Daily Stormer booted off internet again, this time by Namecheap White supremacist web site The Daily Stormer has been booted off the internet, again. GoDaddy and Google each denied the site registration last week, after it published extraordinary vulgar and insensitive comments about Heather Heyer, the civil rights protestor killed during protests in Charlottesville, Virginia. CloudFlare …
As opposed to opaque meddling by people who have the "best" political connections? I think he's just asking for a transparent method for people to make their complaints rather than his company begin caught in the middle while someone whips up a hate campaign against him to get him to ban their political opponents.
The article said his reasons were: “hate speech and incitement of violence provides ample legal support for a proper termination of the domains.” I think you'll find that under American law his company is not allowed to "provide support for" things like "incitement of violence".
The American legal system however is very vague and contains many laws which are arbitrarily invoked after the fact to come down on scapegoats to take pressure off the powers that be. Theoretically, the US has "freedom of speech", but that becomes irrelevant if the web sites are being shut down by putting pressure on third parties who have no real interest in supporting a very minor customer.
I think he's looking for some sort of process where someone would get a court order to state that the content was prohibited, and then that bit of paper would be handed to his company and he would comply with it. You could claim that such a process exists under current laws, but that's only in theory. In practice the laws in the US are applied arbitrarily and unpredictably. In other words, he's looking for an equivalent to the DMCA to shield companies such as his from political fights between third parties and leaves him to simply process the paperwork once it has all the official stamps.
I can't say I'm going to cry if the "Daily Stormer" is shut down by back door political methods, but I don't think it's going to stop there. It's not going to take very long for other political groups to see that they too can shut down their political opponents by putting pressure on third parties. I can certainly see Namecheap''s desire to not get caught in the middle of political fights.
I don't think rules or limits are bad things. They keep us safer than we would be without them.
You want rules that keep the cops out of your business. You want traffic lights to regulate traffic.
The Constitution is a bunch of rules/limits.
You wouldn't like a completely lawless nation, because there would be much unnecessary suffering and death.
While Der Sturmer is a vile site run by vile people, I think it is better if their vileness is out in the open for all to see. If they are driven underground they can claim they are be attacked and censored by whatever (fill in the blank time). Whether it is true or not, the perception of martyrdom that counts in eyes of some. Some will believe their problems are external pressure not their inherent vileness making them a revolting outfit people do not want to associate with. But if they are out in the open they can not make these claims without anyone a couple of functioning brain cells concluding they are idiots. If they are obviously idiots, again, a couple of functioning brain cells will ignore them. Ignoring them does them more harm than anything else. Making them 'forbidden fruit' tends to do the opposite.
They are every bit as bad as ISIS, and ISIS videos/etc. get removed when they're identified. At least to the extent that the west can exert control over them, i.e. if they're on a US site like Youtube or Twitter but not much we can do for stuff hosted in say Syria.
The nazis and other white supremacists have been claiming persecution for ages anyway, so actually persecuting them a bit by harassing them to the dark corners of the web with shady providers who consider money more important than ethics isn't going to make any real difference in the long run.
The Stormer crowd are literally Nazis! Nazis were all talk in Germany in the 20s, until they got power, and once they did they sure did a hell of a job of making up for lost time as far as killing people. Just like the ISIS crowd was all talk in radical mosques or web forums or whatever until a vacuum of power opened up in Syria for them to take advantage of.
The only reason ISIS has killed more people than the Daily Stormer crowd is opportunity. If the US government fell apart in a region like what happened in Syria, you can bet the Daily Stormer and other radical white supremacist groups would be more than happy to come in with all their weapons and ammo, and start killin' Jews and black folks to create their Aryan homeland.
I'm not sure I agree with you Lurker. By driving, these idiots Underground you take away (once the media storm abates) the ability for them to easily reach out and influence People with their disgusting message. The hardcore followers might follow them down into the "darkweb", but they're not the ones you're ever going to turn away from their White supremacy. But the vast majority of the naive People who might have stumbled across them and been tricked/influenced/persuaded by their message, now wont find them, and so can hopefully be spared that influence and all that hate.
