It’s possible that I shall make an ass of myself. But in that case one can always get out of it with a little dialectic. I have, of course, so worded my proposition as to be right either way (K.Marx, Letter to F.Engels on the Indian Mutiny)
(RNS) — Outside the small Texas town of Elsa, a sheet metal fence too tall to see over surrounds a few acres of prime Rio Grande Valley land. In front of the compound’s drab, gray gate, bright orange letters spell out “Nature’s Resort.” The gate opens to reveal a seemingly ordinary community. RVs and small homes line the roads, péntaque and pickleball courts offer residents recreational spaces, and the front office acts as the community’s nucleus.
Nothing looks amiss, except that is, for what’s missing — namely, clothing.
Misty Katz, part owner of Nature’s Resort, finds comfort in shunning clothes. Growing up in South Africa, she was scolded by her parents for undressing in public when her clothes got dirty. She didn’t take those lessons too seriously. More than half a century later, she lives at a nudist (or naturist) resort in South Texas and doesn’t worry about dirty clothes anymore.
For as long as Katz has been a nudist, she has also been a Christian.
Public nudity may seem antithetical to the modesty often promoted by churches, but to Katz, the two go hand in hand. “Believe it or not, we are modest,” Katz says. “Modesty doesn’t mean you have to cover everything up. We don’t display our wares, we’re not adorning various parts of our bodies in a way that’s going to attract attention.
Her idea of modesty echoes Pope John Paul II’s 1981 book “Love and Responsibility,” in which he writes “nakedness itself is not immodest.” He goes on to explain that immodesty presents itself only when nakedness serves to sexually arouse.
Bill and Misty Katz woodwork in the nude at their home in Elsa, Texas, on March 16, 2022. Photo by Jeremy Lindenfeld
At Nature’s Resort, public nudity is not sexual. “The initial conception is that this is a sexual thing,” Katz says. “People think we’re all out on the front lawn having sex with each other, swapping partners. In fact, if there is any overt sexuality, you see that gate open real fast and somebody is ushered out.”
Some Christian critics of nudism, including Mary Lowman of The Christian Working Woman, see the lifestyle as an affront to God. On her website’s page The Christian Dress Code, Lowman claims “God’s dress code from the beginning has been to cover our nakedness.”
Even still, nudism attracts unlikely allies. Some nondenominational, hard-line conservative clergy accept nudism. Pastor Ron Smith, of McAllen’s Church of the King, vehemently opposes homosexuality, abortion and the transgender community, but when it comes to nudism, his strident views loosen up.
“I think it’s odd, I think it’s strange, but I have no proof it’s sinning,” Smith said. “We have a retired couple that sit in the front row every Sunday that live at a nudist camp. I believe they’re dedicated Christians.”
Because the Bible doesn’t explicitly forbid nudism, Smith says he cannot condemn those who practice it. In fact, the Bible condones nudism on several occasions: “Adam and Eve were in the garden talking to God every day. They were nude,” Katz says. “When David had his big victory in battle, he went dancing in the streets naked to praise God. So, that must be OK in God’s eyes.”
Pastor Ron Smith at Church of the King in McAllen, Texas, on March 17, 2022. Photo by Jeremy Lindenfeld
Katz isn’t the only Christian at Nature’s Resort. Chip and Daisy are a married couple who requested to exclude their last names so friends and family don’t learn of their nudism. They, like most everyone at Nature’s Resort, are winter Texans, retirees spending their summers up north and coming down to the Rio Grande Valley when temperatures start to drop.
Chip, a Black man, is also one of the only residents of color out of the up to 250 people in the community. Like Katz, Chip and Daisy find nudism fits neatly into their Christianity and see it enhancing their religious lives. “In a nudist environment, the true Christian belief of valuing others and not judging others is accentuated,” Daisy says. “Here, you don’t judge someone for what they look like or what they wear.”
“It’s one thing to be with Christians in a building,” Chip says. “It’s another thing to be with Christians who are nudists. There’s a deeper connectivity.”
Though Nature’s Resort is not explicitly religious, it is affiliated with the American Association for Nude Recreation, an organization with deep Christian roots. AANR, once named the American Sunbathing Association, and the American League for Physical Culture before that, was led by Ilsley Boone in the 1930s.
Misty Katz stands at the front desk of Nature’s Resort in Elsa, Texas. Photo by Jeremy Lindenfeld
Boone was a Dutch Reformed minister and a driving force behind popularizing Christian naturism in the U.S., where he preached a religiously enriching nudism. Christian naturism, popular in the early 20th century, continues to find success in the digital age on online forums.
And though Nature’s Resort’s particular brand of nudism is not the Christian variety, some of its members have found the lifestyle deeply spiritual.
“I think it’s far easier being a Christian nudist than being a Christian nonnudist,” Katz says. “That’s because as a Christian, you’ve got to love everybody. And as a nudist, you do love everybody.”
Saturday, August 12, 2023
‘A lack of respect’: Catalonian nudists campaign against clothed tourists
Ashifa Kassam in Madrid Updated Fri, 11 August 202 Photograph: Prisma by Dukas Presseagentur GmbH/Alamy
It was on a sun-kissed stretch of beach in Catalonia that Segimon Rovira began to feel self-conscious. For as long as the 56-year-old could remember, the area’s turquoise waters had primarily been frequented by nudists. Now, he was painfully aware of being surrounded by sunbathers – in their swimsuits.
“Before, people would arrive at a nude beach and either leave or strip down,” said Rovira. “Now they stay and keep their swimsuit on. But what they don’t realise is that if there are a lot of them, they end up making us uncomfortable. It’s a lack of respect.”
Now Rovira and other naturists in Catalonia are fighting back, with a campaign aimed at protecting the decades-long tradition associated with 50 or so of the region’s beaches.
“Nudism is not banned in Spain, you can do it on any beach,” said Rovira, who leads the Naturist-Nudist Federation of Catalonia. “But so as not to bother people, we prefer to go to beaches that have traditionally been nudist and where most people are naked. We want people to respect this.”
Recently the association sent a letter to the Catalan government asking for a meeting to address what it described as “the discrimination that nudists face on the beaches of Catalonia”. The collective has already starting mulling potential requests, from beefed-up signage for nude beaches to a public awareness campaign that could help foster respect for naturism. They have yet to receive a response.
At the heart of what the local media call the “textile invasion” is the boom in tourism and explosion of social media. As an ever-growing trove of blogs and travel guides vie to lead sun-seekers off the beaten path, they’ve highlighted the region’s most pristine and hidden beaches, often leaving out their longstanding ties to nudism.
Other times beachgoers themselves have chosen to overlook these ties, traipsing past the signs that read “nudist beach” in order to secure a spot on the golden sands. “We’ve lost a bit of civility,” said Rovira.
The result threatens to steadily erode naturism. “There are nudists who have stopped going to some beaches because they are too crowded and there are too many people wearing swimsuits and they feel uncomfortable,” he said.
Others have chosen to remain clothed, dissuaded by the throngs of smartphone-wielding visitors eager to share the beautiful backdrop with their online followers, said Rovira. “People that are naked don’t want to end up with their photos on social media.”
Some nudists have persevered, only to find themselves the focus of giggles, prolonged stares and, at times, disparaging remarks. “Unfortunately the women are usually more stared at or harassed,” said Rovira. “So they are discriminated against twice over; for being nudists and for being women.”
The hope is that the campaign will help ensure that certain beaches remain safe spaces for naturists and help to keep the tradition going. “Starting to practise naturism when you’re surrounded by people in clothing is very complicated,” said Rovira. “That’s why we think it’s important to have nudist spaces where the majority of people are nude so that people are encouraged to try it.”
