As previously reported, 8chan has been reborn after a lengthy downtime as 8kun in honor of its connection and relationship with 2channel. As the site nears its relaunch not everyone is pleased that the free speech Mecca, now cleared by the US government, is returning. Former owner, Fredrick Brennan, in an exposé with the Daily Dot, written by Mike Rothschild, has taken to denouncing the site and revealing he is taking every action in his power to further de-platform and silence the free speech platform.
In discussions with Mike Rothschild, Brennan uses the usual media talking points of blaming the mass shootings on the image board. Going so far as to make the mistake of blaming the third mass shooting that was to be blamed on the website — even while the site was down — and ignoring basic facts that the first manifesto was only up for mere minutes before being taken down and the second manifesto by the El Paso shooter was assumed to be another post by the FBI and was mocked for the 5 hours it was up. Later the media would attempt to blame the Oslo shooting on 8chan claiming the manifesto was uploaded to the site while it was down.
How could the Oslo shooter have posted on 8chan if 8chan has been offline for close to a week?
You’re actually fake news. https://t.co/GIzfk4MdUn— 8chan (8ch.net) (@infinitechan) August 11, 2019
“I would say that 8chan is much more notorious due to all the deaths directly related to it,” Brennan said. “The Daily Stormer was toxic, but nobody died from it. So it was much more able to make the free speech argument to ISPs.”
I guess Mr. Rothschild and Brennan did not get the memo that the Oslo shooting’s blame was no longer attributed to a website that wasn’t up. Nor did they get the now released memo from the Department of Homeland Security thanking site owner Jim Watkins for his cooperation and clarification of how the website operates.
“We want to thank Mr. Watkins for his cooperation today. He provided vast and helpful information to the Committee about the structure, operation, and policies of 8Chan and his other companies. We look forward to his continued cooperation with the Committee as he indicated his desire to do so during today’s deposition.” – Thomas and Rogers
Failing to use moral juxtaposition to justify his actions Brennan goes on to boast about his actions to isolate and deplatform the website, that he eventually relents is rather futile. In spite of all his efforts have netted a mere weeks long delay in the sites inevitable return.
“Suffice to say, today’s victory brings 8kun one step closer to total annihilation,” Brennan told the Daily Dot.
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“Jim is finding it harder to line up support and my action is increasingly isolating him,” Brennan said. “I got Zare to drop him, the next domino will probably be OVH,” the company that owns the servers 8kun was set to use.
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“Remember that these ‘free speech’ content delivery networks [like former 8chan host Cloudflare] are all relying on network providers upstream. They don’t own the lines. Jim won’t be able to afford multiple connections right to the internet backbone,” Brennan explained.
While one man who lashes out in lamentation of the sale he publicly says he regrets and loss of the spotlight, 8kun marches towards its eventual release. Over 200 boards have prepared for migration and Mr. Watkins appears unfazed by Brennan’s actions.
In a final stab at social manipulation, the Daily Dot attempts to drag into the issue the validity of Q anon. Q anon being an anonymous poster with supposed connections to the Trump administration who often goes into vague detail about the easily observable schism inside the American power structure that centers around the “Deep State Intelligence” and US military. Q Anon does enjoy a very dedicated following, but outside that following very few in the /pol/ community take the poster seriously. To most it is just an elaborate LARP, to others an obvious shill, but to imagine the user has any significant influence over the greater community is a misguided boomer moment of the uniformed.
Yet Brennan has been obsessed with Q Anon for some time, which likely led to Mr. Rothschild including the reference in his celebration for the baseless persecution Jim Watkins and the free speech platform have undergone. Regardless of what its detractors want, the image board will be returning soon.
