More Research

We were looking round the net for information, videos etc. about the training and initiation members of Skinhead and Nationalist groups go through. We found this video from National Geographic about a group of Skinheads in Baltimore in the United States.



It describes how they look for people with a high level of physicality, must be devoted to the groups commandments and do whatever the group asks of them. You can see White Power flags around the room, a lot of the members have tattoos of Swastikas, made popular in Nazi Germany and Sig Runes, which is a Nazi SS insignia.

It also describes the reason why these men have joined this group, mainly becuase they have been wronged or hard done-by, they beileve their masculinity is being taken away by such things alike Feminism, Liberalism, the taking away of manufacturing jobs what they usually see as some kind of "jewish conspiracy. It shows the moves and techniques they use to fight, and also shows a new member joining the group.


Roots of the Skinhead



This film is where the skinhead began and the reggee music joining both White and Black skinsheads together but they were not necesserily fighting for the same cause.

Skin

Skin by Sarah Kane





John showed us Skin. It's a short film written by Sarah Kane about a Skinhead. We all thought that the scene where he has his tattos removed with a scourer was very well done. We also liked the fact that the skinhead changes after meeting a black woman who he falls for but then she turns out to be using him to humiliate him.

We also need to research into why people become skinheads, racists, extremists, join the BNP etc.

Meeting

We had a group meeting on Tuesday 13th November. We discussed ideas we had thought of and turned them into three solid ideas for the film:

Idea 1

A member of the main character's family is killed in the 7/7 London bombings. He seeks answers to his questions by attending a BNP meeting in which he is pulled in by their ideological views on not allowing any race or foreigner live in this country. However, he begins to mix with the extremists and finds himslef in a position he doesn't want to be in.

Idea 2

Follows a reporter undercover to reveal the racists within the political parties such as the BNP. He has gone as far as getting a swastika tattoo to prove that he is a part of the group. However, whilst on their way to a meeting, one of the extremists he is with starts a fight with a passing person who turns out to be a migrant or someone who is on redwatch. He is forced into a dilemma, does he blow his cover to help this person or does he let this happen so that his cover isn't blown.

Idea 3

A skinhead is getting ready for his initiation into his group. A person that is hated by the group (e.g. an immgrant) is talking about getting ready for his interview. We never see him, only the skinhead. This shows the similarities and the contrast between the two. The skinhead meets up with the group and as part of his initiation he has to beat someone up. They do so but it goes too far and the skindhead runs away.

We think that there is too much content in the ideas but it can be cut down. All of the group decided that the third idea is the better of the three. We met with John to discuss them.

Further Research:

Ross Kemp of gangs - Season 2, Episode 2 - Moscow
as further reason, This episode which looks at Moscow’s vicious Neo-Nazi gangs to discover who is behind a recent wave of racist attacks and hate crimes; and uncovers the extent to which these National Socialist groups are gaining power in the country. by watching this i hope we can gain an insite into the mentallity of these right wing organizations .

• These gangs have a heavy presence on the internet…. Videos of them doing racist attacks, propaganda videos.
  
  
  
  
  

