USA: Neo-Nazi website shut down after insulting Charlottesville murder victim
The American neo-Nazi website Daily Stormer is experiencing problems after insulting the woman who was killed during Saturday’s protests against the white racist rallies in Charlottesville, Virginia. GoDaddy, administrator of the web domain, has cancelled its contract and the Google firm subsequently cancelled its registration with them.
Heather Heyer, a 32-year-old defender of the rights of minorities, died after a white radical hit her with a car during Saturday’s protest in Charlottesville. James Alex Fields, age 20, has been charged with her murder and with injuring 19 more people.
The founder of the neo-Nazi Daily Stormer website, Andrew Anglin, posted an article there after Heyer’s death stating that: “Despite feigned outrage by the media, most people are glad she is dead, as she is the definition of uselessness. A 32-year-old woman without children is a burden on society and has no value.”
Outraged reactions to that article on social networking sites forced management at GoDaddy, one of the biggest firms administering Internet domains, to take the strong step of cancelling the contract. “Given that the recent article on Daily Stormer immediately followed a violent crime, it can, in our view, incite further violence, which is a violation of our terms of service,” Dan Race, spokesperson for GoDaddy, said according to The Washington Post.
The firm had been called upon before not to provide a platform for the dissemination of racist opinions because of several previously criticized posts by Daily Stormer, but always referred to the First Amendment of the US Constitution protecting freedom of speech as its defense. Media report that other ultra-right websites are registered at GoDaddy, as far from all the administrators of such domains tolerate the dissemination of such opinions.
Daily Stormer attempted to register with Google after GoDaddy cancelled its contract. A spokesperson for Google, however, quickly announced that the firm had cancelled the neo-Nazi website’s registration because it violated their terms of service.
The Independent reported that a post appeared yesterday on Daily Stormer announcing that it had been hacked by Anonymous. Your Anon News tweeted that it did not believe Anonymous was involved and speculated that the Daily Stormer could have posted the information itself in order to provide an alternate, false justification for the site becoming unavailable to those who frequent it.
