MONTGOMERY, Alabama – The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) released yesterday its annual Year in Hate and Extremism report for 2022. The report added a dozen so-called “parental rights” groups as extremists but also cataloged a lengthy list of neo-Völkisch groups across the United States. The number rose from 32 in 2021 to 38 in 2022.
The SPLC wrote that “neo-Völkisch adherents base their spirituality on the survival of those descended from white Europeans and the preservation of what they claim are dead or dying cultures. Such individuals and groups use a variety of terms to describe their spirituality such as Odinism or Wotanism, but sometimes they co-opt other nonracist denominations such as heathenism, Asatru or paganism. Qualifiers like “Norse tradition,” “Germanic” or “proto-Germanic” are sometimes attached to those terms.”
They underscored that “These categorizations can be confusing, as no form of paganism is inherently bigoted.”
The report added that the Asatru Folk Assembly (AFA) was the largest of neo-Völkisch groups in the US accounting for the majority of identified groups on the SPLC list. The Asatru Folk Assembly (AFA) is a U.S.-based organization currently based in Brownsville, California that promotes and practices their own version of the religious and cultural traditions of Asatru.
The Asatru Folk Assembly places particular emphasis on the ancestral, ethnic, and folk aspects of Asatru. AFA adherents believe that the practice of Asatru is inherently tied to one’s genetic heritage and ethnicity. They promote the preservation and celebration of Northern European folk traditions.
The AFA has faced criticism for promoting white supremacist and racist ideologies. Some of its members have been involved in white nationalist activities, and the AFA has been accused of exclusionary and discriminatory practices based on ethnicity and race.
Many other Pagan, Heathen, and Asatru organizations as well as independent Asatruar strongly reject and condemn the AFA ideologies and emphasize inclusivity and diversity.
The AFA has been the subject of numerous investigations and documentaries, particularly after increased notoriety when building Baldrshof in Murdock, Minnesota in 2021.
The report highlighted the creation of the “Asatru Academy homeschool curriculum” in September 2022. “By the end of the 2022-23 school year, ordained clergyman — or Gothi — Rob Stamm, the headmaster of the Asatru Academy, stated that it would have grades K-3 ready for homeschooling curriculum with plans to develop a complete K-12 program. Additionally, head priest and leader — or Alsherjargothi — Matt Flavel also began airing a weekly podcast called “Victory Never Sleeps” to reach a wider audience, to promote AFA and its activities and to fundraise for another hof — Freyshof — tentatively planned for Ohio,” the report added.
The report noted the AFA’s building of a new hof in White Springs, Florida. Njörðshof will manage AFA affairs in Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, Oklahoma, Texas, and internationally in South Africa, and Argentina.
The report added that the AFA had finalized the purchase of the land in Tennessee to build, Sigrheim Hof to serve as AFA’s corporate headquarters.
The AFA was not the only neo-Völkisch group identified. The report listed groups in other parts of the country:
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- Dakota Prairie Asatru (North Dakota)
- Easter Tidings (New York)
- Hearth & Helm LLC (Indiana)
- The Black Sun Tribe Project (Minnesota)
- Wolves of Vinland (Virginia & South Carolina)
- Women for Aryan Unity (Wisconsin)
The groups all use a variety of runic or Pagan imagery as part of their identity. However, in reviewing them, their religious affiliations were not always clear.
Women for Aryan Unity (WAU), for example, was also among the groups listed. The organization is described by the Anti-Defamation League as promoting and supporting “women in the white supremacist movement, typically from a traditionalist vantage point, with content in its newsletters and websites focusing on “women’s” issues, such as raising children.” They also support incarcerated white supremacists that they deem to be “prisoners of war.” Outside the USA, the organization also has chapters in Argentina, Australia, Italy, and Spain.
The SPLC report also included a long list of white supremacist organizations that use imagery evoking Pagan themes. The organization Stormfront based in Florida has a logo using a Celtic cross surrounded by the words “white pride world wide.”
The Folkish Resistance Movement was also identified by the SPLC. The group also goes by the name Folks Front both terms connecting with neo-Völkisch terminology but apparently unrelated in religious ideology.
SPLC logo
The SPLC also documented a rise in antisemitism and groups opposing LGBTQ identities. It highlighted Moms for Liberty, a group founded in early 2021 by conservative women in Florida to fight COVID safety measures in schools, ban books, as well as school-based conversations about race, genders, and sexual orientations while also working to populate local school boards with individuals sharing their ideology. Rachel Carroll Rivas, deputy director for research, reporting, and analysis at the SPLC told NPR “They really are seeking to undermine public education holistically and to divide communities.”
The SPLC noted in its report that it has “documented 1,225 hate and antigovernment extremist groups across the United States. Extremist ideas that mobilize these groups now operate more openly in the political mainstream. But the ascent of the hard right is not inevitable. We can push back against this rising authoritarianism and turn the tide.”
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