FBI today about the report. The FBI does not recognize the term "hate group." They told us they do not monitor individuals or groups of individuals based on what they think or they say, or because a group or individual espouses a cause. It's only when a line is crossed and when an act of violence is committed.

Now, by that measure, hate crimes are going down. The FBI uses data collected by state and local law-enforcement agencies, and this is what we've found. In 1995, hate crimes totaled 7,974. In 2007, 12 years later, they totaled 7,624. That's a decline of 4 percent.

Meanwhile, the U.S. population rose 16 percent in that period of time. So, hate crimes are definitely declining, according to the FBI. And it's interesting, Lou, what the Southern Poverty Law Center defines as a hate group. They say it's based on ideology. It's not based on action. If you're included in this group, it's not based on criminality or violence or future...

DOBBS: Define a hate group, according to them.

PILGRIM: They say it's any group that thinks less of some other group, that thinks that they're inferior. That's their broadest definition, based on ideology, and that's how they define it.

DOBBS: Well, you know, that would not be an appropriate (ph) way to look at any group. But at the same time, one wonders how Mark Potok, the head of the Southern Poverty Law Center, could say that conditions favor the growth of hate groups, but they have no proof of recruitment. This is -- I mean, that's pretty pitiful, really. And I know a number of news organizations picking up and going with this, because they think it's a ratings-grabber.

PILGRIM: You really have to push this report to say, what are they really saying here. They're including nonviolent groups with violent groups. The definition is so utterly fuzzy on "hate group" that...

DOBBS: Which obviously the FBI, the Justice Department rejects.

PILGRIM: They absolutely do.

http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/ ... dt.01.html