Black Supremacist?

Dyron Hart, a 19 year old African American male, has been arrested and charged with sending threatening emails to three students. Hart created a false facebook account and posed as a white supremacist, named Colten Brodoux. In the email, Hart threatened to kill the students because they were black and there would soon be a black president. A section of the email stated this “By the time you've read this I will have already planned on how I will kill you. I'm just letting you know so your (sic) not surprised when a random white man is walking down the street just split your (expletive deleted) head wide open”. The FBI was able to find Hart via a subpoena of wireless data records. There was no stated reason why Hart sent the emails to the three students.
After reading this article, I was left with a sense of confusion. In all probability he sent the emails disguised as a white supremacist in the hopes of throwing any suspicion off himself, and he sent the emails simply because he did not like the students. Although, I was surprised by his reference to the Barack Obama, and I wondered why he was even mentioned and how that was a substantial enough reason to threaten to kill the students. I was puzzled at this article, an African American disguising himself as a white supremacist and using a false Facebook, well it seems as though no matter what you’re ethnicity there is the option of transforming forming yourself into a white supremacist on Facebook.

Here is the link to the article which I referenced and directly stated: http://www.outlookseries.com/news/Security/5719.htm

Spanish online communities gaining popularity

With an increasing number of Hispanics online there has been a call for specific entertainment and network which tailors to them specifically, with 67% of 18 to 27 year old Hispanics online, a prime age at which to be targeted.” A report from Forrester Research Inc. said 51 percent of U.S. Hispanics who use the Internet prefer Spanish-language Web sites, and 23 percent must have Spanish online”, this allows for marketing to be modified to directly address this specific minority group, and goes to further state the growing power in which U.S. Hispanics have in their investments in the market. El Hood is a bilingual social network which features some of the latest Latin music, which has competition from fellow Spanish- language sites such as MiGente.com, MyGrito.com, Vostu.com, and Quepasa.com. while people may still be racist and discriminate, it’s such a comfort to know that as far as money goes, it sees no color.

This is the link to the article which I directly quoted and referenced:http://www.dmnews.com/spanish-social-sites-on-the-rise/article/95961/

Obama hated....by hate groups

When Obama was elected, it was a huge moment for our country, a sign that we may all finally be able to see beyond the color of skin. Behind all the hype of America’s first black president, a seemingly outdated notion of hate groups brewed and began to boil again. Don Black, the creator of the website Stormfront.com and former grand wizard of the KKK, bragged that the day after the historic election of Barack Obama, more than 2,000 people joined his website. Stormfront is a white nationalist, neo-Nazi website which promotes the preservation of the white race. There have also been reports of the number of hate groups growing by 54% since 2000. “Obama serves as a "visual aid" that is helping respark a sense of purpose in current supporters and lure new members, said neo-Nazi David Duke”, a former Klan leader. While there may not be a direct connection between the rise in hate crimes and the increasing number in members of online hate groups such as stormfront.com, the sentiment is the same. In 2005, the number of hate crimes was at 7,163 and in 2007 there was an increase resulting in 7,624 hate crimes. Despite the lack of direct evidence, it is not hard to correlate the rising number of members joining online hate groups and the rise of hate crimes.

Welcome!

This blog serves as a discussion board to talk about issues surrounding ethnicity and the internet, a relationship plays out and has repercussions which affect all of us. Posts could go from hate groups online such as the KKK and white supremacists, to how different cultures view the use of the internet, and how ethnicity can be presented online. This blog was made for an observation at the relationship between the two and there are endless topics to discuss!