Could you provide some sort of source or citation for this? The Southern Poverty Law Center, Anti-Defamation League, and FBI all seem to consider them extremist.
the ADL also thinks a cartoon frog is a hate symbol, they are not a serious organization.
plenty has been written about the problems with the SPLC. as for the FBI? that story has a lot to do with framing,
“In that briefing there was a slide that talked about the Proud Boys,” Cannon said.
The slide was intended to characterize the potential for violence from individual members of the Proud Boys, according to Cannon, and not to address the group as a whole.
“There have been instances where self-identified Proud Boys have been violent,” he said. “We do not intend and we do not designate groups, especially broad national groups, as extremists.”
generally speaking i tend to assume that feds have and always have keep a close watch on pretty much any sizeable right-leaning organization, most especially ones that are frequently involved in street violence with other organizations. maybe this is the legacy of ruby ridge and timothy mcveigh, maybe it just looks good on a quarterly review.
but even aside from that you can find plenty of accounts over the years from BLM and occupy activists about being surveilled. how many of these are credible? it is hard to say. we do know that there has been a large injection of funds for the purpose of increased surveillance following months of blm related riots
personally i believe the fbi that went after the black panthers and mlk is not materially different from the fbi of today and should be treated with heavy skepticism no matter what your political leanings.
first we need to establish an operable definition of what is considered 'extreme'.
were those of us who participated in the occupy movement extremists? many of the people involved had very strong anti government leanings, there were regular clashes with law enforcement, activists were subjected to surveillance efforts. is greenpeace extremist? what about animal rights activists? both have certainly engaged in far more concerted, adversarial and questionably legal efforts for their causes than a bunch of cringey and belligerent migapedes who offend the cultural sensibilities of coastal bloggers.
this becomes a problem as well, proud boys have been involved in violence... against other groups who were also actively seeking to enforce street violence. is this the result of a concerted campaign or does a group founded around crudity and bravado attract absolute knuckledragging choads who are likely to get into fistfights?
