Comedy Trio with White Nationalist Connections Face Canceled Shows

Dan Collen

From left to right: Brendan “Uncle Hack” Blacquier, Brett Forte, and Sam Walker.
Source: Danger Cats Comedy

When family members of serial killer Robert Pickton’s – a serial rapist and murderer who predominantly targeted vulnerable Indigenous women – victims found out about shirts joking about “hookery” smoked bacon, mocking how those women died, they were incensed.

Palexelsiya Lorelei Williams, first cousin of Tanya Holyk, one of Pickton’s many victims, told Global News, “For them to refer to my cousin as a flavour… I wanted to puke because they’re mocking it.” 

The incident has since garnered comedians Brett Forte, Sam Walker, and Brendan “Uncle Hack” Blacquier, who make up the “Danger Cats” comedy troupe, more attention, as comedy clubs began cancelling stops on their tour. The shirt has now been removed from the Danger Cats webstore.

On the Danger Cats podcast, the men have claimed that a porn operation was a “Jewish psyop (psychological operation).” Members of the trio have also complained about losing comedy opportunities in favour of “trans and gay and women.”

Blacquier has used public “Uncle Hack” social media pages to share Holocaust denial memes, memes referring to himself as racist, and images which accuse 2SLGBTQ+ people of “diddlin’ kids.” 

Danger Cats also has a history of involvement with the Diagolon movement, a white nationalist, militant accelerationist network which takes its name from a tongue-in-cheek meme created by the movement’s founder, Canadian white supremacist Jeremy MacKenzie. Members of the Danger Cats frequently promote media from other openly hateful Diagolon members, including neo-Nazi Alex “Ferryman” Vriend, a self-professed member of a white-only Active Club under American neo-Nazi Robert Rundo’s Will2Rise movement. 

Blacquier has appeared with Vriend on live streams, and all three members of the Danger Cats appeared in a Diagolon live stream fundraiser for legal fees incurred by MacKenzie related to a series of accusations that included assault and weapons charges. Besides Danger Cats, the stream also boasted appearances from American Holocaust denier Ryan Dawson and Tyler Russell, a white nationalist streamer who held antisemitic publicity stunts on college campuses. 

The troupe has even shared the stage with Dan Sleno, an associate of the now-defunct white nationalist group Canada First and a supporter of Rundo’s Active Clubs. According to Sleno, he was scheduled to perform as a set opener at Danger Cats comedy shows in London, Ontario and in Orangeville last year. Diagolon livestreamer Greg Wycliffe has also claimed to have opened for the troupe at a show in Barrie.

From left to right: Sam Walker, Brendan “Uncle Hack” Blacquier, Derek Harrison, Pete “ToFu TV” Sorrenti, Alex Vriend, and Dan Sleno performing a Diagolon salute. Source: Telegram/ToFuTV

According to The Global Project Against Hate and Extremism (GPAHE), Diagolon has “recently expanded its real-life activities and is growing its online community, drawing thousands of followers into its increasingly radical and dangerous beliefs.” GPAHE noted that “this change is incredibly worrying given MacKenzie’s previous gun-related arrests and Diagolon’s connection to a plot to murder members of law enforcement.” Since then, Mackenzie has defended and praised neo-Nazi groups, including Australian Thomas Sewell’s National Socialist Network. 

In the Danger Cats podcast discussing Diagolon, Blacquier praised MacKenzie “for getting this ball rolling and finding people with like-minded thoughts.”

On official “Uncle Hack” social media pages, Blacquier is open about his personal beliefs. In one post to Telegram, Blacquier posted a news headline stating 85% of Americans believe at least one antisemitic trope, remarking, “Only? Come on America, you’re better than that,” followed by an image which said “You gotta pump those numbers up, those are rookie numbers.” In another, he posts a meme depicting Ricky from Trailer Park Boys as a Holocaust denier, with the character saying “All I said was six million sounds a bit off” and referring to Auschwitz as “awwshits.” 

In addition to promoting racist content, Danger Cats often mocks trans people for their appearances, misgenders and deadname trans people, and has even likened 2SLGBTQIA+ people to pedophiles. On Telegram, Blacquier once posted “Happy Pride Month” alongside a meme of “Buffalo Bill,” a cross-dressing serial killer character from Silence of the Lambs.
 

