and if not, winter certainly is.

For this month celebrating the birth of Mithras, here are some recent additional observations relating to my hypothesis that both the ancient Mithraists (who referred to themselves as Syndexioi) and the modern Proud Boys (who I refer to in Latin as Pueri Superbi since they’re self-described Western chauvinists) drew their narratives, mythologies and symbols from a shared cultural well replete with expansionist and fascist tendencies.

Cautes and Cautopates

My original piece limited comparison of these Mithraic twins to the famous Trump quotes “very fine people on both sides” and “stand back and stand by”, referring to the Charlottetown Unite the Right fascist rioters and the Proud Boys respectively, plus the observation that the torches they carried were also present at Unite the Right.  These figures are so central to Mithraic iconography that they deserve further examination in terms of how the symbolism played out in modern times.

Proud Boy founder Gavin McInnes' twin / doppelganger was seen by the thousands of people who volunteered with Sedition Hunters using open source intel to identify the January 6 Coup attendees.  The Proud Boy Billy Chrestman - alias Axehole by virtue of the axe handle he wielded - confused many sedition hunters who commented how strongly he resembled McInnes (Gavin himself was not at the Capitol, though several other far-right leaders were).  Chrestman received a four year sentence, having “presented himself as a leader among the rioters including when he was part of the tip of the spear that created the breach at the Peace Circle, encouraged other rioters to move to the police barricades, told rioters to stop the arrest of a rioter, and thanked them for supporting the Proud Boys”, according to prosecutors.  According to Sedition Hunters research there were 260 Proud Boys who participated in the January 6th coup, with an additional 15 Proud Boys tagged by the FBI.

Grabbing the Bull by the Horns

Another significant item I realized I omitted from my writing concerns the most central Mithraic motif: the Tauroctony, in which Mithras slays the bull.  So where's the beef in my comparative analysis of Proud Boys and Mithraists, or more specifically, where's the bull?  For that we could look at the study of bullshit or taurascatics: an analysis of what lies beyond mere lying, useful for understanding the rhetoric of far-right conspirators stewing in an ecosystem of misinformation as it relates to Trump and his followers, which includes the Proud Boys.  More conspicuous is the bull symbolism of the horns worn by January 6th rioter Jacob “QAnon Shaman” Chansley as part of his raccoon-fur headdress.  Chansley was not a Proud Boy, but photos of him shirtless inside the capitol was emblematic of the January 6 coup.  Though Chansley’s horns were from a different ungulate - a bison, not a bull - Chansley did carry a bullhorn.  QAnon believers are a different species than the Proud Boys, but there were connections between the groups, and some ideological overlap including paranoia, conspiracism, and pervasive antisemitism.

It’s Not Funny Anymore

The Vice media empire was co-founded by Gavin McInnes.  He was the heart and soul of the operation, defining its tone and aesthetic, but his erratic and xenophobic behaviour led to his buy-out by Vice’s other two founders Shane Smith and Suroosh Alvi in 2008.  This was likely under pressure from investors, but due to non-disclosure agreements we'll never know for certain.  While Vice climbed to a peak value of $5.7 billion in 2017, McInnes continued producing his own video content and engaging in increasingly unhinged right-wing punditry.  Out of this effort he founded the Proud Boys in 2016 and led the group until formally exiting in 2018 to avoid prosecution, though he never fully left: maintaining involvement via sideline advocacy.  

Vice gradually declined in value while facing the fallout from multiple lawsuit payouts, a cocaine smuggling ring and numerous sexual harassment scandals, and eventually filed for a chapter 11 bankruptcy in May 2023, announced it would cease publishing content in February 2024.  Despite years of featuring journalists critical of the far-right such as Elle Reeve, Ben Makuch, Mack Lamoureux, Tess Owen and Justin Ling, Vice finally came full-circle and took a turn to the far-right after being gobbled up by a hedge fund. 

The CBC documentary It's Not Funny Anymore: VICE to Proud Boys narrated by former Vice contributing editor Thomas Morton features interviews with various former Vice editors and staff including former editor Amy Kellner.  I bet many more of these “what went wrong with Vice/Gavin?” documentaries will continue to appear: Eddie Huang’s Vice Is Broke is another such example, with an Andy Kaufman hypothesis regarding Gavin.  In the CBC doc, Amy Kellner described Thomas Morton as “raised by wolves” for having worked for Vice for fifteen years straight out of school.  The term generally refers to Rome's mythical founders Romulus and Remus who were raised by the Lupercal she-wolf, and to the supposedly feral child Victor of Aveyron also believed to have been raised by wolves.  Studied by Jean Marc Gaspard Itard, this child was later described as having the symptoms of autism, and many of the most violently influential alt-right, right-wing extremist and incel figures - likely including quite a number of Proud Boys - have been ASD-identified (though, of course, this represents a minority of people with ASD).  In addition, the recent Ridley Scott sci-fi series Raised by Wolves was premised upon killer android nannies and post-Earth space-faring Syndexioi.

For the It's Not Funny Anymore documentary, Morton interviewed Proud Boys founder Gavin McInnes and (separately/painfully) MacInnes’ parents, as well as a Proud Boy who did three years in prison for brutally beating up an anti-fascist, and the ratfucker and Proud Boy confidant Roger Stone mentioned in my hypothesis.   Stone - whose surname in Mithraic mythology represented the petra genetrix from which the god was born - received protection from a Proud Boys security retinue who worship him “with almost as much fervour as they do Trump himself”.  Stone, the MAGA St. Peter, stated in the A Storm Foretold documentary “fuck the voting let’s get right to the violence” just prior to the January 6 coup.  

