the white rose society

tl;dr: Racist bigot who pals around with neo-Nazis is a well-connected Victorian Liberal Party member who stood for local council elections as an independent.

Ex Victorian Liberal Party parliamentarian Moira Deeming has told the court over the past few weeks that she has no association with the far-Right whatsoever – we're not quite sure that's true. Join us as we pull the thread on one Deeming ally with dubious connections.

Content Warning: Extreme anti-Indigenous racism, antisemitism, transphobia, homophobia.

After the champagne had all been drunk, the neo-Nazis who accepted the invitation to join UK visitor Posie Parker AKA Kellie-Jay Keen-Minshull's protest on the steps of the Victorian parliament in March 2023 must have had mixed feelings. On the one hand, they were enormously chuffed that such a small action had garnered them so much attention. Front pages, on TV, radio, discussed by every media company and on every platform. On the other, the reality that even their proximate presence was enough to scuttle a career was settling in – and did not bode well for the future of their political project. A few days after the Let Women Speak rally, they gathered on far-Right streaming platform Rumble to share their thoughts.

It was here that Australian style icon and cataloguer of transphobic nonsense Pauline Pantsdown made note of a most curious interaction.

Kellie-Jay Keen-Minshull has a history of Islamophobia, so it’s not surprising that her supporters would hate Muslims.

Pantsdown then follows this with another observation.

The phenomenon on display here is part of a well-established pattern where people think they can ally with neo-Nazis on one particular issue only to discover that if you are not a straight white male, you’ll always be lesser.

On this occasion, however, Pantsdown received an odd response. The person behind the IStandWithMoiraDeeming account jumped into their replies from an account called Victoria Says No to challenge the accusation of naivety:

This got us wondering – just how closely did Victoria Says No actually stand with Moira Deeming?

Victoria Says No.

First of all, Victoria Says No has made a few replies to Deeming.

In June of 2023, they post a very familiar reply:

In July of 2023, while replying to ‘Moi’, they refer to themselves as a fellow “extremist” woman in the party.

In May of 2024 they complained to Deeming about how long it takes them to get from their work at the World Trade Centre building in Melbourne to Exhibition Street (and all of the Asian fast food they are forced to go past):

Deeming agrees that it’s atrocious:

Moira Deeming is not the only person that Victoria Says No replies to.

In this tweet from July 2023, they are chastising National Socialist Network member Jimeone Roberts for “begging for shekels” through a GiveSendGo fundraiser. Roberts was convicted in August of 2022 after he affixed swastika stickers to the offices of Jewish MP David Southwick.

It seems that their relationship with Roberts must have soured. Back in August of 2022, they tweeted that they had actually donated to one of Roberts’ fundraisers themselves:

Roberts found himself having an extended nap after a night out on the town spending money extorted from The Irish Times pub went south.

Like Roberts, MP Tim Smith has also had issues with his licence, but this was not what Victoria Says No wished to discuss with him in July of 2022.

In May of 2024 they reply to a terrible meme from neo-Nazi Daniel Seery-Walker.

As exposed by the ABC, Walker was a key propagandist for the neo-Nazi contingent of the No campaign against the Voice For Parliament.

Victoria Says No also seems to have had some involvement in the No campaign. In October 2023 they tweet that they are in charge of coordinating No volunteers in an electorate in South-East Melbourne.

The reason for this involvement is made clear in other tweets – they’re very concerned about the Aboriginal takeover of Australia via Welcome To Country ceremonies.

In another tweet she says that her colleagues in the water sector were shocked by recent changes to Indigenous management of water in Victoria.

They’re definitely not a fan of Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus.

And also not a huge fan of us (what did we do?!) – as seen in this reply to neo-Nazi Tom Sewell.

A number of their recent replies are to a now-suspended account which belonged to Victorian Proud Boy leader Jon Field, also known as OzRocka.

They complain about technical issues in a Twitter Space:

They link to a lecture by infamous Australian antisemite Eric Butler:

And they link to the Facebook page of a council campaign by Liberal Party activist Louise Black.

