Talk:United Patriots Front

Interstate

I have two problems with this sentence: "A police officer said that most of the protesters came from interstate."

1. "Interstate" is normally an adjective, so "coming from" is incorrect -- you need a noun here. "Interstate" as a noun means, according to the link provided, "A freeway that is part of the [U.S.] Interstate Highway System", which makes no sense here whatsoever.
2. MOS:COMMONALITY says "Wikipedia tries to find words that are common to all varieties of English. Insisting on a single term or a single usage as the only correct option does not serve the purposes of an international encyclopedia."

I had proposed "came from other states", but that was reverted without any explanation.

I have an idea: why don't we write this so that non-Australians readers don't have to click through to Wiktionary, i.e., choose a construction that is self-explanatory, instead of insisting on an Australianism? Ground Zero | t 12:31, 13 October 2015 (UTC)

political party?

Can UPF be considered a political party if they are unregistered as such? I think the references to political parties should be removed until they actualy are one, if that ever happes. I'll leave the section referring to plans to launch fortitude, but I'm changing the other information.Panglossx (talk) 11:38, 28 March 2016 (UTC)

i updated updated these issues as i mentioned the other day, and also updated the infobox from political party to one more appropriate. used the al-Quaida infobox as a sort of template, gets the relevant information in, and works easier on the page. and makes more sense.Panglossx (talk) 06:27, 2 April 2016 (UTC)

Panglossx it is currently infobox "war faction" I dont know who added that particular infobox, but there is a lot of difference between this group and Al-Qaida. 220 of ^Borg 13:41, 23 September 2016 (UTC)

not really much difference hahahaha sigh... maybe i should have used the ISIS wiki as a template? both mobs are terrorists and/or extremists, just from different places and with different accents.14:34, 27 September 2016 (UTC)Panglossx (talk)

2016 , mcg incident etc

Created section today, still working on it, but anybody that wants to help with clean-up and formatting please jump on board... I'm still better at the research end of things and learning how to make things fit into the wikipedia style. WIll be more soon where necessary or appropriate. CHeers Panglossx (talk) 06:25, 2 April 2016 (UTC)

"Neo nazi"

Until the UPF itself claims it is a neo-nazi group, this statement should be withdrawn. As I have said, the views of an individual does not reflect the group as a whole. Burklemore1 (talk) 01:47, 18 May 2016 (UTC)

What's even funny is that these "posts" and "views" were said long before he even became the leader (i.e. from 2013). Burklemore1 (talk) 01:57, 18 May 2016 (UTC)

FYI, I don't mean to be an arse with what I said in my edit summary here. I think it would be appropriate to see what the wider community thinks, as long as their political opinions don't conflict. Burklemore1 (talk) 04:20, 18 May 2016 (UTC)

To be honest, the actual details you changed were all pretty reasonable, and the edits you made were much welcomed, I've just beeen a bit over-sensitive to change here due to the vandalism in the past (by both pro-UPF and anti-UPF types). Thanks also for pointing out the categories that were designed for individuals instead of groups. Reading your latest comments here in particular, you make a great case as to why the information, if relevant, is presented wrongly anyway. There is a page for Blair Cottrell himself, which is obviously a more appropriate place for information pertaining to him and not the group as a whole. You have my apologies, particularly for the knee-jerk assumption that you were editing to suit your own personal views or support of the group. And, really thanks again for the visual editing of the page, looks much better. Panglossx (talk) 12:20, 24 May 2016 (UTC)

I can come out and personally claim not to be a human, that doesn't make it so. The UPF claiming to be something doesn't make it so. Likewise, I can claim to be a penguin from mars, and wikipedia articles will still be edited to include the reference information from reputable 3rd party sources rather than relying on my blog or business website and taking my personal claims as concrete truth. But, while we have an article showing the leader of an organisation (an far-right organisation whose main focus is race/religion/culture/nationality) identifying as a supporter of National Socialism, it is safer to include such links in the name of transparency and fullness of information. Removing it would seem like an attempt to obfuscate certain details to change/improve the image of UPF directly contrary to the printed evidence at hand. I'm putting the information back in. Panglossx (talk) 22:34, 18 May 2016 (UTC)

