'Hate groups' spread message globally on Internet

By David George
CNN

EAST PEORIA, Illinois (CNN) -- Matthew Hale has a degree in music and has played the violin professionally. You can find him on the Internet but not under music. His name turns up in a search for "hate groups."

The 31-year-old is the leader of the World Church of the Creator -- a white supremacist organization that the Anti-Defamation League calls one of the "fastest-growing hate groups" of the last decade.

During a recent meeting outside Chicago, Hale preached his gospel; "If it is good for white people, it is good. If it is bad for white people, it is bad. That is what we believe. That is what we know."

The critical and the curious at the meeting outnumbered Hale supporters 4 to 1. At times, police and protesters competed with the speaker for attention. But Hale said public meetings are not his group's main focus anyway.

The church's bully pulpit is the Internet.

"The Internet, the computer itself, has been really the equivalent of the lightbulb in some ways for our movement," Hale said. "It's enabled us to reach people literally all over the world."

Hale said he receives 50 e-mails a day via his Web site, mostly from strangers.

"Most of the individuals who are contacting us ... you probably wouldn't see at a lot of public events," he said. "You probably wouldn't have reached them otherwise."

In 1999, Hale disciple Benjamin Smith killed two and wounded nine before killing himself. All of Smith's victims were minorities.

"These acts of violence are committed by individuals," said Maryland police official Ray Franklin. "And we know the acts of individuals can be encouraged through Web sites and other communication activities of the groups."

Hale said that his Web site does not advocate violence, but he added: "It's entirely possible that someone out there is reading our Web site that doesn't share that commitment to legal and peaceful change. But there's not much we can do about it."

Franklin has kept track of what he calls "hate sites" for five years. He has compiled a list of the Web sites that has grown to 67 pages, what is informally known as "The Hate Directory."

"For them to continue to (maintain these Web sites), I think, is the best evidence that it is accomplishing the goals they seek," Franklin said.

"Many of the messages themselves are simply the recycling of the old hatred of the past," he added.

"We could survive without the Internet," Hale said. "However, we wouldn't survive as well. And we wouldn't do as well. We wouldn't have near the chance of winning the victory we seek for our people if we didn't have it."

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