Editing Ethan Nordean (section)

===Right-wing activism===
In mid-2017, Nordean started attending rallies in Seattle and Portland, Oregon organized by the far right [[Patriot Prayer]] group. According to Dave Neiwert, a journalist and author who covers far right political groups, "He's particularly noteworthy for the extraordinary levels of thuggish violence he brings to these events". 

On June 30, 2018, Nordean and other members of the Proud Boys participated in a demonstration in Portland organized by [[Joey Gibson]], founder of Patriot Prayer. Police declared the event a riot after violent street fighting broke out amid tensions between anti-fascist activists and Patriot Prayer supporters. Video showed Nordean shoving one counter protester to the ground before another approached with a metal baton. Nordean was wearing shin guards on his forearms and deflected the baton, then punched the man in the face, knocking him to the ground unconscious. According to a police report, the counter-protester was hospitalized with a concussion.

Following that incident, a meme featuring video of that punch went viral, and [[Gavin McInnes]], founder of the Proud Boys, praised Nordean's role in the violent episode, calling it "the turning point in our war against [[Antifa]]". McInnes compared it to the [[assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand]], which triggered [[World War I]].

The footage of the incident was used in recruiting videos for the Proud Boys that featured special effects and dramatic music. By October 2019, five of the most popular videos had over 1.5 million views on YouTube.

Shortly thereafter, Nordean was interviewed at length on ''The [[Alex Jones]] Show'', with the video playing constantly in the background. During his interview with Jones, Nordean said "Like Gavin McInnes says, violence isn't great, but justified violence is amazing." Describing left-wing counter-protesters, Nordean told Jones and his audience that "these are no longer people who are necessarily Americans, per se, but they're kind of anti-American" and "you just have to eliminate them as a threat".

Joe Rogan discussed Nordean's role in the violent incident on his podcast, in a segment about Antifa and street fighting. Nordean was later interviewed by Alex Jones a second time.

Nordean set up a private Facebook page to vet the fighting abilities of Proud Boys recruits. Despite complaints in 2018, Facebook declined to take down that page.