Sympathy for the "Heretical Two"

Since its inception, more or less, The Hoover Hog has included among its marginal "heterodoxy and crimethink" links an obscure Dada-doused outpost of bizarrely assembled provocations called Heretical.com. It's a peculiar spot, where naked expressions of racism, misogyny and anti-Semitism commingle with genuinely interesting documents in an easter-egg-colored collage of irredeemably irresponsible performance satire. Upon entering, you encounter a kind of odd-knit directory of links where R. Crumb's id-channeling panels cheek up next to National Vanguard polemics, Wotanist pro-polygamy screeds, Spiegeleman-disapproved Holocaust comics, Cargo Cult exotica, anthropological pornography, 70s-era sexual decryptions, inconvenient Darwinism, inconvenient Lovecraftianism, coke-addled Freudiana, anti-television animadversions , suppressed sexology, and good old-fashioned anti-miscegenationist cut-ups. Stick around long enough and you discover the archive of columns by the site's co-curator, "Luke O'Farrell," a self-styled wise-guy who wallows in the worst of it and seems to have a sore spot for da Jews. As hate sites go, Heretical is sui generis. Good for a laugh, an indignant grunt, a befuddled wince, or another guilty click or two or ten. Depending on your mood. You get the idea soon enough and you forget all about it. Until you are reminded.

It turns out the site is administrated by a couple of British meshuganas named Simon Sheppard and Steve Whittle, alias Luke O'Farrell. They look like characters. Go ahead and hate on them, if that's your thing:

I'm sure you'll feel better knowing these mean-spirited weirdos are in jail. And in the United States, no less. California to be specific. By all accounts, they came to our freedom-loving shores seeking political asylum after a British court found them guilty of  "stirring up racial and religious hatred" (or something like that) for writing and publishing the wrong words about the wrong subjects in the wrong way and there you have it. They've been behind bars six months and counting, locked away in a Santa Ana cell, by order of the Department of Homeland Security, where their appeal for asylum is pending before an INS judge with hearings scheduled for select dates throughout March.    

If you're looking for a credible source to verify the grisly details, good luck finding one. I've scoured and scraped and have yet to locate a single fucking mention of this case in a reputable American news source. If the ACLU gives a shit, they're keeping it on the DL. You can read a series of snidely pitched articles in the Yorkshire Post, or you can sift through the editorial fumes provided by any number of dodgy dissident sources, such as Lady Renouf chatting it up with David Duke, or Mark Green writing for Rense.com. Or you can rely with the dense reportage leading the Heretical site. Go with your gut. Take it with a grain.  The plain reality appears to be that two nonviolent men are incarcerated in the land of the free for the content of their thoughts. And somehow it isn't newsworthy. I find this remarkable.

On March 12, the "Heretical Two" stood pro se in their first of several hearings before U.S Immigration Judge Rose Peters. The account posted on the Heretical site is the only one I can find:

Simon Sheppard and Steve Whittle (who were brought into court in handcuffs and leg irons, which, they confirmed, is standard procedure when asylum seekers are held in detention pending the hearing of their case, and not victimisation of themselves) presented their own cases, as their attorney, Bruce Leichty, had withdrawn from the case by leave of the Court, since he was not satisfied with the (substantial) retainer that he had received from friends of Simon and Steve. The U. S. government was represented by its attorney, Miss Myers. The Court heard evidence from Simon and Steve about their experiences at the hands of the British police and Crown Prosecution Service, and also from their English counsel, Adrian Davies, who gave evidence about the relevant provisions of English law (the Public Order Act 1986, as amended) and the English Court’s assertion of jurisdiction over web pages hosted on a server located in Torrance, California. The hearing was conducted in a very fair, courteous and thorough manner, though inevitably Simon and Steve were at some disadvantage, because they are not lawyers, and are moreover being held in prison, where they have had very limited facilities to prepare for the hearing. After a lengthy sitting, the Court adjourned to 1 p.m., West Coast time, on 24th March, when Simon and Steve will address the Court on their own behalf, and Miss Myers will make representations on behalf of the U. S. government. 

