People of Color and Racism

(This is what you might call a special post- I am for reasons that are both personal and political addressing something that some people who looked at my blog between 2009 and 2017 may have criticized me for)

In early 2018 a political friend (who is a widely respected Black veteran of the fight against racism) explained something to me about racism which had not been explained to me very well before that. I had done a post on my blog about the theory/fact that people of color in America can’t be racist. It was originally written and published in 2009 and in 2017 I re-wrote it so it would be more convincing. This essay is largely about how it shouldn’t be held against me, but my position in that 2017 post was that people of color can be racist.

(Not sure exactly where to place this, but in early 2018 I deleted that post)

To a large degree, back then I thought of racism as a set of beliefs and I only sort of thought of it as a system in America. I remember I DID, in the decades before 2018, use the word “structural” a lot but I did not use the word “system” and I think that using the former is less critical than using the latter (I think the latter is a more holistic way of describing it (or comprehensive or something like that)). My friend explained that since there is only one racist system in this society and it’s for the benefit of white people, people of color can’t be racist (I knew of course that there is only one racist system here and it’s for white people, but I didn’t connect the dots the way most white allies do). My very limited 2009 research into this theory/fact had led me to believe that the argument in favor of it was that people of color didn’t have the power to be racist towards whites. In 2018 the explanation that referred to a “system” made a lot more sense to me.

The 2017 version of that post focused largely on two arguments. First, that people of color DID have SOME power with which to be racist towards whites (i.e. the use of physical violence). Second, that I referred to both anti-Catholic and  anti-Protestant bigotry in N. Ireland with the word “sectarianism,” and if I did that I was going to communicate in a similar way about racism in this country.

There are three general points I need to stress. First, what I was calling “anti-white racism” is what many people (including the friend I refer to above) call “anti-white bigotry.” Second, I wrote a very long paragraph in that post explaining why I believe that what I now call anti-white bigotry is a very small problem. That paragraph, with a couple of small changes, is available in a post here. It is about half-way down from the top and starts with “Even without that…” Third, since 2018 there have been 1-2 posts that were “labelled” (“tagged”) “anti-white bigotry,” meaning that they are partly or mostly or completely about that topic (in early 2018 I deleted the post where I said people of color could be racist). At this point there are 109 posts labelled “anti-racist” and there are about 41-189 more that could more or less be labelled that way, so I was and am OVERWHELMINGLY more concerned about white supremacy than I am concerned about anti-white bigotry.

In the context of admitting this mistake I made I’m a little embarrassed to say this, but as you may know I got an Ethnic Studies degree from the University of Colorado at Boulder. Somehow I missed being told in those classes that people of color can’t be racist. First, I hope this isn’t held against any of my professors. Second, I really was a fairly or almost very good Ethnic Studies student and further down I publish the grades I got in those classes.

And there’s some even better evidence that I was a good anti-racist in general. Although some of my anti-racist activism wasn’t about power and privilege and control and exploitation (some of it was just about challenging the prejudice of most white people) I DID do a lot of anti-racist activism that WAS about what I then called “structural racism.” In the mid-90s I did a lot of activity around defending Affirmative Action and defending immigrants. In 1996 and 2000 I attended a total of about 5 actions that were part of two labor union campaigns by the “Justice for Janitors” project of the Service Employees International Union. In 2001 I helped organize three events about racism in America that were largely about racial injustice and inequality. In the late 1990s I went to 3-4 actions in Denver about police brutality and in the last 10 years I went to two Black Lives Matter protests in Boulder. Some of the material on my blog is about “structural racism” (that is not everything I did as a white ally, but probably about 2/3 of it).

Although it was about challenging the prejudice of racist Irish-Americans and not about concrete improvements in the lives of people of color, a large chunk of my Northern Ireland activism was done in a way that was in conflict with white supremacy in this country. That and some other relevant thoughts are in a long post here.

*********

There are four things I need to explain that help justify my belief that this political mistake shouldn’t be held against me.

First, a lot of the books I read about N. Ireland that were written by anti-Unionist (“unionist” meaning pro-British) leftists referred to both anti-Catholic and anti-Protestant bigotry as sectarian. I offer examples of that further below.

Second, the post I deleted in 2018 was called “Guilty of Being White.” I got that title from a song of the same name by a 1980s punk rock band called Minor Threat. The man who wrote that song is Ian MacKaye and it was apparently inspired by he and his friends in High School getting beaten up by Black kids (I may have gotten that from wikipedia but I just found a better source for it here). The thing is, Ian MacKaye I believe is very anti-racist. That’s mostly based on the following: I found a YouTube fan video about anti-racist skinheads that had 4 Minor Threat songs as the soundtrack; and after leaving Minor Threat, he became the vocalist for a band called Fugazi and according to another Black veteran of the fight against racism (Daraka Larimore-Hall) Fugazi was in 2001 the most progressive hard-core punk band.

