Hate Goes Online

The Internet has become a popular place for hate, reports CBS News Correspondent Jerry Bowen.

Among the tens of thousands of sites on the World Wide Web, a rapidly growing number are run by hate groups, according to the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles.

Starting about four years ago, we saw a trickle, then a trend, now an avalanche of these groups migrating to the Internet, said Rabbi Abraham Cooper.

One Web hate site in 1985 has given way to more than 1,500 today.

World Church of the Creator, a racist group, according to the Wiesenthal Center, offers crossword puzzles aimed at kids.

Many of the sites promoting racism, anti-Semitism and homophobia are aimed at children.

Hate in America has been a challenge for generations, Cooper said. But this is the first time where it has been packaged and promoted directly to young people.

There is a site where an image of the pope is sprayed with machinegun fire.

Another Web page recruits all white youth to the "Aryan Nation Youth Action Corps."

There is even one that appears to be a research site on the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., but is actually anti-King.

Parents cannot look at the Internet as the babysitter for their kids, because they are just asking for trouble, Cooper added.

The Wiesenthal Center has compiled a CD that lists Web hate sites and that will be distributed to law enforcement agencies.

But, underscoring the problem, another 100 Web sites were found after the list was produced.