Unfortunately Jon Field’s Twitter account has been suspended (no mean feat on Elon Musk’s X) so we can’t see why Victoria Says No was promoting Louise to him, but we thought it might be worth looking into.

So who is Louise Black?

Louise recently ran as a candidate in the Victorian council elections, contesting the Melaleuca ward in the City of Kingston, in Melbourne’s South-East.

In her response to an Age survey, she described herself as being a current member of the Liberal Party.

Louise has recently locked down her personal Facebook, but before she did we were able to glean a number of interests from her Facebook activity.

She is very involved in animal rescue – with a particular fondness for bats and flying foxes.

Louise campaigned strongly against The Voice – even adminning a Facebook group (also recently removed) called The Truth About The Voice alongside fellow Black Rock Liberal branch member David Frauman and Freedom Party candidate Greg Cheesman.

She is Facebook friends with Proud Boys leader Jon Field, who has liked some of her posts, including this posting of a One Nation video on October 18 2024.

And she is friends with Moira Deeming, having stood with her at the Let Women Speak rally.

On July 29, 2023, Moira Deeming and Peta Credlin held an event celebrating Liberal Values at the Mercure Hotel in Caroline Springs, where members of the party could rub shoulders with such esteemed politicians as Alex Antic, Sarah Henderson and Claire Chandler.

In attendance was one Louise Black.

Not only did she attend, but in one Facebook comment she takes credit for the stunning decor.

There are definitely some points in common between Louise Black and Victoria Says No – but we wondered if there might be more.

We discovered that Louise Black is employed by a well-known business in the water sector, which is owned by her father. This year they moved into their new offices in the World Trade Centre building in Melbourne.

In one Facebook comment discussing the Suburban Rail Link, she mentions that her work takes her to the Mallee.

And until recently, Louise Black was the admin of a Facebook group called Dan Andrews Must Go. A Facebook group whose original name was Victorians Say No. Although this Facebook Group is now gone, the accompanying Facebook Page still remains. The most recent post is a link to a song called Hey There Australia by the musical artist White Flight.

Oh, you say it's for the greater good, but what about our neighbourhood, our traditions and values pushed aside in our own land? We're feeling tonight. Oh, it's what they've done to our homeland. They've allowed the replacement. It's hard to understand

The YouTube page for White Flight instructs the reader on who they should contact if they want to hear a live performance of this ode to the Great Replacement conspiracy theory: L Black.

During her run for council, Louise Black received a strong endorsement from conspiracist activist Joel Jammal’s Turning Point Australia. She explained why in a Facebook comment.

On Twitter, Victoria Says No had also made reference to the so-called Freedom Movement.

In the comment here, ‘Haz’ refers to Harrison McLean, the Melbourne anti-lockdown protest organiser whose involvement in antisemitic Telegram chats was exposed by us with The Guardian in 2021.

It seemed likely that if we were to take a look on Telegram, we might find some trace of Louise Black.

Down the bat hole.

We didn’t have to look far.

In our archives of Harrison McLean’s Melbourne Freedom Rally chat, we found a user with the handle ‘Batw0m’ and the screen name ‘Louise B’ who posted several links to Louise Black’s Victorians Say No/Dan Andrews Must Go Facebook group, and also made reference to a history of animal activism.

Batw0m posted in the MFR chat in the second half of 2021, sometimes live from protests, like these posts on August 21:

Whoevers down at flinders intersection, the people who are throwing the bottles and flares for the love of god everyone take as many photos as you can of them and pm them to me, they are not protesters they are cfmeu members there to agitate I’m being serious they are plants I’ve just seen on the live footage two I know to be. I’m walking down there now but start taking photos now cos they’ll agitate and provoke the cops then will move off when PORT start responding Or someone keep an eye on them and follow them when they move out We need photos of this cos mark my words this is going to be used as the justification for stage 4 Forget about PORT. Get photos of the people who threw the glass bottles and are instigating They won’t be faces anyone recognises I’ll expose the ids when as cfmeu organisers I just need photos of their faces doing shit my legs can’t carry me any faster down there FORGET ABOUT THE POLICE FOR A SECOND, just get those people throwing the missiles and provoking then follow them Please This is a ppo/vth engineered setup and they’re going to get away with it if someone doesn’t frigging listen ffs and start taking photos of them Whatever then, let them manipulate you all like a bunch of pawns instead of exposing them for who they are

