WHAT PART OF “HATE GROUP” DON’T YOU UNDERSTAND?
October 6th, 2008
The folks at FAIR have been in high dudgeon ever since the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) designated them a hate group earlier this year. A significant part of SPLC's case against FAIR rests on the bigoted beliefs and writings of FAIR founder and current board member John Tanton. FAIR has leapt to the defense of the man whose "visionary qualities" they claim "have not waned one bit." FAIR President Dan Stein has even said that Tanton has "never asserted the inferiority or superiority of any racial, ethnic, or religious group. Never." Tanton himself on his personal website condemns "the unsavory characters whose views can easily be characterized as anti-American, anti-Semitic, and outright racist."
Then what to make of a new report by Heidi Beirich of Hatewatch posted on alternet.org last week? The one that documents-through extensive analysis of John Tanton's own archive at the University of Michigan-Tanton's extensive dealings with a rogue's gallery of White supremacists, eugenicists, Klan members, and Holocaust deniers? Given Tanton's and FAIR's protestations, was this merely opposition research?
Let's review some choice quotes and see:
In a 1995 memo to Stein and the FAIR board of directors, Tanton mocked the idea that the 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act, which banned Chinese immigration to the U.S., was racist.
In a 1996 letter to Roy Beck, Tanton questioned "whether the minorities who are going to inherit California...can run an advanced society."
In a 1997 letter to Richard Lynn-a race scientist who claims that "blacks are more psychopathic than whites"- Tanton writes to congratulate him on his book, Dysgenics, on how less intelligent individuals are outbreeding the intelligent.
The report documents Tanton's friendships and correspondence with White supremacists such as Jared Taylor of the American Renaissance and Stan Hess of the Council of Conservative Citizens; Theodore O'Keefe, who was involved with the Holocaust-denying Institute for Historical Review; and many, many more.
We'll send FAIR a copy of the old Spanish proverb, Dime con quién andas y te diré quién eres ("Tell me with whom you walk and I will tell you who you are"). In other words, a person is known by the company he keeps. We'll also throw in a dictionary so Tanton and FAIR can look up the meaning of "hate."
Thanks to Hatewatch for this highly informative and timely report. Check out the whole report here: