Gavin McInnes, founder of the Proud Boys — what he would prefer to be described as a “pro-western fraternal organization” — is adamant that his stable of “western chauvinists” aren’t bigots.
McInnes is the premier salesman of the “either-Nazi-or-not” narrative; it’s his primary defense against critics of his organization. The reality, however, is much more complex for the Proud Boys and their notably slipshod vetting procedures and porous boundaries.
A cursory glance at the rosters of a few of the Proud Boys most established chapters raises questions about whether current and former members whose affiliations completely contradict McInnes’s ‘either-or’ binary are the product of honest or willful ignorance.
McInnes denies any connection between his group and the far right, dismissing the fact that they show up to the same events, take fashion cues from each other, read the same books, sympathize with each other’s viewpoints — including, at times, anti-Semitism — and joust in the shadows of the same windmills.
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