Archive for the ‘press’ Category
Protected: The Truth about White Lies
Posted by E on February 2, 2020
Posted in canada, cbc, crime, csis, dennis foon, elizabeth moore, grant bristow, heritage front, history, identity, jewish, journalism, life, movie, news, politics, press, rodney bobiwash, sarah polley, truth, white lies | Tagged: bernie farber, elizabeth moore, fraud, sarah polley, white lies | Enter your password to view comments.
White Lies is based on Elisa Hategan’s life
Posted by E on March 6, 2018

White Lies is based on Elisa Hategan’s life
For the record, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation’s 1998 movie White Lies, starring Sarah Polley, is based on my life. I have all the verifiable news clippings to prove a vast majority of scenes were based on my life. I also have email correspondence from a former consultant of the film – which demonstrates how the film producer researched my life via court records and interviews with people who knew me at the time, in order to write his script.
Specifically, the scenes were lifted from my 1994 trial testimony against the Heritage Front white supremacists, and my 1995 testimony in the House of Commons, along with the extensive press coverage in the Ontario newspapers that covered my story. When examined frame-by-frame, approx. 80% of scenes from White Lies can be directly traced to Elisa Hategan.
However, I never received any compensation or credit for a movie (an unauthorized biography) that wouldn’t have existed without me. After I testified against neo-Nazis at only 19, and while I was dumpster-diving for survival and begging for spare change on street corners while in hiding, people were making money hand over fist based on what had happened to me. Producers were attending Emmy and Gemini galas and getting nominations for a film that wouldn’t have existed without me, a film that shared MY LIFE with millions of viewers.
Shame on all those who exploited a teenage girl who had nothing but the truth on her side. For more details and to see the articles that formed the basis for the screenplay, please visit my website’s Press Clips section.
If you’re interested in finding out more resources about radicalization, extremism and the process of indoctrination, or know someone who is at risk of being radicalized, please message me. To book me for a speaking engagement, lecture, keynote or workshop at your event or to request more information about topics of interest, please visit my Speaking page to view options and contact me.
Posted in dennis foon, elizabeth moore, history, news, press, press release, sarah polley | Tagged: bernie farber, cbc, cbc white lies, dennis foon, elisa hategan, grant bristow, media, news, press release, sarah polley, white lies | Leave a Comment »
I Know What It’s Like Not to be Believed
Posted by E on February 1, 2016
In light of the Jian Ghomeshi sex scandal and the burgeoning public epiphany that sometimes women don’t speak of abuse not because they’re not truthful, but because they fear ridicule, public mockery, further abuse and being disbelieved in the court of public opinion (as well as actual courts), I must write this.
Over the last year I put aside my blog and focused on generating media interest in my book, which is based on my experiences as a teenage girl inside a domestic terrorist group spear-headed by a CSIS (Canadian Intelligence and Security Service) agent, Grant Bristow.
After releasing my book at the end of March, there was a flurry of interest, but none from traditional media outlets. I quickly discovered that if you are not published by a large press, i.e. Random House or Penguin (who I walked away from back in 2011 for various reasons), nobody will believe you.
My experiences cruelly paralleled what happened to me back in 1993 – upon a secret mandate issued by CSIS to all provincial police forces to dismiss all my signed affidavits and eyewitness evidence (discussed in a 1993 episode of The Fifth Estate), I was denied entry into the RCMP Witness Protection program and forced to go on the run for my life.
It didn’t matter then that everybody knew a CSIS agent had gone rogue and established the violent paramilitary white supremacist group you might remember as the Heritage Front.
It didn’t matter that Brian McInnis, a cabinet aide to the Attorney General who leaked an internal confidential CSIS report about said rogue agent, was dismissed from his job and charged under Canada’s insidious Official Secrets Act.
It didn’t matter that assaults, hate-mongering and even two particularly vicious sexual assaults had been connected to the Heritage Front (and many believe, to the leadership).
It didn’t matter that said rogue agent encouraged others to join the conservative Reform Party (and served as bodyguard at Reform conventions), thereby leading to the destruction of this political party when the Toronto Sun broke that violent HF members were encouraged to join Preston Manning’s Reform party as a way to sway them to the far right.
No investigation was to take place.
The rogue agent would be cleared – because to clear him was to ensure CSIS’s good name, along with the name of the agent’s handler, one connected to the RCMP intelligence unit that preceded the inception of CSIS – the same RCMP unit responsible for dirty tricks against the FLQ that included breaking into offices and blowing up barns under the guise of being “French separatists”.
It didn’t matter that neo-Nazis with criminal histories were taught by this CSIS agent how to stalk and gather information against political opponents, how to harass and threaten them over the telephone and even in person with impunity, while at the same time gathering a seemingly-endless cache of weapons to be used in what they believed was an impending Race War.
It didn’t matter that my credibility on the witness stand had already been established after my testimony was crucial to the convictions of three prominent Heritage Front leaders back in 1993.
In the end, I was just an impoverished, homeless, abused eighteen-year old girl and they….well, they were CSIS.
I was a nobody, and Grant Bristow was deemed enough of a hero to receive a standing ovation at a Toronto synagogue after an event hosted by the Canadian Jewish Congress – albeit they were among the same people who were targeted for attacks by violent skinheads and neo-Nazis who looked up to Grant Bristow, who worshipped him as their hero.
Although I was a lesbian, although my father was Jewish, although I sent three neo-Nazis to prison, I was not credible enough for ANY police division in Canada to open an investigation.
I was worthless.
I was a nobody.
Scores of weapons ranging from automatic rifles to M16s are still on the street because nobody bothered to sign off on a warrant to raid premises that stored illegal weapons intended for future terrorist actions.
But here we are, exactly twenty years later, and I have a book in my hands that details everything I saw and accounted for in my affidavits.
I thought the media were my friends. Upon the advice of my former lawyer Paul Copeland, I contacted various prominent members of the media, including Linden MacIntyre (before his retirement) – who I presume didn’t think much of my heartfelt plea to discuss the events I had witnessed, because he didn’t grace me with a single acknowledgement message.
I sent a message to a woman who had filmed a documentary about me for It’s About Time, a Vision TV program where she had worked before she climbed up the media ladder and eventually became DIRECTOR OF PROGRAMMING AT THE CBC. She had been one of the few people concerned about me, back in the day. Or so I thought, because of the care she took during my interview in the 1990s. Then again, back then she was a hungry, inquisitive recent film school grad with a vested interest in doing the right thing, not Director of Programming at the CBC. She hadn’t rubbed elbows with the elites yet, she hadn’t had a taste of what Canadian media is really like.
She assured me that she would send my manuscript and story throughout the ranks of the CBC – Canada’s taxpayer-funded Broadcasting Corporation. Surely someone there might be interested in speaking with me, even for a mere sound bite, in light of all the controversial CSIS operations in the Muslim community (where people with questionable guilt and motives are pushed into illegal actions by people who cannot, in good conscience, be described by any words other than agent provocateurs).
