Disaster Activists Are Trying To Force Mastercard To Cut Off Payments To The Far Right - The payment giant’s shareholders will vote on a proposal to set up a “human rights committee” at the company to monitor money flowing to hate groups.

http://archive.li/77Yh1
https://www.buzzfeed.com/markdistefano/mastercard-activists-cut-off-donations-far-right

Activists have successfully forced Mastercard to hold a vote by shareholders on a proposal which, if passed, could see the company monitoring payments to global far-right political leaders and white supremacist groups.

The proposal aims to see Mastercard establish an internal “human rights committee” that would stop designated white supremacist groups and anti-Islam activists, such as Tommy Robinson, from getting access to money sent from donors using the company’s card payment services.

It’s been conceived by US-based political activists SumOfUs, who want to escalate the battle against white supremacists and far-right groups from tech platforms like Facebook, Google, Twitter, Patreon, and PayPal to one of the biggest companies in world finance, in an attempt to choke off donations.



Robinson and several other leading figures in the global far right have been forced in recent months to solicit donations directly on their websites via Mastercard, Visa, and American Express after PayPal banned payments to them. Facebook also disabled the donation function on Robinson’s fan page before deleting it completely.

“Spreading hate involves spending money,” Eoin Dubsky, from SumOfUs, told BuzzFeed News. “Whether it’s paying for online advertising or organising violent rallies, white supremacist groups need financial services from companies like Mastercard.”

Over several months, SumOfUs has been locked in a battle with Mastercard executives behind the scenes in order to get the new committee proposal put to the shareholders ahead of the company’s June annual general meeting.

It would see the formation of a “human rights committee” at the board level, which would monitor financial transactions with designated hate groups.

Documents seen by BuzzFeed News reveal that the US Securities and Exchange Commission has given the green light for shareholders to get the chance to vote on the formation of the committee, despite staunch opposition from the Mastercard board and executives.

In the material to be sent to shareholders, the activists refer to a website called Blood Money, which tracks online payments to white supremacist groups from the likes of Mastercard, American Express, and Stripe. The website currently claims that Mastercard services are being used by groups like Counter-Currents Publishing, Covenant People’s Ministry, the United West, Sultan Knish, and the Fitzgerald Griffin Foundation.

SumOfUs has also pointed to the activity of Robinson, whose real name is Stephen Yaxley-Lennon. The former English Defence League founder is running as an independent in May’s European election.

In November 2018, PayPal banned donations to the anti-Islam activist, with the online payment company saying that its services wouldn’t “be used to promote hate, violence, or other forms of intolerance that is discriminatory”.

More recently, Robinson has been calling on his global network of supporters to donate to his election campaign through his website, which allows payments from Mastercard.

“Having a Mastercard logo on their website also gives these groups a veneer of legitimacy, and allows those who want to donate to do so quickly and quietly,” Dubsky told BuzzFeed News.

“Mastercard also benefits, pocketing a transaction fee for each purchase or donation.”

Mastercard declined requests for comment, pointing instead to the board’s position laid out in the information sent to shareholders ahead of the general meeting.

“Mastercard is committed to treating all people fairly and with dignity, and our interest in human rights extends to all areas in which our business is involved and where we have particular expertise,” it reads. “The Board does not believe that establishing a separate human rights committee is necessary to properly exercise its oversight of this important area.”

It’s unclear whether the proposal stands a chance of succeeding at June’s meeting. But the move to confront such a big, mainstream company like Mastercard over issues like the funding of white supremacy and the far right comes after action from smaller, online financial platforms like PayPal and Patreon in the area.

PayPal has banned payments to Robinson, US far-right group Proud Boys, and Canadian anti-Islam activist Laura Loomer. It also acted against several US anti-fascist groups because the company had no tolerance for groups that promoted “hate” and “violence”.

Last year, Patreon banned YouTuber Sargon of Akkad over a 2015 video that featured the Gamergate leader repeatedly saying the n-word in a Google Hangout with the alt-right. According to the New York Times, Sargon of Akkad, whose real name is Carl Benjamin, had 3,000 subscribers and was being paid $12,000 a month on Patreon when he was removed from the site.

In a recent YouTube video, Benjamin and Robinson talked about being de-platformed by social media companies. But Robinson also suggested that he has long-term fears beyond the big tech companies.

“I am being completely un-personed,” Robinson said. “What’s next—my mobile-phone contract?”

 

[Kyria the Great]

All i know is if a credit card company honestly pushes for something as dumb as this, they deserve to go out of business. Better yet, they might face Anti-trust laws as only a few companies process credit card payments and a Republican majority in the house and senate and especially a Conservative majority in the Judicial branch will certainly bring force to swing the hammer down hard on them.

All and all, I don't think any company is that stupid to go for osmething this brazen as all it will do is bring light on them and expose their near monopoly in the industry that has been protected by the government, even though it shouldn't and gets close to breaching anti-trust laws.

