In the aftermath of Charlottesville, white supremacists have been losing their safe spaces on the internet as chat platforms, hosting providers, and security services have started dropping their clients. Now, the longest-operating white supremacist website is off the internet after losing its domain name.
According to Don Black, the former KKK leader who ran stormfront.org since 1995 and was convicted in 1981 of trying to overthrow the government of the Caribbean nation Dominica, Network Solutions revoked his website’s domain on Friday with no warning. Black noted that traffic to the site had been up since the white nationalist rally in Charlottesville. Black told the AP that he might switch to another domain name, “but it might wind up the same way.” The move came following complaints that Stormfront advocates for deadly violence as well as hate speech:
Users of Black’s website have been implicated in more than 100 killings, according to the complaint, including 77 people slain by neo-Nazi Anders Breivik at a camp in Norway in 2011.
“Especially in the wake of tragic events in Charlottesville and the spike in hate crimes across the country, Stormfront crossed the line of permissible speech and incited and promoted violence,” said a statement by Kristen Clarke, executive director of the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law.
Black denied that the website promoted violence on a radio show Monday and was immediately followed by David Duke, who said he supported Black and stormfront.
Surely, David Duke would never support someone or something so odious.
(Via Associated Press)