Third, in a song on Body Count’s first album, Ice-T (the vocalist of the heavy metal band) refers to a Black woman who hates white people as a racist. That was on the same album as “Cop Killer” and was thus long before any alleged “selling out” by Ice-T when he joined the cast of Law and Order: Special Victims Unit. Also, since he got that job Body Count has often played "Cop Killer" at concerts and on a 2017 BC album (Bloodlust) Ice-T did a song called “No Lives Matter” where the lyrics are a creatively written hybrid of support for Black Lives Matter and opposition to poverty. Another reason I would say that he didn’t “sell-out” by joining the cast of SVU is that in 1993 when BC played “Cop Killer” at a concert I went to, Ice-T first said something about how in theory being a cop is something cops should be proud of, but that the reality is very different. He wasn’t 100% anti-cop even then and if you consider the fact that almost once a season SVU’s writers give his character good lines criticizing the police, I don’t think that he has compromised his values to be on that show.

Fourth, I know that at least in 2009 at least some people at the Southern Poverty Law Center believed that people of color could be racist. Although they are wrong about that I imagine it was a semantics thing the way it was with me (in the sense that they were probably referring to anti-white bigotry but were inappropriately using the word “racist”). (Part of why I am reluctant to penalize them much about this is that, at least in recent years and maybe for decades now, in addition to their work on stuff like tracking Klan activity, they also do a lot of work that’s about economic justice)

**********

Below are the grades I got for classes that were part of my major.

Intro to Asian-American History. B-

Intro to Ethnic Studies B

Indian/Govt Conflicts FBI on Pine Ridge A (Note: about 1/4 of it was about the Black Panthers)

Race, Class, and Pollution F (Note: although I probably wouldn’t bother mentioning this if I were to apply for grad school, a huge part of why I failed this is that I made some bad decisions about what to spend time on, I had some personal problems, and I hadn’t, at that point, taken the Research Methods in Ethnic Studies class and until I took it I did not like doing research)

American Indians in Film A

Emergence of Modern Mexico D (Note: although I probably wouldn’t bother mentioning this if I were to apply for grad school, a huge part of why I got a D is that I learned that Summer that Summer School isn’t a good way for me take college classes)

Asian-Pacific American Communities C

Chicanos/US Social System C

Research Methods in Ethnic Studies B

Topical Issues in Native North America A

Selected Topics in Ethnic Studies: Prisons, Crime and Culture B- (Note: About 10% was about the Black Panthers)

Research Practicum in Ethnic Studies B+

Japanese-America: Critical Thinking A-

North American Indians: Traditional Culture B

Senior Seminar in Ethnic Studies A-

**********

This last part is about the N. Ireland dimension of this that I referred to above. It’s a work-in-progress because I have only just started reading those books (4 out of 5 I have read before and I remember some stuff that backs me up on this, but I need to read them again and take some notes and then I’ll add that material here). (I get the impression that in the last 10-20 years it may have become unpopular among anti-Unionists to refer to anti-Protestant bigotry as sectarianism, but most of my reading of the books I’m referring to was around 2000 (I might change how I talk about it, but I am unlikely to become active on the NI issue in the future and may not have the opportunities to discuss this with other anti-Unionists))

 

UPDATE 5/3/24 I just finished the N. Ireland book relevant to this that I haven't read before (Twenty Years On, 1988). It is edited by one of it's contributors (Michael Farrell) but the essay that contained something relevant is by a Northern Ireland Protestant man named  Geoffrey Bell. On p. 93 he says that the involvement of some Protestants in the Civil Rights Movement proved it was non-sectarian. On p. 94 he says that efforts by the left of the CRM to reach out to Protestant workers helped the anti-sectarian cause.

Fuck George W. Bush: Three New Poems

Below are three more poems. For an explanation of how I write my poems, see this. The last one is based on lyrics I agree with, the others are NOT.

For the rest of the lyrics, click on the "lyrics" label at the bottom.

1. Smash the Klan II. What you think it's about.
2. From Out of the Ashes. The birth of the Provisional IRA in Northern Ireland.
3. Surf the Euphrates. About the Iraq War.

“Smash the Klan II” based on “Aryan Pride” by Final War. Original lyrics are here.

