Idahoans teach about tolerance
Pennsylvanians want to hear how Panhandle beat Aryans
The Spokesman-Review, July 30, 2002 (Editorial)
http://www.spokesmanreview.com/news-story.asp?date=073002&ID=s1190269
PITTSBURGH _ Two points raised by us were of particular interest to the Pittsburgh audience.
We observed that the Aryans in 1973 did not move to Idaho from Southern California for our weather, fishing, hunting, the job market or our rural lifestyle. They moved here because they received cultural cues from us that suggested to the Aryans that we would welcome them with open arms.
They also believed that after receiving the “truth” as the Aryans asserted it, North Idahoans would gladly and willingly abandon basic American principles of freedom, equality, the rule of law and the dignity and value of each individual. The Aryans expected to replace these great political values with hatred, fear, racism and a new religion called Christian Identity.
The Aryan Congress just completed its annual convention in Potter County, Pa., and the citizens of Pittsburgh voiced their concern that the Aryans had similarly misunderstood the cultural message sent out by rural Pennsylvania.
We explained that the unanimous $6.3 million verdict by a 12-person jury of the Aryan Nation peers (in Kootenai County) immediately became an unmistakable cultural cue all by itself. It showed the Aryans and any other racist group looking for a new home that their views and attitudes would find no acceptance or growth in the Inland Northwest.
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Norm Gissel is a Coeur d’Alene attorney who worked with the Southern Poverty Law Center to win a jury verdict against the Aryan Nations. The hate group now is trying to establish its headquarters in rural Pennsylvania.