Edward S. May

Edward S. May, who writes using the pseudonym '"Baron Bodissey", is the American co-proprietor of the anti-Islam blog Gates of Vienna along with his wife, who uses the pseudonym Dymphna. May wrote anonymously until he disclosed his name in July 2010. Prior to blogging, he was "a mathematician, a computer programmer, and a landscape artist". Based in Virginia, he is considered to be a central organiser in the development of anti-Islam Counterjihad networks within the United States and across Europe. Besides writing for his own blog Gates of Vienna, he has also written articles for Andrew Breitbart's website  Big Peace  and FrontPage Magazine.

Gates of Vienna
May and his wife began blogging, using the pseudonyms "Baron Bodissey" and "Dymphna" respectively, in October 2004 : ""The thesis of this blog is that, like it or not, we are in a religious war. We do not define the terms but we should take careful note of them. We are mistaken if we think the Enemy wants merely to kill us. Once again, Jihad offers two choices to the West: conversion or death. Jihad exists in order to annihilate unbelief. Christians, Jews, Hindus, atheists, or Wiccans, it is all the same to him.""

Role in Counterjihad Movement (2004-present)
In the Autumn of 2007, controversy over May’s alliance with the European far-right (i.e. Vlaams Belang) drew criticism from Charles Johnson of the American political blog Little Green Footballs and generated a notable split within the American counterjihad movement: "The real point behind all this is that letting the counter-jihad movement be tainted by association with groups like the Vlaams Belang is simply not smart. It’s counter-productive in the worst way, because Americans will not support a movement that can be tied to groups with racist and Nazi pasts."

Some two years later, with controversy from the split continuing to affect May's Center for Vigilant Freedom Counterjihad Europa project, May responded:"Baron Bodissey [...] worries that Johnson “did serious damage to the American blogosphere’s view of European nationalists who oppose the EU, even those who have no anti-Semitic tendencies.” “Not only that,” said Bodissey, “he made it harder for certain American anti-jihad groups to raise funds if they failed to repudiate his designated ‘fascist-enablers’ like us.”"

A 2008 study by the Royal United Services Institute noted the role of May's blog in the rise of the Counterjihad movement: "Very much like Al-Qai’da’s violent jihad, the counter-jihad discourse is a product of globalisation and the internet. Counter-jihad blogs such as The Brussels Journal, Atlas Shrugs, the Gates of Vienna and until very recently Little Green Footballs (see below) and websites such as FrontPage and Jihadwatch have served to amplify the work of a small number of writers and academics."

In early July 2011, May split with Pamela Geller and Robert Spencer, after Geller repudiated her support for the English Defence League.

Breivik Controversy (2011)
Counter-terrorism consultant and ex-CIA officer Marc Sageman stated that counterjihad writers like May and blogs like Gates of Vienna ''"are the infrastructure from which Breivik emerged." ''

According to Guardian journalist Andrew Brown, May's blog was an influence on Anders Breivik: "Breivik referred to something he called "the Vienna school of thought", which consists of the people who had worked out the ideology that inspired him to commit mass murder. He named three people in particular: Littman; the Norwegian Peder Jensen who wrote under the pseudonym of Fjordman; and the American  Robert Spencer, who maintains a site called Jihad Watch, and agitates against "the Islamisation of America". But the name also alludes to a blog called Gates of Vienna, run by an American named  Edward "Ned" May, on which Fjordman posted regularly and which claims that Europe is now as much under threat from a Muslim invasion as it was in 1683, when a Turkish army besieged Vienna."

After the Utøya massacre, journalist Scott Shane, writing in The New York Times, noted: "The Gates of Vienna, a blog that ordinarily keeps up a drumbeat of anti-Islamist news and commentary, closed its pages to comments Sunday “due to the unusual situation in which it has recently found itself.”"

"Its operator, who describes himself as a Virginia consultant and uses the pseudonym “Baron Bodissey,” wrote on the site Sunday that “at no time has any part of the Counterjihad advocated violence.”"

In July 2011, an article by journalist Steven Erlanger in The New York Times stated that: "Mr. Breivik was said by analysts to have been an occasional commenter on a blog, Gates of Vienna, which is topped by these words: “At the siege of Vienna in 1683 Islam seemed poised to overrun Christian Europe. We are in a new phase of a very old war.”"