• "The UPF claiming to be something doesn't make it so." Neither does irrelevant labelling.
• "Removing it would seem like an attempt to obfuscate certain details to change/improve the image of UPF directly contrary to the printed evidence at hand." And the body of the article does not? If you really want to include this piece, why not make mention specifically that the leader is a supporter of National Socialism? FYI, if you are going to revert my edits, at least consider my further edits in improving the format of references that you also removed. That helps nothing. Burklemore1 (talk) 14:47, 19 May 2016 (UTC)

And what the hell was with those new categories? This is an organisation, not a HUMAN. Think before you edit. Burklemore1 (talk) 14:50, 19 May 2016 (UTC)

At the very least they are associated with neo-Nazi's and several members including their leader, Blair Cottrell have explicitly expressed support for Nazism online. This is undeniable fact, online posts and interviews demonstrate this and it's been documented by mainstream media. The group endorsed the Golden Dawn and Cottrell wanted Hitler's portrait hung in all Australian class rooms FFS! "There should be a picture of this man in every classroom and every school, and his book should be issued to every student annually." - Blair Cottrell

- http://www.smh.com.au/national/blair-cottrell-leader-of-aussie-patriots-upf-wanted-hitler-in-the-classroom-20151016-gkbbvz.html

- http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3276988/The-vile-sexist-racist-tirades-anti-Islam-leader-beheaded-dummy-mosque-protest-wants-portraits-HITLER-Australian-classroom.html

- https://books.google.com/books?id=lKvODgAAQBAJ&pg=PT180

There's plenty more articles like this - it's not really debatable.

Info box cleanup

I removed all of those names except for Blair Cottrell from the info box leaders section. That was way to excessive and no other political organisation lists lists its leaders like that on Wikipedia. This also isn't an advertising platform for Cottrell and his pack of inbred mates to circlejerk around.

Also added neo nazism back into the info box as they openly empouse such views, as much as Cottrell or whomever of his inbred mates or otherwise say. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 137.147.165.88 (talk) 07:03, 11 June 2016 (UTC)

Gott mit uns. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 206.255.232.142 (talk) 15:17, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

Merging with United Patriots Front

It has been suggested that the two pages be megre, I am personally in full support of this suggestion. I barely think that the UPF is relevant enough in the long term to warrant inclusion in wikipedia, but Blair Cottrell himself is just a nobody, he is not really relevent outside of the group, and as a known practitioner of hate-speech, it is not really appropriate to let him and his supporters use wikipedia as a platform to further their own interests or promote their own beliefs. As such I believe a much condensed form of the COttrell article could be slipped into the UPf article and then the original UPF article should probably be discussed and analyzed for relevance. It may be that neither of the articles really need to exist anyway.. Just my 2c worth, I hope this is in the right place. I am not necessarily an advanced enough user to do the merger myself, don't have the skillz. Panglossx (talk) 10:16, 23 August 2016 (UTC)

Done! Although, I think that while Cottrell isn't notable enough (at lest not yet) for an article outside of UPF, UPF is definitely notable enough for an article. The article survived a deletion nomination in June 2015, and now they're even more notable than they were then. Unfortunately. Orthogonal1 (talk) 23:37, 28 August 2016 (UTC)

@orthogonal - thumbs up man. thanks for your work. :) Panglossx (talk) 13:50, 27 September 2016 (UTC)

Thanks to you too, Panglossx. I'm just wondering whether or not it's fair to say that UPF is neo-Nazi. It's my understanding that most members aren't, and it's only a minority who are. Orthogonal1 (talk) 11:06, 29 September 2016 (UTC)

Okay, I've removed neo-Nazism from the ideology box, but kept the discussion of it in the article. Orthogonal1 (talk) 07:22, 1 October 2016 (UTC)

to be fair, Blah and Sewer (Tom Siewell) constitute most of the membership. Their following is merely Facebook likes and nothing more and thus it is probably fair to label them as the Neo Nazi antisemites they are. http://www.smh.com.au/national/blair-cottrell-leader-of-aussie-patriots-upf-wanted-hitler-in-the-classroom-20151016-gkbbvz.html — Preceding unsigned comment added by 121.220.35.204 (talk) 03:54, 2 October 2016 (UTC)

The membership must be bigger than Blah and Sewer (nice names, by the way :D); there's a lot of people at these rallies. Orthogonal1 (talk) 02:22, 3 October 2016 (UTC)

