It’s come to the world’s attention that even in idyllic Vermont, where the vibe is Mother Earth, hippies, make love not war, buy local, eat local, drink soymilk, fresh brewed coffee and eat ice cream made social warriors Ben and Jerry, pockets of ugliness can pop up.
Last summer’s Black Lives Matters protests brought out a backlash from some of the racist Vermonters. If you drove around the state you’d see a lot of Black Lives Matters signs and Bernie signs but also giant Trump signs and those “subtle” racist police blue line flags as well as “all lives matter” racist reactions.
As protests against racism in Vermont have intensified, becoming a near-weekly occurrence in towns small and large across the state, another trend has emerged with them: a rise in bias incidents and vandalism of anti-racist displays across the state.
Trump brought many of these closeted racists out as well as online conspiracy sites and the dark web. Some of the hate speech came out in the form of KKK type leaflets being distributed other forms came from business people who feel the need to express their hatred and delusions. Like Welch’s Gun Shop just over the border in West Lebanon, NH that using it’s main street lit word sign to promote right wing messages mix with religious mutterings about GOD.
Probably the worst example recently in the news comes out of the drab little brewery in Saint Johnsbury, Vermont called the Saint J Brewery.
“No Globalists please” – Saint J Brewery Post
Unsuspecting beer trail hunters probably don’t expect that a craft beer brewery would be the source of hate and right wing conspiracy non-sense or that the owner would post on Facebook diatribes about “Globalists” i.e. racist code for Jews.
The right wing Alex Jones and Q-anon conspiracy rantings are even worse on the owner Scott Salmonsen‘s private Facebook page. Posts mixing Christian fanaticism with talk of “globalists” and elites taking over the world.
“I been researching alternative news sources 1 to 4 hours a morning before I start my day for over a year now.”
Scott Robert Salmonsen – Professional Brewer / Home Flipper / Heavenly Handiman at Saint J Brewery
In-person accounts of experiencing racism from the owner live in person at the bar have been posted in reviews of the brewery.
“From July 2020: We sat down at the bar and the owner and a customer were blatantly talking about how black people don’t need to be treated equally because of how the talk and dress. We left our beers half finished and left…”
– customer of Saint J Brewery
I’ve seen this type of racism before in the whitest of white states where diversity is less than 3% of the population. When we lived on Mount Desert Island Maine we were oblivious to the local racism until Barrack Obama dared to become President. I guess that was just too much for some of the racist locals as they hung an effigy of Obama from a lamppost right where the school bus went by. I’ll never forget how shocked I was that such racism existed in New England. Of course, after Trump’s election, it was obvious that racism, unfortunately, exists all over America.
“Beer was good but owner makes no attempt at COVID protections at all. He wasn’t wearing a mask and told us we didn’t need to either. He told us he doesn’t believe in the virus. Basically cracked jokes about how everyone was overreacting.” – Yelp review 10/19/2020
Luckily there are plenty of breweries all over the state of Vermont that are not run by tin-foil hat wearing racists.
