Twitter files reveal ‘junior employee’ opposed Trump ban, warned of ‘slippery slope’
Twitter CEO Elon Musk and freelance journalist Michael Shellenberger have released the fourth installment of the “Twitter Files” showing how the company’s executives acted against their own policy of banning former President Donald Trump.
After showing several screenshots of messages between former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey and senior executives, including former Twitter trust and safety officer Yoel Roth, Shellenberger noted that he There was a notable exception for employees wanting Trump banned.
“The *only* serious concern we found expressed on Twitter about the free speech and democracy implications of Trump’s ban came from someone junior to the organization. It was hidden in a lower-level Slack chain known as “site-integrity-automatic,” Shellenberger said.
Many on the left are sounding the alarm over Elon Musk’s takeover of Twitter.
(FOX)
“It might be an unpopular opinion, but one-off ad hoc decisions like this that don’t seem rooted in politics are in my humble opinion [in my honest opinion] a slippery slope and reflect an alternatively equally dictatorial issue,” the internal message read. “It now seems like an edict from an online platform CEO with a global presence who can keep the talk for the whole world – which seems unsustainable.
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The same employee wrote earlier that his “concern was specifically about the unarticulated logic of the decision made by [Facebook].”
Tech executives banning Trump without him explicitly violating their policies could give people “the idea (conspiracy theory?)
The employee pointed to a Medium blog post by Will Oremus titled “Facebook threw in its own rulebook to ban Trump.”
“The underlying problem,” writes Oremus, “is that mainstream platforms have always been loath to admit their subjectivity, because it highlights the extraordinary and absolute power they wield in the global public square and places responsibility for it. power on their own shoulders.”
“So they hide behind an ever-changing rulebook, alternately pointing it when it’s convenient and pushing it under the nearest rug when it’s not,” he added.
Several people who responded to Shellenberger praised the “junior employee” for taking a stand and said they deserved a promotion.
Another “senior ad sales executive” also expressed confusion to Roth about Twitter’s policy to ban Trump.
“In the past, we ‘exempt violation of the policy’ of a world leader because of the value of the public interest…are we giving up the public interest now…?” the executive asked Roth.
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A photo of Donald Trump with his Twitter account suspended.
(Getty Pictures)
“In this specific case, we are changing our approach to public interest on his behalf to say any violation would result in a suspension,” Roth replied, referencing Trump’s account.
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“We’re not completely getting rid of the public interest approach – although we have planned work on reviews in the first half of 2021,” Roth added, again showing that Twitter was treating Trump differently.
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The latest batch highlights the chaos within Twitter between January 6-8, including the drama surrounding the Capitol Hill riot on January 6.
“As pressure mounts, Twitter executives argue for a permanent ban,” Shellenberger summed up in the thread.
Billionaire industrialist Elon Musk took over Twitter in late October and immediately fired several senior executives.
(Jakub Porzycki/NurPhoto, CARINA JOHANSEN/NTB/AFP via Getty Images (Illustration))
“On January 7, senior Twitter executives: – create justifications for banning Trump – seek policy change for Trump alone, separate from other political leaders – express no concern about the implications of a ban on the freedom of ‘expression or democracy. This #TwitterFiles is reported with @lwoodhouse,” read the first post.
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The installment of messages, titled “The Removal of Donald Trump: January 7”, is the fourth to be made public after previous installments revealed what led to Trump’s removal from Twitter, the “secret blacklists” used by society and how Twitter intentionally buried the Hunter Biden laptop story ahead of the 2020 presidential election.
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