Donald Trump used to call the credentialed media #FakeNews, but even he never set up a ‘Disinformation Governance Board‘, nor picked someone like Nina Jankowicz, who for months told us that the Hunter Biden laptop story was Russian disinformation, to head it.
On April 25th, she told us how she feels about #FreedomOfSpeech:
Last week I told @NPRMichel: I shudder to think about if free speech absolutists were taking over more platforms, what that would look like for the marginalized communities…which are already shouldering…disproportionate amounts of this abuse.” https://t.co/GLqMwC3iYH
Perhaps no group of people is more alarmed about Elon Musk’s plan to make Twitter a free speech free-for-all than those most likely to be targeted for harassment: women, racial minorities and other marginalized groups
by Josh Funk, Associated Press | Wednesday, April 27, 2022
Image by OpenClipart-Vectors from Pixabay
Perhaps no group of people is more alarmed about Elon Musk’s plan to make Twitter a free speech free-for-all than those most likely to be targeted for harassment: women, racial minorities and other marginalized groups.They fear that a more hands-off approach to policing the platform will embolden purveyors of hate speech, bullying and disinformation to ratchet up their bad behavior — a possibility Musk has done little to dispel.
Yet even those who have faced extreme harassment on Twitter say they are unlikely to quit the platform. Despite the negative psychological toll, they still place a high value on Twitter as a place to express their views and engage with others.
That could help explain why Musk shows little concern for the underbelly of unfettered free speech, although advertisers – who account for 90% of Twitter’s revenue – may not feel the same way.
Mr Funk continues to tell us about Renee Bracey Sherman, a biracial abortion rights advocate, who claims to have been verbally abused by those opposed to her positions, and even, Heaven forfend! had “her likeness photo-shopped as a Nazi.”
While polls show all types of people are susceptible to online harassment, extensive research has shown that women and people of color are far more likely to be targeted. That’s also true for people with disabilities, people who belong to religious minorities and members of the LGBTQ community.
Michael Kleinman, who has studied online harassment for Amnesty International, said if Twitter allows more hateful and abusive speech, marginalized people who get attacked are likely to express themselves less.
So, how did Twitter protect such “marginalized people” before? One way was to prohibit “targeted misgendering or deadnaming of transgender individuals.” Simply put, if someone wanted to tweet something about William Thomas, the male swimmer who claims to be female and is on the University of Pennsylvania’s women’s swim team using the name “Lia,” that person would have to concede to Mr Thomas’ claim that he is a woman by using the feminine pronouns and his assumed name, not his real one. The New York Times laughably gave major OpEd space to Chad Malloy, a man male who claims to be a woman going by the name “Parker” to claim that Twitter’s Ban on ‘Deadnaming’ Promotes Free Speech.
No, Twitter’s ban on ‘deadnaming’ — the reference to ‘transgender’ people by their birth names — and ‘misgendering’ — the reference to ‘transgender’ people by their natural, biological sex — tramples on the speech of normal people, people who do not believe that girls can be boys and boys can be girls.
Now comes Helen Ubiñas, who has a very visible platform as a regular columnist for The Philadelphia Inquirer, claiming that Freedom of Speech is dangerous and harmful to people like her:
Civil discourse has long been the biggest casualty on the platform — and that was before a problematic billionaire touting freedom of speech made a deal to purchase the site.
I’ve thought a lot about how I came to Twitter lately, and why I’ve stayed, despite the near-daily harassment and threats and hostility. (“You’re a scumbag,” according to one of my latest interactions on the site.)
Civil discourse has long been the biggest casualty on the platform — and that was before a problematic billionaire touting freedom of speech reached an agreement to buy the site.
I actually think of leaving Twitter nearly every day. Increasingly, it’s become a niche echo chamber of self-promotion. And if my fellow journalists and I should be about the business of meeting the communities we serve where they are (as I believe we should), the most effective way to do so is probably not on the site; barely a quarter of American adults say they use Twitter.
While “barely a quarter of American adults” use Twitter, that’s roughly 64 million people! She does have 13,000+ Twitter followers, a very much not shabby number, and some of them are people who do not normally agree with her views. I have noticed that Inquirer staff writers do have Twitter accounts, mostly blue checked ones, published at the bottom of every news story I’ve checked online — no longer living in the Inquirer’s service area, my subscription is digital only — which has me asking: does the Inquirer itself encourage Twitter use?
Given that the newspaper’s paid circulation is a reported 352,953, the nation’s 17th largest but in our 6th largest city, that Twitter exposure is certainly helpful. Since Miss Ubiñas started her Twitter account while still with the Courant, she probably has a few followers remaining from her New England days.
But it’s not just about journalists, who seem to have an outsized presence on Twitter. It’s about all kinds of vulnerable people who were suddenly able to access a public platform to broadcast their own stories, and their own realities, a few hundred characters at a time.
Look, the reality is this: Even in 2022, there are still too many spaces in this world where women, people of color, and others are excluded or not properly represented. We have to fight our way in — and continue to slug it out to stay there.
I absolutely agree with her last sentence, though I’d put it more inclusively: everybody has to fight his way in, but you can’t fight your way anywhere unless you are willing to fight with everybody else. And some of those people just might call you nasty names, might say unpleasant things about you. To fight your way in, you have to be tough enough to take that. If you have to have special protections to compete, then you are telling the world that you aren’t up to the fight on equal grounds.
