Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre came under fire last weekend after a picture emerged of him shaking hands with Jeremy Mackenzie, the founder of a group known as “Diagolon”.
Jeremy Mackenzie is seen shaking hands with Pierre Poilievre. (Telegram/Raging Dissident)
Shortly after the image appeared on Mackenzie’s public Telegram channel, NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh called on Poilievre to “report Jeremy Mackenzie and Diagolon,” who he said are “designated as violent extremists by Canada’s Integrated Terrorism Assessment Centre.
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Singh was referring to a report by Press Progress, which last week released a document it obtained through access to information from the Integrated Terrorism Assessment Centre, a federal organization that assesses terrorism threats in Canada.
The document, dated February 17, 2022, names Mackenzie as one of the “key IMVE (Ideologically Motivated Violent Extremism) participants” who attended the so-called “freedom convoy” protests in Ottawa in early year.
The Canadian government has not expressed formal concern about Diagolon or listed the group as a terrorist entity.
“During my campaign I have shaken hands with tens of thousands of people at public rallies. It is impossible to check the background of every person who attends my events,” Poilievre’s campaign team said in response to the request of Global News comments on August 20.
“As I have always done, I denounce racism and anyone who spreads it. I did not know or recognize or acknowledge this particular individual.”
So who is Mackenzie and what is Diagolon? Here’s what you need to know.
Diagolon: meme country or extremist threat?
A demon drugged goat named Phillip. A fictional diagonal country that goes from Alaska to Florida. An alleged plot to kill RCMP officers in Coutts, Alta.
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There is a common thread that unites these themes: they are all, in some way, tied to Diagolon.
Read more: How close is the far right? Why some experts are worried about Canada’s parliamentarians
The group’s founders say it’s all a big joke, a meme, and that they’re just a bunch of anti-establishment comics. The demon goat and the fictional country were the product of “various edibles,” as Diagolon founder Jeremy Mackenzie put it.
His telegram channel has more than 13,000 members and he has at least 10,000 subscribers on YouTube.
But after a patch with the group’s insignia was found next to weapons seized by the RCMP near the border in Coutts in February, some extremism experts say they are concerned the hours-long live broadcasts could inspire your viewers to do.
“It’s not just an innocent podcast. It’s not just irony,” said Amarnath Amarasingam, an assistant professor at Queen’s University and an expert on extremism.
These podcasters offer their viewers a new “lens” through which to interpret their struggles, he said, one that paints government as the bad guy and societal collapse as inevitable.
“The louder it gets, the more people resonate with the message, then you automatically create the possibility that one or two of them will do something about it.”
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Jeremy Mackenzie streams live with a Diagolon flag behind him. (Raging Dissident II/YouTube)
In a statement sent to Global News, Mackenzie rejected any suggestion that his live broadcasts could incite violence or aggression.
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The goal of his podcast, Mackenzie said, is “to make people laugh and relieve their stress, to create a sense of community to combat the social and spiritual isolation that is prevalent in society, to make it very clear that these incredibly rich people and powerful at the push of buttons. in our house you don’t have to trust blindly without thinking about it.”
It all started with a single live broadcast.
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Mackenzie said that one night in 2020 he was “pretty broke on groceries”. That’s when the 36-year-old military veteran noticed that states without COVID-19 mandates, when highlighted, formed a diagonal line across the North American continent.
“I said, ‘It’s going to end, this is where all the sane people live.’ The rest of them are going to go crazy, California is probably going to sink into the sea, New York is going to blow up, and everybody’s going to live on that line,” he told a fellow podcaster in a live stream on July 7.
The fictional country ‘Diagolon’ is shown on a map in Jeremy Mackenzie’s podcast. (Raging Dissident II/YouTube)
The joke became more and more elaborate. The live stream dubbed the series of states and provinces the “Empire of Diagolon,” Mackenzie said.
Mackenzie actually said that Diagolon is a “cultural clique”.
“There is a community. It’s like a podcast fan club, basically. That’s really all it is, and it’s just like-minded people,” he said.
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The Diagolon flag is seen in this screenshot from Jeremy Mackenzie’s YouTube channel. (Raging Dissident II/YouTube)
Streams regularly express their deep distrust of political institutions, hinting at a societal collapse towards which they believe the political elite has Canada headed.
The Canadian government has not expressed formal concern about Diagolon, although Public Safety Minister Marco Mendicino did refer to “a far-right organization” in connection with the Coutts blockade.
“Some of Coutts’ people have strong ties to a far-right organization with leaders located in Ottawa,” he said at the time.
He did not name the organization.
Diagolon is not listed as a terrorist entity under Canada’s Anti-Terrorism Act, and according to Amarasingam, it does not fit that definition.
He said the danger with Diagolon, rather, lies in how its viewers might internalize the cynical worldview Mackenzie and other affiliate broadcasters present.
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“I don’t feel like they know what they want to do next… There’s this kind of constant revelry in the grievance itself. But there’s no real question,” Amarasingam said.
“That does not mean specific individuals and this movement will not take it upon themselves to do that, as (allegedly) we saw in Coutts.”
Read more: Domestic extremism ‘here to stay’ in Canada, says Trudeau’s security adviser
When protests against the COVID-19 mandate brought the border to a standstill in Coutts in February, the RCMP said they became aware of a small organized group at the protest that had “a willingness to use force against the police.”
In a subsequent raid, Mounties discovered 13 long guns, pistols, a machete, a large quantity of ammunition and armour. They also found two tactical vests, emblazoned with what Canadian Anti-Hate Network investigators believe were Diagolon patches.
A July 11 trial date was set for the four defendants in that raid in 2023.
A photo released on February 14, 2022 shows a cache of weapons and ammunition seized by the RCMP during the illegal blockade of Coutts. brochure / Alberta RCMP
Mackenzie denies that Patches is affiliated with his group. A post on a website dedicated to Diagolon suggests that the patches are fake and are being used to frame community members.
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Meanwhile, Diagolon’s founder has said on live streams that he’s “not doing anything.” He is only “commenting” on the “destructive” behavior of others, including those in positions of power.
“I’m just pointing it out because I don’t know what else to do,” he said. “And if enough people see it, maybe something will happen.”
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