I’m stunned this isn’t racing around the blogosphere. Two defectors from a major west-coast anti-war group have come out to describe the cult-like behaviour of their organization - the Movement Against War and Occupation. One defector writes:

Inside the group [MAWO Leader] Yerevani is a tyrant who tolerates zero dissent to his absolute control. “Discussions” in meetings consist of two or three hour lectures from Yerevani. “Democratic centralism” means agreeing with and enforcing his often arbitrary and mood swinging political rulings on the fly. “Organizational norms” mean constant phone contact with him to receive constant marching orders on everything from speakers’ lists and the admission of ‘opponents’ to events, to which button to wear on which side of your coat. No joke. These “norms” also address every aspect of personal life, like how to hang car keys, what clothes women members are allowed to wear, how to invite someone to coffee, how to flush a toilet.

You can read the rest of that letter here. Another defector, Ian Beeching, describes:

Sleep deprivation, pressure to fork over personal savings, emotional bullying, mandatory hikes, mandatory “education classes”, getting browbeaten for not producing an Iraqi flag with the words “Alahu Akbar” on it, sleeping in meat freezers, the lot.

MAWO, the “Truthers”, the organizers of the Israel Apartheid Week - the mainstream left (what these groups call the “Status Quo Left”) is in bed with all of them to varying degrees. These Anti-War groups in turn are in bed with the Islamist right - but that’s an old story.

Terry Glavin recounts how MAWO militant Alison Bodine so ingratiated herself with the anti-war New Democratic Party that she opened their convention:

It’s not as though MAWO’s blackshirt conduct and deranged ideology was unknown to NDP activists, either. And yes, I mean deranged: “Wherever Islam is fighting against imperialism, ‘The Left’ must join with Muslims in this fight. . . the Muslims of Iraq, Afghanistan and Palestine who are fighting on the front lines against imperialism.”

This has been no secret, especially on the left. Years before NDP convention organizers thought it would be cool to get in on Bodine’s radical-chic celebrity, MAWO’s lunacy was well-known to New Democrats, especially NDPers involved in “anti-war” activism.

Groups of the far left have the tendency to degenerate into these cultish extremes. Read the section on the British Workers Revolutionary Party in Nick Cohen’s “What’s Left” for more on that.

But what makes the MAWO stand out is their proximity to the mainstream leaders of the Canadian left AND their published list of endorsers. Look at the gullible people, groups and money behind this petty cult:

Tim Louis - Former Vancouver City Councillor

Douglas College Students Union

Kwantlen University College Students Association

Langara Students Union

Lawyers Against the War

Lisa Barrett - Municipal Councillor, Bowen Island

UBC Graduate Students Society

Vancouver Community College Students Union

Exit question: How much student union money is going to the MAWO?