Now that the midterms are (mostly) out of the way, we’re going to look back at a few stories that got buried underneath the election news. (Read PolitiBunny’s excellent rant if you want to know how this editor feels after Tuesday night.)
We heard a lot right before the election about how Elon Musk had let go of the entire team responsible for policing political misinformation — did he do it on purpose? (Probably not, as he’d bid to purchase Twitter months ago.) How could he do such an irresponsible thing with the most important election of our lifetimes (until the next one) right around the corner? As we reported last night, one MSNBC blogger lamented not having Nina Jankowicz and the Disinformation Governance Board in place for the election … and we’re the authoritarians.
Scientific American — yet another once-respected publication that has trashed its reputation in the name of political correctness — says that “researchers” are gearing up to study the impact of extremists flocking back to Twitter now that Musk is in charge. Liberals seemed to think it took only days for Twitter to turn into “a cesspool of lies, hate, racism, antisemitism, and right-wing extremism.” If you want racism, check out the white cable news analysts trying to explain why Latinos turned out in force for Gov. Ron DeSantis.
Under Elon Musk’s leadership, extremists could flock back to Twitter under the guise of “free speech,” and researchers are gearing up to study their impact https://t.co/jUW9m6g00U
— Scientific American (@sciam) November 8, 2022
Heidi Ledford of Nature Magazine wrote Tuesday:
All eyes are on Twitter as Musk’s plans for the platform come into focus. For now, it is unclear how far he will go towards his early pledge to be a “free speech absolutist”, which has raised concerns that he might reduce oversight of offensive or potentially harmful tweets. But past research offers some pointers as to what the impact of looser restrictions on tweeting could be.
“It’s a very complex ecosystem,” says Gianluca Stringhini, who studies cybersecurity and cybersafety at Boston University in Massachusetts. “But if you go and get rid of moderation on Twitter completely, then things will become much worse.”
…
“When you have people that have some sort of public stature on social media using inflammatory speech — particularly speech that dehumanizes people — that’s where I get really scared,” says James Piazza, who studies terrorism at Pennsylvania State University in University Park. “That’s the situation where you can have more violence.”
In other words, all of the bad people moved over to Parler and Gab and TruthSocial, but now they might move back to Twitter.
"extremists" lol
— Antonio (@djtechchicago) November 8, 2022
Michael Moore, Rob Reiner, and Bette Midler never left.
— Michael Staub (@BonfireStaub) November 8, 2022
Cant wait to see where this funding for the research is coming from
— m0Tweets (@m0Tweets) November 8, 2022
"Researchers" is the word that should have been in quotes here.
— Amanda Jean (@AJAmmirabilis) November 8, 2022
This editor did.
Eeeek, you guys need to reassess….
— HarlinTheGreat (@the_harlin) November 8, 2022
Gear up to study this ratio
— Stan Dingwater (@rockytop26) November 8, 2022
So much science in this tweet.
— ʟᴇᴏɴᴀʀᴅᴏ ᴘᴇʀᴇᴢ (@leoperezmusica) November 9, 2022
Who is funding these researchers? I assume that they aren't working for free or producing a marketable product for sale?
— Brent Neas (@BrentNeas) November 8, 2022
“Scientific”
— Ragnar (@RagnarCapital) November 9, 2022
"Researchers" = Activists
— Phil Isophical (@Roll0_Tomasi) November 8, 2022
The guise of free speech? What does that even mean?
— Matt Hayse (@MAKARFAL) November 9, 2022
Scientific American: Free speech is extremist
— Mark The Shark (@MRaff57) November 8, 2022
Wow what happened to Scientific American
— 🦑 Your Hexellence 🦑 (@headlikeahole11) November 9, 2022
“Internet experts”
— Jack Manson (@JackManson88) November 8, 2022
https://twitter.com/Data_Male/status/1590110625325539329
Takes constant effort to fight the force of gravity.
— Marius Svensson (@Mariu55vensson) November 9, 2022
Someone above mentioned Bette Midler and Rob Reiner, and of course, they’re not extremists, and Reiner’s over-the-top screeching about the end of America certainly isn’t radicalizing anyone.
Related:
NBC News’ Ben Collins sounds alarm about Elon Musk’s Twitter enabling J6-level post-election violence https://t.co/XPEpMJKrYO
— Twitchy Team (@TwitchyTeam) November 8, 2022
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