1990s Anti-Gay Motorcycle Club Resurfaces To Protest Drag Events

Peter Smith
Canadian Anti-Hate Network

Source: Telegram

While more often talked about for its culture, coastline and housing costs, British Columbia is lesser known for its biker clubs.

This lesser-discussed heritage was quietly on display during a recent protest outside of a Kelowna library event for children that included a drag performer. Reports place the total crowd at around 200 people, with a small minority gathered to voice their objections to the event and most attendees there to support and protect the event’s performers and attendees. 

Waving signs and slogans, the protest resembles similar events that have been taking place throughout the country. Like many of these other events, counter-protesters have been essential in not just allowing the events to continue but in drowning out the chants and blocking the signs of the anti-drag and transphobic protesters. 

In attendance, often shown shouting at the counter-protesters, draped in a red, yellow and black biker cut reading “Sons of Thunder,” was David Weiche.

David Weiche (center) flanked by other members of the Sons Of Thunder MC. Source: Telegram
 

Weiche is the founder of Bikers Against Pedophiles, a protest group he founded in 1997 and revived earlier this year. 

“We’re here to stop the grooming of children by the transgender agenda,” Weiche told a Castanet reporter, on Saturday. 

In another video shot of the event, he holds a placard featuring a bruised and injured child’s face. The back contains text explaining the graphic image and injuries are the results of “sodomy” and rape. Weiche tells a reporter he is not attending because he “dislikes” transgender people. 

“We dislike that a majority are going after our children.”

The equating of 2SLGBTQ+ people with pedophiles has long been a tactic of those who oppose equal rights for the community. Effective and baseless, recent efforts to tie all-ages drag shows – which do not feature adult content, and instead include reading children's books in bright costumes – with adult drag events that take place in age-restricted venues and can involve sexual content.

There has been a rash of protests against all-ages events in both the US and Canada that involve drag performers and children, with far-right protesters.

Listed by Kelowna Capital News as an “organizer” of the protest against the event, Weiche begins the interview by telling the reporter, “call me Concrete Dave.”

However “Concrete Dave” and his group Bikers Against Pedophiles (BAP) have a long history of activity, and making headlines, in Canada – but not for anything to do with children. 

In the 1990s and early 2000s, the group only ever received minimal coverage outside of London, Ont, where it held protests in tandem with the city’s annual Pride event. According to recent posts online, Weiche claims the group disbanded in 2006, the same year as another significant event in Canadian biker history. 

Wayne Kellestine, previously identified as part of Bikers Against Pedophiles and a close friend of Weiche, was convicted of killing eight other members of the Bandidos Motorcycle Club in 2006 in what is now called the Shedden Massacre. Both men were members of the Bandidos at the time. Weiche was described by one biker as Kellestine’s “right-hand man.” 

Update: Since publication, Weiche denies that Kellestine was a member of BAP, stating the protest group did not have official membership. He did not respond to questions about Kellestine's specific involvement with BAP's public activities.

Picture of “Concrete” Dave Weiche from his time as a member of the Bandidos MC. Source: The Bandidos Massacre

The Bandidos are a 1% motorcycle club founded in the 1960s. The “1%er” title indicates they self-identify as an outlaw club, separating them from other MCs or “Riding Clubs” (RCs) who might look similar, but are more often simply motorcycle enthusiasts. 

Weiche relocated to Winnipeg several months before the killings, which one witness testified had been ordered by the Bandidos’ worldwide leadership within the United States. 

Since its beginnings, BAP has been accused of equating homosexuality with pedophilia, holding annual protests outside of London, Ont, Pride events. Now, it appears BAP is doing much of the same with drag performers and transgender people. Not to be confused with other similarly titled organizations like Bikers Against Child Abuse, who previously organized to escort American abuse victims to and from court appearances, BAP has long failed to maintain the thin veneer of child protection it uses to hide its prejudice. 