1. This is about slightly militant opposition to the KKK among white people. It’s sort of inspired by the time that I joined around 100-300 people in 1995 protesting a “rally” by the Klan in Boulder. At the end we surrounded the building they had rallied in front of and trapped them there for about an hour or two until the police tried something sneaky that involved getting them out in an ambulance.
2. Instead of “crossing the border,” many Mexican-Americans are partly or totally descended from Mexicans who lived in what was Mexico until it became CA, NV and the South-West of the US (and TX).
3. The 54th Mass was the 54th Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry Regiment, the segregated Black unit that fought in the American Civil War and whose story is told, accurately or otherwise, in the movie “Glory.”
4. Racists have a greatly exaggerated sense of how much anti-white bigotry there is. In a paragraph more than half-way from the top of this post that starts with “Even without that…” I explain why I think anti-white bigotry is a very small problem.
5. I exaggerate how easy it is for white people to get a job, although if we focus on times when it’s a white person and a person of color, it IS pretty easy for the white person to get the job. Affirmative Action helps a lot, but “Hispanics” and Blacks still have an unemployment rate fairly close to twice that of white people (it’s a bit higher for Blacks than for “Hispanics” and the gap fluctuates a bit, but it’s around twice; see this). Racists think that white people are discriminated against and have more trouble getting a job. Of course, that’s probably because they think that the natural order of things should involve full employment in good jobs for white people and see anything else as unfair.
6. My thoughts about the white identity and European-American ethnic identities are in the first 2/5 of this (you should also read the conclusion, which is the second to last section) (I realize that BEFORE they read that many anti-Klan white people might not like what I say, but I think that after they read it, they will).
7. The St. Patrick Battalion was a group of American soldiers, most Irish and almost all Catholics, who deserted the US Army during the US-Mexico War and joined the Mexican Army. I’m sure it varied from individual to individual, but to one degree or another they thought that what the US was doing to Mexico was unjust (they were also alienated by anti-Catholic bigotry in the US Army (and of course Catholics *used to be* on the Klan’s list as well)).
8. After I started altering stuff, I switched the first verse with the chorus. Also, there were only three verses in the original, and the fourth verse is totally mine.
9. **70% of this poem is me, 30% is the original. I don’t know if the 3rd line of the second verse in the original lyrics I found on-line is what was actually written by the original lyricist.

Many people hate the Klan for spreading prejudice
Gay people, Muslims, and Jews are on their fucking list
Black people aren’t criminals like you see on your TV
The border crossed Mexican-Americans, its a fact of history

Chorus
Brothers and sisters, join together as one.
We’ve got the fucking KKK totally on the run
in memory of the brave 54th Mass soldiers who died
Fuck the Nazis, and fuck the Klan and fuck Aryan Pride!

Racists cry “Black man, yeah Black man full of hate”
Widespread anti-White bigotry is the bullshit story they narrate
Its fucked up how white people can secure any job by race
It’s funny how the Klan deny that that’s totally the case.

Chorus

Our solidarity won't be broken, and we won’t hide from an affray
We will keep on working until we asphyxiate the KKK
Our message will be spread. Our voices loud and clear
Inform the youth, of the truth, the Klan’s greatest fear.

Chorus

We’ll never be proud of being white, it’s an artificial identity
It’s totally steeped in privilege, hate and inequality
We’re proud of being Irish, Scottish and German, Greek, Polish and Italian
We’re in solidarity with the oppressed, just like the St. Pat’s Battalion

*********

“From Out of the Ashes” based on “After the Fire” by Skrewdriver. original lyrics are here.

1. This is about the aftermath of the anti-Catholic pogrom in the Lower Falls Nationalist/Republican area of Belfast in Aug. of 1969 (it wasn’t INCREDIBLY Republican BEFORE that month, but not long afterwards it certainly was). In July, August, and September, and mostly during a period of 2-3 days, in Belfast, 1,505 Catholic families fled their homes (probably something like 18% of Belfast’s Catholic population, probably something like 1.8% of the North’s Catholic population). In one night alone 650 families were burnt, or at least forced, out of their homes.
2. The DUBLIN-BASED LEADERSHIP OF THE IRA had demilitarized it in the years before Aug. 1969 and only a few IRA weapons were available to help defend the area, a defense that was largely unsuccessful.
3. The Civil Rights Movement that started in mid- and late 1968 was overwhelmingly committed to non-violence and had hoped to democratize N. Ireland.
4. Provos refers to what we call in recent decades Sinn Fein and the IRA. They broke off from SF and the IRA (what became known as Official SF and Official IRA) partly because of the leadership’s decision to demilitarize the IRA.
6. Initially the British Army kind of saved the Catholics from police-led loyalist mobs and were welcomed for about 9 months, but they became increasingly like the notorious Black and Tans unit of the British Army that served in Ireland during the War of Independence 1919-1921.
7. Squaddie is a term for British soldier.
8. On the night of June 27th 1970, the Church of an isolated Catholic enclave in East Belfast was attacked by a loyalist mob. The British Army wouldn’t defend the area but members of the PIRA did. It was their first major action.
9. I like calling The Troubles the Second Anglo-Irish War, the first being the War of Independence.
10. There is or was a T-Shirt designed by either SF or their old American support organization Irish Northern Aid, that said: “From Out Of The Ashes Arose The Provisionals.” It was referring to the ashes of the mythical bird, the Phoenix (in this case representing the IRA they split off from (actually, I used to think it was the ashes of the burned out homes, and I kind of prefer that interpretation because there were some good people in the Officials in the early 1970s and I don't believe in speaking positively about the feud between the two groups)).
11. Skrewdriver were British and supported the British and Unionist causes in Northern Ireland.
12. Based on a fairly scientific look, only .3% of the PIRA’s operations resulted in civilian death.
13. **62% of this poem is me, 38% is the original.

