One of the creators of the Bored Apes Yacht Club, Gordon Goner, has criticized the disinformation campaign on the grounds that he and other co-founders are Nazis.
In a post on blog titled A Letter from the Founder, it pointed out that the group of friends behind Bored Apes have Jewish, Turkish, Cuban and Pakistani origins, making it illogical for them to be Nazis. According to him, although the allegations have been in the news for several months, he hasn't bothered to respond "because, frankly, they're insanely absurd."
Made us feel like it was time to come out and put an end to all this. https://t.co/zcoBwGcWLu
—GordonGoner.eth (@GordonGoner) June 24, 2022
But a YouTube video by a podcaster who claimed to have done a 6-month investigation documenting the links between BAYC and Nazi symbolism appears to be the final straw. The video, which now has nearly a million views, has sparked further debate over what Goner calls a conspiracy.
Meanwhile, Goner claimed that anti-BAYC activist Ryder Ripps is behind the allegations. Ripps had previously copied BAYC artwork for his NFT collection and sold some on OpenSea before being suspended for copyright infringement.
Furthermore, Goner explained that all Yuga Labs and BAYC symbolism comes from video games in the spirit "of irreverence and absurdity". For example, Yuga Labs' name came from the villain of Zelda, and all four founders chose their aliases based on jokes and internal quirks. Furthermore, he denied that the company was launched on the day of Hitler's death, among other allegations made by the troll.