 

[frozenrunner]

Cool, cool because radicalizing the far right is a good idea considering they have the guns and the will to take out leftists.

Why are leftists not afraid of antagonizing the right but extremely afraid of upsetting Muslims/Islam?

They know a significant number of radical Muslims would actually attack and kill them. They don't think a significant number of people on the right will.

Oh, they'll scream about isolated incidents like they indicate something about all right-of-center people, but they're pretending, playing at victimhood. Don't so much listen to what these people say, watch what they do or don't do.

 

[Stoneheart]

What happened to Capitalism? just pay the angels to beat up those fags.

 

[Maxliam]

They know a significant number of radical Muslims would actually attack and kill them. They don't think a significant number of people on the right will.

Oh, they'll scream about isolated incidents like they indicate something about all right-of-center people, but they're pretending, playing at victimhood. Don't so much listen to what these people say, watch what they do or don't do.

The problem with they logic there is derka derkas are a bunch of disorganized tards compared to the right getting organized under the banner of "kill sjws for freedom". Muzzies fight over which goat fucker was supposed to succeed that child molesting muhammad. The infighting cripples religious fanatics.

All they're achieving with this is literally creating a thought police committee in a private company. It's like they're hankering for a civil war.

 

[Zbk3VmLfujjzjxBd43tL]

The problem with they logic there is derka derkas are a bunch of disorganized tards compared to the right getting organized under the banner of "kill sjws for freedom". Muzzies fight over which goat fucker was supposed to succeed that child molesting muhammad. The infighting cripples religious fanatics.

The Muzzies have that solved. If you're Shi'ite you do what the Ayatollah says. If you're Sunni you do what your masters in the Muslim Brotherhood are telling you (which may include joining ISIS). Either way includes trucks of peace, suicide bombing, etc.

Meanwhile the "kill SJWs for freedom" types spend most of their time calling each other Jewish shills and can't decide whether Brenton Tarrant was a hero or a false flag plant, while calling all the other right-wingers cucks and Zionists. These people do nothing but shitpost on the internet all day.

 

[Professional iPad Hoarder]

If I receive a letter saying that "I'm banned" from using my CC I'll proudly hang that on a wall.

 

[Splendid]

They keep shitting up my inbox (because I once signed one of their petitions)

Report them as spam every time. If enough people do it, they'll either have to clean up their act, get put on a spam blacklist and have all their emails going to people's spam boxes by default, or get their account with mailchimp or whatever in trouble. You don't have to tolerate spam because muh nonprofit.

 

[Maxliam]

What happened to Capitalism? just pay the angels to beat up those fags.

Every time you kill a fag, an angel gets its wings.

The Muzzies have that solved. If you're Shi'ite you do what the Ayatollah says. If you're Sunni you do what your masters in the Muslim Brotherhood are telling you (which may include joining ISIS). Either way includes trucks of peace, suicide bombing, etc.

Meanwhile the "kill SJWs for freedom" types spend most of their time calling each other Jewish shills and can't decide whether Brenton Tarrant was a hero or a false flag plant, while calling all the other right-wingers cucks and Zionists. These people do nothing but shitpost on the internet all day.

I'm not talking about the internet tough guys, I'm talking about your average country person who would gladly get rid of the idiots who call them nazi's all day if Antifa really wanted to come to a civil war. The Derka derkas are busy blowing each other up over their retarded religion.

 

[pwnest injun]

Not when a vast majority of banks only offer you one choice who your have your debit card with. Not when some places only take Mastercard.

They're talking about stopping the ability to take payments by MasterCard for organizations deemed to be racist, from my understanding, not from individuals being able to use a card. So, if you wanted to donate money to, or purchase merchandise from KikeBlaster's Xtreem Hatefactory, you couldn't do that using MasterCard's merchant processing service.

If MasterCard ever went closer to the sun than that, then the board would kick the CEO's ass out for fucking up their bottom line.

 

[neverendingmidi]

Hey, maybe they'll finally shut down Louis Farrakhan, that well known far-right firebrand.

The darkly humorous thing is that this was repeated by Washington Post as well. "Democracy Dies In Darkness" indeed

 

[Unog]

All i know is if a credit card company honestly pushes for something as dumb as this, they deserve to go out of business.

Oh yeah, they'll totally go out of business. Just like twitter, facebook, youtube...

Let's be real. The right nowadays wants to pretend that they've gotten their set of dentures back in but it's just that - false teeth. None of these people who say they're going to boycott something ever actually will just like the NFL shit. They pull the same double-think to avoid their massive amounts of cognitive dissonance that progressives do, but pretend that it's different when they do it.

All they're achieving with this is literally creating a thought police committee in a private company. It's like they're hankering for a civil war.

Rest assured that's what a fair whack of progressives want, because for some daft reason they think they'll win in an all-out left vs right civil conflict.