The fires burned for hours, it was a time of terror.
Dublin had ordered the IRA disarmed but they were totally in error
Those nights there were burnt out homes, our community was battered
Non-violence had been our people’s hope, but now that hope was shattered

Chorus
After the fire, the ruins there did lay.
After the Provo victory there will come a brand new day.

The Falls stood in misery, and initially welcomed the British Army Man
But increasingly the Squaddies acted just like the old Black and Tans
Then, on the night of June 27th, it was known the Provos had come alive-
Seeds of resistance once sown, now had grown, new life that would not die.

Chorus

The new Anglo-Irish War is approaching, and with the Provos we shall be.
They rose from the ashes of August ’69 and they will fight for you and me.

*************

“Surf the Euphrates” based on “Surf Nicaragua” by Sacred Reich (despite their name, their politics are very progressive- I'm fairly familiar with all of their music and at least some of it is more or less socially liberal and it's also economically progressive and it's anti-war). Original lyrics are here.

1. This is about the Occupation of Iraq.
2. The Euphrates is a major river going through Iraq.
3. One of the MANY reasons Bush had for invading Iraq was that it has a lot of oil.
4. A major argument in favor of invading was that Iraq was connected to Al-Qaeda. In fact, shortly after the war began a poll found that about 70-75% of Americans thought Iraq was responsible for 9/11. It was such bullshit that Tony Blair didn’t use that argument when trying to convince the British people and Parliament to invade. It’s also been strongly suggested that the % of the anti-US forces that were foreign Islamists was very tiny.
5. There were no Weapons of Mass Destruction found, and that was predictable based on what the UN weapons inspectors were saying just before the invasion and what former Marine and former UN Weapons Inspector Scott Ritter said around 2000.
6. Donald Rumsfeld was the Secretary of Defense.
7. Based on multiple pieces of anecdotal evidence and the existence of Iraq Veterans Against the War (now, About Face), and how unpopular Bush became shortly after the 2004 election, I imagine a lot of American soldiers who voted for Bush in 2000 or 2004 wished they hadn’t after they did one or more tours there.
8. I think another reason for invading Iraq is that it provided multiple opportunities to give money to corporations. Besides arms contractors and those doing privatized work for the military, corporations getting money for reconstruction spent about half of what they got doing actual reconstruction (often a contractor would keep half and give the rest to a subcontractor and sometimes THAT corporation would keep half and give the rest to another subcontractor).
9. This poem is not pro-insurgency. It was reasonable and natural that a large majority of Iraqis wanted the US out, but my favorite slogan of the anti-war movement was “Support Our Troops, Bring Them Home.” Also, some group at some point, and they may have been anti-war, was raising money to send men and women serving there body armor, and I would have supported that (it’s different than giving them extra ammunition with which to kill Iraqi civilians). (it’s also not pro-Saddam- it would be great if Saddam had been pushed out of power in a better way, but the methods that the US and UK used were bad)
10. Besides the insurgency, there was other instability caused by the invasion and occupation- Al-Qaeda attacks on Shiite neighborhoods, ethnic cleansing by Shiites and possibly some by Sunnis, and tension between some of the Shiite population and the Occupation forces. At one point it came close to a full-blown Sunni-Shiite Civil War.
11. The Surge was a brief but dramatic increase in the number of soldiers and Marines in Iraq.
12. Between 1991 and 2003 Iraq was frequently bombed by the US and UK.
13. I think that Bush supporters enjoyed the political dimension of the war, where they tangled with anti-war groups. We were in a time of a “New McCarthyism,” where disagreeing with Bush was seen by a lot of people as politically taboo. As I said, at the beginning of the war, the vast majority of Americans blamed Iraq for 9/11.
14. As far as Bush’s reasons for invading Iraq, here is something I included in two posts about anti-Semitism:

Bush's reasons for invading Iraq were many, Israel was a small part of it. There was the opportunity to give lots of money to corporations in multiple ways, the strong desire for using the US military that most GOPers have, the desire to teach the world a lesson in terms of what the US will do to them if they piss off D.C., the desire for oil, the idea of democratizing the Middle-East. I also heard something about it being connected to countering the growing strength of the Euro. It's possible they half believed that stuff about WMDs and Al-Qaeda. Israel was a small part of it.

15. Bush liked the idea of being a popular war-time president the people would rally around.
16. **46% of this version is me, 54% is the original.
17. In a post here I describe what I did to oppose the invasion.

