Twitter is and has long been the meanest, ugliest, and least funny of all social media platforms.
I joined Twitter in 2008. And I’ve spent more time on the platform than I care to admit.
But I’m a social media kid, like the rest of my older millennials. For the most part, I have no regrets about the hours and energies I put into Twitter.
There was even a brief period, from 2009 to 2012, when Twitter was still somewhat collegial. But that all changed after the Republican Party nominated Donald Trump.
Twitter itself seemed to take the position that some pronouncements are not only inappropriate but immoral, dangerous and evil.
It became a space used by trolls to harass them, signal virtue, and vent their anger.
And his trending topics became something that meant a lot to media professionals and almost nothing to people working in the real world.
In fact, I seriously considered deactivating my account.
Personally, Twitter has too often become a vehicle for abuse and harassment against me.
Check out the replies to my tweets about literally anything.
Musk is committed to creating a level playing field in the game of ideas. But the dark, dirty secret is that the left doesn’t want a fair fight.
Most of the comments are about how fat, ugly, stupid and gross I am, according to a random anonymous troll, and the replies often stray into threats of violence and open abuse.
By far my worst experience on Twitter happened after my father died.
A photo of me crying at my father’s coffin was manipulated to show a gun pointed at my head.
The image stayed on Twitter for days and was retweeted on the platform.
Twitter didn’t do anything to remove it until my husband started freaking out and demanded it be removed.
It was eventually removed, and that sad episode eventually led to a personal call and apology from Jack Dorsey.
I still appreciate the concern he showed, but that ugly image lingered for far too long, causing unnecessary emotional distress at a time in my life when I was already broken by grief and sadness.
Put yourself in my situation. Imagine having to deal not only with an unresponsive Twitter but also with the FBI and a clear threat to my life.
I didn’t have to endure that and I think if I was Sasha or Malia Obama it would have been shut down immediately.
And therein lies the problem – Twitter has become an instrument of the liberal elite’s status quo.
It has long been suspected that Twitter designed its algorithms to favor liberal politicians, experts and personalities and their ideas while censoring dissenting opinions.
Conservative figures – including myself – have suspected that Twitter engaged in “shadowbanning,” which is the covert suppression of someone’s account without their knowledge.
In what may have been the most deaf answer of the day, MSNBC host Ari Melber said, “If you own Twitter or Facebook or whatever, you don’t have to explain yourself, you don’t even have to be transparent, you could be a party’s candidate, or all of its candidates, all nominees, secretly ban.’
Donald Trump and satirical website The Babylon Bee have both been removed from the platform, but Iran’s Ayatollah Khamenei is still allowed to tweet calls for genocide.
Some of the rules seem arbitrary, but too often liberal and progressive sentiments are protected while conservatives are punished or ignored.
The obvious question is: why did I stick with Twitter when it’s gotten so bad?
The truth is, I still believe in Twitter’s potential to be a useful and positive force in the world.
Although most Americans aren’t on Twitter (it only has 38 million users in the United States compared to Facebook’s 221.6 million), it’s still a place to create and share news, ideas, corporate messages, and media narratives will.
I stayed because it’s still a great tool for getting my work (like this column), opinions, and ideas out to a mass audience.
It’s a good way to combat untruths and the spread of rumours.
It’s also a place where I can exchange ideas with interesting people that I would normally never meet in everyday life.
I’ve been in contact with people who have lost loved ones to glioblastoma, the brain tumor that killed my father.
I connected with my friend, comedian Michael Ian Black, and ended up collaborating on a book.
Best of all, my first interaction with my husband and the father of our child, you guessed it, was through a direct message on Twitter.
Jack Dorsey and this platform have brought a lot into my life.
Which brings us to Elon Musk, the eccentric, talkative billionaire who bought Twitter with promises to make it a place of equality and free speech again.
Musk has vowed, among other things, to “defeat the spam bots, authenticate all people, and open source algorithms to boost trust.”
You’d expect Monday’s announcement that Twitter had accepted Musk’s $44 billion offer to buy the company to be met with some hand-wringing, but it was also incredibly insightful.
We are all now witnessing the stubborn collapse of many leftists who have only just woken up to the reality that they will no longer be able to tip the ideological and algorithmic scales in their favor.
Life comes at you fast boys.
“This deal is dangerous to our democracy,” Senator Elizabeth Warren tweeted.
In general, most Americans love freedom so much that we’re practically addicted to it.
Why is the left so afraid of this?
“This deal is dangerous to our democracy,” Senator Elizabeth Warren tweeted. In general, most Americans love freedom so much that we’re practically addicted to it.
In what may have been the most deaf answer of the day, MSNBC host Ari Melber said, “If you own Twitter or Facebook or whatever, you don’t have to explain yourself, you don’t even have to be transparent, you could be a party’s candidate, or all of its candidates, all nominees, secretly ban.’
Yes, Ari — it’s a problem and we’re hoping Musk will fix it.
For a profession whose lifeblood is freedom of expression, it is incredible that so many journalists are threatened with a vow to allow more expression.
Musk is committed to creating a level playing field in the game of ideas. But the dark dirty secret is these people don’t want a fair fight.
They want full power on these platforms and be able to remove any statements they disagree with.
And what are they protecting anyway?
Twitter has become a hateful and malicious place. The stock price is stagnant and its platform is boring similar to the launch.
Americans also regret hypocrisy and the snobbery of being treated like everyone outside of an MSNBC studio is ignorant and not worthy of having their opinions heard.
For now, I’m sticking with Twitter as a sign of good faith that the platform can become more fair, transparent, and hospitable to everyone — not just conservatives.
Please don’t let me down Elon.