VICTORY: GuideStar REMOVES Bigoted Hate Group Label

42

A triumph! GuideStar has removed the “hate group” label smeared on many of us by the hard left, pro-jihad hate machine, the SPLC (Southern Poverty Law Center).

WaPo: GuideStar announced its decision to remove the labels last week, two days after being sent a complaint letter signed by 41 people, largely representing conservative organizations, including Pamela Geller of the American Freedom Defense Initiative, whom the Southern Poverty Law Center describes as “one of America’s most notorious Islamophobes,” and Tim Wildmon of the American Family Association, a group the SPLC says is staunchly anti-LGBT.

“The ‘hate group’ list is nothing more than a political weapon targeting people it deems to be its political enemies,” the letter said. “The list is ad hoc, partisan, and agenda-driven.”

Story continues below advertisement

Threats? None of our followers and members have ever killed or plotted violence against anyone, but members of SPLC, the very group whose defamation GuideStar cites, have killed and attempted to assassinate any number of us.

Last week, a coalition of conservative groups and organizations working in defense of freedom submitted a letter calling out America’s leading source of information on U.S. charities, GuideStar, on its flagrant use of the SPLC’s hate labels in smearing conservative organizations.

Earlier this month, GuideStar, the world’s largest source for information about charities, added a new feature to its website: warning labels flagging would-be donors to nearly four dozen nonprofits accused of spreading hate. The outcry was immediate and most vehement from conservative groups, including Christians who said they’d been targeted as hateful for opposing same-sex marriage.

The complaints prompted GuideStar to reverse its course. The company said it’s removing the labels “for the time being” beginning Monday, in part because of concerns raised about their objectivity but also because of the threats against employees.

Letter: 2017.06.21_vfinal_signatures_LTR_Coalition to Guidestar-Harold Jacobs

We, the undersigned organizations and individuals, write to express our strong disagreement with Guidestar’s newly implemented policy that labels 46 American organizations as “hate groups.” Your designations are based on determinations made by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), a hard-left activist organization. As such, SPLC’s aggressive political agenda pervades the construction of its “hate group” listings.

The SPLC has no bona fides to make such determinations. It is not a governmental organization using a rigorous criteria to create its lists, and it is not a scientifically oriented organization. The SPLC is merely another “progressive” political organization. It gained credibility attacking Klansmen, neo-Nazis, and skinheads – many of whom were engaged in violence. The SPLC is now trying to export the same tactics into areas of mainstream political discourse including debates about immigration and sexual-identity politics.

The “hate group” list is nothing more than a political weapon targeting people it deems to be its political enemies. The list is ad hoc, partisan, and agenda-driven.1 The SPLC doesn’t even pretend to identify groups on the political left that engage in “hate.” Mosques or Islamist groups that promote radical speech inciting anti-Semitism and actual violence are not listed by the SPLC even though many have been publicly identified after terrorist attacks. Radical, violent leftist environmentalists or speech suppressing thugs – like the rioting “antifa” movement – receive no mention from the SPLC.

Despite its denials to the contrary, this highly refined method of ostracism and dehumanization practiced by the SPLC isn’t just about verbal debate – it can foreseeably lead to violence. The SPLC’s primary goal is to achieve the political submission of its opponents, but its practice of sustained demonization in one’s community – which is what a “hate map” is all about – inflames passions of hatred and animus against its targets……

Read the whole thing here.

We fought the lies and the smear. And we won.

Earlier this month, GuideStar, the world’s largest source for information about charities, added a new feature to its website: warning labels flagging would-be donors to nearly four dozen nonprofits accused of spreading hate.

The outcry was immediate and most vehement from conservative groups, including Christians who said they’d been targeted as hateful for opposing same-sex marriage.

The complaints prompted GuideStar to reverse its course. The company said it’s removing the labels “for the time being” beginning Monday, in part because of concerns raised about their objectivity but also because of the threats against employees.

“Dismayingly, a significant amount of the feedback we’ve received in recent days has shifted from constructive criticism to harassment and threats directed at our staff and leadership,” said a statement posted to GuideStar’s website on Friday. “With this development in mind — driven by both our commitment to objectivity and our concerns for our staff’s wellbeing,” the labels are being removed.

