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Twitter bans Alex Jones and Infowars for abusive behaviour

bbc.com

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Re: Twitter bans Alex Jones and Infowars for abusive behaviour

#11

Post by Atlantium »

marcrosoft wrote: post #8
IgorPartola wrote: post #2

Why is Twitter always last to do the right thing? It’s almost like being a publicly traded company robbed them of their last shred of humanity.

"do the right thing" is difficult when you are suppressing free speech on a platform that's supposed to be all about it.

Alex Jones is free to express his speech on his own website as much as he pleases. "Free Speech" is not about forcing a company to host content they don't like. That would be against Twitter's freedoms. Alex Jones will still be heard by his audience.

Re: Twitter bans Alex Jones and Infowars for abusive behaviour

#12

Post by maxander »

dmix wrote: post #5

Anyone know what videos or tweets were 'abusive'? Twitter didn't say which ones they were. Twitter needs to be more transparent about this stuff. Especially when banning one of the most influential conspiracy theorist in the world. Not to mention a vague and/or arbitrary banning policy is always a bad idea.

Twitter isn’t going to broadcast or link to tweets that were bad enough to merit a ban, for obvious reasons- they’re banning it precisely to avoid having that content be propagated any further.

Re: Twitter bans Alex Jones and Infowars for abusive behaviour

#13

Post by mmanfrin »

adamrezich wrote: post #9

Does anyone still actually think that Alex Jones isn't a character or persona being put on by an actor, like Colbert's Colbert Report character? Not that this excuses anything he says or does of course (though apparently what he said here wasn't a big deal at all)... but how anyone can think Jones acts the way he does on-camera after the cameras are turned off and nobody is looking is beyond me. His lawyer essentiall…

Does it matter? His viewers see him as genuine and believe the things he says. When people watched Colbert, most of them got the joke because it was clearly satire. Jones hiding behind 'its a character' is such a flimsy and useless excuse.

Re: Twitter bans Alex Jones and Infowars for abusive behaviour

#14

Post by mmanfrin »

marcrosoft wrote: post #8
IgorPartola wrote: post #2

Why is Twitter always last to do the right thing? It’s almost like being a publicly traded company robbed them of their last shred of humanity.

"do the right thing" is difficult when you are suppressing free speech on a platform that's supposed to be all about it.

Twitter is not 'supposed to be all about [free speech]'. It's a microblogging platform, not a political stance.

Re: Twitter bans Alex Jones and Infowars for abusive behaviour

#15

Post by jaydz »

dmix wrote: post #5

Anyone know what videos or tweets were 'abusive'? Twitter didn't say which ones they were. Twitter needs to be more transparent about this stuff. Especially when banning one of the most influential conspiracy theorist in the world. Not to mention a vague and/or arbitrary banning policy is always a bad idea.

I imagine the videos where he harasses the CNN reporter and the females protesting Kavanaugh were the last straw. This was from his Periscope live stream.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0dcSvuyZm-U

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JrZuQqtABUo

Re: Twitter bans Alex Jones and Infowars for abusive behaviour

#17

Post by natex »

marcrosoft wrote: post #8
IgorPartola wrote: post #2

Why is Twitter always last to do the right thing? It’s almost like being a publicly traded company robbed them of their last shred of humanity.

"do the right thing" is difficult when you are suppressing free speech on a platform that's supposed to be all about it.

This is wrong. Is Twitter suppressing Jones' ability to say what he wants to? No. So they are not suppressing free speech. Twitter is banning a serial harasser from using their (privately owned) platform.

The analogy would be kicking someone out of your house for harassing your other guests.

Re: Twitter bans Alex Jones and Infowars for abusive behaviour

#18

Post by themoonbus »

marcrosoft wrote: post #8
IgorPartola wrote: post #2

Why is Twitter always last to do the right thing? It’s almost like being a publicly traded company robbed them of their last shred of humanity.

"do the right thing" is difficult when you are suppressing free speech on a platform that's supposed to be all about it.

Nobody's free speech rights were violated? I can't believe this has to be explained on hackernews... https://xkcd.com/1357/

Re: Twitter bans Alex Jones and Infowars for abusive behaviour

#19

Post by yters »

dmix wrote: post #5

Anyone know what videos or tweets were 'abusive'? Twitter didn't say which ones they were. Twitter needs to be more transparent about this stuff. Especially when banning one of the most influential conspiracy theorist in the world. Not to mention a vague and/or arbitrary banning policy is always a bad idea.

Yeah, that doesn't help Alex Jones' cause at all, does it?

It also seems quite arbitrary when there are plenty of very abusive people on the other end of the spectrum.

Re: Twitter bans Alex Jones and Infowars for abusive behaviour

#20

Post by orf »

dmix wrote: post #5

Anyone know what videos or tweets were 'abusive'? Twitter didn't say which ones they were. Twitter needs to be more transparent about this stuff. Especially when banning one of the most influential conspiracy theorist in the world. Not to mention a vague and/or arbitrary banning policy is always a bad idea.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ne_wFdA-1oU

This is where he compared a journalist eyes to a rats, which I believe is what caused the ban?

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