Is Twitter's Response To This Infamous Rightwing Troll Enough?
20 July 2016, 16:06 | Updated: 8 May 2017, 17:09
Milo Yiannopoulos ain't coming back ya'll.
As you might have read earlier this week, two days ago (18 July) comedian and Ghostbusters actress Leslie Jones left Twitter after receiving horrific amounts of abuse from trolls.
In a series of distressing tweets, Leslie retweeted large amounts of the racist and misogynistic abuse she was receiving, as well as revealing the personal toll it was taking on her. It was heartbreaking to read.
It left many wondering how Twitter can allow this hate to be freely directed at people.
In the case of Leslie Jones, conservative commentator Milo Yiannopoulos was widely credited as having directed his 388k followers to Leslie's account to abuse her. If you're unfamiliar with Milo, his record includes comparing rape culture to Harry Potter ("both fiction") and described himself as the "the most fabulous supervillain on the internet” because of his online trolling. He's a vile human being.
Twitter decided to take decisive action, permanently banning Milo from the micro blogging service. In a statement they said that "people believe we have not done enough to curb this type of behavior on Twitter. We agree."
Here's the full statement.
source: buzzfeed news
Twitter acknowledging that it has not done enough is a good first step in taking more responsibility for the abuse that some twitter users experience.
But it's interesting to learn that they are reviewing their hateful conduct policy which, at present, does NOT ban hate speech (Milo was banned for directing his followers to Leslie's account). It seems staggering to me that hate speech isn't an outright ban. Freedom of speech doesn't = no consequences to what you said. Hate speech should beprohibited and any users that do abuse other users in this way should be banned.
Do you think Twitter will ever be able to get rid of it's trolling problem? Let us know in the comments.
