The current ENS Director of Operations at Ethereum Name Service, Brantly Millegan has been cancelled by the NFT Twitter community after his comments on homosexuality and abortion have resurfaced from 2016. After the resurfacing, he continued to back up his views, including going onto Twitter Spaces to reaffirm his controversial beliefs.
About the Brantly Incident
The entire incident and controversy with Brantly started after a Tweet from 2016 resurfaced. The Tweet read: “Homosexual acts are evil. Transgenderism doesn’t exist. Abortion is murder. Contraception is perversion. So is masturbation and porn.”
Since this Tweet came out again, Brantly has constantly reinforced his ideas and original statement. In response to the backlash he received, Brantly said: “looks like I’ve got my first mob. nice to see some ppl finally read the first word of my bio (Catholic). I love you all, I’m gonna keep working on web3”
This was responded to by Adam Cochran who quoted some Bible verses which promote loving others and not speaking unwholesomely. Brantly replied: “not really interested in debating theology right now, but what I believe is the mainstream traditional Christian positions held by the world’s largest religion. it’s not exactly fringe”. Finally, he added that there’s “not really anything to address”.
About ENS
For those who don’t know, Ethereum Name Service (ENS) domains are a decentralised domain naming service for wallets, websites and more. They allow for users in the Web3 and NFT space to get a personalised username and store an avatar and other profile data. Holders own an NFT for each of their domains, which can be bought and sold on Ethereum based marketplaces.
Overall, there are over 675,000 registered names with 292,000 owners, as per the website. They are overall the biggest web3 domain name service company without a doubt. Since its launch, over 12,000 ETH in volume has been traded on OpenSea. Also, it was reported by Blockchain News that they have had approximately $2.5 million in renewal fees.
On top of their domain name services, they also gained a lot of exposure for their airdrop which took place in November of last year. The airdrop scheme allowed for users to claim $ENS tokens, the value of them varying depending on the amount of ENS domains they owned, and how long they owned it for. Many people made $1000’s at the time of the airdrop, however, the price of course has varied since due to the volatility of crypto.
Airdrops have become more common recently, from ENS to LooksRare and Opendao recently. Most of them have done well and have earned people who claimed them a lot of money since. However, as with all aspects of crypto, there are still scams going about.
NFT Twitter’s Reaction
NFT Twitter of course didn’t take well to this old Tweet. It has caused many people to complain about and cancel the ENS service as a whole, as well as Brantly, however, it’s also brought some positive things from the incident. Many people have donated money to various LGBTQIA+ charities after the NFT community came together.
In terms of the backlash towards ENS and Brantly, many people took to Twitter to complain and cancel Brantly and the service. Many of whom hope to see Brantly relieved of his duties at ENS.
Twitter user and artist, @fvckrender said: “Rest in Peace ENS Domains. I will be selling or even burning any ENS sh*t… This is web3, a place for us ALL.”
Another popular NFT photographer, NathanHeadPhoto, who is openly gay, said on Twitter: “Grateful that the majority of the NFT space disagrees with ‘homosexuality being evil’ “.
So far, we’re yet to see an official reply from ENS, however, @futurealisha who is part of the community team at ENS said: “ENS is for everyone I personally find Brantly’s views to be the antithesis of the values we stand for in web3”. She also added links to re-delegate their $ENS as well as make a proposal to ENS through their forum. Further, ENS’ Lead Developer (@nicksdjohnson) added: “Brantly’s statements don’t reflect my views”. Also mentioning: “I’ve been working with Brantly for a number of years now. I’ve never seen Brantly treat anyone as different or lesser because of who they are.”
Of course, there will always be people who agree with the controversial views of Brantly. In this case, there is. However, the people who agree with him are in the major minority.
What’s Next for Brantly and ENS?
ENS, at its core, is a DAO, or a decentralised autonomous organisation. This means that those within the DAO have voting power on what goes on, and the decisions which are made. Theoretically, this means that those in the DAO could team up together and relieve Brantly of his duties at ENS.
In the last 24 hours, the price of $ENS is down 4.3% to a current price of $19.86. The token was once at an all-time high of $83.05. This was around the time of the token’s airdrop in November when the hype was at its peak.
No one knows what will happen next for Ethereum Name Service as a whole and Brantly. We’re yet to see a response from ENS as a company or an apology from Brantly. There is still ongoing back-and-forths on Twitter, so there’s probably still a lot more to uncover.
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