NOBODY bothered to contact me again.
FINALLY, I heard from a journalist at the Globe & Mail who is very familiar with political columns and often writes articles about the over-reaching grasp of our country’s shadowy intelligence agency.
We met for coffee in the Annex and had a conversation which lasted over an hour. He was interested, even flabbergasted, by what I had seen. And then came the punchline – when he asked me if the book was self-published. When I told him it was, it was clear that his mood had shifted.
Somehow, by the sheer fact that someone like Random House wasn’t behind me, he was never going to cover the story. In fact, it seemed like he lost interest and questioned whether what I had told him was in fact, factual.
I am used to being disbelieved by the police, but it was a first – to encounter this from people who are entrusted with impartiality.
It was in that moment when I experienced a visceral sense of deja-vu – the sensation of feeling like no matter what I said, or did, that nobody would believe me. That I was worthless. That I was a whore who was doing this for attention.
I felt dirty. I felt ashamed. I felt exactly as I did when Wolfgang Droege, leader of the Heritage Front and best buddy of Grant Bristow, hit on me when I was sixteen, and when a knife was held up to my neck and I was threatened with death on suspicions of turning against them.
Yes, I know what it’s like to be treated like a rape victim. I know what rape feels like, and I know what it’s like to be alone in the world, to feel ashamed and dirty when everybody around you prefers to look the other way.
Back in the 1990s, I possessed enough information to send at least ten Heritage Front and Northern Hammerskins individuals to jail. Probably more, but it hurts too much to start thinking about all the What Ifs. Aside from learning how to hack into telephone systems and how to push people to the brink of suicide, I was taught another important lesson by CSIS – that the weight of truth depends on the perceived worth of those who speak it.
To the OPP and RCMP officers who had been advised by CSIS to disregard my statements, the intrinsic value of my evidence was judged by my worth as a human being – and as an abused, impoverished teenage girl with no education, family or powerful clique of good old CSIS boys to back me up, what I had to say meant absolutely nothing.
Thanks to Canada’s Security and Intelligence Service, millions of dollars were sank into ugly, bottomless pit that was Operation Governor. Falsehoods were spun to assert that Bristow had somehow “prevented” crime from happening, though the fabrications included in the SIRC Report tell us just how much their words are worth. And when I brought real, concrete evidence forth to prosecute dangerous individuals, they buried it.
And yet somehow, being that it is 2014 and I am a university-graduate and professional writer, I never expected this treatment from the supposedly-liberal, “bleeding-hearted” media. From journalists who work for the CBC and Globe & Mail. From people who are not supposed to make you feel like garbage for TELLING THE TRUTH.
But then I think, they too must be scared. Scared to offend, to push the wrong buttons, to stick up for someone who was victimized.
Not when the men in question are powerful. Not when the victim is a teenager, a piece of trash. Not when our government has bought an agent’s silence with a quarter million dollars.
And not when a book is self-published.
For further research, I have an extensive media library and traditional press documentation available to anyone interested in what really happened in Canada during the early 1990s: https://incognitopress.wordpress.com/2014/11/03/race-traitor-reference-media-library/
READ MY BOOK HERE: http://www.amazon.ca/gp/product/B00JA05FYM
Posted in grant bristow, media, press, truth, writer, writing | Tagged: cbc, corruption, csis, ghomeshi, grant bristow, jian ghomeshi, journalism, media, Ontario, press, publishing, rcmp, toronto, truth, victim, whistleblower, writing | Leave a Comment »
White Lies: A Pack of Lies, or How the CBC Ripped Off My Story
Posted by E on February 23, 2015
In 1998, the CBC (Canadian Broadcasting Corporation) released a movie based on my life titled White Lies, which starred Sarah Polley.
The film producer and script writer, Dennis Foon, collected as many details of my actual life as he could based on trial testimony, newspaper clippings and interviews I’d given in the media, and then decided to produce a movie script inspired in large part by what had happened to me while I was a teenager.
Trouble was, although my experiences were appropriated for the story, I never received any credit or compensation.
So how did this sordid saga begin?
In 1993 I was a 16-year old who was recruited into the ranks of Canada’s most dangerous (and notorious) white supremacist group, the Heritage Front. I was the only girl in the core of the movement, and was subsequently groomed for a leadership position. I began writing articles for their far-right publication, Up Front, spoke at rallies and even participated in talk shows on their behalf, such as my appearance on the Montel Williams show alongside White Aryan Resistance leader John Metzger.
I was still sixteen years old when I was introduced to notorious worldwide Holocaust-denier Ernst Zundel, who welcomed me into his townhouse on Carlton Street in Toronto. As an abused, impoverished, often runaway teenager, I didn’t have a home to go to or a family to care for me, and this is where Zundel stepped in and became a grandfatherly figure to me, while simultaneously teaching me that Jews controlled the world, the Holocaust never happened, and Hitler (whose portraits hung from the walls of his home) was invariably right to eliminate the mentally and physically handicapped, the homosexuals, and of course the Jews.
By the time I turned 17, one of the Heritage Front’s leaders, Grant Bristow (later revealed to be a CSIS agent) started what would become known as the It Campaign – a campaign of terror waged against anti-racist and community organizers who stood up in protests against the Heritage Front. Bristow single-handedly instructed dangerous white supremacists tips and tricks of the intelligence community – how to break into answering machines, impersonate reporters, stalk your victims and terrorize them, threaten and disguise oneself to avoid arrest. The emboldened skinheads went out and continued the harassment with vicious street attacks, beatings, physical and sexual attacks, car-tire slashings, as well as spray-painting / firebombings of places in the community such as synagogues, bookstores, and even the home of a well-known Kitchener-area activist and member of the CJC.
I knew I had to get away from the Front’s escalation of terror. This realization came on the heels of me admitting to myself that I was gay. However, as a core insider I had a lot of information I could access, and had earned the trust of the HF leaders as well as Ernst Zundel himself, for whom I worked as an assistant and errand-girl.
So I turned to the other side, spied on my former friends for 4 months, stole Zundel’s international mailing list, turned whatever information I could to police, and defected. In March 1994 I testified against Wolfgang Droege and 2 other white supremacists in the court of law and sent them to jail for the summer.
Although my info had resulted in convictions and I had been threatened with death, I was denied Witness Protection, while Grant Bristow – the CSIS agent whose years of building up the racist empire in Canada had resulted in ZERO arrests and convictions – was retired in the Witness Protection Program and given a brand new house, two cars, a retirement package worth hundreds of thousands of dollars.
I spent a couple of years in hiding all over Canada, sleeping on sofas, floors and dumpster-diving for food before I finally got my GED and was accepted into the University of Ottawa (from where I graduated Magna Cum Laude in 1999 with a double major in Criminology and Psychology).