My bias is for individual freedom. Has been since I was a pup. I try not to get all sentimental about it, but free speech is one of those core issues that still raises my rankles. I think it's despicable that Max Hardcore is serving time for obscenity and I wish Ira Isaacs all the best. It should absolutely fucking concern civil (and uncivil) libertarians that the U.S. government is complicit in the persecution of these eccentric limey hatemongers. The edges aren't even blurry. No animals were harmed and no teenage innocents were brought to tears. Whittle and Sheppard are charged with publishing offensive words and images and no one should go to jail for that.

Lenny Bruce is dead and those Skokie Nazis are fading into textbook lore. Freedom of expression isn't a fashion signal. You can't wait around for the next typecast martyr. The feds aren't worried about Larry Flynt or Bill Maher, and your precious blog is probably safe for now. But these guys are in serious trouble for no good reason, and the silence is palpable. This is the genuine article and you aren't even paying attention.

If you can set aside your cynicism just long enough, why not write a letter to the ACLU? Just bring the matter to their attention. Contact information for their Southern California division is posted here. You might also consider sending a note to the Orange Couny Register, or the L.A. Times, since they would presumably have an interest in covering a major free speech case that's playing out on the home turf. Perhaps they discarded those other press releases for reasons of provenance, suspecting it was all an elaborate rightwing prank. Perhaps that's all it ever was. There must be some explanation. This is America, after all.

Memento mori.     

______________________

 

3/31/09 UPDATE: My thanks to several readers who referred me to this OC Weekly article, which, to my knowledge, is the first American semi-msm mention of the case to date. Snarky but fair:

Amongst the many wabs, a couple of chinitos, and I'm sure more than a couple of gabachos currently in custody at the Santa Ana Jail are British nationals Simon Sheppard and Stephen Whittle. They haven't committed any crime in the United States but have nevertheless languished under the watchful eye of SanTana immigration guards for almost two years in a fascinating case involving free speech, international jurisdiction, Holocaust denial, and an American media that just doesn't give a damn about those topics.

Sheppard runs The Heretical Press, an online repository of far-right essays, photos, and just plain bizarre entries (don't they realize R. Crumb is being satirical when he publishes a comic titled "When the Niggers Take Over America"?), to which Whittle contributes. According to British reports, authorities raided Sheppard's flat in 2004 after a copy of his Tales of the Holohoax were found inside a synagogue. After discovering the contents of The Heretical, they arrested Sheppard and Whittle for distributing hate speech online.

If that's not Orwellian enough for you, refry this: Sheppard and Whittle claimed that British courts had no jurisdiction over The Heretical and its materials since its servers hum along in Torrance. But the Brits don't care.

Prosecutors didn't agree with their excuse, and convicted the two in January for publishing racist material online--the first conviction of its kind in the history of the United Kingdom. "People in this country are entitled to be racist and they are entitled to hold unpleasant points of view, but what they are not entitled to do is publish or distribute written material which is insulting, threatening or abusive and is intended to stir up racial hatred or is likely to do so," a prosecutor told the Yorkshire Post. "If this sort of material is made generally available on the internet or by pushing it through people's doors indiscriminately, it is likely that racial hatred will be stirred up in some people who are exposed to it - the young, the impressionable, the gullible, and so on."

British courts had to convict Sheppard and Whittle in absentia, however. In July 2007, the two skipped bail and made their way to LAX, where they promptly turned themselves over to authorities and asked for political asylum, claiming the British government was harrassing them for their "satire." Immigration officials hauled them to the Santa Ana Jail, which has a contract to help out the government with immigrant detainees. Read their case for asylum here.

"This is a test case for the US on whether the American court will protect anti-semites and those that incite the hate that leads to anti-Jewish or anti-Muslim violence, or whether it respects a British court decision and sends these people back for sentence," a Parliament member told the Post.

The fates of the Heretical Two is in the hands of Immigration Judge Rose Collantes Peters, who has a past of thumbing her nose at British courts. In 2004, she went against the wishes of the American government and ruled that la migra couldn't deport Sean O'Cealleagh, a bartender at O'Malley's in Seal Beach, for having been convicted in England for his role in the murder of two British soldiers during a 1988 Irish Republican Army funeral. This past Tuesday, Peters heard final arguments in the case of the Heretical Two, with Sheppard and Whittle acting as their own attorneys because the attorney originally recommended to them by Mark Weber of the Holocaust-denying Newport Beach-based Institute for Historical Review  dropped out after not getting paid enough cash (according to The Heretical Press home page). Peters is expected to deliver her verdict within 30 days.

