Far-right nationalist behind mock beheading appealing his conviction
HE PROTESTED the building of a Victorian mosque by recording a sick video with two mates. Today, Blair Cottrell is back in court, and he’s unapologetic.
OUTSIDE the Bendigo Council offices in 2015, Blair Cottrell picked up the severed head of a mannequin covered in red paint and tossed it into a wall.
Moments earlier, the far-right nationalist at the head of the United Patriots Front encouraged Christopher Shortis and Neil Erikson to “carry on” with the mock beheading.
“We’re just going to give you a bit of a taste of our religious culture,” Cottrell said to the camera. Shortis and Erikson shouted “Allahu akbar” — which translates to “God is great” in Arabic — before using a toy sword to take the mannequin’s head off.
The video was created in protest over plans to build a mosque in the regional centre but it would come back to haunt all three.
Cottrell and his co-accused became the first to be charged under Victoria’s Racial and Religious Tolerance Act and were found guilty of inciting serious contempt of Muslims. They were fined $2000 apiece.
Today, Cottrell, who is as popular as ever among followers on social media, appeared at the Victorian County Court where he is appealing his conviction. He smiled for cameras and took to Twitter to declare how well it all went.
“My court battle for ‘inciting ridicule of Muslims on Facebook’ is actually looking good,” he wrote.
“The new judge seemed confused then a little bemused at the details of the charge when the prosecutor said I ‘set out to incite negative feelings in others’.”
The former bodybuilder and carpenter is loud and unapologetic for his views, even if they’re offensive. It’s why so many rally behind him.
The Victorian man convicted of stalking and recklessly causing serious injury refers to himself in jest on social media as “just a white, privileged, socially constructed, oppressive, Islamophobic, xenophobic, patriarchal, colonial, genocidal, capitalistic slaver who is personally and racially responsible for everything bad that has ever happened in human history.”
He laughs at and mocks the outrage targeted towards him, but most of it is warranted. Littered throughout his past are calls for pictures of Adolf Hitler to be hung in every Australian classroom, claims that women can be “manipulated” using “violence and terror” and the use of the phrase “Jews are the parasites”.
He claims Australia’s traffic chaos is the result of our intake of working migrants, and that embracing different cultures will lead to “rape, terrorism, racially-motivated murders, rampant crime, maybe even a full-blown genocide” but “at least we’ll have kebabs and other foreign foods”.
We should be a vibrant & diverse society with many different cultures. Sure, we’ll face some problems like rape, terrorism, racially motivated murders, rampant crime, maybe even a full blown genocide & societal collapse –But at least we’ll have kebabs and other foreign foods.
— Blair Cottrell 🇦🇺 (@blaircottrell89) March 21, 2018
He sees himself as a spokesman for white Australians and today’s appeal is bolstering his credentials among followers. But it’s also stirring old tensions.
In 2016, he did the same, telling ABC2’s Hack Live program that “I don’t view myself as far right or neo Nazi but by standard of the current political system, yes, I am a racist”.
He did it again in January, appearing on Channel 7 during a very questionable interview. The broadcaster was slammed for its report after claiming “exclusive access to a secret meeting organised by right wing activists” but failing to challenge him on his self-described “racist” views.
“Hey @7NewsMelbourne did you broadcast the expert local opinion of a guy who says Jews are parasites?” comedian Charlie Pickering wrote. “Good job. Great newsing. Or ... maybe ... get your s**t together.”
Craig Emerson, the former Queensland ALP member, wrote: “My father fought against Nazis, spent time in a German POW camp and watched them take all the Jewish POWs away — it turns out to Auschwitz. He wouldn’t be too happy with Seven promoting Jew-hating neo-nazis.”
The response is typical of many Australians who are tired of Cottrell being afforded the spotlight. As his case returned to court on Wednesday in central Melbourne, that spotlight was on him once more. Even if it was briefly.
Cottrell’s appeal was adjourned until August.