While still in hiding and going by a different name in Ottawa (they knew me there as Kat), the CBC was making a movie behind my back. A movie they advertised on their own DVD/VHS covers as a “True Story” – supposedly based on the “true story” of another ex-Heritage Front member, Elizabeth Moore.
I tracked down Elizabeth two years ago, after she messaged me through my website – she’s going by her married name now – and we became friends. She’s a nice person actually, a woman who bears no resemblance to the old Elizabeth who was featured (along with me) in Hearts of Hate. She confessed that the CBC had paid her $12,000 to be a consultant on the movie, and that they based it on her. She told me that Dennis Foon, the writer, had helped her get an agent to negotiate with CBC on her behalf.
I thought I had seen the film, but back in the 1990s I was suffering from PTSD issues and I realize now that I must have only seen a commercial for it. No matter – it was unavailable now anyway, out of print and besides, I didn’t really want to revisit that part of my life or Elizabeth’s. So I let the whole issue go, although a nagging thought at the back of my mind told me that I should really see the film and their interpretation of what had really happened.
And then, voila! last week I found it on YouTube, uploaded by a girl named Brittany and chopped into 10 parts. I watched it closely, with a growing sense of horror, as I realized – for the first time – that the CBC hadn’t actually adapted Elizabeth’s story but my own.
The only things Elizabeth and Sarah Polley’s character ‘Catherine Chapman’ seemed to have in common was a nice, middle-class girl background. Oh, and the fact that Elizabeth had actually dated skinheads back then, while I did not (obviously, because I was a lesbian).
The story of Elizabeth-as-Catherine quickly lost credibility as the movie progressed. Her acceptance by a thinly-veiled Ernst Zundel (played by Lynn Redgrave), who puts her to work for him and grooms her as the new face of the movement, was actually my own experience. Elizabeth never worked for Ernst. I did. She was never the “new face of the movement.” These facts were stated about me over and over in newspaper articles throughout 1992-1995, as well as court documentation – from my trial testimony against Wolfgang Droege and his boys.

1992 Globe & Mail article that describes me (using the alias surname Deschner) as the new, softer face of the movement – a line taken by Dennis Foon and used on the cover of White Lies.
There are scenes where “Catherine” goes to Klan rallies, shooting ranges, and is shocked by the escalation of violence – which makes her turn against “NIM” (which stands for a mash-up of the Heritage Front and Ernst Zundel). At one point toward the end of the film, “Catherine” is directed by a Jewish community leader to steal Zundel’s mailing list – this never happened to Elizabeth, but I did actually take possession of such a list (both from Zundel and Droege’s home).
All of the above-scenes were lifted directly from interviews I did throughout 1993-1995 with CBC, CTV, Vision TV, and various newspapers – notably Toronto Sun, Globe & Mail, and the Ottawa Citizen.
I should add that there was a secondary character by the name of Erina who is essentially a used-up ex-NIM member whose only act of protest against the hate movement is to hang herself. The CBC had the nerve to advertise that Erina was based on Elisse Hategan.
So why pay Elizabeth $12,000 and pass off my story as her own? It’s a tough question, and I speculate it has to do with the fact that I was in hiding for my life and using different names, so they couldn’t reach me for comment. At the same time, Dennis Foon (as interviewed in the movie’s ‘Bonus Feature’) was excited by the prospect of making a film about a “normal”, “educated”, regular, “middle-class” white girl from the suburbs, with “nothing particularly deviant or crazy about her” (i.e. not abused, poor, gay or particularly vulnerable, etc.) who attended university being caught up in the white supremacist movement – while myself, as an abused runaway high-school drop-out from a low-income single-mother household, didn’t fit Foon’s arguably elitist profile of “girl next door”.
Ironic, considering that at 16 I was a runaway, homeless MINOR in need of a family when I was recruited, and by age 18 I defected from the group and turned information to police. Elizabeth, on the other hand, was a university-attending, 19-year old ADULT from an upper-middle class family who stayed in the group until age 21.
Ironic also, given the fact that my father was Jewish (I converted several years ago to Judaism and embraced my family roots), but Elizabeth comes from old Christian stock. Perhaps Foon and the CBC felt a privileged, Christian girl from a wealthy family would be more appealing as the girl-next-door?
There is also the issue of the story arc – the truth is, Elizabeth Moore came into the movement, stayed for a couple of years, dated someone in the group, distributed some posters, recorded hotline messages, wrote a couple of articles for Up Front, and then left as unmemorably as she had entered. According to her own admission in an essay titled From Marches to Modems, her first concerns about being a member of a white supremacist, neo-Nazi group came after she was featured in a documentary called Hearts of Hate – after it came out, she became very concerned about how she would be perceived (as in, her public image and I assume her school-grades) by her university circle, neighbours, etc.. It certainly wasn’t due to a perception that what she was doing in the Heritage Front was actually wrong.

Elizabeth Moore describing what made her leave the racist Heritage Front in the essay “From Marches to Modems”
If the CBC had made a movie about that, it would have been a flop – there was no action, no drama, no excitement. Elizabeth lived in the Annex (Clinton St) in Toronto for many years afterwards – pretty strange behaviour for someone who claims their life is in jeopardy. Nobody attacked her, nobody from the Heritage Front held a knife to her throat and threatened to take her life (like Peter Mitrevski did to me at Wolfgang’s urging). By her own admission (via a Facebook conversation with me in 2014), she was only a fringe, tertiary group member who wasn’t trusted with any sensitive information by the group’s core members:
But that didn’t stop her from unsuccessfully asking the Canadian Jewish Congress to help her get admitted into the Witness Protection Program, a preposterous idea given that she didn’t actually possess any sensitive information and was never in danger. In fact, there are ZERO police records, independent evidence or media accounts /reports /articles about Elizabeth’s involvement with the Heritage Front until Hearts of Hate came out. There is virtually nothing as far as real evidence to back up her questionable claims of endangerment or self-importance.
In sum, after hearing Elizabeth’s own confession – both in writing and several conversations – that she had been considered paranoid by several psychiatrists back in the 1990s (and after witnessing her mindset in relation to another extremely serious and troubling issue which I won’t mention publicly due to respecting the sexual privacy of both Moore and other Canadian Jewish Congress individuals in question), I believe that she became fixated – even obsessed – with my story.
Unlike me (i.e. CBC’s “Catherine”), Elizabeth didn’t go to any gun ranges, Klan rallies, and most certainly didn’t steal any information, from Zundel, Droege or otherwise, to incur as far as I know any danger on the part of the HF. She didn’t “defect” from a group where, by virtue of being female (a ratio of over 10-1 in the hate moment) and a university student, was invited to tag along with Wolfgang and the boys, but wasn’t actually taken into confidence in terms of their terror attack plans on their so-called “enemies” – they had learned their lesson after I had betrayed them a year prior to Elizabeth coming on the scene.