I know a place Where you're all going to go
They'll pay you to kill for oil If You're eighteen years old
First You'll need a haircut And then some new clothes
They'll stick you in Baghdad To play G.I. Joe

CHORUS:
You think you’re fighting Al Qaeda and that you’ll find WMD
But it’s total bullshit, concocted by Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney
But now it's too late You're entering Iraq
You voted for Bush, you’ll soon wish you could take it back

What is this we're fighting for and What are our goals
To create a cash cow for US corporations and improve Bush’s polls
Instability  and Sunni resistance grow deeper everyday
The situation worsens, the Surge is on it's the way

CHORUS:

Lessons we have learned Are easy to forget
Hints of Vietnam How soon we all forget
First we used sanctions and bombs, now go in the troops
Another chance for the Right to slander anti-war groups

Slaytanic Wehrmacht

 (As far as the anti-bigotry part of this blog, I decided at some point early on that I wanted to work around the edges of battling bigotry, offering ideas and information that most people are unaware of but which might help them here and there with anti-bigotry work. So that’s why there are a lot of posts that seem a little weird, including this one)


This was originally written and published in Dec.of 2008. I have re-written it to improve it’s read-ability and have written it from my perspective in early 2015.

(I came up with this new version by editing the old and I hate to say it, but I didn't make any changes to reflect the sad passing of Jeff Hanneman. Besides the part about them needing to do more anti-racist stuff now, this post is about the time when the band included Hanneman, King and Araya)

There are many, many people (in both the nazi and anti-nazi camps) who think that Slayer is a racist and/or ant-Semitic band (Slayer of course is one of the top four thrash metal bands, known for it’s creative and controversial lyrics and creative and very aggressive music). As I’ll explain, although I’m sure they AREN’T racist or anti-semitic, they need to do more to combat those kinds of bigotry among their fans.

Am I writing this as a long-time and dedicated fan of Slayer? Have I carved SLAYER on my arm? Will I if that gets their attention? Not really, no, and possibly. I started listening to that kind of music in 1991 and a couple years later started listening to the Slayer album Seasons in the Abyss. I bought Divine Intervention in 1994 but didn’t like it until recently. In the last few years I have started listening to almost everything by Slayer for an average of about 1 hr. a day and I love it. Unfortunately I listen to it on YouTube and I don’t pay for it and for various reasons that’s not gonna change. But I AM now close to being a real fan. And if you look at thrash metal in general, I have been really into it since 1991. Some of my long-time favorite bands are more or less in that genre (Megadeth, Metallica, Nuclear Assault, Anthrax, Body Count, Suicidal Tendencies, and DRI).

Even with that I still doubt Slayer will listen to me, but maybe enough of their real fans will be convinced to do something and convince Slayer to do more. In any case I decided in 2008 that this issue(s) fascinated me and that if this effort were successful it would help the broad anti-hate movement make more progress.

I’ll be honest, I haven’t been an active fan of metal since roughly my mid- or late twenties (I was born in 1975). No concerts, a declining number of T-shirts that I have barely worn since 2005, etc. But I still listen to it a lot and I am concerned about the presence of racism in that scene (reflected in part by about 95% of the audience being white and about 95% of the performers being white). I think back to the Body Count song “There Goes the Neighborhood,” where Ice-T yells about that problem. Sure, it was in 1991 but in 2008 I looked around the internet some and got the strong impression there is still a problem with racism in metal. What can be done about the existence of racist thrash-metal fans? Well, a SMALL part of this problem I believe is/was the small but largely unchallenged presence of nazi skinheads- their presence by itself and also the effect that can have on young, impressionable minds attending such concerts. And this part of the problem should be relatively easy to address by making Nazi Skinheads unwelcome. Looking at the punk scene in the not-too-distant past, Black Flag and Fugazi would make it clear from the stage that Nazi skinheads weren’t welcome. More recently, there was an example of this at a punk show in CA. Although I don’t know the details, there was at some point in the last twenty years or so a feud between Slayer and Sepultura, with the latter criticizing Slayer about their attitude towards Nazi Skinheads at Slayer shows.

My problem with Slayer is that they need to take the struggle against racism seriously when racism rears it’s ugly head among their fans- I’m mostly thinking of their concerts, which attract a LOT of Nazi skinheads. Many Slayer fans would probably say that the band has nothing to do with that. Even if they do NOTHING to make Nazi Skinheads think they’re welcome, Slayer needs to do more to make it clear they’re UNwelcome.

*     *     *

As I have explained above and will explain below, I'm taking the unusual step of writing and publishing this because of the following combination of reasons: 1) nazi skinheads (not racists in general, but people who are very comfortable engaging in unjustified and bigoted violence) are very visible at Slayer concerts; 2) why isn't Slayer doing what other bands have done in a similar situation?; 3) solid evidence that at least in the past and to some degree today racist Slayer fans saw Slayer members as being fellow racists; 4) the cover of "Guilty of Being White" gives white people the wrong idea about anti-white bigotry; and 5) to settle the argument over whether or not Slayer ARE racist.

