Wolves of Vinland is a Norse neopagan group based in the outskirts of Lynchburg,

Virginia Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States, between the Atlantic Coast and the Appalachian Mountains. The geography and climate of the Commonwealth ar ...

. In 2018, the

Southern Poverty Law Center The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) is an American 501(c)(3) nonprofit legal advocacy organization specializing in civil rights and public interest litigation. Based in Montgomery, Alabama, it is known for its legal cases against white s ...

added the Wolves of Vinland to its list of hate groups.

History

The Wolves of Vinland raised $3000 on

GoFundMe GoFundMe is an American for-profit crowdfunding platform that allows people to raise money for events ranging from life events such as celebrations and graduations to challenging circumstances like accidents and illnesses. From 2010 to the be ...

to purchase materials for a Viking-style longhall, and accepted donations from white nationalist organizations such as

Counter Currents Publishing Gregory Johnson (born 1971) is an American white nationalist and advocate for a white ethnostate. He is known for his role as editor-in-chief of the white nationalist imprint Counter-Currents Publishing, which he founded in 2010 with Michael P ...

. Members of the group routinely post photos of ritual animal slaughter on Instagram. Prior to his resignation from the organization in late 2018, author Jack Donovan was an outspoken supporter of the Wolves, along with Kevin DeAnna, the founder of the now defunct

Youth for Western Civilization Youth for Western Civilization (YWC) was a far right student group registered as a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization in the United States. The group became a corporation in 2006 and began actively organizing in 2008. Kevin DeAnna founded the ...

. One member of the group, Maurice "Hjalti" Michaely, served two years in prison after being found guilty of attempted church arson against the Mount Pleasant Baptist Church, a historic black church in Gainesville, Virginia. The fire did not injure anyone but did cause $1 million in damage. After his arrest, group members began wearing T-shirts that said "Free Hjalti". The group has been compared to Chuck Palahniuk's novel ''

Fight Club ''Fight Club'' is a 1999 American film directed by David Fincher and starring Brad Pitt, Edward Norton, and Helena Bonham Carter. It is based on the 1996 novel of the same name by Chuck Palahniuk. Norton plays the unnamed narrator, who is d ...

'' and its film adaptation, and members have quoted the work as an influence, specifically the story's antihero

Tyler Durden The Narrator is a fictional character and the primary antagonist appearing as the central figure of the 1996 Chuck Palahniuk novel ''Fight Club'', its 1999 film adaptation of the same name, and the comic books '' Fight Club 2'' and '' Fight ...

. Members of the group have been associated with the

white power music White power music is music that promotes white nationalism. It encompasses various music styles, including rock, country, experimental music and folk.Messner, Beth A., Art Jipson, Paul J. Becker and Bryan Byers. 2007. "The Hardest Hate: A Soc ...

and

black metal Black metal is an extreme subgenre of heavy metal music. Common traits include fast tempos, a shrieking vocal style, heavily distorted guitars played with tremolo picking, raw (lo-fi) recording, unconventional song structures, and an emp ...

scenes in Baltimore, Maryland and elsewhere. In 2022, two men with ties to Wolves of Vinland and the Asatru Folk Assembly were arrested and charged with plotting to rob a bank. They reportedly ran a Telegram channel that engaged in militant

accelerationist Accelerationism is a range of Marxist and reactionary ideas in critical and social theory that call for the drastic intensification of capitalist growth, technological change and other social processes in order to destabilize existing systems a ...

rhetoric.

Controversies

The

lists the Wolves of Vinland as a "neo- Volkisch hate group"https://www.splcenter.org/fighting-hate/extremist-files/ideology/neo-volkisch SPLC. "Neo-Volkisch". Online. Accessed 6 August 2018 and as a "

white nationalist White nationalism is a type of racial nationalism or pan-nationalism which espouses the belief that white people are a raceHeidi Beirich and Kevin Hicks. "Chapter 7: White nationalism in America". In Perry, Barbara. ''Hate Crimes''. Greenwoo ...

group".

References

External links

The group's official website
{{Alt-right Environmental organizations based in Virginia White supremacist groups in the United States Alt-right organizations Germanic neopagan organisations Modern pagan organizations based in the United States Modern pagan organizations established in the 2000s