The intersection of first and second amendment rights and the cancel culture is quickly becoming volatile.
Facebook is now banning ads for weapon accessories. As reported by USA Today and other media outlets Facebook says it is temporarily banning ads that promote weapon accessories and protective equipment at least through January 22nd.
"We already prohibit ads for weapons, ammunition and weapon enhancements like silencers. But we will now also prohibit ads for accessories such as gun safes, vests and gun holsters in the US," Facebook said.
Following along is massive online DNS and web services company, GoDaddy, with the deplatforming of the popular gun site www.ar15.com.
President and co-founder of www.ar15.com, Juan Avila, says that his site has been
around a long time and is one of the grand daddies when it comes to online communities, founded in 1996.
What happened to him this past week was a total shock. “We got an email from GoDaddy on Friday, asking us to remove some content,” he said. “We took a look, we have about 300 moderators and staff that work for us and take care of everything for us and it was already handled. I emailed them back to let them know and as always, if there is anything more we can do to help or if any other content came up, to just let us know. Nothing from them until Monday when we got an email saying they were shutting us down. I emailed them this week to review what happened and nothing.”
GoDaddy is a popular choice for anyone wanting to purchase a domain name or hosting and email services. Avila has done business with them for about 15 years and feels he’s had a good relationship with them. This swift pulling of the plug on his website - as perhaps a panicked reaction to the events at the Capitol or even capitalizing on the democrats’ sentiment - was unexpected and he was given no recourse to stop it or appeal.
“They didn’t provide any reason on why or what the offending content was or even if they want to have any process to fix it. It was just, ‘you’re terminated.’ There’s plenty of fear mongering going on and a particular focus now on those who own firearms and support the second amendment,” he said.
The online community at www.ar15.com is a network of police, current and former military and everyday Americans that have a tie because of a shared faith in the Second Amendment and what it stands for in America. “We’ve done a number of events across the country and it’s always been wonderful to spend time with them and none of them wants to see what’s going on today. We don’t support violence or anything illegal, it’s just like everything else, you may have buddies that love cars and get together or friends who love music and get together and talk about those things, it’s the same thing. We’re just everyday Americans, sharing something that we love,” he added.
People who support the second amendment today are now being treated as domestic terrorists, according to Newsmax personality, Michelle Malkin. She doesn’t feel average citizens are the threat, but rather the thugs who have burned businesses and destroyed cities in anything but peaceful protests.
The First Amendment would not be possible without the Second Amendment. With the swift purge of conservative voices by Big Tech and the mainstream media, there’s a growing desperation among those who are afraid of losing their voice and the ability to communicate.
Avila agrees, saying, “In this day and age, it’s a concerted effort to silence opposing viewpoints. Anyone with a conservative-leaning view is subject to this movement they have going on. If you’re online, have a backup plan and a backup plan for your backup plan. It’s only a matter of time before they deem this kind of talk illegal. Once they do that, we’ll have to figure out how we can reach people. The fact that they’re going after companies like Newsmax and Fox News is deeply disturbing. With the Biden administration coming in, policies they can pass that will make them look good to the masses is what they want to do. Ar15.com is a minority-owned business and if they really cared, they would look out for you. I would just be careful.”
His site has found another host and is back online.
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