Cancellations
 

Danger Cats are no stranger to cancellations, most notoriously over accusations of anti-Indigenous racism. Vancouver’s House of Comedy cancelled a Danger Cats show planned for March 24 following a viral petition over the racist t-shirt, which included an illustration of Pickton and Sam Walker smiling and fistbumping with bacon in their hands.

On the Danger Cats podcast, Sam Walker blamed the cancellations on “sheer Bolshevism” (a reference to an antisemitic conspiracy theory) and “government-appointed” actors. Walker promoted a claim that Pickton was only a “fall guy” in relation to murders pinned on him: “that place (Pickton’s farm) was a body dump for the whole lower mainland to get rid of there, whoever ran afoul of the powers that be. And William Pickton, he was the fall guy.” 

He repeatedly claimed activists opposing the troupe’s shows were paid by a “Communist” government and that, “once the revolution happens, these are the first people to be executed, 100 percent.”

On February 27, Blacquier posted a message on behalf of “Danger Cats Comedy” that the group was “removing” several shows from their ongoing tour, including a planned show at Vancouver’s House of Comedy on March 24. The troupe claimed that “for the exception of Yuk Yuk’s Winnipeg, every venue has stood behind us but now we’re making the decision to stand behind them [sic]” and cited concerns over “arson, vandalism, and threats of bodily harm” However, The House of Comedy told CTV that the venue itself had cancelled Danger Cats’ show, directly contradicting the Troupe’s statement.

Weeks earlier, a Danger Cats show was cancelled after on-stage anti-Indigenous jokes were brought to the attention of Yuk Yuk’s Comedy Club in Fort Garry Hotel’s Club Room in Winnipeg. A clip posted to Facebook by a Winnipeg-based Indigenous comedian shows Blacquier, who appears to be reading a joke from his smartphone on stage, saying “They say the body is a temple, but in (name of a woman)’s case, it’s more like an unmarked grave. She spit out more potential children than a dig site at a residential school.”

Blacquier posted a video mocking an activist interviewed on CityTV news about their cancellation and complained that “bored women, that’s who cause the most noise.” In the official Danger Cats’ chat room – a Telegram group of 68 members which is moderated by all three members of the troupe – Blacquier’s sentiment was echoed by their fans. A chat room member with a swastika profile picture and 88 in their name (88 is common shorthand for “Heil Hitler”), posted “Just bored women” alongside what they believed to be information about an activist who spoke against Danger Cats, tagging Blacquier’s Telegram account in their post. Blacquier posted a direct reply to the user with more screenshots of the woman’s social media.

In fact, several active users of Danger Cats’ chat room promote neo-Nazism. One of the most active users – whose username is a direct reference to "gassing" Jewish people, and includes a slur for Jewish people, as well as the number 14, a common numeric neo-Nazi shorthand – has taken to the forum to claim that AIDS “cures N****rism.” Another active user used Nazi Germany’s Hoheitszeichen, an eagle perched on a swastika, as their display picture. While not especially busy (the chat room only has 23 messages and fewer than a dozen active members, including Blacquier himself, since February), none of the Danger Cats’ comedians have appeared to reduce or discourage the chat room’s neo-Nazi users and explicitly hateful posts.

The Canadian Anti-Hate Network confirmed that a Danger Cats show scheduled for March 17 at the Comedy Cave in Calgary has been cancelled. In a statement provided by email, the Comedy Cave said, “The show has been cancelled and we no longer have any association with the group.” 

Yuk Yuk’s founder and CEO Mark Breslin said that he does not plan to stop booking Danger Cats at Yuk Yuk’s comedy clubs.

Despite the cancellations, certain venues, including Yuk Yuk’s Toronto and the Vic Juba Community Theatre in Lloydminster, Alberta, are still promoting upcoming Danger Cats shows. 

Danger Cats, the Vic Juba Community Theatre, Yuk Yuk’s Toronto, and Yuk Yuk’s head office did not respond to requests for comment.