Takimerch sale now on! 25% off everything for a very limited time

July 03, 2012

Last week I wrote about Facebook, censorship, and the danger of relying upon these supersized social-media conglomerates to get your message out, particularly if that message is deemed “€œoffensive”€ (i.e., “€œconservative”€).

Now, according to one report, Facebook’s rival Twitter is “€œpreparing to introduce new measures to reduce the visibility of “€˜hate speech.”€™”€

For a company ostensibly in the communication business, Twitter’s public utterances can be head-scratchers. One longs for the rise of a Twitterologist in the tradition of the Kremlinologists of the past and the Vaticanologists of the present.

So the Financial Times“€™ interview with Twitter CEO Dick Costolo contained more “€œbuts”€ than a gonzo porn shoot. Costolo insists his company’s mantra will remain “€œTweets must flow,”€ but he wants to tamp down the abuse that UK celebrities supposedly suffer at the hands of anonymous stalkers and “€œtrolls.”€

This First World problem is apparently so pervasive and corrosive that the government’s new defamation law may include a troll-tracking provision.

“€œTwitter’s principles about “€˜hate speech”€™ and politics seem to default to whatever the latest “€˜progressive”€™ fad happens to be.”€

(This is the same country where an actor sued a journalist who described him as “€œhideously ugly“€”€”and won. A country in which performers such as Rowan Atkinson, John Lydon, and the Carry On crew are among its few remaining exports.)

Here’s another “€œbut”€: Costolo says he doesn”€™t want these troll-tracking measures to accidentally curtail anonymous Tweeting by “€œArab Spring”€-type political dissidents.

Naturally, he has no idea how to make all of these things happen simultaneously on the platform he’s constructed”€”one that was never designed to hold so much weight.

What happens if, for example, celebrities are being subjected to “€œhate speech”€ not by anonymous British trolls, but by other celebrities? What if that “€œhate speech”€ has an arguably political flavor?

Comedian Louis C.K. can “€œdrunk Tweet”€ to his thousands of followers about Sarah Palin’s surprisingly fascinating vagina without consequences. In theory, under the new Costolo/UK libel dispensation, the comedy star should be subject to the same punishment”€”a lifetime Twitter ban?”€”as any anonymous troll. Yet the very thought of every hipster’s favorite standup being banned from Twitter is laughable.

Meet one Russell Barth, a Canadian leftist whose self-penned Twitter profile is impossible to improve upon:

Medical Marijuana License Holder, multi-disciplinary artist, writer, activist, public speaker. Fibromyalgia, PTSD, wife with epilepsy. Need social justice.

Subscription Membership

Subscribe to Taki's Magazine for an ad-free experience and help us stand against political correctness.

Join Now

Donate

Support our writers

Donate Now

Newsletter

Sign up to receive posts

Columnists

Sign Up to Receive Our Latest Updates!