A story in this week's City Pages on a local anti-fascist skinhead group known as the Baldies, contained some possibly disturbing revelations:
A group called the Minneapolis Oi! Boys (MOB) arose as a consortium of non-aligned skins and punk rockers. While generally apolitical, MOB adhered to a nationalistic, right-leaning philosophy. Unlike the East St. Paul-based White Knights before them, MOB was operating on the Baldies' turf.
Gulp. Could this group have been a precursor to today's Minnesota Organization of Bloggers? Maybe those local left-wing bloggers were right about the malevolent intentions of the MOB after all.
With that, the war intensified. Beat-downs became a daily occurrence. Members on both sides began brandishing weapons, usually baseball bats and ax handles.
"If I have one regret, it's that we didn't do more to reach out to MOB," says Ciaran. "Things got out of hand."
Other Baldies agree.
"Some of those MOB guys were cool," says Davey. "Our pride got in the way. It turned into a vicious cycle of needless violence."
By '92, the skin scene was dying. Part of it had to do with the MOB war, but the simple fact was that the crew was getting older. Some Baldies were fathers. Some, such as Hawkins, went off to college. Others, like Danny, had joined the military.
Hmmm....What would be the connection between the current MOB and a of group nationalistic, right-leaning, punk-loving, skinheads? Could it really be this man?
We all know what Mitch was doing twenty years ago, but what about seventeen or eighteen? And what about the "Mayor" of the MOB? Are we really expected to believe that this is all just a coincidence? Connect the dots people. Connect the dots.
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