The message is at the crux of a video, recently published by his association, that depicts two tourists who stumble across a nudist beach and soon go from gawking to stripping down.
The video seeks to capture the pair’s journey as they come to embrace all that enthusiasts say nudism offers. “We do it for the feeling of freedom,” said Rovira. “There’s no comparison between swimming in the nude and in swimwear. You’re more free, more calm and relaxed.”
Monday, January 20, 2020
Bored with Sunday Service? Maybe Nudist Church Is Your Thing Or even mass from the comfort of your driver's seat. No matter your lifestyle, there’s a way for you to convene with God in America. AMERICAN PROTESTANTISM IS A HOME GROWN RELIGION WITH NO LINK TO EUROPEAN CHRISTIANITY AND IT IS BASED ON THE BARNUM AND BAILEY AMERICANISM; THERE IS A SUCKER BORN EVERY MINUTE PHOTOGRAPH: CYRIL ABAD Visitors take a photo with an actor dressed as Jesus at the Holy Land Experience in Orlando, Florida.
A nudist church in Virginia where the pastor delivers sermons in his birthday suit. A drive-in church in Florida where parishioners can attend services from the comfort of their cars. A 500-foot-long, “Biblically accurate” reconstruction of Noah’s Ark in Kentucky. These wild and woolly corners of American Christianity are the focal points of French photographer Cyril Abad’s series In God We Trust.
While some two-thirds of Americans describe themselves as Christians, a declining number identify with any specific sect. In 2000, half of Americans belonged to a Protestant denomination; today, that number is down to 30 percent. Many of the rest—one in six Americans—consider themselves nondenominational. These unaffiliated worshippers are the ones targeted by the proliferating number of alternative churches and Christian recreational sites captured by Abad.
“Churches have adopted free-market principles to open up new niches in spiritual beliefs,” Abad says. “If you’re a surfer, there’s a church for Christian surfers. If you’re a biker, there’s a church for bikers. I’m less interested in big megachurches and more interested in these small churches designed to appeal to specific tribes.”
Abad sees these churches as a distinctly American phenomenon; there is no comparable phenomenon in France, he says. He spent almost a year researching churches and Christian-themed attractions all over America before settling on the seven included in the series, which he visited over the course of three visits to the US in 2017 and 2018. The most difficult to get permission to photograph was the Virginia nudist church; to make the parishioners more comfortable, Abad took off his own clothes while taking the photographs.
The series can certainly be funny, particularly the images of the Holy Land Experience in Orlando, a Biblical amusement park featuring a re-creation of ancient Jerusalem and daily reenactments of Jesus’s crucifixion. But Abad insists he doesn’t intend to ridicule the people who visit such attractions. “That’s why I don’t show people crying in the Holy Land Experience—I always show them from the back,” he says.
For Abad, the photographs are part of a longstanding interest in the sociology of religion. “I want people to be amused, but after that to be challenged and start asking deeper questions,” he says. Mocking is easy. Empathy—and understanding—are the hard part.
From lakes to saunas and parks: Is Germany's nudist culture, known as FKK, dying out or still making waves? It's still strong enough to inspire a change of attitude for Berlin-based expats.
NAKED FACTS: GERMANY'S NUDISM MOVEMENT A 'free body': Germany's nudist culture It's a part of German culture, just like techno music and "Spargelzeit," the asparagus season. Even though the practice of Freikörperkultur (FKK), which translates as "free body culture," is dwindling among the younger generations of Germans, you'll still find lots of FKK areas on beaches as well as nude culture enthusiasts in spas — and even parks. 1234567891011
At first glance it seems like a regular beach scene: Children running in and out the water, sandwiches being passed around families and couples sunning themselves.
But on closer inspection most people at Krumme Lanke, a lake in the south west of Berlin have something in common.
They aren't wearing a scrap of clothing. And it's a non-event. No one cares and no one is surprised. There's nothing sexy about it. It's 25C; it's a very hot spring day and there's really no need for clothing if you don't feel like wearing it.
Three letters allowing everyone to get naked: FKK
Germany has a tolerance of and, in some cases, a fondness for being "textile free." Whether it's one of the country's hundreds of spas and wellness resorts, parks or lakes, many citizens here are known for having no qualms about taking their clothes off.
In certain parts of Germany, this is still a normal scene today
This is the country of FKK — Freikörperkultur — an informal movement that translates to free body culture.
But with bans on public nudity and the popularity of naked swimming in decline in Germany, advocates of nudist culture fear FKK is on its way out.
A declining tradition?
East Berlin-born Gregor Gysi, president of the European Left, spoke out last year on the decline of FKK and called for more designated areas for nudists.
Gregor Gysi, a key politician of The Left party, at the opening of a photo exhibition in 2017
The politician said that according to a sex researcher it was the "pornographic gaze" of Westerners after reunification in Germany that destroyed the pleasure of nude bathing that had always been more widespread in East Germany.
"It think it's a pity because FKK has class," says Gysi, 70. An expat's perspective
Back at the lake a cyclist has just arrived, peeled off his bodysuit to reveal bare skin and jumped into the water. I'm not surprised at all the bums on show but it's taken some time to become accustomed to this laid-back attitude to nudity.
Why? Because I'm from Scotland, and, like other parts of the UK, there isn't the same attitude towards stripping off. To put it bluntly, if you take your clothes off in public you'd probably be accused of being a pervert. It's just not that common.
For Scotland the reluctance to go nude could be blamed on year-round terrible weather, but it's also something deeper. The British attitude to bare skin differs hugely from the continent. We're not used to seeing naked bodies unless they are highly sexualized in advertisements, music videos or porn.
So "normal" nudity in saunas or beaches can make expats giggle or feel embarrassed.
Put your cameras away: FKK beaches are not for Instagram
"In Anglo culture, people tend to have a very different relationship to the body, says Annegret Staiger, associate professor of anthropology at Clarkson University in Potsdam, New York. "Where as if you go to Germany, Bulgaria, France, Austria… it's a different story.
"In the US people are scandalized about skin and at the same time make such a hype about showing it," adds Staiger, who grew up in Stuttgart, Baden-Württemberg, before leaving to study in the US in 1987. A counterweight to sexualized nudity
For me, the thought of baring all in public was unimaginable until I visited Berlin to take part in a journalism fellowship in 2015. Along with learning the language I was trying to embrace German culture — and quickly found out that FKK and not wearing any clothes in spa environments was part of that.
You don't need a bathing suit to feel the heat in a sauna
It took a lot of courage but I did it. After years of feeling uncomfortable in my skin, feeling that my body was ugly or something to be hidden away, it felt empowering to lie on the wooden slats of the sauna, with the heat prickling across my skin.
I found the attitude to nudity in Germany refreshing.
I had battled body confidence issues for years and embarked on numerous diets as I struggled with my changing body shape after puberty. But here people of all shapes and sizes could take their clothes off and feel comfortable.
It was such a different concept compared to what I'd grown up with. Taking your clothes off isn't necessarily a sexual thing and it's not about looking good.
Politician Gysi agrees, saying nudism "isn't really erotic." "I see FKK as a possible counterweight to the ubiquitous sexualization in advertising, but also in society in general," he adds
The English Garden in Munich and the Tiergarten in Berlin are two of the most famous parks in Germany with nude areas
A brief history of a movement
The country's first FKK organization was created in 1898 and the idea, connected to the pursuit of good health, quickly spread, especially around Berlin, the North Sea and the Baltic Sea.
"Even at the turn of the century there was this movement away from the cities," says Staiger. "It was part of a broader movement connected to not having the body constrained by things like corsets, and letting it breathe."
