The Heritage Front was a Canadian neo-Nazi

white supremacist White supremacy or white supremacism is the belief that white people are superior to those of other races and thus should dominate them. The belief favors the maintenance and defense of any power and privilege held by white people. White s ...

organization founded in 1989 and disbanded around 2005. The Heritage Front maintained a telephone message line with a different editorial each day. The voice on the hotline was Gary Schipper. The line resulted in complaints to the

Canadian Human Rights Commission The Canadian Human Rights Commission (CHRC) was established in 1977 by the government of Canada. It is empowered under the ''Canadian Human Rights Act'' to investigate and to try to settle complaints of discrimination in employment and in the pr ...

and hearings into allegations that the group violated Canada's hate crime laws. The group organized a series of white power rock concerts in

Toronto Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Ontario. With a recorded population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the most populous city in Canada and the fourth most populous city in North America. The city is the anch ...

and elsewhere. Immediately after one of these concerts, a Tamil man, Sivarajah Vinasithamby, 41, returning home from work was beaten and partially paralyzed by several

white power skinhead White power skinheads, also known as racist skinheads and neo-Nazi skinheads, are members of a neo-Nazi, white supremacist and antisemitic offshoot of the skinhead subculture. Many of them are affiliated with white nationalist organizations and ...

s who had just left the concert.

History

The Heritage Front was founded in 1989 by former Nationalist Party of Canada members Wolfgang Droege, Gerry Lincoln,

Grant Bristow Grant Bristow (born February 1958 in Winnipeg, Manitoba) was an undercover spy, or mole, for the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS), who co-founded and successfully infiltrated the Heritage Front white supremacist group for six years. S ...

(a plant working for the

Canadian Security Intelligence Service The Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS, ; french: Service canadien du renseignement de sécurité, ''SCRS'') is Canada's primary national intelligence agency. It is responsible for collecting, analysing, reporting and disseminating int ...

(CSIS)) and James Scott Dawson. They were joined by

Al Overfield Alan Overfield was born a First Nations person on Manitoulin Island and is considered to have been a Canadian white supremacist. He was a founding member of the Edmund Burke Society, established by Paul Fromm, Don Andrews, and Leigh Smith. He was ...

and other former members of the Nationalist Party who had become disenchanted with Don Andrews's leadership and felt that a new organization and tactics were necessary. The idea for the new group was developed in early September 1989 when a delegation of 18 Canadian far right activists were visiting

Libya Libya (; ar, ليبيا, Lībiyā), officially the State of Libya ( ar, دولة ليبيا, Dawlat Lībiyā), is a country in the Maghreb region in North Africa. It is bordered by the Mediterranean Sea to the north, Egypt to the east, Suda ...

at the invitation of Muammar al-Gaddafi, who was celebrating the twentieth anniversary of his regime. The Heritage Front formed an alliance with the Church of the Creator and its Canadian leader

George Burdi George Burdi, also known as George Eric Hawthorne (born 1970), is a Canadian musician, publisher, traditionalist, mysticist, and a white power musician who became known for his role in white nationalist organizations. He led the Canadian branc ...

. Other prominent figures in the Canadian far right, such as Paul Fromm and

Ernst Zündel Ernst Christof Friedrich Zündel (; 24 April 1939 – 5 August 2017) was a German neo-Nazi publisher and pamphleteer of Holocaust denial literature.

, worked with the Heritage Front but did not join the organization. In 1992, the Heritage Front illegally brought prominent American

neo-Nazis Neo-Nazism comprises the post–World War II militant, social, and political movements that seek to revive and reinstate Nazi ideology. Neo-Nazis employ their ideology to promote hatred and racial supremacy (often white supremacy), attack ...

Tom Metzger Thomas Linton Metzger (April 9, 1938 – November 4, 2020) was an American white supremacist, neo-Nazi skinhead leader and Klansman. He founded White Aryan Resistance (WAR), a neo-nazi organization, in 1983. He was a Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux ...

and his son John Metzger to Canada to speak, and provided security at a speech by

Holocaust denier Holocaust denial is an antisemitic conspiracy theory that falsely asserts that the Nazi genocide of Jews, known as the Holocaust, is a myth, fabrication, or exaggeration. Holocaust deniers make one or more of the following false statements: * ...

David Irving David John Cawdell Irving (born 24 March 1938) is an English author and Holocaust denier who has written on the military and political history of World War II, with a focus on Nazi Germany. His works include '' The Destruction of Dresden'' (1 ...

. Droege retired in 1995, following legal troubles, and handed leadership over to Marc Lemire. Under Lemire's leadership, the membership of the group declined rapidly, and by 2005 it existed in name only. Now it is defunct. The activities of the Heritage Front led to the formation of an

Anti-Racist Action Anti-Racist Action (ARA), also known as the Anti-Racist Action Network, is a decentralized network of militant far-left political cells in the United States and Canada. The ARA network originated in the late 1980s to engage in direct action (inc ...

(ARA) branch in Toronto, which engaged in a series of demonstrations and confrontations with the Heritage Front, culminating in 1993 with a riot on

Parliament Hill Parliament Hill (french: Colline du Parlement, colloquially known as The Hill, is an area of Crown land on the southern banks of the Ottawa River in downtown Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. Its Gothic revival suite of buildings, and their archit ...

between members of ARA and the Heritage Front after a concert by

's rock band RaHoWa. Four Heritage Front members, including Burdi, were arrested and charged with assault. Burdi was sentenced to a year in prison for aggravated assault, and later dropped out of the movement and renounced racism. A month after the clash in Ottawa, ARA held a militant demonstration outside the Toronto home of Gary Schipper, which resulted in damage to the property. Droege and other members of the Heritage Front responded that evening by attacking members of ARA outside of

Sneaky Dee's Sneaky Dee's is a concert venue and Tex-Mex restaurant in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Originally opened in 1987 on the north west corner of Bloor Street and Bathurst, it moved to its present location at College and Bathurst in 1990. History 562 B ...

, a known ARA hangout, resulting in Droege and other Heritage Front members being charged with assault. In 1995, Droege was convicted of the assault and sentenced to five months in prison. He also spent time in jail for contempt of court and other violations relating to the Canadian Human Rights Commission tribunal.

, a

mole Mole (or Molé) may refer to: Animals * Mole (animal) or "true mole", mammals in the family Talpidae, found in Eurasia and North America * Golden moles, southern African mammals in the family Chrysochloridae, similar to but unrelated to Talpida ...

for the

(CSIS), infiltrated the group and became one of its leaders. According to the CSIS and Bristow, their aim was to gather intelligence on the far right and to suppress its violent activity. Bristow's role in the group was made public in 1994 by the ''

Toronto Sun The ''Toronto Sun'' is an English-language tabloid format, tabloid newspaper published daily in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The newspaper is one of several ''Sun'' tabloids published by Postmedia Network. The newspaper's offices is located at Pos ...

'', and became the subject of an inquiry by the

Security Intelligence Review Committee The Security Intelligence Review Committee (SIRC; french: Comité de surveillance des activités de renseignement de sécurité) was a committee of Privy Councillors that was empowered to serve as an independent oversight and review body for the o ...

, which published a report on the matter in that same year.

References

External links

The Heritage Front Affair
-From The Nizkor Project {{Neo-Nazism 1989 establishments in Canada Neo-Nazi organizations Neo-Nazism in Canada Organizations established in 1989 Organizations disestablished in 2005 2005 disestablishments in Canada

History

See also

References

Further reading

Archival holdings

External links