This Week Shows How Neutered Trump Is Without Twitter

[Celerity]

https://www.thedailybeast.com/this-week-shows-how-neutered-trump-is-without-twitter



Donald Trump’s absence from Twitter has had an even bigger impact on the American psyche than I might have imagined. It is often true of toxic relationships that you don’t realize just how dysfunctional they were until you can extricate yourself from the situation. I’m sleeping better. Food tastes better. Colours are more vibrant. But enough about me. Trump’s absence has been conspicuous. Take, for example, Wednesday’s inaugural. It was calm and peaceful and refreshing. Now imagine the inaugural with Trump live-tweeting his running narration. It would have cast a pall on what turned out to be a pretty special day. We have one president at a time (“TOTAL LOSER Sleepy Joe got sworn-in twelve minutes early!?!”), but the outgoing president’s split-screen commentary could have easily been reality.

And that’s just one day. Imagine how good it will feel to string together a few months with no chaotic tweets. Twitter removed Trump from the platform to prevent him from using it to incite violence. But his absence has calmed things down to the point where it’s pretty obvious that this should have been done long ago, and for other valuable reasons. Trump might have posed a clear and present danger to democracy in the short term, but he also posed a long-term danger. His tweets—even the less overtly threatening ones—scared Republicans into compliance; threatened journalists; radicalized extremists; spread conspiracy theories, disinformation, and fake news; and eroded the social fabric of democracy. The calmness that has permeated these last couple of weeks has shown us that social media platforms have enormous power that can either strengthen democracy or help destroy it.

Now, I can predict the obvious pushback I’ll get from that statement. Only the government can violate your First Amendment rights, but Twitter has become essentially the national town square—the de facto marketplace of ideas. So deplatforming someone, it is argued, is tantamount to taking away their right to free speech. Prior to Trump’s egregious behaviour and rhetoric, I would have been very sympathetic to this free speech absolutist argument, particularly as it pertains to political speech. However, Twitter is a company, not a country. Good companies accept their social responsibility. And—to the extent that Twitter is also a community—shouldn’t there be community standards?

It is a paradox of a free society that its very freedoms can bring about its demise. This tendency has been exploited by the Soviet Union, radical Islamic terrorists, and, I would argue, Trump. The danger, of course, is that in beating back their exploitation, we may lose the precious thing that we were trying to protect to begin with: a free and virtuous civilization. We are not alone in wrestling with these questions. Ireland recently passed a new hate speech law that includes provisions against online abuse. This sounds good in theory, but what constitutes hate speech? Would a conservative who opposes gay marriage (a position Barack Obama held not that long ago) qualify as exhibiting hate speech? Unlike other countries, America has the First Amendment. But again, it wouldn’t apply to rules imposed by private companies.

snip

[Vinca]

1. It's been glorious - as if someone put him down the garbage disposal.

[world wide wally]

2. Even a picture of him with his mouth closed.

I didn't know any existed

[Celerity]

4. oh, he went full beta bish, closed-mouth mode around his master

[world wide wally]

5. Except when he was kissing his ass

[DeminPennswoods]

3. Jr is apparently trying to pick up the banner,

but no one cares what he tweets.

[kskiska]

6. It's so nice to wake up in the morning

and not dread turning on the TV or looking at the news on the internet only to hear of another dastardly deed from that imbecile.

[RockCreek]

7. There is no excuse for twitter not doing this months or years ago.

He violated their terms frequently and flagrantly.
The excuse that certain political leaders can have such violations excused is disingenuous -- politicians have many, many effective ways to spread their messages to the country and the world. If anything, they should be held to higher standards on Twitter and similar platforms given the negative effects of their abuse as compared to less known communicators.

[keithbvadu2]

8. Hogan Gidley Pretends Trump Can't Denounce Capitol Riot Because He's Not On Twitter

Hogan Gidley Pretends Trump Can't Denounce Capitol Riot Because He's Not On Twitter

Trump campaign spokesperson Hogan Gidley on Sunday said that President Donald Trump does not have the ability to denounce the riot he incited on Capitol Hill because his Twitter account has been revoked.

They just don't realize that the WH has a room for press conferences where reporters will point cameras and recording equipment at him?

(Before the inauguration)