Rather than sexualizing the body, the naturist movement was about health as well as freeing people from shame, social inequality and from the unhealthy living environments in the crowded cities of early industrialization.
At the time there were dozens of magazines and films dedicated to FKK culture. FKK was initially banned by the Nazis during the war era, but the practice soon returned. Staiger says it could be argued that the party adopted the culture in some ways through their obsession with bodies.
"By the time Hans Suren's book Mensch und Sonne (1936) and Leni Riefenstahl's propaganda film Olympia (1938) came about, nudism had become incorporated — at least to some extent — into the racial ideology of the Nazis," she says.
Leni Riefenstahl's film Olympia celebrated the aesthetics of the Aryan athletic body
FKK culture persisted after the war and, although it existed in both East and West Germany, it took on a new meaning in the East where it became a symbol for people to escape a repressive state.
"FKK culture has a long tradition in Germany," says Gysi. "Partly, it also had ties to the workers' movement. In the GDR (German Democratic Republic), FKK beaches on the Baltic Sea were the norm."
Gysi says there were no separate nude beaches — everyone, whether they chose to wear clothing or not — bathed together. "This way of dealing with nudity was lost after the country's reunification," he adds. Not the spirit of FKK: Sex sauna clubs
Staiger says a darker side connected to FKK has emerged in recent years in the form of sauna clubs that sell sex.
"We have the issue of these sauna clubs or brothels that call themselves FKK sauna clubs, but they're hiding behind the FKK label. It's another cycle of co-optation of an idea or maybe an ideology."
These clubs, according to Staiger, "don't have the spirit of FKK," she says. "They're purely a euphemism to make it (prostitution) more acceptable."
"FKK and nudist culture was about celebrating the body unencumbered by clothes, in nature and sunlight," adds Staiger. "In FKK sauna clubs, only sex workers are naked, except for their six-inch high heels. That is not what the idea of FKK is about.
" There are however still many German spas that are textile-free facilities without being brothels, such as the Vabali Spa A culture worth protecting
So how can naturist culture get back to its roots and does it have a place in modern German life?
The way forward, Gysi says, lies with local politics — and to ignore those against it. "They (politicians) can easily declare certain areas on beaches and in spas to be FKK areas and in doing so they should not be misled by investors (who don't want nude people there)," he says.
Gysi says nudism stands for "self-confidence and the departure from social constraints" and I have to agree. "That's important and worth supporting," he adds.
As a non-German I feel there's something special about naturist culture.
And I like living in a country where you're likely to find pensioners in the buff, friends chilling without clothes, and naked yoga. No one cares what you look like, it's just bodies — we all have them.
A wild boar is shown in this Nov. 17, 2020 file photo.
Two pigs briefly took over a police station in Pakistan earlier this week, forcing officers to evacuate the building while the porky pair ran amok indoors.
The incident happened in the city of Moro in Pakistan's Sindh province, according to the Pakistan-based Express Tribune and The Current news outlets.
It was not immediately clear where the pigs came from, or how long they spent wallowing in their victory over the police.
Authorities ultimately enlisted help from some locals to retake the station, broadcaster ARY News reports.
The anti-pig posse drove out one of the animals and restrained the other, according to the station house officer.
It was the latest in a years-long run of bizarre wild pig stories, as the animals have become an increasingly challenging problem in many parts of the world.
The hefty, hungry and intelligent animals often band together and can cause havoc in urban and rural settings.
Last year, for example, a wild boar wandered into a German nudist park and snatched a naked man's laptop bag, touching off a bizarre chase that one bystander captured on camera.
Wildlife officials in Alberta, Saskatchewan and neighbouring U.S. states have also struggled with the threat of wild pigs, which can ruin farmland and spread disease to valuable livestock.
Denmark addressed a similar problem in 2019 by trotting out a border wall with Germany.
Wild pigs are also a widespread nuisance in the city of Hong Kong, where they feast on garbage and frighten citizens with their tremendous size.
Police in Pakistan did not say how the two swine managed to break into their station in the first place — but perhaps they can get the captured pig to squeal.
Tuesday, August 30, 2022
The French island that's a nudist resort and military zone
On Ile du Levant, a French island in the Mediterranean, two unlikely communities have been living side by side for decades — one without clothing and one in military uniform.
The resort's founders wanted 'a simple, rustic city, where lovers of fresh air and sun would come to the calm of nature'
It's approaching 10:40 a.m., and the ferry headed back to the mainland will soon depart. Passengers gather at the port, waiting to board. "Ah! You've gotten dressed. How strange," a man says to the person next to him. "Yes I know. I waited until the very last moment," the young woman laughs.
Welcome to the Ile du Levant, a small island about 15 kilometers (9 miles) off the French Mediterranean coast where two very different communities have co-existed for more than 70 years.
A tenth of the 10-square-kilometer surface area is home to Heliopolis, a small naturist resort founded in 1932, with around 250 property owners. The remaining 90% is a restricted military zone housing a missile testing center established in 1950.
While walking among relaxed, naked holidaymakers, it's easy to forget the other part of the island. But the path to the beach is flanked on one side by a barbed-wire topped fence; signs reading "Military zone. Do not enter" also provide a clear reminder.
The French sign reads: 'Military Zone. Access forbidden'
According to Guido, 71, when you live on the island — as he does half the year — it's not really something you think about. "We have almost nothing to do with the military," the Swiss retiree says at his holiday home overlooking the sea. Sometimes, Guido concedes, he does hear military exercises, munition being fired. "Always on Tuesdays," he says. "A bit of noise."
Life without clothes
He's more keen to talk about how he and his wife Sylvia "live in freedom without clothes." The couple have been coming to the island since 1990, often with their three children. They bought their house in 2003.
This time they have two grandchildren, aged 11 and 9, in tow. Being naked as a family unit "simply isn't a big deal," Guido says, though some relatives have declined invitations to visit. "Mainly the men," he adds.
Like many naturists, Guido, who was responsible for reactor safety at a nuclear plant in his professional life, stresses that there is nothing sexual about the practice.
Hedonists might be disappointed: Public sex is strictly prohibited on the island. Nudity is the rule on beaches and the hiking trail, and is allowed in certain restaurants and shops, of which there are just a handful. In the port, minimal coverage is required. The island is quiet, with no cars. Electricity only arrived in 1989.
Heading down to the beach in minimal clothing
Delphine and Francois, a French couple sitting at the port, say they came for the peace and natural beauty. For them, naturism is not about exhibitionism. "Actually, it's funny, but when you don't have clothes on, you don't look at each other. You don't look at whether a person is large or small or whatever. Everyone is the same. It's relaxed," Delphine, a 57-year-old dental assistant, says.
Retreat from civilization
Nudism or naturism (advocates generally use the latter) is a movement that first emerged in Germany partly as a reaction to the industrialization and urbanization of the late 19th century, soon spreading to France and beyond. Early proponents emphasized the health benefits of outdoor exercise, a good (often vegetarian) diet and a return to nature.
BARE FACTS: GERMANY'S NUDISM MOVEMENT
A 'free body': Germany's nudist culture
It's a part of German culture, just like techno music and "Spargelzeit," the asparagus season. Even though the practice of Freikörperkultur (FKK), which translates as "free body culture," is dwindling among the younger generations of Germans, you'll still find lots of FKK areas on beaches as well as nude culture enthusiasts in spas — and even parks. 1234567891011
As the movement gained traction in the early 20th century, two brothers — doctors Andre and Gaston Durville — bought a section of the Ile du Levant from a property company and founded, in 1932, Heliopolis as an "international naturist center."
