8chan founder Fredrick Brennan calls for site to be shut down

The man who created hate-filled forum 8chan but since quit the site has likened it to Frankenstein’s monster and called for it to be shut down.

The creator of extremist forum 8chan has likened the site he founded to “Frankenstein’s monster” and slammed the current owners for not doing enough to stop extremist content proliferating online.

Fredrick Brennan created the site in 2013 as a place for users banned from other sites to congregate and access “free speech” but said he now thinks it should be taken down.

Speaking to PM’s Sally Sara Mr Brennan said he could “definitely see the comparison” between 8chan and the Mary Shelley classic, including “not really thinking about the effects this could have on society and the world at large and you just created this monster and thought it was a great innovation.

“Now it’s come back to haunt you.”

“Maybe I did create a monster but [the current owners’] administration is much more monstrous than it has to be. Maybe it would never be a G-rated site but it definitely doesn’t have to be what it is,” he said.

In recent years 8chan has become a haven for the worst of the internet and gained a reputation for meme-driven hate speech including misogyny and white supremacy.

Frederick Brennan has a disability known as brittle bone disease and said he was an “angry” teen.

It made headlines in March when Christchurch’s alleged gunman Brenton Tarrant posted a hate-filled manifesto before allegedly killing 51 people in a shooting at two mosques in the city. It was also used by a man who killed one person and injured three at a California synagogue.

Mr Brennan quit as administrator of the site in 2014 and severed ties in December 2018. It is now controlled by Jim Watkins and his son Ronald, who Mr Brennan has urged to “do the world a favour and shut it off.”

Mr Brennan said he is “tired of getting dragged into the media” every time there is a mass shooting but is furious the current administrators won’t do more to clean up the site.

“I feel like they’re not doing what they should be doing,” he said. “I’ve given them a bunch of things they could do, they haven’t done any of them.”

“For example, they could shut down the boards that are known for being places where people celebrate mass shooters after a mass shooting occurs.”

All Jim and Ron had to do was pretend to care, not flaunt the fact they're infamous because of white supremacists on their homepage, perhaps shut down /pol/ for X amount of days so victims' families wouldn't have to know people are reveling in their loved ones' deaths. https://t.co/Fp8243tx8j

— Fredrick Brennan (@HW_BEAT_THAT) August 5, 2019

The front page still says "embrace infamy". Is this funny to you Ron? https://t.co/NFI0DhYj2M

Are the constant shootings funny? Why can't you and your dad at least act like you care so that @CloudFlare isn't forced to deplatform you, at great pains to themselves? https://t.co/zbWozULSFn

— Fredrick Brennan (@HW_BEAT_THAT) August 5, 2019

Thank you so much @CloudFlare. Finally this nightmare might have an end. I just want to go back to making my fonts in peace and not have to worry about getting phone calls from CNN/New York Times every time a mass shooting happens. They could have prevented this and chose not to.

— Fredrick Brennan (@HW_BEAT_THAT) August 5, 2019

Mr Brennan, suffers from osteogenesis imperfects, otherwise known as “brittle bone disease” and said he had broken his bones 120 times by age 19.

He has spoken widely about his anger growing up with a disability and was placed in foster care at 14. He described building 8chan as a site for free speech where users who had been kicked off other sites could congregate.

“I was happy to have my site being very popular and [user] ideology seemed like it made sense to me at the time and I was happy to take it on as my own,” he told the ABC.

When asked about the way in which it quickly allowed the darkest corner of the internet to flourish, he said “humans have a great quality for self deception” and he feared it would be abandoned by users.

“I thought it was better to just take on that ideology and I think I may might have deceived myself a little bit that it was actually a correct ideology,” he said.

Frederick Brennan took part in a short documentary about his life, saying he has broken bones 120 times.

Following news of the mass shooting in El Paso and the manifesto posted on 8chan, Cloudfare’s Matthew Prince announced he would be “terminating service” for 8chan, claiming it was a lawless “cesspool of hate”.

“The rationale is simple: they have proven themselves to be lawless and that lawlessness has caused multiple tragic deaths,” he posted online.

“Even if 8chan may not have violated the letter of the law in refusing to moderate their hate-filled community, they have created an environment that revels in violating its spirit.”

Jim and Ron Watkins have not commented on the issue. 8chan tweeted: “There might be some downtime in the next 24-48 hours while we find a solution.”