*     *     *

At some point I should say that I found an online discussion among white supremacist fans of Slayer (on the Stormfront site here). Most of them indicated that at some point in the past and/or during the discussion they believed Slayer was a white power band.

UPDATE 6/13/17 in 2013, shortly after the death of guitarist Jeff Hanneman, I read a couple discussion threads about his death on the world's largest white supremacist web-site. NO ONE mentioned the song Slayer did with Ice-T for the Judgement Night soundtrack (see below)- despite the fact that in the 2002 discussion about Slayer and race it was mentioned a few times; it appears that Nazi Skinheads might be even less aware of that song now than they were back in 2002

*     *     *

And, they HAVE done a handful of things that have had or probably have had the effect of making nazi skinheads feel welcome. The smaller ones are:

1. A song called “Angel of Death” is about nazi death camp doctor, Joseph Mengele and has apparently been widely mis-interpreted (by both advocates and opponents of anti-Semitism) as being pro-Nazi.

2. Their official fan club (and a lot of unofficial fan stuff refers to this as well) is called the "Slatanic Wehrmacht." The Wehrmacht was the non-SS military of Nazi Germany.

3. Apparently in response to the criticism they received as a result of "Angel of Death," they temporarily adopted a symbol some have said is based on the Nazi "Eagle Atop Swastika." Jeff Hanneman sometimes appeared with (what might be called) Nazi “accessories” such as SS symbols on his guitar strap or a t-shirt with the symbol of the SS unit responsible for the Holocaust on it and possibly displayed other similar imagery.



There are a handful of small things and between 1 and six big things about Slayer that all combined make me certain they’re not racists or anti-semites:

1. For about 1-2 years they were signed to Def Jam, a record label primarily for rap music. The co-founder of that label, who is Jewish, produced most of their albums.

2. Tom Araya is from Chile and Dave Lombardo is from Cuba. I'm not sure that proves it, as much of Chile is White and 65% of Cuba is white. On a related note, 1-2 members may be Jewish.

3. Two members were briefly in a band with Rocky George (of Suicidal Tendencies fame).

4. One band member, at one point, had a Dead Kennedys sticker on his guitar (probably not a lot of racist DK fans out there).

5. Kerry King did some work with the Beastie Boys on their album “License to Ill.”

6. There are at least a few big things which are in this category and I’ll mention them further below.



The big thing they did that has encouraged racist Slayer fans is a song on an album they did which was mostly a bunch of punk covers. They did "Guilty Of Being White" by Minor Threat. As far as I can tell, when that was written Minor Threat were anti-racist and nowhere near as tainted by the sort of stuff I mention in the first category above. The vocalist who wrote the song was apparently inspired by being beaten by black kids at his mostly black school; apparently he had good reason to think (or maybe KNOW) that it was racially prejudiced. Also, unlike with Slayer, I feel comfortable assuming that at Minor Threat shows and in interviews the vocalist, Ian MacKaye, made anti-racist statements (I'm basing this on the politics of another band he was with (Fugazi), on a report that during the Minor Threat era MacKaye was a big fan of Bad Brains and was close to Henry Rollins, and on a pro-SHARP (SkinHeads Against Racial Prejudice) video on YouTube that had music from 4 Minor Threat songs).

Slayer's version changed the last line from the song title to "Guilty of being right." It's not real clear, but they seem to have admitted that, although they were just trying to be controversial, it was supposed to be interpreted as racist. And based on an online discusson among racist Slayer fans on Stormfront, it WAS interpreted as racist by some racists.

Even without that lyrical twist at the end, there would still be a problem with this. Sure, there's anti-White bigotry.  But it's safe to say that racism is more common among white people than anti-white bigotry is among people of color. Around 2009 I looked at FBI figures on hate crimes for the preceding 10-15 years. At first I just looked at murders, then I looked at the numbers for hate crimes in general. I found that according to the FBI, for every anti-White incident, there were about six incidents motivated by white supremacy. I had heard that there are a lot of hate crimes unreported to the FBI, so I made it seven. I have had trouble figuring out what percentage of the population is White (this is complicated by the fact that I’m pretty sure there are a lot of white people classified as “Hispanic/Latino” and when I last looked at this it would have been the 2000 Census data), but I’d say around 75%, making people of color around 25%. I then did some math involving those figures, but I can’t remember what I did. I DID conclude that racism was about twice as common among white people as anti-white bigotry was among people of color (that is, if 50% of whites are racist, 25% of people of color are bigoted towards whites). I have since learned that the Department of Justice believes that for every hate crime that is included in the FBI’s figures, there are 20-30 more that aren’t. I don’t know how they came to that, but it makes sense. There are two main reasons for believing this- 1) Many, MANY law enforcement agencies do not send hate crime figures to the FBI and undoubtedly, such areas would be very racist, and there would be a lot of racist crimes; 2) There must be a HUGE number of homophobic crimes unreported partly because there are so many gay and bi-sexual people who are more or less still in the closet, and because you take what I wrote in #1 above and change “racist” to “homophobic.” I can’t remember how I did the math earlier, but it makes me think that racism is about 10-20 times more common among white people than anti-White bigotry is among people of color. This part about hate crimes involves any kind of incident (pro-white or anti-white), the sort of thing that pretty much everyone is physically capable of doing as a result of prejudice and is about how widespread a belief is, compared to another belief, as indicated by actions that pretty much anyone can take. I am certainly not talking about how oppressed people are (people of color are infinitely more oppressed than white people, since the ways in which anti-white bigotry is manifested do not add up to white people being oppressed (as white people) at all), just how widespread a belief is, compared to another belief, as indicated by actions that pretty much anyone, white or non-white, can take). When there isn't an appropriate amount of hostility towards white supremacy to balance it out, discussing anti-white bigotry can easily lead white people to think that anti-white bigotry is a greater problem than it is, which can lead a lot of white people to become racist.