The rest of the island, long used by the French navy, has been owned by the French state since 1892. All of this is meticulously documented on the island's history blog.
The brothers wanted — according to legal documents belonging to the Heliopolis association — to build "a simple, rustic city, where lovers of fresh air and sun come to the calm of splendid nature, rest from the fatigues of the artificial civilization of cities by spending their holidays simply and healthily." Early photos show the athletic Gaston Durville hard at work at construction.
These days, people come to relax. The island is very popular with the queer community and this year's traditional beauty pageant, Miss Ile, was won by a trans woman for the first time, local newspaper Var-Matin reported.
Civilian life, military life
Life on the other side of the barbed-wire fence is likely quite different. While civilians sun themselves on the beach or take a naked hike in the nature reserve, military officials test marine, submarine and airborne material, or carry out training.
About 70 testing or training sessions are expected this year alone, a spokesperson for the French Armament General Directorate told DW. However, testing is limited in the busy months of July and August, the source stressed. About 225 personnel reside on the island Monday to Thursday. Italian and German troops also come here to train.
As Guido stressed, interactions are rare, though the military staff does provide emergency medical care if needed.
From Golden Age to renewal
French naturism saw its heyday in the 1960s and 70s, according to the French Naturism Federation (FFN): "The relaxation of social mores, the emancipation of women, and the development of paid annual leave allowed naturism to establish itself as a new philosophy of life… and holidays."
After the golden age came a period of decline but France remains a major international destination, with 350 naturist centers, according to the FFN. However, the movement struggles with an ageing fan base.
Only 14% of France's naturism enthusiasts (an estimated 2.6 million) are under 40, according to a 2016 survey carried about by campsite chain France 4 Naturisme and cited by the FFN on its website.
But the FFN says that promotional campaigns and increased societal interest in healthy living have helped win over a younger demographic in recent years.
On the day of DW's visit in August, the island was indeed bustling with visitors.
"In the last 10 years, there's been a renewal of clients, younger people," the president of Federation of Naturist Spaces (FEN), Jean-Guy Amat, told broadcaster RTL in July.
The pandemic years also stopped people from travelling abroad, bringing new visitors to naturist camp sites, Amat said.
Among the next generation of naturism fans are the passengers leaving on the 10:40 a.m. ferry, mainly a younger crowd. Those left on the bay cheer and wave the boat away. On the top deck, swimming trunks come off and are waved enthusiastically above heads in what looks like a good omen for the future of the movement.
Paul Pelosi's Suspected Attacker's Nudist Ex-Lover Says David DePape Was 'Constantly Paranoid' & 'Mentally Ill For Long Time'
The nudist ex-lover of the man accused of attacking Nancy Pelosi’s husband recently spoke out and revealed the suspect has been “mentally ill for a long time” and suffers from “paranoid delusions,” RadarOnline.com has learned.
But during a phone call from prison on Monday with the San Francisco Bay Area affiliate outlet ABC 7, Taub revealed she witnessed DePape slowly succumb to his mental illness during their nearly two-decade relationship together.
“He came back in very bad shape. He thought he was Jesus. He was constantly paranoid, thinking people were after him,” Taub said regarding one incident where DePape disappeared for almost an entire year.
“And it took a good year or two to get back to, you know, being halfway normal,” she added. “He is mentally ill. He has been mentally ill for a long time.”
Related video: Paul Pelosi's Alleged Attacker Identified; Authorities Say He Assaulted 82-Year-Old in Front of Officers Duration 2:08 View on Watch
Even more surprising was Taub’s claim that, when she and DePape first met roughly 20 years ago, the suspected assailant held progressive political views. She also described herself as the “ex-life partner of David DePape and the mother of his [three] children.”
“Well when I met him, he was only 20 years old, and he didn't have any experience in politics, and he was very much in alignment with my views and I've always been very progressive,” she explained. “I absolutely admire Nancy Pelosi.”
As RadarOnline.com previously reported, DePape was arrested on Friday morning after allegedly attacking Paul Pelosi at his and the House Speaker’s Pacific Heights, San Francisco home.
"Officers told the men to drop the hammer, at which point DePape allegedly wrestled the tool free and struck Paul Pelosi with it in the head, knocking him unconscious," a newly released sworn affidavit read regarding the incident.
"DePape stated that he was going to hold Nancy hostage and talk to her,” the court documents continued. “If Nancy were to tell DePape the 'truth,' he would let her go, and if she 'lied,' he was going to break her kneecaps.”
House Speaker Pelosi’s 82-year-old husband has since undergone surgery for a skull fracture and injuries he sustained to his hands during the altercation with DePape. He is expected to make a full recovery.
DePape is currently facing at least two federal charges for Friday’s incident, including one count of assault of an immediate family member of a United States official and one count of attempted kidnapping of a United States official. He is facing upwards of 50 years in federal prison and is expected to be arraigned on Tuesday.
Saturday, October 29, 2022
TWO DECADES OF GOP ATTACKS
Nancy Pelosi Was a Target of Misogyny and Threats. That Turned Into Violence
Zoe Tillman, Bloomberg News
U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a Democrat from California, speaks during a joint session of Congress to count the Electoral College votes of the 2020 presidential election at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., U.S., on Wednesday, Jan. 6, 2021. The House and Senate resumed a politically charged debate over the legitimacy of the presidential election hours after a pro-Trump mob stormed the U.S. Capitol and drove lawmakers from their chambers. , Bloomberg
(Bloomberg) -- The attack at House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s home this week underscored the potential for violence from the escalating threats and misogyny directed at the California Democrat in recent years.
Threats against members of Congress have been on the rise, according to data from the US Capitol Police. But the hundreds of criminal prosecutions stemming from the Jan. 6 attack as lawmakers met to certify President Joe Biden’s election win offered a new perspective on the depth of hostility and threatening rhetoric specifically directed at Pelosi.
Police who responded to Pelosi’s home early Friday found her husband, Paul Pelosi, 82, in a struggle with an intruder, according to San Francisco Police Chief William Scott. Police said the suspect, David DePape, 42, of Berkeley, California, struck Paul Pelosi in the head and body before being subdued and will face charges of attempted homicide, assault with a deadly weapon and elder abuse.
Scott told reporters a motive was under investigation, but a person familiar with the investigation said that the intruder had shouted “Where is Nancy, where is Nancy?” before attacking her husband. Using the research site DomainTools.com, Bloomberg News found several websites registered to a David DePape that railed against the government and technology giants, and espoused far-right conspiracy theories. Blog posts took aim at immigrants, “climate hysteria” and feminists, among other targets.
Elected officials who serve as the public faces of their political parties unsurprisingly tend to bear the brunt of criticism -- and, sometimes, threats -- from their opponents. A November 2020 report from the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace identified an “overwhelming amount of online abuse, harassment, and gendered defamation” that women in politics face at higher rates compared to their male counterparts.
Political scientists and extremism experts have been raising the alarm about the evolution of violent speech to violent acts as political polarization in the US deepened during former President Donald Trump’s time in office and since the 2020 election.
Pelosi had been the target of political vitriol through the years, but the prosecutions of Jan. 6 rioters driven by Trump’s baseless election fraud claims show the degree to which the 82-year-old House speaker has become a singular focus of right-wing anger.
Federal prosecutors, in charging papers and other court filings, describe rioters searching for Pelosi as they entered the Capitol and shouting that they were “coming for” her as they tried to get past law enforcement into the House chamber. One woman allegedly demanded that police bring Pelosi out so the mob could “hang that f---ing bitch.”
