Lauren Southern

Lauren Southern (Vorlage:IPAc-en; born 16 June 1995) is a Canadian far-right political activist, book author, and internet personality associated with the alt-right. In 2015, Southern ran as a Libertarian Party candidate in the Canadian federal election. She worked for The Rebel Media, a far-right online media company based in Canada, until leaving in March 2017. Southern continues to work independently and publishes videos on YouTube. In 2017, she supported the nativist group Defend Europe opposing the action of non-governmental organizations committed to save-and-rescue operations in the Mediterranean.

Education and personal life

Southern was born in Surrey, British Columbia. She studied political science at the University of the Fraser Valley but only completed two years and did not receive a degree.

Media and political career

Political career

In 2015, Southern was a candidate in the Canadian Federal Election representing the Libertarian Party in the district of Langley—Aldergrove. She was briefly removed by the party as a candidate, but was eventually reinstated with support from Breitbart News and The Rebel Media. The election was eventually won by Conservative candidate Mark Warawa. Southern finished last, having received 535 votes, or 0.9% of the total.

Media activism

In June 2015, while reporting on the event, Southern's Rebel Media cameraman was shoved at the SlutWalk in Vancouver, and Southern's protest sign stating "There Is No Rape Culture In The West" was torn up. Southern initiated "The Triggering", whereby on 9 March, the day after International Women's Day, Twitter users post taboo content in defence of free speech.

In March 2016, a protester in Vancouver poured a container of urine over Southern's head while she was engaging with LGBTQ protesters at a rally in Vancouver, arguing that there were "only two genders". Southern was mistakenly suspended from Facebook, having criticized the site for banning several conservative commentators. She later received an email apology from Facebook saying the suspension was an 'error'. In October 2016, Southern had her gender legally changed to male as part of a video produced for Rebel Media to show the ease of the new gender ID laws.

In January 2017, Southern posted incorrect rumours from 4chan that the Quebec City mosque shooting had been carried out by Syrian refugees; she later deleted those tweets. In March 2017, Southern announced she would be leaving Rebel Media to become an independent journalist. In the same month, she gained access to White House press briefings. In April 2017, Southern was one of several scheduled speakers at a Patriots' Day rally in Berkeley, California.Vorlage:Citation needed The rally led to a riot between pro-Trump demonstrators and anti-Trump counter-protesters. In July 2017, she revealed that Patreon had deleted her account out of concerns about her raising funds for identitarian operations in the Mediterranean, although she denied the validity of these accusations.

Controversial support for the targeting of NGO ships

In May 2017, Southern took part in an attempt organized by the identitarian group Génération identitare to block the passage of an NGO ship, the Aquarius (co-owned by SOS Mediterranée and Doctors without Borders), which was leaving Sicily to start a search-and-rescue mission for ship-wrecked migrants off the shores of Northern Africa. Claiming that the goal of the activists "was to stop an empty boat from going down to Libya and filling up with illegal migrants", Southern was briefly detained by the Italian Coast Guard. It is typical for migrants, who disembark from Libyan shores on makeshift rafts, to be picked up by NGO ships and taken to Sicily for medical treatment.

Publications

Southern wrote Barbarians: How Baby Boomers, Immigrants, and Islam Screwed My Generation, which she self-published in 2016 through Amazon's CreateSpace.

External links

Wikiquote: Lauren Southern – Zitate

Commons: Lauren Southern – Album mit Bildern, Videos und Audiodateien

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