The “hate group” designations used by GuideStar came from the Southern Poverty Law Center, a nonprofit watchdog organization that tracks such groups, which it says includes the Ku Klux Klan, neo-Nazis and white nationalists. The “hate group” banners used on GuideStar’s website linked to the law center’s website, according to the Associated Press.

The SPLC lists 52 “anti-LGBT” organizations on its website, including several churches and nonprofit Christian ministries, such as the Alliance Defending Freedom, which it says “has supported the criminalization of gay sex and currently is working to enact so-called ‘bathroom bills’ around the country to prevent trans people from using public restrooms … in accordance with their gender identities.”

“These groups are not listed on the basis of opposition to same-sex marriage or the belief that the Bible describes homosexual activity as sinful,” the SPLC’s website said.

But some conservative organizations complained that the center’s lumping them together with violent racist groups wasn’t based on objective research but on a political agenda. GuideStar’s usage of the center’s designation, they said, undermined the website’s policy of “neutrality.”

“One may or may not like the legal advocacy of the Alliance Defending Freedom, but they’re not a bunch of hooded-sheet Klanners burning crosses,” wrote Mark Kellner for the conservative-leaning “Get Religion” website, which focuses focused on religion coverage in the news media.

GuideStar announced its decision to remove the labels last week, two days after being sent a complaint letter signed by 41 people, largely representing conservative organizations, including Pamela Geller of the American Freedom Defense Initiative, whom the Southern Poverty Law Center describes as “one of America’s most notorious Islamophobes,” and Tim Wildmon of the American Family Association, a group the SPLC says is staunchly anti-LGBT.

“The ‘hate group’ list is nothing more than a political weapon targeting people it deems to be its political enemies,” the letter said. “The list is ad hoc, partisan, and agenda-driven.”

The letter called the SPLC a “progressive political organization” that had “gained credibility attacking Klansmen, neo-Nazis, and skinheads — many of who were engaged in violence.” But now, the letter stated, the center had expanded its “tactics” into debates about immigration and “sexual-identity” politics.

In the first instance, the gunman said that he targeted Family Research Council after seeing it was listed as “anti-gay” on Southern Poverty Law Center’s website. In the second instance, the letter simply stated the gunman “liked” the SPLC’s Facebook page.

The letter complained that the SPLC continued to “list” Scalise on its website. A 2014 posting on the center’s website says Scalise gave a speech to a “well-known group of white supremacists and neo-Nazis” years ago in his home state of Louisiana. Scalise said he wasn’t aware of the group’s views, a claim with which the SPLC took issue.

Conservative media outlets seized upon GuideStar’s warning labels and the organization’s decision to remove them. A headline in the Daily Signal, a news platform for the conservative Heritage Foundation, blared: “Nonprofit tracker smears dozens of conservative organizations as ‘hate groups.’” Breitbart News reported: “Institutional Left Loses Again: Nonprofit Tracker Withdraws Inaccurate Leftist-Driven Labels Hurting Conservative Groups.”

For its part, GuideStar said in its statement that designating “hate groups” is more complicated than it had realized when it first starting using the labels.

In the weeks and months since, we have heard from both supporters and critics of this decision, many of whom have presented reasonable disagreements with the way in which this information was presented. We are always open and willing to have conversations with our users and nonprofit groups and welcomed this feedback. We acknowledge there is a deep, nuanced conversation to be had with Americans of all political, cultural, and religious backgrounds regarding how we address — and identify — hate groups.

GuideStar said it will continue to make the “hate groups” information available “on request.”

Family Research Council (who was the victim of a shooting by an SPLC member) said this:

  1. The SPLC is a partisan, hard-Left profit-machine trafficking in labels that lead to violence.
  2. GuideStar was right to disassociate from them, and joins the good company of the FBI and the Army (under Sec. McHugh), who’ve done the same. This establishes GuideStar as a truly neutral source for non-profit data.
  3. We disavow and condemn violence in any form, and encourage GuideStar to report any threats of violence to the authorities.
  4. We will continue to monitor “neutral” charity sites for expressions of partisan politics.

Haaretz has this:

The Truth Must be Told

Your contribution supports independent journalism

Please take a moment to consider this. Now, more than ever, people are reading Geller Report for news they won't get anywhere else. But advertising revenues have all but disappeared. Google Adsense is the online advertising monopoly and they have banned us. Social media giants like Facebook and Twitter have blocked and shadow-banned our accounts. But we won't put up a paywall. Because never has the free world needed independent journalism more.