Merge into new page covering far right groups in Australia

I propose merging Australia First Party, National Action, Reclaim Australia, True Blue Crew, United Patriots Front etc into one page covering minor far-right groups in Australia, I really don't think that these groups warrant entire articles, many of them are made up of less than half a dozen members. The groups often only make the news because of vulgar stunts, they are not noteworthy by any measure, many are just blokes ranting on YouTube or even less noteworthy. Bacondrum (talk) 07:14, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

But this one is certainly notable by itself. Also, merging articles of groups is generally no the best approach because it means views/attitudes/actions of one person/group could be misattributed to another. StAnselm (talk) 08:19, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

Fair enough.Bacondrum (talk) 09:24, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

What's with the multiple discussions? I and someone else have responded at the far-right politics page, but you've set it up so that there's a whole bunch of different discussions. The Drover's Wife (talk) 10:44, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

Still learning, sorry. Bacondrum (talk) 11:25, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

Reducing verbosity re Eggboi

Hi @Bacondrum:. I did a bit of a tidy as I added an item under the 2019 heading, but think that there are still just too many words about the egging incident here. The focus should stay on the UPF thugs' actions, and I don't see the need to provide the long quote from Anning. Much of that can go into the egg incident article and/or the Fraser Anning one - the focus should be on UPF here, and too much text can put off people reading to the end. (If enough is removed, it could perhaps all be in one paragraph, and remove those section headings I added?) Laterthanyouthink (talk) 06:01, 22 March 2019 (UTC)

Sounds right to me, it does focus on Anning too much rather than the UPF. Do what you think works best regarding the headings. Bacondrum (talk) 23:49, 22 March 2019 (UTC)

OK, ta. Back later. Laterthanyouthink (talk) 01:53, 23 March 2019 (UTC)

Nazism and Antisemitism

I propose adding the Nazism and Antisemitism catagory sidebars. I think the fact that this is a neo-Nazi antisemeitic group is well established now, and has been for a while. I'm certain that the saint will object, but the evidence is overwhelming. As I wrote in the lede: Erikson has admitted to being a neo-Nazi and was convicted of stalking a Rabbi. Cottrell has called for a portrait of Adolf Hitler to be hung in all Australian classrooms and for copies of Mein Kampf to be "issued annually" to students. In 2015 the two leaders were documented surreptitiously discussing Jewish conspiracy theories and "the Jewish problem" with Erikson stating that "My personal opinion is stick to the Muslim shit and Cultural Marxism for max support do Jews later you don't need to show your full hand," Cottrell replied, saying that it was his "current attitude as well. It will take years to prepare for the Jewish problem. If any of us came out with it now we would be slaughtered by public opinion." I believe it is time to stop the obfuscation around clear and established facts regarding the nature of this group here. Bacondrum (talk) 00:32, 27 March 2019 (UTC)

I'm not sure about this one. I'm not familiar with the rules about sidebars, but the reason I'm hesitant here is that I haven't seen evidence that the organisation as a whole subscribes to Nazi ideology, even if the individuals concerned have spoken and behaved like Nazis. Not that I'm fully informed because I haven't read all of the sources - but I think that it might need specific refs to justify the sidebar. Devil's advocate - I could recommend that every student reads Mein Kampf in order to comprehend Hitler's twisted thinking, and anti-semitic views can be held without embracing Nazi ideology...?

Also - question - is there a specific source relating to the group's Christian fundamentalism? I had a quick look at the first citations behind the statement and couldn't see it. They may well be - but I haven't read or heard much relating to their citing the Bible or practising a faith. Is this just something they throw in to attract a few conservative Christians? Laterthanyouthink (talk) 12:36, 5 May 2019 (UTC)

There's a few sources in the lede. I've not got time to go through it now, but I'll get back with pages and quotes soon. Bacondrum (talk) 00:10, 6 May 2019 (UTC)

Hey, added the text from the book that mentions the group's Christian fundamentalism to the citation. can also be found here if you're interested in further reading. It's an interesting read.Bacondrum (talk) 03:02, 6 May 2019 (UTC)

Thanks for that, Bacondrum. I went looking for the sources that book is quoting, and they led to two articles in the SMH which you've already got cited for the article (here and here), and neither of them mention Christian fundamentalism. I then went googling for Blah + Christian and not much turned up (Rational Wiki mentions it but not in that context). So while such a book, with the prestigious OUP behind it, should be reliable (and would be acceptable by Wikipedia standards), I have to question this particular statement. Andy Fleming (writer of that chapter) is on Twitter - in fact seems to be behind Slackbastard - so perhaps could have this discussion with him... Anyway, it's fine for the moment and for this article, but I don't see Blah and cronies as fundamentalist or religious types myself and would be hesitant about categorising them as such.