There's also the racist twist of the lyrics and some of the other things I've mentioned. So, Slayer ought to do AT LEAST about 10 things of equal significance (to recording that song) to challenge white supremacy. As far as I can tell they have done at most 6 total (I’m counting stuff done before that Minor Threat cover, because it’s still out there and could contribute to making Nazi skinheads unwelcome).

The first big anti-Nazi thing is that Slayer recorded a song (a medley of three songs by The Exploited) called "Disorder" with Ice-T. Some of the lyrics were altered to apply to American politics in the early 1990s, and some of it was anti-racist. It's very clear that they're referring to the LA Riots of 1992, when they sing "Injustice drives you crazy, it drove LA insane."

But it was on a soundtrack. There were probably MANY Slayer fans who didn't even hear about it, but did hear Slayer's cover of "Guilty of Being White" (that’s based on the Stormfront discussion I referred to above).

The second and third things are pretty minor. They did at least two tours with Suicidal Tendencies (a racially diverse band that’s more or less thrash metal).

The fourth anti-Nazi item is a song on the album “South of Heaven” called “Behind the Crooked Cross.” First, it’s about a soldier in Hitler’s army that is starting to feel disillusioned about what he’s involved with. I didn’t know it was an anti-fascist song until someone who was arguing with me about this post mentioned it. And I doubt that more than 5% of Slayer’s fans know it’s anti-fascist. The thing is, the “crooked cross” is another word for the swastika, but who knows that? (at one point I found a video on YouTube that had a lot of WWII imagery with that song playing, but I’m certain it’s a fan-video).

In Oct. 2012 I wrote the following: “I'm not sure why this took so long, but I finally figured I could do some internet searches to get some solid idea of how many Slayer fans know what the song is about. I did a google advanced search for the phrase "crooked cross is another term for swastika" and the word "Slayer." There were only two results- one was this post, one was a discussion on Irish Indymedia where I and a Slayer fan went at it, and s/he told me about the song. I did another (Google Advanced) search for "crooked cross is another word for swastika" and the word "Slayer." Nothing came up with that phrase, but there were 10 results with all those words: A) A wikipedia page about the swastika, which at this point doesn't contain the word "Slayer"; B) A page on what probably is a sort of high-traffic heavy metal site, a page on Slayer; C) Basically the same thing; D) a blogpost which doesn't do much more than explain that the crooked cross is the swastika, and briefly discusses the Slayer song; E) An anti-fascist discussion forum post about this issue where the only person to mention this song is me; F) This post I'm typing right now; G) A music site I imagine has a lot of traffic, it says little or nothing that explicitly identfies the song as anti-Nazi; I got distracted and forgot to check the last three, and now they don't show up in the search anymore, but they didn't look like they touched on this song. I did another (Google Advanced) search, with ""crooked cross is the swastika" and "slayer." There were three results: A) A page with the lyrics for the song and a brief discussion about them, identifying them as anti-Nazi; B) the same web-site, and a very brief anti-Nazi description of the lyrics; C) This blog post.”

Because of that (and in general the lyrics aren't quite as explicit as "Guilty of Being White"), I’m being generous by counting that song as a whole anti-Nazi item. Although their lyrics are even less clearly anti-fascist, anti-Nazi items 5 and 6 are the songs “Angel of Death” and “SS-3.” (there are so many things about Slayer that can only mean they’re anti-Nazi that I’m assuming that these unclear lyrics were intended to be anti-Nazi or at worst, with "Angel of Death" were written to be neutral descriptions of horrible things (as far as I can tell, MANY Slayer songs are like that))

Slayer, I imagine, might not be around much longer. They should do some stuff to compensate for the damage they've done (see the Stormfront discussion). They could do explicitly anti-racist songs, more collaborations with rappers (especially those who are people of color), do benefit concerts for anti-racist organizations, make explicit, detailed anti-racist statements that go well beyond simple denials of racism (if they're so inclined, maybe, denouncing the Confederate flag) do more tours with groups that are mostly/completely people of color, etc.

