Anti-racism, brotherhood, and righteous violence: the world according to the Baldies

.

When Max was in high school, he went and to a tattoo parlor and had the word skin imprinted inside his lower lip. "Oh, yeah, it hurt like hell at the time," he grimaces. Without much prompting he sets aside his burger and rolls down his lip to expose the black lettering inside. "i got it because it's something i believe in," he says. "Once a skin, always a skin. It's something that will always be there. It's a matter of pride."

After he finishes his burger, Max thinks better of his boast. "Can you change my name in the story?" He asks. "i'm afraid my mom would get mad if she knew." Okay-Max isn't his real name.

Max's friends Joe Hawkins and Gator were 16 when they organized the Baldies, an anti-racist skinhead group, five years ago. A few days later, over dinner at Chi-Chi's, Joe, Gator, and their friend Chops talk about what the Baldies mean to them. "I think they know I'd give my life for them," Joe says of his fellow skinheads, who currently number about 100 in the Twin Cities. "i know they'd do the same for me. I care about 'em like they're my brothers. They're like a replacement family for me." He smiles and nods at Gator. Gator nods back.

Joe is an intense 20 year old with short cropped blond hair, light blue eyes, and a loud, nervous laugh. When he speaks he stares unwaveringly into your eyes, and the effect suggest a presence much larger than his stocky frame. He talks about partying and politics interchangeably; as he fluctuates between soft spoken steadiness and fiery tirades about social injustice, he seems much to old for his years.

Both Joe and Gator seem most comfortable when they're talking politics. They talk about changing the racist, classist system they were brought up in; their line is strident-combining traditional midwestern populist distrust of the system with vaguely democratic socialist ideas about how to fix it-but even as they're giving speeches they're looking to each other for approval: is this right?

They're less eager to talk about their families and their upbringing. The other Baldies, they're family. Joe: "when you see a big group of skinheads all dressed the same, with the same hair, you just feel so relaxed. Goddamn, that's true love to me man, because more than any other group-I don't care who you are-skinheads will stand together. You can just look at them and know they're gonna be with you. I'm down with them, they're down with me. It's like they're automatically your brothers. We'll take care of each other, and it feels so good."

"i don't think most people can say they have that sense of security." Joe and Gator's pal Chops has eight skinhead tattoos on his arms, neck, and torso: the letters ACAB tattoed across the knuckles of his left hand stand for All Coppers Are Bastards. Now he chimes in: "How many people can walk into a city and know one person and then meet people who will put you up and be your brothers? It's like that in every city I've been to where there's real skinheads who are anti-racist. I've been put up and they've taken care of me while I worked my way."

But what about the families they all came from before joining the skins? If you push a little they'll talk about parents who divorced, and childhoods spent on welfare. But Joe and Gator insist they're lucky compared to alot of kids they know. "My mom is my hero," Joe says. "she's a real successful lawyer." Not by virtue of how much money she makes, he hastens to add. Because she helps people. How? He won't elaborate; like nearly every Baldie i talked to, he's leery of giving enough details to allow his family to be identified. Joe says his own reticence stems from hate group threats his family received in the past when his real name appeared in Star Tribune articles.

"People have this stereotype that all skinheads come from fucked up families," he continues. "Most of their families aren't bad, they're just poor. Mine was real poor. My father left when i was two, and my mother and I were alone on welfare for five years until she married my stepfather. She was just trying to make something of herself and a better life for both of us. I remember that shit and I'm real proud of her. She beat the system, and now she helps people with legal problems work things out. Whether they've got money or not."

Unlike Joe and Gator, Chops really hasn't known much family besides the Baldies. At first he won't say anything about it. He won't disclose his age, or where he's from, but little by little the story emerges anyway. His parents kicked him out of the house after he started using drugs in elementary school ("I didn't wanna leave. I still wanna go home, you know"), and he's spent the last several years bouncing between jails, reform schools, and lots of temporary jobs.

"I was having alot of problems with drugs back then," he says of the days after his parents kiced him out. "So I checked myself into treatment, and then I was straight for two and a half years, but I lost that again. But I've always held true to my beliefs and been true to my people, even though i've always failed myself."

