Time to get serious... 

In the last few weeks I have been in some intense discussions with some people here on FB. To be very clear: as a writer of fiction this is not in my economic and commercial interest. But I am not only a writer of fiction, also a writer of scientific work re. genocide, exclusion, the genocidal process etc,. But besides all that I feel it is my moral obligation in these turbelent times to raise my voice and stick to the facts. (Mind you, not unfounded opinions.) These discussion often are followed by personal attacks. (In one discussion I have been called a racist, a narcisist and other insulting comments aprox. 17x.) These discussions always follow the same patern: 1) first the dismassel of scientific and objective data, 2) calling your knowledge directly or indirectly "fake news", 3) coming with alternative sources often directly or indirectly linked with Breibart or other alt-right organizations and then 4) finally the personal attack. ("You are brainswashed by the left-wing media." "You're a leftwinger." "You're stupid", "You're a racist", "A narcisist" etc.) Mind you, as an author I am used to criticism. But this goes, as I will show below, a lot further than that.

That the discussion follow these patterns is no accident. Its playbook propaganda. And more than that: playbook discussion techniques and styles used by alt.right to silence dissident opinions.

But the organization behind that, goes even further than that. Someone contacted me this week and linked me to a closed FB profile and send me a print.screen in the process. The whole profile, or at least the printscreen I saw, was about me. And to be clear, some of the names I saw are directly linked to my "friends" here on FB or the fantasy writers community in the Netherlands. The comments that were made were both threatening in nature as well as how to undermine my comments and work. (I found out that people on purposely order books by me and don't pay and even remove their fake profile pages after that - the reason for that will become clear below.)

The reason why I write this in English is because not many of my international friends know a) how well organized alt.righ in the Netherlands is and that the organization levels are taking fascist degrees and forms, b) that some of my fiction work goes to a good cause: my royalty's goes to women who are abused by ISIS and escaped the slavery circuit. These women are in a very vulnerable position for they are both traumatized and considerd "stained" by their own communities. By giving all my royalty's to this project, I hope to help with sustainability, help with community building and help these women getting professional help for their myriad of trauma's and experiences they had to live through and endure. Hopefully, you start to see the pattern here: attacking me on all fronts is both attacking my professional standing as well as the humanitarian work I do with my books. (And I am not a writer who get big amounts of money for advances for my work etc; I do this for I believe that it is important. I do not do this for fame or acknowledgement. I have played down these aspects.) So by ordering books, playing on my goodwill and not paying for them is directly undermining my humanitarian work.

As stated: some of these people are in my "friend" group, others are writers I personally know. I am in a position now I will have to take proper action. Unfortunately it also means, due to this, I can no longer send books and get paid afterwards on trust alone. Secondly, I have some names collected now and will seek help for a legal response. These are highly organized intimidation techniques, which I will simply not bend for. You know who you are, and I know who some of you are now. The organization goes very deep and includes a myriad of people.

This is no longer innocent. It's no longer just debating or reacting on comments. The attacks are organized, planned and as stated follow a definite pattern. The aim is to silence me, undermine me and label me.I will not bend. Not to subtle threats. And I will def. not bend to the techniques used above or organized intimidations.

As stated appropiate action will be taken. But let this also be a wake-up call to others: even alt.righ in the Netherlands is very well organized. To the extent that they single out people to undermine them on all fronts.

Sincerley,

Anthonie Holslag