Twitterfied - updated
Robert Stacy McCain is a conservative journalist who writes at his own site The Other McCain. He’s not a blogger, he worked his way up through print jounalism. The man knows his craft and has paid his dues.
I’m a semi-regular commenter at his site. We do not agree on everything obviously. But like most principled conservatives, Mr. McCain will tell you up front and to your face if he doesn’t agree with you. He doesn’t butter you up to take advantage of you later.
There are times I’m sure he wishes I didn’t comment on his site. Certainly a handful of his other commenters would like me banned. They make no secret of that.
But here’s the thing. They make no secret of their opinion. If they think I am wrong, they tell me and they tell me why.
Which brings us to last Friday.
Twitter not only suspended Mr. McCain’s account, they shut him down. Nobody eeems to know exactly why.
But the really interesting thing is that the #FreeStacy hashtag is not only not trending, but won’t autocomplete.
What Twitter does is it’s own business. But they aren’t being honest about it.
You see, I know RSM and I know what he writes. It is not hate speech. Oh he is certainly conservative and he does go after the RadFems, But Twitter’s new politicy seems to be “Thou shalt not dissent.” And they aren’t telling their users.
I wonder what is next?
If Twitter promises to be a communications platform, it can’t ban stuff because of ideology. That’s up to the users. That’s pretty important and it’s implicit in Twitter’s promise so I’m going to repeat it.
That’s up to the users.
And Twitter had done that BEFORE. Users could choose who they wanted to follow and who they wanted to ignore. I didn’t like Twitter and I barely used it, but that was the promise. You could choose who you followed.
Now you can choose who you follow if it’s previosly approved by Twitter. This won’t end well.
I’m a semi-regular commenter at his site. We do not agree on everything obviously. But like most principled conservatives, Mr. McCain will tell you up front and to your face if he doesn’t agree with you. He doesn’t butter you up to take advantage of you later.
There are times I’m sure he wishes I didn’t comment on his site. Certainly a handful of his other commenters would like me banned. They make no secret of that.
But here’s the thing. They make no secret of their opinion. If they think I am wrong, they tell me and they tell me why.
Which brings us to last Friday.
Twitter not only suspended Mr. McCain’s account, they shut him down. Nobody eeems to know exactly why.
But the really interesting thing is that the #FreeStacy hashtag is not only not trending, but won’t autocomplete.
What Twitter does is it’s own business. But they aren’t being honest about it.
You see, I know RSM and I know what he writes. It is not hate speech. Oh he is certainly conservative and he does go after the RadFems, But Twitter’s new politicy seems to be “Thou shalt not dissent.” And they aren’t telling their users.
I wonder what is next?
If Twitter promises to be a communications platform, it can’t ban stuff because of ideology. That’s up to the users. That’s pretty important and it’s implicit in Twitter’s promise so I’m going to repeat it.
That’s up to the users.
And Twitter had done that BEFORE. Users could choose who they wanted to follow and who they wanted to ignore. I didn’t like Twitter and I barely used it, but that was the promise. You could choose who you followed.
Now you can choose who you follow if it’s previosly approved by Twitter. This won’t end well.
blog comments powered by Disqus