Chops is doing okay for himself right now. He's got a roomate to share expenses, and lately he's had good luck landing factory work through a local temp agency. He hasn't spoken to his dad in several years, and he's only talked to his mom four times since he was kicked out. "I really wanna see my sister," he says at one point. "Even after I moved out, I still took care of her as best as my situation allowed. She's 17 now, and she's working and doing pretty good. She's got clothes now, and food, and she's got a way to school, cuz I'm gonna sell her my car."

"She's gonna finish high school and try to go to college. She knows I'll beat the hell out of her if she fools around with anybody or drops out of school."

When they're not riding bikes, listening to music, or working righteous violence against yuppies or the small contingent of racist skinheads from East St. Paul, the Baldies like to hang in the uptown neighborhood. Their rough appearance and air of machismo makes them intimidating to alot of uptowners. That's OK with them; as Joe puts it, "we're an army for a righteous cause, and the best thing an army can do is look intimidating."

But they hate it when people confuse them with racist skinheads, a smaller groups that's nonetheless gotten far more media attention. "The media has created a kind of mass hysteria over nothing," Joe fumes. "News 11 for godsakes, those morons. They showed a group of about 8 of us and two of us were Black and one was Oriental, and another was Native American, and they labeled us nazi skinheads. I mean, how ignorant can you be?

"Skinheads believe it's their country, not the rich people's. That's why alot of skinheads wear the flag; they mean the flag is theirs. I'm proud of the American working class, but I don't hold any allegiance to this government. I don't believe in all that."

Joe says the problem is that the leaders in this country don't know or care what the people need. "I was watching Dan Quayle and George Bush on TV during the elections and they kept saying that they knew what America needed. How do they know that? They've never fucking been there, man. They don't know what it's like to be poor. They don't have any idea, and they don't care. You know the government hates us. They don't wanna see us unified, becuase that means the working class will have the power and could challenge the system, right?"

"Yeah," echoes Chops. "That would mean the 5 percent who own 50 percent of the world would be challenged by the working class rising up to meet them. They dont' wanna see that, they don't wanna see that at all. That's why the boys in blue are always on us, because they're the foot soldiers for the rich. They're just the lackeys. Their job is the subjugation of the working class, to keep the poor down."

The most conspicous rap against the Baldies is their penchant for violence. They beat up alot of people. But not randomly, they insist; it's part of the program. "There's a place and a time for violence and it has to be righteous," Joe says, looking down at the table. "I mean, I'm not just gonna go fight somebody. We've made mistakes, but--well, we've made alot of mistakes. We're only human. But I don't want normal people to be afraid of me. They've got nothing to fear from me. Except for nazis. I give everybody respect that gives me respect. You be good to me, i'll be good to you. I want to get along with people. You know?"

Joe stops and Gator takes over, emphasizing that violence is righteous when you're fighting for a cause: "Fighting racism is righteous. We don't condone violence unless it's righteous."

So it's righteous to beat up nazis because they're racist. Joe and Gator also agree that it's all right to bash drug dealers because they undermine the working class by taking them down with drugs. As for other kinds of violence, Gator says earnestly, "we really are trying to stop the unrighteous fighting. We don't wanna fight anybody but the nazis, really."

And the yuppies, sort of. They both know this is tougher to defend, but the Baldie crusade for the betterment of the working class gets tiresome; real results are hard to come by. There are times when just punching a cocky yuppy in the face warms a Baldies heart. "Hey, I'm not gonna lie to you," Joe agrees, "we're kids. We make mistakes sometimes, you know, but that's just part of growing up. You have your big drunk jocks who come out of Figlio's and have heard how tough skinheads are, and they think they've got something to prove by fighting us. Same with yuppies downtown. I'm not gonna back down to a yuppy."

When a yuppie heckles Joe, "I'll let them strike the first blow, but they're gonna be on the ground real quick. I think they're scum. I guess Ican't say that about all of them, but their attitudes are generally bad. All they care about is being rich and acquiring as much as the can and showing it off. They don't care about sexism or racism or anything but themselves and i just don't have time for that. They're like bugs clogging up a fan."