The saga of Sheppard and Whittle has drawn nary a press report in the United States, even though it involves all sorts of free-speech questions. But the Heretical Two have become far-right causé célebres, earning support from the aforementioned IHR, David Duke, and other types of trash.

Then again, supporters of the Heretical Two make this interesting point:

The question is not whether you like Sheppard and Whittle, or agree with their writings, or the other material posted on the Heretical site.  It is, quite simply, whether you are prepared to help ensure the effective representation of two men seeking to set a vital precedent for genuine asylum seekers from oppressive, liberticidal regimes, seeking refuge in the world's last true free speech zone.

The byline goes to Gustavo Arellano, who may or may not be a Hog habitué.

Meanwhile, the Yorkshire Post provides an update on the asylum proceedings, with additional coverage and linkage heading the Heretical site. Looks as though things may drag on for a while.

Memento mori.            

Comments

[Andy Nowicki]

If the ACLU doesn't give a damn, does Amnesty International at least have anything whatsoever to say? This is supposed to be their bread and butter, isn't it? "Prisoners of conscience," and all that?

[Chip Smith]

Andy,

Good point. Here is a link to contact information for Amnesty International:

http://www.amnesty.org/en/contact

I searched their site and couldn't find any mention of the case.

Meanwhile, over at the racialist-nationalist forum, "The Phora," the commenter "Lud" makes a legitimate point:

"Apparently they're applying for political asylum in the US while there are outstanding warrants for them in the land of their citizenship.

They're being held because they are non-resident aliens with outstanding criminal(?) warrants from an international jurisdiction. While those warrants themselves may be based on political content alone, that's not the fault of the US. Note the piece does not mention any type of bail like hearing or decision. Bail or release on recognizance might have been offered but they were unwilling or unable to pay.

Let due process take its course. Then you'll see if the US legitimizes the British posiiton."

For what it's worth, the account provided on the Heretical site does mention "a bail like hearing or decision," to wit:

"The judge claimed that she did not have the power to release the Heretical Two under the defensive procedures adopted by the US authorities. The ‘asylum-only proceedings’ for the Heretical Two was heard by immigration judge, Rose Peters, on October 14. An attempt to get them released before the ruling on asylum was denied by the judge, whose reasoning appeared contradictory."

It would be interesting to know more about the judge's reasoning in this instance in order to determine whether it was indeed "contradictory." That's precisely the sort of information that might be reported in greater detail if anyone were doing any reporting on this case at all. But they're not, and that's half my point.

My view, based on what I understand of the facts, is that neither of the men who were tried in the "land of their citizenship" did anything to warrant being tried at all. I'm sure there are procedural points to complicate the story, but I'm not a lawyer and I don't much care. If the same thing were happening to any renowned writer, public arguments would center on first principles, and Amnesty International would be there to rattle the cages.

[MRDA]

C'mon - are you seriously surprised?

[Chip Smith]

MRDA,

Honestly? A little. Makes me wonder what else we're missing. Any ideas?

[MRDA]

Don't know what we're missing...

...but it's obvious that the so-called "Free World" misses the concept of that auto-appellation.

[Tor H Tor]

The ACLU cares not for any case that isn’t Skippy Goebbels approved and the mass-media news IS Skippy Goebbels, regardless of whichever ‘symbols’ they may pay homage to.

[Chip Smith]

Over at the "afcore" forum, someone called "ljp" writes:

"Now I've looked at that site in question (Heretical.com) and it's quite appalling! If this is 'art', stuff like that was done better in EXIT magazine. About the only stuff I can stand reading is Simon Shepperd's tales of working in the British music industry in the 70s and 80s (which has always interested me regardless...)

Anyways I'm torn between standing up for the right to be stupid bigots (if that's what they want), or just standing back thinking those two clowns got what they deserved anyways..."