A North Carolina man brought guns and ammunition to Washington on Jan. 6 and texted a relative the following day that he was thinking of going to see Pelosi speak “and putting a bullet in her noggin on Live TV.” He’s serving more than two years in prison after taking a plea deal.
Earlier this year, jurors in federal court in Washington heard how a Texas militia member convicted of bringing a firearm to the Capitol on Jan. 6 told people around him about wanting to drag Pelosi down the steps of the Capitol “by her ankles.”
A Pennsylvania woman who pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor offense for illegally demonstrating at the Capitol admitted filming a selfie-style video in which she said, “We were looking for Nancy to shoot her in the frickin’ brain but we didn’t find her.”
Arkansas man Richard Barnett is set to go to trial later this year on a mix of felony and misdemeanor charges that accuse him of illegally going into the Capitol with a weapon. A photo of him sitting in Pelosi’s office with his foot on a desk was widely shared on social media. Prosecutors quoted a video that appeared to show him bragging about leaving a hand-written note referring to Pelosi with an obscenity and featured a photograph of the note in court filings.
Pelosi has a protective detail because of her position, but many members of Congress do not. Asked about any special security measures taken to protect Pelosi and her family after Jan. 6, a spokesperson for the US Capitol Police said in an email that, “For safety reasons, the USCP does not discuss potential security measures.”
PAUL PELOSI’S SUSPECTED ASSAILANT HAS TIES TO QANON
Blog posts under the name David DePape contain references
to the deeply conspiratorial group.
DAILY HIVE
VANITY FAIR BY OCTOBER 29, 2022 Paul Pelosi and Nancy Pelosi attend the TIME 100 Gala Red Carpet at Jazz at Lincoln Center on April 23, 2019 in Manhattan, New York.
Photo by Dimitrios Kambouris/Getty
The man charged with attempted homicide for striking House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s husband in the head with a hammer had posted about QAnon conspiracy theories, including disinformation about election results, the Holocaust, and space aliens, amongst other topics.
According to Rolling Stone, in blog posts, the accused man, David DePape, wrote screeds that questioned the legitimacy of the Holocaust, climate change, and the 2020 election results, and also had sections dedicated to transphobia, racism and misogyny. Although Facebook deleted the post on Friday, he also posted similar content regarding conspiracy theories on the platform.
AP reported that DePape wrote a blog entry in August titled “Q,” which included references to QAnon and memes about deceased sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Another August post featured his views on gun rights: “You no longer have rights. Your basic human rights hinder Big Brother's ability to enslave and control you in a complete and totalizing way.”
The 42-year-old attacked 82-year-old Paul Pelosi at the couple’s San Francisco home. He apparently asked Paul Pelosi, “Where is Nancy? Where is Nancy?” before hitting him in the head with a hammer. Pelosi suffered a skull fracture, and underwent a “successful surgery.” Pelosi somehow managed to call 911 before the attack, allowing the police to arrive in time to prevent further injury.
Speaker Pelosi was in Washington, D.C. on the night of the attack.
Gene DePape, David’s stepfather said, that although he hasn’t seen his stepson since 2003: “David was never violent that I seen and was never in any trouble although he was very reclusive and played too much video games.”
The speaker has headlined Republican attacks for almost
as long as she's led House Democrats — a political truism
her party is lamenting after her husband's assault.
Republicans have targeted Pelosi, among the highest-ranking women ever to serve in U.S. government, during election cycle after election cycle. | Jacquelyn Martin/AP Photo
By SARAH FERRIS and JEREMY B. WHITE 10/29/2022 Over Nancy Pelosi’s nearly two dozen years leading House Democrats, she’s played another consistent role: one of the GOP’s favorite political villains.
Republicans have targeted Pelosi, among the highest-ranking women ever to serve in U.S. government, during election cycle after election cycle. Ahead of the 2010 tea party wave election that swept the GOP to the House majority, the Republican National Committee remade its website with a “Fire Pelosi” theme that depicted her in flames. Even from the minority in 2018, she starred in dozens of GOP spots that sought to link her to vulnerable Democratic candidates.
And that hasn’t changed in what could be her final year leading the caucus. Less than two weeks before the Nov. 8 election, Pelosi remains a fixture in Republican attack ads airing in districts from Montana to Wisconsin to Pennsylvania. Many of the ads cast her as the “liberal elite,” criticizing her for “lying” or working with Biden to “destroy” the country.
“Biden and Pelosi are breaking our country,” the narrator reads in a House GOP ad promoting their candidate, Ryan Zinke, in Montana’s newly created 2nd District. Another ad from the House GOP campaign arm blasted Democratic candidate Eric Sorensen in Illinois for being “in Pelosi’s pocket” and “in lockstep with her costly liberal agenda.”
However, the GOP’s laser focus on Pelosi, while hardly a new phenomenon, is drawing new criticism in the wake of the violent assault on her husband early Friday morning. The assailant, whose online activity was steeped in conspiracy and baseless allegations about the 2020 election, had been specifically searching for the speaker, according to law enforcement officials — calling out “Where’s Nancy?”
Hillary Clinton, no stranger to Pelosi’s mantle as GOP target, tweeted Saturday: “The Republican Party and its mouthpieces now regularly spread hate and deranged conspiracy theories. It is shocking, but not surprising, that violence is the result. As citizens, we must hold them accountable for their words and the actions that follow.”
An array of top Republicans has sharply condemned the Pelosi home invasion, making clear that it was unacceptable criminal behavior. Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), who has traveled the country campaigning for House Republicans, said: “We can have our political differences, but violence is always wrong & unacceptable.”
But as Democratic lawmakers decry GOP political rhetoric with a new fierceness, the attack on Paul Pelosi is becoming the latest inflection point in an American political discourse that’s grown exponentially coarser since Republicans first embraced Nancy Pelosi as an attack-ad bogeywoman. While both parties regularly demonize their opponents in campaign messaging — Democrats hammering former President Donald Trump, as well as House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) and Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) — the speaker has occupied an arguably unique position.
Pelosi’s fellow Democrats insist that the focus on her goes too far in a political world now defined by the Jan. 6 Capitol siege by Trump supporters. Rioters that day also chanted Pelosi’s name as they walked through the building they had invaded, and some eventually ransacked her office. It was later reported that some of those who broke into the Capitol that day had intended to seriously harm the speaker, who is second in line to the presidency.
The attack horrified California state senator Scott Wiener, a San Francisco Democrat, but he said it was “completely and utterly predictable” given the endless demonization of Pelosi by Republican politicians, conservative media and social media trolls.
“We have an entire right-wing machine dedicated to promoting conspiracy theories, to brainwashing people, and to directing their anger towards specific leaders including Nancy Pelosi,” Wiener said. “That machine led directly to this attack.”
Wiener added that he has faced intensifying acrimony in recent years, including a death threat specific enough that the man making it was convicted of multiple felonies last month. He attributed that to the “mass delusion” of election denial and to proliferating online toxicity that has seeped into the Republican Party.
“QAnon doesn’t necessarily exist anymore, but QAnon is now part of the DNA of the Republican Party,” Wiener said. “The big establishment forces in the Republican Party,” he added, “they created this monster.”
Democrats have already emphasized what they call rising, dangerous GOP extremism in some of their own hotly contested midterm races. The House Democratic campaign arm has centered its message on so-called pro-Trump “MAGA Republicans,” pointing to candidates who have supported right-wing conspiracy theories or showed up for at least some of the Jan. 6 events designed to protest congressional certification of Trump’s loss.
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The frequent targeting of U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi by online extremists and political opponents likely contributed to the violent attack on her husband Paul, terrorism and extremism experts said.