Some might suggest that the idea that Daniel Andrew’s Private Office (PPO) and Victorian Trades Hall had engaged CFMEU agent provocateurs to bring in Stage 4 lockdown restrictions smacks of conspiracy theory, but many of Batw0m’s other contributions to the MFR chat were criticising the other participants for their own conspiracy theories. In particular, she felt that the movement would do better if they moved away from subjects like vaccines and paedophile rings, and concentrated on more grounded and concrete demands. She was also unimpressed with the movement taking orders from Freemason-obsessed Karen Brewer, who – from her safe haven in New Zealand – was instructing people in Australia to protest outside empty government buildings.

This attitude didn’t win her many friends.

We also found another Telegram account which claimed responsibility for the Victoria Says No Twitter account. The following exchange took place in the Telegram chat of Margo Huss, a Christian fascist who is perhaps best known for accompanying neo-Nazi Neil Erikson when he invaded an LGBT-friendly church.

This account, Eerie Eerukandji, had used a number of profile pictures on Telegram.

The most recent one was of a blonde woman with a ponytail tending to a bat.

Another was a manipulated image of Indigenous activist Marcia Langton.

And yet another was a picture of a flying fox pulling at a woman’s blonde hair.

Another name used by this Telegram account was Batwaff3n, a reference to the Waffen-SS, the military branch of the Nazi Schutzstaffel.

One of this account’s contributions is the creation of racist & antisemitic wildlife-themed Telegram sticker packs.

These Telegram stickers are all in breach of the Australian Federal government’s anti-swastika legislation.

Between August of 2023 and June of 2024, this account made over 22,000 comments in the Telegram chat of Brisbane-based neo-Nazi Daniel Seery-Walker. They also commented in other chats belonging to Young Liberal turned neo-Nazi Stefan Eracleous and Proud Boy Tim Wilms.

In June 2024, this account abruptly stops posting – only for a new account called Batwoman to take its place. As Batwoman, they explain that they lost access to their old account.

This Batwoman account has posted nearly 3000 comments in Daniel Walker’s chat since June.

You might be wondering how anyone finds the time.

Multi-tasking.

On August 22, 2024, Batwoman posted live from a cultural induction she was supposed to be attending for a pump substation in a lake.

In 2022, Louise made a chaotic appearance on the podcast of American neo-Nazi Jovi Val as ‘Batwaffen’ to discuss her involvement in organising anti-Andrews ‘Kill The Bill’ rallies using the Dan Andrews Must Go Facebook group.

When some trolls joined the call and accused her of a romantic entanglement with fellow ex Young Liberal-turned-NSN “treasurer” Stefan Eracleous, she explained that she didn’t have time to discuss such matters because she was doing the podcast from her desk at work.

Her work in the water sector would come up frequently in the chats – as would her racist and conspiratorial disdain for the Indigenous people she was forced to interact with.

In this screenshot, Telegram user ‘FreshFire’ (former Queensland Lads Society leader Grant Fuller) scolds Louise for posting so loosely when it wasn’t ‘Fedpost Friday’ – the day of the week when the chat let their hair down.

In these posts, GWM refers to Grampians Wimmera Mallee Water, the state government-owned water corporation with which Louise Black's family business has a number of contracts.

This hatred of Indigenous people wasn’t limited to her work:

We found the Facebook post in question posted by Louise Black in an animal rescue group.

Another frequent topic of discussion was her involvement in the No campaign against an Indigenous Voice to Parliament.

Louise made a number of references to working on material directly for Advance Australia, the conservative propaganda outfit – though at times her content was knocked back for being too edgy.

Another video Louise made featured a compilation of Marcia Langton clips describing the racism coming from some corners of the No camp (a corner which fully included Louise!). In one chat, Louise complained that another neo-Nazi Telegram channel had posted it without crediting her.

