The logo of the Bored Ape Yacht Club (created by Yuga Labs) has a logo lockup with an objectionable degree of design similarity to a well-known neo-Nazi emblem.

The controversy around their Nazi-like logo accompanies various references from Yuga Labs which evoke colonialism, imperialism, pedophilia, and the Confederacy. After Yuga’s collections were released, it was also discovered that the Bored Ape founders attempted to conceal their intimate ties to an alt-right publisher of Nazi, white supremacist, and pedophile fiction.

The Bored Ape Yacht Club logo and the Waffen-SS Totenkopf share five major characteristics:

1. White on black color scheme
2. The text is wrapped in a radial design around the emblem
3. Centerpiece is an emblem of a left-facing skull with 18 teeth
4. The emblem is buttressed by a pair of initial letters on each side
5. The emblem is a circle with ragged edges (like a patch)

The logo designs also overlap in terms of artistic style, such as the inner ridges of the eyesockets and the spacing between the teeth. Yuga’s trademark description for their logo also explicitly states that the skull is left-facing, the same direction the totenkopf always faces.

The edge of the Waffen-SS Totenkopf is ragged because it was likely designed by a neo-Nazi in recent decades. Both lockups follow the pattern of a motorcycle club patch lockup, a style that was not widely popularized until the 1960s. The historical SS Nazis also generally preferred sharp or rounded edges, indicating that this specific design was most likely created well after the fall of the Third Reich.

Many of these similarities between the BAYC logo and the Waffen-SS Totenkopf were highlighted by conceptual artist Ryder Ripps on his website covering some of the accusations of racism and antisemitism against BAYC.

The Totenkopf’s History of Neo-Nazi Violence

The BAYC logo effectively imitates the Nazi 3rd SS Panzer Division Totenkopf insignia, one of the most widely recognized Nazi symbols next to the swastika and the Reichsadler. The totenkopf represents a violent obsession with traditionalism and anti-liberalism. The insignia is deeply intertwined with the lives that perished in the Holocaust and WWII and with modern white supremacist terrorism. 

English white nationalists revitalized the totenkopf during the 1980s and 90s with special emphasis on the amount of teeth in the skull. Combat 18, a neo-Nazi terrorist organization formed by the British National Party, derived their name from the eighteen teeth of the SS totenkopf. 

Combat 18’s name borrows the first and eighth letters of the alphabet (A and H), which form the initials for Adolf Hitler. The ADL recognizes the alphanumeric dog whistle and its association with Combat 18. 

Neo-Nazi punk band Skrewdriver prominently incorporated the totenkopf into the band’s imagery. The band’s frontman, Ian Stuart Donaldson, also founded the white supremacist organization Blood & Honor. The group borrowed its name from the slogan of the Hitler Youth movement and spread into the United States with the help of the Ku Klux Klan.

According to the ADL, Blood & Honour members were active at the 2017 Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, sporting vests with the group’s signature totenkopf. 

The logos of Skrewdriver, Combat 18, and Blood & Honour uniformly appear with eighteen teeth to evoke the name of Hitler. All three groups appeal to racism and antisemitism using violent rhetoric and action, symbolized by their Nazi skull with eighteen teeth.

The Totenkopf in Vogue With the Alt-Right

The totenkopf is experiencing a modern resurgence in popularity among neo-Nazis. Neo-fascist groups like the Atomwaffen Division use the totenkopf to conceal their identities in photos.

In 2017, a Nazi skinhead appeared at a Proud Boys rally with a totenkopf shirt. Proud Boys themselves have been reportedly spotted with the totenkopf on their tactical vest. In 2019, multiple Proud Boys in Colorado were photographed wearing shirts with totenkopfs atop the Nazi sonnerad. Victor Knight, a neo-Nazi with ties to the Proud Boys, has a totenkopf tattoo on his hand. 

Chicago Police Officer Robert Bakker was an active participant in a white supremacist chatroom along with Jon Argumedo, a Nazi who represented himself in the chatroom with a totenkopf and text that read “Blood and Honour.” Older photos indicate that Argumedo also represented himself as a member of Combat 18.

A White Lives Matter protester with a totenkopf tattoo was arrested at an April 2021 rally at Huntington Beach. Another man with a totenkopf on his forearm also attended the Huntington event.

Across the years, NYC Football Club has struggled to keep the totenkopf away from Yankee Stadium, infected by a group of violent white nationalist supporters with ties to Blood & Honour.

Matt Warner, chief of staff of neo-Nazi organization Identity Evropa, wore a “Surf the Kali Yuga” totenkopf shirt alongside the white supremacist leader Richard Spencer. The phrase on his shirt refers to the fascist writer Julius Evola, popular with the alt-right. Another neo-Nazi group focused on “keeping Florida white” incorporated the same totenkopf with sunglasses onto their flag.

Colton Fears, a reported fan of Spencer, was convicted in 2019 for aiding in an attempted homicide. After Richard Spencer gave a speech in Gainesville, Fears and two companions attempted to intimidate protestors with Nazi salutes and death threats. One of his companions fired a shot, missing the protestors. Hours before the shooting, Fears was photographed wearing a totenkopf pin in an interview airing out his white supremacist grievances. 

Too Close to Nazi Symbolism

The Bored Ape Yacht Club logo’s uncanny resemblance to the totenkopf evokes not just a history of hate-driven violence, but an active threat of white supremacist terrorism. 

Intent behind the creative choices isn’t the key priority. Advertently or inadvertently, the Bored Ape logo shares an uncomfortable degree of design similarity with a well-known Nazi hate symbol. 

The underlying artwork remains offensive regardless of intention. It is too close in design to the Waffen-SS Totenkopf.

A number of Jewish people have expressed their offense over the Nazi-like design and the corporation's indifference to our concerns. Meanwhile, Yuga Labs has engaged in tactics of censorship, deception, harassment, and intimidation in its efforts to silence genuine concerns from members of the community.

Yuga Labs must change the Bored Ape Yacht Club Logo.