"People fear violence in this city, but the reality is you can either cower from it or live with it. Cuz it's not gonna go away. Skinheads are just a reflection of inner city life. We were created from the inner city underclass, and the violence you lay on us was already there. But there's respect and dignity, too. We have to get along because we're all in this together. The whole saying is 'united and strong'. It means everybody. Not just blacks and whites, but everybody-if we ever want to have a decent society."

Righteous or not, the Baldies are just another gang in the eyes of the cops. "My basic feeling about the skinheads is that they're all equally violent," says Gang Unit officer Mike Schoeben. "It seems that even the non-racist ones have a philosophy of life that says if you are somehow above the working class, or part of the establishment, then they don't like you. That is their form of prejudice. We've classified them as a white gang but it's still hard to get a handle on who they are realy. They do fit our criteria, though: dressing alike, same philosophy, and fighting among themselves, you know."

Bring up the word "gang" around Joe and his voice gets shrill: "We are not a gang! That's one thing I want you to get straight in your article. We are not a gang. We don't do drugs and we don't sell drugs. We don't carry weapons and we don't commit crimes. If you deal and you're a Baldie, you're out. We just won't tolerate it. I mean the only crimes we condone are righteous acts of violence. Those are necessary things."

"Our relationship with the police is an example of something that could use a hell of alot of improvement," he says. Gator and Joe both claim to know Baldies who've been picked up by cops uptown and driven to the banks of the Missisippi, where they were called names like "nigger lover" and "communist" and thrown out of the squad car. Says Joe: "I know this guy who had his legs kicked out from under him by one cop while his partner kicked him in the chest and said not to come around uptown for a long time unless he wanted more of the same."

They say a few cops, mostly minorities, give them a break out of sympathy with what they stand for. "Some of the minority cops give us a lot more room, because they know what we're about. Like if there's a fight between us and the nazis they'll say, 'okay, are there any Baldies here?' and we'll say 'yeah' and they'll let us go and arrest the nazis. But that doesn't happen very often."

Ironically, alot of the people the Baldies are currently looking to bash were once part of their fold. In the begining, the Baldies were just a bunch of adolescent guys looking to belong to someting; almost any one was welcome. "There weren't any nazis in the begining," says Joe, but about six or seven months later alot of kids started shaving their heads and hanging out with us, but they were dorks, man. The didn't know what it was about, so we kicked 'em out. That's how the White Knights basically started."

"We tried to talk to them and educate them for a while, but they were going around in groups attacking minorities. I mean, like seven guys with bats attacking one lone Indian or Black man. We just got sick of it, and we told them that everytime we saw them we were gonna bash them and we did. They were totally disbanded within two weeks." But the White Knights soon regrouped, dressing the same way as their anti-racist counterparts but espousing white pride and racial violence. Joe estimates there are 20 or 30 nazi skins in the Twin Cities now, but only 10 or so who are very active.

Sitting at a table in Chi-Chi's downtown, Chops pulls on my sleeve. He looks overcome with self-consciousness.

"Hey," he says. "am I dressed right to be in here?" He's wearing jeans, a black t-shirt, and a black flight jacket.

Joe tries to reassure him by making a joke of it: "shit man, there's crumbs in my chair." He makes a dismissive gesture.

Chops doesn't seem reassured. "Man, I'm sitting two feet from a fuckin' fountain."

After Chops is finally assured that they'll serve him in spite of his clothes, I ask all three of them what they see themselves doing in a few years. What about girlfriends, families of their own?

"I've had some serious relationships," Joe volunteers. "I had one for about a year and a half, and it's really hard. Quite honestly, it didnt' work out because I'm a skinhead. It's a really big part of my life, and she didn't get it."

"You can talk about skinheads being crusaders and everything, but when they get together the first thing they do is talk about music, what concerts they've seen and stuff. And they trade things with each other, like records. The thing I'd really tell people about skinheads is that if they see them, the shouldn't be afraid. They should just walk up and tell 'em where the good parties are!"

Joe knows the Baldie life can't stay the same forever. "I realize there's gonna be a time when I get older and I'm gonna have people that I care about, and who care about me, and the risk just won't be worth it. Right now I'm going to school and I'm real interested in social work. I'm getting a humanites background."

"I still want to do something that involves fighting racism when i get older. And even if i'm not working in a factory or something like that, I still want to be doing something that contributes to the working class, because that's where my roots are. That's where i come from."