And yet, that didn’t stop her from continuing to walk in my footsteps: after I came out as a lesbian and my coming-out was featured in Now Magazine, Elizabeth (who’d always dated men before, including a racist HF skinhead) confessed that she also went through a gay period (she’s back to straight now). Then she wanted to work with the media, and was excited to get that gig with the CBC.
Upset, I decided to confront Elizabeth with the reality that the CBC producers who made the film had appropriated my story. Dennis Foon’s own website states the following:
“I was intrigued when I read about a high school girl, Elizabeth Moore, who had been recruited into the Heritage Front, a neo-nazi group in Toronto. She rose up in the ranks of the organization before she finally defected.”
Rose up the ranks? Defected? Dennis Foon lifted that description from a Toronto Sun article written about ME.
According to Elizabeth’s own confession, she was a tertiary, fringe group member.
During the 3 years she was a fringe member of the Heritage Front, Elizabeth’s involvement was NEVER documented in any articles, press/media – with the exception of Hearts of Hate, a documentary she volunteered to appear in, there is absolutely no evidence of anything that could constitute her “rising in the ranks” or having any significance whatsoever to the group’s leadership, other than perhaps in her own mind.
Unlike what the film depicted, Elizabeth Moore was never a speaker at rallies – I was. She never had access to Ernst Zundel’s data and I doubt she was in his townhouse more than a couple of times. I had enough on the Heritage Front to put its leader behind bars and disband CSIS’s Operation Governor – since I testified in Parliament in front of a specially-appointed Senate SubCommittee that investigated Bristow’s illegal activities, CSIS had to hide him in Alberta. His days as agent provocateur extraordinaire were over.
Did Elizabeth Moore shut down the Heritage Front? Absolutely not. What were the CBC smoking – because I want some of it. Given Elizabeth’s own confession that she had been considered paranoid by several psychiatrists and that she hadn’t actually been taken into the group’s confidence, I believe that she fixated on my story after it received national press attention and subsequently (while I was in hiding for my life) appropriated it for her own benefit.
No – the Heritage Front, Ernst Zundel, and the whole neo-Nazi movement in Ontario were essentially shut down by the actions of a few brave anti-racist activists: Martin Theriault, Rodney Bobiwash, myself, Ruth M and Annette H, and by the hard-hitting articles penned by Toronto Sun’s Bill Dunphy. Although they continued to operate for a couple of years afterwards, they were nothing like the power-force they used to be in the early 1990s.
When I confronted Elizabeth, this is what she wrote back. It’s an exact quote of the email she sent me yesterday afternoon:
“What Dennis learned about you came from legit sources like court records, newspaper articles and talking to many people who knew you then. He did over a year of research on this”
So basically, Elizabeth herself ADMITS that Dennis Foon (along with his chain of command, which include Phil Savath and Brian Freeman), researched my story via court documents, interviews with people who knew me, and then made a movie about…..Elizabeth?
Maybe since our names were basically the same (Elisse/Elisa vs Elizabeth) and we are both short, dark-haired women, they thought nobody would notice.
It’s pathetic.
Pathetic because while I was dumpster-diving for survival and begging for spare change on street corners while in hiding, people were making money hand over fist based on what had happened to me. Producers were attending Emmy and Gemini galas and getting nominations for a film that wouldn’t have existed without me.
Pathetic because even after I wrote my memoir last year and was interviewed by the CBC’s Director of Programming / Original Program Development Sadia Zaman (who interviewed me 20 years earlier in a half-hour documentary for Vision TV), nobody at the CBC was willing to give me even a sound-bite of coverage. The story wasn’t relevant anymore – in today’s political climate, only Muslims can be terrorists. There’s no such thing as racism and white supremacy anymore.
I guess they had already capitalized on my story and were busy supporting other CBC rock stars like, you know, Ghomeshi?
I don’t know of any lawyers who can help me pro-bono in going after the CBC – but if you can help, please email me. Regardless of whether I can win a lawsuit against them or not, it’s clear that from a moral (and karmic) viewpoint, my story was exploited and I received no compensation, no credit whatsoever from the publicly-funded Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. I have an extended collection of media clippings that demonstrates many of the events depicted in White Lies were actually based on my experiences.
I would suggest the CBC revise the title of that shoddy film as “CBC Lies.” For anybody who is interested in what really happened back in the 1990s, please read my book Race Traitor: The True Story of Canadian Intelligence’s Greatest Cover-Up. (Sorry for the shameless plug, guys, but I didn’t score a dime from the CBC and I’m telling a TRUE STORY.)
So if you’re reading this – Dennis Foon, Phil Savath, Brian Freeman, Kari Skogland, whoever else worked on it and yes, especially Elizabeth Moore – you should all be ashamed of yourselves.
Posted in 1mooreliz, activism, anonymous, canada, cbc, crime, csis, dennis foon, elizabeth moore, grant bristow, heritage front, media, onemooreliz, politics, press, zundel | Tagged: 1mooreliz, cbc, crime, dennis foon, elizabeth moore, ernst zundel, espionage, film, fraud, ghomeshi, heritage front, kari skogland, law, lies, media, movie, onemooreliz, sarah polley, terrorism, white lies, wolfgang droege, zundel | 10 Comments »
Race Traitor – the media library
Posted by E on November 3, 2014
Hey guys,
after twenty years of telling people what happened in our own country, I’m tired of the BS I occasionally encounter from people who are so shocked by my story that they would rather deny it happened instead of doing due diligence and actually researching what is freely in the public domain. See how the denial haunts me to this day and parallels my experience as a victim of sexual assault: https://incognitopress.wordpress.com/2014/10/30/i-know-what-its-like-not-to-be-believed/
Yeah, I know that the info is out there, but in this day of anonymous derogatory quips and an attention span that makes a fruit fly’s seem genius, I doubt the naysayers will actually take the time to investigate the facts and realize that everything I wrote in my book Race Traitor: The True Story of Canadian Intelligence’s Greatest Cover-up is rooted in hard, undeniable fact.
The denial ends today.
You will also find this list in the References section of my book. Please note that this is by no means a comprehensive list of resources, but it should suffice to convince even the most ardent nay-sayer that all this actually took place in a free and democratic country.
I have quite a few affidavits made public in 1993 that I can provide upon request to anyone who is interested in further documentation of what is without a doubt one of the most ruthless and insidious, yet well-documented cases of an intelligence agent gone rogue.
Not included in this list is a transcript of my testimony against three notorious leaders of the Heritage Front, a testimony which resulted in convictions and prison sentences. Also not included (though mentioned in the articles below) is a transcript of my testimony in the House of Commons on Parliament Hill in 1994, where I spoke to a Senate Subcommittee on National Defence about the illegal actions of CSIS agent and group co-founder Grant Bristow – actions that I witnessed first-hand while being a teenager inside the domestic terrorist group that was the Heritage Front.
