Page 6 - ARUBA TODAY

A6 U.S. NEWS
Friday 27 September 2019
‘OK’ hand gesture, ‘Bowlcut’ added to hate symbols database

By MICHAEL KUNZELMAN and supported cartoon-
Associated Press ist Matt Furie’s efforts to
COLLEGE PARK, Md. (AP) reclaim the character he
— The “OK” hand gesture, created. The “Happy Mer-
a mass killer’s bowl-style chant,” one of the new
haircut and an anthropo- database entries, is an an-
morphic moon wearing ti-Semitic meme that de-
sunglasses are among 36 picts a stereotypical image
new entries in a Jewish civil of a bearded Jewish man
rights group’s online data- rubbing his hands togeth-
base of hate symbols used er. Another addition, the
by white supremacists and “Moon Man” meme, is de-
other far-right extremists. rived from “Mac Tonight,” a
The Anti-Defamation character in a McDonald’s
League has added the sym- advertising campaign dur-
bols to its online “Hate on ing the 1980s. Internet trolls
Display” database , which transformed the sunglass-
already includes burning es-wearing cartoon moon
crosses, Ku Klux Klan robes, into a vehicle for rap songs
the swastika and many with racist and violent lyrics.
other of the most notorious The ADL also added the
and overt symbols of rac- “Dylann Roof Bowlcut,” an
ism and anti-Semitism. The image of the hairstyle worn
New York City-based group by the white supremacist
launched the database in who shot and killed nine
2000 to help law enforce- In this May 2, 2017 file photo Jonathan Greenblatt, CEO and National Director of the Anti- black people in 2015 at a
ment officers, school offi- Defamation League, speaks on Capitol Hill in Washington. Associated Press church in Charleston, South
cials and others recognize Carolina. Roof’s bowl-style
signs of extremist activity. It Defamation League CEO er mainstream platforms, ters “W’’ and “P’’ to mean hair became an avatar
has grown to include near- Jonathan Greenblatt said and to public forums and “white power.” But the ADL for extremists, including
ly 200 entries. in a statement. fliers. says extremists also are us- a Washington, D.C., man
“Even as extremists con- Some of the new entries The ADL has updated its ing it as a sincere expres- whose relatives contacted
tinue to use symbols that started as trolling cam- database to include the sion of white supremacy. the FBI to report concerns
may be years or decades paigns or hateful memes on “OK” hand symbol, which Brenton Tarrant, the Austra- about his behavior and
old, they regularly create internet message boards became fodder for a lian man charged with kill- far-right extremist rhetoric
new symbols, memes and such as 4chan, 8chan and 4chan trolling campaign to ing 51 people at mosques after last year’s Pittsburgh
slogans to express their Reddit, before migrating to dupe viewers into thinking in Christchurch, New Zea- synagogue massacre . Jef-
hateful sentiments,” Anti- Facebook, Twitter and oth- the fingers formed the let- land, in March, flashed frey Clark’s username on
the “OK” symbol during a the Gab social media plat-
courtroom appearance form was “DC Bowl Gang,”
after his arrest. Tarrant also an FBI agent wrote in a
had the number 14 written court filing for gun charges
on his rifle, a possible refer- against Clark.
ence to the “14 Words,” a Logos of white nationalist
white supremacist slogan, groups including the Rise
according to the Southern Above Movement and the
Poverty Law Center. American Identity Move-
Oren Segal, director of the ment also are among the
ADL’s Center on Extremism, new ADL database entries.
said context is key to inter- The recently formed Ameri-
preting whether an “OK” can Identity Movement is
symbol is hateful or harm- the successor to the now-
less. He said the ADL had dissolved Identity Evropa,
been reluctant to add it which frequently plastered
to the database “because its white nationalist propa-
‘OK’ has meant just ‘OK’ for ganda on college campus-
so long.” es and is one of the groups
“At this point, there is that has been sued over
enough of a volume of use the violence that erupted
for hateful purposes that at a white nationalist rally
we felt it was important to in Charlottesville, Virginia ,
add,” Segal said. in August 2017.
An earlier addition to the Four members of the Cal-
database was Pepe the ifornia-based Rise Above
Frog , a cartoon character Movement pleaded guilty
that became hijacked by this year to attacking coun-
online extremists who su- terprotesters at the Char-
perimposed the frog with lottesville rally. A federal
Nazi symbols and other judge sentenced three of
hateful imagery. The ADL them to prison terms rang-
branded Pepe as a hate ing from 27 months to 37
symbol in September 2016 months.q