Fascist Fashion: How Mainstream Businesses Enable the Sale of Far-Right Merchandise
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Fascist fashion items can help promote and provide funds for extremist groups. In some instances, it appears, their sale relies upon key services provided by prominent businesses that have policies against promoting racist organisations and hateful content.
An investigation by Bellingcat has found that a number of far-right and neo-Nazi online stores are openly utilising the infrastructure provided by major payment processors, commercial content management systems and web domain registrars.
Bellingcat was also able to establish that some far-right web stores appeared to be purchasing garments from wholesale manufacturers, whose charters celebrate diversity and equality, before embossing their own hateful messaging onto the clothing and selling it at a profit.
Some of the far-right sites could even be seen using mainstream social media platforms to promote links to their own online shops and those of their far-right allies.
Illustration: Ann Kiernan
Several groups studied by Bellingcat maintained Instagram pages that were carefully curated to stay within the boundaries of the platform’s rules. However, some of these accounts linked out to Telegram channels and web stores where the same groups were promoting and selling fashion items that depict Nazi and racist symbols.
Other items of clothing visible in far-right online stores showed more subtle or coded references to fascism and Nazism, such as the coordinates of a castle used by prominent Nazis during World War II.
T-shirts sold by the European Brotherhood. On the right, the coordinates point to Wewelsburg castle, a spot considered important by many neo-Nazis.
The above T-shirts, for example, were being sold on a site that was hosted by GoDaddy, which has previously
spoken out against racism and homophobia.
Other far-right websites, meanwhile, appeared to offer buyers the opportunity to pay for goods using payment processing platforms such as Payops, Nets Easy, MolliePayments, Bungeecolud and Paysera.
A screen grab from Whois.com which shows European Brotherhood website hosted by GoDaddy.
Numerous far-right and neo-Nazi organisations have taken to raising cash and spreading each other’s brand names by hawking a variety of clothing and merchandise in recent years.
According to Dr. Hans Jakob-Schindler from the international policy organisation, Counter Extremism Project, far-right webshops are “one of a range of methods by which the overall movement is financing itself.”
Such operations have two distinct advantages, he added. “They allow easy cross border sales, as you do not have to have a physical shop in the jurisdiction of your customer base, and they can easily [be] adapted to changing circumstances” if, for example, a crackdown occurs in one country or area.
But it’s not just about being a potential source of finance. As others have noted, including professor Cynthia Miller-Idriss in her book, “
Hate in the Homeland”, these stores can help connect the global far-right discourse, strengthen ideologies and help the far-right see itself as part of a broader, global movement.
International Brothers in Harm
Far-right clothing and items have previously been
reported as being sold in mainstream online stores. But the likes of Amazon, Google and Wish have taken
steps to remove obscene material in recent years.
This has led some far-right groups to seek other means of promoting and selling their products.
While the Telegram instant messaging service has become a place where many far-right groups promote themselves and communicate with others, the platform’s interface and architecture means it is not somewhere that items can be easily bought and sold.
Far-right traders therefore generally have to operate their own online stores if they wish to hawk their wares.
Many of those that do also take to advertising a variety of other products on top of their own lines of clothing. These include mixed martial arts sportswear, far-right music, as well as the flares and smoke bombs commonly used by ultras football groups.
Cross promotion by far-right and neo-Nazi groups for online stores in other countries also appears common. Such collaboration helps boost awareness within international networks, spreads racist messaging and widens the potential market for the niche products on sale.
For example a post on the Telegram page of European Brotherhood – a group of self-styled European nationalists that could be seen selling T-shirts that depict several Nazi symbols – detailed dozens of “WLM” or White Lives Matter stores across Europe.
A message promoting far-right and neo-Nazi stores throughout Europe and the US, shared by the European Brotherhood in it’s Telegram channel. Bellingcat has censored part of the names to reduce amplification.
Pride France, meanwhile, is a brand that mixes martial arts with some white supremacist and neo-Nazi lifestyle clothing and is sold through a French language website called 2yt4u (which stands for “too white for you”).
A look at the 2yt4u website confirms it also promotes products from other far-right stores such as ‘
Svastone’ from Ukraine and the Russian ‘
White Rex’ online shop.
Some of the clothing sold on 2YT4U, featuring nazi and white supremacist symbols.
The 2yt4u website also features the logos of several other neo-Nazi groups on its website header image. Among them is the ‘Rise Above Movement’, an American white supremacist gang previously
investigated by Bellingcat.
Some groups even appeared to be selling the same un-branded products at a significant markup. Bellingcat found an item, described as “police gloves” on one far-right store, was also being sold on several others.
Results of a reverse image search of a pair of gloves sold on one far-right web store leads to matches on other sites.
A reverse image search of the gloves and table of their specifications lead investigators to several more far-right websites with the same product offering.
Interestingly, however, the same reverse image search revealed that an army goods store that appeared to have no affiliation to any far-right brands or groups was selling the same gloves for close to half the price.
The same gloves product sold on a far-right web store was found being sold at a cheaper price on more mainstream sites.
It was not possible to find who the original producer of the gloves was, but the fact that the same product was being sold in various far-right stores suggests similar learnings or tactics were being employed by the outlets – some of whom even advertised each other’s products.
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Still, other far-right outlets appeared to piggyback off of more mainstream services to get their name and products noticed.
Social Status
Some of the stores identified by Bellingcat could be seen either using or attempting to use mainstream social media sites.
However, most appeared to tone down their messaging to avoid contravening rules around hateful content.
Many far-right websites often displayed both Facebook and Instagram links on their stores and pages. More often than not, however, the Facebook pages were defunct, indicating that if they ever did exist they had been taken down.
Yet maintaining a presence on Instagram seemed to pose less of a problem for a select group of stores. When banned, some appeared to have renamed themselves and returned to the platform under a different guise.
