Racist meme coins proliferate, here’s how
The cryptocurrency sector is a reproductive ground for viral projects and focused on the community, but the rise of racist memes parts has triggered debates on the limits of decentralization.
This issue attracts renewed attention after rapper Kanye West, who now passes “Ye”, announced his intention to launch A so-called “swasticoin” in a series of controversial publications on social networks.
West statements, which included anti -Semitic remarks on the Jewish community, mark a change compared to its previous critical of coins backed by celebrities that “preserve” fans.
On Saturday, West apparently changed his mind.
“I’m going to open CA [contract address] For my swasticoin to the Jews and my friends and my family first, ”he wrote. In addition to this announcement, the singer “Jesus Walks” seemed to ask for advice on blockchain networks like Ethereum, Solana and BNB Chain, while trying to contact the co-founder of Binance, Changpeng “Cz” Zhao.
The items triggered a backlash, but they also highlighted a broader problem: the growing number of coins promoting extremist ideology.
A disturbing trend
The token proposed by Ye is not an isolated case. During the last year, a wave of racist and offensive tokens has been launched, which prompted discussions on the question of whether the decentralized platforms should implement the moderation of the content.
Some of these tokens have used racial insults or Nazi images in their brand image, trying to gain ground in online extremist communities.
“Hitler Musk”, for example, appeared on Pump.Fun about a month ago after the owner of X Elon Musk, while speaking during the inauguration event of President Donald Trump, made a salvation of RM Straight-A RM (observers (observers interpreter It is a reference to Nazi fascism).
Before that, in 2021, a token called “Hitler” briefly surfaced before being radiated exchanges. Another piece, “Groyper”, was linked to online communities from the far right.
Despite the ephemeral nature of these projects, their presence underlines how blockchain technology – while being open and without authorization – can be used to spread harmful ideologies.
Who addresses the problem?
As parts of racist memes proliferate, some in the cryptographic industry take measures to slow down their spread. The Solana Foundation has recognized the problem, with Austin Federa, the head of the foundation strategy, suggesting that integrated filtering could be a potential solution.
This would allow portfolio applications and decentralized exchanges to filter tokens with offensive names or images. However, the implementation of such measures in a decentralized system remains a challenge.
The co-founder of Ethereum, Vitalik Buterin, also criticized the rise of coins associated with dictatorships and racist themescalling for better quality projects in cryptographic space.
Last March, Buterin expressed Concern about the growing number of speculative active ingredients which offer little value beyond the short-term beating. He specifically underlined the pieces-based parts in Solana, which he described as “openly super-racist” and condemned tokens related to totalitarian regimes.
Buterin stressed that he had “no enthusiasm” for projects motivated by scams, rugpulls or an ephemeral excitement that ultimately disappoints investors.
But, day by time today, where anyone can launch a token with even money generators (that is to say Pump.fun) unattended. As a result, the problem persists.
What is the next step?
According to Coindesk, the West planned token – called “Yzy” rather than “Swasticoin” – is designed as a bypass solution for Shopify restrictions On his Yeezy store. The reports suggest that it plans to keep 70% of the token supply for itself, feeding more speculation that it is more financial gain than ideology.
This would be aligned with Ye’s previous attempts to monetize Nazi imagery, in particular by selling t-shirts labeled “HH-01” (largely interpreted as a shortcut for “Heil Hitler”), which were deleted after An announcement of the Super Bowl directed traffic to its website.
Despite YE’s assertion that the token will be launched next week, it is not clear if the project will materialize – or if it is another example of an inflammatory rhetoric designed to cause indignation. His latest article simply read: “It’s time to launch my own blockchain”, leaving its uncertain crypto ambitions.
West would have been inspired by the Trump official (ASSET), the president of the same Coin Trump launched two days before his second inauguration. It is currently down 78% compared to its top of all time.
Trump has raised eyebrows for its ownership distribution of similar initiates: 80% of Trump is currently held by CIC Digital, a commercial entity with links with the president.
You too wanted an 80%stake, but you were negotiated at 70%, Coindesk. If his token even reaches a fraction of Trump’s success, his participation could still be worth several million dollars.
What is certain, however, is that the pieces of racist memes continue to test the limits of the “wild-west” nature of crypto while the leaders of the industry are content to know how to moderate the offensive content.
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