Everyone who reads our reporting knows the Geller Report covers the news the media won't. We cannot do our ground-breaking report without your support. We must continue to report on the global jihad and the left's war on freedom. Our readers’ contributions make that possible.

Geller Report's independent, investigative journalism takes a lot of time, money and hard work to produce. But we do it because we believe our work is critical in the fight for freedom and because it is your fight, too.

Please contribute here.

or

Make a monthly commitment to support The Geller Report – choose the option that suits you best.

Quick note: We cannot do this without your support. Fact. Our work is made possible by you and only you. We receive no grants, government handouts, or major funding. Tech giants are shutting us down. You know this. Twitter, LinkedIn, Google Adsense, Pinterest permanently banned us. Facebook, Google search et al have shadow-banned, suspended and deleted us from your news feeds. They are disappearing us. But we are here.

Subscribe to Geller Report newsletter here— it’s free and it’s essential NOW when informed decision making and opinion is essential to America's survival. Share our posts on your social channels and with your email contacts. Fight the great fight.

Follow Pamela Geller on Gettr. I am there. click here.

Follow Pamela Geller on
Trump's social media platform, Truth Social. It's open and free.

Remember, YOU make the work possible. If you can, please contribute to Geller Report.

Join The Conversation. Leave a Comment.

We have no tolerance for comments containing violence, racism, profanity, vulgarity, doxing, or discourteous behavior. If a comment is spammy or unhelpful, click the - symbol under the comment to let us know. Thank you for partnering with us to maintain fruitful conversation.

If you would like to join the conversation, but don't have an account, you can sign up for one right here.

If you are having problems leaving a comment, it's likely because you are using an ad blocker, something that break ads, of course, but also breaks the comments section of our site. If you are using an ad blocker, and would like to share your thoughts, please disable your ad blocker. We look forward to seeing your comments below.

0 0 votes
Article Rating
42 Comments
Oldest
Newest Most Voted
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments
Menseisvolstrond
Menseisvolstrond
6 years ago

A perfect case of projection! “Hate” seems to be the latest weapon added to their verbal arsenal by PC marxists.

LIVE FREE OR DIE
LIVE FREE OR DIE
6 years ago

And just as impotent as all the other useless labels they use the same way Goebbels designed his propaganda: essentially, call your opposition exactly what you are, blame them for your own sins. Hitler and Goebbels should be VERY” proud of Soros and his paid henchmen (Clintons, McCain, Ryan, ACLU, etc etc etc); he is single handedly creating a 4th Reich. Get him and the islamics who fund anti-zionist messages in all levels of education and a lot of the left would start to fall apart.

Drew the Infidel
Drew the Infidel
6 years ago

How soon before the SPLC assumes its rightful place on the list of deplorables, to borrow Hillary’s phrase?

calliope
calliope
6 years ago

Pamela Geller is a realist- a Patriotic American committed to the Constitution- and definitely not a hater of anything or anyone except those who want to destroy our American way of life. Sharia Law, which all committed Muslims believe in, is designed to do just that. Its aim is to end Freedom of Speech and Freedom of Religion and conscience through the use of tools like Lawfare, Warfare and Stealth Jihad. As Muslims gain positions of influence in our police forces, our courts and our government step by step they work to destroy us. Islam wants to dominate- and will use all methods to accomplish that end including rape, murder, terror and intimidation.

Annielgill
Annielgill
6 years ago
Reply to  calliope

I get paid over $87 per hour working from home with 2 kids at home.
On tuesday I got a great new Land Rover Range Rover from having earned $8752 this last four weeks.. Its the most-financialy rewarding I’ve had.. It sounds unbelievable but you wont forgive yourself if you don’t check it
!yc91d:
➽➽
➽➽;➽➽ http://GoogleFinancialJobsCash91OfficeCity/GetPay$97/Hour ★★✫★★✫★★✫★★✫★★✫★★✫★★✫★★✫★★✫★★✫★★✫★★✫★★✫★★✫★★✫★★✫★★✫★★:::::!yc91k…..

Frank Del Vicchio
Frank Del Vicchio
6 years ago

The Southern Poverty Law Center and the American Civil Liberty Union have always been racist organizations designed to demonize conservative groups! They are the true racist and terrorist they should be investigated and shut down by the government.