A message shared on the Telegram channel of European Brotherhood advertising an account on Instagram.
The groups that used Instagram, and managed to avoid censors by staying inside the platform’s guidelines, generally included a link to either an online store or Telegram page in their bios where far more extreme content would be visible.
The Ukrainian ‘Schutzenbrand’ appears to have pursued this strategy, advertising relatively innocent T-shirts on Instagram under the name Schutzen.product to over 1,800 followers.
But a link in their Instagram bio led to a Telegram channel, where a whole new group of T-shirts appeared. Some of these depicted
sonnenrads, white power logos, glorification of the Ku Klux Klan and teddy bears adorned with swatiskas.
An image from the Telegram channel of Schutzen.brand. “Rahowa” is an abbreviation of “Racial Holy War” and is widely used by neo-Nazi groups.
Other stores with pages on Instagram even appeared able to upload posts that openly depicted far-right symbols. Ruswear, a Russian store with an official website in its bio, advertised sweaters and T-shirts that appeared to be clearly emblazoned with swastikas.
A screen grab from the Ruswear Instagram page.
On Ruswear’s official website, where plenty of clothing without Nazi or hateful symbols can also be purchased, this design is described as being a traditional Slavic and Russian pattern.
But other clothing advertised on their Telegram channel appears overtly fascsist.
One T-shirt depicts a German eagle over a black sun (or sonnenrad), a neo-Nazi symbol. A version of this image appeared on the cover of the ‘Steel Eagles’ album by the neo-Nazi Russian band, Russkiy Styag. Several of the group’s songs from this album were branded
extremist by Russia’s Ministry of Justice (MOJ) in 2015.
A T-shirt with a German eagle over a black sun (or sonnenrad) advertised on the Ruswear Telegram channel.
Another store promoted by far-right vendors on Telegram is ‘Sturm Store’ (usually abbreviated to SS and seemingly another hat-tip to neo-Nazi
lore). This store also advertised white supremacist merchandise openly on Instagram itself. The Sturm Store Instagram bio consisted of a link to the group’s Telegram channel, which has nearly 1,000 subscribers.
A screen grab shows clothing promoted by Sturm Store on Instagram.
Bellingcat sought to ask Instagram about the details in this report. A spokesperson for Meta, Instagram’s parent company, said it had taken down several of the accounts flagged by Bellingcat and that they employ various technologies and 350 counterterrorism specialists to try and keep up with evolving trends.
They added : “We ban people and groups involved in organised hate or violence from Facebook and Instagram. We take down any content that praises, supports or represents them, including symbols like the swastika or sonnenrad, and when accounts repeatedly break these rules, we’ll disable them completely. But this is an adversarial space, and we know people will try to find different ways to share this content.”
The accounts of the European Brotherhood and Ruswear detailed in this article did appear to have been removed at time of publication. But while the initial Sturm Store channel appears to have been taken down at some point over the last few months, an account with a near identical name appears to have replaced it – linking out to the same Telegram channel selling white power and neo-Nazi merchandise. Another account advertising what appeared to be Ruswear clothing also remained on the platform. One picture on this channel displayed a T-shirt that contained a Swastika and other symbols that have been adopted by neo-Nazi groups. The same schutzen.product account appears to remain on Instagram but the link to its Telegram channel is no longer in its bio.
Hate-Filled Threads
The far right groups who sell these items don’t manufacture the materials themselves.
The garments, as well as other accessories, usually come from wholesale suppliers who most likely have no idea how their products are later adapted and used.
The designs depicted so far in this investigation seem to have been applied to generic clothing on a DIY basis before being sold on to consumers.
For example, the website of one online store, Martelentete, which sells neo-Nazi clothing from brands with seemingly openly racist names like “Keep it White” and “Ubermensch” also sells a sweatshirt featuring a death rune (another pagan symbol
coopted by neo-Nazis).
The product description for this sweatshirt includes a link to a product spec sheet which in turn points to the website of russelleurope.com.
A sweater decorated with the logo of the Belgian ‘hate-core’ band Les Eburons, a ‘death rune’ symbol that has been coopted by Nazi’s, and the text ‘nuclear winter’.
Russell is a subsidiary of Fruit of the Loom and a major business-to-business garment producer.
It must be noted that neither Russell nor Fruit of the Loom will have much knowledge of how their product has come to be used in this way. Their clothing items are sold to a variety of customers and suppliers at various stages of the value chain, each of which could be the vendor that knowingly or unknowingly sells the materials to the far-right brands or the individuals representing them.
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A spokesperson for Fruit of the Loom told Bellingcat that respect for people is one of the company’s core values. They added: “We in no way condone hate speech or any actions by groups or individuals that are contrary to our values. As our products are sold through wholesale distribution, we cannot identify or control the final sale of our product.
“However, we will thoroughly investigate this situation and take appropriate action to stop any association with our brands or use of our products in the future.”
Bellingcat also found that garments from B&C Collection were also featured on the Martelentete website. The image below shows a T-shirt with a vegvisir symbol that has been
co-opted from Norse mythology by some far-right groups and figures.
A T-shirt with a vegvisir symbol is sold on the Martelentete website, with the description pointing to the website of B&C Collection.
In response B&C Collections said: “Of course, we do not support extremist messages, nor any types of discrimination based on gender, origin, religion, as stated in our code-of-conduct.”
“Unfortunately, we are in a
B2B2B2C market and we do not sell to final users. We sell our boxes of garments to big international European multi-brands wholesalers, that sell to agencies or resellers, that sell to printers, that sell to associations. We have unfortunately no way to control the place where our tees will end-up. We hope you understand that we can not be suspected of any sympathy for these messages but that we can absolutely not control the downstream supply chain.”
weapons.