If interested in further research, there are also quite a number of articles in the press regarding the shocking treatment received by Brian MacInnis, a Parliamentary aide who leaked a secret CSIS report to the prime minister detailing the controversial actions of a spy gone rogue. For his effort to expose the cover-up, (this was in the days before the Julian Assanges and Edward Snowdens of the world made leaking documents cool) MacInnis was charged under Canada’s insidious Official Secrets Act and his career was permanently ruined.
Furthermore, there is extensive coverage of the more-RECENT (as in 2010!) illegal actions of Bristow’s new persona, “Nathan Black” in targeting the Jewish former mayor of Edmonton Stephen Mendel for harassment using his old spy tricks. I’ve compiled some of those articles in this post: https://incognitopress.wordpress.com/2011/11/17/old-habits-die-hard-the-dubious-adventures-of-grant-bristow-or-how-csis-taught-me-everything-i-know-about-phone-hacking/
VIDEOS
CBC, The Fifth Estate, October 4, 1994.
Excerpt from the Toronto Star, October 5, 1994, describing the content:
“The government-appointed CSIS watchdog, called the Security Intelligence Review Committee, wrote a top-secret 1992 report to Mr. Gray’s Conservative predecessor, Douglas Lewis, warning that Mr. Bristow was involved in ‘unlawful activities’ that could ‘generate controversy.’”
“CSIS is scared Grant will blow his lid,” one police source tells The Fifth Estate.
“What they’re scared of is Grant’s going to say: ‘Yeah, we desecrated Jewish synagogues. We threatened people’s lives. We were throwing rocks through windows and we were manufacturing (violent) incidents and we were doing all of this on the instructions of CSIS’.”
The program says CSIS not only did nothing to prevent these incidents but allowed Bristow’s handler, whom it identified as Al Treddenick, to get Bristow out of trouble with police on several occasions.
It says Treddenick is a former officer of the discredited RCMP security service, disbanded in the early 1980s after it was found to have committed illegal acts against Quebec separatists and other domestic dissidents in the 1970s and 1980s. CSIS was created to replace the RCMP security service.”
FIFTH ESTATE QUOTE: “When Elisse came out and said she was going to tell the truth, CSIS was saying they were going to get out and discredit her because at least Hategan was pointing the finger at Grant Bristow… we’ll tear her to shreds”.
White Pine Pictures, “Hearts Of Hate: The Battle For Young Minds”. Peter Raymont, 1995.
It’s About Time, VISION TV. “Racism, Sexism and Belonging.” Sadia Zaman, 1994.
ARTICLES
Dunphy, Bill. ” STIR IT UP. Spy Unmasked: CSIS Informant ‘Founding Father’ of white racist group,” Toronto Sun, 14 Aug. 1994.
Dunphy, Bill. “Turncoat spied on racist group,” Toronto Sun, 16 March 1994.
Dunphy, Bill. “Ex-racist’s despair,” Toronto Sun, 17 March 1994.
Dunphy, Bill. “We’ll Squash ‘Em! Manning fears plot behind racist infiltration of the Reform Party”, Toronto Sun, Feb. 29, 1992
Dunphy, Bill. “Reformers boot out ‘infiltrators'”, Toronto Sun, March 11, 1992
Dunphy, Bill. “Top racist in welfare scam,” Toronto Sun, Nov. 29, 1992.
Dunphy, Bill. “White rights groups readying for racial war.” Toronto Sun, 1992-11-29. Includes description of HF leader Grant ‘Briston’
Dunphy, Bill. “Canada’s Neo-Nazis”, Toronto Sunday Sun, November 29, 1992 Includes description of HF leader Grant ‘Briston’
Swanson, Gail. “Fire guts rights activist’s house”. Toronto Star, 92-11-09. involving arson of Jewish community leader’s home
Deverell, John. “Metro constable facing charges”. Toronto Star, December 17, 1993. involving metro Toronto cop member of HF
Mascoll, Philip. “Public mischief charge dropped”, Toronto Star, March 8, 1994 – involving an HF sexual assault on a black woman
Platiel, Rudy. “Front played dirty, court told.” Globe and Mail, 17 March 1994.
Platiel, Rudy. “Front tried to thwart agency, court told,” Globe and Mail, 16 March 1994.
Oakes, Gary “Woman’s hate-crime charges withdrawn,” Toronto Star, 24 Jun 1994.
Salot, Jeff, Henry Hess. “Memo leaker questions CSIS conduct,” Globe and Mail, 27 Aug. 1994.
Swainson, Gail. “Elite soldiers members of racist group, leader says,” Toronto Star, 6 May 1993.
Speirs, Rosemary, David Vienneau, “Commons panel to probe CSIS,” Toronto Star, 25 Aug. 1994.
Speirs, Rosemary. “CSIS told to ‘clear its name’ publicly,” Toronto Star, 24 Aug. 1994.
Speirs, Rosemary, David Vienneau. “Who’s watching whom?,” Toronto Star, 27 Aug. 1994.
Vienneau, David. “Spy agency kept watch on CBC,” Toronto Star, 19 Aug. 1994.
Vienneau, David, Rosemary Speirs, and Shawn McCarthy. Ex-aide admits leaking spy note,” Toronto Star, 26 Aug. 1994.
Cal Millar and Dale Brazao, Parliament set to probe secret actions of CSIS spy Committee to see if Grant Bristow was a spy or racist. Toronto Star, September 12, 1994.
Derek Ferguson, “Report ‘whitewash’ of spy agency mole. Toronto Star, June 14, 1995
Toronto Sun, October 1995 MPs rip Bristow spying scandal: CSIS broke the law, leaked report says”
Clayton Ruby, Fighting racism going out of fashion. Toronto Star, December 13, 1995
Toronto Star, September 10, 1994. “Exclusive: CSIS spy snapped in Libya: Portrait of the vanishing spy: Grant Bristow was a man with great contacts and plenty of money to spend.”
Dale Brazao, “Star finds Grant Bristow”, Toronto Star, Apr 20, 1995.
ONLINE ARTICLE that also discusses what I covered in my book regarding Stephen Harper’s roots in the Northern Foundation, a radical far-right group whose members included skinheads, neo-Nazis, Holocaust deniers, Airborne Regiment soldiers, radical anti-abortionists and Reform Party members: Agora Cosmopolitan
BLOGS
Anti-Racist Canada Collective, A History of Violence, 1989-2011.
http://anti-racistcanada.blogspot.ca/2011/10/history-of-violence-1989-2011.html
Elisa Hategan, Incognito Press. Old Habits Die Hard: The Dubious Adventures of Grant Bristow, or How CSIS Taught Me Everything I Know About Phone Hacking
UPDATED APRIL 2017 – From my website: http://elisahategan.com/press_clips
Documentary / Television Media
The Montel Williams show, Season 2, Episode 62: “I’m a Racist”. Nov 3, 1992. Appeared on Montel along with White Aryan Resistance leader John Metzger. Represented the new, young female face of Canada’s Heritage Front.