Anyone going looking for them now, is already a part of that hard core (or wants to be part of it) and there's pretty much nothing you can do to stop them, but at least one of there megahorns has now been taken away...
This post has been deleted by its author
"I think it is better if their vileness is out in the open for all to see."
Yes I'm going there, but Godwin has allowed me.
Both the Nazi's and Italian fascists were very much in the public eye, with their hate filled media very much out there for all to see and we all know how that ended up.
@ Lost all faith...
"Both the Nazi's and Italian fascists were very much in the public eye, with their hate filled media very much out there for all to see and we all know how that ended up."
They were the retaliation to the spreading communism and we all know how that ended up too. And yet one is distasteful now and the other almost worshipped in varying names and guises. Unfortunately labels such as nazi and communist make for easy identification while people recognise it but not when people forget their meaning. I fear now we fear the word nazi but not the actions. People seem happy to dismiss the history of communism and various socialist variations and forget the atrocities in its name.
Both should be allowed to be seen. And both opinions should be available for challenge. If we try to forget we will repeat the mistakes. If we remember the horror we will reject it.
"I think it is better if their vileness is out in the open for all to see."
It would be even better if the folks using the site (especially the ones posting hate speech) were identified.
Unfortunately the problem with "out in the open" means that other fruitcakes may gravitate to them where they would previously have been neighbourhood kooks and allowing them to hit a critical mass is risky. Never underestimate the power of stupid and angry people in large groups. At least if it's "underground" you'll keep the casual and impressionable nazi wannabes offline.
It would , of course, be "interesting" to run an 'underground' version of such a site in order to collect and collate as much information as possible about the hardcore nazi wannabe seditionist (overthrowing a legitimate government _is_ sedition, no matter how much they paint their opponents as such), then put it all out in the open for society to judge them.
This may sound like conspiracy theory, but bear in mind that the US intelligence and military services spent quite a bit of time and effort infiltrating and encouraging UFO conspiracists for decades as it was a convenient way to distract attention away from what they were really doing (eg: stealth blackhawks, F117). The truthers who got too close to important stuff were encouraged to break into military facilities as a way of getting themselves arrested and gagged.
Was Namecheap registrar, hosting provider, or both to Daily Stormer?
The role of a registrar is to map text strings to numerical addresses. They are, and should be, solely a technical resource, like a phone book. They should also be treated legally, and by society, as such, and not held responsible for the content made available at those addresses.
Hosting providers, on the other hand, have to actually store and serve up the content. They bear greater risk of being associated with the content as well as infrastructure risk of excessive requests due to either spiking interest or DDOS attacks. Hence they should be allowed some leeway in what content they are willing to host.
I'd seriously like to know why the couple of you that downvoted this did so. I don't care about counts but I am wondering at the mind-set of people that think we don't all need to work from the same definition of Nazi. After all I have seen people called Nazi for simply disagreeing with far left politics regardless of how far right or left they are. I've seen people called Nazi for just being capitalists. Go on - defend your point of view - I'm interested.
@Timmy B
I didn't downvote you but I wouldn't bother. The people downvoting will not give a reason because to give a reason invalidates their argument.
It goes something like this.
I want them banned because they are Nazis.
OK, that's great but what if we start banning other things? Nobody is forcing you to go to the website.
But they are Nazis.
Yes but how do you define something everyone doesn't like? Where does it end?
But they are Nazis.
You get the idea, that's why these people will not respond, they know they are wrong but think that "Doing the right thing" makes them right regardless of the eventual outcome.
The best question that none of these virtue signallers will answer is "What were you doing about this two weeks ago?". The answer to that is "F*ck All" because you only care now because it's news. Are people really that thick to believe that these are the first rallies of this type and that this is the first time anything like this has happened? Pretty much.