The intruder at the Pelosis' home yelled "Where's Nancy?" before assaulting Paul Pelosi with a hammer, according to a person briefed on the incident. An internet user with the same name as the man arrested at the scene, David Depape, expressed support for former President Donald Trump and embraced the cult-like conspiracy theory QAnon in online posts that referenced "satanic paedophilia."
Police have yet to comment on a motive in the attack.
But terrorism and extremism experts believe it could be an example of the growing threat of so-called stochastic terrorism, in which sometimes unstable individuals are inspired to violence by hate speech and scenarios they see online and hear echoed by public figures.
"This was clearly a targeted attack. The purpose was to locate and potentially harm the speaker of the house," said John Cohen, a former counterterrorism coordinator and head of intelligence at the Department of Homeland Security, who is currently working with state and local law enforcement across the country on the issue.
"This is a continuation of a trend that we have been experiencing over the past several years. It is a threat dynamic that has law enforcement extraordinarily concerned."
Pelosi has been demonized online and in public by both far right and far left-leaning political websites and figures. Graphics depicting her being beheaded, and a call to send immigrants to her home, with her address, circulated online this summer, according to Site Intelligence Group, which researches online extremism.
Rita Katz, executive director of Site, said the Speaker was a hate figure for much of the political right, and is the "face of the Democratic establishment and, as such, at the center of many QAnon-adjacent conspiracy theories."
Those theories and people who espouse them are sometimes promoted by more mainstream public figures, amplifying the threats, experts say.
"While the intent may be to mobilize one's political base or generate ratings it also adds to the volatility of the threat environment," said Cohen.
Individual attackers, sometimes known as "lone wolves" frequently combine personal with political grievances and are reinforced and radicalized by things they read online, the DOJ's research arm The National Institute of Justice reports.
Attacks on political figures, places of worship and races or ethnicities have occurred in the United States for decades, but law enforcement professionals say the current environment is particularly dangerous.
"Today's radical extremism threat has this powerful digital component that can really accelerate recruitment and activate violence across a broader threat landscape," Aisha Qureshi, a social science analyst at the National Institute, said in an agency podcast before the Pelosi attack.
"Just the sheer volume and speed of misinformation spread through social media really exacerbates this problem," she said.
Threats against political leaders are rising in the United States. Cases related to "concerning statements and threats" against members of Congress jumped from 3,939 in 2017 to 9,625 in 2021, according to the U.S. Capitol Police.
"Look at the FBI attack in Ohio," said Todd Helmus, a senior behavioral scientist at security research firm Rand Corp., referring to an August incident when an armed man tried to break into the Cincinnati FBI headquarters.
Helmus linked that incident to rhetoric surrounding the FBI's removal of classified documents from Trump's Florida estate. Site said the Pelosi attack was being celebrated online by far-right supporters.
"We're just waiting for more of these things to occur," said Helmus.
(Reporting by Heather Timmons; Editing by Daniel Wallis)
Pelosi's San Francisco home has long-
drawn unwanted attention
A pig's head. Graffiti. Dayslong protests. Nancy Pelosi's
critics have often gone straight to her house.
A police officer stands outside the home of Paul Pelosi, the husband of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, in San Francisco, Friday, Oct. 28, 2022. | Godofredo A. Vásquez/AP Photo
SAN FRANCISCO — The hilly San Francisco neighborhood where House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s husband was attacked has long been a magnet for tourists, celebrities, billionaires — and political protests.
Pacific Heights, one of the ritziest sections of one of the wealthiest cities in America, has commanding views of the San Francisco Bay and homes valued in the tens of millions of dollars. But the presence of Nancy Pelosi has attracted unwanted attention many times over the years.
Her address was hardly a secret long before Friday’s predawn attack, when police say a 42-year-old man whose online history suggests an obsession with delusional conspiracies broke into the speaker’s home and struck her husband with a hammer. Paul Pelosi, 82, was hospitalized with serious injuries but expected to recover.
Just days before the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection, protesters defaced Pelosi’s mansion with spray paint and left a pig’s head out front, apparently angry about the size of a coronavirus stimulus package. Later that year, activists stuck an eviction notice at her door calling for an extension of a federal eviction moratorium.
In 2007, anti-war demonstrators held a dayslong vigil outside her home to denounce the war in Iraq.
On Friday morning, San Francisco Police Chief William Scott told reporters that officers arrived at the house early that morning and found suspect David DePape and Paul Pelosi grappling over a hammer, which DePape then used to strike Pelosi.
Nancy Pelosi was in Washington at the time of the attack, but DePape allegedly called out “Where’s Nancy?” after breaking into the home through the back, echoing a chant used by Jan. 6 Capitol rioters.
Scott emphasized that the Capitol Police have primary responsibility for protecting the speaker. But he condemned violence against elected officials and their loved ones.
“Their families don’t sign up for this, to be harmed,” Scott said. “It’s wrong.”
By Saturday morning, Pelosi’s block no longer resembled an active crime scene. The police tape had come down, and a single police cruiser remained. But neighbors were still processing what had happened.
Interior designer Natalie Loggins has become accustomed over the years to Pelosi’s presence attracting protests. She saw the anti-war protesters and heard about the severed pig’s head. A break-in and assault, she said, were of an entirely different magnitude.
“It goes way far and beyond to break in and to actually hurt someone,” Loggins said, adding she was “really disgusted, of course, that there could be this type of violence against elected officials and their family.”
Researchers and elected officials argue the tenor of the animosity directed toward Pelosi has become darker and more dangerous as she has become a symbol of national Democrats. They say political attacks on Pelosi have fed into extremist hatred.
Brian Levin, who leads the Center for the Study of Hate & Extremism at California State University, San Bernardino said in an interview that he has tracked “a real toxic brew that is different from what it was like even in recent years,” with conspiracy theorists, often stoked by social media, directing their ire toward an “intertwined, attached set of villains” in public life. Pelosi figures prominently among them.
“Now we’re seeing eliminationist language,” Levin said. “It’s not just, ‘Nancy Pelosi has failed policies, don’t make America like San Francisco. Now it’s: ‘Nancy Pelosi and her ilk are existential enemies who must be eliminated.’”
David Frum: “There’s nothing partisan about political violence in America… But if both Republicans and Democrats, left and right, suffer political violence, the same cannot be said of those who celebrate political violence. That’s not a ‘both sides’ affair in 2020s America.”
“You don’t see Democratic House members wielding weapons in videos and threatening to shoot candidates who want to cut capital-gains taxes or slow the growth of Medicare. Democratic candidates for Senate do not post video fantasies of hunting and executing political rivals, or of using a firearm to discipline their children’s romantic partners. It’s not because of Democratic members that Speaker Nancy Pelosi installed metal detectors to bar firearms from the floor of the House. No Democratic equivalent exists of Donald Trump, who regularly praises and encourages violence as a normal tool of politics, most recently against his own party’s Senate leader, Mitch McConnell.”
AMERICAN LIBERTARIAN CONSPIRACY FREEK
(ITS A FRISCO THING)
Suspect in assault at Nancy Pelosi home
posted about QAnon
AP By MICHAEL BIESECKER and BERNARD CONDON 29 Oct, 2022 David DePape, right, records the nude wedding of Gypsy Taub outside City Hall in San Francisco in December 2013. DePape is accused of breaking into US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's California home and severely beating her husband with a hammer. DePape was known in Berkeley, California, as a pro-nudity activist. Photo / AP
The man accused of breaking into House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s California home and severely beating her husband with a hammer appears to have made racist and often rambling posts online, including some that questioned the results of the 2020 election, defended former President Donald Trump and echoed QAnon conspiracy theories.