In the 1990s and early 2000s, the expressed goal of BAP was to strengthen laws against child abuse, however, to accomplish this task, they staged protests that targeted London’s Pride parades. The following passage from the book “Bandido Massacre: A True Story Of Bikers, Brotherhood And Betrayal,” by Peter Edwards, helped fill in the feelings of fellow Bandidos on the subject:

There is an understanding that a one percenter club shouldn't get involved in any political cause, unless it was something that directly affects them, like motorcycle helmet laws. The idea is that they are supposed to be freedom-loving rebels, not bigots who try to impose their values on others. The Greater Toronto Area Bandidos worried that things like the Pride Parade debacle only destroyed whatever mystique they might have built up, and would inevitably make them targets of jokes themselves. "It makes you look like small-town hillbillies," one former Toronto area Bandido grumbled. "If you keep your mouth shut, you keep some mystique.”

Weiche also has a family connection to other extremist movements in Canada. Besides his own previous affiliations, he is the son of Martin K. Weiche, a German immigrant and business owner in Ontario who fought for Adolf Hitler’s regime during the Second World War. 

After emigrating to Canada, he ran unsuccessfully in a federal election as a “National Socialist'' in the 1960s. The elder Weiche eventually became known for the large swastika that he cultivated at the edge of his Ontario property, hosting Ku Klux Klan cross burnings, and styling the interior to look like Hitler’s mountain retreat. 

Kelowna Library Draws A Crowd

The recent protest in Kelowna drew particular attention after a Change.org petition started by mortgage broker Laurie Baird was removed from the site. In the run-up to the library protests, far-right group Action4Canada decided to host a petition themselves. Since-deleted social media posts identify a woman named Laurie Baird as the Kelowna leader of A4C.

The petition targeted the performer running the story event, Freida Whales. The petition went as far as to include contact information for the Kelowna mayor, city council and RCMP Integrated Child Exploitation Unit.

“If the Mayor and Council choose to support this event, or similar future events, they may be found criminally liable for facilitating the exploitation of minors,” the call to action reads on Action4Canada’s website. “Should the library decide to go ahead with this event further action will be pursued to defund the library, as I do not want my hard-earned money supporting the exploitation of children.”

A Christian Nationalist organization, Action4Canada’s website indulges in a varying spread of conspiracies, that includes subjects like 5G Technology, which they say attacks innocent bystander’s cells; political Islam, a subversive and secretive political cabal supported by Justin Trudeau to launder in authoritarianism, and repeated attacks against LGBTQ+ communities, who they allege are part of a global network of child abusers. 

Like others opposing the Kelowna drag storytime, A4C has chosen to focus on a series of short lipsyncing music videos created by the performer, accusing Whales of promoting murder and cannibalism. The video – currently behind a user-requested age restriction and labelled with a content warning – does involve elements of camp horror, and was part of a Halloween series.

Ahead of the protest, Weiche promoted the event on his Telegram page, where he goes under the name “Canadian Dave.” While Weiche is not the only administrator of the channel, which has made numerous posts attacking transgender people as pedophiles, several messages are signed “Dave” with even more bearing a digital watermark attributing the posts to him. 

The Telegram channel also includes references painting Jewish people as the architects of a global pedophilic cabal, while also promoting well-worn historical inaccuracies like the Khazar origin myth. This theory supposes a large kingdom of Turkish-speaking refugees adopted Judaism, and are the ancestors of present-day Ashkenazi Jews. While sometimes incorporated into actual academic studies, more often than not the story of the Khazar conversion has become a way to separate Jewish people from their roots.

Some posts within the channel paint the federal government as Nazis, while others maintain that the Holocaust never happened. 

Other posts also include references to both BAP and Sons Of Thunder. Weiche’s contact information is also listed several times on the site, often printed on posters that relate to attempted protests and rallies. 

Beyond blatant homophobia, transphobia and antisemitism, the site makes numerous references to the QAnon belief system. 

David Weiche confirmed his attendance at the protests and maintains that he is an advocate for children. Since being contacted several posts about CAHN have appeared on his Telegram channel. 

“We went to the library in Kelowna BC and stood against the evil ones going after our children,” a post on the same channel reads. “Twelve God directed souls against 180-200 souls. Of which I believe about 2/3rds of that group were misled and under a spell.” 

This article was updated to include comments from David Weiche and for clarification.