• Nio-Nazi – National socialist society – have links with skinheads and combat training. this training is classed as training for momentous events that will happen in future. Training for the moment to defend the motherland, and their people (True White Russians.) , against the Islam the Muslims…but they are many enemies. They have plans for civil war between people that "realise that the country is in a critical situation and the people that don’t care." It would seem that their idea of enemy is pretty abstract, yet they use Islam as Muslims as a way to recrite new members stating "If people think about terrorist attacks, if you don’t have the same views after that then you don’t deserve being called “people." "were training people for street fighting, not sports competitions," Dimitry leader of the party states himself. “we are the most feared political party, we bring fear to the streets.”
• When addressing actual Skinheads, they state their reasoning for the attacks, stating "Scars are decorations for a fist, its beautiful to have a scar, In the desert there are aggressive wild animals, you have to hunt them, if you don’t they attack the peaceful population. If you kill 1, and thousand immigrants wont come."
• The National socialist party though do not openly admit to racial attacks, though its pretty obvious they do. they differ themselfs from Skinheads by stating, "we understand that just street violence alone doesn’t solve problems," but they don’t say its wrong.
• Seem to have a deranged vision of the future. Stating "When we take power, the first thing to do is to arrest all the corrupt officals and decide the fate of each of them, we would then have to put in their place, young guys that are fighting in the streets and have no experience of government, of course it wont be easy. 2nd priority is to get rid of all the immigrants, they need to be put in camps and prisons like the corrupt officials"
• Ideologies based on mien-camp and Hitler’s rise to power
• Ross talks to an writer of a famous right wing book. Dimitry author of this apparent work of fiction, admits book is based on personal experiences as a skinhead. “in the next carriage the skinheads stood by the door, watch the communication door, don’t attempt to attack all together. The immigrant woke up and saw that he was surrounded by angry skinheads. He looked around in desperation. Twice the Immigrant tried to get to his feed, but the skinheads pushed him down. The skinhead where removing their belts and chains. The air was electrified with calm and calculated hatred. There was nothing left for him to do, but await the execution. There was a countdown in everyones head, Four, Three, Two, One. Lets go. “Why the fuck did you come here? Bitch, Die, Die” having arrived home they phoned each other to make sure everyone had arrived home safely. At 3 o’clock in the morning they were asleep with the sense that they had fulfilled their duty."
• Since the book was written the movement has made a step forward. Victims are no longer beaten up…but stabbed to death.
• The right wing can speak so openly about these attacks because Convictions against race hate crime are very rare. Several cases even involve police. Corrupt police make situation a lot worse. Threaten immigrants with crime or even death if the don’t pay up. This makes right wing gangs think they are above the law.
• They even have supporters in the russian parliament,
  Nikolai Kurianovich – Member of the state parliament is a fan of Hitler and starlin. Likes the spirituality of union of far right portrayed in books of the 4rd reich and films. The “Imperial power”, he believes Migrant workers should be used as cheap labour, A form of slavery. Shouldn’t be allowed to be Russian citizen. Work, Pay tax, go home. and that the removal of passports from white Russian women that go out with “Blacks” should be put in place.
• This is becoming a major problem in cities such as Moscow, where 1/3 of the population and immigrants.

Clips from this episode can be seen here... www.youtube.com/result?search_query=Ross+Kemp+Moscow

research

Here are some videos on youtube to look at as research for our idea:

The Battle of Cable Street




The Battle of Lewisham





The young BNP in Stoke

First meeting of Clear Sky Films. All group turned up and was a productive session. Wrote a list of subjects we thought would be interesting and then researched them.

Islamophobia.

Definition- Islamophobia is the fear and/or hatred of Islam, Muslims or Islamic culture. Islamophobia can be characterised by the belief that all or most Muslims are religious fanatics, have violent tendencies towards non-Muslims, and reject as directly opposed to Islam such concepts as equality, tolerance, and democracy.

It is viewed as a new form of racism whereby Muslims, an ethno-religious group, not a race, are nevertheless constructed as a race.

A set of negative assumptions are made of the entire group to the detriment of members of that group.

During the 1990's many sociologists and cultural analysts observed a shift in forms of prejudice from ones based on skin colour to ones based on notions of cultural superiority and otherness.

(definition found at http://www.islamophobia-watch.com/islamophobia-a-definition/)

Ideas related to this subject would be a documentary following a Muslim showing the racial hatred he receives of just being a Muslim.

Human Trafficking
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/5343036.stm Good information on what human trafficking is and the human trafficking situation in the UK.

Immigrants
would look at the situation of immigrants in the UK and what it is doing to the unemployment statistics and the way they are treated.

Yob Culture
Meaning young people acting in a violent way for no reason. hanging in streets causing trouble and when ask to leave they attack and some times kill. some times young group just attack random strangers. we ask why do they do this and who is to blame.


MP's idiots or not?
looking at Mp's to find out if they actually do anything. do they do it for self gain or to improve the way of life for others.

Terrorists

for film ideas we talked about:
looking at a terrorist orginisation and how they set up for a terrorist attack and then them being found out by police or goverment.

National parties

Here we began to think about nationalist parties such as 'skin heads,' BNP and other organisatiosns that don't believe in accepting foreigners and other races into the country.

For the film idea we wanted to show the violent nature of these groups and how they go about their work. For the main character we wanted to have a more passive member of the gang that isnt too sure if what he has decided to become is the right thing.