White Pine Pictures, “Hearts Of Hate: The Battle For Young Minds”. Peter Raymont, 1995.
It’s About Time, VISION TV. “Racism, Sexism and Belonging.” Sadia Zaman, October 5, 1994.
CBC, The Fifth Estate, October 4, 1994.
CTV National – dozens of footage clips across 1993-1995, including a 3-part series that aired on CTV National News in 1994.
CBC (Canadian Broadcasting Corporation) – assorted interviews and footage clips between 1993-1995.
CityTV news – assorted interviews and footage clips between 1993-1995.
CTV Toronto, Ottawa, Montreal – assorted interviews and footage clips between 1993-1995.
Books / Journals / Periodicals / Government Publications
Kinsella, Warren. “Web of Hate: Inside Canada’s Far-Right Network.” Harper Collins 1994.
Hategan, Elisa. “Race Traitor: The True Story of Canadian Intelligence’s Greatest Cover-Up.” Incognito Press, 2014.
Parliamentary Evidence transcript, House of Commons 1995 – transcript of Elisa Hategan’s testimony in the House of Commons to a Senate Subcommittee on National Defence about the illegal actions of CSIS agent and Heritage Front co-founder Grant Bristow.
Newspapers / Magazines / Assorted Media Coverage 1992 – 2017
Mendleson, Rachel. “Former white supremacist probes the personal roots of hatred.” Toronto Star, May 5, 2015.
Mendleson, Rachel. “Timeline: Elisa Hategan’s Journey” Toronto Star, 2015.
Hategan, Elisa. “Confessions of a Teenage Neo-Nazi: How I Became a Heritage Front Poster Girl.” Canadian Jewish News, July 21, 2016.
Brean, Joseph. “How Neo-Nazis are using attractive young women to boost their movement.” National Post, DailyMirror.uk. December 22, 2016.
News Staff, CityNews. “Alleged Toronto neo-Nazi publication expands west, pestering downtowners.” CityTV, March 16, 2016.
Stirile ProTV. “Povestea necunoscuta a romancei care i-a invins pe neo-nazistii din Canada.” [in Romanian]
One People’s Project. Interview: ‘Race Traitor’ author Elisa Hategan. Wednesday, 18 March 2015.
Anti-Racist Canada. “A History of Violence, 1989-2011“.
Incognito Press. “Journey to Judaism: The Day I Became A Jew“. Aug 10, 2015
Incognito Press. “Old Habits Die Hard: The Dubious Adventures of Grant Bristow, or How CSIS Taught Me Everything I Know About Phone Hacking”
Scholars from the Underground, “Book Review: Race Traitor“. April 2014.
Samita Sarkar. “Race Traitor Author Elisa Hategan Talks Gov. Conspiracies, Forgiveness and Her Next Memoir.” Blossoms Writing, Nov. 2016.
Sarkar, Samita. “Self-Publishing: An Insult to the Written Word or a Boon to the Industry?” Huffington Post, January 3, 2017.
Sarick, Lila. “Limmud 2017 Highlights Programming for Young People“. Canadian Jewish News, March 6, 2017.
Lungen, Paul. “Indigo Pulls Pro-Hitler and Holocaust-Denial Books from Virtual Shelf.” Canadian Jewish News, March 10, 2017.
On the Prowl Magazine – insert clippings / links here.
The Globe and Mail, “Hotlines to Homelands: A Trip Through the Far Right.” February 8, 1993.
Small, Peter. “Charges Laid after Leaflets Called Racist Distributed.” Toronto Star, February 1993.
Dunphy, Bill. “Hate Group Teen Boss Out on Bail.” February 1993.
Dunphy, Bill. “Racist to Fight Hate Charge.” Toronto Sun, Aug. 12, 1993.
Dunphy, Bill. “Neo-Nazi Member Defects.” Toronto Sun, Nov 1993.
Canadian Press. “Racists Burned House, Defector Says.” Kitchener-Waterloo Record, December 13, 1993.
Dunphy, Bill. “Turncoat spied on racist group,” Toronto Sun, 16 March 1994.
Dunphy, Bill. “Ex-racist’s despair,” Toronto Sun, 17 March 1994.
Platiel, Rudy. “Front Lawyers Seeking to Testify at Hearing.” Globe and Mail, March 19, 1994.
Dunphy, Bill. “Some Time Spent with Hatred: She was a Rising Star in the RacistHeritage Front.” March 19, 1994.
Dunphy, Bill. “Cop Faces Charge.” Toronto Sun, December 16, 1993.
Winsor, Hugh. “Toronto Police Officer Linked to Neo-Nazis,” Globe and Mail, June 14, 1995.
Deverell, John. “Metro Constable Facing Charges“. Toronto Star, December 17, 1993. involving metro Toronto cop member of HF
Swanson, Gail. “Fire guts rights activist’s house”. Toronto Star, 92-11-09. involving arson of Jewish community leader’s home
Salot, Jeff, Henry Hess. “Memo leaker questions CSIS conduct,” Globe and Mail, 27 Aug. 1994.
Platiel, Rudy. “Front Played Dirty, Court Told.” Globe and Mail, 17 March 1994.
Platiel, Rudy. “Front Tried to Thwart Agency, Court Told,” Globe and Mail, 16 March 1994.
Platiel, Rudy. “Commission to Oppose Testimony.” Globe and Mail, March 22, 1994.
Pazzano, Sam. “Racist Quick Switch Described.” Toronto Sun, March 22, 1994.
Platiel, Rudy. “Heritage Front Founder Convicted.” The Globe and Mail, June 1994.
Gombu, Phinjo. “Heritage Hotline ‘Fanatics’ Convicted.” Toronto Star, 1994.
Dunphy, Bill. “Guilty of Contempt: Racists Set for Jail Time.” Toronto Sun, 1994.
Wilkes, Jim. “Heritage Front leader, Two Members Jailed.” Toronto Star, June 23, 1994.
Platiel, Rudy. “Three White Supremacists Jailed,” The Globe and Mail, June 23, 1994.
Oakes, Gary “Woman’s hate-crime charges withdrawn,” Toronto Star, 24 Jun 1994.
Dunphy, Bill. “Teen’s Hate Charges Dropped.” Toronto Sun, June 24, 1994.
Globe and Mail. “Crown Withdraws Hatred Charges.” June 24, 1994.
Sattin, Amy. “Neo-Nazi Leader, Followers to Spend Summer in Jail.” Canadian Jewish News, June 30, 1994.
Dunphy, Bill. ” STIR IT UP. Spy Unmasked: CSIS Informant ‘Founding Father’ of White Racist Group,” Toronto Sun, 14 Aug. 1994.
