FreeSpeech and Censorship: Thread

[grarpamp]

> Twitter censorbans @LibsOfTikTok

Twitter Suspends LibsofTikTok For Featuring Liberals Talking About Themselves?

https://jonathanturley.org/2022/04/15/twitter-suspends-libsoftiktok-for-featuring-liberals-talking-about-themselves/
https://twitter.com/SethDillon/status/1514394254101168129
https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/fox-news-using-libs-tiktok-twitter-account-wire-service-anti-lgbtq-attacks
https://nypost.com/2022/04/12/twitter-a-sh-tshow-for-employees-since-elon-musk-took-stake/

Twitter has continued its ever-widening censorship of social media
this week with the suspension of the popular site, The @LibsofTikTok.
What is interesting about this latest move is that it lacks even the
pretense of neutrality. The liberal group Media Matters had targeted
the site due to its use by Fox News and conservatives to run
embarrassing stories for the left.

So Twitter suspended a site that entirely features liberals talking
about themselves.

Twitter suspended the site for “hateful conduct.” It warned the site
“You may not promote violence against, threaten, or harass other
people on the basis of race, ethnicity, national origin, sexual
orientation, gender, gender identity, religious affiliation, age,
disability, or serious disease.”

However, the site highlights liberals speaking about themselves and
their values in their own voices. There is no explanation, which is
common for the company. It simply suspended the site and told it to
reform itself.

Formed in November 2020, the “Libs of Tik Tok” account has more than
613,000 followers on Twitter and has become a major feeder for
conservative new sites.

The success of the site drew the familiar crowd demanding the
silencing of opposing voices or groups.

Notably, the liberal Media Matters stressed that the site had simply
become too successful. Sophie Lawton described the replaying of
postings liberal voices as “targeting teachers and schools with
anti-LGBTQ smears.” She described that the site was going in influence
as the basis for stories by Fox, Joe Rogan, Meghan McCain and others.
However, all she describes is the use of tapes of liberal subjects
talking about themselves and objects that “the Libs of TikTok content
has become ammunition for their arguments.”

That was apparently enough for Twitter, which defined reposting
liberals to be a form of hateful conduct.

The action seems consistent with the chillingly anti-free speech
agenda of Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal. In an interview with Technology
Review editor-in-chief Gideon Lichfield, he was asked how Twitter
would balance its efforts to combat misinformation with wanting to
“protect free speech as a core value” and to respect the First
Amendment.  Agrawal responded:

    “Our role is not to be bound by the First Amendment, but our role
is to serve a healthy public conversation and our moves are reflective
of things that we believe lead to a healthier public conversation. The
kinds of things that we do about this is, focus less on thinking about
free speech, but thinking about how the times have changed.

    One of the changes today that we see is speech is easy on the
internet. Most people can speak. Where our role is particularly
emphasized is who can be heard. The scarce commodity today is
attention. There’s a lot of content out there. A lot of tweets out
there, not all of it gets attention, some subset of it gets
attention.”

Twitter seems to have followed Agrawal’s lead. It not is just thinking
less about free speech. It is not thinking of it at all.  Libs of
TikTok was getting too much attention so it suspended it without
further explanation.

Notably, there are many sites that watch and replay evangelical
ministers and conservative figures for use on liberal sites.  That
includes “Right Wing Watch” run by the liberal People for the American
Way. It is all free speech. However, Twitter is now in the business of
shaping viewpoints and values. It has, according to its CEO, simply
moved beyond free speech.

Given such actions, it is understandable why Twitter employees are
reportedly not just in a panic of Elon Musk buying the company (and
reintroducing free speech principles) but even requiring emotional
support to just “get through the week.”

That is the problem with free speech. Just when you think that you
have moved beyond it, it just comes back. For corporate censors, it is
a perfect nightmare.