With regard to the Nazi sidebar, after reading WP:SIDEBAR, I'm not sure that it really fits or adds much to the article, seeing as there's already a navbar at the bottom and the Antisemitism template at the bottom - a sidebar may just clutter it up more? Anyway, as you wish, I'm not strongly opposed, if you want to give it a try and see what it looks like. (Antipodean Resistance looks as if it's more directly aligned with Nazi symbolism, etc. and it doesn't have the sidebar, for whatever reason.) Laterthanyouthink (talk) 11:16, 6 May 2019 (UTC)

Reversions

@GenerationCurrent2015: - please discuss here if you want to double-revert. You removed an illustration without an edit summary earlier, which I reverted for that reason. You have just undone my reversion with an explanation that doesn't make sense to me. The illustration appears to be apt for the section, showing a poster put up in protest against the Lads Society. Can you please explain which WP rule supports the removal of the illustration (which btw was not added by me originally)? Laterthanyouthink (talk) 13:23, 5 May 2019 (UTC)

Indeed, you've given no reason for the images removal and keep reverting. I did upload it, but I reverted your edit as you had already been challenged by another editor - you are edit warring @GenerationCurrent2015: The image is of a protest poster opposing the groups presence in Ashfield, they were all over the area, it illustrates local community concerns and objections about the nature of the group and is therefor entirely appropriate. Bacondrum (talk) 00:02, 6 May 2019 (UTC)

Page Merges

I fail to understand what the objective is behind merging the pages dedicated to Blair Cottrell, the UPF and the Lads Society into a single article with a title specifically pertaining only to one of the above. I would assert that they are closely intertwined but fundamentally separable subjects, better served by a series of articles with a small portal or side-directory (forgive me if this isn't the correct term; I'm new to editing Wikipedia) linking them together.

Regardless of one's opinion of the man, Blair Cottrell is at least a peripheral public figure, and has been sufficiently relevant to public discourse in his own right to merit a separate article. Many of the views he has expressed at various points are not necessarily reflected in the rhetoric or (at least, outwardly presented) attitudes of the organisations in which he has taken part, and it is seemingly unprofessional to treat him and such organisations as a singular monolith. Moreover, I would note that Blair Cottrell is in no sense a leader of Lads Society, and has not been for some time (although at an earlier point, it is clear that he was certainly associated with the organisation in what was perhaps a figurehead role).

More importantly, the structure, operating model and leadership of the Lads Society and its predecessor the UPF are quite different - firstly, Neil Erikson and Shermon Burgess (both leadership figures of the now-defunct UPF, and listed as leaders on this page) are not even members of the Lads Society, far from being leaders. As I already mentioned, it would also be incorrect to list Cottrell as a leader for the Lads Society. The Lads Society is quite openly run by Tom Sewell, as many articles both friendly and hostile to the Lads Society will attest - Sewell hardly receives a mention in the entire article, which is still clearly the hastily-relabelled UPF page.

Regarding this talk page, there appears to be a clear desire that this entry should reflect the tone of an editorial opinion piece - I would strongly caution against attempting to use Wikipedia as a venue for political partisanship on philosophical grounds. Bias shows, and the credibility of the entire Wikipedia project is diminished by its presence. Neoplatonism is fkn sik (talk) 13:32, 6 May 2019 (UTC)

(Just moved newest comment down to bottom, as per convention.) Good points, Neoplatonism is fkn sik. I am much less informed than you or some others here, but I'll return to this tomorrow. Laterthanyouthink (talk) 14:39, 6 May 2019 (UTC)

Forgot to say, WP:BIO should be the main reference point for determining notability for a person, and WP:NOTE for any article. Laterthanyouthink (talk) 14:48, 6 May 2019 (UTC)

