when I was 18 I think it was just after Lewisham during the National Front and
then it got to be tasty
was it excited yes yes you've got one thing in common you've got the same
police system same enemy as well and it was unifying it
it was Jewish people immigrants too far left
anybody who imposed a left-wing agenda plus anybody who disapprove what I was
doing them after a lifetime of involvement Kevin will Shaw is unpacking
his Nazism so what do we have here various bits and pieces and artifacts
from my past from well-known National Front organizer in the 80s to quite
supremacist groups earlier this year that was on the wall in the bedroom
Wilshire has flown the flag for a racist and homophobic world of you butcher
Randolph Hitler here tonight he says he wants to publicly disavow it all to
share secrets that fly in the face of everything he stood for there is a lot
of unpacking to do at what point did will Nazism start to be attractive to
you I was too mean about 11 years old 11 at 12 years old my father was very
right-wing and I think I took it a bit further than him because even though I
didn't get on me dad I wanted to basically emulate him to a certain
extent and father was when he wasn't knocking us about he wasn't there it's
quite quite a lot the time in his absent yeah so we didn't see much of him when
he was there he was a used to wield the rod quite severely used to get beaten
with a riding crop okay he was an ex NCO from the Royal Horse
Guards so he imagined he wasn't predisposed to wear any sort of liberal
ideas of how to bring up children and tell us about your mum she is from Roth
room he served in the 80s just after the war
and she was Jewish yes part Jewish maiden name was Benjamin we do have
Jewish blood in the family on that side what's this
that was my application form for the world Union and National Socialists I'm
of the opinion that the war against the enemies of my race the Jews needs to be
waged on a global scale to be effective when you wrote bracket the Jews were you
thinking of your mom no no but why not because because that term the Jews
you're presenting a global faceless mass of people you know you can't personalize
it you can't see an individual there that's not even your mom no and that's
the sort of generalization that results in six million people being deliberately
murdered I didn't have many friends at school and I thought that do you know
getting involved in that sort of thing would you know be there's like
comradeship that's nothing you know yeah did it give you that in the end yes
he did unfortunately you do have a sense of conjugate comradeship in that you're
a member of a group that's been attacked by other people he joined the National
Front during its heyday in the late 70s became a regional organizer in Cumbria
by 20 describe the atmosphere in this club as you describe it a lot of people
who joined when didn't like what was happening to the country they were
conservative of the small see reactionary they didn't like mass
immigration they didn't like decimalisation so that all happened a
few years before they wanted to put the clock back and then the skinhead craze
kicked off we basically got a hardcore skin it for we knew were more radical I
think than the old the oldest and then it got a bit tasty
have you ever caught anyone yes but not not not unprovoked in devine defense
this by-election in Leeds I smashed a chair of a blokes head but have you ever
walked up to a Jewish person or an immigrant and hit them no I would never
do that but I have seen instances where people have been singled out because
they're blocked by a groups of people and I just turn my stomach I just sort
of rejected that I pushed it in the back of my mind
will you carry down low with your involvement in the Nazi groups despite
that yes that is the a remarkable lack of empathy yeah I think it is how do you
how how did you manage to disconnect that your worldview the people the face
at the end of us the black face or the Jewish face basically I think I was
rejecting it because I wanted to to be long after the National Front he joined
the BNP after that became what he describes as a freelance extremist there
had been no warning flirted with dangerous fringe groups like the racial
volunteer force remembers coming across David Copeland the Brixton Soho nail
bomber Wiltshire was arrested for vandalizing a mosque in Aylesbury
in the early 90s as the far-right splintered became more and more isolated
took to social media in March just this year arrested for online race 8 offences
left with a life revolving around his keyboard and speaking at Fringe demos
but all the while Kevin Wilshire had a secret and over time that secret started
to erode away at his intolerance fact that or one or two occasions in the
recent past I've actually been the recipient of the
hatred from many people I'm what to belong to don't meet elaborate on that
see obviously if you gay it's acceptable in normal
society I mean this group of people it's not
acceptable and I found on one or two occasions where our Suspiria speed I've
been suspected of being gay I've been subject to abuse so at this
point in your life you're a Nazi that's wrong
with a Jewish background who is gay it's a contradiction his name I mean it is I
mean at what point did the sort of irony klaxon go off in your head difficult to
say he's been going off off for quite a while it's a terribly selfish thing to
say when it's true I saw people being abused shouted out
you know spat at in the street it's not until he's directed at you that you
suddenly realize that what you doing is wrong so all of that camaraderie and
that sense of community you were looking for is ultimately hollow because of who
you are their whole relationship with May the whole acceptance of me is false
isn't it the National Front campaigned on a very lonely anti gay rights
platform but Kevin Wilshire wasn't the only one able to compartmentalize
exceptions this is the strange thing about it because it has always being
part of the narrative of the racial nationalist movement but it's been
contradicted by the fact you had people like Marty and Webster leaving the
National Front it was overtly gay and nobody could see the contradiction it
had an overtly game national activities organized leading a homophobic
organisation doesn't make any sense and then he got somebody like Nikki crane
but with the hardest person I've ever met
who was gay I first had sex with a man when I was 26 and yet even when people
found out he was gay they're rationalized it's um I think all you
either he's not really gay or we you know he's gay but he's okay and I mean
the reason is they didn't say anything Rhaenys he would have killed them
earlier this year Wilshire reached out to an old ex National Front activist do
you believe this sort of road to Damascus decisions don't I've done it
myself Matthew Collins now works for the
anti-fascist group hope not hate one of things that we noticed in Kevin from say
2015 I think when his mother passed away we noticed that there was someone who
was struggling and was having real real deep and dark issues and if anything we
noticed he became more and more extreme so we almost as we do in these
situations we expect the phone call we expect the cry for help and that's
basically what he's done Kevin Wilshaw is publicly rejecting his Nazism for the
first time coming out publicly for the first time as well so why I feel
appalling me guilty as well I really do feel guilty do you yes not only that I
think that this is also a barrier between me having a relationship with my
old family and I want a jet chase and it get rid of it it's just doing what
you'll wait what changed your mind why are you sitting here in front of us
doing this interview all to do some do some damage to the people who were
propagating this sort of rubbish I want to hurt them I want to do I want to show
what it's like to actually live a lie and be on the receiving end of this sort
of propaganda I want to actually hurt them will there be old comrades of yours
watching this interview wanting to get revenge or yeah one or two would
actually want to sort me to put it in there yeah why did say is betrayal are
you worried that as a result of doing this interview and all you'll be alone
yes you say the things with with this sort of organization there are some
good people in it really genuine sincere people who are wrong it can be genuine
insincere and be wrong at the same time there's also people in it were excellent
scumbags and they make up a sizable amount it psychopaths
people who like violence people who just hate people for being different
ayoung got a finally difficult granted to actually fill a void that's before
keeping occupied my life since I was a child basically
you