Neo-Nazi rockers with swastika tattoos and Insane Clown Posse-like makeup. Album art showing the gates of Auschwitz. Songs longing for a “pure f—ing genocide.” For years, Facebook has allowed bands centered on this content a home on their platform — but now the social media giant is racing to remove them. An investigation by Al Jazeera uncovered over 120 pages featuring neo-Nazi music groups — most of them heavy metal acts — and their labels; altogether, the pages collected over 800,000 likes. After Al Jazeera sent five examples to Facebook, the site removed three for being in breach of Facebook’s hate speech policy; the other two are under review. Al Jazeera claims that many other pages found in their audit were found to violate the policy. The bulk of the pages have been online for years, actively advertising upcoming concerts, music and merchandise. One group, M8l8th, a black metal band from the Ukraine, samples remarks from Joseph Goebbels and the Nazi anthem the “Horst Wessel-Lied” in their songs. The group was founded by Alexey Levkin, an organizer of Asgardsrei, a neo-Nazi musical festival in Kyiv. Pages for a number of headliners at that festival were also found on Facebook. While many bands eschewed sharing their more controversial content on the platform, Al Jazeera indicated that Volrisch, a Mexican band, used an album cover showing the gates of Auschwitz-Birkenau as its Facebook cover photo. The artwork shows a track list with English song titles like “Jewish Plague” and “New Holocaust.” Other bands such as Leibstandarte (named for Hitler’s personal SS bodyguard), Kristalnacht and Einsatzgruppen (the Nazis’ mobile killing squad) also remained active on the site. So did Peste Noire, a French band that, only last year, unveiled an album showing their lead singer in a lifted Klan hood threatening another man — actually himself, in blackface — with a noose.
via forward: Over 120 Neo-Nazi band pages found active on Facebook
siehe auch: Exclusive: Facebook used extensively to spread neo-Nazi music. An Al Jazeera investigation identified some 120 pages belonging to bands with openly white supremacist and racist views. Facebook has removed several pages belonging to music groups espousing white supremacist ideology following an investigation by Al Jazeera into the prevalence of such bands on the social media platform. Al Jazeera’s Investigative Unit identified more than 120 pages from mostly heavy metal groups and record labels with direct ties to white supremacy. The pages had gained a total of more than 800,000 likes and some have been online for more than 10 years. After sending five examples to Facebook, the platform initially removed three of the pages of such bands, adding that the two others were under review. Later, one other page was removed. The four removed pages of the SoldierSS of Evil, Whitelaw, Frakass and Frangar groups all violated Facebook’s policies, according to the social media giant. However, other pages identified by Al Jazeera are still online in breach of the company’s policies on hate speech. (…) One of the more popular pages belongs to M8l8th, a black metal music act from Ukraine, whose full name means Hitler’s Hammer. The two 8s refer to the letter H, the eighth letter in the alphabet. Both 88 and the double H are common shorthand in neo-Nazi circles for Heil Hitler. In its songs, M8l8th uses parts of a speech by Nazi propagandist Joseph Goebbels and the Horst Wessel-Lied, the official anthem of the Nazi Party from 1930 to 1945. Have a tip for Al Jazeera that should be investigated? Find out how to get in touch with us on our Tips page The band’s founder, a Russian national named Alexey Levkin, is closely linked to Ukraine’s far-right nationalist Azov Battalion, which is currently fighting in Ukraine’s continuing conflict against Russian-backed separatists. Levkin is also one of the organisers of Asgardsrei, a neo-Nazi music festival held annually in Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv. Festivalgoers have been seen waving swastika flags and making Nazi salutes. Al Jazeera identified Facebook pages belonging to bands that have performed at Asgardsrei, including Goatmoon, a Finnish black metal band whose page has more than 12,000 likes.