David DePape, 42, grew up in Powell River, British Columbia, before leaving about 20 years ago to follow an older girlfriend to San Francisco. A street address listed for DePape in the Bay Area college town of Berkeley led to a post office box at a UPS Store.
DePape was arrested at the Pelosi home yesterday (NZ time).
San Francisco District Attorney Brooke Jenkins said she expected to file multiple felony charges, including attempted murder, assault with a deadly weapon, burglary and elder abuse.
Stepfather Gene DePape said the suspect had lived with him in Canada until he was 14 and had been a quiet boy.
“David was never violent that I seen and was never in any trouble although he was very reclusive and played too much video games,” Gene DePape said.
He said he hadn’t seen his stepson since 2003 and tried to get in touch with him several times over the years without success.
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“In 2007, I tried to get in touch but his girlfriend hung up on me when I asked to talk to him,” Gene DePape said.
David DePape was known in Berkeley as a pro-nudity activist who had picketed naked at protests against local ordinances requiring people to be clothed in public.
Gene DePape said the girlfriend whom his son followed to California was named Gypsy and they had two children together. DePape also has a child with a different woman, his stepfather said.
Photographs published by The San Francisco Chronicle identified DePape frolicking nude outside city hall with dozens of others at the 2013 wedding of pro-nudity activist Gypsy Taub, who was marrying another man. Taub did not respond Friday to calls or emails.
A 2013 article in The Chronicle described David DePape as a “hemp jewellery maker” who lived in a Victorian flat in Berkeley with Taub, who hosted a talk show on local public-access TV called “Uncensored 9/11”, in which she appeared naked and pushed conspiracy theories that the 2001 terrorist attacks were “an inside job”.
A pair of web blogs posted in recent months online under the name David DePape contained rants about technology, aliens, communists, religious minorities and global elites.
US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and her husband Paul Pelosi, who was assaulted by an assailant who broke into their San Francisco home and is in hospital and expected to make a full recovery. Photo / AP
An August 24 entry titled “Q” displayed a scatological collection of memes that included photos of the deceased sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and made reference to QAnon, the baseless pro-Trump conspiracy theory that espouses the belief the country is run by a deep state cabal of child sex traffickers, satanic paedophiles and baby-eating cannibals.
“Big Brother has deemed doing your own research as a thought crime,” read a post that appeared to blend references to QAnon with George Orwell’s dystopian novel “1984”.
In an August 25 entry titled “Gun Rights”, the poster wrote: “You no longer have rights. Your basic human rights hinder Big Brothers ability to enslave and control you in a complete and totalizing way [sic].”
The web hosting service WordPress removed one of the sites on Friday afternoon for violating its terms of service.
On a different site, someone posting under DePape’s name repeated false claims about Covid vaccines and wearing masks, questioned whether climate change is real and displayed an illustration of a zombified Hillary Clinton dining on human flesh.
There appeared to be no direct posts about Pelosi, but there were entries defending former President Donald Trump and Ye, the rapper formally known as Kayne West who recently made antisemitic comments.
In other posts, the writer said Jews helped finance Hitler’s political rise in Germany and suggested an antisemitic plot was involved in Russia’s recent invasion of Ukraine.
In a September 27 post, the writer said any journalists who denied Trump’s false claims of widespread voter fraud in the 2020 presidential election “should be dragged straight out into the street and shot”.
We didn’t write about the attack on Nancy Pelosi’s husband, Paul Pelosi yesterday. We are not a breaking news site; we are a commentary site, and the commentary surrounding this attack was both ghastly and predictable, just as the attack itself was both ghastly and predictable. It took no time at all for Fox News to minimize the attack; for Caitlyn Jenner to blame the violence of San Francisco; for the right to chalk it up to a crazed loon acting alone.
He may have been crazed, and he may have been acting alone, but it’s only because he’s been radicalized by a Republican party steeped in conspiracy. He may have acted alone, but he did so with the implicit permission of the tens of thousands who advocate this brand of political violence. TFG is out of office, but it’s not getting better. It’s getting worse. I don’t know where it stops. A lawmaker will be killed, and I doubt that will change anything, either, because the person who commits the assassination — regardless of how extreme he has been radicalized by elected officials or the top cable news channel in the country — will still be characterized as acting alone. Things are bad, and I would expect them to get worse over the next 12 days, and maybe thereafter, too.
I know there are thousands of liberals who would probably celebrate the deaths of certain Republican public officials (or Supreme Court justices), but at least Democratic politicians aren’t encouraging it, at least our media echo chambers do not advocate political violence.
All the same, I think it’s incumbent upon the entire media infrastructure — from Fox News to the Daily Kos — to at the very least say, “Hey! Murder is not OK.” It’s not OK to kill Nancy Pelosi, and — no matter how much you might detest him — it’s not OK to kill Mitch McConnell, either. Vote. Protest. March. Get so angry that your teeth crack from grinding. But don’t murder.
Jake Tapper — of all people — says it best here.
“We’re at a moment right now of extreme polarization, where calls for violence are leading to actual violence. We cannot pretend that these are all isolated, fringe events. There are people in mainstream accepted society - elected officials, TV anchors, others - who have been creating a permission structure that is helping to open the door to this violence, a permission structure created when they dehumanize opponents or smear them, or belittle or make light of acts or threats of violence against their perceived foes or spread conspiracy theories.”
We don’t need to offer examples of those permission structures — we see them every day on Fox News, on social media, from the former President of the United States. We know exactly who Tapper is talking about. I don’t know how to make it stop, but we should at least speak out against it.
Dustin is the founder and co-owner of Pajiba. You may email him here, follow him on Twitter, or listen to his weekly TV podcast, Podjiba.
While discussing hammer assault on Paul Pelosi, CONSERVATIVE PODCASTER Chris Plante plays The Beatles' Maxwell's Silver Hammers, sings “made sure she was dead”
CHRIS PLANTE (HOST): The break-in was, according to a police sergeant in San Francisco, at 2:27 a.m. – 2:27 a.m. California time, of course. And there is video of the break-in. So that probably rules out being invited in then, and all that.
...
But there's video of the break-in at 2:27 a.m., according to a San Francisco police sergeant. Alright. We got that going for us. That's the – that's the thing. And it does look like Nancy has an alibi, but that doesn't mean – I know. I kid. I kid. I just kid. Womp, womp, womp. Bang, bang. Maxwell's silver hammer.
THE RIGHT CLAIMS IT WAS THE LEFT THAT ATTACKED PAUL PELOSI
Pelosi attack suspect David DePape was a psychotic homeless addict estranged from his pedophile lover & their children
“This is despicable,” said President Biden. He noted that the alleged attacker, David DePape, 42, shouted the same line, “Where’s Nancy?” as the supporters of Donald Trump, who stormed the US Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. “And what makes us think that one party can talk about stolen elections?” said Biden. “COVID being a hoax? It’s all a bunch of lies.”
California political leaders agreed. “This heinous assault is yet another example of the dangerous consequences of the divisive and hateful rhetoric that is putting lives at risk and undermining our very democracy and democratic institutions,” said California Gov. Gavin Newsom. “This attack,” said San Francisco’s state Sen. Scott Weiner, “is terrifying and the direct result of toxic right-wing rhetoric.”
Journalists, en masse, agreed with their assessment. DePape “appears to have made racist and often rambling posts online,” noted AP, in a report that encapsulated the media narrative, “including some that questioned the results of the 2020 election, defended former President Donald Trump and echoed QAnon conspiracy theories.”