They should have themselves a nice (s)mug of tea.
Thanks other AC for proving my point.
"Because Nazis."
Would you mind expanding on your comment?
We didn't win a war against the Nazis, we won a war against an expanding Germany who just happened to have a Nazi ideology. Do you really think we would have got involved if they hadn't invaded all the countries they did?
Lovely post hoc ergo propter hoc logical fallacy (Nazism was defeated because the Allied Forces WW2, therefore the Allied forces fought the war to defeat Nazism). This is incorrect. WW2 was fought because German and its allies were invading countries. The Allied Forces fought back against this.
The fact Nazism as a major political power was defeated was a huge bonus.
I suspect that like Flat Earthers and Anti-Vaxxers, they'll never entirely go away, but as long as they're confined to fringes, monitored to keep people safe, and treated humanely (giving them a chance to humanise the mainstream, and realise of their own accord that they're dead wrong in this ideal), then they'll be kept from doing harm, and numbers kept as low as possible.
That was a fortnight ago, before someone got killed and 30 got injured when demonstrating against them, a president gave them a free pass, and white supremacists went on record as being pleased with what the president said.
There's a point where the frog boiling has to stop.
What is a Nazi? No hard to answer.
A person who believes that who they are is better than who everyone else is, though vague 'blood' and 'soil', never talent or even actual DNA (as if DNA can be superior to other DNA).
Who wants to crush, enslave, or kill all those people lesser than themselves.
Who see themselves as victims of vast global conspiracies, usually by specific groups or 'races'.
Who believe they are especially persecuted and denied their rights, usually through the hatred and jealousy of their inferiors.
Who believe that they must 'take back' what was 'stolen' from them (usually their place at the top fo the pyramid).
Who big up military mentality and weapons.
Who dislike and mock intellectual pursuits, e.g. science and the arts.
Who are obsessed with hierarchy, badges, symbols, crime and punishment.
Who have a cult-like awe of machismo and 'alpha dog' leaders.
Who support any political movement that believes all these.
@Hollerithevo
Some people believe they are better than others because of a quirk of birth. Some of them even believe that the others that don't match this should be killed. This matches your first point.
These same people believe that those that don't match their traits should if not killed should be controlled and forced to follow them. This matches your second.
They certainly see themselves as victims of a conspiracy and even though there are rules and provision just for them excluding the others are convinced that they still have it worse.
They don't big up weapons though and their stance on intellectual pursuits varies.
They are certainly obsessed with hierarchy, badges, crime and punishment.
They also have a cult like awe of some of their leaders.
So that's most of these points covered and therefore by your measure radical third wave feminists are Nazis aren't they?
@AC "Oh dear, I'm guessing you don't really get to speak to real women do you?".
Plenty. I am happy to say the vast majority don't fit what I'm talking about. But then most aren't Nazis either. Some do, though. Try to actually address peoples points next time, perhaps?
"Where do you draw the line?"
Good question. But irrelevant here. Wherever it is drawn Andrew Anglin is pleased to be the other side of it.
I'm a registrar (well the company I own is) and I passionately believe in free speech. I even support his right to hold his ideology and to speak or print his own leaflets (in an un-inciteful manner). But I'm never going to be a party to publishing, printing or distributing it. That just makes me his tool and betrays our responsibility to his targets who are our fellow human beings. Not bits, bytes or even ideas.
Good decision.
While he raises a valid issue, that next time he might come under pressure to refuse service to a site that shouldn't be banned, by raising the issue that "public opinion is not always right" in connection with denying service to The Daily Stormer, I fear that there will be people who will cite that statement as "proof" he sympathizes with Nazis.
So he may not have entirely dodged the bullet of a hate campaign against his company.
I'm interested why you think it wasnt his call to make. It is his Company, he has every right to decide what is hosted on his company's servers. It's not a government server, nor is there any sort of law or human rights requirement that private hosting companies must host anyone that comes to them.