Louise posted the same video on Facebook on the same day:

As the campaign reached its end, stress began to set in.

The day of the Referendum doesn't start well for Louise.

But thankfully for Louise, racism wins the day.

Those complaints about absent vainglorious ‘tough white men’ are references to the National Socialist Network, with whom Louise has had an evolving relationship.

Frenemies.

In 2022, while talking to Jovi Val, discussion turned to the NSN, who had recently performed Nazi salutes in balaclavas at a children’s library event, terrifying attendees.

“The right is generally very peaceful. I've never seen any of them like, you know, they stood there and they held up banners … They, you know, might have chucked out a Roman but, you know, they didn't, they weren't aggressive. They weren't going up to the families or the children or even the performer and being threatening in any way. They were just, you know, stood back, you know, there was a couple of policemen in front of them, and they just, you know, chanted their piece, held up their banners, and then they folded them up and went home. And that's generally how, you know, the right here, or NSN, that's how they protest these, you know, there's never been like violent counter protests that I've seen, but I have seen, you know, violent counter protests from the left against, you know, some of our protests, the freedom like rally protests. So I think people have got this perception through the media, and it's been a very deliberate crafting, or almost, almost a demonization of them.”

At this point NSN leader Tom Sewell was facing charges in relation to a brutal assault on a black security guard at Channel Nine, as well as an incident in which he and balaclava-clad thugs had threatened hikers with knives.

In early March 2023, all was rosy as Louise joined NSN member Stefan Eracleous’ Telegram chat to share her thoughts on the state of the Liberal Party…

And to give the boys from the NSN a spot of friendly legal advice about Victoria’s then impending swastika ban:

Even on the day of Moira Deeming’s ill-fated Let Women Speak rally, all was well:

The next day however, as her friend Moira Deeming found herself in the spotlight, Louise had a few criticisms to make…

This goes on and on…

In June of 2023, we found Louise complaining about the NSN in a Proud Boys chat with OzRocka (Jon Field) and other Melbourne Proud Boys.

Still, Louise Black’s relationship with the organisation had sufficiently thawed by the time anti-fascist influencer Tom Tanuki had produced a video highlighting the National Socialist Network’s internal paedophile problems that she was willing to put NSN SA leader Cameron Brodie-Hall into contact with a KC specialising in defamation.

August 2024 saw some friendly banter between Louise and members of the NSN, such as ‘Splatteus’:

Still, despite posting over 25,000 messages in neo-Nazi Telegram chats, some banter might still be a bit spicy. Around the same time that Louise Black was cleaning up her Facebook footprint, Batwoman quietly deleted a small handful of messages she had posted on October 2nd 2024 about discussing Andrew Deeming’s council campaign with Moira Deeming.

As Louise’s council bid reached the pointy end, she was even willing to let NSN members hand out how-to-vote cards for her.

We found other examples of Louise Black bragging about her Liberal Party connections within far-Right Telegram chats.

On July 29 2023, she referred to Moira Deeming’s Liberal Values fundraiser as ‘her event’ in the chat of Proud Boy Tim Wilms.

Back in Daniel Walker’s chat, we found her asking neo-Nazis for poster ideas for Robbie Beaton’s election campaign. Her only caveat: try not to be insanely antisemitic. Arthur Calwell (NSN member Jack Darren Bell) had a few ideas.

In May of 2024, Louise shared her thoughts on the status of women in the Liberal Party (and a familiar Exhibition Street traffic gripe):

Conclusion.

We find it telling that, while Louise Black has been shut out of a number of extremist groups—due to her habit of spitting the dummy when her unsolicited advice is ignored—the one organisation which hasn’t seen fit to show her the door is the Victorian Liberal Party.

There are many good reasons to be opposed to the National Socialist Network – that they were rude to you in one of the number of neo-Nazi chatrooms you regularly hang out in is not one of them.

(And Mark Dreyfus might want to check that the batteries in his palm tree CCTV are charged up.)