run an article on it...Thanks for the free press coverage Dana!
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July 26, 2002
Baby Drive Wraps Infants in White Supremacy
by Dana Parsons LA Times
Here's some news to make you feel all warm and fuzzy about your world:
White babies around the country are receiving white clothing from white
people.
Thanks to the Aryan Baby Drive that operates from a Costa Mesa post
office box, white supremacists are showing their generosity in wonderful
ways. They even have a Web site that encourages others to give, give,
give.
Who says you never read any good news?
Just listen to these testimonials:
"The failing global economy hit our family pretty hard. At about the
same time, our toddler hit one of those amazing growth spurts and began
to outgrow everything we had. Unsure of when our next paycheck was
coming and not knowing what to do, the Aryan Baby Drive was right there
to help us ... Thanks. Anonymous."
Here's another thank-you, this one from "the Bostwick Family" in an
undisclosed community: "When I was carrying our third child, a good
friend of mine gave my name and address to the Aryan Baby Drive and
immediately she sent us more than enough to help prepare for our
baby.... Today Valkyrie is 11 months old, and we still receive care
packages for her. I feel good knowing that the things she sent came from
good clean Aryan families.... I have sent all of my children's clothing
to the ABD when they outgrow them (I have to hug the memories out of
them first)."
Almost enough to make you weep, isn't it? One can only imagine the
amount of love that could be sewn into clothing donated by white
supremacists.
The Web site for the Baby Drive doesn't contain any explicitly racist
philosophy. But it does include a link to the Aryan Nations site--and,
of course, you can't call yourself "Aryan" anything without telling the
world what you really stand for.
By e-mail I tried to reach the brains and heart of the Baby Drive
movement. I received an e-mail from someone who declined to be
interviewed but wrote, "I do not give you permission to print anything
about the ABD in any newspaper, not until I find out what you intend to
write, and please be exact."
After replying that I couldn't agree to that, this second e-mail
arrived:
"The Aryan Baby Drive Web site was created for the sole purpose of
enlightening the mass public to the unique, charitable project
undertaken. There are countless white families out there who could use a
helping hand, and that is what we are here for."
I wanted to ask how Aryan clothing differs from non-Aryan. Even more
puzzling to me is how the Baby Drive people know for sure that the
clothing comes from committed white supremacists. What if some minority
group member with a twisted sense of humor sent some booties or jammies?
Would an alarm go off at Baby Drive headquarters? Finally--and this is
almost too chilling to contemplate--what would happen if security were
breached and an Aryan baby actually slipped into clothing previously
worn by a non-Aryan?
The Baby Drive Web site has drawn the attention of the Simon Wiesenthal
Center in Los Angeles--and not because it wants to donate. The center
included the site on its latest CD-ROM spotlighting "hate" groups on the
Internet.
Abraham Cooper, the center's associate dean, concedes that the site is
at the more benign end of a spectrum that includes online recruitment of
suicide bombers, but that it was included on the 200 sites the center
monitors to reflect the total context of the white supremacist movement.