He has made the calculation, that Hosting this site would cost his Company money, by being assoicated with it, so he has chosen not to host it. End of Story.
If the Daily Stormer are willing to pay enough, someone will be willing to host it somewhere, but that doesnt mean those who think that the costs wont justify the payment have to accept it.
To give an analogy, if I own a billboard, and you rent space from me and start displaying ads that cause people to attack and damage my billboard, I am well within my rights to remove your ad and tell you to go find some other billboard for your ad. There's nothing to say that I have to put up with keeping your ad on my billboard....
moiety,
Another example of the "It's OK because it's me doing it" malaise.
I disagree. He has a company, he has a right to choose who his customers are.
I'd never even heard of the Daily Stormer until all this came up, so I've no idea if what they run is just the usual bollocks, hateful bollocks that all right-thinking people should despise or actually illegal bollocks that incites violence.
But even if they just put out unpleasant stuff, there's no obligation on him to deal with them. He has a right to choose who he associates his company with, just as they have a right to free speech (within certain legal limits).
One doesn't conflict with the other. People have a right to express disagreeable opinions (within limits), but that doesn't give them a right to a guaranteed audience.
I dio see your points and I'm sure he's covered in the TOS that he can do what he wants; but it's a bad precedent to set. When one person acts as judge, jury and executioner -no matter how well intentioned- it is a bad thing. Always leads to the question "Who's next?"
Namecheap run a shitload of domains and statistically they are probably aiding and abetting worse sites than these alt-right guys. As a long-term customer of theirs I don't want them to start picking off stragglers....not because I have any particular fear of being picked off; just because it's the wrong thing to do. Arbitrary decisions from the people holding your domains is not a wholly comfortable feeling. There's no due process. There would almost certainly have been a takedown notice along shortly, so why not wait for that and blame somebody else?
I know he only did it for a free publicity wank; but not totally happy about it.
"He chose (wrongly) for the whole human race which makes him a pretentious virtue signalling SJW asshole."
So he doesn't really believe in what he's saying, he's just doing it to impress people?
It's fascinating to see full blown reality denial from these scum. They can't imagine treating anyone who isn't a white male (plus whatever magic rules) as an equal, thus everyone who expresses (or worse, acts upon) such ideals must only be doing it for show. Because no-one *really* believes this equality nonsense, right?
"So he doesn't really believe in what he's saying, he's just doing it to impress people?"
At last someone understands the alt left, but, remember when they look in the mirror they are impressing themselves. That is why they like attending protests so much so they can bathe in each other's emitted virtue.
The equality this is about is the equal right to freedom of expression which his actions denied and why he is an asshole.
Which is probably the actual reason. After all, most of the content can easily be argued to be illegal, with few people willing to defend it (few people with a brain or career that is)
These kind of hosting companies really on get away with it on the sufferance of their Governments, go to close to the bone and they may go far enough to force the daily mails of the world to start shouting, which leads to legislation.
I don't know,I may be doing the CEO of this company a disservice, but he doesn't seem to give a rats arse for the content on the other sites that give him money.
Then again, this reads like I am against the service he provides, I am not, and I am fully aware that the West is as highly censored as China in many aspects, its just we don't want to see it.
I'd imagine he doesn't check the content of the other sites he hosts. Which isn't his job, after all. They have many customers.
But once it comes to a high profile case like this, accepting their money becomes a public statement in itself. And there's no law that says he has to throw his company on the grenade on someone else's behalf. He's free to do so if he wants to, and not if he doesn't.
At least he
a) Actually looked at the content.
b) Checked whether it came under the heading of protected free speech, or prohibited hate speech.
c) Made a rational decision based on the facts.
It's not ideal that he should have to do this, but at least he did something rational, instead of just shouting "No Nazis here!"
.