Steve
Steve
6 years ago

They’ll keep pushing for as along as silence allows them to get away with lies.

venusinfarse
venusinfarse
6 years ago

Holy crap. Your god is even embarrassed by you.

Pray Hard
Pray Hard
6 years ago
Reply to  venusinfarse

Typical leftist, speaking for God.

venusinfarse
venusinfarse
6 years ago
Reply to  Pray Hard

You are lost in life. There is no supernatural being. Anyone saying God has spoken to them has lied.

LIVE FREE OR DIE
LIVE FREE OR DIE
6 years ago
Reply to  venusinfarse

Your use of the word “farse” in your title shows that you have some degree of self-insight.

venusinfarse
venusinfarse
6 years ago

Missed the the reference, did we?

Sage Nighthawk
Sage Nighthawk
6 years ago
Reply to  venusinfarse

Just because you don’t believe in God does not mean that He isn’t there. You obviously are a moronic liberal who will meet GOD one day, explain your words and actions to Him. ass wipe

venusinfarse
venusinfarse
6 years ago
Reply to  Sage Nighthawk

“He”. So a supernatural being has a sex now? God has a penis? Speaking of asswipes, he uses toilet paper?

Frank Del Vicchio
Frank Del Vicchio
6 years ago
Reply to  venusinfarse

My God loves ne, but he said you are boned because he hates you!

venusinfarse
venusinfarse
6 years ago

Ne? So God is a he? God has a penis? I’m boned. Do you speak English as a first language?

Frank Del Vicchio
Frank Del Vicchio
6 years ago
Reply to  venusinfarse

You truly are a little faggot, go suck a black dick you fucking scum.

Ichabod Crain
Ichabod Crain
6 years ago

This is cause for celebration. Now if we could just get the MSM to stop mindlessly quoting the SPLC in every article.

Drew the Infidel
Drew the Infidel
6 years ago
Reply to  Ichabod Crain

Agreed. That is a cause and effect relationship, like a guy who drinks because he is a failure and then fails all the more because he drinks.

Fromafar
Fromafar
6 years ago
Reply to  Ichabod Crain

The SPLC is just a dishonest tool of the LEFT and the MSM.
That is all it has ever been.

Midniterider
Midniterider
6 years ago

The SPLC is NOT a “Non-Profit’ organization.
Perhaps an in-depth INVESTIGATION of this vehemently ANTI-AMERICAN/FREEDOM crew of lowlife leftist scum is in order,and find the second set of “books” that they didn’t cook.
Not that I give a rats a$$ about being on their “Hatewatch” list.To me it’s badge of HONOR I wear PROUDLY.
Semper Fi
http://www.silverbulletgunoil.net
Proud member of SPLC hatewatch list.

Mahou Shoujo
Mahou Shoujo
6 years ago

It is time for Conservatives to actively attack those who attack them, the lies of the left are getting to be intolerable.

Steve
Steve
6 years ago
Reply to  Mahou Shoujo

This is an exceptionally good time for attacking in self-defense with so many internet resources. Its much harder for the left to count on people not remembering as they can always pull up the past – as long as they can just put their cell phones down for a few minutes.

venusinfarse
venusinfarse
6 years ago
Reply to  Steve

4 likes and that was incoherent. Nonsense sticks together!!

Dan Knight
Dan Knight
6 years ago

Great news. Nice to see GuideStar do the right thing … butt monkey alert …

But why did we have to complain? Is this organization so institutionally ignorant?

GuideStar should know the SPLC is actually a controversial Left-Wing Hate Group that likes to target its enemies by sprinkling their names among actual – and often Leftist!! – hate groups.

Dan Knight
Dan Knight
6 years ago

The last time I stomached an examination of SPLC’s list (about eight years ago) – almost half the list was devoted to black racist groups and neo-nazis – neither of which type counts as a Right-Wing type group outside of a Commie-pinko Faculty Lounge.

