This Twitter Account Is Exposing The White Nationalists At Charlottesville

@YesYoureRacist has contributed to at least one participant at the rally losing his job.
Ben, a 21-year-old KKK member from Harrison, Arkansas, in Emancipation Park prior to the “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville, Virginia.
Ben, a 21-year-old KKK member from Harrison, Arkansas, in Emancipation Park prior to the “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville, Virginia.
The Washington Post via Getty Images

In the days since “alt-right” white supremacists descended on the town of Charlottesville, Virginia, for a white power rally, one Twitter user is leading the charge in exposing and publicly shaming the participants.

The account, called Yes, You’re Racist, was created in 2012 by Logan Smith, according to CBS News. Originally used as a space to call out casual racism on the internet, Smith shifted his agenda on Saturday after violence broke out at the “Unite the Right” rally.

“They’re not wearing masks anymore,” Smith told CBS on Tuesday. “They’re not wearing their hoods. They’re not afraid anymore.”

On Saturday, Smith began sharing photos from the rally on his Twitter page, asking his followers (which as of Tuesday are now at over 370,000) to help him track down and identify the white supremacists in the pictures.

Among the people exposed were Cole White, who was forced to resign from his job at a Berkeley, California, restaurant and Pete Tefft, whose family disowned him after learning of his involvement in the rally. Peter Cvjetanovic was exposed after a photo of him at the UVA campus rally went viral, becoming synonymous with the anger and hatred of the so-called alt-right, a group attempting to re-insert racism and anti-Semitism into America’s conservative movement.

“I’m not the angry racist they see in that photo,” Cvjetanovic told KTVN News after the image gained notoriety over the weekend.

While Yes, You’re Racist is inspiring other activists on Twitter to expose white supremacists, Smith has also been criticized for failing to do his due diligence in researching the identities of the participants.

Smith has made several mistakes, according to NPR ― he tweeted a photo taken at a Trump rally from several months ago that featured a man wearing a Nazi armband who apparently had done so as a “social experiment.”

Smith has also faced criticism from some social media users for using his Twitter popularity to collect donations on Patreon, a crowdfunding site, and for “doxxing,” the act of searching and publishing the private information of individuals on the internet.

Defenders of Smith and others who have been actively exposing the men and woman at the rally argue that by entering a public space with their faces clearly visible, the demonstrators should have no expectation for privacy or anonymity.

Smith did not respond to a HuffPost request for comment, but his work calling out white supremacists who attended the rally continues.

This story originally appeared on HuffPost.

Close

What's Hot