No Twitter is Still a Trash Fire
About a year ago I think everyone who uses and even didn’t use Twitter could probably agree that the site was a garbage pit, an irredeemable trash fire and a blight on the the information age. However ever since the wrong tech billionaire bought the site popular opinion has changed into something delusional.
First let me state my opinion on Elon Musk. I’m not a fan of his, I think he’s an impotent ideas man with absolutely piss poor execution and non existent impulse control. The only but I’ll include is that I think there are far worse people that could’ve bought Twitter. I think him buying Twitter was a total meme move and I’m hoping it’ll bit him in the butt.
Twitter being a trash fire extends to the sites founding. A social media site where all you post is: pictures, gifs, links to sites, and a paragraph of 140 characters. It’s as inane and dumb as it sounds. While cool things could be done with the idea I think humanity took it upon themselves to make sure those cool ideas were drowned out by the reality of awful that runs rampant on Twitter. I’ve watched peoples home addresses get posted and receive hundreds of thousands of likes and retweets before finally being taken down. The site has had repeated problems with illegal content, misinformation and bigotry of all forms. Alejandra Caraballo’s recent pizza box and Andrew Tate story being prime example. Twitter doesn’t have the thin, almost nonexistent silver linings other sites might have or claim to have. Reddit has it’s communities, (that are riff with issues) charities, and positive group efforts, YouTube is mostly full of creative people working to make content, and I guess it could be claimed Facebook keeps people in touch. Twitter is just a terrible platform filled with almost the worst humanity has to offer.
The foundation is already terrible but the site refuses to grow into anything better. In 2009 Twitter created its verification system. A small white in blue check mark that signified that the account it was attached to was the real account of a public figure or company. This was made so I can’t make a Ryan Reynolds impersonation account and post suggestive replies under peoples tweets. A lot of social media sites have this feature and had this feature remained this way the check mark would not be such a mess under the elongated muskrat. However verification was something given out. It was not something received when someone went through a certain process or asked. It did change and for the worse. In 2017 Twitter came under fire for verifying a white supremacist Jason Kessler. The reason being that people on the internet whose IQ is equal to their shoe size saw this as some sort of endorsement by Twitter. Several public figures also later lost their verification like Alex Jones reinforcing the verification=endorsement narrative. Verification applications closed down in 2017 only opening again in 2021. Sometime later Twitter gave verified users special tools. You might believe that these tools are to help deal with impersonation, fraud, or some other problem a public figure or group might deal with. You would of course be wrong, these tools included restricting replies (which other social media sites do to an extent), sorting followers by verification, giving you better engagement, access to analytics, and I know this from personal experience, heavily moderated replies. All of this has created a weird class divide on Twitter different from other social media sites.
The experience of users of course changes on every platform whether you have 1 follower or 100k. However Twitters verification makes yet another weird distinction based on whether or not a company acknowledges whether or not you are who you say you are. We can see this distinction again in a recent AOC rant on Twitter. Most Twitter users have known for years that the site is buggy and prone to instability. AOC was apparently not aware of this and believed Musky man was targeting her account specifically. (2:22 for the exact tweet) This shows us that verified users either get better support or a more stable version of the app.
We see more of this weird class division when it comes to Kathy Griffin. What Kathy Griffin did was a Twitter terms of service violation. It has been policy since before Elon even thought about buying the platform and I’m sure exists on other platforms. If you as a verified user use your verification to impersonate another verified user you will be suspended. It’s an anti-impersonation rule not a “apartheid Clyde got his fees fees hurt by the unfunny redhead” though in the court of public opinion it’s a fantastic clap against the long rodent, only ruined by Kathy logging in as her dead mother to continue her crusade.
Finally I come to peoples new borked view of the website. I’m going to provide various terrible takes in ascending order of bad and talk about why they’re terrible.
I think part of this view is informed by how different people use twitter. However experience is not universal and calling Twitter “the world’s main hub for news and politics” is such a stretch it’s almost pulling something.
Ignoring the fact democracies have existed for thousands of years and have been doing “well” in the Information Age, further ignoring Twitters age, and relative unimportance. The only reason I can see that some blue check might think Twitter is a pillar of our democracy (and not in fact as I would argue a detriment) is speaking truth to power which is nigh useless and squandered, and the dissemination of information which is counter balanced by the average users apathy and misinformation on Twitter. Which has always been an issue. There will always be ways for “experts” and influencers to get in touch with audiences.
I shouldn’t have to explain why this is ridiculous.
I think Elon Musk buying Twitter and the ensuing meltdown is a product of the philosophy of the right/wrong person doing something. I intend to write a full essay about it later but to boil it down, any and all acts are ethically neutral until it is discovered who did it and to what. Jack Dorsey was the right person to start Twitter, buying Twitter is a neutral act, BUT the man buying it was E long Musky and therefore makes the whole thing bad. This philosophy is terrible and should not be used for anything, ever.
If Twitter continues to exist I think this mindset an way of thinking will probably continue, but simmer down as time goes on. As things are panning out I believe Elon’s ineptitude is showing what a nightmare this site always was.