I used to refer to January 6 as a coup attempt, but since the re-election of Trump and since special counsel Jack Smith's motion to dismiss federal charges against Trump due to presidential immunity, I think it's fair to say that the coup was not just an attempt but a resounding success.  According to the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, “Proud Boys-affiliated accounts were extremely active in the immediate aftermath of the election”, with a “427% increase in posts by Proud Boys-linked accounts” from November 3 to November 6”.  All that's left is for Trump to free the imprisoned Proud Boys, Oath Keepers and other putschists and install them as his own private Praetorian Guard.

Gavin McInnes is also described in the It's Not Funny Anymore documentary as having the charisma of a cult leader.  This begs the question: if Gavin was the cult leader, then what was the cult?  Was it Vice, the Proud Boys, or just whatever Gavin was up to that required human participants?  McInnes' comparison of former VICE reporter Thomas Morton to anti-comedian Neil Hamburger reminded me of my brief encounter with McInnes way back in 1996: he made a point of comparing me to singer Ben Harper (I don't see it personally, and neither does my wife who has hung out with Ben).  McInnes’ charisma and persuasive skills may hinge on his ability to quickly typecast the people he meets to determine whether to persuade them through charm or to manipulate them through shaming.  Perhaps McInnes even read How to Win Friends and Influence People, a Trump favourite.

Bannon and Communication Channels

Trump called Steve Bannon the morning of January 5th.  Bannon, who also met with Proud Boy leader Enrique Tarrio, has threatened several with arrest since his own release from prison in October.  Those on Bannon's shitlist include January 6 Committee Chair Bennie Thompson, Vice Chair Liz Cheney, U.S. Attorney Damian Williams, special counsel Jack Smith and MSNBC legal analyst Andrew Weissmann.  If I were one of those people I'd strongly consider life abroad in a country that has no extradition treaty with the United States, as a number of newly empowered MAGA officials - including Trump's FBI Director replacement choice Kash Patel - have promised to unleash imprisonment and violence against their political adversaries.

While communication channels for planning the January 6 coup extended from Trump via intermediaries like Bannon and Stone to the Proud Boys, one of these channels was further extended between Proud Boy elder Joe Biggs and January 6 rioter Ryan Samsel, the latter observed speaking with his arm curled around the former’s shoulder in front of the Capitol. Two minutes later, Ryan Samsel initiated a push against the Capitol Police and the barricade.  Two minutes after that, the barricade was overrun and protesters began pouring out onto the Capitol grounds.  

Similarly, Thomas Osborne - the heavily armed January 6 rioter - was connected to fellow putschist and Proud Boy Christopher Worrell.  His trial has been pushed forward because Osbourne believes that he'll be pardoned by Trump after his inauguration.  According to the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, Proud Boys have signaled that the election results “have galvanized them and expressed hope that Trump will pardon their incarcerated leaders”.

This galvanizing has led to some Proud Boys further radicalizing through switching or maintaining dual extremist group membership, such as Proud Boy Ryan Roberson who was part of the recent neo-Nazi Hate Club disruption in Columbus, Ohio.  According to anti-hate researcher Peter Smith, “for years, antifascists warned that the Proud Boys isn’t just racist and fascist, but a pipeline to even more extreme forms of white supremacist violence. They’ve been proved right. Now, many Proud Boys have gone on from punching each other while shouting brands of breakfast cereal – a rite of passage within the Proud Boys – to calling for “total n****r death” in the CF88 chats”.

Communication channels also existed laterally between the Proud Boys and sympathetic members of the police force.  Proud Boy leader Enrique Tarrio received help from the cops, with Lt. Shane Lamond acting as Tarrio's “point of contact” with the DC Police Department.  “Of course, I can’t say it officially, but personally I support you all and don’t want to see your group’s name or reputation dragged through the mud,” Lamond wrote on Jan. 8, 2021.  This is ironic considering that several police officers died on or as a result of January 6, enacted by Trump, with Stone and Bannon acting as intermediaries (similar to the role of Mithras, “an intermediary between Ahura Mazda and men, protecting them from the attempts of Ahriman to destroy them”), while on the ground the Proud Boys spearheaded the action and riled up the larger crowd of rioters.  Proud Boy Dominick Pizzola was the first to breach the Capitol, stating once he got in “I knew we could take this mother fucker over if we just tried hard enough.  Proud of your boy”.

Salvation

BBC religion editor Aleem Maqbool recently described how supporters saw assassination survivor Trump as a saviour, voting for him to precipitate a second coming of Jesus based on his assertion “if you elect me, I'm going to restore power to the Christian Churches”.  Leading a “Republican party that is 70% white and Christian” Trump is placing religious Christians such as Mike Huckabee, Kristi Noem and Pete Hegseth into positions of power and influence.  Trump is also the saviour of the Proud Boys who were “willing to commit violence on his behalf”, while Mithras was the saviour of the Syndexioi who inscribed unto him “et nos servasti eternali sanguine fuso” (and you saved us after having shed the eternal blood).  However, no blood needs to be shed, and it's best to steer clear of anyone claiming to be a saviour, or of anyone following such a figure.   Mithras, Jesus, Santa or Q won’t be coming, and they certainly won’t help or save anyone; the only salvation will come from doing what we can to help one another out.