The Alt-Right Economy is Still Powered by Shopify?™
Embattled giant struggles to balance freedom, risk, and profit.
In 2017 Shopify CEO Tobias Lütke came under fire for operating Breitbart’s online shop. He defended his actions in the name of Free Speech, saying to take down their site would be “selective”. On the other hand, Shopify de-platforms its smaller merchants around the world every day as part of its risk management strategy. So where do freedoms and risk meet?
The Capitol riots in January 2021, along with the associated raid, caused Shopify to come under fire once again. Their response was to remove two Trump related stores for inciting violence: “Shopify removes Tr*mp-affiliated stores”, ran the headlines. [5][6][7][8][9][10].
Yet many other stores such as trump2020masks.com, officialtrump2020store.com and megatrumpstore.com were still operating on Shopify as of writing, at the end of April 2021 [11] [12][13] [14].
Criticism revived in 2021 around these organizations for not only fueling the Capitol riots through the spread of misinformation and illegitimate claims of vote tampering, but the spreading of fear and hatred toward people of Chinese descent. We are reminded far too often of the very real, painful, and damaging effects that racial hatred and division causes.
If you peek under the hood, it’s hard not to wonder if Shopify is a key player in the operation and proliferation of the hate economy, driven largely by hate propaganda merchandise.
So, let’s take a look.
Anti-Asianwear
MAGA in Canada?
Fight on the 6th and Immigrants
Back to Reality
Citing the Criminal Code in Canada:
Section 320 allows a judge to confiscate publications which appear to be hate propaganda, after due notice to the apparent owner of the material and the owner of the premises where the material is found, and after a hearing.[16]
Section 320.1 allows a judge to make similar orders with respect to confiscation of hate propaganda stored electronically, and to order that hate propaganda which is made available to the public by electronic means be taken down.[17]
Shopify continues to profit from this type of hateful speech, despite public pressure. At this point it is difficult to argue that CEO Tobias Lütke is not fully aware of the unrelenting promotion of hate on their platform.
Additional links:
Gateway Pundit —
Fight for Freedom
Stolen
RebelNews Anti-Asianwear
Don’t eat me
Please Don’t Eat Me
Please Don’t Eat Me 2
MAGA in Canada movement?
Make Canada Great Again 1
Make Canada Great Again 3
Make Canada Great Again 6
Breitbart
Fight for Freedom
Border Wall Construction Company
Breitbart Fight Club
HodgeTwins Anti-Asianwear
China Virus Survivor
All Faster than 911
Chinese Virus
Chinese Virus Nipping at Your Nose