I found myself thinking as I re-typed this in 2015 that the earlier discussion on Stormfront might have dis-illusioned most of the racist Slayer fans who speak English (I know of a recent discussion in a Spanish and Portugese part of that site about Slayer being Nazis). But I read several recent discussions about Slayer on that site and hardly anything was said about the band not being Nazis, and there were a few things said going the other way. So it seems that it’s still a problem- the anti-racist movement could really benefit (in different ways) from Slayer acting as you would expect violence-friendly, outspoken people who oppose racism to act when Nazi skinheads show up at their concerts.

I'd also like to say that if it were JUST a small amount of controversial imagery and their lyrics occassionally made it very clear they're anti-racist, that'd be fine. I haven't thrown myself into their stuff yet, but I am pretty sure that many Sacred Reich songs are anti-racist (certainly "One Nation," and "Blue Suit, Brownshirt" are). I've got no problem with their name, especially because it's hilarious considering the politics in their lyrics.

But I believe that what I have written about above means that lots of young white Slayer fans have seen and maybe DO and WILL see a thumbs up from Slayer when it comes to racism and that might possibly lead them to even get involved with Nazi skinheads.

As far as I can tell, they've done 6 things to make that less likely, and at the VERY least they need to do 10, so at least four more.

UPDATE 4/24/15 I just learned that a video album by Slayer (Soundtrack to the Apocalypse) includes "Disorder." So now they are three items short of the minimum of 10 (I doubt that more than a minority of Slayer fans have actually seen that video album). The video album was released in 2003, and as I wrote in the above, in recent discussions on Stormfront the Nazis STILL believe Slayer is more or less in their corner.

UPDATE 9/30/15 on the 11th Slayer released their most recent studio album, "Repentless." I bought it (I'm happy that Slayer will get some of that money, it's a great album) but it took me about 2 weeks before I read the lyrics for the song "Pride in Prejudice" but I just did. I'm not a real "deep" thinker and if not for the 2nd to last line, I would say that I have a weak grasp of what it's about (I have only read the lyrics of about 20% of Slayer songs because most of them are very cryptic-  it's difficult for me to figure what they're saying (is "War Ensemble" pro-war, anti-war, or just a creative illustration in words of what war is probably like?) and sometimes even the subject is difficult to identify ("Behind the Crooked Cross")). But the subject of this song is made clear with a reference to "racial slurs." Between that and my certainty that they are anti-racist, I will count this song as the 8th thing they have done to compensate for covering "Guilty of Being White." Two more things at the very least, Slayer. (UPDATE 3/26/20 I just saw the video for that song, and although it's not clear EXACTLY what it's about and I suppose Nazis can misinterpret it, it's clearly about white supremacy. So that's #9)

 UPDATE 3/14/20 I have to admit I am not incredibly familiar with the band Biohazard, but as far as I can tell, they were sort of racist at the beginning- I heard it was to steal fans from a racist band, which is either a lame excuse or just bizarre. In any case, I have looked into it a little in the past, and I also remember when they were interviewed in the early 1990s (maybe on MTV's The Headbanger's Ball) they tried to spin the lyrics of a song as anti-racist and I think they were trying to sweep under the rug their racist or faux racist past. The thing is though, in the mid 1990s they did not just two songs with a black rap group called Onyx, they did a music video for each one, and I assume they got a fair amount of exposure on MTV. One song was called "Slam" and the other one was the title track on the Judgement Night soundtrack.

(Also, since I have not yet mentioned N. Ireland in this post, and that's a crime or it should be, at the 2002 National Conference of Sinn Fein Youth in Galway, Ireland, a member of SFY offered to give me his Biohazard t-shirt)

UPDATE 12/14/24 I just learned something very relevant to this post. The album that included "Guilty of Being White" was called Undisputed Attitude. What I just learned is that there was a European edition and a Japanese edition. The latter included a Suicidal Tendencies cover called "Memories of Tomorrow." That was not found on the American edition or the European edition, and both America and Europe (not Japan) have a lot of Nazi skinheads. This boosts both my belief that Slayer were anti-racist and that they avoided conflict with their Nazi skinhead fans.

******

Some of my sources for some of the more controversial claims:

Slayer's page on Wikipedia, and related pages for specific band members, songs, albums (I've looked at TONS of stuff on Wikipedia and have yet to find one thing that I know is incacurate, and a lot of what I've looked at includes info I was already aware of)

Slayer and Nazi Skinheads- well known that the latter love the former (multiple sources, just do a search on it)

Minor Threat and related Wikipedia pages

In general, I doubt anyone will seriously question the facts I've presented. I'm sure plenty of Slayer fans will disagree with my analysis, I'm pretty sure the facts are not in dispute.