Last Updated on June 16, 2020
The Centre for Countering Digital Hate has released a blacklist of 10 US-based websites it wants banned from Google AdSense for “racism.”
Working together with NBC News, the Centre for Countering Digital Hate, or CCDH, succeeded in getting ZeroHedge banned from Google’s adsense, but it turns out they’re not the only websites on their blacklist.
Stop Funding Fake News, a project by the CCDH, has put 10 US-based websites, including ZeroHedge, on a blacklist for posting “racist articles about the protests.” Sites on the list include: American Greatness, Moonbattery, American Thinker, Big League Politics, WND, The Washington Standard, Gateway Pundit, and Breitbart. The Federalist is also on the list, and were targeted by Google, but were allowed to remain on AdSense after removing their comments section.
“Fake News and racist narratives can cause real-world harms: dehumanising black people and whipping up fear,” they write on their site, and that therefore advertisers must “blacklist these 10, US-based, racist Fake News sites.”
The CCDH’s CEO, Imran Ahmed, applauded Google for banning ZeroHedge, and, at the time, The Federalist, from AdSense, but said that the Big Tech company needed to go even further, and go after everyone on their list:
There are eight other sites that we identified that make millions of dollars from Google Ads. We take Google at face value when they say #BlackLivesMatters [sic] and that they want to Do No Evil, but right now they are funding hate-filled and conspiracy-filled sites that may have a right to free speech, but they absolutely do not have a right to profit from it.
CCDH CEO, @Imi_Ahmed: “We take Google at face value when they say #BlackLivesMattters… but right now they are funding hate-filled and conspiracy-filled sites that may have a right to free speech, but they absolutely do not have a right to profit from it.” pic.twitter.com/IM7ojzB5np
— Center for Countering Digital Hate (@CCDHate) June 16, 2020
The campaign criticised the decision by Google to reinstate The Federalist on AdSense after having removed its offending material. “Google must not give in to pressure, and stick to their decision to demonetise The Federalist,” Stop Funding Fake News tweeted. “Everyone has the right to free speech. No one has the right to profit from hate.”
Google must not give in to pressure, and stick to their decision to demonetise The Federalist.
Everyone has the right to free speech. No one has the right to profit from hate. #DefundRacism https://t.co/JdYqZrukwv pic.twitter.com/n8mi3bUYgA
— Stop Funding Misinformation (@SFMisinfo) June 16, 2020
Ahmed has been active in lobbying Big Tech companies to take down and blacklist conservatives for a while now. Earlier this year, he, along with Rachel Riley, a British celebrity most known for her appearances on Count Down, met with Twitter at their London offices to try and get Katie Hopkins removed from the site.
Ahmed also has strong ties to the British government and the Labour Party. Not only is Ahmed a member of the Steering Committee of the British government’s “Commission on Countering Extremism,” an organisation that was created by then-Prime Minister Theresa May “to help fight hatred and extremism in the same way as we have fought racism,” but he has also worked as a political advisor for Labour MP Hillary Benn, and co-wrote a book with another Labour MP, Angela Eagle.
Ironically, the term “blacklist” has recently come under fire for itself being racist. Google’s Chromium project, for example, argues that “terms such as ‘blacklist’ and ‘whitelist’ reinforce the notion that black=bad and white=good.”