Three days later,  May acknowledged that Breivik may have commented on the  Gates of Vienna in September 2008 and October 2008.

Co-director of Center for Vigilant Freedom Inc. (2007-2011)
According to annual report documents submitted by Christine Brim  of the Center for Security Policy between 2008 and 2011,  May  was co-director of the  Center for Vigilant Freedom Inc. between January 2008 and January 2011 along with Christine Brim, Vicky Marlene Kaufer, and UK resident Chris Knowles , who still remain listed as current co-directors.

Co-director of International Free Press Society (2009)
May was also listed on the International Free Press Society (IFPS) Board of Directors for 2009, from its inception in January, as Outreach Coordinator. His name was removed from their Board of Directors list in early 2010 and does not appear thereafter.

International Civil Liberties Alliance (2006-present)
In 2006, the Counterjihad  organisation known as the 910 Group  came into being as a direct result of discourse in the comments section of  May's  blog. In 2007, the 910 Group changed its name to the Center for Vigilant Freedom (CVF) and since approximately 2009 has operated as the International Civil Liberties Alliance (ICLA)  : "The ICLA also runs the Counter-Jihad Europa website, which acts as a "clearing house for national initiatives to oppose the Islamisation of Europe". Three months after Breivik's attacks the ICLA organised a counter-jihad conference in London with the help of its European co-ordinator, Christopher Knowles, another English Defence League co-founder and director of the UK branch of the CVF, which is registered in Wakefield."

Counterjihad Europa (2007-present)
Counterjihad Europa, which began as a project of the Center for Vigilant Freedom and now operates as International Civil Liberties Alliance, has held annual summits or conferences in European cities since 2007

On 14 April 2007, May spoke at the first Counterjihad Summit in Copenhagen, which was organised by the Center for Vigilant Freedom and hosted by Stop Islamisation of Denmark (SIAD) and Danish staff from the international Counterjihad network. Also present were Chris Knowles (aka Aeneas) and  Ann Marchini  (aka Gaia) representing the UK chapter of the CVF; members of the Sweden Democrats party, including  Ted Ekeroth, and "several Norwegians" including Peder Jensen (aka Fjordman). Paul Beliën founder of the Flemish separatist blog The Brussels Journal was unable to attend.

In June 2010,  May  attended the Counterjihad Europa annual Counterjihad conference hosted in Zurich. Also present were: Chris Knowles and Ann Marchini, who represented both the UK chapter of the  ICLA  and the  English Defence League. May's co-director Knowles (as Aeneas ) delivered  '"a presentation entitled The Anatomy of an EDL Demo."

In September 2011,  May  attended the Counterjihad Europa annual Counterjihad Conference hosted in London, where he met with: Paul Weston (then of UKIP);  Chris Knowles;  Ann Marchini; Elisabeth Sabaditsch-Wolff; Kenneth Sikorski (aka KGS); Henrik Ræder Clausen; the leaders of the British Freedom Party: Peter Mullins, Lee Barnes, Simon Bennett and Dr. George Whale , and; the current leaders of the  English Defence League, namely Stephen Yaxley-Lennon (aka Tommy Robinson), Kevin Carroll and Jack Smith. As an outcome of the 2011 Counterjihad Europa conference in London, it was announced in November 2011 that those former British National Party activists who had founded the far-right nationalist British Freedom Party would step down, and Paul Weston, formerly of UKIP, would take the helm as party chairman. Additionally, an alliance between far-right street-protest movement English Defence League and British Freedom Party was also announced.

English Defence League (2008-present)
May's wife, who uses the pseudonym "Dymphna", wrote in July 2011 of how she and her husband, " the Baron ", gave financial support to Paul Ray, '(aka Lionheart), when Ray sought political asylum in America in January 2008 after being charged with inciting racial hatred. Ray went on to co-found the English Defence League: "Back before the EDL, when he hid out here in the US (a few years back), the Baron and I supported him financially (we wuz "rich" then --i.e., full-time work). In addition, a fellow blogger gave him a condo to live in, rent free. On a golf course, no less!."

One of May's fellow co-directors at the Center for Vigilant Freedom, Chris Knowles, (who is also European co-ordinator and director of the UK branch of the Center for Vigilant Freedom), is also a co-founder of the English Defence League. ''