The interesting point about "protected free speech" is that the US Constitution only prohibits the US Government from interfering in a US citizen's right to freedom of expression. It has no effect whatsoever on a private business's right to deny someone the use of their platform for the expression of exactly the same material.
I don't know what the daily stormer says, or used to say. I have no interest in them, other than in the context of their current persecution. They're not even the thin end of the wedge, because we're already a lot further down the slippery slope than merely suppressing genuine nutjobs.
That still doesn't mean they should be silenced. Still less that the decision should be thrust onto some poor bugger who never asked to be a judge or a politician. If he can be bullied or intimidated into suppressing them other than by a court order, that's the thin end of a very totalitarian wedge.
The thick end of that wedge was on the radio this morning. The odious Luciana Berger, from the extreme totalitarian wing of the Labour party (she who called for MPs to be protected from their own constituents by wrapping all contact in heavy red tape and airport security) was on the radio this morning, rejoicing that the UK police state locks people up for the crime of school-playground-style language online.
Step right up, put your hosting company name in the hat.
Who is going to get the free publicity next?
I will sleep very well tonight knowing a website I never visited on a subject I have never searched for or will ever come across is no longer available on the internet.
Well done everyone, I can't wait for the mission creep to start where this is used against other websites because the majority don't like it or even that the government has an issue. It's all for your own good remember.
When you all live in an authoritarian country you will only have yourselves to blame.
This has always happened. It's nothing new. I understand that in the US you'd get campaigns to write to the advertisers on newspapers and TV networks from people objecting to the content. If you can get sufficient numbers of motivated people together, this kind of thing has been possible (and happening) for at least 60 years. And probably longer...
But on the other side, if people are sufficiently motivated, there are always ways to get published. Unless of course you are actually breaking the law really obviously, and get noticed enough to become an issue. At which point government might start taking serious action against you.
Even then, there's been underground publishing for as long as there's been printing. And even before that, when manuscripts had to be hand-copied.
So it seems to me that this case has pretty much no significance. Unless you happen to be the Daily Stormer, whose life just got a bit harder. I'd not even heard of them until a couple of days ago, and know nothing about them. So I've no idea whether they deserve it or not.
Personally, I'm very annoyed at him for doing this. I've never looked at the Daily Stormer, but I can take a pretty shrewd guess at what the content is like from what I've heard. I don't like them.
What does worry me is that this dude has effectively set his company up as a arbitrator of what content is and isn't allowed. It's his company and it's his prerogative to do that. However he's also potentially set a precedent for anyone who doesn't like what other people are saying on the internet to attempt to have it taken down - he can now no longer claim neutrality as he has surrendered it and announced himself able and willing to modify content to the extent to which he can. And if he can do that for moral purposes, CorpA will argue, isn't he damaging CorpA by refusing to take down these negative reviews? Well, you can see what that leads.
I do wish people would stop calling these people "Nazis". They're not. The Nazi party is a long extinct political party from Germany - it no longer exists and has no members. I know what people mean, but it grates on my OCD just a little. From what I know of Nazi ethos they'd actually have little love for these idiots who are just arseholes.
I do wish people would stop calling these people "Nazis".
Upvote for that: the word has, like so many, become a generic term of abuse, and lost its meaning.
Having said that, news reports spoke of someone at those Virginia demos waving swastikas and the like: someone is actively inviting the comparison. Whether that was actual white supremecists or someone out to discredit legitimate demonstrators doesn't appear to have been questioned.
"Let's call them daleks instead... since they both seem to want to kill everyone who isn't exacly like them..."
Nononono! Both the nazi's and daleks kill everyone who isn't exactly like an arbitrary made-up standard*, which include agreeing that they have the right to kill all inferior beings....
* that will obviously not be used to test anyone who is clearly a *proper* whatever. See Hitler and Nuremburg laws
We agree that public opinion is not always right, but it is, more often than not.
We agree, I think, that each issue should be dealt with on a case by case basis.
