Eustace Mullins : Anti-Semite to lecture in B.C. town - News about religious cults and sects

A notorious hate-monger and unapologetic anti-Semite is scheduled to appear at a New Age festival in British Columbia this summer, despite a controversy that saw him barred from a Toronto health show in the spring.

Eustace Mullins, 78, a man the Canadian Jewish Congress calls "one of the most vitriolic anti-Semites in North America if not the world," will be a guest speaker at the Festival of the Ages, to be held in Salmon Arm in August.

The event is billed as a "festival dedicated to solutions" and "an outstanding four-day retreat, with fabulous food and good fellowship" featuring "revolutionary new products," fun and even yoga classes.

A controversy erupted in February over Mr. Mullins, who is based in Staunton, Va., when it was learned he was to speak on medical monopolies at Total Health 2001, a popular trade show aimed at the growing numbers of Canadians interested in natural products and holistic health.

The show lost sponsors, and other speakers threatened to cancel their presentations if Mr. Mullins participated. His writings have characterized Jews as parasites, baby killers and blood drinkers, and blacks as satanic. The show cancelled his engagement.

Despite this, the Salmon Arm-based Preferred Network, a business which sells "alternative" books and videos and organizes the festival, is making no secret of the fact that Mr. Mullins will share the speaker lineup.

Others in the lineup will be espousing views on everything from Canadians' rights to unregulated herbal remedies to international oil cartels.

"I can only imagine if these people know what happened in Toronto . . . if they have knowledge of his hate-mongering and his anti-Semitism, then these people must subscribe to his views," said Bernie Farber, executive director of the Canadian Jewish Congress, Ontario region.

A woman identifying herself only as Irene answered the Preferred Network's phones last week to say that president Wes Mann is out of town.
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When asked if she had heard about the Toronto controversy over Mr. Mullins, she replied: "Whatever he says in his books, he can prove. It's all true.

"It just gets taken out of context."

According to David Lethbridge, director of the Bethune Institute for Anti-Fascist Studies in Salmon Arm, the cross-pollination between hate-mongering and alternative health is a new and disturbing trend.

"It became obvious four years ago that traditional groupings of neo-Nazis, the Ku Klux Klan and Christian Identity, while they still existed, were no longer found in their pure forms," he said recently. "We began to see crossovers with three distinct groups: those into New Age, alternative health and tax refusal." Mr. Lethbridge said hate groups view alternative health and New Age devotees as potential recruits because they are often cynical and suspicious of the status quo and mainstream political process.

"They become easy victims of any kind of conspiracy thinking."
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