By Bob Gaydos

The Southern Poverty Law Center’s hate groups map.

    Thinking about that ugly, hate-filled MAGA rally in Madison Square Garden a few nights ago, I wondered about the real audience Donald Trump was addressing out there in the rest of the world.

     Surely it wasn’t the millions of relatively normal Americans who will be  choosing their next president on November 5. The message coming out of the Garden was too pointedly — too obviously— hateful to appeal to any but the already committed Trump voters. To pump them up, media analysts said. To get them ready for the inevitable defeat, many speculated. Ready to do what? To reprise January 6? To simply further stall Trump’s imprisonment? To actually try to overthrow the government?

     As outlandish as these thoughts seem to me as I think them, I know there are people in this country who actually hold them seriously. They are a minority given disproportionate voice by Trump these past eight years.

    Who are they, I wondered? Where are they? For help, I went to a source that has made it its business to know the answers to those questions. To know who the hate groups in America are and where they are.

     The Southern Poverty Law Center, headquartered in Montgomery, Ala., was founded in 1971 with civil rights activist Julian Bond as its first president. Its purpose, as its web site declares: “To ensure that the promise of the Civil Rights movement became a reality for everyone.”

       In taking the fight for equality to the courts, the nonprofit organization has won victories, not only for blacks in America, but for women, children, the LGBTQ community, the disabled and immigrants.

     As part of its mission, in the 1980s, with a rise of white supremacist activity in America, the group started tracking hate groups. It publishes an annual report, state by state, listing the groups, their hometowns and their particular flavor of hate.

    It’s informative, if not pleasant, reading. The 2023 report lists 2,430 hate and anti-government groups in America. No state is spared.

     Especially curious, I checked out New York, where I live. The SPLC lists 63 such groups in New York last year with agendas ranging from anti-government to anti-Muslim, anti-semitism, anti-LGBTQ, neo-Nazi, white nationalist and, my favorite label, “general hate.”

     Moms for Liberty, a group of parents which wants to control what schools teach and do not teach, has 14 chapters, including one in Orange County, which is in my bailiwick.

      Also, of note, the Proud Boys, a group of that has gained some notoriety recently, has five chapters in the state. It’s in one of those “general hate” categories.

     According to the SPLC, “Established in the midst of the 2016 presidential election by VICE Media co-founder Gavin McInnes, the Proud Boys are self-described ‘Western chauvinists’ who adamantly deny any connection to the racist alt-right. They insist they are simply a fraternal group spreading an ‘anti-political correctness’ and ‘anti-white guilt’ agenda.” They are listed as a terrorist group in Canada.

      How do you show you’re a Proud Boy? The SPLC, which is clearly very thorough in its research, says there are four degrees of membership. It writes, “To become a first degree in the ‘pro-West fraternal organization’ a prospective member simply has to declare, ‘I am a Western chauvinist, and I refuse to apologize for creating the modern world.’ To enter the second degree, a Proud Boy has to endure a beating until they can yell out the names of five breakfast cereals (in order to demonstrate ‘adrenaline control’). Those who enter the third degree have demonstrated their commitment by getting a Proud Boys tattoo. Any man – no matter his race or sexual orientation – can join the fraternal organization as long as they ‘recognize that white men are not the problem.’ The fourth is reserved for those who have gotten in a ‘fight for the cause.’”

     On a positive note, I guess, the SPLC says, “All members are banned from watching pornography or masturbating more than once a month because, in theory, it will leave them more inclined to go out and meet women.”

         Well then. So now I know a little bit more about the audience Donald Trump was addressing in Madison Square Garden Sunday night. Still not sure how I feel about that.

By Bob Gaydos

     I was voter number 838 Sunday afternoon, Oct. 26, at the Government Center in Monticello, N.Y.. Row A, Kamala Harris and Democrats, all the way. “Yes” on New York State Proposition One extending protection against discrimination in several categories including pregnancy and pregnancy outcomes — Democrats’ preemptive effort to thwart possible Republican efforts to enact a national abortion ban.

            Republicans have forfeited any chance of consideration at the ballot box with their full-throated and conscience-free embrace of all things Trump, punctuated by the all-out salute to hatred and bigotry at his Sunday night Madison Square Garden rally. An utterly despicable display.

       In contrast, it was a pleasure casting the vote Sunday. A sunny afternoon. Lots of parking. No lines. Plenty of helpful volunteer poll workers. Name, address, signature. Smooth as silk. Well done, Sullivan.

       Of course, this is precisely the kind of thing Republicans have been trying to dismantle across the country — orderly, honest, uncomplicated voting. For all. When that happens everywhere, they tend to lose nationally because their policies don’t sit well with many Americans. Especially for the past decade when their only policy has been to oppose anything Democrats propose. It’s hard to run a two-party system of government that way.

       That’s why Trump and the MAGAs want it their way: one ruler with absolute power and a bunch of flunkies to make it happen. Essentially eliminate all marginalized citizens — non-white, non-straight, non-Christian — who might expect support from their government by eliminating their vote and the votes of those who support the concept of equal rights and opportunity (those Trump calls “the enemy within”).

       It wasn’t that long ago that women were on that list of marginalized citizens. Not anymore. They have the vote and tend to vote in larger numbers than men. They have a candidate this year who understands their concerns and those of the citizens who were targets of ugly “jokes” and comments in Madison Square Garden Sunday night.

       Early voting numbers are up in many areas of the country where it hasn’t always been as easy as it was in Monticello Sunday afternoon. I’d like to think it’s a positive sign for Kamala Harris and those who want to protect and preserve democracy in America. 

          Vote like your freedom depends on it.

rjgaydos@gmail.com