@Neoplatonism is fkn sik: I'd be fine separating them out into three pages, I merged UPF and LS after reading in numerous places that it was simply a re-branding, all the same members plus a few out and out Nazi's from AR...and then I came across this https://www.universiteitleiden.nl/perspectives-on-terrorism/archives/2019#volume-xiii-issue-2 and felt it was appropriate, however I have had my doubts since doing it. When Blair was first merged with UPF there was a consensus that he wasn't sufficiently relevant to public discourse, I agree that this has changed and he is now worth noting. You've raised good points and I have no objections with your critique and would be happy for you to separate them out and reword as you see fit

@Laterthanyouthink: I appreciate your assessment - since I haven't been editing Wikipedia for long enough, I am unable to make any proposed changes to this page myself (since the page is semi-protected, and rightly so given its politically charged subject matter). If I may, I would like to start by largely duplicating the contents of this page into a new page for the United Patriots' Front, and also begin work on a specific page for Blair Cottrell (since as I understand it, the previously deleted Blair Cottrell page was quite low on detail and would by now be somewhat outdated given his notable activity in the public sphere since the UPF period). Neoplatonism is fkn sik (talk) 04:42, 7 May 2019 (UTC)

@Neoplatonism is fkn sik: Thanks for your involvement in this - I am sure that your work will help our quest for continuous improvement. I've just copied a number of WP links to your talk page to help get you started. Adding content sometimes seems to be only a minor part of the work involved in keeping to all of the conventions, rules and guidelines here! (And we don't want to be adding pages which are flagged for speedy deletion before they are finished...)

It's going to take a bit of time to untangle these properly, and page histories need to be kept updated for purposes of attribution. WP:MOVE covers some of this, and there is a note at the top of Blair Cottrell's talk page which will need updating. (Those project templates should have been removed, really, but if he's going to be recreated, may as well leave them there.)

@Bacondrum: How about you create the basic pages (re-creating UPF and Blair Cottrell) and annotate the talk pages appropriately and then we can all work on separating the various strands and describing the roles of the characters who are not notable enough to warrant an article? I am not across all of the separate histories but happy to contribute as I find stuff and have time. A recent article I read the other day referred to UPF in Western Australia, btw - so perhaps they've splintered rather than officially changed? Laterthanyouthink (talk) 06:31, 7 May 2019 (UTC)

Also, reviewing the content of the page, I reckon it could do with quite a bit of trimming and condensing. Let the details remain in the cited sources. I don't think that the subjects really warrant a blow-by-blow account of their activities nor all of the responses to their antics (which I too have contributed to in the past), and let's not give them more attention than they deserve. Laterthanyouthink (talk) 06:41, 7 May 2019 (UTC)

I'm on board 100% with all the suggestions made so far @Neoplatonism is fkn sik: and @Laterthanyouthink: I like where we are going with this, the page needs improvement. What if I set the pages up as you suggest and we can all work on them from there? Bacondrum (talk) 12:28, 7 May 2019 (UTC)

Might take me a few days to get it all done.

Sounds good, Bacondrum. No rush - more important to get it right. (We all have lives outside of Wikipedia, and I seem to be editing across several topics as well as the odd random page at the moment...) Laterthanyouthink (talk) 12:50, 7 May 2019 (UTC)

So, I've separated them out if you folks wanna have a look at them, they still need a lot of work. Bacondrum (talk) 00:50, 8 May 2019 (UTC)

Sorry, I meant to get back earlier, Bacondrum. I did have a look the other day and it looked like you'd done a great job of splitting them and sorting out the info. I thought I'd wait until you'd finished your tinkering, but would like to do a bit of trimming and condensing at some point. (Think of looking back at the page in 5-10 years' time and what is really going to remain notable.) Laterthanyouthink (talk) 13:08, 10 May 2019 (UTC)

No worries, thanks, I agree it needs work still. Go for it, trimming and condensing is exactly what is needed. Bacondrum (talk) 00:03, 11 May 2019 (UTC)

Sewell planning a fascist, whites only community

I've not got time to get into this, but it's certainly noteworthy: https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/nov/12/australian-white-nationalists-reveal-plans-to-recruit-disgruntled-white-male-population