Meanwhile the "kill SJWs for freedom" types spend most of their time calling each other Jewish shills and can't decide whether Brenton Tarrant was a hero or a false flag plant, while calling all the other right-wingers cucks and Zionists. These people do nothing but shitpost on the internet all day.

If there's anything that would actually bring the right together in as monolithic an entity as the left is nowadays, it'd be shutting them down financially en-masse. Or at least I used to think that, until it became clear through right-wingers that bitch about twitter yet will endlessly come up with excuses for still using it are just all faggots who will never practice what they preach, and have no more a spine than they did ten years ago. I'm not sure anymore.

 

[Ledian]

Maybe the actual issue is having a society where a single private corporation run by private unelected individuals can destroy it you.

Fixed that little mistake for you.

 

[Vlinny-kun]

Ok. Who are the bastards that think this is in ANY POSSIBLE WAY a good idea? Show yourselves!

 

[Marissa Moira]

View attachment 744782
Ok. Who are the bastards that think this is in ANY POSSIBLE WAY a good idea? Show yourselves!

Sorry I confused them for Sum 41.

 

[boulderblundermatt90]

these people are idiots.

they will not win. sooner or later, people will figure out you can send money through the mail and once that happens its game over because they can't legally fuck with someones mail without risking major jail time.... nevermind the fact that its theft and depending on how much they've stolen, they could piss off the IRS.

 

[Manah]

Proud Boys is the gayest fucking name I've ever heard.

 

[mindlessobserver]

Any of the shareholders who vote for this will need to be stood up against the wall and shot. Seriously, as if we needed anymore evidence of what "human rights boards" are. Extra legal kangaroo courts far left activists Create as actual courts cant stand their bullshit and the voters wont give them a mandate because they are authoritarian dick bags.

 

[Iwasamwillbe]

Oh yeah, they'll totally go out of business. Just like twitter, facebook, youtube...

Let's be real. The right nowadays wants to pretend that they've gotten their set of dentures back in but it's just that - false teeth. None of these people who say they're going to boycott something ever actually will just like the NFL shit. They pull the same double-think to avoid their massive amounts of cognitive dissonance that progressives do, but pretend that it's different when they do it.

And now you sound like raymond.

Many in "the right" aren't talking of boycotting tech companies en masse because for many reasons, that many have recognized, said boycotts wouldn't amount to much. Getting the normies to get on the boycott, finding suitable alternatives, making sure said alternatives don't get crippled or squashed by the cartel that is Big Tech.

And many on the right actually are promoting or even creating alternative platforms, like Bitchute, Minds.com, Dick Masterson's Patreon-esque service. You apparently weren't paying attention.

Or at least I used to think that, until it became clear through right-wingers that bitch about twitter yet will endlessly come up with excuses for still using it are just all faggots who will never practice what they preach, and have no more a spine than they did ten years ago. I'm not sure anymore.

Right-wingers use Twitter to engage with their followers. When Twitter fucks with right-wingers, they have less ability to engage with their followers.

Most people (in this context) use Twitter, because Twitter is a mainstream platform, so to not use Twitter is to create less engagement with your followers still.

Even Null still uses Twitter, for Christ's sake. And it's to engage with his followers too.

It is also hard to get normies, relatively normie e-celebs, or anyone of notice to alternative platforms, which is what makes them grow in the first place. You don't just want Twitter rejects. Otherwise, you just get another Gab or Mastadon.

Those alternative platforms also have to get past the tech oligopoly.

So the major problem is figuring out how to break up the power of big tech companies.

I agree. The right’s problem is that they still think authority figures or the free market will solve it. So all they’ll do is bitch and hope for the best. They lack balls or ambition which is why they keep getting pushed around. The left acts like exceptional individuals but they have the ability to organize and get shit done.

That’s one of the main reasons why they shat their nappies over Charlottesville: the right was starting to organize and they freaked out.

What do you think the right should do about the big tech companies?

 

[mindlessobserver]

So the major problem is figuring out how to break up the power of big tech companies.

What do you think the right should do about the big tech companies?

There really isn't a conservative situation from an economic standpoint for dealing with the tech companies. But they are not behaving like corporations out for profit anymore but rather as political actors and there are solutions for dealing with political enemies. For example, we could pass a constitutional amendment that declares social media to be the public square and access to the internet a basic right.

Barring that there is also the really conservative solution for dealing with the tech companies that involve hemp rope and helicopter rides over the Pacific ocean.

 

[Manah]

The far right would be the first in line to support refusing service over political beliefs, maybe they should get exactly what they want.

This guy is a moron, but I absolutely have to agree that if someone on the right thought of this first they would have tried to pull the exact same shit.

Anyone who thinks tactics like this are only used by whichever party they designate as "the bad guys" are only fooling themselves.

It's the same shit with how people keep insisting that 'the other side' is full of brainwashed morons, and also a minority, but giant corporations are just following what they want because ???. See also, when people supporting the Occupy movement back in the day had their twitter accounts purged en masse.