By Philip Klein
Tuesday, November 02, 2021
In any ranking of dumb Twitter suspensions, Quin
Hillyer’s has to land pretty high up there. Full disclosure, Quin is a former
colleague of mine at the Washington Examiner as well as a
former National Review author. He recounts his story:
On Twitter, people often have fun
with random nostalgia games. Somebody named Jon B. Wolfsthal posted this : “Tell me you watched SNL in the 1970s
without saying you watched SNL in the 1970s.” To which, almost immediately,
playing off the phonetic similarity of his first name with that of
onetime SNL star Jane Curtin, I wrote: “Jon, you ignorant
slut.” As my reply was directly responsive to what Wolfsthal had requested, he
quickly both “liked” and retweeted it.
After all, for some 20 years or
more, for those of a certain broad age range, the saying “Jane, you ignorant
slut” was a catchphrase, a way for people (at parties, or while watching
ballgames with friends, or whatever) to laugh while feigning mutual
displeasure.
Within 24 hours, Quin received a note from Twitter
flagging the tweet and informing him that his account had been suspended, “for
violating the Twitter rules. Specifically for: Violating our rules against hateful
conduct. You may not promote violence against, threaten, or harass other people
on the basis of race, ethnicity, national origin, sexual orientation, gender,
gender identity, religious affiliation, age, disability, or serious disease.”
So, according to Twitter, playfully tweeting out an
old SNL joke to somebody who was amused now represents
“hateful conduct.”
Some have pointed out that Quin’s suspension was likely
triggered by a bot programmed to react to the word “slut” rather than some
overly sensitive human. But the suspension started on Saturday night and we’re
now into Tuesday morning, so there was plenty of time for a human to intervene
to restore sanity.
Quin reports that he wrote a polite note appealing the
decision, pointing out the context. He quickly received a reply reading, “Our
support team has determined that a violation did take place, and therefore we
will not overturn our decision.”
The only option he was given to get his account
reactivated is to admit he violated the rules, which he did not.
When we discuss the issue of tech freedom, it is
important to emphasize distinct points. Yes, as a private company Twitter has
the freedom to impose whatever policies it wants, however arbitrarily. But at
the same time, it’s apparent that Twitter does so in such an incoherent way,
that it deserves universal condemnation and mockery. The idea that Iran’s
Ayatollah Khamenei was allowed to use Twitter to communicate with his terrorist
proxies and incite rocket attacks against Israeli civilians but
that Quin’s repetition of an old SNL joke represented hateful
conduct that promotes violence is patently absurd.
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