
Cutting off white supremacists: Apple Pay, Cloudflare and PayPal join the trend - JumpCrisscross
http://www.latimes.com/business/technology/la-fi-tn-apple-cloudflare-nazis-20170817-story.html
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nautilus12
Dont misinterpret this as any kind of defense of white nationalism, because I
dislike them as much as anyone else: Suppose that every tech company followed
suit making these people basically cut off, and someone was incorrectly
identified as a white nationalist. To what extent is this trial without jury
or mob mentality?

~~~
true_religion
As an aside, unless the outcome of mob mentality is a decision that you'd not
otherwise agree with.... the only consequence of it is faster decision making
for you (member of the mob).

But the core of the issue is that we are shunning them, as we have shunned
many other groups too closely connected to violent motivations.

The only difference between now and then is that this brand of terrorism is
homegrown, so the 'suffering' of the white supremacists is more visible to us.

One thing to note is that unlike say no-fly lists, no one is targeting
individuals, just the organization. These people could dissolve their group,
wait one month, and start a new company that no one would ever think to ban.
These people could also similarly act as individuals within the system,
without any blowback. It's only when they congregate under a clear,
acknowledged banner of hate that any penalties come into place.

~~~
nautilus12
"unless the outcome of mob mentality is a decision that you'd not otherwise
agree with.... the only consequence of it is faster decision making for you"

No this is wrong, this means that you've established a system that when it is
in agreement with what you personally believe to be justice it delivers
quickly upon them, but when it does not it works against you and/or justice
with the same efficiency.

You are basically advocating for a Judge Dredd philosophy.

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Yetanfou
I think it is high time to start listing other extremist groups which make use
of all those services which have decided to become their own judge, jury and
executioner. I'm thinking about groups like AFA/Antifa, BLM/Black Power/Black
Pride/other racially-oriented supremacy organisations, salafist/wahabist
organisations, groups which sympathise with terrorist organisations,
'revolutionary' communist groups (yes, those still exist) and any other
radical/extremist groups and find out where they host their stuff, which
payment processors they use, whether they have apps on Google Play and the
Apple app store, etc. Once a group has been identified the related services
should be given a chance to react, and their reaction should be published just
like they are when they close down nazi/white power/white pride/white
supremacy groups.

~~~
scarface74
_I 'm thinking about groups like AFA/Antifa, BLM/Black Power/Black Pride/other
racially-oriented supremacy organisations_

Where on the BLM website do they promote "racially-oriented supremacy?

~~~
nautilus12
Once the leader of the BLM said that the only way to resolve the racial issues
this country faces is for white families to sign their entire estates over to
black families, I think the BLM may have crossed that line. Maybe if she asked
people to will their estates to Poor people I wouldnt feel that way, but as it
stands, this screams racially oriented priority. Can you even imagine if a
white person made these demands what would happen?
[https://www.leoweekly.com/2017/08/white-
people/](https://www.leoweekly.com/2017/08/white-people/)

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Simon_says
If it's illegal prosecute it; if not, let people have their shitty opinions in
peace. Why does seemingly everybody have to virtue signal and cut peaceful
people out of civil society?

~~~
fooey
They're not cutting out "peaceful" people, they're cutting out “activities
that promote hate, violence or racial intolerance” which are inherently
neither peaceful nor civil.

~~~
smsm42
There is substantial disagreement about what "activities that promote hate,
violence or racial intolerance" are. Some would define any defense of Israel
as "promoting hate and violence". Some define critique of certain aspects of
religious practices to be "promoting hate". Some consider criticizing
diversity programs as implemented in certain companies as "promoting hate".
Some consider arguing about changing immigration law as "promoting hate". Some
think discussing results certain scientific research that does not sit well
with certain political theories as "promoting hate". As long as disagreement
is not tolerated, you can always find somebody who disagrees with you as
"promoting hate".

SLPC lists[1] as "hate groups" people that think English should be official
language of the US (a bad idea, but is it really "promoting violence"?),
people that insist on necessity of immigration reform, people that
legitimately disagree and criticize other policies, like immigration or
taxation or international trade. They even designated presidential candidate
Ben Carson as "extremist" (that got them so much bad press they had to
backpedal and apologize).

And SPLC designations have been used to boot sites from platforms like Google,
Paypal, Facebook, Twitter, etc.

Don't get me wrong, there are true hate-mongers there, and on SPLC lists, but
far from all of them. There are a lot of organizations there that just promote
unpopular, unorthodox, and sometimes outright kooky, but not hateful or
violent, views. Interestingly enough, such outright violent and openly
militant groups as BAMN or antifa are not there on the list.

All this looks not like attempt to produce less hate but an attempt to
establish political control over the internet. And I remember the times when
the internet community was proud to be censorship-free. How the times changed.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_organizations_designat...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_organizations_designated_by_the_Southern_Poverty_Law_Center_as_hate_groups)

~~~
true_religion
Yes, the racists themselves do not think they are objectionable in anyway, and
obviously wouldn't characterize themselves as promoting hate.

We, as a reasonable majority, can disagree with this assessment.

That we do not have perfect information, and absolute agreement, is no reason
for _private_ organizations to not exercise their own rights to _not_
associate with those they dislike.

If this were the government at work... I'd agree that extremely high standards
ought to be in place, but as is? No, I don't think _organizations_ deserve
protection since they are flimsy things, easily discarded when PR turns
against them.

None of the white supremacists is being banned as an individual, only specific
institutions that they've chosen to raise up.

~~~
smsm42
> We, as a reasonable majority, can disagree with this assessment.