But DePape’s politics have little rhyme or reason. In past years DePape shared a post about Stephen Colbert’s 2006 roast of President George W. Bush at the White House Correspondents dinner; linked to videos of Disney films altered to make it look like the characters were swearing; and claimed, “Jesus is the anti-Christ” — not exactly a litany of right-wing tropes.
David DePape allegedly broke into House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s San Francisco home and brutally attacked her husband Paul.San Francisco Chronicle via APPolice outside of Pelosi’s home after the attack.David G. McIntyre for NY Post
And, as I soon discovered, DePape lived with a notorious local nudist in a Berkeley home, complete with a Black Lives Matter sign in the window and an LGBT rainbow flag, emblazoned with a marijuana symbol, hanging from a tree. A closer look reveals the characteristics of a homeless encampment, or what Europeans call “an open drug scene.” In the driveway, there is a broken-down camper van. On the street is a yellow school bus, which neighbors said DePape occasionally stayed in. Both are filled with garbage typical of such structures in homeless encampments. People come and go from the house and the vehicles, neighbors say, in part to partake in the use of a potent psychedelic drug, ibogaine.
Neighbors described DePape as a homeless addict with politics that was, until recently, left-wing, but of secondary importance to his psychotic and paranoid behavior.
“What I know about the family is that they’re very radical activists,” said one of DePape’s neighbors, a woman who only gave her first name, Trish. “They seem very left. They are all about the Black Lives Matter movement. Gay pride. But they’re very detached from reality. They have called the cops on several of the neighbors, including us, claiming that we are plotting against them. It’s really weird to see that they are willing to be so aggressive toward somebody else who is also a lefty.”
The Berkeley home where DePape lived with a local nudist and others.David G. McIntyre for NY PostPresident Biden and other leaders have blamed the political right for the assault targeting Speaker Pelosi.Photo by Paul Morigi/Getty Images
Not all of the news media missed DePape’s history of drug use, psychosis, and homelessness. CNN reported that a woman named Laura Hayes, who said she worked with DePape 10 years ago making hemp bracelets, said he had been living in a storage shed. “He talks to angels,” she said, and told her that “there will be a hard time coming.”
Another woman, Linda Schneider, told CNN and Bay Area NBC TV affiliate, KRON4, that she got to know DePape around 2014 and that he was still homeless, living in a storage unit, and using hard drugs. “He [was] likely a mindless follower of something he saw on social media because I don’t think he had the courage to be part of any political or terrorist group,” said Schneider. “His drug use began again and he went off his rocker.”
But much of the rest of the news media, particularly local journalists who could have interviewed DePape’s neighbors, were swept up in the narrative that DePape was more like John Wilkes Booth, the fanatical but sane assassin of Abraham Lincoln, than John Hinkley, Jr., the mentally ill man who shot Ronald Reagan. DePape is much more like one of the hundreds of psychotic homeless people I’ve interviewed in recent years than the fanatical climate ideologues who I’ve been writing about in recent weeks.
Broken windows at Pelosi’s home after DePape allegedly attacked Paul Pelosi.ABC7
Wrapped up in their own obsession with Trump Republicans, most journalists have missed the real story. David DePape is not a microcosm of the political psychosis gripping America in general. Rather, he’s a microcosm of the drug-induced psychosis gripping the West Coast in particular.
Drugs, Paranoia, and Pedophilia
I visited the Berkeley house where DePape had lived with his former lover, Oxane “Gypsy” Taub, 53, a charismatic Russian immigrant 11 years David’s senior. DePape appears to have fallen under the spell of Taub around 2003, when DePape was a quiet, video game-obsessed 21-year-old in Powell River, a town of 14,000 people that is a four-hour drive up the coast of British Columbia from Vancouver.
A Nov. 27, 2008, article in the Oakland Tribune said Taub and DePape were married with three children. But DePape’s stepfather, Gene, told AP yesterday that Taub was his stepson’s girlfriend, not wife; that David and Taub had two, not three, children together; and that David’s third child was with another woman.
Neighbors described DePape as a drug addict with left-wing politics.Eric Risberg/AP
Thearticle, which carried the headline, “Need is great on Thanksgiving Day in the East Bay,” described Taub, Pape, and their three children eating Thanksgiving dinner with the homeless. Taub told the reporter that they were there for the community, not because they couldn’t afford to eat at home.
Taub was in the news again five years later when she, then 44, married a 20-year-old man, Jamyz Smith, naked, at City Hall in San Francisco. A photo in the December 16, 2013, edition of The San Francisco Chronicle shows DePape, Taub, Smith, and the three children huddled under a blanket watching television together. The caption describes DePape as “a family friend.” As in TheOakland Tribune article, the focus was on Taub, with no quotes from DePape
DePape filming Gypsy Taub at her City Hall wedding in San Francisco on Dec. 19, 2013.
Michael Short / San Francisco Chronicle / Polar
DePape and Taub have two children together. San Francisco Chronicle / Polaris
Taub married 20-year-old Jamyz Smith while naked.San Francisco Chronicle / PolarisRyan La Coste, who lives in an apartment directly behind the Taub-DePape house, said that the day after Taub’s wedding to Smith, “There was a huge fight. The guy [Smith] that she married got locked up. And so Taub married somebody else. My understanding was that David [DePape] was the best man to her husband at the wedding.”
The episode was typical of the chaos that swirled around DePape during the years leading up to his alleged attack on Paul Pelosi.
Meaghan Ellis, AlterNet October 29, 2022 Donald Trump speaking with attendees at the "Rally to Protect Our Elections"
hosted by Turning Point Action. (Gage Skidmore/Flickr)
A presidential historian has offered a blistering assessment of former President Donald Trump's role in influencing political violence and normalizing violent rhetoric.
On Friday, October 28, Michael Beschloss made an appearance on MSNBC’s “The Beat” where he weighed in on the assault of Paul Pelosi, the husband of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.). “We’re in a time where violence is licensed and encouraged by an ex-president of the United States,” Beschloss said during the broadcast.
“An awful lot of people are encouraged by a former president to think the way you get your political goals — which may be an authoritarian, even fascist, society — is by encouraging violence,” he added. “That’s the climate we’re in.”
Paul Pelosi's attack has caused quite a stir as reports suggest it is politically motivated. Per HuffPost, "Suspect David DePape was after Speaker Pelosi, who was not at the San Francisco home at the time, according to a source briefed on the attack. The Republican Party has long demonized Pelosi in comments and political ads."
Reports have also indicated that DePape has a history of circulating conspiracy theories. Speaking along the same lines, MSNBC’s Katie Phang also spoke during the segment and emphasized that threats against politicians are at an all-time high.
On Friday, per the news outlet, authorities also indicated that "U.S. Capitol Police launched investigations into 1,820 threats and concerning statements in just the first three months of this year."
Speaking to Phang, Beschloss also chimed in saying, “You and I look at the 45 presidents of the United States ― all but about one have taken it seriously that part of their job was preserving public safety."
“Once again, Donald Trump as an ex-president and a president is in a dark category of his own,” Beschloss added. He said Trump “encouraged violence at his rallies” beginning back in 2015 during his campaign, and “did this periodically as president of the United States.”
Phang also highlighted remarks from presidential historian Jon Meacham where he issued a stern warning.
“One of the marks of the end of a republic is the normalization of political violence,” Meacham said during an appearance on MSNBC’s “Andrea Mitchell Reports.” on Friday. “It just is. And everybody needs to remember, including us, that what we say matters, that words have consequences, and that things that seem improbable one hour can happen in the next.”
“Violent acts can change history,” he added. “And a mature democratic society ― lowercase ‘d’ ― has to have a way where we mediate our political differences without political violence.”
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