Twitter won't autoban neo-Nazis because the filters may ban GOP politicians

[hlthe2b]

Sometimes the truth is soooooo obvious.

Link to tweet

Is booting neo-Nazis from Twitter a simple process? Probably not. Can steps be taken at the very least to punish racist tweets? Probably, but not everyone will be happy with whose hate speech gets scrubbed as a result.

With a user base of 321 million monthly tweeters — a few millions less than the total US population — the micro-blogging site could help minimize the rapid spread of digital hate speech in the country if they helped silence racist and xenophobic tweets. Turns out one Twitter employee couldn’t help but wonder why they don’t take action.

During an all-hands staff meeting on March 22nd, an employee asked why the company refrains from using its AI to kick white nationalists off the site. After all, Twitter had previously ushered a sweep of bans on accounts pushing Islamic State propaganda. The answer was unsurprising for anyone who’s ever perused Twitter: Content filters created to identify hate speech could potentially result in Republican politicians being banned, an executive explained.
--snip--

In separate discussions verified by Motherboard, that employee said Twitter hasn’t taken the same aggressive approach to white supremacist content because the collateral accounts that are impacted can, in some instances, be Republican politicians.

[empedocles]

1. This Twitter policy would be vulnerable to public exposure

[librechik]

2. yeah, they are the same. Admit it, snowflakes.

[displacedtexan]

3. And that's a problem because...?

I really see no downside to this ban.

[NewJeffCT]

5. Nazis and other Republicans

have a huge media platform in Fox News and another in Rush Limbaugh. If they get banned from Twitter or Facebook, the GOP politicians huff and puff and threaten to censor Twitter and/or Facebook and also call them to testify to Congress to explain.

[NewJeffCT]

4. Meanwhile, a ton of Resistance accounts

are subjected to a Reply Deboosting Shadowban.

Reply Deboosting means that your replies won't be visible to people that don't follow you - so, if you don't follow Trump, but come up with a snarky reply to one of his tweets, not only won't Trump see it, but the 99.99% of his followers that follow you and don't click on "View More Tweets" won't see your reply, either.

[hlthe2b]

6. So is this Trump's "work around" to the court order that he reinstate blocked twitter accounts?

[NewJeffCT]

9. I don't know, to be honest

I've seen right-wingers whining about being Reply Deboosted as well, but I don't think it's as extensive. But, RWers have prominent media figures and reps in Congress complaining about Shadowbans and other things as well.

[ck4829]

7. K&R

[Proud Liberal Dem]

8. Wow

Not only is this an awful excuse for not banning accounts but it really illustrates a serious problem with one of our major political parties.