Thursday, May 1, 2014
AMAZON NOW URGED TO BLACKLIST ‘HATERS’
For many years, the Southern Poverty Law Center has labeled groups with values it doesn’t tolerate as “hate groups” – but now the organization is taking its attacks a step further, demanding Amazon and PayPal blacklist bloggers and websites that don’t fall in line with its leftist agenda.
Headlined “Financing Hate” in the group’s Intelligence Report publication, the Southern Poverty Law Center, or SPLC, listed 91 “hate groups” ranging from those clearly on the fringe to mainstream bloggers and websites such as Catholic Family News, Atlas Shrugs, Jihad Watch, WND and the Americans for Legal Immigration PAC.
Clearly stating its opposition, it describes how some of those organizations utilize Amazon, PayPal and other online services to sell products.
SPLC said the Intelligence Report contacted Amazon in September about the participation of “hate groups” and “hate sites” in Amazon programs that earn the groups commissions.
Amazon, according to the report, said it would assign “appropriate teams to investigate, review applicable policies, and take appropriate action.”
But the SPLC lamented that some of its targets “were still earning commissions through Amazon.”
Several of the targeted organizations have criticized the “thuggish” behavior of SPLC, charging the organization is “somewhere to the left of Karl Marx.”
Renowned Islam expert Robert Spencer, whose Jihad Watch monitor on Islamic radicalism was targeted, said it shows “the desperate insecurity of the left: even at a time when they control the government, the media, and the entertainment industry, they have to strike out against the small, under-financed voices of truth that challenge their hegemony.”
“It also demonstrates their true totalitarian colors, in their absolute unwillingness to tolerate the smallest dissent. This is Goliath striking out against David. But we all know who wins,” Spencer said.
William Gheen, whose organization, Americans for Legal Immigration PAC, or ALIPAC, opposes illegal immigration and amnesty, said it was all too much.
In an open letter to SPLC posted online and to be “delivered to your offices by certified mail and then turned over to our attorney for further action,” Gheen said SPLC’s claims are “demonstrably false.”
“This letter is to inform you that we have Internet posts and emails containing threats and death threats against my life and the lives of my family members in reaction to your false claims that we are a hate group,” he said. “The threats we have received specifically cite SPLC claims that suggest we are somehow motivated by racism and advocating violence against minorities, both of which are demonstrably false.”
The issue of “hate,” “hate crimes” and “hate speech” has moved back into the headlines now because of a proposal in Congress to evaluate online speech for “hate” and then take action based on that assessment.
As WND reported, if two Democratic lawmakers have their way, Barack Obama’s Justice Department soon will submit a report for action against any Internet sites, broadcast, cable television or radio shows determined to be advocating or encouraging “violent acts.”
That’s from the text of a new bill from Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass., and Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y.
The Hate Crime Reporting Act of 2014 “would create an updated comprehensive report examining the role of the Internet and other telecommunications in encouraging hate crimes based on gender, race, religion, ethnicity, or sexual orientation and create recommendations to address such crimes,” stated a news release from Markey’s office.
Full article: http://www.wnd.com/2 … to-blacklist-haters/
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