Twitter co-founder and CEO Jack Dorsey is on a roll lately. As the company’s stock continues to crater, Dorsey keeps coming up with one bad idea after another in what seems like an attempt to turn the platform into Facebook Lite. Now Dorsey and Co. are openly admitting that they’re in the thrall of the pro-PC, anti-free speech crowd:
Twitter stands for freedom of expression, speaking truth to power, and empowering dialogue. That starts with safety. https://t.co/PbEoM1lCyb
— Jack (@jack) February 9, 2016
This is how he plans on achieving “safety”.
On Twitter, every voice has the power to shape the world. We see this power every day, from activists who use Twitter to mobilize citizens to content creators who use Twitter to shape opinion. To ensure people can continue to express themselves freely and safely on Twitter, we must provide more tools and policies. With hundreds of millions of Tweets sent per day, the volume of content on Twitter is massive, which makes it extraordinarily complex to strike the right balance between fighting abuse and speaking truth to power. It requires a multi-layered approach where each of our 320 million users has a part to play, as do the community of experts working for safety and free expression. That’s why we are announcing the formation of the Twitter Trust & Safety Council, a new and foundational part of our strategy to ensure that people feel safe expressing themselves on Twitter.
If you’re short on time and were wondering if any groups that could be considered right-leaning are involved with this council, let me help: no. It does, however, include a “Muslims are really peaceful” group, a feminist group, an anti-bullying group, and something ominously called the “Dangerous Speech Project.” The latter takes a “Minority Report” approach and uses speech as a “pre-crime” indictment. American leftists who grew up when the Cold War was waning or over all tend to sound so very Soviet when discussing their warped versions of free speech. In an era where feelings are prioritized lest anyone ever feel bad and actually learn a life lesson, the fact that being offended is part of the free speech package is rejected. Twitter, of course, has a right to ban whomever it wants to ban, but adopting a condescending, paternalistic “we’re doing this for your own good” sales pitch is ridiculous. The social media companies are getting to be a lot like the entertainment companies in that they don’t realize that people who disagree with them politically are avid users of their products, and potential consumers for their advertisers. That’s because leftists are bubble people, and are terrified by thought diversity, so they only associate with people who think as they do. Sure, I could be overreacting here, but I’m just saying there is an outside chance that the gleefully pro-abortion council member “Feminist Frequency” may just have some lingering issues with conservatives that may be found to be “unsafe”:
Gamers of color are livestreaming to raise money for @abortionfunds MLK weekend! Support here: https://t.co/TyLVlExjRt #s4g2 #ReclaimRoe — Feminist Frequency (@femfreq) January 16, 2016
I promise to stop complaining to Dorsey if he simply adds a rep from the NRA to the Council.
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