Substackers Against Nazis
A collective letter to Substack leadership
I know that many of you regularly read only one Substack newsletter - this one. So you will probably be double surprised, both because this isn’t the sort of thing you expect from META-SPIEL, and because you’ll be taken aback by finding out that, well, Substack has a Nazi problem.
Substack is not alone, of course. We’re at a painful historical moment where extreme white supremacists, including avowed Nazis, are popping up in more and more places where perhaps they would not have ventured in the fairly recent past.
In the next couple of days, I hope to publish a piece I’ve been working on - a longer one than usual - at the bottom of which I’ll say a few things about free speech. That piece will be called “Big Jim’s Glass Castle and the Nazi” and will be about my own encounter with a Nazi 16 years ago - a Nazi who attempted to run for public office, and who as recently as 2020 was still filing as a write-in candidate.
For now, though, I am simply sharing this open letter to the people who run Substack. To date, over 200 Substackers have shared this, and I am proud to be able to join them.
Dear Chris, Hamish & Jairaj:
We’re asking a very simple question that has somehow been made complicated: Why are you platforming and monetizing Nazis?
According to a piece written by Substack publisher Jonathan M. Katz and published by The Atlantic on November 28, this platform has a Nazi problem:
“Some Substack newsletters by Nazis and white nationalists have thousands or tens of thousands of subscribers, making the platform a new and valuable tool for creating mailing lists for the far right. And many accept paid subscriptions through Substack, seemingly flouting terms of service that ban attempts to ‘publish content or fund initiatives that incite violence based on protected classes’...Substack, which takes a 10 percent cut of subscription revenue, makes money when readers pay for Nazi newsletters.”
As Patrick Casey, a leader of a now-defunct neo-Nazi group who is banned on nearly every other social platform except Substack, wrote on here in 2021: “I’m able to live comfortably doing something I find enjoyable and fulfilling. The cause isn’t going anywhere.” Several Nazis and white supremacists including Richard Spencer not only have paid subscriptions turned on but have received Substack “Bestseller” badges, indicating that they are making at a minimum thousands of dollars a year.
From our perspective as Substack publishers, it is unfathomable that someone with a swastika avatar, who writes about “The Jewish question,” or who promotes Great Replacement Theory, could be given the tools to succeed on your platform. And yet you’ve been unable to adequately explain your position.
In the past you have defended your decision to platform bigotry by saying you “make decisions based on principles not PR” and “will stick to our hands-off approach to content moderation.” But there’s a difference between a hands-off approach and putting your thumb on the scale. We know you moderate some content, including spam sites and newsletters written by sex workers. Why do you choose to promote and allow the monetization of sites that traffic in white nationalism?
Your unwillingness to play by your own rules on this issue has already led to the announced departures of several prominent Substackers, including Rusty Foster and Helena Fitzgerald. They follow previous exoduses of writers, including Substack Pro recipient Grace Lavery and Jude Ellison S. Doyle, who left with similar concerns.
As journalist Casey Newton told his more than 166,000 Substack subscribers after Katz’s piece came out: “The correct number of newsletters using Nazi symbols that you host and profit from on your platform is zero.”
We, your publishers, want to hear from you on the official Substack newsletter. Is platforming Nazis part of your vision of success? Let us know—from there we can each decide if this is still where we want to be.
Signed,
Substackers Against Nazis
I’m so sick of it.