Who is "we"? Do you think the right to speak should be defined by the
majority? Too bad the US was explicitly founded on the diametrically opposing
principle. To be sure, they even explicitly wrote it in the constitution, that
it is not how things are to be decided. But what they knew, anyway...

> is no reason for private organizations to not exercise their own rights to
> not associate with those they dislike.

They can exercise whatever they like. But then we get partisan war on the
internet, instead of cooperation, with everybody hating everybody (there are
many hot topic issues in politics, and once using access to infrastructure
like DNS is politicized, there's no stopping of it). And where nobody can be
sure that they won't be target of the unpersoning campaign next. It's not the
internet I would like to see. Legally, of course, they are within their
rights. But not everything that is legal is a good thing to do. Turning access
to internet into political battleground is not a smart thing to do. It will
hurt everybody.

> None of the white supremacists is being banned as an individual, only
> specific institutions that they've chosen to raise up.

How does it matter? If Google seizes domain from nazis as organization,
because they wanted to, what prevents them from seizing domain from an
individual person, who, say, has controversial political views? Or espouses
controversial ideas that are outside current scientific consensus? Or merely
criticizes Google management a bit more harshly than they'd like? It is a
logical next step, if no pushback happens on this one, it would expand. People
are all scared about content provides limiting access for commercial reasons,
what about political reasons?

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walterbell
A good way to lower trust in digital payments and boost cash. Probably not the
intended outcome.

Did Section 230 disappear overnight?

~~~
DaniloDias
Doesn't law enforcement already prosecute criminals? Why would anyone risk
using Apple Pay now that they are thought policing?

Dumb.

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qrbLPHiKpiux
dangerous precedence.

~~~
liberte82
Another company is welcome to create a competitor. As a society we decide who
we want to shun from the mainstream. Social shunning and shaming are essential
tools to a society that wants to function under a certain set of principles.
Maybe eventually the shaming stops working, and that's the point where a new
cultural zeitgeist or a culture war takes over.

~~~
MBCook
Shaming is probably the main reason we haven't seen a lot of self identified
Nazis/white supremacists in protests more often. Now that they seem to think
their views are more excepted they're willing to be more public.

I remember hearing the story that one of the reasons the KKK use the hood is
so they could be anonymous. The old superman radio show that was on in the 40s
are so decided to take on the KKK and make them bad guys which only made
people even more embarrassed to be KKK member since all the kids were playing
Superman against the KKK.

Shaming is a very powerful weapon.

It can certainly be misused (against homosexuals, for example) too.

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weeksie
You know what worries me about this? Not free speech because that's a dumb
line of argument.

What bothers me is that these companies are inadvertently teaching a bunch of
nazis how to use the dark web by pushing them out of the public square. I
prefer these dangerous assholes corralled into easily observable spaces.

~~~
MBCook
The flipside of the coin is the harder it is to do all that stuff the fewer
people are going to be willing to jump through all the necessary hoops.

Those that do maybe some of the hardest of hard-core. If they are the violent
ones (I have to assume that the violent ones are also hard-core) then going
through all those steps just associates you with violent people more.
Hopefully that would turn off of other people who aren't interested in the
violence.

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Overtonwindow
For some reason this reminds me of banks refusing to do business with
marijuana dispensaries. All this will do is push digital currency, and the
hate groups will still get their money. Then it won't be traceable,
accountable, and completely decentralized.

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SoMisanthrope
Does it scare anyone else that groups that aren't illegal are being censored
for their (utterly repulsive) principals? Where do we draw the line?
Personally, I don't want to enable bad people e.g. _real_ nazis (calling
someone a nazi doesn't make them a nazi), racists, homophobes, etc. But that
old saying, "live by the sword, die by the sword" begins to echo in my head.

To further that line of thinking, I also know that majority progressives
incorrectly ascribe the characteristics of bigotry and homophobia, too broadly
to those who differ with progressive ideology. Take for example, the facts of
gay marriage. Only a minority of politically conservative folks hold those
anti-gay-marriage views. Among young Republicans, 61% are in favor of gay
unions / marriage [http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2014/03/10/61-of-
young-...](http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2014/03/10/61-of-young-
republicans-favor-same-sex-marriage/) That statistic is actually in keeping
with the aggregate national average (all people, regardless of political
orientation) of 67% [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_opinion_of_same-
sex_mar...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_opinion_of_same-
sex_marriage_in_the_United_States) However, progressives strongly reject any
opinions or facts, no matter how well reasoned and well intentioned, unless
those opinions and facts support the progressive ideology and agenda:
[https://www.cnbc.com/2017/08/14/fired-google-engineer-
james-...](https://www.cnbc.com/2017/08/14/fired-google-engineer-james-damore-
says-this-.html)

So, where will people like Zuckerberg (a far-left progressive) like to draw
the line, when it comes to political speech. My bet is that they would love to
slam the door on non-progressive speech... but they know that the current
political machine would respond with litigation or anti-trust litigation. But,
what about when the pendulum swings the White House back to a Democrat. Will
that door slam, at that time, while the government looks the other way?

Remember, this is a two-way street. Perhaps, one day soon, someone won't want
to hear your liberal perspectives, because they violate people's right to free
practice of religion... then what?!

In summary, be careful what you ask for, what you cheer for, what you won't
tolerate, because the guillotine doesn't distinguish between good people or
bad people. It simply does it's job.... and one day, they may come calling for
YOUR mechanisms of "free speech."

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josmar
First, they came[0] for the nazis - but they didn't use bitcoin...

[0]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_they_came_..](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_they_came_..).