BethesdaDog
BethesdaDog
6 years ago

The SPLC is a fraud and a smear outfit. I used to track the same kind of REAL hate groups the SPLC purports to track–I did it for a major Jewish organization some years ago. I am talking about the neo-Nazi and white supremacist movement, as well as the extremist groups of the left. (I would include the black nationalist and extremist movements among them) I do not consider the SPLC to be a legitimate observer or analyst of extremist groups. The whole thing is a scam developed by direct mail marketer Morris Dees who used to spend his efforts on behalf of segregationist George Wallace. I never see the SPLC address the extensive and real threat: the antisemitism of the left. It is a shame that the mainstream media like the Washington Post treats the SPLC as a legitimate authority on hate.

The SPLC is not a legitimate charity, either. The salaries of the staff are beyond reasonable. It’s a money-making machine and a scam. It spends very little of the money it takes in on legitimate programmatic activities.

Steve
Steve
6 years ago

It shows that there is power in numbers and the efforts of the many are needed to overcome the efforts of the fools. There is a time and a place for turning the other cheek but standing up for your reputation is not one of them.

ConnectingDots
ConnectingDots
6 years ago

When I tried a couple of years ago to pick AFDI as my charity on AmazonSmile, I could not find it. When I complained to Amazon, the company replied that it relied on a couple of sources to determine whether the charity was a hate group. My memory is hazy on this, but I believe that Amazon said that it used GuideStar and SPLC to make this determination. I hope that this change makes it possible for Amazon customers to pick AFDI as their AmazonSmile charity!

Dave Cody
Dave Cody
6 years ago

About time us conservatives mounted a backlash on this pathetic ideology….we r the true purveyors of the truth not the dems and their media bias

bob e
bob e
6 years ago

Tear ’em up Pamela. Luv ya’ mucho ..

AlgorithmicAnalystD
AlgorithmicAnalyst
6 years ago

That group is a phony radical leftist front group, operating under false pretenses, and a misleading name.

Jackie Puppet
Jackie Puppet
6 years ago

Somebody at the Washington Post has an ironic sense of humor.

Under the name, is “Democracy Dies in Darkness”. That should’ve been up there at least 8 years ago, where it would really ring true, especially with the ‘most transparent administration in history”.

LIVE FREE OR DIE
LIVE FREE OR DIE
6 years ago
Reply to  Jackie Puppet

As transparent as the skin color that led it.

Fromafar
Fromafar
6 years ago

The “SPLC” is perhaps one of the singularly most dishonest organizations in the USA.
They use their sympathetic sounding name to do nothing but demonize those whom they disagree with.

WaPo died in darkness in 2008…..

LIVE FREE OR DIE
LIVE FREE OR DIE
6 years ago
Reply to  Fromafar

When it became part of Amazon.

Fromafar
Fromafar
6 years ago

Please explain? If Jeff Bezos is their financial backer, that would be explosive.

Lydia Church
Lydia Church
6 years ago

Great! The only problem is how they claim that they are removing it more or less under duress, under the ‘threat of harm’, as if conservative organizations are just a bunch of violent mobs threatening to harm them and for the concern over employee ‘well-being,’ so they removed it for the sake of ‘safety.’ It’s just another slanderous mud sling.

Pray Hard
Pray Hard
6 years ago

Is this some sort of victory? Is it meaningful that evil fools decided this? They’re still evil fools.

Independent Voter
Independent Voter
6 years ago

It’s not hate or a phobia when their stated goal is to kill all those who refuse to convert.

LIVE FREE OR DIE
LIVE FREE OR DIE
6 years ago

Way to go Ms. Geller! SPLC is the “intelligent” cohort of BLM and other liberal/black racist organizations attempting to destroy any vestige of traditional western Judeo-Christian culture, and islamics are their willing henchmen, much as Hitler viewed the Mufti. Not surprising that the TRUE Nazis Soros and Juncker fund much of the murder and mayhem the left inflicts under the lying media shroud of “peace and tolerance”. This is a step in the right direction for sure, but I am still not convinced this will end peacefully – they are losing badly and they have too much at stake. My instincts tell me the the outing of those involved in PedoGate will go a long way towards broadening the political imperative to destroy the left entirely, and to deport those who immigrate but fail to assimilate. Keep up the great work.

BonniePrinceCharlieD
BonniePrinceCharlie
6 years ago

Isn’t it about time that the conservatives started labelling every left-wing organisation that uses violence to silence those with whom it disagrees as a Hate Group and to apply this epithet to those on the mainstream left – eg the Democrats and its leadership – who fail to condemn this behaviour?

Sponsored
Geller Report
Thanks for sharing!