Clarification concerning the article THE NEW ROMANTICS in the Spring 2001 issue of Intelligence Report.

The following was sent to Apologia

by Chas Clifton, a leading figure in the Nature Religions Scholars Network <http://www.uscolo.edu/natrel/

>:

---------------- Begin Forwarded Message ----------------

Date: 4/10/01 4:56 PM
Received: 4/11/01 11:16 AM
From: Clifton Chas, clifton@uscolo.edu
To: -R Poll, richpoll@apologia.org

Rich,

First of all, did you see Gardell's "clarification"? I wanted to make
sure that you had.

I will pass your request for the other position to some Asatruar.

Chas

>X-Sender: Mattias@mail.ceifo.su.se
>Date: Mon, 09 Apr 2001 12:16:18 +0200
>To: clifton@uscolo.edu
>From: Mattias Gardell <mattias.gardell@ceifo.su.se>
>Subject: Clarification of SPLC interview
>
>Dear Professor Clifton,
>
>Jeff Kaplan suggested that I should contact you in the hopes of clarifying
>a set of misunderstandings that has caused a minor thunderstorm of protests
>from upset pagans of many traditions. It concerns an interview published in
>the Spring 2001 issue of SPLC's Intelligence Report that unfortunately has
>been interpreted as if it dealt with the worldwide pagan community, which
>it in fact did not. Jeff, whom I know since several years, told me that you
>sponsor the NUREL list and that it might be a good idea to ask you if you
>kindly would post the following message (with permission to crosspost).=20
>
>Best,
>
>Mattias
>
>
>Clarification concerning the article THE NEW ROMANTICS in the Spring 2001
>issue of Intelligence Report.
>
>1. I was NOT talking about the whole neo-pagan community in the United
>States. The interview focused on the racist interpretation of Asatr=FA often
>referred to as Odinism. I also tried to make clear the distinction between
>the racist and ethnic positions as these two very different interpretations
>of Norse traditions often are confused. (The wider non-racial non-folkish
>pan-pagan milieu was hardly mentioned at all. There is a growing body of
>studies concerning the wider pagan revival but that was not the topic of
>the interview and will neither be the focus of my forthcoming study.
>However, I do will make the distinctions clear)=20
>
>2. The line 'everybody supports the Unambomber' is somewhat taken out of
>context. It should have been made much clearer that I here talked about the
>radical environmentalist subsection of racist Odinism where one does find
>considerable support for the Unabomber. The word 'everybody' was a casual
>metaphor that I would never use in writing. It came in the course of a 4
>hours something transatlantic interview over the phone and I am sorry for
>having made that slip.
>
>A note to introduce myself:
>
>I am an Associate Professor of the History of Religions at Stockholm
>University. I did my PhD on Black religious nationalism with a focus on
>the Nation of Islam. It was based on field research and taped interviews
>with Minister Farrakhan and his top lieutenants and from the feedback I've
>got from the Black Muslims I can assure you that they feel accurately
>portraid. In case you're interested you can make up your own mind by
>reading IN THE NAME OF ELIJAH MUHAMMAD: LOUIS FARRAKHAN AND THE NATION OF
>ISLAM (Duke University Press, 1996).
>
>Since 1996 I have been doing a series of fieldworks in the radical
>right/White religious nationalist milieus, publishing (in Swedish) a
>comparative study of black and white separatism named RASRISK (Federativs
>f=F6rlag, 1998). During the course of that study, I was fascinated with the
>Odinist/racist heathen tendencies within the Aryan revolutionary milieu and
>decided to make that the topic of my next study. As with my former studies,
>it is based on field research and taped interviews and aims at portraying
>the multifaceted scene as accurately as possible. Contrary to lumping all
>pagans and fascists together, it discusses at length the variations of
>viewpoints that exist both within and between the many different pagan (and
>fascist) milieus. Hopefully, it will come out as a nuanced,
>thought-provocing and stimulating reading.
>
>May the Gods and Goddesses enlighten your path
>
>Mattias Gardell

----------------- End Forwarded Message -----------------

Also see "The New Romantics," published by the Southern Poverty Law
Center in Intelligence Report, Spr '01.
<http://www.splcenter.org/intelligenceproject/ip-index.html

> (Front page)
<http://www.splcenter.org/intelligenceproject/ip-4q9.html> (Direct link to the article).

In the Name of Elijah Muhammad: Louis Farrakhan and the Nation of Islam

By Mattias Gardell.

Clarification concerning the article THE NEW ROMANTICS in the Spring 2001 issue of Intelligence Report.
An Apologetics Index research resource