Substackers Against Nazis: an update
On December 14th, I joined many Substack writers (now including Margaret Atwood) in an open letter to Substack’s founders, calling out their willingness to platform and monetize Nazis. Substack’s response was weak but unsurprising: Yes, they are willing to platform and monetize Nazis. This is, at best, a deeply flawed understanding of the first amendment. What’s actually going on, and why it’s unsurprising, is that money trumps ethics. (In other breaking news, today is a day ending in Y.)
The letter was successful in drawing attention to Substack’s Nazi problem, and forced the founders to make a public statement. We now know what and who we’re dealing with. The only demand the letter made was a response, and we got one. A possible next step could be a pressure campaign where a substantial number of Substack writers with large, monetized followings move their newsletters to a different platform, hitting the founders where they’ve shown us it matters. Honestly, I don’t see that happening. I expect a few will move, most will stay, and the pressure campaign will have resulted in only those who moved feeling any negative impact. Changing platforms is a pain in the ass for anyone, but for those who depend on their Substacks for income and for a very real, valuable connection to readers, it would be no small thing.
I’m not new to standing up to Nazis. In my real-life, boots-on-the-ground activism, I have pointedly NOT ceded space to white nationalists. I don’t intend to do so here, either. I do not now and at no point in the future plan to charge for this Substack. I don’t make myself or Substack as a company a dime with these posts. I enjoy this as a free platform that allows me to easily connect to my existing audience (Hi! I adore you!) and to be easily discovered by new readers. If I were to move to a different platform, I would need to pay a monthly fee to send an email out to the number of subscribers I already have, and would be limited in my ability to find new subscribers. Substack wouldn’t feel the loss—they already aren’t making any money off of me and are providing me with a valuable service for free—but I would feel it for sure. How does limiting the reach of what I have to say fight Nazis? It doesn’t.
On pre-Musk Twitter, I had a verified account when it was a good thing to have a blue check, and almost 11k followers. It was a sometimes wonderful and sometimes maddening place to connect and have conversations, and a number of professional opportunities came directly from my interactions there. For all of its flaws, including the waves of fascist pile-ons I endured any time one of my political tweets went viral, I loved Twitter. I stopped using it in September in part because of Musk’s vile, blatant antisemitism, but also because the way the function of the actual site has been changed has made the damn thing unusable. What’s the point of holding ground when your posts are seen by no one? When the comments of the worst of humanity are pushed to the top because they’ve paid for a blue check?
That’s not what’s going on with Substack. This platform still very much works as a way to share my thoughts and amplify my voice. Why should I withdraw, making myself smaller, quieter, harder to find, and cede this powerful tool of communication to the people who hate me for being a Jew?
I may change my mind on this, as I eventually did with Twitter. Each Substack writer needs to make the choice that’s right for them. For me, for now, that means staying, holding this ground, while continuing to pressure the founders to do the right thing and ban hate speech.