Pelletier, James. “Ex neo-Nazi Comes Out: Elisse Hategan” Now Magazine,
Cal Millar and Dale Brazao. “Parliament set to probe secret actions of CSIS spy, Committee to see if Grant Bristow was a spy or racist.” Toronto Star, September 12, 1994.
Derek Ferguson, “Report ‘whitewash’ of spy agency mole.” Toronto Star, June 14, 1995
Dunphy, Bill. “CSIS Mole Fuelled Hate.” Toronto Sun, June 1995.
The Canadian press. “Heritage Front Defector Accuses CSIS of CoverUp.” Ottawa Citizen, June 14, 1995.
Toronto Sun, October 1995 MPs rip Bristow spying scandal: CSIS broke the law, leaked report says”
Clayton Ruby, Fighting racism going out of fashion. Toronto Star, December 13, 1995
Toronto Star, September 10, 1994. “Exclusive: CSIS spy snapped in Libya: Portrait of the vanishing spy: Grant Bristow was a man with great contacts and plenty of money to spend.”
Dale Brazao, “Star finds Grant Bristow”, Toronto Star, Apr 20, 1995.
Grant Bristow’s hit list of people to be targeted for stalking and harassment:
Posted in activism, canada, cbc, csis, history, media, news, ontario, politics, press, racism, truth, writer, writing | Tagged: activism, anti-racism, book, cbc, corruption, csis, edmonton, espionage, grant bristow, heritage front, memoir, nathan black, racism, rape, sexual assault, spy, toronto, toronto star, toronto sun, truth | 10 Comments »
RACE TRAITOR: The True Story of CSIS’ Greatest Cover-up – Official Press Release
Posted by E on March 28, 2014
Available in e-book format only at Kobo and Amazon.
RACE TRAITOR:The True Story of Canadian Intelligence Service’s Greatest Cover-Up is the visceral true story of a teenage girl who becomes entangled in Canada’s most powerful white supremacist group, the Heritage Front – a domestic terrorist group later revealed to have been created and funded with the assistance of Canada’s spy agency, Canadian Security and Intelligence Service (CSIS).
To sixteen-year old runaway Elisse, the new friends she encounters in the secretive Heritage Front are the family she’s never had. They feed her when she’s hungry, watch her back, and Wolfgang Droege, one of the group’s charismatic leaders, introduces her to a trusted friend, notorious Holocaust denier Ernst Zundel, who provides her with shelter and work.
In less than a year, Elisse evolves into an extremist groomed for a leadership role in the far-right movement. Her loyalty earns her the attention and tutelage of Grant Bristow, co-founder of the Heritage Front, who is training a secret faction of skinheads and neo-Nazis in information-gathering and terror tactics targeting political opponents. Rapidly drawn into their web of hatred, Elisse witnesses an escalating campaign of terror from which there seems no way out.
Forced to confront her sexual orientation and secret heritage, Elisse realizes that she must fight back. But when she attempts to shut down the vicious organization that had brainwashed her and terrorized innocent Canadians, she learns that a darker force is behind the façade of the Heritage Front: Canada’s own spy agency, backed by the government that was supposed to protect her.
A CSIS cover-up has just begun.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
At age 16, Elisa Hategan was an alienated runaway who became recruited into Canada’s most powerful white supremacist movement, the Heritage Front. She was groomed by top leaders to become a rising star of the extremist far-right movement. An errand girl for notorious Holocaust denier Ernst Zundel, she was a witness to the illicit activities of an undercover CSIS agent and co-founder of the Heritage Front. At age 18, she turned against the group and spied on them for several months before testifying in court and going into hiding.
Posted in activism, canada, crime, csis, news, politics, press, press release, racism, toronto | Tagged: agent provocateur, canada, csis, Elisse Hategan, espionage, grant bristow, heritage front, new book, politics, press release, racism | Leave a Comment »
Is traditional publishing the new vanity publishing?
Posted by E on August 27, 2012
Normally I don’t tend to highlight articles, even some of the juicy controversy surrounding Amazon vs the Apple, Big Six et al collusion. But this is far too interesting not to share with you folks.
This article written by Bernard Starr, professor at CUNY, came out this past week in The Huffington Post, and as I read it my neck started cramping from all the nodding in agreement that it provoked. Yes, I too have had friends who have shelved viable manuscripts because agents or publishers refused to look at them, instead of trying to make a commercial profit from something that had taken them lots of sweat, time (in some cases, years) and grief to write. Even when confronted with the reality of being able to both monetize your career AND reach a willing audience, many of my writer friends have decided to “hold out” for a publisher – and admitted that they just wanted to be published by a trad press, period – even if their print run was in the hundreds and they never saw a dime.
This is absurd.
It’s time to peel back the blindfold and look reality in the eye. No matter which side of the publishing precipice you happen to fall on, this article will give you a lot of food for thought. Yes, it’s provocative and may rub some readers the wrong way, but if it wasn’t controversial would you be reading it? And just in case the Huffington Post page disappears or gets archived, as it so oftens in online journalism, I’m going to reproduce it here.
The old vanity publishing offered authors who could not attract the interest of a traditional publisher an opportunity to get their books published. The process was costly and often required that the author purchase large quantities of books. According to legend, garages throughout America are warehousing these dust-gathering volumes. Some so-called vanity books were written by competent writers who just couldn’t find a way into the mainstream; others were exercises in ego building — the books were sold or given away free to family members, friends and colleagues. These authors were willing to pay the price to boast, “I’m a published author.”
Commentators on the current upheaval in publishing have observed that many authors desperately seek a traditional publisher when self-publishing would serve them far better. Traditional publishing has thus become, in many instances, the vanity choice. Does it make sense?
The new world of self-publishing has little in common with the old vanity publishing, but for many writers it still bears the taint of vanity. Self-publishing has not only democratized publishing, it has opened up the opportunity for authors to publish at low or no cost, own all the rights, control the pricing and timetable for publishing, and get their books listed for sale and distribution on major outlets and platforms — e.g. Amazon, kindle, nook, other e-readers, Google and more. Royalties for self-published books can range from thirty to eighty percent (depending on ancillary services that are selected) compared to the 71/2 to 15 percent in traditional publishing. And if you are adept at Internet marketing, you can reach large targeted audiences for your books.
Fact is that authors no longer need a publisher. And more and more writers are awakening to the realization that if you are not a high-profile author who can command large sales, a traditional publisher will do little for you beyond editing and printing your book. While it’s true that they will also distribute it to the waning number of brick-and-mortar bookstores — self-published books are not usually available in bookstores — the number that actually land on the shelves is surprisingly small. And the argument that self-published books are not widely reviewed in mainstream publications loses steam when you realize that only a tiny percent of traditionally published books are reviewed at all. Add to that the growing number of prestigious venues that now review self-published books. Publishers Weekly devotes a quarterly supplement to reviews of self-published books and Kirkus Reviews, as well, offers self- published authors the opportunity to have their books independently reviewed. Then there are companies springing up like Blue Inc., where self-published authors can pay a small fee for unbiased reviews that are posted on the web.