The Majority is right more often than it is wrong.
Issues should always be put to public debate.
Not talking about issues is part of why we're in the mess we're now in.
The ignorants need to hear from the more aware folks.
Ignorance leaves the door open for fear, and from fear to hate.
I wonder how long it took the guy to figure out that calls for genocide is a no no. Days? Hours?
"The ignorants need to hear from the more aware folks."
Those who are truly ignorant about a subject obviously need exposure to facts before they can form an opinion. However what they will be given in a public debate are conflicting statements of "fact" - which may be true, false, or taken out of context.
The human mind often seems to prefer to accept simple strong statements at face value - rather than nuanced shades of grey that require hard thinking.
I would go as far as to say that most people cannot easily view two opposing points in their mind. It sets up an unpleasant disturbance of their innate desire for "certainty". I have seen supposedly well educated, intelligent IT people - who support only one answer to a technical problem by ignoring any contradictory hard evidence.
“both sides of the free speech consideration.”
Surely this shows serious misunderstanding. Both sides of free speech is free speech or not free speech. This isnt something that comes with shades of grey nor addendum. If he said something on the lines of 'I disagree with their views and what I consider offensive content and so have refused hosting' that would make sense. But to talk about considering both sides of free speech sounds like a woolly attempt to say 'I support free speech in all but action'.
Personally I am not a fan of banning opinions and views into the darkness where they fester and grow, but to bring them into the light and the realm of discussion where we can see them for what they are. And allowing ideas to be challenged is an important aspect we seem to be losing as people seem to jump to take offence and to demand echo chambers or the shielding of their sacred views from the challenge of discussion or perspective.
@ samzeman
I have no problem with that at all. But I dont think this is a UK matter is it? And if the site would be committing a crime then surely namecheap should say that, not that there are 2 sides to free speech.
I dont like the attacks against free speech because it seems to be going too far (e.g. no-platforming). I am no fan of extreme views from either left or right, they are all too similar to me. Unfortunately people seem to get hung up on the label nazi instead of the actions to oppose. Very concerning and I cant see it leading anywhere nice.
For decades, indeed, for over a century, African American schools, publishing houses, newspapers, libraries have been burned down, shut down, starved of funding etc.
Women's Centres have been attacked, women's books have been burned, women's work has been hidden (all those 'anonymous' manuscripts in the Vatican library - oops, turns out written by women*).
Jewish books and art have been burned, their libraries put to the torch.
Writing by Native Americans or gay men or women have been considered unmarketable and so not published.
Censorship has been exercised, but as it's never been against white guys, the decades have rolled on.
My concern that white supremacist neo-Nazis are finding it hard to find a platform is zero.
* look it up
Fuck the nazis. Fuck those who are apologists for them. Fuck those who would allow them a platform. Fuck all those who would let nazi ideology see us all killed.
This isn't some fucking game - People are going to die. Many have died because of their ideology.
Am I fucking angry? Too fucking right I am. Too many of my own family and many others died at their hands or saving us from nazi hate.
So, let's see: If someone has a cake-baking service, and they don't want to sell a wedding cake to a homosexual marriage, they will be shut down. If someone has a registrar, how is this any less a public service?
It does no good at all to say, "we have free speech, the government let's us say what we want", if when you actually DO attempt to speak, you are prevented from doing so by a bunch of self-styled tolerance police.
The rights guaranteed by the first amendment do not come from the US Constitution. They are enshrined there to prevent their abrogation from the entity that it addresses--the US Congress. (It does not mention the States at all.) According to the Declaration of Independence, these rights are inherent in all human beings, and it is the purpose of government to safeguard these rights.
The right to peaceable assembly is not a constitutional right in the sense that it originates with the constitution. The constitution was created in no small degree to protect the existing right.
Can a company violate the first amendment? No. Can they violate the rights of individuals to practice the rights that the first amendment is intended to protect? All the time.
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