The question of whether Heretical.com is art is interesting to me. I suppose that my description could be read to imply as much, and in truth I'm fond of Catherine Breillat's assertion that merely asking is enough. I'm familiar with EXIT and George Petros' boundary-flouting swastika-laden sex-violent collage MO. I think it's boring, and certainly well removed removed from Adam Parfey's concept of "aesthetic terrorism," which is the ostensible frame of comparison. AT is all but defined by a volatile combination of incendiary intent and outsider-sincerity, something which is lacking in Petros' calculated artworld gestures, however they're decorated. But with Sheppard and Whittle, the question seems open at the edges. Their gallery is too weird and meticulous to dismiss, too weird and hateful to believe, too weird and polemically ugly to be boring. Could be art. Of the unpretty kind. Does sincere hatred preclude the possibility? Is irony sacred? Who makes these rules?

Not that it should matter. It shouldn't matter. John Hinckley wrote poems where the turmoil and rage bled through. That wasn't his crime. This stuff isn't complicated. Not to me. Life is short, and freedom is exhilarating.

[ljp]

Well this is ljp from the afcore forum. Thank you for printing my comments. Your views of both Heretical and EXIT are quite interesting, and I do think you might have a point there. Funny enough I have returned to Heretical repeatedly, if only in the way of gawking at a car wreck. Yes I have come to the conclusion that Shepperd is indeed being wrongly prosecuted, however...

It's still interesting to read about Shepperd's involvement in the music industry. It's kinda hard to believe someone involved with music would turn to extreme politics as (of course) Ian Stewart Donaldson had...

[Savrola]

ljp, I would interested to hear your particular rationale for that final statement.

[ljp]

Just what Chip said. Maybe I still sound ambivalent about it, but people do have a right to free speech.

[icr]

This is hardly a surprise given the US Gov treatment of Germar Rudolph and Ernst Zundel.

[icr]

"Just what Chip said. Maybe I still sound ambivalent about it, but people do have a right to free speech."

Hell, I'm even in favor of the rights of free speech and assembly of the sixty or so black psychos who demonstrated in celebration of the murder of the four Oakland cops

[davidk]

Does the nom de outrage Biseor and his old website Biseor's Dreams set the handbells chiming? He keeps a low profile these days but in other times the uni libertarians The Friends Society nee The Fuck Society tussled with him over a series of provocative flash cartoons in which he personified himself as a Batmanlike moral avenger (underage male sidekick in tow) who, in one way or another, incinerates black leadership ( jackson, Sharpton mainly), Tom Cruise and Rob Reiner because AIDS isn't killing them fast enough and several crack houses. I watch his cartoons with a horrible relish, reminding myself that Biseor's non-ironic hateful speech is entitled to the same legal and constitutional protection as Bret Easton Ellis, Dennis Cooper and Robert Mapplethorpe.

I'm startled that this story is so far below the media radar. Once upon a time, 60 Minutes would have done a segment on the jailed Brits. Nat Hentoff would have given the story the time it deserves. Where's the coverage Kenneth?

[who+dares+wings]

This is old news. The OC Register article by syndicated columnist Gustavo Arellano ("Ask A Mexican" ) was followed by another in the LA Weekly before the "Heretical Two" were deported back to the EU where they
were sentenced in Leeds to jail terms they are now serving. Hoover Hog was right when he said there was a deafening silence about this case in the American MSM. There was nothing except the two articles that came at the tail end of their pre-lost battle for political asylum in the US.

The current addresses for these "prisoners of conscience" which no human rights org in the world will touch with a ten foot barge pole (Amnesty International considers Holocaust skepticism and relativism a hate crime) are:

Stephen Whittle (“Heretical Two” US Asylum Seeker)
#A8041AA)
Everthorpe Prison
Beck Road
Everthorpe Brough
East Yorkshire HU15 1RB
UNITED KINGDOM

Simon Sheppard (“Heretical Two” US asylum seeker)
#X0106
HMP Wolds
Brough,
East Yorkshire HU15 2JZ
England

Both are avid readers (Whittle reads French) and welcome correspondence, books and magazines from anyone who cares to contact them.