Can you count on a traditional publisher to substantially market your book? A prominent literary agent recently told me that unless an author receives a hefty advance of $100,000 or more most publishers will do virtually no promotion, leaving it to authors to create and exploit their own platforms via social media and networking connections, workshops and webcasts. So when you go the traditional-publishing route, you may well find yourself self-publishing without the benefits of self-publishing.
Yet many writers who would do just fine with self-publishing — and build a following — still refuse that choice; they continue to pursue a” real publisher.” My friend Mike (not his real name — I don’t want to embarrass him) has been sitting on a completed non-fiction manuscript for the last three years while going through several agents and running the manuscript past numerous editors. They all agreed that he’s an outstanding writer, but publishers rejected his manuscript because he doesn’t have a platform or relevant credentials for his current book. Mike says he would be happy to publish with any traditional publisher, even if this meant a small print run, no publicity and high pricing. The fact that his sales are likely to be low — thus creating a bad “track record” when he goes to publish another book — hasn’t deterred him from the wish to have a “name” publisher’s imprint.
I finally realized that Mike was representative of the new quest for vanity publishing. These writers are willing to forego the benefits of self-publishing for the unshakable belief in the “prestige” of signing on with a “real publisher.”
If Mike would shed his prejudice, he couldn’t help but notice that an increasing number of successful traditionally published authors are choosing to self-publish. Barry Eisler’s rejection of a $500,000 advance to self-publish has encouraged other writers to take a fresh look at self-publishing. Amanda Hocking’s phenomenal success with self- publishing has had a similar effect.
And Mike should listen to Theresa Ragan’s story. For nineteen years she was mostly a stay-at-home mom raising four children — all the while penning romance novels. But she got nowhere with a few agents and was turned down over a hundred times by publishers. Although she knew about self-publishing she dismissed it as a vanity club. In 2010, while surfing the web for a job to help pay the bills, she stumbled on an article by a successful self-published author which prompted her to give it a shot (“what do I have to lose?”). She hooked up with CreateSpace, the self-publishing arm of Amazon.com and self -published her first book in March 2011 in both paperback and e-book formats. Within the first two months she was stunned by the sale of over two thousand copies — and the sales continued to rise. To date, she has self-published four romance and two thriller novels with sales exceeding three hundred and fifty thousand copies. Theresa expects to cross the million dollar mark in royalties by March 2013. And the good news doesn’t stop there. Several top-line publishers are pursuing her.Thomas and Mercer, Amazon’s “traditional” mystery and thriller line, will now republish her two thrillers. In my interview with Theresa Ragan on August 21, 2012, she said that prior to venturing into self-publishing, “I would have gratefully signed with any traditional publisher with no advance and a six percent royalty.” Lucky for Theresa that all the publishers passed on her.
A. J. McDonald, communications manager at Lulu, another leading self-publishing company, related similar success stories. Lulu has also attracted five formerly traditionally published bestselling authors who are now self-publishing and still making the best seller lists — with greater royalties and total control of all the rights.
Will the bulk of self-published authors match Theresa Ragan’s spectacular success? Of course not — and many don’t even have that intention. If you do, you must first write a marketable book, one that will appeal to easily identified readers. In fiction, that often means mystery, suspense, and romance; so-called literary fiction tends to do less well, since the audience is much smaller. In the nonfiction world, books on subjects with a niche market — cooking, nature, hobbies, music, spirituality and travel, to name just a few — fare best. But regardless of your topic or the size of your potential readership, the new world of publishing offers an unprecedented and unlimited opportunity to forge your own destiny.
First- time authors and those struggling to find a publisher should seriously consider self-publishing. Keep in mind that self-publishing does not close the door on traditional publishing. Agents and publishers are cherry- picking successful self-published books for traditional publishing. And when they do they will roll out the red carpet, offer an advance and a marketing plan — a different experience than a hundred rejections.
Think about how much you are willing to sacrifice for a “real publisher.” Is the “prestige” of a traditional publisher’s imprint mostly illusory in the context of the new world of publishing? Ask what traditional publishing will do for you in the long run if you don’t get effective distribution and publicity. Which platform is more likely to bring you sizable sales? Which will help you build a large following for marketing future publications? These are critical questions that deserve serious attention, especially if you are planning a career in writing.
Posted in press, publishing, revolution, thoughts, writer, writing | Tagged: article, huffington post, publishing, self-publishing | Leave a Comment »
Alice in Writerland
Posted by E on June 4, 2012
PRESS RELEASE
For Immediate Release
June 4, 2012
Toronto, Ontario
Incognito Press announces the publication of ALICE IN WRITERLAND: A WRITER’S ADVENTURES IN THE UGLY WORLD OF PUBLISHING, written by local author Elisa Hategan.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Elisa Hategan is the Romanian-Canadian author of RACE TRAITOR, a debut novel based on her experiences inside a terrorist group, which won a Toronto Arts Council award, an Ontario Arts council grant, and a Canada Arts Council work-in-progress award, as well as qualified as semi-finalist in the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Contest.
ABOUT THE BOOK
ALICE IN WRITERLAND is a heartbreaking, candid and scathing indictment of the publishing industry and the personal sacrifices involved in the pursuit of success. Much more than a shocking exposé of unprofessional behavior in the literary world, however, this is a memoir that transcends into an intense exploration of what it means to be an artist.
If you could have anything you wanted, would you sell your soul for it?
ALICE IN WRITERLAND provides a shocking inside view of a world where pompous literary agents, sleazy managers and high-priced creative writing workshops have created an industry that is less interested in pursuing talent and more concerned with ripping off hopeful writers.
If following your dreams meant giving up everything you held dear, would you still do it?
Elisa Hategan started out as a debt-ridden poet who knew absolutely nothing about the publishing industry. On a whim, she applied for and won a scholarship to a prestigious creative writing program. Within a year she had transformed from complete newbie to professional writer, winning multiple art grants and being accepted to the most prestigious MFA program in the country. Better yet, she had the perfect agent and a manuscript that caught the attention of a Big Six publisher.
And then, somewhere along the way, it all went terribly wrong.
Elisa Hategan’s Alice in Writerland: A Writer’s Adventures in the Ugly World of Publishing is the heartbreaking and ultimately triumphant story of one woman’s attempt to make it as an author, all the while trying to figure out what that really means in the 21st century.
Posted in artist, books, canada, canadian literature, culture, depression, freedom, inspiration, life, literature, manuscript, media, MFA, news, perseverence, press, press release, publishing, writer, writing | Tagged: agent, expose, literary agent, memoir, MFA, press release, publishing, writer, writing | 6 Comments »