On Sunday night, GoDaddy said it gave the Daily Stormer 24 hours to move its website to another provider.
Perhaps I shouldn’t be so surprised, but I am. I am in awe of how relevant questions about Holocaust memory and technology have become over the last few months. This week in particular.
GoDaddy and Google have both banned the neo-Nazi site, Daily Stormer, for “violating their terms of service.” We are reminded that technology is not neutral. The services that host and make available outlets of hate speech - like the Daily Stormer - are not neutral. They may seem anonymous, but they sustain systems that spread hate and incite violence.
While it’s refreshing - and headline grabbing - to see companies like GoDaddy and Google stand up to neo-Nazis in this way, this story is not over. The Daily Stormer plans to fight against the GoDaddy decision. And, there are hundreds of other racist, antisemitic, white nationalist, neo-Nazi publications that continue to rely on the technology we take for granted to spread their messages. More public outrage is needed, more attention on the way these sites “violate” not only terms of service, but also moral decency and shared values. We can start by recognizing that technology is not neutral and that it is just one of the systems enabling this kind of hate to spread in America and around the world.