In November of last year I noted a story concerning a leaked membership list* for the British National Party, a whites-only far-right (some would say pseudo-fascist) political party in the UK. The list revealed some members identifying themselves as Witches, and in one instance as Pagan clergy, which prompted the Pagan Federation to issue a press release that this person is in no way affiliated with them. Since that story first ran, the BNP have had a run of good luck, exploiting a political melt-down in the Labour party to win two seats in the European Parliament, and an English county council seat for the first time. But while the BNP is trying to present a more civilized (and mainstreamed) face to the public, a recent undercover expose of last weekend’s BNP Red White and Blue festival (a “family” event full of “nice” people) showed something quite different.

“Saturday night was the climax of the festival – and when the vileness reached its peak. Firstly, around 50 skinheads took part in a PAGAN ceremony to summon occult powers for their cause. They chanted incantations as they passed around and drank from an animal horn filled with mead. Two hours later, local council candidates John Coombes, of Maidenhead, Berks, and Dick Hamilton of Marlow, Bucks, were sitting with others around a brazier. Hamilton’s ghettoblaster blared out songs supporting Hitler and attacking “ni**ers”.”

Sounds very family friendly, doesn’t it? Other highlights include throwing wet sponges at a man in an Obama mask locked in a stockade, and burning a “golliwogg” (essentially a black-face doll) for the crime of being black. The reporter goes on to list several other instances of racism and thuggery that party leadership either took part in, or turned a blind eye towards.

As for the “pagan” ceremony, since the reporter didn’t go into specifics we have no way of knowing what (if any) tradition these skinheads adhere to, or if it was simply a ritualized racist pep-rally. What is increasingly certain is that the core of the BNP is simply a political front for a motley assortment of racists, aging National Fronters, and outright Nazis, who happened to luck into chaotic political landscape (rife with economic uncertainty and tensions over immigration) and gain a small taste of power. While this sort of “blood and soil” politics may charm some Pagans who hold romantic ideas of their “British-ness”, we must remember that romanticism is often exploited by fascists, pseudo-fascists, and other authoritarians for their own political ends, often leading down violent and ugly roads. The BNP doesn’t care about the British people, it cares about the ever-shifting “other” (blacks, immigrants, Indians, Jews, etc) they can place under their boot-heel in order to feel powerful.

* Concerning the membership leak, two have been charged, and in a case of delicious irony, the BNP had to complain under the Human Rights Act, which they vehemently oppose, in order to stop the list from being published.

Since I first mentioned the leaked membership list (which included some Pagans) of the far-right British National Party, the press in England have tried to put the 12,801 names into perspective.

“Your first instinct, naturally, is to check if you know anyone. I didn’t, as far as I could see: no one in the small Middlesex village where I grew up (though four in Pinner, where I was born), and only three in the district of west London where I now live. Colleagues have pored in amazement over the records for their home towns.”

Jon Henley’s editorial for The Guardian also touches on the fact that Pagans were/are a part of the whites-only extremist party. He first notices that BNP leaders (much like mainstream political leaders) were worried that Pagan membership would make them look bad (“Member describes himself as witch: potential embarrassment if active”), and that an alleged “Pagan prison chaplain” was among their number. This has, in turn, sparked an immediate press release from the Pagan Federation stating that none of their chaplains are BNP members.

“We are not aware of any British National Party members serving in the Pagan Federation Prison Ministry. All Pagan chaplains are subject to counter-terrorist clearance (CTC) by the Home Office. This includes in-depth checks about associations and memberships or affiliations with activist groups. The British National Party is one group that no Prison Service worker is allowed to be a member of … Should it subsequently come to light that any potential or current Pagan prison chaplain has made a false statement about such memberships, I would take immediate action in removing that individual from the Pagan Federation Prison Ministry … The claim being made on a widely circulating list that an individual named on that list is a Pagan prison chaplain is false.”

For more Pagan reactions to the BNP leak check out the Pagan Network message boards. I find it interesting how prison chaplaincy for Pagans is so centralized within the Pagan Federation. It certainly allowed for a quick response to allegations of BNP Pagan chaplains. I can only imagine the havoc that would ensue among the Pagan community in America should a similar list surface here.

While some harbor the notion that Pagans are all leftist anarchists, modern Paganism is actually quite politically flexible, as a story about a BNP member-list leak proves.

“Police, teachers, paratroopers, guards, royal marines, district nurses, librarians and clergymen are among the 12,000 or so members of the British National Party whose details have been revealed in an internet blog by a disgruntled former employee of the party. And it is to the police that the BNP has turned to carry out a full investigation into the matter … The list, which included home addresses, telephone numbers, employment details and hobbies (including steam railways, line-dancing, paganism and witchcraft), has been removed from the original blog but is available on other websites.”

The reason the British National Party is so upset is that members of this whites-only, far-right political party are considered little better than Union Jack wearing fascists (a position held by both the mainstream right and left in England). In fact, they are so notoriously racist that police, prison workers, and other civil service staff aren’t allowed to be members. So for those worried about a leftist hegemony in modern Paganism, fear not! Anyone can be a Pagan, even psuedo-fascist morons.